#vetvimes are absolutely in this one..

[des-fangirl]

Artbook with @/rebelflet 's works WHEEO WHEEO WHEEO IM SUPER HYPED UP IT'S MY FAVE vetvimes ARTIST !!

And yea i guess in the artbook there will only be Kay's comic arts and vetvimes aren't really one of em..but still! I love some of the characters on the cover SO much!! And in Kay's style! IM BUYIN IM BUYIN LOOK AT HOW COOL THIS IS

[catharsis-in-a-bottle]

hey guys... who wants some vimes/vetinari/sybil... who wants some post-assassination attempt vimes/vetinari/sybil...

[p4nishers]

truly insane just how MUCH vimes thinks about vetinari when he's not around. like literally every 50 pages or so girl just cant help himself and always thinks some gay shit like 'hmmp. wonder if vetinari feels like This all the time" like hello? disc to vimes? u r down bad my guy

[des-fangirl]

I CNAT BREATH IT'S SO FUNNY

look, I’m not a vet/vimes shipper at all (I only ship vetinari with being alive and healthy. he and margolotta are tyrant bffs) but I had this stupid idea about the three biggest smokers on the disc being forced to take an awkward smoke break together at some fancy party, and as we know from fifth elephant that margolotta basically considers winding up vimes a personal hobby, so you can’t tell me she wouldn’t 100% take this opportunity if it presented itself… 

adora’s just there for the #gossip (she marries MOIST VON FREAKIN LIPWIG, there’s no way she doesn’t secretly thrive off The Drama) 

LATER:

(adora’s incredible fearlessness combined with her total lack of a self-preservation instinct is gonna give moist a heart attack one day)

[cleopatras-library]

📚🗓 Mid-Year Freakout Tag 2024 🗓📚

jumping on the hype train because it’s fun

How many books have you read so far?

35! I have been in a bit of a rut (or what qualifies as a rut for me) this year but there were some gems in here nonetheless

What genres have you read?

Lots of fantasy and historical fiction, but also significant amounts of romance. It's been a bit all over the place lately though.

Best book you’ve read so far in 2023?

My Year of Rest and Relaxation by Ottessa Moshfegh; a horrible, no-good, stuck-up wreck of a woman makes all the wrong decisions and hurts everyone around her and gets what she wants anyways. Iconic, funny, shocking, this book does it all. I just finished Eileen by the same author and it also did not disappoint.

A runner-up is American Hippo by Sarah Gailey, which I liked enough to give five stars and an effusive review but remember next to nothing about.

Best sequel you’ve read so far in 2023?

Feet of Clay by Terry Pratchett. One of the only sequels I read this year, but hands down the best City Watch book so far (for the vetvimes alone).

New release you haven’t read yet, but want to

Apostles of Mercy by Lindsay Ellis!

Most anticipated release for the second half of the year

I haven't really been keeping up with my favourite authors' new releases, so none yet.

Biggest disappointment

The Weather Woman by Sally Gardner. Another case of stellar cover but the most disappointing piece of mainstream historical fiction I ever hope to read. I got queerbaited so hard (though it was partly my own fault) and the plot was painfully over-the-top.

Biggest surprise

Also My Year of Rest and Relaxation. I don't know what I was expecting but it wasn't that.

Book that made you cry (or in my case, almost cry)

Loveless by Alice Oseman, even though I thought I was ready. The queer joy is just too much.

Book that made you happy

You Made a Fool of Death with your Beauty by Akwaeke Emezi and Le jardin, Paris by Gaëlle Geniller both belong here. The first was a tender and heartfelt unconventional romance and the second was, once again, queer joy distilled into 200 pages of absolutely stunning illustrations. I highly recommend both, even if you have to read the second (as I did) in translation.

Most beautiful book cover of a book you’ve read so far this year

Velvet Was the Night by Silvia Moreno-Garcia; sadly another case of great cover mediocre book though.

How are you doing with your year’s goal?

Don’t have one!

What books do you need to read by the end of the year?

I really want to finish Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norell, and maybe also Hild. Finally trying to read Gormenghast would also be nice :)

(and since they haven't done it yet I tag @maddiesbookshelves (but only if they feel like it))

[old-stoneface]

i know i only talk abt vetvimes but god i find them so fascinating with how theyre seemingly trapped in a dichotomy together despite having extremely similar motivations. im sure its clear that i absolutely love the supporting characters and my top three fave city books arent even all vimes books, the cast of the truth is one of the all time best in my opinion, i just gravitate towards writing abt vetvimes bc its so compelling and its a fun excersize to write vetinari's dialogue

[lesamis]

*hands you a bag of biscuits* may I have some vetvimes recs please m'dear or a discworld book faves list or two?

oh of course!! thank you for asking! this didn't even need the biscuit bribe, i love pushing vetvimes fic on people. :')

my very favourite is on the difference between heat and light - mind the tags; this includes dubcon as the summoning dark is involved. it is, however, also high romance (to me) and principally about making sense of painful and complicated and very gooey feelings. i love it. highly recommend.

Holding On is another fic i've recently re-read and enjoyed all over again. it has hurt, it has comfort, it has mutual self-sacrifice, it has getting stuck in the wilderness together, it has clothes sharing. it also has a G rating, so it's a good one to offset the above with. delightful read.

another one i'm extremely fond of is What's Past is Prologue - in which the old men have a sleepover, and there's a ghost. excellent for an october fic reading list. this is very sweet, still more so than Holding On, and feels a bit like drinking hot chocolate.

if you're looking for something quite discworldy and funny and don't mind a fic mainly written in outsider perspectives, i very highly recommend The Nine Circles. it's a loving pastiche of fanfics, their authors, and what they might look like in-universe.

to be fully honest, i still haven't even come close to reading all discworld novels! out of all the ones i've read (fourteenish i think?), my #1 absolute favourite is feet of clay - it's also just one of my favourite books in general. up there with it are the truth, hogfather, and carpe jugulum :')

[datsderbunnyblog]

Vetvimes for the ship thing.

Of course! Thanks for the ask! (Here’s the link to the post)

1. What made you ship it?

I ship Vetinari with his best life, whether that’s in a romantic relationship or not, because he’s an absolute legend and he deserves it. I never actually considered vetvimes until I started looking for Vetinari fanfiction and realised how popular it was, and then I noticed a lot of the things in canon that show just how much affection Vetinari has for his terrier. It’s adorable.

I’ve already said this in many comments sections on AO3, but fanfic is often my way of dealing with the fact that I just want to give Vetinari a hug sometimes, especially after reading Guards! Guards! where he goes on his nihilist monologue about the rolling sea of evil. Poor lad.

2. What are your favourite things about the ship?

The fact that it makes complete sense in some ways, and at the same time it’s so utterly absurd. I don’t think that’s an unfair statement, as many people have quite rightly said it is an objectively funny pairing. They must be two of the most emotionally repressed men on the Disc, Vetinari’s ideal night in would be playing chess, Vimes’s ideal night out would be standing in the rain at 2am chomping on his cigar, one lives off dry bread and boiled water, the other literally has people begging him to eat less bacon for the sake of his own arteries. Bless ‘em.

Ultimately, they have a brilliantly frustrating power dynamic in the books, and I want to play with it.

3. Is there an unpopular opinion you have on your ship?

I don’t know whether this is unpopular (within the ship) because I haven’t road-tested this one yet, but if vetvimes had been canon (and by that I mean an actual romantic relationship), I’d actually have been really really disappointed. The development of good policing and the progression of the government of the city over the course of the series is just too good, and let’s face it, it’s hardly good practice for the Commander of the Watch to be sleeping with the Patrician, secretly or otherwise. That’s the whole point of transformative works!

Having said that, some more queer representation in Discworld in general would’ve been fantastic, but I’m assuming that we have Margaret Thatcher and Section 28 to thank for that based on the publication dates of the books (does anyone know if Terry ever spoke about the impact of Section 28 on his work? I’d love to read about that).

[softlyblues]

hi I read your answer about moist! I agree. :) I was wondering based on what you said if you ship vetvimes or not?

fhi, thanks very much! 

i think vetvimes have a rly interesting and nuanced dynamic. i’m all in for the memes, of course i am, but i don’t really ship it so much as i think vetinari/vimes/sybil have a rly interesting, basically canonical relationship, involving if not vimes w/ both of them, then all three of them with each other. i rly hope u dont mind bc im about to go off on one lmao. 

i recently reread guards guards and what got me (and i know from a doylist pov it’s because pterry hadnt finalised the universe yet) was the inequality in vetvimes dynamic. vetinari pities vimes and holds him at arms length, and vimes is a very stupid but very earnest drunkard. he’s a pitiable figure when he asks for a small raise and a dartboard, and vetinari doesn’t take him seriously. 

through men at arms/feet of clay/jingo we see the dynamic we know and love growing. it’s been a while since i’ve read them all, but im gonna get up some scenes that i think are super important to vet/vimes/sybil... and yes this includes the gonne scene. (:D)

so here is the scene right after vetinari is shot. here is really, imo, the first time vimes stops seeing vetinari as one of his Betters - vimes is in his element, calm even, and vetinari asks him what to do. vetinari speaks slowly, almost stuttering, and i read a lot of fear into that line “i appear... to be losing a lot of blood.”

and then vimes outright accuses vetinari of not doing the right thing. can you IMAGINE guards guards vimes doing something like that? vimes holds vetinari to account, and vetinari allows him. i also think it’s significant that this all happens at vimes & sybil’s wedding; we know sybil and vetinari are friends, old friends, and the wedding continues on despite the attack. vimes has time to save sybil AND vetinari, without sacrificing one for the other. that’s really the central point of men at arms: vimes doesn’t have to retire to have time for his wife and for the watch. he can multitask without losing either. 

feet of clay is another important leveler book for vetinari and vimes. for most of the book, vetinari is slowly dying, trusting basically nobody but drumknott and vimes to come into his room - he does know what’s going on, yes, but he trusts vimes to not need his help to work the thing out. vetinari does stay ahead, and he does have the advantage, but he doesn’t feel the need to help vimes; he respects him, and treats him as though he’s on the same level as him. this is really important for vimes’ perception of himself going from drunkard to someone who has people relying on him, and as someone who can be trusted. in order for vetinari and vimes to have any relationship, they need to not only be on a level, but they both need to know they are as well. i think vetinari has no problem knowing this, but sam is very unreliable when it comes to an account of his own intelligence, bravery, and merit. i mean. he remains, right up until the end of snuff, convinced that he is a Bad Person who has Snuck Into Someone Else’s Happy Life and is waiting for the other shoe, yknow, so men at arms/feet of clay are important books for hauling vimes up onto vetinari’s platform so they both know they’re equals. 

sybil is HUGELY important in this, and part of the reason i dislike traditional vetvimes is bc they just... idk, kill her off of make her horrible or just disregard her existence. sybil is the catalyst for literally all of sam’s development. without her he’s an alcoholic in the gutter. with her, he’s duke, commander, sir samuel, the man vetinari trusts the most. (dont disregard sybil, vetvimes ppl.)

in jingo, i think we start to see the vetvimessybil dynamic we’re more familiar with. vetinari trusts sam to play along with him, and he goes to klatch and does the whole sexy juggler thing and he allows sam to arrest two countries. he lets the lords of ankh-morpork raise armies, because he trusts sam. sybil trusts sam. vetinari trusts sam. vimes trusts both of them implicitly, even if he doesn’t think or say so. 

fifth elephant might seem not that important, but it’s really big to note that at the beginning, vetinari and sybil appear to be conspiring to give sam a holiday. also, sybil calls vetinari havelock, and the only other person i can remember who calls him that is lady margolotta, his ‘love interest’. vimes turns to sybil as his last chance against vetinari, only to find that they’ve been in cahoots because they’re both concerned about his health (and about sybil) and doesn’t that sound terribly domestic!

then we come to night watch, and i know it isn’t a new opinion, that this is one of the big pivotal books for he whole series, but more than that it’s pivotal for the balance between vetinari, vimes, and sybil. the cigar case is the only thing stopping sam from going off the deep end - with love from your sybil, just to press the point - and it all happens in between the birth of young sam. vimes is motivated by love for his city of course, but he has a family now, and he drinks Loving His Wife Juice through history. vimes has already been through his character development; night watch is vetinari’s turn.

finally vimes is the wiser, superior, older mentor figure to vetinari’s bullied, presumably 25-or-younger self. he is already mature, with a tendency towards the dramatic, but i think it’s not really a reach to say night watch was vetinari’s gay awakening. and OH MY GOD the ending scene beside keel’s grave is etched into my memory. i’ll attach it even though i’m sure we don’t need it:

like, woah. what a change in dynamic. now vetinari is bowing to the whims of a vimes he can’t predict, and now vimes is the one telling vetinari off. this is his area of expertise. “afterwards we could-” vetinari has become accustomed to a world where he and sam do things together; it would be fair to say (and supported by the young assassin at the start of this book) that vimes is now firmly integral to the cogs of ankh-morpork. vetinari not only relies on him, but trusts him to be at his side without having to ask. vetinari respects him at this time, in this place, because he has finally seen the lengths to which vimes will go to protect his city, a dedication to a-m that only vetinari has ever expressed. 

from there i think vetinari/vimes/sybil continue without much change. in thud, snuff, and raising steam they have settled into a comfortable give and take. i think that sybil ABSOLUTELY CANNOT be removed from the equation, because she cares for both vimes & vetinari - she is a formidable force when put into action (hello, army of letter-writers from snuff!) and we know she has the power to bully both men into taking care of themselves. imo she is the driving force behind any romantic action between any of the three of them, including herself & sam; remember how they got together in guards guards? she just sat him down with a cup of tea and talked and he realised that he’d somehow gathered a fiancee without realising it. sybil ramkin is DEFINITELY the unstoppable force to both mens’ immovable objects. 

i think it’s perfectly expressed in thud. vimes can both read a story to his son, be a good husband to his wife, be a good commander to his patrician, and be a good watchman to his city, without ever having to sacrifice anything - because of the machinations of his wife and his patrician. (and his city and his son. i mean, that scene with the traffic and the high-speed bedtime story chase says it all.) 

so those are my Many Many Thoughts about vetvimes, i hope that... wasnt too much over what you were asking me for lmao

[thetiptoeingtulip]

Discworld for the ask meme?

Thank you!! This was so much fun and discworld is something at the core of my little heart

Top 5 favourite characters: In no particular order- Sam Vimes, Lord Vetinari, Death, Tiffany Aching, and the Librarian

Other characters you like: So many, I love them all so much… I think Mr. Teatime is one of the most enjoyable villains I’ve ever read and obviously he sucks but I still reread Hogfather every Christmas excited to see him. Dr Lawn was also my favourite solo appearance character. Granny Weatherwax, Moist van Lipwig, Nobby Nobbs, Death of Rats

Least favourite characters: There aren’t any characters I dislike just ones I’m less attached to. I found Gaspode annoying sometimes. I like Carrot but am less fond of the parts of books that focus on him too much. Rincewind is a cinnamon roll but also less interesting than some of the other characters. 

Otps: Vetvimes and/or VetvimesRankin ;) half a crackship half a legitimate interest in their dynamic

Notps: Don’t really have any because there isn’t a lot of shipping in this fandom but there are so many characters that if you put some of them together I’m sure I’d wince. 

Favourite friendships: Vetinari and Margolotta, Om and Brutha, Nobby Nobbs and Colon

Favourite family: Gotta be Vimes, Sybil, Little Sam, although I love Death and Susan

Favourite episodes: N/A

Favourite season/book/movie: Night Watch closely followed by Small Gods

Favourite quotes: My absolute favourite quote of all time is the one from Night Watch when Vimes is talking about The People- ‘The People on the side of The People always ended up disappointed, in any case. They found that The People tended not to be grateful or appreciative or forward-thinking or obedient. The People tended to be small-minded and conservative and not very clever and were even distrustful of cleverness. And so the children of the revolution were faced with the age-old problem: it wasn’t that you had the wrong kind of government, which was obvious, but that you had the wrong kind of people. As soon as you saw people as things to be measured, they didn’t measure up.’ It hits.

Best musical moment: How do they rise up?

Moment that made you fangirl/boy the hardest: Any moment where a character who is not commonly in that series makes an appearance ie. mentions of Vimes in Lipwig books, mentions of Granny Weatherwax in the Tiffany Aching books

When it really disappointed you: This is saddened more than disappointed but the last three books- Snuff, Raising Steam, Shepherd's Crown- were definitely not up to the usual writing standard, although I’m 100% certain that was because of Terry’s condition. 

Saddest moment: So many come to mind. Off the top of my head, when Granny Weatherwax has to choose between the child or the mother in the birth scene in Carpe Jugulum

Most well done character death: All the character deaths are well done because of Death (haha) I have to say Granny Weatherwax though, if only because of the weight her character carried.

Favourite guest star: N/A

Favourite cast member: N/A

Character you wish was still alive: I mentioned him before, I almost wish Mr. Teatime had survived if only so we could see him used in other discworld books. 

One thing you hope really happens: I just want the characters to be happy. Tiffany Aching grows into a happy young woman. Sam Vimes is happy with his son. 

Most shocking twist: The vampire/heraldry dude being behind everything in Feet of Clay genuinely surprised me

When did you start watching/reading?: When I was 16 and going through the roughest time of my life. Later than most people but it really saved me (cliche but yeah)

Best animal/creature: Hm… does the Librarian count? If not than the great A’tuin himself

Favourite location: Ankh Morpork obvs 

Trope you wish they would stop using: None I love them all

One thing this show/book/film does better than others: Social and political commentary in a fantasy format that actually works, isn’t preachy, makes extremely intelligent and well thought out points without being tone deaf to the fact that it is a fantasy format. 

Funniest moments: Any mention of Bloody Stupid Johnson. Any footnotes. 

Couple you would like to see: VetvimesRankin (Sybil still has to be there)

Actor/Actress you want to join the cast: N/A

Favourite outfit: Sam Vimes’ shoes and Nobbs disguise in Jingo

Favourite item: Death’s sword

Do you own anything related to this show/book/film?: No but I desperately want an Unseen Academics hoodie

What house/team/group/friendship group/family/race etc would you be in?: I’d be a witch baby! or an unseen academic (small part of me wants to be in the assassin’s guild)

Most boring plotline: Colour of Magic 

Most laughably bad moment: None. Everything is laughably good. 

Best flashback/flashfoward if any: The entirety of Night Watch, if time travel counts

Most layered character: Probably Vetinari? Nobby Nobbs was given good depth in Night Watch too. 

Most one dimensional character: Rincewind in Colour of Magic (he got better!)

Scariest moment: Vorbis and his torture techniques in Small Gods

Grossest moment: Same as above

Best looking male: N/A although canonically probably Carrot

Best looking female: N/A 

Who you’re crushing on (if any): Vetinari and Margolotta because intelligent + powerful = sexy :/ No one!

Favourite cast moment: N/A

Favourite transportation: Leonard de Quirm’s yellow submarine

Most beautiful scene (scenery/shot wise): N/A 

Unanswered question/continuity issue/plot error that bugs you: Nothing really, Terry was always exceptional at continuity for someone who wrote about 50 books in one series

Best promo: N/A

At what point did you fall in love with this show/book: Like 5 pages into Guards Guards when there was the joke about black magic cults reserving certain hotels and having overly complicated passwords. Humour made me fall in love, humanity made me stay in love

[patricianandclerk]

Will that be all?

My Ask | My Ko-Fi | On Ao3 | Requests always welcome!

VetVimes. 

At the behest of Lady Winesta Sexton, there is a great ball, and Samuel Vimes hates it. There is a peculiarity to the Ankh-Morpork ball that makes it even more unbearable than anything Vimes could imagine in his wildest dreams. It’s a mix of a few factors, really. The tinkling nature of the music on the air, which contains no personality at all and somehow manages to echo off the ceilings and walls, ringing around the room and insinuating itself inside one’s skull. Even when Vimes finally leaves, he knows the waltzes and little ditties are going to be stuck in his head for the next few weeks, and he wouldn’t mind, if they were only any good.

Which they are not.

The average composition of the Ankh-Morpork musician comes somewhere between “brain-numbingly bland” and “desperately commercial,” meaning that it clings long after you’ve hoped to have forgotten it.

And what’s worse is that the Lady Sybil Vimes, née Ramkin, has fallen ill. Vimes does not doubt that she is ill, either – Sybil is not the sort to let Vimes wander into some awful soirée and not be there to make it bearable. Unfortunately, by the time the message of Sybil’s abrupt flu and confinement to bed with one of the ridiculous (and yet specially designed) bowls that is made especially for the purpose of vomiting in it (the rich and powerful of Ankh-Morpork believing in specialised crockery for every purpose imaginable in two to three colours, so that they have something to put in the dozens of storage closets that make a manor a home), Vimes had already arrived, and been announced.

Vimes isn’t one for rules, or for social etiquette, or appearing in public except for in his official capacity as a watchman (albeit, Vimes thinks with a sense of vague disgust, a Commander), but once you’re announced, you need to stay for at least an hour, unless you are called urgently away.

Unfortunately, despite his best efforts, no one seems willing to call him urgently away on anything.

Captain Carrot had assured him, in his brightest tone, that he would handle absolutely everything, and unfortunately, Captain Carrot is a man of his word. Unfortunately…

Noting a curious gap in the waves of ridiculously dressed lords and ladies milling around the ballroom, the majority of them absently swaying from side to side or fluttering fans or swinging canes, Vimes arches one eyebrow. A natural parting occurs in the crowd, and Vimes beholds the slow moving figure of the Patrician of Ankh-Morpork. His ebony cane held neatly at his side, he moves delicately through the crowd, seemingly incognizant of the way that everybody naturally gives him a gap of around six feet on each side.

“Good evening,” Vetinari says mildly, and Vimes gives him a dutiful salute as he comes closer. Unlike the average member of the aristocracy, Vimes does not especially fear Vetinari: to do that would amount to about the same lot of good as being afraid of the moon, or the sun. You can be frightened of it if you like, but it isn’t going to go anywhere, and if it wants to harm anyone, it probably won’t go to the bother of harming you specifically.

And if it does?

Well. It’s not as if you can do anything about it. What’s the point in being frightened?

“Is it?” Vimes asks, unenthusiastically.

“I notice the Lady Sybil is absent,” Vetinari says, with a sort of wooden sympathy. His expression is entirely neutral, displaying its usual blank-eyed stare that would make most people flinch, fluster, or perhaps break out in a flopsweat. There are some on the Disc that might retort to this stare with a cheery grin that might annoy Vetinari; others might respond with blank incomprehension; Vimes’ riposte – well-practised after all his years of service – is something rather different.

Vimes’ method is to retain an expression of dutiful service, the lips pursed, the eyes staring forward and not crossing the gaze of the Patrician’s own, his fingernails still touching against his forehead in silent salute.

“Yessir,” Vimes says.

“Put your hand down, Vimes,” Vetinari says, in a tone of some boredom.

“Yessir,” Vimes assents, and he does, his hands settling behind his back. He’s still wearing his Commander’s uniform, although he had been convinced to exchange his cardboard boots for some “handsome” ones. “She’s caught ill.”

“What a shame.” With the familiar stiffness to one side, Vetinari moves to stand beside Vimes, so that the two of them are shoulder to shoulder. Vetinari stands slightly closer to Vimes than is strictly necessary, and Vimes can feel the dusty, stiff fabric of his sleeve against the bare patch of arm where his breastplate gives way before his gauntlet begins. It’s summer in Ankh-Morpork, a dreadful, sticky heat lingering on every street, and causing the river to concentrate its smell on the air at large instead of just the air beside the river. This means that Vimes is even less inclined to wear the full livery of his poshed up uniform than usual, as it’s simply too hot to bear.

Vimes is aware of the looks being sent their way.

Ordinarily, Vimes is the subject of a great many looks – these looks ordinarily happen along the lines of, “he doesn’t belong here, the jumped-up little oik,” and such sentiments as that – these are sentiments, in fact, that Vimes would agree with. He does not belong here. He is of the opinion that nobody belongs here. This is nonsense.

But the fact of the Patrician standing beside him means that many of these looks stop in their tracks, and are abruptly softened (or, more accurately, strangled) on the faces of those delivering them. It’s one thing to send a withering look to Sir Samuel Vimes, who should not be here anyway, and who couldn’t give a toss who looks at him, withering or no, but—

Lord Vetinari?

Well.

That’s a very different matter.

“You don’t sway to the music,” Vetinari says mildly.

“This ain’t music,” Vimes scoffs.

“Isn’t it?” Vetinari asks, “Curious that you should say so, Vimes. It meets many of the descriptors of music. Instruments, a rhythm, chords—”

“It’s like,” Vimes starts, wrinkling his nose and crossing his arms tightly over his chest, “clay. It’s cheap, easy to reproduce, and it doesn’t matter that it looks nice for five minutes, because it’s sticky and it clings to your boots.” Vimes glances at Vetinari, and he sees Vetinari’s thin lips twitch slightly into a smirk.

“I see,” Vetinari says. “You dislike popular music.”

“Don’t see the point to it.”

“There is no point to it, Vimes. One hears it, one listens to it while it is playing, perhaps one dances, and then one goes home.”

“What time is it?” Vimes asks.

“Bingly-bingly-bong!” comes the resulting chime from his pocket, and Vimes feels his mouth twist into a scowl. “It is precisely about half seven!”

“Can I have an actually precise figure, if you please?” Vimes demands. There is a sort of stiff growl in his voice that rings on the air, and the demon in the Dis-organiser hesitates for a second or two as it evaluates the potential of this growl being a threat.

“It’s thirty-six past the hour.”

“Right,” Vimes says. He has been here, then, for thirty-two minutes, meaning he has to pass another twenty-eight before he can leave without Sybil calling him impolite. It isn’t that Sybil will mind, exactly. Sybil doesn’t like any of these people any more than he does, really, and she doesn’t want him to have to withstand it either, but—

She’ll be pleased, if he sticks it out. She won’t say so, outright. But as much as Sybil will playfully call him impolite, if he goes home early, she’ll also be delighted, if he is polite, for once. It’ll make her smile.

He likes those absent smiles of hers, when she is focusing on other things, and when it’s something Sam’s done. She does it like she doesn’t know she’s smiling, her expression faraway and focused on other things, and it’s—

It’s lovely, is what it is. She’s lovely.

“You like it when I piss ‘em off, don’t you?” Vimes asks. His voice is quiet, meant for Vetinari’s ears – the benefit of a room like this, with this tinkling music and the chatter of all these toffs, is that you can be in full view of everybody, and still say what you like.

“I’m sure I have no idea what you mean,” Vetinari replies, his tones smooth and oily. “Nothing you do, Vimes, gives me pleasure one way or the other.”

Vimes feels his lips shift into a slight smile.

“As intended then, sir,” he says cheerfully. A little while ago, he’d been looking back on the times where he’d been a little bit more reliant on the bottle, and missing it – he’d wanted for a drink, and had been glancing at the trays of champagne as they’d passed him by, but Vetinari…

In a completely different way to Vimes, Vetinari is seemingly incapable of getting drunk.

“What’s this music for then, my lord?” Vimes asks.

“I believe I told you, Vimes.”

“Oh, I see,” Vimes says. “Dancing.”

“Quite.”

“You ain’t dancing, lord.”

“I am not.”

“You ain’t even swaying.”

“No.”

“’Cause you’re too tall, is it?” Vetinari’s blank expression—

It would be unfair to call it a falter. If we are to use the terms of the music Lord Vetinari is so fond of, we might say that a falter lasts too long: it would need to last at least a beat. The shift in Lord Vetinari’s expression is so marginal that it does not even amount to a quarter of a beat, so we can’t call it a falter.

Vetinari’s blank expression, instead, flickers.

A light seems to shift in his icy blue eyes, so small a change as to scarcely be noticed, and then he gives Vimes a sideways glance that Vimes has seen before. This glance communicates a great deal of information in one easy shift of the heavy eyelids and the dark eyebrows, in the glacier-cold colour of the eyes: it says, Explain. Explain now. Explain with expedience. And maybe, all will go well for you.

“Well,” Vimes says, conversationally. “It’d look silly, if you were to sway, wouldn’t it? You could tap your foot, maybe, or flick your nail against your cane, but if you were to sway, well. You’re just too tall, and too thin. You’d look like some Uberwaldian tree in a low wind.”

A pause spans between them.

The rest of the ball continues around them, the music irritatingly pleasant (Vimes can just feel it needling its way into his ears, to worm about as much as it pleases over the coming weeks and rot his concentration), the people dancing. Ugly men dance with ridiculous women; ugly women dance with ridiculous men. One couple that is equally ugly and equally ridiculous are better at dancing than everybody else, and Vimes decides he likes them, based on the fact that Lord Rust is giving them both a disgusted stare, meaning there must be something about them worth liking.

“Am I to understand, Vimes,” Vetinari says in a poisonous whisper, the best the Assassins’ Guild knows how to train into a man, “that you are teasing me?”

“Don’t reckon it’s up to me to decide what you understand or don’t understand, lord.”

A beat passes (not a falter, you understand), and Vetinari laughs, and for a second, the entire room freezes.

The music stutters, and stops: dancers stop dancing with one another, and people turn to look at their Patrician as he chuckles quietly, his teeth showing, his head leaning forward slightly. “Very droll, Vimes,” he finally rumbles out, and at a sudden glare, the music starts back up with a hurried stumbling over notes and scrambling for instruments. “Do you know how to dance?”

“’Course, sir. Sybil insisted.”

“I see.” There’s a measure of doubt in Vetinari’s voice, and Vimes frowns at him, looking slightly up at Vetinari’s expression, which reveals nothing at all, but… Well, Vimes can dance. He’s got a sense of rhythm, and he knows how to hold himself at least as well as any of these toffs.

The thing is, sometimes, Vimes does things just to cause a spectacle. It’s because, at heart, he’s an angry man, and the fact of the matter is that anger can only get you so far with truly upsetting some people – you can yell until you’re blue in the face at one of these nasty, gold-plated bastards, and they’ll just laugh. But a spectacle? Well, that sort of thing needles right into the heart of these ugly people and rubs sparks together, makes them pop and shudder and make indignant noises. Indignation is the weakness of any lord or lady – when you’re indignant (and that’s trulyindignant, not just putting on a show of indignation for the sake of it), it’s hard to remain superior. It rips the rug out from under you, in that respect.

“Can you dance, lord?”

“Yes,” Vetinari says, in the mild tone of someone making small talk, but not exactly clear on the path it’s taking him on.

“Nah. Bet you a penny you can’t.” Vetinari glances at him again.

“I beg your pardon, Vimes?”

“Bet you a penny, sir. Legs’re too long: bet you can’t dance a beat.”

Vetinari stares at Vimes, uncomprehendingly, and then his icy-cold gaze flickers downward, to Vimes’ hand, which is outstretched, palm up. The golden shine of his gauntlets catches the ridiculous candlelight. Vetinari blinks.

“Don’t be ridiculous, Vimes,” he snaps out scoldingly, and Vimes holds his position for just a second longer than another man might. “Take those gauntlets off. Drumknott.” The last is added in a sort of automatic way, and Drumknott materialises out of the air beside Vimes with astonishing alacrity.

“Were you there this whole time?” Vimes asks, and Drumknott arches his eyebrows at him, his hands out. Vimes sets each of his gauntlets down on Drumknott’s soft palms with one quiet clank and then a second, and he looks to Vetinari, raising his eyebrows in expectation.

Vetinari’s hand is inhumanly cold in Vimes’, but his grip is firm, and Vimes moves faster than Vetinari does: his other hand settles on the firm, flat rivet of Vetinari’s hip, gripping loosely at the black cloth. Something shifts in Vetinari’s expression, a kind of brightening, and Vimes thinks – or he imagines, more accurately, because he can’t possibly actually be seeing this – Vetinari’s breath stutters just slightly as his hand settles on Vimes’ shoulder.

Sybil would love this, and Vimes wishes she was here to see it. Gods, Sybil will be delighted, just hearing about it.

“I’ll lead, shall I?” Vimes asks.

“For once,” Vetinari replies, and Vimes takes the first step.

Dancing with the Patrician is not like dancing with Sybil. For one, Sybil is a good deal bigger than Vetinari – they’re about the same height (taller than Vimes), true enough, but Sybil is a stout woman with a prominent chest, and when she and Vimes dance chest-to-chest, they dance chest-to-chest. You could fit Vetinari’s biography, sideways, between his and Vetinari’s chests right now. For two, Vetinari’s movements are—

Look.

The moves are correct. Vimes couldn’t argue with that. The bastard has perfect rhythm (and probably perfect pitch and all), and his movements are completely in time with the music, but there’s a sort of clockwork element to them, a little too perfect. His body is held stiffly, his steps quiet against the ballroom floor, and unlike Sybil’s body, which moves with the music, her bosom shifting, her hips swaying, her frame seeming to sing, Vetinari just moves.

It still works. Vimes can’t deny that it still works, and that there’s something hypnotising about the ramrod straightness of Vetinari’s spine as they take themselves through the one-two-three, about the smirk on his face, about his bone-dry hands under Vimes’, but—

It’s not Sybil.

Then again, if Vetinari did manage to move like Sybil, somehow, Vimes supposes that’d be more unsettling.

They don’t speak, as they dance. He and Sybil usually do, her chattering away about what the dragons need this week, or him saying which lords and ladies in the room he dislikes the most, and Sybil patiently agreeing or disagreeing, depending on which of them likes dragons. He and Vetinari don’t speak: instead, they retain a perfect rhythm, dancing one way and then dancing the other, Vetinari seemingly content not to lead, and it’s—

It’s almost fun.

The music suddenly doesn’t seem quite so grating.  

People are staring, but that doesn’t matter – Vimes expected them to stare, and to be indignant, and the best thing about the indignation is that it’ll be like these people’s withering looks. In the face of the Patrician, they have nowhere to go. No one is going to tell Lord Vetinari that he can’t dance with the Watch Commander, if he wants to, no matter that the Watch Commander isn’t a real gentleman, or that the Watch Commander is a man, or that the Watch Commander is—

Well.

Sam Vimes.

“Think anyone’s gonna cut in?” Vimes asks when he feels his feet getting a bit tired in his disgustingly expensive boots. Vetinari, almost unsettlingly, has had a slight smile on his face the entire ten or fifteen minutes, and now, it only deepens.

“I don’t think they’d dare,” he says, with no small amount of fascination, and he neatly releases Vimes’ hand, letting him step away. They bow to one another, Vimes a bit deeper than Vetinari, and then Vimes glances at the big clock on the wall.

It’s a quarter past eight.

“You will be taking your leave, then, Commander Vimes?”

“Yessir,” Vimes says brightly, with an easy salute. “Good evening, sir!”

“Is it?” Vetinari replies smoothly, and Vimes brings a cigar to his mouth as he filters through the crowd, to make his way home.

It doesn’t matter that Sybil’s taken ill – he’ll sit up with her anyway, rub her back, brush her hair before bed… It’s a rare morning off tomorrow, as he’d expected for them to be up late, and Sybil will be glad to hear all about Vetinari, and about Vimes pissing off the toffs. Hopefully, she’ll feel better soon.

This’ll distract her, anyway. This’ll make her smile.

Gods, he loves that smile.

♕  ♕  ♕

Standing in an anteroom, Vetinari allows his thumb to stray over the delicate skin at his wrist, pressing tightly to the pulse point. Ordinarily, his heart beats in a slow and orderly manner, even in times of great crisis, but now, it has taken up the slightest speed, a disruption to its regular beat.

Vetinari’s mouth is slightly dry, and he feels the warmth in the smile he does not bother to force from his mouth in the privacy of the little room.

“Another glass of water, my lord?” Drumknott asks, sounding faraway.

“Please,” Vetinari says, and he hears the door open and click shut behind him.

Vimes is married, of course – it wouldn’t surprise Vetinari if Vimes had never even spared a thought to the idea of any man wanting another man, let alone the idea of a man wanting him, or wanting a man himself, but that isn’t the point, is it? Vetinari is a man of singular focus – he lacks the time for dalliances with young men, or even men his own age, nor the real inclination to want time to pursue such things, but that isn’t the point either.

The point is the ridiculous smile tugging at Vetinari’s lips, and the speed of his pulse that even now is evening out, smoothing to a fine, even pace.

“Up the budget for the Watch this year,” he says cleanly, when Drumknott returns with his water.

“An extra fifty dollars, my lord?” Drumknott asks.

“That should do it,” Vetinari says, inclining his head before taking a sip of his water.

“A very bold man, that Sir Vimes,” Drumknott says. Vetinari does not believe he imagines the slightly dreamy tone to his voice. “But now, that Captain Carrot…” Drumknott trails off, his eyebrows raised in inward, appraising thought, and then he coughs delicately against his hand, seeming to remember himself. “Will that be all, my lord?”

“Yes,” Vetinari says, drawing his thumb away from his wrist, and putting his sleeve back. “That will be all.”

[des-fangirl]

https://youtube.com/shorts/o4fiqx7e8Q4?si=Cx1-bEsCG5I-E4y4

IT'S VETVIMES VETVIMES VETVIMESSS XDD

[des-fangirl]

True, you can't make vetvimes gayer than they already are😭

thing is i would write fanfiction but whatever they have going on in canon is much more fucked up and interesting

[datsderbunnyblog]

Listening to a lot of Sia these days... This one is THE vetvimes anthem (unless I’m just seeing vetvimes in absolutely everything again). I mean... It’s even called Dressed In Black, what more could you ask for?