#which is valid and fine. but i'm just like. sitting over here with my unrealistic fluff...

[clownprince]

Look. Don't get me wrong. I love the batjokes fandom literally everyone I've interacted with has been SO nice for such an insane ship it's a surprisingly chill fandom.

That being said... sometimes I feel Weird because a lot of the community (not all! but a large part) is like haha yeah my favorite fucked up toxic problematic ship love how twisted it is >:) batman wants to fuck that clown even though he literally killed his whole ass son it's so fucked I love it.

And that's fine! No problem with that. Power to you.

But I'm just over here like... what if they both got better together and processed their trauma and Joker made amends with everyone and everyone was happy and content as a family.

Like, the most compelling thing for ME in Batjokes is easily Bruce's refusal to view Joker the way most other people do. Even in arcs where he does dehumanize Joker, he at the very least makes an attempt to understand him. Everyone else is just like yeah, he's evil, he's just doing this shit because he enjoys it because he's a monster. But even when their relationship is at its worst, like in Joker War, Batman tries to understand where Joker is coming from. He doesn't just assume oh yeah Joker is just doing this because he's evil there's no logic behind his crimes he just enjoys it.

Bruce actually understands that Joker is trying to show him something, i.e., that he isn't being Batman right (in Joker's opinion). And even after Joker literally tears down his life, fucking reanimates his dead father figure to torment him and re-enacts his childhood trauma on the city, Bruce STILL ends up agreeing that he had a point!

Like to ME... Batjokes is about loving someone so transcendentally that you devote your entire existence to helping them. It's about having compassion for someone even after they commit horrific atrocities. It's about loving someone who everyone else hates and views as a monster. It's about someone loving the parts of someone that they consider terrible and unlovable. It's about being misunderstood your entire life and finally finding someone who gets it. It's about love for one person motivating you to stay alive in a world that's been nothing but cruel to you. It's about finding someone who makes everything awful that's ever happened to you seem worth it. But most importantly it's about the refusal to give up on someone who everyone else has long since declared a lost cause.

[damienthepious]

I mean literally the last 1000 or so words of chapter 12 lmao but SPECIFICALLY ["Maybe he'd wanna be generous again, just for a second?"] to ["Fine. Helpless little thing. Move aside, will you?"] (shush i'm totally not doing 2 from the same chapter it isn't my fault i swear you just put SO MUCH GOOD SHIT IN IT)

[Pick a short passage from any fanfic I’ve written and send it to me, and I’ll give you the equivalent of a DVD commentary on that snippet]  

FUCK how did i MISS THIS the timestamp says TWO MONTHS AGO and i’ve been out here WHINING about not having and excuse to talk oh my gOD i’m so stupid

CHAPTER 12

["Well…" she pauses, gently turning Damien's hand in her own, biting her lip.] Rilla... shy? Rilla being shy? hhhhhhh she knows this is a long shot. she knows she probably... shouldn’t even want this, let alone ask for it... but...

["I… my hands are a little… shaky, at the moment. Maybe he'd wanna be generous again, just for a second?"] Rilla is having a really, really, really rough night. And she knows, intellectually, that Damien and Arum are both safe. They didn’t really try to kill each other. She didn’t really... burn them to death. but also........ Arum is all the way over there.... and she just... she knows that she shouldn’t want to touch him for non-medical reasons. That’s overstepping, for sure, and she knows with the way she feels that it’s inappropriate. but. but. but. she’s had Damien’s hands in her hair and it’s been so nice and she’s feeling very fucking vulnerable right now and if he helped Damien with something vulnerable while she was gone... maybe? maybe?

[Arum freezes, and then his frill presses to his neck and he glances towards the pair of them with a look of alarm. // "Wh- what do you mean? What do you want?"] Arum, in his usual defensive assumption, thinks he’s being made fun of in some way. He doesn’t actually know what she’s asking for, but he’s just barely past freaked out that she’s going to be angry at him (that she’s going to remember to hate him for his nature) for the cut on Damien’s hand. His frill presses down- he’s scared. And Arum gets aggressive when he’s scared.

[Rilla ducks her head, and then she glances up at the monster and Damien knows what she means, even if Arum does not.] Damien knows Rilla. He’s very, very perceptive, and he pays a hell of a lot of attention to her face, her motions, her moods, her wants. And it’s rare for Rilla to want something and not ask for it directly. Rilla doesn’t keep her desires close to the chest- she gets what she wants because she’s so willing to directly address those feelings. Which means, of course, that she is uncertain about asking for this. A rarity. So. She wants Arum to help Damien braid her hair, but she’s not sure about actually asking. Is she unsure because of Damien? Is she unsure because of Arum? Because of herself? Damien doesn’t quite know why she’s hesitating, but he knows what she wants.

[Damien feels, perhaps, that he should be… concerned, at the very least. Disgusted, even. But…] This chapter is a lot of What Damien Should Feel versus what he does feel. The idea of a monster carding his claws through Rilla’s hair “should” absolutely fill Damien with terror and repulsion. But Arum isn’t just “A Monster”, anymore, is he? Damien isn’t even concerned. What, would Arum have waited and bided his time for the moment he could... get his claws into Rilla’s hair? He could have killed her repeatedly by now. Could have killed either of them, over and over again. It’s barely a shadow of a worry, anymore. It’s just a whisper of Should Should Should. He has to keep reminding himself about it, these days.

["Do you… do you know how to braid, Lord Arum?" he asks, tilting his head, and Arum blinks, and then scowls.] Damien asks. Damien asks. Damien asks. A little less directly than Rilla ordinarily would have, but still. If he can help Rilla he will, but if he cannot do this for her... well... should he leave Rilla’s desires unfulfilled simply because he would not be himself fulfilling them? that phrasing got away from me. Dammit Damien. He doesn’t ask Arum TO braid her hair. He asks, first, if Arum can braid. And Arum already on the defensive, gets growly because it feels like his “skills” are being picked at.

["Of course I do. Don't ask foolish questions."] “of course I do” you fucking... dumbass. It’s a perfectly legitimate question. Damien has no fucking reason to know that you like to fucking weave vines you ridiculous lizard. You don’t have hair it’s a VALID. QUESTION. Jackass.

["Would you… perhaps…] A valid hesitation tbh [would you help me to braid Rilla's hair, again?] aaaaaAAAAAAAA [With my hand…" Damien frowns gently at himself, and he fully expects the monster to snap, to laugh, to bolt.] GOD.... THEY’RE TRYING SO FUCKING HARD TO NAVIGATE AROUND EACH OTHER IM DYING. I WROTE THIS AND I’M DYING. FUCK!!! Snap/Laugh/Bolt. Damien catastrophizes, we know this. This is a minor version of that, but-

Arum could Snap: You think I am some sort of SERVANT for Amaryllis now that she has saved my life? How DARE YOU.

Arum could Laugh: You soft, stupid thing... you want a monster to braid for you? You cut your hand and then wish for me to fix your messes? Do you think we are FRIENDS? [LIZARDY LAUGHTER]

Arum could Bolt: Literally the lizard is so easily embarrassed he could just nyoom from the room at the suggestion. That’s not unrealistic, actually.

[Arum stares, his violet eyes wide and stunned, and then he drops his gaze,] Arum is exactly as surprised as Damien is, that he would actually ask for this. [pulling his hands close to wring awkwardly in front of himself for a moment before he seems to become aware of what he is doing,] hhh oof fuck i love that mental image a LOT actually. Arum thinking about braiding Rilla’s hair and compulsively clutching his own hands, clamping down on the desire, realizing how obviously he is doing it and then forcing himself to stop. we love a touch-starved repressed lizard

[and then without answering he- he crawls closer, bringing himself beside Damien and stubbornly not looking at Rilla as she smiles, breathing a soft laugh.] he was asked. They asked him. Rilla is smiling, and she implied, even if she wasn’t the one who... Arum has been sitting aside since Damien started brushing out Rilla’s hair. He’s been stuck like two feet away, just fucking yearning tbh. He got a go-ahead to come closer and he can even pretend it’s not something he wanted to do anyway. Big Fucking Win for the lizard lord, tbh.

["Fine. Helpless little thing. Move aside, will you?"] And he even gets to be GRUMPY ABOUT IT!!! Act like he’s being IMPOSED upon, and he’s being magnanimous about it. Big Fucking Win for the Lizard.

[Damien shifts, moving to sit beside Rilla instead, and then he gestures for Arum to take his place,] h h h symbolic??? [and the monster does so with a graceless grumble.] performative grumpiness to obscure how fucking much he wants this. he wants this so fucking badly.

[Rilla exhales, her eyes closing again as three of Arum's hands (the fourth, his broken wrist, apparently not quite dexterous enough for the task just yet) sink into Rilla's hair, parting and sectioning it off before he starts to weave an elegant braid slowly down.] He doesn’t hesitate so they don’t have the opportunity to change their minds. Not that they were going to, obviously, but Arum doesn’t know that. And Rilla.... Rilla share some of that around, maybe. Having someone play with your hair is delightful ugh. And this is. all. still from Damien’s perspective. He’s watching. And he’s applying words like ‘elegant’ and ‘dexterous’ to Arum’s hands, and Arum’s handiwork. Mmhm.

ANYWAY sorry this languished in my inbox for TWO GODDAMN MONTHS i love you sweetpea