Post-Film Iron Lung Headcanons
The Void, Simon, & the Blood Tree
It's glorified notebook scribbling time. Feel free to tag me if I inspire you with my ramblings!
Subscribing to my theory that Simon's actual conscious being has been thrown into the Red Void for eternity (akin to an afterlife dimension), and that he wasn't locked inside the blood tree, has opened a whole bunch of post-movie creative avenues to take.
Because he's fucking pissed.
Simon is the most defiant, petty man I've ever seen in my life. His last memories are getting simultaneously exploded, crushed and drowned in a great big ball of blue light (it looks orange in the movie because of the exterior blood, but if you have a look at the storyboards, it's blue.)
Simon had already been to the Void once before and came back. He had gone there a little over an hour before he actually died. He got a taste of it. He knew what was waiting for him ("I might've died"), knew the Eel had been stuck there already, as they met there in a metaphysical sense ("We are one... in the blood...")
Simon who shows back up in the Void, rises out of the blood and calmly makes his way to a rock to brood. Doesn't talk for a hot minute and just looks at his own face in the blood's reflection.
Simon, who is thankful he was able to take his knife (sheath) to the other side, who's happy to hold it again.
Simon who makes the entire ocean's hive mind regret sending him to super hell with them. Nobody would enjoy being "one" with Simon and he'd make damn sure of it.
Simon who's had enough of the Eel's shit, so he antagonizes her now that they are mentally connected. They have each other's insecurities on file and, boy, they are systematically combing through them all. He picks fights with her when things get too quiet for his liking. She's Enemy #1. Simon starts the arguments and bitches a lot, but the Eel is the one to shut him up by prying terrible things out of his head and dissecting them in front of him. The audacity!
Simon suddenly having the answer to all his questions beamed directly into his head because the Eye is omnipotent, and realizing just how deep the corruption went against him. And then brooding some more.
Simon having to sit there and think about how the Quiet Rapture did happen, and it wasn't just a few stations. He didn't know then what he knows now.
The Eye creating the visage of the blood tree out of Simon and every other Eden fella down in the blood being like, "I cannot believe the anti-tree guy we all hated got turned into a tree while the rest of us ended up as fish monsters."
"I didn't want this."
"Nobody does."
Other souls wandering his way, wading through the blood, and sitting with him. Simon asks each and every one if they've seen Ava. They never know who he's talking about. They're apologetic. Very much so meet his bitterness with, "ah, first time?"
"It's really pretty. The tree. A lot of us end up… scarier."
"It used to be prettier."
"I know."
Sometimes the people trapped in the Void try to comfort each other, but all it does is draw attention from the Eye...
The Eye hanging in the sky to peer at its little human soul collection in its domain. People try not to look back. Simon curling into a ball not to look at it, keeping his head between his legs. Part of what makes "super hell", well, hell, truly is what happens when the Eye decides to swing by and dissect you again, lay you out in new and horrible ways, play with your very being, dig into your insecurities, your embarrassments, your habits, your love, your life, and take it all for itself.. It is a child with play doh and you are the play doh. It's a selfish thing that tries to talk to them using a mimicry of a human voice. Testing how language works. Testing the humanity it steals for itself. Nobody wants to talk back.
The blood on his "body" never dries or scabs. He tries to wipe it off with his hands but it's Sisyphean. There's an innate discomfort to being wet all the time but it sort of feels like a second skin after long enough.
Simon who plays "king of the hill" with his spot by the blood tree and sort of becomes territorial over it. Other souls have their spots. Others can't stop wandering. Others go mad looking for a way out. Simon stays put. Needs a place to call home. Needs something to watch over. Needs purpose.
Simon, who occasionally watches other people rise from the blood. Who gets to do the "ah, first time?" thing back at someone. Who has to deal with more unwanted memories getting shoved into the collective.
"You're fucked. Sorry."
"GOD DAMN IT ALL. THAT LYING SON OF A BITCH."
"Ahhh, COI got ya'?"
"How'd you know?"
"Hunch."
