Shelby Is Not Naive, Or: Everyone Cares Too Much About Scott Goldsmith
Shelby fully expects the people of Oakhurst to kill her at the first opportunity. Shelby is so invested in the coven and so willing to excuse the flaws of other vampires because she has bought into the idea that the humans can and will hurt her at the first opportunity. There are many reasons for this, but Scott Goldsmith is not one of them.
Scott is her bestie because he stands still and says nice things while everyone else is running around introducing her to new and exciting forms of torment nexus. It is a “luigi wins by doing nothing” ass situation.
Once Shelby is turned, it becomes nearly impossible for her to talk to a human without being threatened. Many social interactions from the very instant she walks back into town after the fishing trip are shadowed by someone openly planning to hurt or kill vampires.
Avid tries to test if she’s repelled by silver and then starts building a jail cell in front of her. Apo isn’t directly threatening, but basically comes to Shelby with the hypothetical “what if there was an evil vampire”. And then they emphasize the importance of keeping a stake at hand.
Shelby asks Ren if they’ll really have to fight each other, and Ren says that it’s just the way of the world. Sausage emphasizes the point by yelling “stab them all until they’re dead!”, which isn’t really a great thing to hear when you are one of the “them” in question.
Eventually, Apo gets turned, and most of the vampires convene at the beacon, where Martyn burns her alive.
Let me repeat that: she burns alive.
The video editing emphasizes this as a big deal. Shelby’s narration in the aftermath concludes that “if i asked for a chance to talk, they would have just killed me without a second thought.” From Shelby’s perspective, they did just kill her without a second thought. It is the climax of their episode 3, and one of the first things Shelby mentions in episode 4. It is a major turning point for the character, with good reason.
As far as Shelby is concerned, the vampire vs human conflict began with her experiencing a horrific death for the grand crime of crouching next to a beacon.
From this point forward, non threatening interactions with humans vanish almost entirely.
The only conversation Shelby has with a human is episode 4 is her face to face with Avid, which has high points and low points. The low points include Avid telling her about staking his partner because she attacked him.
Shelby, does, however, visit the town later, where she finds Avid burning her house down.
And then Legundo reads the cure book in front of the house’s ashes.
Legundo also scolds Avid for burning down the house, but Shelby misses that part. In fact, Shelby missed all of the pro Shelby comments made in the town around that time.
According to the post series creator’s commentary, (which i can’t link because twitch deletes old vods so it probably no longer exists aajfas;llllldg) this isn’t even a matter of clever editing- Shubble was legitimately out of range for all of the parts of the story where people agreed that they wanted to help Shelby.
In episode 5, she is approached by a group of Drift, Cleo, and Pearl. Shelby is surrounded, and asks them to put their swords away. Pearl takes a minute to do so, and when she does she switches to a bottle of holy water. Shelby backs away and Pearl moves forward.
The start of this conversation very much has shades of an interrogation: “why do you look so different? Did you eat truffle?”
Shelby tells them about being burnt alive, and the response she gets from Cleo is “but you got better”. Which sucks, and serves as an ironic mirror for the way that Scott and Owen are dismissive about the trauma involved with turning people. Both factions are expecting Shelby to just walk off the wrongs done to them, but the Oakhurst faction is openly threatening future harm to Shelby.
Of the three of them, Drift is the most supportive. The conversation improves from there, and some nice things are said, but Shelby was still threatened. It was still the preamble to the nice and productive part of the talks.
Then she has the meeting with Avid where he asks to be turned, which goes fairly well but ends with Avid being decidedly non human. Also Owen replaced one of Avid’s messages to Shelby with a death threat, so Shelby was still threatened over it.
Episode 6 has the Oakhurst invasion where all of the vampires visit Oakhurst and Pearl gets chased around. Shelby doesn’t really talk to anyone here, but she sure does get to hear Pearl make a generalized threat. Because Shelby can never catch a break.
We also see another instance of Shelby assuming that the townies are after her: her narration says “i thought Pearl was chasing me”
Then there’s a conversation with Sausage. Sausage pulls out a stake because of course he does.
Then Drift pulls Shelby aside, and they have a lovely chat where there are no threats of bodily harm. However, Drift is a vampire, so it doesn’t count. Rip.
When Avid starts talking about the cure, Shelby’s immediate assumption is that if Avid asks to be cured, the humans will stake her without a second thought. She also is the one to suggest sabotaging the cure for the sake of protecting herself and the other vampires.
Episode 7 sees Shelby dealing with humans twice, and both of them are decidedly hostile interactions
The first bit of human contact comes when the vampires burn down the walls of Oakhurst. This is, naturally, open combat. Shelby makes a point of targeting Martyn.
Her second human interaction in episode 7 is running into Abolish, who promptly introduces her to the Veylocke murder box. In other words, Shelby is stunned, rendered immobile and helpless, and executed in cold blood. It is not an easy death.
Abolish even acknowledges that she didn’t do anything, and then kills her anyway.
episode 8 is the finale, where she fights some humans, hides from humans, eventually has a truce with humans for the first time ever, and then wanders off into the sunset with Drift and Scott.
That’s basically all of Shelby’s major human interactions post episode 3. There is never an instance where speaking to a human is not linked with being threatened by a human after that point.
For the most part, this is entirely the result of the people of Oakhurst’s own priorities and character choices, but there is one vampire that tries to make sure that Shelby can’t talk to the humans. Someone that tries to isolate her, someone that uses threats, someone that is willing to lie to keep Shelby in the castle and away from town.
That person is Owen.
Owen interferes with Shelby speaking to townsfolk three times, to mixed results: he joins the conversation with Apo and successfully diverts them from trying to convince Shelby she’s wanted in town; he replaces Avid’s letter with a threatening message, but Avid manages to set up a meeting with Shelby and clear the air with her anyway; and he appears in the Pearl-Drift-Cleo meeting with Shelby in episode 5, which arguably improves the situation because he took the conversation in a useful direction and Shelby had already felt threatened anyway.
…actually, all three of these things happen in episode 5. Owen has a very brief window of being invested in the coven in this particular way. He does some pretty nasty lying in that window, though.
While this could be an interesting plot thread, Owen’s contributions are something of a cigarette in a burning warehouse. Shelby got killed twice as collateral damage, and both deaths were exceptionally traumatic. No amount of intercession on Owen’s part is going to speak louder than the wrongs done to Shelby by the humans themselves. No amount of lying on Oakhurst’s behalf is more damning then Oakhurst’s own failure to address the damage they’ve done in any way. He’s burying a relationship so far underground it is already in hell.
Even seemingly minor things like Pearl’s tendency to casually arm herself do more to damage Oakhurst’s reputation then Owen is really capable of- there is a direct line of cause and effect between Pearl saying she has a stake and Shelby assuming that Pearl is chasing her down. Shelby is rightfully skeptical of the claims Owen makes about other people, but when someone else is making those kinds of statements, she tends to believe them.
And then there’s Shelby’s backstory.
Shelby’s backstory, where she is isolated from her entire community growing up. Where people she considered friends and neighbors didn’t care about her in turn. Where nobody had even done something as basic as telling her that she’s fun to be around.
Of course Shelby thinks that Oakhurst is willing to write her off at the drop of a hat. That’s what her hometown did.
In conclusion
1: the town is not blameless in the Oakhurst vs Castle conflict. They have done real harm to the Coven, and most of it has fallen on their friendliest and least aggressive member.
2: Shelby is indeed afraid and isolated, but the bulk of that fear and isolation is generated and maintained by the people of Oakhurst themselves. The one time Scott had an opportunity to sabotage one of Shelby’s outside relationships, he chooses not to.
3: Scott is Shelby’s first friend, ever, and the feeling is mutual. This is a key component of why Shelby is Like That.
4: The answer to most gripes regarding vsmp’s story arc and ending is Shelby. Why did Scott live and Pyro die? Shelby. Why did Scott suddenly pivot to pacifism? Shelby. Why can’t the humans just wipe out the coven and call it a day? Shelby. Why was the coven a legitimate social structure in the first place? That’s also Shelby. It’s Shelby all the way down.
In Shelby’s story, Scott is the prize she wins for her kindness and Pyro becomes the avatar of all of the senseless violence she has suffered.
Shelby’s character arc is one of being the collateral damage of other people’s agendas so frequently that she becomes convinced that she must use violence herself. This culminates in her killing the most direct and personal threat to her physical safety, which is Pyro. Shelby’s other character arc is about seeking peace and companionship despite the bloodshed around her. This culminates in her turning her closest companion from the path of violence, and that companion happens to be Scott. Scott and Pyro’s conclusions are mirrored halves of Shelby’s finale, and reflect Shelby’s greatest triumph and lowest low.
The outcomes they get make sense if you position Shelby as the central character, and her choices were the ones that decided their fates.
OK so divorce au but what if: Somewhat(¿ Legundo's sire appears and Scott is jealous/pissed off because he sees someone else that has power over Legundo, Over HIS husband. Maybe the sire is the one who is able to truly make Legundo shut down and its makes scott blood boil..., ofc assuming that Legs sire is just like how canon v!Scott was to v!Pyro or a similar attitude, but I put it as the default because of course the doc cant have a peaceful day.
Maybe Legs was turned in the war against his will, maybe his sire saw the potential on Legundo as a doctor and didn't wanted to loose it, who knows... (well you know bcs is ur au lmaoo). Maybe the sire is a oc or another cc hehehe
-🥩
I haven't thought too much about Legs' backstory in the AU, beyond it being similar to his canon backstory, just happened a lot longer ago, but I did imagine he got turned late in the war, after he had already poisoned the village. (Really solidify the whole I'm not a monster because I'm a vampire thing he has).
Whatever the circumstance, Scott would 100% HATE Legundo's sire, exactly for the reasons of power and control. Scott wants to be the only person occupying his husband's mind.
Especially if you add in sire bond stuff. Legs' has cut off his bond with Scott, blocking him out as much as possible. But imagine if Scott found out he hadn't cut off his sire?? Scott's feeding off scraps of what he can get when the bond manages to break through, and yet Legs' sire gets full connection? Fucking rude.
it *would* make things very messy. Because you *know* Morcant wouldn't mention it to Abolish - it's only a short mission, Abolish is just monitoring Legundo, they shouldnt have to interact much, after all. The fact that Legs is Morcant's fledgling isn't mission critical, so he doesn't say anything. (Plus it'll be funnier to see Abolish's reaction to that info *after* the mission, anyway)
You could also justify Morcant showing up in the middle of canon if you go with the whole "the barrier is a one way thing, people can come in but not leave", and have him realise a month or so in (maybe because of some of the things he's feeling through the sire bond with Legs) that maybe the mission is getting a bit out of hand, so he decides it's time he goes to deal with things himself.
hmmmmmmm I may have convinced myself on this.......... it's still a very silly thought... but this AU is very much equal parts tragedy and comedy.......
Abolish is having very mixed feelings about Morcant’s arrival because, on the one hand, by this point he's got the measure of his neighbours, and another sane voice in the crowd would not go amiss.
On the other, sir. Sir, I have this under control, I know I've been unable to report back, but this is literally my job, I've done more dangerous missions than this, did you really not trust me enough that you had to turn up halfway through this mission. Sir.
Only for Morcant to explain that, no, dear boy, he has no doubt in Abolish. It's his fledgling-in-law he doesn't trust.
and I think Legs would have avoided Morcant quite heavily, especially after the divorce because "he turned me to make me something better than a murder and look what I still turned into", so yes he is comforted by having his sire there but also The Guilt.
And you know Scott is being SUCH a pissy baby about all of it. New person shows up in town, after everyone has been trapped in a fishbowl of horrors for a month so suddenly Scott isn't the centre of attention anymore. *Plus* it's his ex-husbands' sire? *Double plus* it's his not-boyfriend's boss/parental-ish figure????? Scott would be having SUCH a tantrum about it.
He would also dial up the flirting with Abolish even more because it would be fucking Hilarious.
Oooh those are such good tags! It's also making me think about the parallels between Abolish and Legs and how messed up that gets whichever way you spin it.
Because if Morcant turned Legs after his massacre and gave him the tools to become a doctor, what do you mean he turned around and raised this kid as a living weapon, after knowing how it fucked him over??
And alternatively, if Morcant was one of the hands which steered Legs to commit his war crime, only for Legs to break away from it all, then his sire is still up to his old tricks and Abolish is being moulded into the same soldier he was
god yes ALL of this. Legs, who saw shadows of his former self in Abolish but wrote it off as him being unfair to the kid, suddenly realising that he was raised by Morcant - the man who turned him for [insert reason here].
I do love me some grey/amoral Elder Vampires. So what if we blend the two potential reasons here. Morcant turned Legundo in the early days of the Organisation - before it's really solidified as a Thing - after he committed the massacre of the town. Here is this incredible strategist, who works with brutal efficiency. He would be the perfect potential agent. So Morcant turns him, and through the sire-bond is slammed with an overwhelming horror of guilt.
Well, can't send that one out into the field then, he's just gonna find a way to commit an assisted suicide, Morcant thinks. But surely he could still be useful. So he hands him the tools to become a healer. And Legs grabs onto the opportunity with both hands.
But Morcant's got the Elder Vampire weakness of thinking "I have all the time in the world", so doesn't worry when Legs sets off to do his travelling doctor thing. He'll be back when he's ready, it's fine :)
Then Scott happens. Morcant writes Legundo off as a lost cause. Shame, but, the Organisation was still an experiment when Legs was turned, they've locked down a lot of the process now, and they have plenty of other agents.
And then six centuries later, Abolish Veylocke falls in Morcant's lap.
OK so divorce au but what if: Somewhat(¿ Legundo's sire appears and Scott is jealous/pissed off because he sees someone else that has power over Legundo, Over HIS husband. Maybe the sire is the one who is able to truly make Legundo shut down and its makes scott blood boil..., ofc assuming that Legs sire is just like how canon v!Scott was to v!Pyro or a similar attitude, but I put it as the default because of course the doc cant have a peaceful day.
Maybe Legs was turned in the war against his will, maybe his sire saw the potential on Legundo as a doctor and didn't wanted to loose it, who knows... (well you know bcs is ur au lmaoo). Maybe the sire is a oc or another cc hehehe
-🥩
I haven't thought too much about Legs' backstory in the AU, beyond it being similar to his canon backstory, just happened a lot longer ago, but I did imagine he got turned late in the war, after he had already poisoned the village. (Really solidify the whole I'm not a monster because I'm a vampire thing he has).
Whatever the circumstance, Scott would 100% HATE Legundo's sire, exactly for the reasons of power and control. Scott wants to be the only person occupying his husband's mind.
Especially if you add in sire bond stuff. Legs' has cut off his bond with Scott, blocking him out as much as possible. But imagine if Scott found out he hadn't cut off his sire?? Scott's feeding off scraps of what he can get when the bond manages to break through, and yet Legs' sire gets full connection? Fucking rude.
it *would* make things very messy. Because you *know* Morcant wouldn't mention it to Abolish - it's only a short mission, Abolish is just monitoring Legundo, they shouldnt have to interact much, after all. The fact that Legs is Morcant's fledgling isn't mission critical, so he doesn't say anything. (Plus it'll be funnier to see Abolish's reaction to that info *after* the mission, anyway)
You could also justify Morcant showing up in the middle of canon if you go with the whole "the barrier is a one way thing, people can come in but not leave", and have him realise a month or so in (maybe because of some of the things he's feeling through the sire bond with Legs) that maybe the mission is getting a bit out of hand, so he decides it's time he goes to deal with things himself.
hmmmmmmm I may have convinced myself on this.......... it's still a very silly thought... but this AU is very much equal parts tragedy and comedy.......
Abolish is having very mixed feelings about Morcant’s arrival because, on the one hand, by this point he's got the measure of his neighbours, and another sane voice in the crowd would not go amiss.
On the other, sir. Sir, I have this under control, I know I've been unable to report back, but this is literally my job, I've done more dangerous missions than this, did you really not trust me enough that you had to turn up halfway through this mission. Sir.
Only for Morcant to explain that, no, dear boy, he has no doubt in Abolish. It's his fledgling-in-law he doesn't trust.
and I think Legs would have avoided Morcant quite heavily, especially after the divorce because "he turned me to make me something better than a murder and look what I still turned into", so yes he is comforted by having his sire there but also The Guilt.
And you know Scott is being SUCH a pissy baby about all of it. New person shows up in town, after everyone has been trapped in a fishbowl of horrors for a month so suddenly Scott isn't the centre of attention anymore. *Plus* it's his ex-husbands' sire? *Double plus* it's his not-boyfriend's boss/parental-ish figure????? Scott would be having SUCH a tantrum about it.
He would also dial up the flirting with Abolish even more because it would be fucking Hilarious.
another level for Scott to be upset about is "what do you MEAN you've had a sire this whole time and didn't tell me?" and "i've had a grandsire this whole time and he never visited? never even showed up? didn't even send his evidently extensive network of minions after me? rude! neglectful! what kind of deadbeat-"
Doc trying to avoid having a relationship with Shelby and Pyro is cute because he thinks he can actually escape and because it makes Scott the uncontested mentor and authority figure in their lives. discovering that this is a habit he picked up from someone that should have been (for a given value of "should have") in his life is infinitely less fun.
ok but imagine if Shelby had done her besties/roommates/latching on/definitely-not-replacing-my-dead-father-figure-with-you-don't-worry-about-it vibe with Ren instead of Scott
here's this sweet, passionate man who tells wonderful stories and has a deep sadness and loneliness to him. I could definitely picture Shelby vibing with that. And yeah, Ren is another character (like most of the townsfolk) who don't see Shelby as a person, only as a symbol of something to be saved, but imagine if they'd had time to bond before she was turned. I think Ren could have recognised the depths of her loneliness, recognised it because he's felt it too.
Shelby is also another character who desperately needs a really good hug, which Ren could definitely give her.
AU where every vampire has a soulmate, be they human or vampire as well. The vampire has no way of knowing who their soulmate is, no marks nor tethering strings. All except their bat form knows them at first sight, and in a flurry of instincts demands cuddles, returning whenever able much to the vampire’s lack of awareness or memory of the visits.
have this be why Scott accidentally bats during the house contest
It’s the first time that Abolish has stood close enough to Scott to trigger the soulmate instinct. Scott bats and just plants himself on Abolish’s chest
everyone is Freaking Out
and Abolish, who knows exactly what is happening, is just standing there like “oh no. No. Not this. Goddamn it.” (Absolutely stone faced, not visibly reacting at all, of course, he is a Professional).
I vote vampires turn to ash on temporary death and then reconstitute elsewhere, and this includes deaths by fire. However, silver can disrupt this process especially if it's mixed in with the ashes, and Louis was tied to the stake with silver chains.
He didn't burn to death once. He burned to death, and then he couldn't reconstitute elsewhere, so he burned to death again. And again, and again, and again, until it took.
Shelby only burned to death the once, so it was traumatic but didn't permakill her. If she'd been tied down with silver while it happened, it'd have been a different story.
V!Owen is a person with rich emotional depths that primarily serve to drive him and everyone he comes into contact with towards horror and violence. the horror is that he is doing this because he cares and the tragedy is that he is the architect of his own suffering
V!Scott is an incredibly shallow person who gives up evil the same way a normal person gives up tacos. the horror is that it was always this easy for him and the tragedy is that he never had a reason to try before this
How would Owen fit into the Bloodloathing Divorce AU? Is he still human? Does Legs want to help him still?
I haven't thought too much about Owen in this AU, but during some brainstorming with some others we did come up with the idea of a horrible toxic polycule by adding Bloodletting and Crossfangs to the disaster of the Bloodloathing divorce. And I think that's hilarious so I'm running with it.
So, Owen.
I think we go with the classic approach to role-reversal bloodletting. He's human, he's sick, he's shunned by his society. Keep the majority of his canon backstory, but change the setting and the timeline. Louis wasn't the mayor of Oakhurst, but a different town not too far away. Owen was 16 when he met him, and their story is the same, but Louis is killed before he can turn Owen. Maybe he offered Owen the gift, Owen accepted it but Louis - knowing what an enormous decision that was - told him to think on it overnight. And that was the night the villagers came for him. Owen doesn't have vampiric strength to slaughter an entire village. Maybe he tries, maybe he kills some of them, and then is driven out into the woods.
He wanders alone, sick, heartbroken, for ten years before he stumbles into Oakhurst. His pain doesn't need 200 years in a hole to sour into bitterness and a hatred for humanity.
So I think Legundo very much does still want to help him. He's very obviously sick, and hurt in many ways. And it would still be awful and haunting for Owen, because here is someone showing him kindness once more, and it's genuine and so like Louis and that's terrifying - because humans don't care, no human has ever cared about Owen, so why is this one? And then the inevitable reveal of Legundo's vampirism just solidifies that belief. Of course Legs is a vampire, only vampires can love like that.
But he refuses every offer of turning from Legs, because Louis was supposed to be his sire. If it can't be Louis, then it will be no one. Owen is glad he is dying, because he has that same belief as he has in canon, that vampires all go to hell, and he will go to hell too for the things he has done, so he will get to be with Louis there too.
So I think Owen and Legs would have a very similar dynamic in this AU as they did in canon, just reversed. Whatever it ends up being, it would definitely be toxic and weird and secret-third-thing in the way Bloodletting is so good at being.
i think i figured out the contradiction between the rebels not wanting to kill the dragon riders, and their use of an incredibly deadly poison.
(and also putting a hit on them, attacking them at every opportunity, ect ect)
the "weakened" and "suppressed" they want the students of the academy to be at is specifically the weakness that comes from dying and being revived by their dragon.
magically weaker, closer to death, more easily killed for good, all of that.
they can use poison rot and call it a "distraction", because they know that the students have multiple lives. they can justify their attacks as fair because they tell themselves that their victims will just "come back" if they succeed.
they either don't know or don't care that they are doing permanent damage, both to their own position and to the people they are attacking
(I'll get to the ones you keep leaving in my inbox I promise! Just have been feeling bleh)
Take your time, no rush! I do tend to throw these presents everywhere when I see them lol
Took a brief break from my main fic to start working on a oneshot for my Stardew Valley Trustbites AU, which probably appeals to no one but me haha
“I see.” Legundo puts his hand on either side of Owen’s neck to check his lymph nodes, and while he’s there, Owen feels the doctor’s eyes linger on the blotchy, mottled skin peeking out from under his collar at the hollow of his throat.
@jackdaw-sprite “surely this won’t spiral” is the eternal prayer of fanfic writers everywhere
And LOL I love that idea! Dr Legs, famously skeptical of all things magic, now living in a magical valley where Weird Things Happen and he just has to go with it 😂
“Wow Doc, this potion is some really powerful stuff! Your magical skills are coming along!”
“IT’S NOT MAGIC, FOR THE LAST TIME, JUST BECAUSE I BREWED IT IN A CAULDRON THAT DOESN’T MAKE IT A MAGIC POTION, IT’S MEDICINE.”
...Scott Goldsmith as that guy in the woods handing out questionable potions to random farmers and teaching everyone magic. calls Legs "my apprentice". also he owns a casino and puts weird shit in the mines because it amuses him.
Shelby and Drift co run the adventurers guild. Shelby is very enthusiastic about the various magic items just "appearing" in the mines.
Pyro is the blacksmisth. people keep commissioning him to make iridium products. "isn't iridum radioactive?" he asks. no one listens.
(Pyro is pretty sure Scott is putting weird things in geodes just to mess with him. this is the third haunted doll this week. where do they keep coming from)
Abolish as the Fisherman to be as far from town (and it's craziness) as possible.
Apo is Joja For The Dynamic (sorry girl ily but it makes the rest of this funnier), Pearl technically runs the general store but is 50/50 with Cleo the rancher. They both have a rivalry with Apo.
Scott is the traveling salesperson. Which one? All of them. Vastly overpriced goods at (likely) an insane markup? "One of a kind" items that show up every year? He's your guy! He can talk you into buying almost anything, and the stuff he can't sell he leaves in the mines For the Whimsey of It All.
...okay, Joja Apo is inspired. when the store gets shut down they get reassigned to the mushroom cave on Ginger Island. someone free them from this hell.
(Apo took Truffle with her when she got reassigned. Pyro was devastated)
i can also see general store Pyro and Blacksmith Pearl- Cleo complains extensively about Pyro being closed on Wednesdays, and Pearl is disturbingly cavalier about the valley's strange ores. she sees something glowing bright green on the table and goes, "oh, what a lovely color!"
Oscar is a mummified cat that Pearl found in an Ancient Trove one time
ohhhhh, evil thought: Scott keeps doves. they are beautiful and immaculately kept, and help him with his work. you can even use them as a mail service, if you like.
ok but imagine: established Bloodloathing as starter vamps
No solid thoughts on the details, but like they are definitely Divorced (maybe literally)
For some reason Legundo has been drawn back to Oakhurst. Maybe he hears Scott is dead, and there was something that Scott had that Legs wants from the ruins of the castle.
So he walks into town and is blending in, playing the kind, skeptical doctor, getting along with people.
and then Scott arrives.
Scott: 😍😍😍✨✨Legundo✨✨😍😍😍
Legs: If you take one more step towards me I will rip your smug face off
Scott: awww I missed you too😘
the townsfolk have NO IDEA how to deal with that energy
Thank you @mytoomanybookstoread for lovingly crafting me some blorbo torment
“he’s not equipped to do couples counselling or divorce court” lol Abolish’s “I’m not paid enough for this shit” level gets freaking tripled here
abolish and legs’ dynamic would be so funny pre vampire reveal too. Because rather than getting Abolish gently coaxing the Doc to be a little more open minded about the supernatural, we’d have Abolish just dropping subtle lines that hint that he knows *exactly* what’s going on with Legs and Scott, and he is both threatening and sympathetic.
(I'll get to the ones you keep leaving in my inbox I promise! Just have been feeling bleh)
Take your time, no rush! I do tend to throw these presents everywhere when I see them lol
Took a brief break from my main fic to start working on a oneshot for my Stardew Valley Trustbites AU, which probably appeals to no one but me haha
“I see.” Legundo puts his hand on either side of Owen’s neck to check his lymph nodes, and while he’s there, Owen feels the doctor’s eyes linger on the blotchy, mottled skin peeking out from under his collar at the hollow of his throat.
@jackdaw-sprite “surely this won’t spiral” is the eternal prayer of fanfic writers everywhere
And LOL I love that idea! Dr Legs, famously skeptical of all things magic, now living in a magical valley where Weird Things Happen and he just has to go with it 😂
“Wow Doc, this potion is some really powerful stuff! Your magical skills are coming along!”
“IT’S NOT MAGIC, FOR THE LAST TIME, JUST BECAUSE I BREWED IT IN A CAULDRON THAT DOESN’T MAKE IT A MAGIC POTION, IT’S MEDICINE.”
...Scott Goldsmith as that guy in the woods handing out questionable potions to random farmers and teaching everyone magic. calls Legs "my apprentice". also he owns a casino and puts weird shit in the mines because it amuses him.
Shelby and Drift co run the adventurers guild. Shelby is very enthusiastic about the various magic items just "appearing" in the mines.
Pyro is the blacksmisth. people keep commissioning him to make iridium products. "isn't iridum radioactive?" he asks. no one listens.
(Pyro is pretty sure Scott is putting weird things in geodes just to mess with him. this is the third haunted doll this week. where do they keep coming from)
I have given myself the world's most horrendous idea:
After the series, Legs goes to that town in hopes that one of the survivors will kill him if he asks. And they do!
But they're not going to stake him or burn him at the stake, what on earth? Both of those things are horrible. Anyway, poisoning him is much more fitting. Shooting him is easier. Hanging him is more of the Done Execution at the time.
...anyway. Legs who is trying to get the survivors of the town he destroyed to kill him, and the survivors of the town who are discovering that he doesn't stay dead.
Because the thing is, when I was watching Legs try, over and over, to find some kind of peaceful resolution, try to talk people down even at the risk of his own life, to physically put himself, unarmed, in situations that could have gotten him killed in order to try and stop the brewing violence, I saw a man twenty years removed from the man who killed thousands of people on orders.
I got attached.
I wanted him to have done enough, changed enough to make up for it. I wanted him to have a happy ending, even if it was pretty clear he wouldn't get one.
The character of Dr. Legundo, in the series, asks the question of if there are things a human being can do that are so utterly vile that they can never, ever mend them, grow from them to become a person worthy of forgiveness (or, if you care to frame it in another way, to find redemption.)
And he asks, "If the answer is no, that you have gone far past the point of no return...what if you try, anyway? What if you give everything of yourself to others, over and over--"
.
Because the thing is, the framing of the series asks these things severed from the true context of what he did. The audience had a stronger reaction to Avid's murder than the revelation that Dr. Legundo had, in his past, done the same more than five thousand times over. Because those numbers are distant, and abstract. Those numbers are not people; we do not see the shape of what he wrought, only what it made of him.
This is fine. It is not a story about Dr. Legundo's guilt. It is a story about 14 people made rats in a trap, and how the nights draw long and bloody as the noose closes around their throats.
But it might be worth it, to bring that back into focus. To show the crumbling grave of thousands, to show the shattered remains of the survivors, still scarred, still burned, ghosts in their own right and ask the question again, reversed:
Is there? Is there anything a single man can do to earn forgiveness for this?
When he caused it? When he's the reason the home you had is a moldering corpse? When the community you had is shattered beyond repair? When the people who were neighbors are scattered to the wind, if they don't reside forever in the graveyard that burst its banks decades ago?
When everyone who remembers it never recovered, just patched themselves together enough to make it through each day?
.
(Would it be like draining infection from a wound? Or would it be like dancing on a broken bone that never healed?)
...i mean, if the personal author of a recent and devastating act of mass destruction showed up in my community and asked to be killed for it, my reactions in order would roughly be a) this is obviously a trap, b) how dare you show up and make your guilt my problem, and c) if you feel so bad about maybe actually try to do something that actually improves the situation. you can't make up for it but somebody has to do the laundry.
there's also the greater political situation at hand- given that Legundo was given a medal, he was presumably on the winning side of the war he was in. the war where there was a public ceremony declaring the entire village to be "enemy soldiers". which means this new village of survivors has almost certainly been offered no restitution or even public acknowledgement of wrongdoing in the first place. in which case the guilt ridden is-that-a-fucking-ghost of the soldier that actually applied the poison may be the least of the villagers problems!
and also the only outside validation or acknowledgement of wrongdoing that the villagers have actually received, ever.
(which isn't to say that none of the villagers are down with plan "kill the soldier", or are more then fine with simply hating Legs for what he represents. but if we're acknowledging the personhood of Legundo's victims, we should also acknowledge that those persons are messy and complicated and do in fact have priorities outside of the Doc's personal torment nexus)
...actually, come to think of it, you know what a recently devastated community is really unlikely to have? what they might desperately need but probably cannot afford on account of them being rare and expensive?
I have given myself the world's most horrendous idea:
After the series, Legs goes to that town in hopes that one of the survivors will kill him if he asks. And they do!
But they're not going to stake him or burn him at the stake, what on earth? Both of those things are horrible. Anyway, poisoning him is much more fitting. Shooting him is easier. Hanging him is more of the Done Execution at the time.
...anyway. Legs who is trying to get the survivors of the town he destroyed to kill him, and the survivors of the town who are discovering that he doesn't stay dead.
Because the thing is, when I was watching Legs try, over and over, to find some kind of peaceful resolution, try to talk people down even at the risk of his own life, to physically put himself, unarmed, in situations that could have gotten him killed in order to try and stop the brewing violence, I saw a man twenty years removed from the man who killed thousands of people on orders.
I got attached.
I wanted him to have done enough, changed enough to make up for it. I wanted him to have a happy ending, even if it was pretty clear he wouldn't get one.
The character of Dr. Legundo, in the series, asks the question of if there are things a human being can do that are so utterly vile that they can never, ever mend them, grow from them to become a person worthy of forgiveness (or, if you care to frame it in another way, to find redemption.)
And he asks, "If the answer is no, that you have gone far past the point of no return...what if you try, anyway? What if you give everything of yourself to others, over and over--"
.
Because the thing is, the framing of the series asks these things severed from the true context of what he did. The audience had a stronger reaction to Avid's murder than the revelation that Dr. Legundo had, in his past, done the same more than five thousand times over. Because those numbers are distant, and abstract. Those numbers are not people; we do not see the shape of what he wrought, only what it made of him.
This is fine. It is not a story about Dr. Legundo's guilt. It is a story about 14 people made rats in a trap, and how the nights draw long and bloody as the noose closes around their throats.
But it might be worth it, to bring that back into focus. To show the crumbling grave of thousands, to show the shattered remains of the survivors, still scarred, still burned, ghosts in their own right and ask the question again, reversed:
Is there? Is there anything a single man can do to earn forgiveness for this?
When he caused it? When he's the reason the home you had is a moldering corpse? When the community you had is shattered beyond repair? When the people who were neighbors are scattered to the wind, if they don't reside forever in the graveyard that burst its banks decades ago?
When everyone who remembers it never recovered, just patched themselves together enough to make it through each day?
.
(Would it be like draining infection from a wound? Or would it be like dancing on a broken bone that never healed?)
...i mean, if the personal author of a recent and devastating act of mass destruction showed up in my community and asked to be killed for it, my reactions in order would roughly be a) this is obviously a trap, b) how dare you show up and make your guilt my problem, and c) if you feel so bad about maybe actually try to do something that actually improves the situation. you can't make up for it but somebody has to do the laundry.
there's also the greater political situation at hand- given that Legundo was given a medal, he was presumably on the winning side of the war he was in. the war where there was a public ceremony declaring the entire village to be "enemy soldiers". which means this new village of survivors has almost certainly been offered no restitution or even public acknowledgement of wrongdoing in the first place. in which case the guilt ridden is-that-a-fucking-ghost of the soldier that actually applied the poison may be the least of the villagers problems!
and also the only outside validation or acknowledgement of wrongdoing that the villagers have actually received, ever.
(which isn't to say that none of the villagers are down with plan "kill the soldier", or are more then fine with simply hating Legs for what he represents. but if we're acknowledging the personhood of Legundo's victims, we should also acknowledge that those persons are messy and complicated and do in fact have priorities outside of the Doc's personal torment nexus)
don't you hate it when ur coworker that you may or may not have a crush on turns out to be the among us imposter and starts cosplaying as themselves pre-incident ughh
If Flowery ever comes back I want him to be in a wheelchair and I want there to specifically be a bit where he’s near some stairs and he’d say something like “You’d think the dark worlds would be wheelchair accessible.”
And then he makes a slope next to the stairs for his wheelchair to go up.
