Will expand on this further but this is some of my headcannons over Laurence's eyes because Jess didn't do a good job at explaining it:
TW: Torture
It gets a little medically because I'm going into the medical feild but this is also headcannons and I'm not yet a doctor so dont take ANY of this as 100% medical fact
-Underwent torture as a process of his transformation (I believe this is basically cannon)
In the Neather:
-Part of the torture was damage to the eyes with Shad promising that if Laurence joins, his vision will be restored.
Post Neather:
-As a result of the torture he gets a collapsed iris, which according to the Cleveland Clinic can happen from penatrating eye injuries, so in this case I say Laurence got a red hot poker to the eyes.
-And this caused him to go completely blind, the torture and the collasped iris was what was left visually
-(Its so cool to look at but its not something for someone with a weak stomach to look at. The iris, the colour part of our eyes, is detached from the pupil)
-He wore a bandage over his eyes to let them heal as much as they naturally could for a bit and to not expose them to light
-When he is completely healed, or as much as he could be with normal human healing he stopped wearing the bandage but was completely blind. Total blindness, no light perception. Just darkness
Post Irene:
-As a result he developed a N24SWD or a Non 24hr Sleep Wake Disorder because his brain could not use the light to tell what time of day it was, basically his internal clock was more than 24hrs and would be asleep at odd hours of the day
-After Irene had blessed Phoenix Drop, his vision and sleep rapidly started to get better.
-It wasnt a wake up and you can see but he started to regain some vision, total darkness to a dimmed and blurred world, to a brighter but blurry world, and eventually to 20/20
-Irene however could not properly fix his iris and still have them be the orginal color. So he has central heterochromia, of blue eyes and a green center. (This)
-However, he is prone to headaches as a result, being more sensitive to light, and stopped sleeping on his back so he didnt have to wake up to the sun right in his face. Choosing to sleep on his side or stomach if he didnt have a roof to sleep under, or a sleep mask from Cadenza
-His sleep cycle was transformed back to its orginal cycle after Irene or else it would have taken him too long to get it get back to square one, using up time he did not have
Some sketches of this:
The before Neather and after Irene was supposed to be shaded to show the darker green compared to the lighter blue but I was lazy
Coloured version: (Pretend the greens are the same)
Edit: I have more headcannons that revolve around his vision and the consequences, some I've adopted from other people such as the horrible depth perception, or other things like colour blindness, and more. This will probably be a multi-part post going over all of my Laurence headcannons that have to do with his eyes/vision but this post was just to explain the shift in eye colour
Headcannon: Keith didnt immediately recognize Lance because he's face blind
This isnt some Galra thing, bros just face blind. Would've been face blind if he was 100% human.
He knows the voltron team well because everyone has unique enough features, different hair styles/colours and others, but when he's interacting with people from other planets, he lets the other members talk to them first while he tries to identify who they're talking to
This is cannon because I'm face blind and I say so
I personally headcannon that 'The Calling' that Laurence experiences is similar to withdrawal symptoms. And that Shad is trying to make the experience as unbearable as possible to get them back.
It may be because im writing a speech on opioids but I see the 'The Calling' as a form of shadow knight withdrawal. And Shad gets people because its easier to give in (relapse) than fight it and suffer withdrawal even if its the better option
There's something so...violating...about Bucky and the super soldier serum.
TW: SA themes
When Steve finds him in CATFA, he's tied to a table, mumbling his serial number to hold onto his senses. We assume, especially when watching it with the knowledge of CATWS, that he underwent attempts of brainwashing and torture from the marks on his face. And we know he got the serum during this time because he was able to survive the fall.
But there's something so violating about it. Getting captured in war is already a lot on its own, but being forced onto a table and strapped down so you cant move as something you don't know is put into you without your consent. And you barely hold onto sanity.
Bucky and Steve are foils in their super soldier-ness. Steve had a choice, he agreed to be apart of the program, and when it was looking bad and like he'd be in more pain that what was expected, the people running the test were going to shut it down until he yelled to keep going. And they listened to him. Steve's word was respected and listened to. He had every opportunity to back out if he was uncomfortable. He willingly got into the machine, and wasnt strapped down. His consent was valued and respected.
Bucky, in contrast, wasn't respected. He was taken, forced into the laboratory with the serum. Forced into whatever thing that held him, table, machine, whatever, against his will. And given a serum he didn't know existed. Something was inserted into him and forever changed his life. And he didn't want it. We aren't told anything in the MCU about how he got the serum because HYDRA took away his memories, HYDRA controlled his narrative and to HYDRA. Consent wasn't important when it came to Bucky. And they didn't care when Bucky screamed in pain. They fried his brain multiple times, and the only thing they gave him was something to bite on.
People talk about SA themes wirh Bucky in FATWS, how he can be used for anything and what not according to Zemo. But I think a more interesting theme is how he became this. Captured and experimented on against his will. Being strapped down so he can't escape as HYDRA does what they want to him. As someone with a history of being assaulted, there are themes of SA in Bucky's history. Its not confirmed and barely implied if HYDRA had Bucky do anything sexual during his time as the Winter Solider, in contrast to Natasha where its very clear that she uses her body and likely had to get sexual to complete the mission (that is a separate topic but her consent also wasn't valued), but with Bucky, there are themes that surrounds assult without it ever being told if it was sexual assult or not.
I love learning about how we used to treat "othered" people in history
And by "othered" people, I mean people with things like mental disorders, long term/life long diseases, disabilities, etc.
Because its very easy to see someone you dont know but is disabled and not care about them but we as a species are a lot more compassionate for people we know and care for
And how did that look in the ancient world
When the world was smaller, that "othered" person was also someone you likely knew
And when illnesses like epilepsy or other conditions that have clear and negative impacts on lives were seen in some cultures as curses from the Gods, how were these "cursed" people treated
Especially in cases of being born like that, that baby did no crime but be born, what did they do to be cursed
"Oh they were left to the woods" but were they? Some yes. But all?? No. Because that wasnt just another mouth to feed, that was a child. Someone who was with someone else for 9 months and bonded with her. That's not an object, that's a person with thoughts and feelings. And not everyone sees the disabled as "things" they're disabled people but they're disabled PEOPLE
And we've known that from the start, so how did we treat them?
It was heavily stigmatized, and they were outcasts, but some churches had Leper squints, basically cut out holes for people in a separate room to still engage with mass/service. People were afraid of people with leprosy but had enough love for the person infected to build around them, letting them attend church to be saved
Idc how anti-feminist this makes me. As a woman. Period blood is gross. Something can be natural and gross.
1. Blood is gross. Doesn't matter where it's from. I hate when I get blood beef from the supermarket. No. Ew.
2. Blood carries diseases, and until you test the blood, you don't know if you're working with infected blood or not. This is why all blood is treated as a biohazard. Because it is one.
3. Periods are messy, they are natural, but they are messy. I hate being on my period as a germaphobe, because I am touching bloody pads, my underwear, clean pads, and possibly blood stained stuff. It's messy.
This is just a ramble because I came across someone saying that freebleeding is natural and shouldn't be shamed. And I disagree, and I didn't want to both a friend by texting her this. Something can be natural while also being gross. And period blood is in a weird spot where it gets treated as different than non-period blood on both ends of the spectrum. Both as something more and less gross than non-period blood. (Which BTW, so funny)
In the same way mucus is gross but natural, period blood is also natural but gross.
2010s music will always have a special place in my heart because I would play it while reading Avengers fanfic or playing alone on a downloaded minecraft world of the helicarrier
Idk, 2010s music and Avengers happening at the same time in my life (which was also my worst time mentally) as an escape will always be so special and I'm so sad I can never experience that for the first time again
Battle Scars by Paradise Fears is so special to me for this reason because it was depressed 9-12 year old me's JAM while playing some shitty minecraft game with Avengers on the TV
It smells nice. Say a picnic on the beach, notes of fruit, salt water, maybe chocolate, sand, and when you burn to the middle of the candle, feet, spray tans, weed, things also at the beach.
And you can't return it because you burned too much. Bit friends don't want it because they smell feet. You're stick. And it's your faulbtvjerk
And we di thay for some time and fome ou5 wi5h a NEW line, playground Cafe, mountains with a sent of shit
And it shakl be for heris jerk. 5hey starts out otetty and become ULGY
This is mainly why I relate to him. And 2 of the many reasons
1. Bucky canonically has issues sleeping because of PTSD. Which i relate to on both a physical level (sleep disorder) and a mental level, (PTSD) and we both sleep on the floor. I've found that on hard nights, the floor is where I'm able to sleep better. This is when I can't get my brain to shut up and realize that there isn't a threat.
On the more mental side
When Bucky is free, he's Bucky but a part of him is the Winter Solider and he will always have that part of him till he dies. This can be seen as a mental illness. Specifically ones that you develop later in life. Ovbiouslly his PTSD from ww2 and HYDRA but the Winter Solider. And like with a mental disorder, the Winter Solider is the explanation behind what he did but he still has to take accountability for what he did. He hurt a lot of people and did a lot of bad stuff. He still did it even if it wasn't Bucky. It was his body and his actions. We can see this in FATWS. I can draw an almost direct comparison to something I personally deal with, we think it's Bipolar II. And when I'm in a high or a low, (my terms for depressive/hypomanic episodes since I'm not comfortable using the terms without a diagnosis) I do things. I'm reckless, I'm at a higher risk to myself and others. I pay less attention to my surroundings. And I've hurt people because of this. It was me but it was me. And I take full responsibility for my actions during those episodes.
The Winter Solider is to Bucky as my mental disorder is to me. They're facts of life we deal with and we have to take accountability for our actions while in those states even if it wasn't us.
These are just 2 of the many reasons why I love Bucky as a character. And it really boils down to seeing so much of myself in him.
Unable to use normal phrases to describe my feelings
I speak art of them
I ask my friend to visualize as I describe the current peice that is me.
How it's rough around the edges but if you press it'll shatter into a tiny little arts. Arts of different colours. They are almost pointillism. The colours of the paint are feelings. Sure it looks like a blob of red, maybe a dark red, but some dots are blue of sadness and others are green of jealousy and envy. And that red square, so sharp and pointy, is really a pointalism of emotions.
Explaining is hard. But tell me how you are feeling in whatever language you know can explain it best. It is your responsibility to get it out, and mine is to translate
So um...I wrote this while...high on my sleep meds...