THE SORDID AND THE SUBLIME

stray thoughts, head canons, and ostensible reading notes for Opheer's characters Contains mature or triggering themes.

[sordidandsublime]

Calling it quits on this blog, farewell! It was fun in its heyday.

I’ll still be posting art on other blogs, but not headcanons or ideas.

[sordidandsublime]

I forgot to add; the Ramazanovs to a man have mean steaks a mile wide. When it comes to lovers or love interests there’s a particular tendency to play with their food, if I might be allowed to describe it that way. If they’re interested (or disinterested but bedding someone anyway) they want to poke, prod, ignore or torment the object of their interests in covert or overt ways. Vadim and Milan aren’t really given to physical expressions of this perverseness and neither is Avenir although he’s the coldest and crudest when bidding a lover farewell (or kicking them out the door).

Miklos typically employs mind games and a cool disinterest that tends to keep people around anyway. It’s not entirely deliberate on his part, at least not always, although he can examine his actions from a distance and with vague fascination (hello disassociation). But sometimes he wants to hurt people, he fantasizes about things people don’t like to admit to fantasizing about. Sometimes a good mindfuck requires physical action (very, very non consensual knife play for instance). Anyway, my point is, Miklos has never felt “I want to hurt it” with Rui. He wants her happy and amused and amusing, and he enjoys being around her. I dunno why precisely, sometimes you just know when character vibe and you know when they don’t.

[sordidandsublime]

AU stuff

Canon except for the familial angle

- Mik doesn’t know why he becomes a career soldier, not really, even though he has logical reasons for it. When he was younger it was partially about proving his toughness and being angry with the state of his life. After a couple of years on active service it was just easier to stay than it was to leave.

- Mik’s trauma reservoir was already pretty filled up by his experiences with his mother before it was compounded by what he’d seen and experienced on tour. His father was always kind to him, but Vadim’s imprisonment and the lack of stability and financial difficulty Avenir experienced while housing and caring for him and Milan didn’t help. When Vadim is released from prison and begins working for the brotherhood he becomes well off with a rapidity Mik mistrusts and finds difficulty adjusting to.

- Mik’s enlistment is mandatory, but he didn’t have to join the special forces or commit to a career. At 18 Vadim isn’t quite as ludicrously wealthy as he will be when Mik is discharged, but there’s enough money for Mik to not have to work, if he wished.

- Vadim didn’t speak to Mik for most of his time in the military, displeased with his choice and claiming there was no use talking to the boy because he couldn’t understand the reasoning behind his actions (Vadim’s usually uncannily good at divining subconscious or emotional motivations no matter how outrageous or nonsensical, but he finds himself unable to do that with his son). (If you’re thinking that’s unlikely, my own father didn’t speak to me for five years over a fairly minor misdemeanor, and we have what’s considered a good rapport. That stuff happens). The Ramazanovs are champion brooders, so Vadim is capable of giving someone the cold shoulder for decades if need be. Milan’s the only Ramazanov who doesn’t brood; he sulks.

- Mik has two injury incidents while in service. The first you’ve probably read about, the land mine that kills Aleksandr. That leaves him with some shrapnel scarring along one side and in his right hand and forearm. He’s sent back to base, technically on active duty despite his injuries. The second is while working special recon with the SOF in Syria. The burn isn’t so bad bc of his armor, but he still sports scarring on his the upper right side of his back. It’s his last operation with the SOF

- Routine medical checkups and talks with physicians. He is sent to a therapist but doesn’t return after the second session. Eventually his family takes over his medical care and he’s welcomed back to the family. Vadim spares no cost to help him, but their relationship remains cordial but formal

- Mik interrupted his university studies to go into the military. He resumes his degree two years after his discharge. Between the pain, his medication, the insomnia, depression, headaches, forgetfulness and sudden bouts of intense anger it’s an uphill slog despite respectably good grades. He graduates and despite working for the legal side of the family business (energy development, oil, construction, industrial technology that sorta stuff) he’s aimless and one bad night away from blowing his brains out

- fam is lowkey concerned but also not. Vadim has his Miklos shaped emotional blinders on, Avenir is inept as fuck when it comes to handling delicate situations and Milan is the only one who tries at reaching out (having been in war more recently than his older brothers, what with actually being in the special forces and the Gulf war himself even tho he spent most of it selling weapons to dubious scummy criminal types on the sly). Miklos, never talkative or visibly upset about anything, claims to be fine and Milan doesn’t want to be pushy. He remains concerned however.

-why go to therapy when you can deal with your shellshock by living a dissipated albeit broody millionaire playboy lifestyle

- Mik is (temporarily) rescued from himself by meeting Rui, who, corny as it sounds, makes him feel something other than numb, who amuses him, makes him feel cared for. She gives him the entirety of her fickle attention and isn’t put off by his silences or the times he goes away behind his eyes.

- while Mik is, objectively, a catch, based on bank account alone, Rui can (still) have her pick of the lot, lots of fish in the sea etc. It’s his vulnerability that attracted her and kept her around, although she won’t tell him that.

- Rui also wants to make sure he’s fed and sleeping properly, that he’s doing work that makes him feel fulfilled and that he’s happy (more or less). In Rui’s own words it’s pretty fucking gross

- Rui figured he was fucked up aside from just being a really quiet guy, what with the getting blown up and the PTSD and all. The mafiya stuff is pretty much whatever to Rui, she’s had sketchy boyfriends before. She doesn’t know how fucked up until after they’re married. Romantic relationships don’t cure depression

[sordidandsublime]

Weird ideas:

-Cross is working for the same criminal organization he’s in debt to. Watched a documentary about a medical doctor who survived an assassination attempt from a Mexican cartel, think one of Cross’ early jobs might have been to kill the doctor while they were recovering in the hospital he was working at. His monetary debts are paid off, but he owes them still

-maybe Cross was the doctor in attendance when Miklos was injured in Afghanistan (assuming I go with the whole, pulled briefly from the Chechen war to go hunting for rebel leaders hiding out in Afghanistan). Miklos doesn’t really remember him, he had a concussion. Cross on the other hand remembers him well

[sordidandsublime]

Rui and Miklos, driving home from a family dinner;

Rui, as if it had only just occurred to her: your uncle’s not going to go all Scar on you, is he?

Miklos: I hope not. I’d hate to kill him.

[gnossienne]

F. Floris, “"The Fall of the Rebellious Angels” (1554) (detail)

[sordidandsublime]

I might scrap my other idea for ADKOB (the immortality thing) and end up with the idea I had when I first came off that first long hiatus (not the Hiatus of 2018). Might just use the immortality idea for something else.

*that first idea was more of an urban gangland thing.

Dunno, depends if I’m still feeling it a couple days from now. I might need to scrape up a character with a personality strong enough to deal with and lead all the other characters.

[sordidandsublime]

The general shape of the ideas I had the last week or so:

- before Miklos retires, he’s working full time for a multiethnic criminal group (drugs, human trafficking, weaponry, money laundering, theft, forgery and art theft) composed of several gangs/ mafias that have decided to collaborate and form a cooperative of sorts for peace (of sorts). The group includes a small cadre of persons specializing in Miklos’ type of work. Miklos is the only one with a paramilitary/special forces background.

-Viktor is the head of this group of assassins. He and Cross aren’t related in this version. Viktor is the illegitimate son of one of the leaders of this organized crime group and a woman who left him in childhood to the care of his father. Ede (a version of her) is one of the assassins in this group along with an older fellow named Dieter who trained her. An as-yet unnamed Taiwanese-American also used to be in this group and has just recently finished a stint in prison.

- around the time Miklos is deciding to leave, there’s a violent power struggle in the leadership of the group. Viktor leads a coup against the old guard. Miklos has to choose what side he’s on. *I realize it’s this part I’m a bit foggy on cause I was more focused on character building and interaction haha. I haven’t figured what started the power struggle in the first place

-there’s some kinda triad leadership change and that fucks things up as well

- another reversal occurs and Ede, with Miklos’ help, manages to replace Viktor

-Miklos doesn’t know it, but Andrea until recently in the story was doing work for the same syndicate. He started as a young doctor to help pay off his student debts, pay for his living expenses and attempt to maintain the family estate. The work ranged all the way from killing a patient in the hospital he was working in, patching up persons who couldn’t go to hospitals without alerting the authorities and amputating kidnap victims.

-all is not well in gang land/an old victim’s family (?) wants revenge and Miklos is sucked back into it

- Andrea has a hand in helping Miklos retire. Idk how, Miklos doesn’t know

- the St Michael painting is involved in all this, at least peripherally

- so are Vadim, Milan and Lucien. Lucien more actively than the Ramazanov bro’s. Cause of art theft and the painting. We’ll figure it out

- Miklos probably has a lot of power before he retires. Aside from just eliminating problems he also has some logistic and slowly growing leadership responsibilities in the group. He was about to replace Viktor even, as leader of the killers in the gang (something he didn’t want but he wasn’t in charge of the appointment, it was a choice of the leaders of the group). Kind of a cold, gritty dark luxury if we were to describe it, visually.

- basil’s in this too. Idk if he’s in the leadership of the gang Miklos works for, or if he’s just affiliated. Has some conflict with the bratva controlling the city he’s in when they repeatedly refuse his bid to join them

[sordidandsublime]

I might scrap my other idea for ADKOB (the immortality thing) and end up with the idea I had when I first came off that first long hiatus (not the Hiatus of 2018). Might just use the immortality idea for something else.

*that first idea was more of an urban gangland thing.

Dunno, depends if I’m still feeling it a couple days from now. I might need to scrape up a character with a personality strong enough to deal with and lead all the other characters.

[absencesrepetees]

miami vice (michael mann, 2006)

[purecinema]

Miami Vice, 2006, dir. Michael Mann.

[sordidandsublime]

Like, would Milan own clubs? Like a couple in different cities around the world. His favorite one would be in Miami lol. He wouldn’t actually manage it, he’d just swan in whenever he wants. Good money laundering opportunity too.

I think the question I’m really posing is, would this be fun for Opheer.

[sordidandsublime]

Another question/musing. I left Miami (Miami of fiction, cocaine cowboys Miami, weird Florida of my childhood) behind in ADKOB, but should I revisit it in NG? Like geographically it just makes a lot of sense. It’s a transpo hub in general and for contraband in particular, a stopover between Europe and North, South America.

Just imagine it in the style of Michael Mann’s Miami Vice and I’ll be perfectly happy.

[sordidandsublime]

Like, would Milan own clubs? Like a couple in different cities around the world. His favorite one would be in Miami lol. He wouldn’t actually manage it, he’d just swan in whenever he wants. Good money laundering opportunity too.

I think the question I’m really posing is, would this be fun for Opheer.

[sordidandsublime]

Whenever I think of Vadim and Milan as children, the only readily available image I can summon is of Milan bundled into a coat (so presh) crying lustily, red and wet faced (but no doubt with a good deal of inner satisfaction in the act in his small self), wailing “Vadi!” while Vadim dutifully retrieves a handkerchief from his pocket and with amusement and good humor (to his own great surprise) proceeds to seriously (or with as much of a serious tone of voice and face as he can summon while trying not to laugh) attempt to determine what started this particular bout of tears.

Milan rarely cried over anything terribly serious; it ranged from scraped elbows to odd fancies or peeves like gloomy afternoons or that he couldn’t fall asleep in the afternoons when he wanted, or that a book on the shelf had moved from where he placed it. He almost always stopped crying as soon as he’d expressed his displeasure to his satisfaction. Anyway Vadim let Milan cry or tantrum as he liked, so long as their parents weren’t present.

[sordidandsublime]

“In childhood, the story might have gone like this. A parent needed us to be special – by virtue of intelligence, looks or popularity – in order to shore up a floundering sense of their own self. The child needed to achieve and could not, therefore, just be; their own motives and tastes were not to be part of the picture. The parent was – privately – in pain; unable to value themselves, battling an unnamed depression, furious with the course of their own lives, perhaps covertly tortured by their spouse. And the child’s mission, for which there was no option but to volunteer, was to make it all somehow better.

It seems odd to look at achievement through this lens, not as the thing the newspapers tell us it is, but – very often – as a species of mental illness. Those who put up the skyscrapers, write the bestselling books, perform on stage, or make partner may, in fact, be the unwell ones. Whereas the characters who – without agony – can bear an ordinary life, the so-called contented ‘mediocrities’, may in fact be the emotional superstars, the aristocrats of the spirit, the captains of the heart. The world divides into the privileged who can be ordinary and the damned compelled to be remarkable.”

https://www.theschooloflife.com/thebookoflife/overcoming-the-need-to-be-exceptional/

[sordidandsublime]

“Bonsoir. I’m a shameless and impatient man who hasn’t yet had the pleasure of meeting you.”

I swear telenovelas are literally the only things keeping me alive rn.

[sordidandsublime]

A question no one asked; which of the ramazanov siblings I’ve introduced so far would make for a better fling/bf/etc?

I have no answers but I can provide the ff

Milan: loves to party, travel, eat, drink, smoke, snort. Has no patience for intellectual conversation but will happily debate the hell out of a topic or take a position he doesn’t actually believe in just to take the piss. Especially willing to talk if his conversational partner is sharp. Great club date, so long as he doesn’t disappear and leave with someone else. Will gladly eat street food, get coffee at a shitty diner that just happens to have good coffee and drop several grand on a good meal at painfully exclusive restaurants. Filthy fun in bed, up for almost anything. Very handsy. Calls everyone babe. Not interested in commitment, not out to intentionally hurt anyone’s feelings (but doesn’t care whether so and so has a wife/husband/boyfriend/girlfriend whatever) just wants no strings attached fun. Isn’t a gift giver but is generous when taking someone out or nights on the town, when he remembers to be. Won’t call you in the morning.

Vadim: doesn’t go out much. Simply doesn’t have the time or the inclination. Most of his socializing is business obligation disguised as parties, dinners, birthdays, etc. Good conversation, is faintly condescending with most of the persons he takes to bed but in a humorous way. Isn’t cruel with peoples’ feelings, doesn’t see the point. Generous, intense, usually not very interested in getting off or even taking his clothes off. Difficult to shake the feeling that he might be laughing at you or maybe he’s just laughing at the world. Willing to get on someone’s level, isn’t in the habit of making people uncomfortable by flaunting money or insisting on fine things. Very generous gift giver and it’s almost certain that during the time spent with him one will eat, dress and sleep well because he will spend for one without a second thought. Gold diggers amuse him and so do hustlers on the make. A certain kind of brattiness will amuse him. If they’re charming he humors then, if they bore or irritate him he cuts them off with seeming forgetfulness. Might call you in a month or a week because he can’t call you in the morning.

Occasionally both brothers find it amusing to hurt people/drive them distracted/to tears. Bc it is funny/they are in piss poor moods. Milan’s little bouts of petty cruelty are more frequent but not as devastating as Vadim’s cool dismissals.

[sordidandsublime]

I think Emil the Pornographer from ADKOB works for Milan. Milan bought his production company after a series of comedic misfortunes. Eventually even Milan got tired of dating porn stars and getting blood tests every two months.