Hungry wasn’t good to describe it. Evie wasn’t even sure if hangry could work either. At the moment, all she knew was that she was starving and no one in this whole damn place knew how to cook!
That wasn’t to say that things weren’t edible, and that all the dishes didn’t taste good. They were just… fine. It didn’t feel like how food should feel. It didn’t bring that comfort that a good home cooked meal with love should. It didn’t give her anything to look forward to like how her mom’s chili and her dad’s gumbo would.
All it did was provide nourishment. No delight and no warmth.
That’s why she was standing at the stove at 8 PM, stirring a pot of grits, flipping over bacon, and watching to make sure her fried eggs didn’t burn. She wanted something hearty and filling-something that reminded her of home when her family was so far away.
Every light was on to account for her dimmed vision, but she would tilt the glasses up every now and then to make sure she didn’t ruin the food. Evie breathed in the scent as she hummed an absent minded tune. So what if everyone seemed to run from her when she walked by? So what of the hushed whispers when people noticed her? All that would be forgotten and stowed away with good food.
Thoughts after Beau's backstory reveal? For me, it seems to raise more questions than answers but I could be reading too much into it. I am a big fan of your CR metas, so I would appreciate any insight you can provide. Thanks!
I wasn't particularly surprised by any of it. I talked quite a bit awhile ago about the different possibilities for her "criminal background", and the sort of "rebellious teen" thing was one of the options I discussed at length. It's definitely very interesting that her criminal rebellion, or at least the major one, was specifically about stealing from her father. That actually says quite a lot. While some minor stealing here and there from their parents isn't actually that unusual when it comes to kids, when the theft is a consistent, ongoing behavior, and it's happening on a relatively large scale, it's usually one of two things: desperation (dealing with addiction, needing money to pay off debts, etc.) or some really aggressive negative feelings. Obviously, in Beau's case, it's the latter. At best, it's a complete disregard for them, their authority, their rules, etc., which would be based on a huge lack of respect. It could also come from far more severe aggression, resentment, and hatred.
That stuff doesn't come from nowhere, so I'll be very interested to learn more about her backstory prior to her criminal rebellion, the things her father did and what happened in their relationship that led to those feelings. We've definitely been given hints, with Beau talking about how her parents wanted a boy and how she felt like she was living a life meant for someone else. I'm very interested in seeing exactly how those things played out in her childhood.
Please stop talking. The only people making this fandom worse is you by trying to stir shit up. Maybe if you didn't try to make it out like every single character is asexual people wouldn't feel like they need to try to get you to shut up.
NOTE: As per my “fic in response to hate” policy, there is fic at the bottom of this post!
Having ace/aro headcanons is not "stirring shit up". Pointing out that there are ace people in this fandom and that we like to be included in discussions about characters' sexual identities is not "stirring shit up". Pointing out the ignorance and erasure of posts and arguments that attack and hurt us is not "stirring shit up". Unless you think that the mere existence of us in the fandom is "stirring shit up". In which case, your ignorance and hatred is your own problem.
Discussing the possibility that some characters could be ace/aro or pointing out that it's possible that and of the characters are ace/aro is hardly "making all the characters out to be ace". Perhaps you should explore why the idea of these characters being ace/aro bothers you so much.
Now, in response to such a hateful ask, here's some fic! Ace Caleb fic!
I’ve never written Caleb before, and I’ve only written Beau once, so I have no idea how good of a handle I have on their characterization and voices. Sorry if it sucks. I just really wanted to write something about one of the characters being ace in response to such a horrible ask.
A Question. Beau and Caleb. Rated T.
Beau yawned, wiping at her eyes and blinking hard, trying to stay awake for the last half hour of their watch. A few feet away from her sat Caleb, flipping through the pages of one of his books. It looked like he was perusing more than reading, probably trying to keep himself awake just as much as she was.
"Hey, since we're friends and everything now," Beau started, figuring an awkward conversation might be just the thing to keep them from falling asleep, at least for thirty minutes. "Can I ask you a question?"
"You can ask," Caleb said after a beat, not looking up from his book. "But I may decline to answer."
"Okay, well," she started, shifting so she was facing him a bit more. "It's probably none of my business, but I'm totally just trying to help. So you can just tell me to shut up or whatever. But have you ever thought that, you know... getting laid might help?"
Caleb's hand froze mid-page turn, and after a long, long second he looked over at her. She could see the blush that covered his cheeks, especially now that there wasn't a beard in the way, and his eyes were wide, bulging almost. "Are you suggesting..." he said, his voice high and uncomfortable. "That you and I...?"
"Oh god, no!" Beau shouted, so stunned by the idea that she forgot about the people sleeping around her. "No!" she repeated, quieter this time. "I mean, no offense. You're just not my type."
"Okay," Caleb drawled out slowly. "Then what are you getting at?"
"Well, it just seems like you're always sad or stressed or whatever. Which I totally get considering... everything. But maybe doing something like... getting a little action might chill you out a little bit. At least for awhile."
Her voice trailed off, expecting Caleb to interject with... something. Instead, he was very quiet, staring at his book intently. She started to think that he'd simply gone back to reading, electing to just ignore her, when he finally spoke up. "That's just not something that interests me."
"Oh." It was information she had to take a moment to process, not entirely sure what exactly he meant. "You mean like, it doesn't interest you to do it with just random people, or do you mean it doesn't interest you at all?"
A barely perceptable sigh escaped him as his shoulders hunched up a bit, his knees drawing in closer to his chest. "It doesn't interest me at all."
"Has it ever?"
"No, it has not."
"Oh," she said again. "I guess I just didn't realize that there were people... okay. Cool."
"Cool?" he asked, his voice small and tinged with disbelief and just a bit of hope.
"Yeah, cool. If it's not your thing it's not your thing."
Beau didn't think that Caleb had ever smiled at her before. It certainly seemed to be a first.
"Wait, though," she said, remembering something he'd mentioned. "You said when you were telling me about all the... stuff that happened to you that you had fallen in love."
The smile dropped off his face instantly, replaced with something far more familiar, that shadow of sadness and burden that's usually hanging on him. "Ja."
"So you were in love with someone but you two never...?"
He was silent for a long moment, his brow furrowing as he studied her. "You do know that you don't have to..." he trailed off, searching for the right words, "...engage physically with someone in order to be in love with them, don't you?"
Beau flushed, a bit embarrassed. "Well, I guess... Yeah, I mean, I guess I just never really though of it... Obviously, yeah."
"Yes."
"Okay. Cool," she said again.
"Cool." Caleb's smile returned. It was far dimmer than it had been before, but she could see it there, as he turned his gaze back to the pages of his book.
"Don't worry. I'll think of something else you can do that will help you chill out a little bit," she promised, leaning back against the tree, closing her eyes for just a moment."
"Cool," he responded, the smile still clear in his voice.
I'm glad that SOMEONE recognized how controlling Beau was being. Caleb was being controlling, but she was too. The things you pointed out like the way she just talked over Calli and then not asking anyone in the M9 what they thought. She was basically doing what Caleb did, just from the other side of the argument. The fact that Calli was like "no, Caleb was right and he's the only one who gets it" just shows that Beau was kinda making it all about herself.
As with someone else who sent an ask about this, it wasn't until my second watch that the fact that Beau was also controlling in the situation became clear. Talking over Calli, who was trying to interject (and who would probably would have diffused the situation right there if she'd been able to talk, as she agreed readily to having a spell cast on her, offered a suggestion to make that happen, and then said that Caleb was the only one who understood the danger the bowl represented) demonstrated that Beau's actions weren't about Calli. They weren't about trusting her or anyone trying to "control" her destiny. It was about her, her feelings, and her own issues that she seemed to be projecting onto the situation.
Talking over Calli, who the situation was largely about, was controlling in and of itself, and then not asking the rest of the group for their input and making it difficult for Caleb to explain to the group what he wanted to do was further controlling behavior. Just as Caleb had taken over the situation without any input from the group because he thought that he knew best, Beau basically did the same thing. She thought she was right, that Caleb was wrong and was motivated by his trauma (which, again, at least in part misrepresents his motivations, and could very much come from Beau filtering Caleb's actions through her knowledge of what happened to him, something that often happens when people know about another person's trauma), and that was it.
That's one of the things that ultimately makes the whole thing so interesting. They were both being controlling in their actions, just on different ends of the spectrum. They were both projecting things onto the situation that didn't really belong there (though I would say that Beau was probably doing that more, because Caleb having knowledge of how horribly magic can be used because of his trauma doesn't mean that he's projecting his trauma), making the group kind of caught between it, and demonstrating very clear issues that each one has and the potential place that those issues come from.
Honestly, I don't think there is any objective argument for either character being 100% right. They were both showing very controlling behavior and projecting things that had nothing to do with the situation onto the whole thing. Caleb and Beau are a lot more similar than people seem to think. Their dispositions are very different, and they way their issues manifest are different, but they've shown some similar behaviors and likely both have some kind of trauma in their younger years that they haven't dealt with, and are pushing down and "dealing with" (perhaps not the right phrase, as I don't think either one of them is actually dealing with their issues, but I couldn't think of a different way to phrase it) in ways that are neither effective nor healthy.
The thing is that the team is doing things in response to the stuff Caleb's PTSD makes him do in ways that are going to make things way worse. Molly pinning him to the wall talking about skimming of the top like he was just being selfish would make his anxiety go up hugely and Beau yelling at him about his trauma and then throwing it in his face is going to fuck with his ability to trust.
This is true. In Molly’s defense, he probably wasn’t aware that Caleb has PTSD, or at least how deep it goes and where it comes from. However, he totally understood Caleb’s anxiety. Taliesin said on Talks Machina that he specifically did that wall pinning to make him uncomfortable. Exploiting someone’s anxiety like that is never okay, and intentionally doing something that elicits an anxious response is not going to make the point that’s being made stick, because once that anxiety starts the words are not the thing that’s being focused on.
Beau’s behavior could very much have an impact on his trust capabilities. Definitely where she’s involved, and possibly with others. She was one of only two people he trusted his deepest, darkest secret with, and after that he had done things to try to demonstrate to her that they could have each other’s backs now (like giving her haste in her fight with Jester). Using what he told her, throwing it at him in a way that kind of misrepresented his motivations, could very much make him have a reaction where he feels like he can’t share personal information because he can’t trust people to not use it to hurt him.
What’s interesting is that Beau’s inability to handle the confrontation in an effective way, and even to see Caleb’s initial motivation, is likely very much either influenced by her own trauma or her youth. As discussed in another post, both brains effected by PTSD and brains that are still developing struggle with a lot of things, like empathy, problem solving, emotional regulation, understanding consequences, future planning, etc. Basically, lots of things that help to see another person’s point of view and understand where they’re coming from. She also got controlling herself, grabbing that bowl and then not even really asking the rest of the group what they wanted to do, instead just presenting her position as the right thing to do. That kind of stubborn and controlling behavior is also something that comes with both PTSD and a still developing brain.
So far, exempting Nott (because her handling of Caleb’s issues is a whole other thing that probably needs its own post), Jester is probably the one who has handled demonstrations of Caleb’s issues best. Though her “you shouldn’t stop people from talking to gods if they want to talk to gods” was, at best, painfully naive, the way she handled the aftermath of their argument about money was sensitive and understanding. Fjord has also demonstrated patience, outside of the whole “threatening to kill him for taking the scroll” thing.
THANK YOU SO MUCH for pointing out that Caleb's controlling stuff comes from the PTSD. Lots of people are bitching about him "hoarding" items and being bossy and obvs not getting that it's a part of his illness. You're pretty much the only person who's said it. I got really controlling when I was in the worst of my PTSD. You want to control things so that you can make sure nothing bad happens to you again. It's not something he can control.
I decided to answer all of these asks at the same time because they kind of all go into the same topic.
Ask #2: the thing that got me about beau when i rewatchedd was that she was making it about her. callie was trying to talk to caleb about it and beau just talked right over her. i was more neutral right after the episode but now that i rewatched beau doesnt really have a leg to stand on. she made the whole thing about her
Ask #3: I gotta be honest I kinda laughed at loud when Beau was telling Caleb that he can't let his trauma blah blah blah because I was just like "I'm 99.9% sure that that's what you're doing most of the time"
Ask #4: I was with Beau at least with her being angry that Caleb was pretty much trying to make all the decisions for the group, but then she got hypocritical about it. That's the thing that really got to me. She was acting like Caleb was trying to control everything, but then she started to do the same thing. She didn't even really ask anyone else if they agreed with Caleb or what they thought. She just decided she was right so that was the way it was, no other input needed.
Control issues are incredibly common with PTSD. Naturally, people who have suffered through trauma and remain effected by it are worried about it happening again, so they try to do whatever they can to control their environment and the situations they're in so that bad things don't happen to them, so that their trauma isn't repeated. In a way it's a form of self-comfort, being able to know exactly what's happening because they're in control of the situation. There's also the fact that during a trauma, a person has no control over the situation, so control issues spring up as a way to reclaim that control that was lost.
I know that when people think of PTSD, the things that come to a lot of people's minds are violent outbursts and flashbacks. But people with PTSD are impacted by their trauma and their illness pretty much every second of their life. It has a huge impact on interpersonal communication, personal emotional control, cognition, and behavior. It's not as though they're in some sort of flashback or recreation state 24/7, nor is it as though when they're not having flashbacks they're fine. It effects so much, almost everything they do in some way.
Caleb's PTSD is going to make him controlling in general, and it's going to be especially true when he's in a situation that reminds him specifically of his trauma. The situation with Cali and the bowl probably very much did that, as her back story of being taken in by a charismatic leader and made to feel special only to find that they were being made to do horrible things is very similar to Caleb's story, and because he's seen how incredibly powerful magic can be used for horrible things first hand. It wasn't just "oh, Caleb's being paranoid". His control issues aren't really something that he can control right now. Not until he starts confronting his illness.
This episode actually showed some progress in that regard. He absolutely didn't handle the situation as he should have, basically using his party as a meat shield and springing the bowl on them. But the fact that he didn't try to just keep the whole thing to himself and handle it without telling the group shows that he's making progress in being more trusting and less controlling. He still has a ways to go. But it should be noted that, in story time, this is progress that has taken place over the span of just a few weeks. That’s pretty good growth for that time frame.
And yes, it should be noted out that Beau also demonstrated controlling behavior in the whole thing as well. She did talk over Calli, effectively making it about her issues with Caleb and not Calli and not even necessarily the specific situation they were in. And, quite possibly, making it about her own issues. And it is true that she didn't really ask for input from the rest of the group, either.
As I discussed in a post earlier, Beau also demonstrates a lot of potential symptoms of PTSD or other trauma disorders as well, so it's not unlikely that her trying to take control in that situations comes from a very similar place as Caleb. I definitely think she was projecting a lot onto the whole situation, far more than it seems a lot of people think. Add to that the fact that she's still very young and the part of her brain that controls things like empathy, problem solving, and understanding other perspectives. I was surprised by the fact that there seemed to be so many people who that there were absolutely no problems with anything she did, because her actions were clearly those of a very young person who has the arrogance, lack of understanding of consequences, lack of empathy, and so on that comes with a still developing brain, and it seemed pretty obvious she was projecting SOMETHING from her backstory onto the whole thing (pretty much confirmed by one of Marisha's tweets).
Here's that post on Beau's trauma, how it impacts her behavior, and how her age and neural development comes into play. It's a continuation of this post.
She clearly has some kind of trauma, but we don't know what it is yet. There's some shape to it. There are obvious issues with her father, specifically based on what she said about Dairon flicking her in the back of the head reminding her of her father. And she seems to have some issues surrounding the things her father did to make powerful people happy. She wants to know everything, to the point where she acts like she's entitled to literally all the information. She seems to have issues with the idea of people controlling her. She's incredibly avoidant of dangerous situations that don't have some apparent benefit. Finally, her disposition and issues with communication could have some root in her trauma.
Her preoccupation with knowing everything and her tendency to take a "not my problem" approach to things like the Drow assassin/dodecahedron and giving the bowl to Cali is very consistent behavior with a trauma disorder. In such disorders, these are behaviors that come from the need to protect oneself from danger, from always being in some form of a fight or flight state. Seeking all the information is about being able to protect yourself, knowing everything so you can make the decisions you need to make to avoid danger and keep yourself safe. Avoiding dangerous situations that aren't directly beneficial to her is, obviously, about avoiding any unknowns or any danger that could hurt her or people she cares about.
A lot of her communication shows signs of a trauma disorder as well. She doesn't control her anger impulses very well, she sometimes has a bit of a lack of affect in certain discussions, she's incredibly stubborn, she's not able to pick up on certain social cues.
Whether or not all of these things are a product of her trauma... well, that's something we won't be able to know for sure until we know her back story.
Another thing to keep in mind is that she's still relatively young. I believe Marisha said on Talks Machina that she's early 20s, around 23-24. The human brain continues to develop well into our 20s, and sometimes even into our 30s, and since the brain develops back to front, the frontal lobe/pre-frontal cortex is the part that develops last. That's the part of the brain that controls things like impulse control, a deeper understanding of consequences, an true understanding of mortality, emotional regulation, decision making, future planning, empathy, reward seeking behavior, selective attention, motivation, and classification/categorization, among other things.
A lot of Beau's behavior demonstrates one of two things: a still developing frontal lobe, or a brain that underwent significant trauma during key parts of the development of the frontal lobe. As Marisha said, Beau thinks she's immortal, and that falls in line with lacking a true understanding of mortality and consequences. She takes a very "if it doesn't impact me then fuck it" attitude with things like the bowl and the Drow assassin/dodecahedron, demonstrating either a lack of caring or lack of understanding of the consequences that exist in those things being in the wrong hands and possibly poor future planning, and it also shows, when combined with her focus on working for money or other things that would specifically benefit her, demonstrates that the part of the brain controlling motivation is still developed/under developed. She sometimes has very strong anger reactions, which is in line with a lack of emotional regulation and impulse control. Her empathy, and specifically her ability to express it, absolutely shows a lack of development.
If Beau's brain is still developing, then its likely that her experiences with the Mighty Nein will have a big impact on the way these things develop, hopefully for the better. If it's a result of experiencing trauma during key points of development, developing past some of those less healthy behaviors and mindsets is more difficult, but it's definitely possible. I think that it's likely a combination of whatever trauma she went through and her brain still developing, so her further character development could be very interesting as she both gets older and has new experiences in the world that are vastly different than those in which she grew up.
I've always liked Beau but I just can't with her last night. When someone shares their trauma with you you don't turn around a couple days later and basically go "fuck your trauma it shouldn't effect you". There were a million different ways she could have talked to him and she went with that. Now I'm just worried she's going to resort to "it's your trauma" everytime she doesn't agree with him. She really needs to learn how to talk to him or she's going to fuck him up
It actually can be very easy for people to start applying another person’s trauma to all of their actions and disagreements. Not usually in any kind of spiteful or careless way, like it being an easy way to win an argument (although there absolutely are people who do this). It’s usually because when you know something like that about a person, it can be really hard to not view everything they do through that lens. Especially if you don’t know them particularly well. But it’s something that we have to be really, really careful about, because if you bring up a person’s trauma every time you disagree with them or every time you criticize them and attribute their words, actions, or choices to it, they’re going to stop trusting you real quick. And it has the potential to make them start looking at their actions, their trauma, and the relationship between the two in a pretty unhealthy way. So I very much hope that this is not something that happens where Beau and Caleb are concerned.
There are absolutely ways to talk to people, to be critical of their behavior, to express concern, etc. who have post traumatic stress.
Dialogicality is something that a lot of practitioners and teachers really stress when it comes to professionals treating victims of trauma, but it’s also something that’s really important when it comes to interactions and discussions between friends, family, or acquaintances about a person’s trauma. Dialogicality means that there’s a fluid movement between who is talking and who is listening, so both parties get a chance to say what they think and feel without being interrupted with reciprocal communication. This can only happen when the motivations involved aren’t selfish. So it can’t be approached by either party as just unloading on the other person. It’s approaching it from the perspective of “I have concerns about your behavior and I want to talk about them so we can find a we to work together to make it better.” It should never, ever be about “I’m right and you’re wrong.” It needs to be about “we’re in this together, so let’s figure it out together.”
Often, when people get frustrated by another person’s behavior and they think that behavior has to do with their trauma, the approach the person in an angry way, as though the person in question is aware that this behavior is effected by their trauma and is doing it anyway. The thing is, they often don’t realize the ways in which their behavior is effected by what happened to them. And it has to be understood that oftentimes certain things, certain events, or words, or thoughts are going to be filtered through the lens of that trauma, so they’re not able to recognize where parts of their thought process might not be logical or effective. So coming at them with anger, telling them to stop letting their trauma dictate their behavior, is going to do no good. It’s just going to confuse and upset them. You need to express exactly how you think that their trauma is effecting their behavior, especially in this specific instance. And it’s important to really listen to them respond because sometimes, you might be wrong.
Perhaps the biggest things is to never, ever minimize their trauma or equate it with anyone else’s. No “everyone has their trauma” or “a lot of people have trauma” or “all of us have trauma”, and no “your trauma isn’t as bad as that person’s”. For one thing, trauma doesn’t work that way. The impact a person’s trauma has on their life and their psyche often has very little to do with the severity of it, or how severe it is in comparison to someone else’s. It’s about several things, including brain chemistry and an individuals personal experience, things that are confined to the self, so none of it can really be compared to anyone else. Minimizing trauma and its effects can do a tremendous amount of damage. It causes a lot of regression, can lead to issues with impulse control when it comes to behaviors related to the trauma, can lead to a lot of self-blaming and overall makes it much harder for a person to recover.
It’s also important to remember the different ways that trauma disorders impact a person’s communication. I think most people realize that people with PTSD have a hard time communicating, but they don’t really understand why or where it’s coming from. Trauma disorders put people in a very strange state. Their fight or flight response is often on high alert, they have very little control over their anger impulses, they’re left feeling helpless, and they frame a lot of what’s happening around them as “how can I minimize the danger?” It also causes issues with procession information, concentrating, and memory, and their emotions are heightened, so they’re incredibly sensitive to the emotion expressed by other people. They also develop pretty specific feelings and ideas about trust and betrayal. All of these leads to people with trauma disorders having a hard time understanding how a person is going to react to their words or actions, being able to control their anger, being stubborn, not being assertive, missing connections, reading too much in to tones of voice/body language/etc., and remembering what they want to say.
Those things lead to all kinds of things that can make communicating difficult. The issues with being able to make connections means that they might not understand what you mean. So if you just come at them with “stop letting your PTSD control you” they might not be able to make the connection between the idea you’re presenting about their PTSD and their actions. The combination of being stubborn and rigid while also struggling with assertiveness often leads to them taking off and walking away when an argument isn’t going the way they want it to. Anger, sadness, annoyance, irritation, etc. in a person’s tone of voice are going to sort of amplify in their minds so they focus much more on that than what’s being said. Memory and concentration issues will make it hard for them to take in everything you’re saying. The fact that they’re always in some kind of fight or flight state and looking to minimize the danger to themselves means they’re going to have a hard time seeing other points of view. And they’re likely going to have big reactions to perceived breaches of trust.
That’s why it’s so important to approach people with trauma disorders in calm ways with limited negative emotion and have reciprocal communications.
The thing is, this can be really hard to do if you’re someone who has not dealt with their own trauma. Having trauma disorders has a major impact on a lot of things, but the ones that really impact communication are empathy and vulnerability.
In order to have calm and reciprocal communication with a person who is suffering from PTSD, you have to be empathetic to what they are going through and be able to calmly handle it when things aren’t going the way you want them to. And you have to be able to be vulnerable so that they can see you care and that your concern is genuine.
Trauma disorders really mess with your empathy and vulnerability because you are constantly in “protect yourself, everything is a danger” mode. And all of the above things I talked about that make it difficult to communicate with a someone with a trauma disorder is going to make it tremendously difficult for a person with PTSD to have this kind of discussion with another person with PTSD.
Sadly, the fact that people struggling with trauma are constantly trying to minimize the danger to themselves means that their perception of another person’s actions might not exactly be accurate.
That’s why Beau is probably not the person to have this kind of conversation with Caleb (which means that, ultimately, she probably isn’t the one who should be the sole holder, other then not, of this information within the group.) She clearly has some trauma from her childhood, whether it was from an individual experience or long lasting traumatic situation, and she has not dealt with it. Combine that with the fact that she’s still relatively young and is possibly still undergoing some neural development in the areas closest to the front of her brain, which control things like impulse control, understanding consequences, problem solving and reasoning, and emotional regulation, and she’s probably one of the last people who should have the responsibility of that information, and who should be having such discussions with Caleb.
This is already super long, so a little later today I’ll make a post about the things about Beau’s characterization that demonstrate the existence of some kind of trauma disorder, and how her age and neural development might also play into all of it. Once I’ve written and posted it, I’ll link it here.
