#flii rambles

[dragonfliier]

One toxic prompt for each Caine ship...

I'm sorry in advance, tooth man is rattling my brain. Fluff prompts soon maybe.

Showtime (Caine x Pomni): Caine's attraction to Pomni is one-sided, but she fakes a relationship with him in order to try and manipulate his adventures for the others. When the truth comes out, she's horrified to discover he actually considers this a win-win: he gets to learn what humans like and gets to date her!

Bucktooth (Caine x Jax): Post episode 7. Jax is all too willing to play any role he is given to escape his real life. If that includes being the ringmaster's personal yesman as the circus crumbles around him, then so be it. And given the ringmaster's deteriorating state? He needs someone he can confide EVERY horrible, nasty thought in.

Bowtie (Caine x Ragatha): Also post episode 7. Ragatha is always so sweet, so kind. When everyone else refuses to indulge him, Caine finds himself turning more and more to Ragatha, who is too polite to turn him down, leading her onto more and more "solo adventures" that have become a little blatantly romantic.

Royalteeth (Caine x Kinger): Caine had always admired Kinger greatly, but never had the courage to approach while Queenie was around. Yet after Queenie's abstraction, Kinger was too despondent to even consider love. How convenient for Caine that he managed to find a way to "unabstract" her... while really just wearing a different guise to get closer to his favourite king.

Crookedteeth (Caine x Zooble): In an increasingly desperate attempt to regain Zooble's favour, Zooble is soon finding that anything they say to Caine is being taken as a request. Things soon get out of control as they realize how flexible the ringmaster can be with their language.

Ribbonfloss (Caine x Gangle, rarepair ahoy?): Gangle is so fragile, and it fuels Caine's desire to be needed perhaps too much. If the adventures are a little harder, maybe she'll come to him more often! And after all that, maybe he needs to start fixing her hands-on as well.

Bluetooth (Caine x Moon): The Moon was watching when Caine deleted Abel, and soon realizes her situation is no less precarious.

[dragonfliier]

Theoretically if people would draw baby Caine without teeth and elderly Caine without teeth, can Caine's teeth be considered his hair? Discuss.

[dragonfliier]

I find it highly amusing that given all the knowledge we have around Caine that he chose to name himself after the first murderer of all time. Like I've seen posts before describing how they gave an AI Catholic guilt but it is funny to think about that to him, devouring his brother is THAT defining that he renamed himself willingly in honour of that.

On the flip side, imagine a Caine post-series who is thinking about renaming himself again. He doesn't want to be a murderer, he doesn't want to lord over his power, and on some level, he doesn't want to think about his brother who is still out there and likely better off without him. He goes through a variety of names- Ryan's too normal, Melchizedek is too much a mouthful, so on and so forth. Until he realizes he just doesn't want or need to change his name at all.

His mistakes, innumerable and hard to forgive, are still his, and the Digital Circus wouldn't exist without everything that happened. So he decides the name is suitable after all, as he lives with what he did. Just as Caine.

[dragonfliier]

TADC SPOILERS TADC SPOILERS

Don't read below the cut unless you are willing to see spoilers!

Just thinking in my head about Caine seeing the wifi door in Episode 9. Pomni seeing the Exit door in Episode 1.

In both cases: both initially desiring their unattainable dreams, then eventually going back to be with the ones they love and form connections with (Pomni in Episode 8, Caine at the end of Episode 9).

The doors are even both red.

Parallels, parallels...

Hrng they're so perfect.

[dragonfliier]

Maybe it's because I love angst but imagine a version of Episode 9 where the reason why Pomni didn't pry into Jax approaching her wasn't only because of the stress of the situation but also because she was angry at his reaction to the reveal of them being brainscans... She'd think she caused his abstraction even when it wasn't in her control. She should've been a little more forgiving, right? But then there's also Ribbit who was endlessly forgiving and all and all... there was no way to win. But she just can't find it in herself to believe that.

[dragonfliier]

Another interesting thing on the "Bubble is Caine's intrusive thoughts" theory is from the Favourite Character Award videos when Bubble actually corrects Caine's pronunciation of art-eest: "It's pronounced artist. You're wrong, Caine. Why can't you ever speak right?" To me, it sounds a lot more like internal monologue than a natural way of speaking to someone else. It's a jab, sure, but it's more a frustration rather than an accusation. Maybe a bit rambly here, but I've definitely heard that voice before.

I'll be interested to see what they do with Caine and Bubble in Episode 8, I think a lot of it has implications for whether Caine is a truly thinking entity or not.

[dragonfliier]

Random headcanon go!!

Warning: sort of suggestive?? it's more like anti-suggestive lol.

While there is a certain tickle in my soul for Caine learning human sensation, part of me imagines that even if Caine opened himself up to a wider range of human experiences, he still doesn't have a frame of reference for it.

Like imagine he finally listens to Zooble's suggestion, but when everybody expects pleasure and ecstasy it just ends up being like the feeling of a deep tissue massage or a warm bath instead, because it's a pleasant feeling. Or like Caine tries but there's a slide whistle noise every time he starts getting undressed. There's a sims-style pixelated box blocking everything from view and the only noise anything makes is "BONK" repeatedly.

It's somehow disappointing but not at the same time.

[dragonfliier]

Manifesting giving Caine a music number manifesting giving Caine a music number...

So ready for episode 8...