#ping patton

[tulipscomeinallsortsofcolors]

i’m not sure if this question even makes sense, but if you were to rank everyone in terms of how powerful they are in ping verse, how would you do that?

the twins clear every other anomaly on the planet by orders of magnitude. their powers are capable of a feedback loop that can generate theoretically infinite power. it was a really, really good thing that remus got away before the peacekeepers could figure out how to properly weaponize them.

in terms of purely destructive ability, virgil and logan are probably tied, but logan's powers have more versatile positive uses as well. as logans mental health improves post defection, he starts having to siphon off the excess energy into various rechargeable batteries remus keeps for this purpose. logan joy is a renwable resource

Patton is probably next because his powers can be used in very versatile ways, but its also a lot subtler of an ability, not as flashy or impressive as logan virgil or the twins

and then either bottom or tied with patton is probably janus, because most of janus's power comes from his intellectual ability in using his powers, not the powers themselves. he can limited shapeshift some animals parts that give him an edge in a fight against a similate or a less flashy anomaly, but his power is mostly just 'can be any normal guy with some minor additions' which is the COOLEST power definitely (source: im trans) but not really the STRONGEST power

[tulipscomeinallsortsofcolors]

how aware was Patton about Janus trying to steal him from the peacekeepers? like on a scale from "not at all" to "I know exactly what you're doing and unfortunately it's interfering with my own plans, so shoosh"

so very much the second one but with also just OODLES of fondness. Janus is his buddy. they are absolutely besties in patton's eyes and the being a supervillain and superhero is a minor detail in regards to this as far as he's concerned

this also means that, as buddies, patton's also definitely fucking with him a non-zero amount of the time

[tulipscomeinallsortsofcolors]

I have a minor headcanon that Sweetie is... not quite immune to Patton's pings, but a bit fuzzier in them. so she can occasionally include him in the demon cat jumpscares <3

oh for sure. patton is the only person on board with virgils Sweetie Is The Worlds Most Perfect Angel agenda, though not near as much as virgil is. partly because cat love and partly because he thinks everybody being afraid of this mangled little freak cat is hilarious. so sweetie jumpscaring him is not going to ping to patton because he'll be delighted by being jumpscared.

he does get pings for janus's pranks in the halloween fic, because teasing janus is funnier than the jumpscare

im going to elaborate on this more in the next fic (its the argall family reunion but there is also other stuff going on lol) but pattons actually put a lot of effort in his life into honing the pings because in a vacuum, it would be extremely easy for him to go off the villain end.

its like an algorithm - the pings he reinforces occur more frequently, and the pings he ignores tend to fade. theyre trying to make patton happy - giving him intuition into the best path for his goals. if he was the kind of person who was made happy by the misery of others, for example, the pings would tell him exactly how to do that in exquisite detail

i found this a very interesting to give patton to further explore the idea of morality + superpowers and the perennial trope that good powers make good people and bad powers bad ones. but i dont think so, i think morality is something that ought to be intentionally cultivated, not something we're born with

so pattons pings are good and kind and helpful because thats what patton chose to make them.

all of which is to say theres every possibility he sometimes gets too excited about Sweetie and starts getting pings about where to go to ensure being ambushed, which he must desperately resist because he would NEVER cheat sweetie out of a rightful win by throwing the game

[tulipscomeinallsortsofcolors]

how much have roman logan and patton actually spoken about the morality of the peacekeepers/the system before defecting? like i could imagine the conversation where logan suggests the secret backdoor messaging system being super risky if there wasnt some kind of unspoken acknowledgement that the three of them might not be as on their side as they pretend

okay so the thing here is that if patton was evil this could have been so so so very bad

because basically the progression is that patton opens their literal first interaction with an implicit 'i care more about you, personally, than i do about the handlers rules'

this immediately sets the tone and then he just keeps escalating that vibe. and Roman and Logan, cut off from their families, with only each other and not even knowing each others names, are desperate for companionship and affection and love.

so after a few months to a year of increasingly explicit "im with you, not the boss" they finally Actually Say That Out Loud probably around the same time the dark sides come on the scene. logan's communicator hack comes later still, and by the time of Destination Wedding, Roman is not at all worried about the possibility of Logan or Patton turning on him or refusing to run interference

as for how they had the initial conversations without getting caught, well there are maybe a handful of secret lefts in the last chapter of ectgir. little ones. kinda. dont panic.

[tulipscomeinallsortsofcolors]

“Keepers die every day,” said Patton dully.

“Do they?”

“Yes,” said Patton, a little more steel in his voice. He didn’t elaborate.

ALSO reading back through ectgir and i just picked up that this line is probably about morgan, like yeah patton really has hated them from the start i love him

oh yeah definitely dont think of patton 'white-knuckled repression' profeta telling himself morgans body was in the casket and he would know, he would know if it wasn't, he would know if theyd taken his brother like they did andy. he would know. because he cannot possibly contend with any other option. certainly not right then. or now, right after either

[tulipscomeinallsortsofcolors]

Just did a reread through of Every Chance and loved every bit! I was curious, there’s a point when Patton starts saying ominous seemingly nonsense? I was wondering whether, now that it’s finished, you could go in depth into what he’s saying and what you were intending with it? I love how effectively spooky it is, and was curious about the thought process behind it

its probably less directly meaningful than people thought - patton is experiencing a lot of extremely painful input from his powers and is delirious. when attempting to translate what he's seeing through its abstractness and his own hallucinations, he starts quoting tangentially relevant bible verses (mostly from the book of Revelations) because that where his brain stores the concept of "apocalypse"

[tulipscomeinallsortsofcolors]

Poor Janus was being played this whole time 😔

i need you to understand that this has been years of moceit chatting it up while they beat the shit out of each other, with Janus convinced he's so very close to cracking him, knowing Patton has a strong moral center and yet inexplicably casts his bets with the Peacekeepers???? He has no hope for Roman or Logan, but thinks if he can convince Patton to cut them loose Patton will immediately switch sides.

Janus has been HAUNTED by this task.

And the entire time Patton has been internally like "Oh yeah, Janus is my really good friend and buddy!!! Be cool if he could stop trying to undermine my long-term undercover operation tho"

[tulipscomeinallsortsofcolors]

🪺

Keepers are allowed to choose the colors and patterns of their suits - its all the same basic material, but theyre given this superficial control over their superhero appearance and name, but in return the actual person behind the mask can have no identifying markings, no tattoos, no dyed hair, no tanning, not piercings, no easily recognizable hairstyles. it doesnt really make up for it but thats the line

However sometimes handlers will pressure their Keeper one way or another and Patton's tried really really hard to make him choose a dark stealth/spy like outfit. but patton was like no <3 i wanna be robin egg blue and sunshine yellow <3 die mad about it