#redacted kody

[mythallia]

POV: You’re Kody and the Damn Crew just noticed you.

[blueberrymuffinpuffin]

i love how erik handles sa/rape in the redacted universe. 

(CW for discussions of rape/ sexual assult/ the magical equivalents for SA) 

it’s a heavy topic, and most storytellers seem to avoid it entirely. but erik doesn’t shy away from including it when it makes sense for the story. and if it’s not actual sexual assult it’s some magical equivalent, like with freelancer and kody or adam and lovely.

and he doesn’t just show the event in these cases, he shows the aftermath too. the struggle to get accountability for kodys actions, the nightmares after adam even a year later. he doesn’t make these experiences define the listener character but he still allows them to be affected by it. it’s a very realistic depiction. 

he also handles different kinds of “assult” (they’re not actual sexual assult but in the description of at least the freelancer one it’s said to be an allegory for it). with freelancer and kody it’s from a place of ignorance, being coerced into doing something you don’t fully understand with someone who *knows* you don’t fully understand. kody taking advantage of freelancer being a human born to be able to bridge with them. less overt but very insidious and very harmful.

then on the flip side, we have the other extreme. lovely being kidnapped and tortured like something straight out of a horror movie. and adam bites them repeatedly without their consent (and if i’m not mistaken, with them verbally saying “no” or at least trying to through the trance). and from the other vamps we know biting, neck biting especially, is a very intimate thing. not necessarily sexual but deeply intimate and most/ all of the vamps mix biting with sex. 

so where freelancers experience was more manipulation and coercion, lovely’s was just straight up physical force. two very different sides of assult, both portrayed very well. 

and we can also see two sides of how people navigate the activity with their partner in the aftermath. for freelancer, they can’t bridge with gavin, it’s a biological impossibility. it means they’ll never have to (or rather, never be able to) work through the possible feelings that would come up, doing the thing that traumatized them again.  you can make an argument for it representing a reaction of avoidance of “sex” after an assault, even though in universe there’s a different reason why gavin and freelancer never bridge with eachother. 

then for lovely, we get to see how these two partners navigate biting after what happened. the waiting period between the kidnapping and vincent biting them again, vincent’s assumption that lovely would never want to be bitten again. lovely still wanting to have this intimate experience with their partner even after being traumatized by adam doing it to them. how slow they went and the sheer number of check ins, but it didn’t feel patronizing towards lovely just full of love and care. 

it’s also an amazing portrayal of navigating having a partner who’s experienced sexual trauma. vincent being terrified of accidentally triggering/ re-traumatizing lovely. vincent’s self blame for not being able to protect them. vincent’s sad and complicated feelings about not being their “first”. it’s obviously the hardest for lovely, but it’s also a hard and arguably very traumatic thing for vincent to work through and it comes across very well. 

there’s a thin line between representation and fetishization when it comes to rape in media. and this line is even harder to navigate when it comes to making straight up rape fantasy audio porn (or “dubcon” yk). but i think he manages to do it well. balances keeping with storyline, not romanticizing the actions of the characters and making some very hot audios. 

the dub-con audios im referring to are ivan’s bonus audio and the imperium! vincent bonus audio. ivan’s especially i feel like truly adds to the story and makes it have more depth, which is hard to pull off with something like that. 

all that to say, mad respect to erik for being so good at handling a topic that’s very difficult to get right. 

[porters-treasure]

erik getting tumblr and seeing 3 random ppl planning ways to kill adam and kody

@h3lektra @echoschaoticreality

[elvishdemigod]

Previously, I did the Listener picrews. Now, these are their dudes, how I imagine. In the same order as their listeners.

Vamps

Vincent:

Porter:

Sam:

Shaw pack

David:

Asher:

Milo

The Balance

Elliot:

Blake:

He kept looking emo to me, I dunno. Maybe kinda looks like the guy from The Show Must Go On music video by Famous Last Words? Which...that song does fit him a little, ngl.

Brachium:

He has purple skin in my mind, but, alas, that wasn't an option. So Blue it is DA BA DEE DA BA DIE

D.A.M.N Crew

Gavin

Damien:

Huxley:

Lasko:

Caelum:

(Un)Special guest, Kody

Soverign State

Avior:

Other

Guy

[ryukawa29]

Huxley after freelancer told him about Kody:

[callumdeficiency]

Just started listening to Kodys playlist

Bro was so salty and jealous over Damian, like he couldn't go 10 minutes without saying something backhanded about hlm

[keylimeextract]

Misc. Redacted Headcanons!

Hot Singles in Your Area! (1/2)

☆⋆ ⠄⠂⋆ ･ ⠄ ⠄⠂⋆ ･ ⠄ ⠄⠂⋆ ⟡ ⋆ ･ ⠄ ⠄⠂⋆ ･ ⠄ ⠄⠂⋆ ･ . ⋆☆

⟡ Xavier was double-jointed and liked to freak people out with it

⟡ Brachium has a broken horn from someone grabbing at him while trying to escape the river of death

⟡ Theo was an outdoorsy kid and always came running back to his parents with some sort of weird critter in his hands (and promptly told to put it back immediately)

⟡ Dreamer is always fidgeting with their jewelry

⤷ A lot of their piercings are still healing long after they got them because they just can’t leave them alone

⟡ Quinn has a thing for teeth, the more “imperfect” the better

⟡ Naos primarily lives in/prefers Aria

⤷ His favorite thing about Elegy, though, is music and he will stay and explore music/record shops while out

⟡ Kody would describe his tastes as “niche” and “esoteric”

⋆₊˚.⋆☾⋆⁺₊✧ ✩₊˚.⋆☾⋆⁺₊✧ ✩₊˚.⋆☾⋆⁺₊✧ ✩₊˚.⋆☾⋆⁺₊✧ ✩₊˚.⋆☾⋆⁺₊ ⋆

[intergalcticbugbot]

How that one scene in the Inversion felt -

Once again everyone give thanks to that delightful hothead who, in the midst of all that chaos, took the time to absolutely deck that watery creep.