Hey Axel! Idk if it'd be too much, but I'd really like to hear about your story/main timeline with Clancy and Torchbearer! I always see you mentioning bits and pieces of it. But I'm so curious to hear about the whole thing!!
(You can hold onto this ask in your inbox, if you wanna take time to flesh things out more before sharing.)
~ <3 your loving mutual, @frogshipping
@frogshipping
INHALES
EXHALES
LETS DO THIS
DISLCAIMERS REAL QUICK MY COMMANDMENTS IF YOU WILL:
This is so long, I tried to supplement with images for Vibes
If this doesn't make sense its bc i'm high and it is a big ol struggle to type my ass is not proofreading this
THANK YOU FOR SHOWING INTEREST IN MY BOYS AND GIVING ME AN EXCUSE TO KIND OF CHEW THROUGH MY IDEAS
putting this under a cut, but be warned it is uhhhh VERY LONG
I have included several gifs/pictures in this infodump, and also there are mentions of self harm/depression/suicide so please be cautious when reading! Not in detail, but it is there.
So the story of Clancy goes from the albums Blurryface to Breach, a five album set with different 'eras' representing different parts in Clancy's story and timeline. It's a huge complicated thing that the fandom is still deeply struggling to put together because our content creator wants to make some sort of zodiac killer cyptic puzzle inside an arg for us to get the news I DIGRESS THOUGH.
So my story with Clancy starts with his, at the end of the Blurryface Album where we're introduced to him and the concept of DEMA in Trench album also.
Clancy's main thing is that he was a citizen of DEMA since he was born. He started to learn and discover that he was an exception to the Bishops (the nine beings that rule DEMA and control it through religion) and escaped beyond the city walls to the continent of Trench with the help of Torchbearer, who can project himself as different forms and lead Clancy to him!
This is what Trench looks like also. The big ol' circular thing is in fact DEMA.
ALL THAT OUT OF THE WAY WE CAN GET TO MY STORY:
Basically, Clancy and I are childhood friends who grew up in DEMA together. He was in one Bishop's area (Keons) and I was in another (Listo). We were always sneaking around to meet one another and stay together. DEMA isn't known for letting people feel any positive emotion. So, when Clancy and I started to feel that for one another the more we spent time together, it was so new and strange. We were friends for years basically, way before he tried to escape and succeeded. We've gone through the highs and lows of DEMA depression together, a lot of struggling including self harm and self hatred within ourselves, but we always ended up clinging to one another.
We knew we loved one another near the end, but, in DEMA there was no way we could say it without getting in trouble. Getting locked away for a designated 'act against vialism' (thats the religion btw it sucks).
So Clancy finds ways to escape. The first time he went out, I stayed behind. Listo, whose a representation of the fear of abandonment and connection (teehee i projected) got his claws into me a bit more day by day.
When Clancy was brought back by Nico, however, we reunited. He brings me a yellow flower and talks about how he saw it. Beyond The City. It's that yellow flower he brings me back the last time, asking me to go with him. That he finally found the way we can actually get out. I was scared, badly so, but Clancy held out his hand to me.
I knew I couldn't leave him, so I went with him instead.
When we escaped, it was through a tunnel on the East side of DEMA, and that's where we met Torchbearer! We follow him and a group of Banditos (the rebels outside of DEMA who were banished for breaking out of the cycle of The City) back to the Bandito Camp, where they plan and fight to help free other citizens in DEMA and bring them to the Banditos to fight against it.
Trench ERA kind of begins then! Basically, Clancy bringing me out to Trench is a culture shock and we both stick by one another. The first time we were out together, we lay in patches of yellow flowers and grass and watched the clouds. Later we lay in the same spot to watch the stars, never having seen them since you couldn't in DEMA over its lights.
It was then that Clancy decided to confess to me, for us to fully say that we loved one another, and we kissed. It was our first kiss! And it was very romantic under the stars. We became a couple after that!
All the while, Clancy grew closer with Torchbearer. So did I, but we for sure started out as 'our mutual friend is Clancy' since we're both quiet and don't really socialize too much. We're friendly and close in that way, but we don't Love one another yet. I admit I do get a crush on him, and when Clancy wonders if it's okay to see him too with me, we all agree because we love seeing Clancy happy! In the end, that's what made us okay with being kind of poly together, Clancy's love and our devotion to him. We respected that about one another.
So we spent time in Trench with the Banditos, a sort of fresh start where we lived and slowly recovered. Our love grew stronger in the camp, and we barely left one another's side as we explored new parts of our relationship, the world, and everything else. It was odd, navigating it, but we always did our best and were still loyal to one another and never ever stopped caring.
Then Nico finds the camp one day and captures me first. He uses me to kind of lure Clancy away and also take him back, which is kind of the switch to the Scaled and Icy Era!
SAI is a weird era honestly. In this era, Clancy is taken by the Bishops, put in jail, forcibly colored his hair pink, and then made him write songs and perform for the amusement of the citizens of DEMA, and the Bishops who hosted the show would torture him and hurt him the whole time. The worst part is, every time, they would keep me nearby or keep me to watch him. If he did anything, Listo would simply threaten to end me and possess me as his new vessel. So I was a sort of radio/commercial host between Clancy's Good Day DEMA performances and concerts.
SAI ends with Saturday the music video, in which Clancy is singing in a submarine that's full of the next group of Vialists to be sacrificed. Listo puts me on it so that Clancy would have no choice but to watch me die while he is forced to perform.
However, the submarine gets broken by a giant ancient Dragon creature named Trash, and Clancy escapes with his life to an island off of the coast of Trench, past the Paladin Strait which is an actual body of water in the story. The island he's on is called VOLDSOY and he meets these lil creatures called NEDS, who gift him the ability to Seize bodies and use them just as the Bishops in DEMA can! I forget if I mentioned the ability, but they can sure do that!
While Clancy is on Voldsoy, however, I end up on the other side back on Trench, where Torchbearer finds me and brings me back to camp.
From there, Torchbearer and I have more time to develop our relationship. He takes over as leader, and so do I as I was known as one of Clancy's best friends and confidants. Everyone thought it was natural for us to be paired together to fight for the camp and lead it. That was when Torch and I grew closer and closer, soon falling for one another over a span of time!
The first date he took me on, I didn't know it was a date. He walked me through the woods and we watched the sun set together, he made me a crown of flowers and put it on my head. Then I jokingly said 'What, is this a date' to which he goes '??? yes???' AND THAT'S HOW WE KIND OF STARTED DATING.
When Clancy finally comes back from Voldsoy after training up his powers, starting a revolution from far away inside the city with the use of his abilities, I all but tackle him when I see him back. We have this big giant warm reunion, but, I can tell he's exhausted and tired from his journey. From being alone and isolated for so, so long. We care for him and kind of catch him up on what we've had going on, including me and Torch's relationship.
Clancy is happy, and is grateful all three of us can share our love, and he ends up squished between me and Torch while we hold him <3.
Clancy basically begins the revolution with the Banditos and leads them to DEMA to fight against Nico and the Bishops. There's a huge battle between the zombie bodies of citizens of DEMA who succumbed to Vialism and their life was ended for it and the Banditos.
While the fight is happening, Clancy basically spider man crawls up one of the tall Bishop towers where the Nine Bishops reside.
The events of City Walls then occur, where Nico tries to corrupt Clancy, and it fails so Clancy can get into a bit fight with him.
It follows the plot of the MV then, in which Clancy gets killed by Nico basically and he becomes the next Bishop in Nico's place, ruling over DEMA in the same cyclical way. Torchbearer has to leave him and find the Next Clancy to start the cycle over again and try once more to free DEMA.
That's when I start having my diverging timelines that can go 3 ways, which I've talked about in this post.
BUT YEAH THAT WAS THE REALLY REALLY BRIEF SUMMARY OF IT! I'm literally writing an entire fic for this when I have time, so hopefully I can go more in depth with that! But to chew through a lot of band lore and timelines, this is the best I got!
Summary: An infodump about the Vampire!Nevermore x Vampire hunter!Robert AU
Characters: Nevermore Grimes, Robert Robertson III, Aerith Lake, Amarilis, Anya, Kira Grimes, Robert “Robbie” Robertson II, Robert “Bobby” Robertson, La Tierra Madre (“The Earth Mother”)
Ship: Nevermore Grimes x Robert Robertson III
AU: Scorned (Tagged as a subcosm on my MaDD blog)
Warnings/Tags: Enemies to lovers, familial feuding, vengeance on vengeance, violence, death and murder, discussion of a made-up religion and deity, and some angst here and there, also I’m figuring out the vampire logic of this world as I go so don’t expect any folklore accuracy 😅
Word Count: 1,170
Prompts + Header by @/strawbeaniie
Dividers by @/toastray
In this world, The Elemental team from my main paracosm (The Ember Blade Chronicles) is a quartet of elemental-powered vampires.
The differences in this AU delve into the lore of the elemental religion (which I still have yet to name), and really the biggest differences sprout from their goddess, La Tierra Madre (“The Earth Mother”), reacting to her first creations betraying her in anger rather than sadness. There’s more on the original lore here if you want to see how that went down in The Chronicles.
So, we have our four ancient evil spirits, Surge, Inferno, Flora, and Cascade, and they’re destroying the world and all that. Except, rather than lock them away and grieve, Madre destroyed them and created the new elemental vampires as a kind of convoluted generational punishment.
Thus, rather than bless the womb of a mother and turn her children into elementals to protect the human race, Madre used her powers to raise four brothers from the dead (their names are the same: Andrix, Nash, Alek, and Archer) to create monstorous creatures for the human race to hate and kill for years to come (and hate and kill they did).
As an added punishment, since Inferno was the spirit who incited the almost-end-of-the-world, Madre cursed the fire elemental spirit to destroy its undead body from the inside out. See where this is going?
Fast-forward to the modern day (finally!) and our vampire elementals are royals in an underground vampire kingdom. One silly detail I want to mention is that I literally just took their ages and added a zero (so, normally Nevermore is 34, but in this AU she’s 340).
Anywho, that fire elemental curse basically puts Nevermore in the unfortunate situation of having elemental powers and not being able to use them without effectively killing herself. Stress and anger can also cause her powers to manifest, which does some pretty gnarly things to her (the most obvious symptoms are smoke billowing out of her mouth and she starts to smell Very Burnt).
I feel like there’s something to be said here about a potential allegory for chronic illness, but I don’t actually have experience in that arena, so I’ll keep my trap shut on that.
But, ROBERT!!! Hoo, boy, here’s where things get interesting.
I kept the whole generational hero idea because yes. We love. Instead of Mecha Men, the Robert Robertsons are a lineage of vampire hunters. Bobby (Robert Robertson the first) had the longest and most successful hunting career, but was killed in an eventual vampire ambush. Robbie (Robert Robertson II), was successful in killing Nevermore and Aerith’s mother, Kira, but was caught and killed by Nevermore herself in an immediate bout of vengeance.
But, vengeance begets vengeance, because about fourteen years later, with one generation of elemental vampires left, here comes Robert Robertson III (our Robert <3) to avenge his father. Cue the enemies to lovers.
So he sneaks into the castle one night and attacks the first elemental he finds. Aerith.
If you know anything about Nevermore’s sister, you know she’s generally a peacekeeper. Nevermore’s polar opposite. Like, if Aerith wasn’t an Avenger, she’d be a hardcore pacifist. This Aerith is no different.
So, Robert attacks her, and Aerith refuses to fight back. Nevermore notices the commotion and rushes in to defend her.
But, if you know anything about Robert, he has hands. This is the guy that bit a guy’s thumb off in a bar fight. Needless to say, he’s doing just fine against Nevermore. So she’s getting desperate, her powers manifest, and she starts smoking.
The other elementals show up, Robert is subdued and thrown into the castle dungeon, and Nevermore is injured for the coming days.
So, some days later, Nevermore is feeling sort of better (she lost her voice for a little longer and by this point is still a little weak and pained), so Robert is brought out of the dungeon and put in front of the elementals to determine his fate.
Amarilis and Anya are dead set on killing him, Aerith is unsure but distraught as Robert’s attack brought back memories of her mother’s murder, and Nevermore comes to the conclusion that death would be too merciful of a punishment for the son of her mother’s murderer. Thus, he’s condemned to indentured servitude until the elementals can figure out what to do with him.
But, spending more time with one another causes sparks to fly, and before they know it… Smooch smooch <3
I have to say, some things I love about this dynamic:
Both Nevermore and Robert dislike being what they are, and that oddly brings them closer. Robbie mercilessly training Robert to hunt and kill at any cost, and Nevermore being raised only to be killed and turned to continue her immortal lineage? And then they fall in love but are painfully aware that their romance would be disapptointing their dead parents? OOF. Yeah, it hits. Call that undead Romeo & Juliet.
Vampire x human is such a cute pairing I fear. Nevermore will be as rough with Robert as she is, but is still protective of him when it comes down to it. And he loves his protective elemental vampire girlfriend, trust. She also refuses to turn him. Ever. If Robert ever asked her to (which he wouldn’t) she would shut that down so fast. He does, however, convince her (with much effort and time) to occsionally bite and feed from him.
Also, Robert doting over Nevermore when her elemental and vampire sides clash? Treating her burns and holding her when she’s feeling weak? Ouhhhhhh yeah, that’s the stuff.
Oh, and also! While I’m yapping about random stuff, Robert still has his scars, they’re just from past hunts in this AU. Nevermore is in fact still kissing these in every universe. Mmhmm mmhmm! Though, in this one, it does feel especially significant that a vampire would be kissing the scars from past successful vampire kills.
A tentative ending I have for this AU is Nevermore dying, lmao!
No, but, for real, the elementals decide to end the curse—and their slaughter of the human race—by killing all the vampires once and for all.
I’m undecided on how they would do this, whether it be holding a ball in a large greenhouse and trapping everyone inside by sunrise, or a massive gathering in a building that’s set ablaze and burns everyone inside, but no one’s making it out regardless.
It’s a kind of sad resolution to Nevermore having been created to kill Robert, and Robert having been born to kill Nevermore. She wanted to end that cycle and set him free, so now he’s tasked with figuring out what he wants to do with the rest of his life, because the only thing he knew—his purpose, if you will—was taken care of.
That is to say, I’m still not entirely sure if I want this to be the way their story ends, but I’ve been thinking about this ending a lot.
🌶️ - does your f/o have any remedies they follow when they get sick? like taking a shot of whiskey to get rid of a fever?
Jiminy's a very "by the books" guy sometimes. Any time he gets sick he always takes the medicine he needs (even if he hates the flavour of it) and drinks plenty of water/eats plenty of hot foods.
Gonna be honest though he's also the type who is so stubborn and doesn't just stay in bed no matter how much Berry tells him to.
Truth is he wants them with him to cuddle but he doesn't want to get them sick either. He just gets very clingy when he's sick because he doesn't like how weak his body feels. Berry still absolutely snuggles with him though, regardless how sick he is.
🌽 - does your f/o have a favorite animal? what is it? are they scared of any animals?
Honestly kinda tricky to choose! I don't really feel like he has a favourite animal? But... mayhaps he's a dog/cat guy! I think after Monstro though he might have a slight fear of underwater creatures. He's only a little cricket, easy for him to get eaten.
🥒 - what's your f/o afraid of? do they have any phobias? anything minor they're scared of?
Isaac's an interesting one... You'd think he'd be terrified after everything he's been through, right? Like it's not easy to go up against hoards of Necromorphs, yet he seems just, fine.
While that is true, it's left it's mark on him... I feel Isaac definitely has a fear of sudden loud noises and needles.... If you know, YOU KNOW.
🥑 - is there any niche topics your f/o is interested in? what are they and why do they like them?
Isaac is EXTREMELY talented when it comes to mechanics and engineering! Heck it's literally his job. I believe he got into electrical and mechanical engineer because of his father who was a ship architect.
I honestly really find it interesting how skilled he is at what he does because I'm not really a mechanical person. The scene from Dead Space 2 where he makes a makeshift Plasma cutter out of bits and pieces he finds on the sprawl, it was genuinely so cool to watch him do that <33
🫚 - is your f/o a picky eater? is there any foods they will not under any circumstances, gun to their head, eat?
Gonna be honest, I think Willikers would eat almost anything. Given that he was bought to life the same way Pinocchio was, he doesn't exactly posses the same the anatomy others do! I think it greatly affects his tastebuds.
He'd pull up with the worst food combo known to man and he'd STILL stay it tastes good.
🍏 - if you have any queer headcanons for your f/o, how did they realize they were queer?
OH BOY HEHE I SURE DO!! I headcanon Willikers to be he/they nonbinary, pansexual and polyam!
I tend to write him and see him as a trans allegory. Being that he's a wood-carving bought to life, I feel he'd experience some slight dysphoria around that fact, especially whenever people refer to him as "wood" or "worm" or something to do with that, because it makes him feel less like an actual bug. To me he's also polyam because the way he and Grumblebee interact in the movie is like??? dude there's tension. Also he's my boyfriend too so hehe :3
Tag list 💛 (Hope you guyz are chill with me tagging you in these infodumps!!)
Hi, Berry! Here's a question for you? What music video(s) best fit you and your F/Os? For me and ToeJam, I was thinking of APT by ROSÉ and Bruno Mars, minus the alcohol, although there might be a better one and I just can't think of it. What are your thoughts? Do you have several that fit you and your different F/Os or one that fits them all?
oohh that's an interesting question : 0
I have entire playlists dedicated to my selfships/F/O's so I'd say I'd have multiple!
For Jiminy, obviously When you wish upon a star, that's literally his song!
But in terms of my selfship with him, I'd say our theme is If my heart was a house by Owl City (please give it a listen it's a really sweet song)
I often associate the song Magic by Pilot with Willikers! Can't explain why... just do!
