#starrcollective

[emet-selch-apologism]

thinking about your dgmau au and the whole “czeslaw used to have a crush on pyro” thing plus the whole giftgiving..

Pyro offers up himself and gets used and abused for it, czeslaw offers “gifts” that usually only end in more violence..

I also imagine this would make Pyro more wary of many of Oakhurst’s residents? Seeing the way they interact with eachother(at least when Avid isn’t actively forcing a wedge in between townsfolk) and seeing how sometimes gifts don’t result in violence could probably simultaneously make him angrier because of his mistreatment but also realize he was right to be afraid and he did technically make the right choice..

And then also the kids naturally having a language of gift-giving/acts of service.. Pyro obviously wouldn’t let them get abused but can you imagine them trying to help Shelby around in the castle.. sometimes reorganizing part of Pyro’s room when he’s out.. picking flowers that grow from inbetween the ruined cornerstones of the castle and giving them to Owen.. do you see the vision..

IM GONNA BE SICKKK

when czeslaw gives pyro gifts, hes expected to accept them no matter what. czeslaw also uses those gifts against him, if hes not happy with pyros behavior (which he usually is not) hes definitely the kind of guy to get mad at them for being "ungrateful". and pyro with his acts of service become almost transactional, if czeslaw gives him a gift he has to perform an act of service to keep the scales balanced. because if they tip too far in either direction, it will come back to bite pyro.

(itll bite pyro anyway. but maybe a bit less this way)

and then he gets to oakhurst and sees how people interact with eachother there. it puts him on edge. even though he has no reason to suspect any of them are like czeslaw, hes instinctually bracing. waiting for the other shoe to drop. he politely turns down gifts (claiming he doesnt want to be a bother), and when he does accept them, he is immediately working to balance the scales again.

AND THE KIDSSS 😭😭😭 they end up copying czeslaws gift giving and pyros acts of service, and probably have internalized pyros instinct to balance the scales but they pick that up from observing pyro rather than they themselves learning it to be a nessecity... they dont have the same fears around those types of displays of affection that pyro does.

love the idea of them being alone in the castle and running around, leaving gifts or helping organize the chests or decorating sections of the halls outside of their favorite peoples' room, giggling together like theyre pulling a prank 😭

also imagine owen showing up to terrorize the town, but he has a bunch of wildflowers braided into his hair. hes brooding and eviling but he refuses to take them out

[emet-selch-apologism]

hello new mutual(what the fuck I never thought I’d be calling YOU that but hi :3) question about the drownedglory arraigned marriage au bc your au solely got me interested in drownedglory as a whole

Im wondering.. considering even.. would Scott ever use Pyro’s running from the truth as an attempt to control him? even if Owen was Scott’s sire in this au, I imagine Pyro would still fear Scott to some extent.. maybe Scott eventually backs Pyro into a (metaphorical) corner and for whatever reason he either coerces, threatens, or outright forces Pyro to essentially explain to the kids why they came to Oakhurst. maybe not outright explain that he killed czeslaw, but at minimum explain that Pyro ran with them to get away….

also imagining Owen getting REAL MAD about it after Pyro tells him about the situation..

HI OMG THANK YOUUU <333 another soldier for the drownedglory army... for real though thats so sweet im so glad my au could do that i love winning

this is punishment for avid

scott thinks its more valuable as a secret, because then he can hold it over their head and threaten to reveal it. he doesnt want to lose that leverage by having it exposed.

but hes so mad when he finds out about pyros involvement in avids murder. sure he may have only been an accomplice, but between him and owen there was only one person scott could actually punish for it.

im picturing scott, pyro, and the kids alone in the castle together. scott and pyro are talking and scott starts dropping little hints and comments "you know a lot about running away, dont you?" "im surprised you werent more involved, given your history." "oh, but they dont know about that, do they?" and pyro feels a pooling dread in his stomach. they ask him to not get them involved, but since when has scott ever listened to him?

the kids ask what hes talking about and scott says "were just discussing what happened to your father. the other one." and now the kids are looking at pyro, and he realizes theyre finding out today no matter what. and they can either hear it from scott or from him.

owen is LIVID when he finds out. he comes back to the castle to find pyro very visibly trying to push down a panic attack as he holds his sobbing children. he does his best to help comfort them (its a bit better than "there there" because hes being earnest, but its still not good). hes tempted to go confront scott right then and there, but his fledgeling and his their children need him right now.

mentally, scott takes the number one spot in his Must Stake list

[emet-selch-apologism]

dgamau is once again affecting my brain chemistry. I’m back here again.

I’ve been thinking about Pyro running with the kids to Oakhurst.

He doesn’t look back. He doesn’t even check if Czeslaw’s even dead. Which possibility is more terrifying? I doubt Pyro knows.

Assuming this is still KIND OF based in canon and that Pyro found out about Oakhurst while in uni, it really changes the dynamics that Pyro has with most of the Oakhurst residents, and especially how he watches the kids.

If we go off the premise that like in canon, the “rumors” of vampires in Oakhurst or the massacres were stuff Pyro had learned of, Pyro probably figured it’d just have been a ghost town. A place in the middle of nowhere. Maybe if he ran far enough then Czeslaw wouldn’t find him. He’d never even know where they went. And they’d be alone in Oakhurst. Him and the kids.

So when he stumbles into Oakhurst to find 13 other people, it’s a shock. The kids are completely unaware of what Pyro’s expectations were, but yeah ok there’s some adults here! Not like all the people that used to come by the house, but they’re not alone! That’s a win, right?

pyro didnt have any solid plan after he killed(?) czeslaw, his murder fantasies had always been vague since he never planned to enact them. he was in a blind panic, the only thing that was on his mind was getting the kids and getting out of there the rest of it could be figured out later. but he needed to get out of the capital now.

and he remembers the rumors about oakhurst. it ought to be deserted. they can go there, just for a little while, just long enough for him to figure out what happens next. he was never supposed to be there for more than a week or so. but then there was people, and then they were trapped.

obviously hes graduated already, hes been out of school for nearly a decade at this point but when people start sharing their reasons for ending up in a place like oakhurst he cant just tell them that he killed his husband and needed a place to lay low until he figured out what to do. he needed an excuse.

he majored in civil engineering. he has no idea why he claimed to be writing something so anthropological

[emet-selch-apologism]

I blacked out during an AICE class lecture on free speech and.. well. Avery was staring at me. I dunno how he got there but that’s your guy⁉️⁉️

AAAAH AVERY!!!!!!! my beautiful freak of a guy......... TYSMMM FOR DRAWING HIM OMG :DDD