Latest Posts by merciathekingdom - Page 6

Fish and chips :3

⊂◉‿◉つ

Chip has moved in the shadows his entire life almost, he only stood out when he wanted to- when he knew he needed to.

Because he's a thief first and foremost, a bastard, with silent footsteps and the ability to dodge impossibly- to avoid and sneak past at every turn.

But when Jay and Gillion entered the scene, that changed.

When he looks at them he must admit he shines a little brighter, grins a little wider, stands a little taller- but it's not just that... Jay and Gillion are the sun and the moon, and when they turn to look at him, no matter how he tries to hide, to blend in to his surroundings, they always find him. Left, right and centre.

And it makes him feel vulnerable. But it makes him feel seen.

It's a terrifying feeling, having those eyes pierce through him and skewer him right through the middle. The one defense measure he's used his whole life, the thing that's kept him alive all this time- stolen away from him in the blink of an eye, in the turn of a head and the shine of a smile.

Yes, it feels a little bit like dying- but doesn't it also feel a little like love?

For the first time since he was taken on board and given a family, a sister; all of who were torn away from him, he is being looked at like a living, breathing, feeling thing.

Like running out onto the sunlit deck with not a fear in the world, like watching moonlight glimmer on the ocean and hoping to one day swim down there and feel it, like defeating his sister in their play battle and reigning victorious, King of the overseas, King of it all.

That feeling is distant to him now, hidden from the sun for so many years, staying far away from the chill of moonlit waters. All this time, it's felt unfair to him to know that he is alive when they are not. So he avoids sensation, avoids the gold and silver the world offers him freely.

Until he find the gold of a girl he can't help but run with, the silver of a boy who's hand is cool in his, as he helps him breach the surface of the swaying ocean.

Jay drags him out onto the sunny deck to spar, to dance, to laugh and navigate their course together.

Gillion grabs his hand and pulls him down into the cold midnight waters, pulling him through glimmering waves and showing him even more beautiful things he's never seen underneath it all.

Sometimes he wonders, when he sees Gillion pray or Jay drift, when their eyes begin to glow and magic seems to spill from their lips, seeping out of the corners of their mouth, if their goddesses ever missed him- if they ever noticed his absence, or more prominently, his return.

I tend to care about taking a more realistic approach to Riptide in terms of resource management ect, so here's some random thoughts about clothes.

(minor spoilers up to episode #87)

Space management is important on a ship, so pirates tend to stick the essential clothing pieces, and change and wash them less than the average land-dweller.

Pirates don't smell great. This is just something you have to accept.

(except Gillion. Gillion smells of fish and salt and seaweed and the ocean, and never smells sweaty because he doesn't sweat in the human sense, he's just always moist)

Pre episode #87:

Chip has one shirt and one pair of trousers. When he needs to wash them, he will just walk around shirtless or in his underpants depending on what item is being washed. even for a pirate, this is a bit excessive.

he has like three pairs of underpants and he washes them concerningly infrequently

Jay has a change of clothes - she has a spare shirt and trousers, 2 bras that she alternates between, and several pairs of underpants. This is closer to the regular amount of clothes you would expect a pirate to have

After Chip lost his shirt in Allport, he borrowed Jay's spare one since I refuse to imagine him shirtless for the entire Feywild arc. My boy would be cold! :(

Jay is overall the most well-groomed due to her Navy upbringing. However, this isn't something she enjoys - more like something that she feels obligated to do. She finds washing her clothes a pain, and doesn't mind not smelling great or being dirty. As a kid she always hated washing and wearing uncomfortable clothes. As she spends more time on the pirate ship, she becomes less well-put-together and starts to drift more towards a Chip-level of cleanliness - though she promises herself she will never stoop quite as low as him. It's a matter of pride.

She does pick up his habit of walking around shirtless or in her underpants when she can't be bothered to get dressed / it's too hot / whatever. It's a pirate ship, social norms don't matter. Everyone on the ship is family and no-one cares.

She stops wearing bras when they are not on land for the same reason. However, when they come to land, she does make a concerted effort to make herself look socially acceptable and conform to standard norms regarding dress, since she knows this will get them a better reception with the land-dwellers they interact with.

Gillion's was raised to be well-groomed, but didn't have a chance to pack a change of clothes when he was kicked out of the Undersea. His clothes are stiff and encrusted with salt from all the time he spends in the water. There isn't as much of a need to wash items of clothing in the Undersea, as they are in water the whole time, and stains don't show up in the underwater gloom unless they're extremely obvious. Chip and Jay teach him how laundry works easily enough, and Gillion employs a similar strategy to Chip. However, he washes his clothes less frequently than they do as they are always being resubmerged in water anyway.

Post episode #87:

They finally get Gillion a change of clothes. He has an alternate shirt and trousers.

Since they have a bigger ship by this point, the crew has space for a few more fun/luxury items of clothing that aren't for everyday wear. Only a few - ie one special shirt - but it's still nice to have.

(Gillion has an emo band T-shirt) (yes they have emo bands in the fantasy world of Mana) (come on we all know at this point that the world doesn't conform to a consistent time period)

Jay realises she hates her current clothes because the starched sleeveless shirts she has been wearing, though they have become far less starched after a year of heavy use and improper wear, are very scratchy on her skin. She buys two softer wooden sleeveless shirts instead (ie the ribbed design a lot of the fanart of her features). She gives the old shirts to Chip

Chip buys the coat, which keeps his shoulders warm, and so he often prefers to go shirtless to show off his tattoos. However, he will wear Jay's old shirts when his tits get too cold.

saw a twitter post that got to me a bit so

gillion is stupid. like. he's got low intelligence. he's slow to pick up on things, he takes a while to understand new concepts, he doesn't think things through and on the rare occasions he does he just doesn't manage to grasp all the different possible outcomes.

yes he's got high emotional intelligence, yes he's good with words, yes he grew up in a different environment and is unfamiliar with the one he's in currently, but he is still a little stupid.

and that's important because it's part of the reason gillion feels so guilty, so anxious about being the chosen one, about trying his best to be a protector and still getting it wrong. he's a bad student, and he makes bad decisions, he's just not as smart as jay or chip. he gets them into danger at least as often as he gets them out of it, and he hates it. he wants to be strong and capable and smart, so that he can keep his family safe as best he can, so that he can be the perfect chosen one, but he just isn't! and that's so important to who he is as a person and why he does what he does.

The Vees dressed up to match each other's eras ✨

the eepening

i watched one (1) video on how to draw hands that changed my life forever. like. i can suddenly draw hands again

these were all drawn without reference btw. i can just. Understand Hands now (for the most part, im sure theres definitely inaccuracies). im a little baffled

this is the Vees. to me.

chibo save me chibo

chips ride home

the beast charms everyone with no exceptions!!!! ehehehe

too much yaoi on my blog, I have to even it out... so here's jay slayin'

employees should be allowed to steal, actually

One last thought about the mindbreak AU before bed:

It's a normal day in Vee Tower. Velvette's in her quarters, trying to livestream, when Valentino bursts in, bitching that he can't find Vox and that he's not answering his calls. Velvette pauses the stream to yell at Val for interrupting her work with something so petty— Vox is probably ignoring him on purpose because of shit like this. They go on like that for a bit until suddenly, the tower experiences a brownout. Velvette's laptop starts glitching out— not only is the internet down, but the computer itself seems to be corrupting. This is all highly unusual; the tower never loses power, since they're the ones producing most of the damn stuff. And then Alastor's voice starts emanating from every speaker in the building.

He welcomes everyone back to his show, saying that tonight's broadcast will be a very special one– a throwback to his older work. This week's guest is a powerful overlord from the entertainment district and one-time close personal friend of his: Vox, the Media Demon! Vox's voice is heard, cursing at Alastor in response, followed by the sound of shattering glass. Don't touch that dial, Al says, for tonight's show will be very entertaining, indeed.

Valentino and Velvette are frozen for a moment, rooted to the spot in terror. Then, before Velvette can even process what's happening, Val tears off down the hallway to his quarters, scrambling for every gun and angelic weapon he owns. Velvette goes after him, yelling to slow down, that this might be a trap and that there are ways to fake someone's voice. And then the screaming starts. Velvette may not have ever experienced one of Alastor's broadcasts before, but she can tell on an instinctual, animal level that the sounds coming out of the tower's speakers are not AI.

Val tears off to the roof, barely able to contain his demonic form as Velvette runs behind him. He almost takes off without her, but grabs her at the last moment when she shouts to take her with him. In his full demon form, Val makes a beeline for Alastor's radio tower, with Velvette dangling off of him. She tries to make calls and check social media for more information, but her phone is completely non-functional, along with every other piece of modern technology in Pentagram City. The only things that seem to be working are the speakers, all of which are playing Alastor's broadcast, city-wide.

When they reach Alastor's tower, Val immediately starts tearing through everything he can, but to Velvette's horror, no matter how much of the tower they search, they don't find anyone: Alastor and Vox aren't there. Vox's screams are echoing throughout the city and Val is yelling and crying and smashing things in vain and she's just stuck there, useless, unable to do anything about it.

Eventually, the broadcast comes to an end. Alastor thanks Vox and the audience for a delightful show and signs off. The power and cell service suddenly come back on. Val and Velvette only have a few moments to try and wrap their minds around at the fact that they didn't make it in time before Velvette's phone starts blowing up. She gets a call from her secretary: Alastor just dumped Vox's mangled body in the middle of the lobby before vanishing into thin air. The two of them race back to the tower.

Everyone is astounded to learn that, when they scan his systems, Vox is still alive, although completely non-functional at the moment. VoxTek employees scramble to repair his mutilated body, all while Val screams at them to work faster, to fix him. Velvette is approached by one of her employees; they've looked over the security footage and it turns out that Vox and Alastor were actually in the basement of the tower, in one of Val's studios no less. They don't have footage of the actual event, but they do have the aftermath, with Alastor (in pretty rough shape himself) dragging Vox's body back upstairs. Velvette goes numb at the news. They were in the same building the whole time. All she can manage to say to the employee is to not, under any circumstances, tell Valentino.

don't do it

The Vees ! They're four now ! Sadly for Valentino, he is the only one with enough arms to hold them all

Sometimes I think about Chip and Jay meeting Gillion for the first time. How was it for them exactly?

Gillion, lying on his back on the surface of the water, staring at the sun. Lost, in the middle of an ocean in a place he doesn't know. He should be afraid, but he just feels empty. The bright light is blinding him but he does not care to see. The events of the past few days play endlessly in his mind. His breaking point, his frenzy, the trial, the verdict. The sinking feeling that he's lost every single small bit of what was him and what was his, what he was desperately clinging to. So he doesn't need to see, and there is nothing inside his eyes, cause there is nothing left of Gill.

Did Chip, I wonder see those empty eyes? Did he notice the pain they hold? Before they were masked by excited greeting and a bright smile of a Triton he's grown to know and love, before they shifted into focus, did he look at them and saw his own eyes staring back at him? Did he see the same emptiness he felt when the water swallowed everything he had known and washed him ashore with no direction, the same eyes that reflected the fire of a burning warehouse as he left his life behind once more? Did Jay see it too? Did she see the same loss and grief she expreienced, staring at her sister's grave? Did she understand the same feeling of being isolated, of not feeling like yourself, like you don't belong amongst those who are supposed to be your own?

Is this why they took his hand that day? Was it simple pity or a connection weaved through compassion and a desire to share suffering with another? To help each other feel whole again?

The empty gazes looked at the lost Triton, and his empty eyes stared back. And then, they were together. And with love, care and understanding they share, they see a little clearer now.

Do you think chip cringes when he listens to hole in your heart lol

The Vees ABSOLUTELY do the rainbow capitalism bs irl companies do, except all of them are ACTUALLY queer so its even more effective than it is irl bcuz "they wouldn't take advantage of us, they're gay too!" Unfortunately rhey are still takinf advantage of queer people. Diversity loss the evil capitalists profiting off of your identity are all some flavor of queer.

Vox: To prevent double crossing, Val and I have sold our souls to each other at the beginning of our partnership

Vel: What

Vox: Yeah, you can take a look if you want

Vel: ...

Vel: This is a marriage certificate

you know maybe the vee aren't delulu in the finale where they're talking about a power vacuum

- a fuck ton of rosie's civilians are gone now and alastor, who's presumably her biggest ally, is busy with the hotel

- vox presumably just placed a massive order from carmilla carmine for his whole angelic security thing as well as the hotel gang. the last battle took place at the hotel so carmilla and co couldn't gather more weapons. and presumably the angelic forces aren't going to attack again any time soon so she can't replenish her supply

- vox presumably has a supply of angelic weapons + now knows they're deadly to alastor and the other overlords

Idk how this app works. Heres some cool and awesome albatrio drawings

Some more silly sketches. They're watching Jaws and Val is allergic to feathers. Yes, I draw Valentino way bigger than he is in the show, fight me

Oh my god Chip is just a kid who never had a chance to grow up so he's still acting like a kid in an adult world, ie not expecting consequences for his behaviour, being impulsive and disrespectful towards others ect, because he's still hoping for the softness of childhood where consequences are never more serious than a slap on the wrist and his behaviour is met with indulgent laughter from the crew of the Black Rose Pirates instead of hatred and aggression. He hasn't ever shifted his veiw of himself from being a little kid who should be forgiven and let off easy because if he acknowledged that he wasn't "the kid of the crew" anymore he'd be acknowledging that the crew was gone. Oh my god.