🩷🩷🩷

suddenly they are no longer edwin, crystal, and niko. instead they are a young boy tormented by other boys (loud, vicious, violent) to the point of his cruel death and hellish punishment, a young girl abused and stalked by someone who will wear your face in her dreams, and another young girl who likely has experienced harassment at the hands of people just. like. you. young, stupid boys lashing out out of hurt.

It would’ve been cool to see Merlin struggling to contain all this power especially at the start of the series while he’s still learning to harness his magic:

Like maybe Arthur throws something at Merlin while half paying attention but Merlin’s magic stops it midflight and he has to quickly unfreeze and take the hit to avoid suspicion

Gwen asks Merlin to pass her the washing but it’s moving before he can even get his hands on it and Merlin has to scramble after it to grab the basket midair

Merlin’s carrying a meal up to the princes chambers and trips, his magic catching him and the tray of food and quickly righting them both, and Merlin glances around to see if anyone noticed

Gaius asks him to light a candle and suddenly every wick in the room is lit before he can even finish his sentence

because obviously five hates being young again, it makes him look weaker and is a constant reminder of the biggest fuck up of his life. but what if he looks at his reflection in the mirror sometimes and just wonders if there was ever any room for him to just be a stupid thirteen year old that didn’t have world-ending consequences

time botched body aside, do you think five ever misses when he was allowed to be a twenty-something naive kid. do you think every time his siblings says something stupid he wonders about how long ago he would’ve died if he had had the privilege (and, simultaneously, the curse) to be that naive.

do you think five ever wishes he was actually a kid again. so he could redo everything he fucked up the first time. do you think five ever wishes he could hide behind his kid body, like he’s not a cynical old man with too much blood on his hands to ever feel clean again

THE ARTFUL DODGER (2023 - present) • dodgerfox parallels [2/??]

…And Jesper is wearing a bedazzled belt over purple pants, a green shirt, and a multicolored waistcoat. His hat is striped with pins among the brim. His shoes have a small heel which isn’t even a style in Ketterdam yet, but he adopted it from his riding gear. He has a pocket watch that doesn’t tell the time but it looks cool. If the mission doesn’t require stealth, he jingles everywhere he walks.

vs crooked kingdom

particularly in regards to this conversation:

thinking about inej, who is actively dying, asking kaz for an apology. inej, whose native tongue leaves no room for triviality here. this isn’t “you were mean to me and you need to make nice,” it’s so much deeper.

this is “promise me you won’t treat me like a piece in your chess game again. promise me you won’t keep acting like i’m replaceable. promise me i’m not just another one of your investments.”