Gizmo Is Bungus

thhis polll is nuts to me bc in 2020 during the portland wildfires and the pre vaccine era of the pandemic, i tried to sign up for a "mutual aid n95 giveaway" list, via my twitter account, and they banned me for having an anime girl pfp (it was rakka from haibane renmei) and having a locked account (i had a job and was closeted). i messaged them like "is there any way i can appeal this?" and they said "no" because apparently my anime girl icon and locked account meant i was either "fash or a creep or both." anyway they approved my roommates so they both got n95s but didn't share them with me. because i had an anime girl icon on twitter and didn't want my boss to find out i was trans.

So why the change? I mean, almost certainly at some point off-page Ianthe threatened to do something if he didn't start treating her as The Top Bitch--but as to what she threatened to do, we can only speculate.

The first, perhaps too obvious explanation is that she threatened to use necromancy on him. Weirden his proportions. Weaken his muscles. Give him sudden-onset male pattern baldness. Something of that nature. But while I don't think we can dismiss this possibility out of hand, I think there's a stronger argument to be made for something else:

The Third House arrives at Canaan House with a whole host of secrets. One of these secrets Babs seems to care about keeping a hell of a lot more than the Tridentarii do. The only time we see him genuinely panicked is when he thinks Corona has revealed it to Gideon (and she actually did reveal it to Gideon, Gideon has just lived under in a rock her whole life and lacks the context to put together the pieces than anyone else at Canaan House could have done under those circumstances) . And pretty much as soon as Babs is dead, Ianthe is more than happy to announce it to everyone in attendance.

Past all that though, I just don't think his loyalty was ever fully Corona's, regardless of what Ianthe says in TUG. He worshiped Corona, he adored Corona, but... I dunno if you might've already seen it but Crane_Carlisle has a really compelling deep analysis of the Third's introductory scene, the short version of which is like...

Babs loves Corona in a way that's sort of protective and sort of patronizing, but he does see her as like... someone in need of protection, someone he needs to get defensive about when Ianthe says anything even a little accusatory. Meanwhile he respects Ianthe a lot more, not just the authority both have over him but her wits. The way they argue and bounce off of each other is ultimately really effective and productive for working through problems. (And of course there's like, "You know I always said what Babs would've said, except when he said what I would've" etc.)

uhhh

happy birthday ford ig

I guess they're still kids at heart after all

Bonus doodle under cut