DEATH IS JUST A PAUSE.

inspired by this meta post. spoilers up to c2e75 below the cut!

in a conversation with yasha in ep 46, caduceus mentions an old injury in his knee, given to him by his sister:

ASHLEY: Yeah? How did you know it was going to rain? I mean, other than the obvious, gray skies. 

TALIESIN: Well, the skies were turning; the wind was coming in; and I honestly have to mention my knee hurts a little bit on the left side, usually about an hour beforehand. It was a thing my sister did. It was 25 seasons ago, give or take. She's a piece of work. She's great. A piece of work.

25 seasons is just over 6 years, which means this happened some time after caduceus’s parents left, but still a few years before he would be left on his own in the blooming grove. “ sister ”  implies it could’ve been either calliope or clarabelle, but based on caduceus’s mentions of / interactions with clarabelle — which are all fond, albeit brief — i don’t think she would’ve been the one to hurt him. calliope is the more obvious culprit as the older of his sisters, both because of their dynamic as well as her being ( presumably ) stronger than caduceus ( which, granted, isn’t very hard to do, considering his 10 STR... )

my guess? calliope pushed caduceus and he hit his knee on a rock, hard enough to at least fracture the bone. not intentionally, of course, and not out of character for calliope, just an unfortunate accident — one that would end up having some unfortunately long-term consequences.

ASHLEY: It just hurts when it gets cold type of a thing? 

TALIESIN: Yeah, usually half a day before it rains.

this kind of chronic pain can ( though doesn’t exclusively ) occur with old injuries from bone fractures to breaks, where basically the air pressure from before/during inclement weather can mess with already-fragile nerves in the body. 

this is the first and only mention of caduceus’s knee pain, which isn’t surprising considering how bad caduceus is at taking care of himself. in fact, i wouldn’t be surprised if this is the first time he’s even mentioned it out loud. caduceus talks about himself so rarely, and who knows if he ever got the chance to tell calliope before she left? ( or if he even would, for that matter. )

Send the MUN of this blog what vibe they give off.

Send the MUN of this blog what vibe they give off.

do they consider to ‘always have been’, or do they see the phases in their life before coming out as ‘back when i was [cis/straight/allo]’?

on the rare occasion that he actually bothers to reflect on his gender identity ( or lack thereof ) , caduceus considers it an ‘ always has been ’ situation : gender roles were not high on the list of the clay family’s priorities in raising their children, and his family took his apparent lack of romantic or sexual desire in stride. 

how does their family feel about the matter? friends? coworkers?—and does their thoughts matter to your muse?