put that man on a leash!

Some elephants in the room:

- this blog is 18+. if you are openly a minor i will block you. i will also block anyone for any petty reason because it’s my favorite thing to do. nothing personal babes

- violating CC “boundaries” is always morally correct and i do it a lot. i have specifically quarantined myself to an area where they will never see or hear about it for a reason. if you have any objections to this i encourage you to read this post on the matter and then go read, write and draw them having sex and abusing substances and getting vivisected. good luck and godspeed, traveler.

- a lot of stuff on this blog is dubiously consensual at best. most of the time it doesn’t stray into straight up noncon but if it does you’ve been warned

Tags I use under the cut:

YES YES YES !!! bodice ripper trustbites yes. with lovebitten it’s very very beneficial for the both of them, with louis getting to put away the Good Vampire persona and actually indulge in all of those ugly/monstrous parts of vampirism without hurting anyone and feeling guilty about it, and owen gets to feel desirable without feeling guilty or ashamed of wanting it. legs i think would be a little harder to get onboard (louis and legs’ respective fears of hurting people come from very different places, for louis it’s “you’re proving that you’re exactly the monster they expect you to be” and for legs it’s “you know you’re a monster and you let them believe you were good anyway” which are similar but result in wildly different baggage) but i think he it does soothe his anxieties knowing that owen enjoys it and it makes him feel wanted and valued, and if you could frame it as something legs is doing For Owen he would be slightly less nervous about it.

ooooor this could go full au territory which i Loveeee. owen you poor sweet darling, getting lost in the woods all alone, and the storm’s rolling in, oh my whatever could he do besides seek shelter with the reclusive noble outside of town. louis inviting him in and offering him a place to stay for the night, but once the sun comes up louis still insists owen stay for breakfast, and keeps finding more and more excuses to keep him from leaving (he’s lonely, sue him for wanting a little company around) and eventually well. things escalate.

can ofc range anywhere from “wildly nonconsensual but in line with the genre” to “louis is pretty much normal but they have some incredibly ill advised sex” depending on taste. personally i do think No Choice But To Be Cared For And Loved is very compelling the more resistant to spoiling owen is, perhaps they fuck and he clocks that louis is a vampire (catching glimpses of his fangs, not having a heartbeat, etc etc) and oh well he simply cannot be allowed to leave until louis is certain he won’t let the whole town in on his secret… louis putting him in pretty dresses and fancy clothes that would make it harder for him to run away, dressing him up like a princess. owen trying not to admit how incredibly into it he is.

not entirely sure how to get legs in here without creating another vet legs situation, but ah well. perhaps the jaded war doctor is an old friend of louis’ who stops by for tea every so often and louis can’t help but show off his new pet i mean guest. again, varying levels of consent but i did just imagine louis introducing the doctor to owen while he’s in a rope harness/possibly gagged and i blacked out for a second. hello.

because like, v!owen does his absolute damndest to fit v!legs into a louis-shaped box, but it never really shakes out the way he wants it to for a multitude of reasons— the main one being the fact that legs is a living breathing person who is capable of making mistakes and being morally flawed, which louis isn’t, because louis can never contradict the idealized version of himself that exists in owen’s head. but the other part of it is the fact that owen is a deeply traumatized person craving comfort that he is fundamentally unable to accept, he wants someone to take care of him but he can’t let someone take care of him, because his independence and his ability to support himself have historically been the only things that keep him alive when his community repeatedly abandons and demonizes him. which i think is admittedly why that “i’m going to help you even if you don’t want it” attitude from v!legs slips past a lot of his alarm bells, because it engineers a scenario where owen is allowed to have without needing to want, it puts him in a position where he can maintain the illusion that his complete and absolute independence is still intact.

howeverrrrr. i think it would be a lot easier for owen to slot dcau!legs into that louis box at first— owen is not only grieving louis as a lover but as a sire as well, he’s yet again floundering trying to figure everything out on his own because the one person who was supposed to help him just isn’t here. and here comes dcau!legs, someone who more than anything wants to be the sire who cares, who makes sure his fledgling is safe and comfortable and healthy (because that makes it all worth it, because that means he was right, owen is better off this way, turning him was for his own good) and i think he would have far less qualms about being put into that box than doctor “i understand if you feel like he was taken away but i am not a replacement for him” legundo. both v!owen and dcau!legs are willing to turn away from the reality of the situation to an absolutely insane degree and it drags them much much further into the denial than the dcau couple ever managed to get.

however, as is the standard for v!owen, the moment his illusion of legs as unendingly kind and perfect is shattered it is going to be fucking catastrophic. and even more so than in canon, at least v!legs was very insistent from the start that he’s not perfect, that he’s a flawed person trying his best, but dcau!legs is actively hiding the reality of owen’s forceful turning for as long as possible because he can’t recognize it himself, and the moment v!owen finds out about that is the moment things get very bad very quickly. because again v!owen’s point of comparison is louis, who turned him gently and consensually, who knew how important owen’s bodily autonomy is to him. the second it becomes clear that not only does dcau!legs not live up to that standard, but is actually in direct opposition to everything louis valued in their relationship, he is going to Lose His Fucking Mind. like, lunging and clawing at him until he physically can’t fight anymore type of lashing out.

i thought i posted this and then realized it’s been sitting in my drafts ;-; anyway

YEAH YEAH YEAH. like as much as legs thinks owen’s whole everything is Weird i dont think legs initially links it To Him directly bc presumably he hasn’t seen owen interact with literally Anyone Else, its possible he might think some shit happened in oakhurst or maybe a non starter vamp+no massacre owen is just more skittish than usual (both true, just not the whole truth) and hell maybe he does go to dcau!legs about this who gives him sort of a vague non-answer; even that i think v!legs could probably excuse as trying to respect owen’s privacy.

and then yeah naturally, the Sinking Horror he would experience watching owen be dragged literally Kicking And Screaming into “feeling better” is. hoough. he might actually throw up.

i’m trying to figure out what he would do about it bc truly every possible option is bad. if he intervenes In The Moment owen is already freaked out and dcau!legs will be pissed at him for making owen even more stressed and upset than he already is. if he somehow has the willpower to wait it out until owen is in less active distress which one does he confront first?

if he talks to owen there is potential for v!legs to reaffirm him on “you’re not going crazy, you’re not overreacting, what he’s doing to you is fucked up,” and on the one hand that’s good! because he can finally get a second set of eyes on this whole situation to validate his experience and break down some of dcau’s gaslighting, but on the other hand this whole conversation is catastrophic for owen, because if he was right, if v!legs is telling the truth, what would he do? where else could he go? even if he had somewhere else, what lengths would legs go to in order to keep him here? all that’s doing is confirming owen’s fears— he’s trapped with a monster and all he can do about it is exactly what he has been doing, fighting tooth and nail against legs’ every attempt to help him just to make things as difficult as possible, until he’s too exhausted to do anything but surrender to whatever legs thinks is best.

on the other hand if he goes to dcau!legs about it,,,,, oh man. because that’s an important part of dcau’s gaslighting— not only is legs trying to convince owen that he would never hurt him, he needs to convince himself that he’s doing the right thing, that owen is just reacting badly because he’s deeply traumatized (and legs can help, legs can Fix Him) and the second someone who is Not Owen calls attention to how fucked up all of this is the illusion starts to crack. and he can’t have that! because this— other version of him, this stubborn, shortsighted, human version of him— he doesn’t understand. he can’t understand.

(but shouldn’t he? isn’t he the only one who could? legs has spoken to him enough to know he cares about owen— and he knows how stubborn and self destructive owen can be. doesn’t he want what’s best for him?)

so anyway dcau!legs is 100% likely to lash out and try to shut him up before he starts making a little too much sense, and unlike owen dcau!legs has no qualms about hurting v!legs either emotionally or, if it really comes to it, physically. if it comes to blows i don’t think he would outright kill him (do no harm is still on the table at this point, or at least legs wants to think it is) but i do not think it would be pretty and unfortunately we all know that’s not a fight human legs is winning.

the only potential upside to this i can see is that if owen witnesses dcau!legs reacting violently towards another person, especially another person who is actively concerned about owen, it gives him something more solid to hang onto in the face of legs’ gaslighting. because if legs is genuinely trying to insist that he only wants to help, then why is he actively shutting down a conversation where someone is advocating on owen’s behalf? if legs were truly doing the right thing, wouldn’t he be able to defend it? wouldn’t he be able to tell v!legs why treating him like this is okay?

but he can’t, because dcau!legs’ entire philosophy relies on Not Looking At The Problem— if they pretend owen wasn’t turned violently and they pretend legs isn’t actively trapping and isolating him and they pretend owen isn’t scared half to death of him then it’s fine. then things are nice. legs wants to earn owen’s trust back but he wants to do that without acknowledging the harm that he’s done to break that trust in the first place, so it just manifests as forcing owen to play along with him and keep quiet about the whole thing.

FUCKING AMEN oh my god both options are so good……. personally really liking the one on one scenario here bc it’s sorta similar to the louis thing ive been on about lately except Way Worse… legs finding him mid-breakdown and doing his best to approach cautiously, careful not to startle him, and the second he registers legs is there (probably can’t recognize which version of him this is immediately bc of. well everything) he essentially shuts down and immediately tries to stop crying, pretty much doing the emotional equivalent of playing dead and hoping legs feels like he’s Fixed The Problem, but human legs knows owen well enough to know that something is Wrong because in all likelihood he probably expected him to lash out, this sort of reaction really isn’t like him.

YEEEEEESSSSS IT WOULD BE REALLY BADDDDD !!

dcau legs bemoaning to his human counterpart that owen is just so stubborn sometimes… he really just wants to help, but owen keeps pushing him away, he just still can’t seem to trust him after all this time— canon legs agreeing with him. the fact that dcau really is just canon legs’ ideology taken to its furthest possible extreme, the main difference being that the power dynamic is flipped.

the complete horror canon legs would experience realizing he turned owen by force and doesn’t even regret it— it’s a shame it had to be this way, of course, he really did try to convince him to go willingly, but eventually the risk was too great. if his disease didn’t kill him, one of the other vampires would have. he did what was necessary to keep him safe. a duty of care, you understand. what else was he meant to do, let owen die? he couldn’t. you would’ve done the same, wouldn’t you?

HIIIIII YOURE ACTUALLY SO RIGHT YOU GET IT YOU GET THE VISION.

legs holds him as he cries and purrs softly to calm him down and against his better judgement owen relaxes into his arms. he’s so exhausted, and legs’ touch is so gentle, and he can’t bring himself to fight the panicked, animal thing at the back of his brain going sire’s here sire can help sire’s supposed to protect you, it’s okay, you’re safe, everything’s okay. owen flinching back as legs leans in to nuzzle his neck expecting a bite that never comes. legs kisses over his scars carefully in apology as the tension drains from his body.

i’m going to help you whether you want it or not. i’m helping. i’m helping. i’m helping. i’ll be gentle with you. i just want you safe. happy. can’t you see how much i love you? can’t you see how far im willing to go to keep you from suffering? no, no, i would never hurt you, i promise. no more pain, thaaats it, just stop struggling. i knew you’d come around eventually. isn’t this so much better? just let me take care of you.

taps the sign: