#askroach

uhhh… hi?? wrong inbox maybe?? (ノ-_-)ノ~┻━┻

Attention: lost cockroach spotted in my ask. Whoever owns it, come pick it up 🪳✨

Sorry it took me a million years to post decent refs of these characters! I could imagine them in my head, but I had a bad case of stupid-hands that couldn't translate the designs to drawings for the longest time. I'm still not 100% satisfied with their designs here, but I think it's the closest I'm going to get any time soon.

Roach looks as sinister as he acts in his pirate captain fit, and Deanne will absolutely rip a bitch to shreds if they get in her way lol. I actually really like Deanne as a character, I think she's a total badass. Maybe kinda misguided, but her heart is in the right place. I would like to see her break free from Roach's influence one day and be her own master.

Thank you so much Razz, you always make my day. <3

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Questions/Comments?

Lore Masterpost

I'm so happy to hear this series brought you some comfort, Anon. That means a lot to me, thank you for reading and taking the time to tell me so! I really appreciate it.

Also that's a good question. Mr. Ocean and Roach are...a lot of things. They have several different dynamics to their relationship: Chief and commander. Sorcerer and apprentice. Patient and caretaker. Friends. Confidants. Both descend from royalty, were estranged from their people and share the same goal: to stop Sovereign. They have a lot in common.

But were they lovers? In "Supply and Demand", Mr. Ocean said that he can't do harm to anyone he loves, insinuating that he can't hurt Roach even if he wanted to. So he does canonically "love" Roach, but the nature of this love isn't clear. Platonic love? Romantic love? Familial love? If it's romantic, it's most likely one-sided, as Roach has said in multiple stories that he's on a mission to rescue his beloved wife from Sovereign, so I can't imagine he'd go through all that trouble just to cheat on her--especially with someone like Mr. Ocean. No shade (okay, a little shade) but Roach could do a hell of a lot better than Ocean...

Romance is complicated for cecaelia because they're totally asexual creatures. There's no element of lust/sexuality even between breeding pairs, so the way they treat their romantic partners really isn't much different from how they treat other people they love, like their best friends and family.

That said, I think they do observe some kind of distinction between these different relationships. Roach, for example, cares about Mr. Ocean. That much is clear by the end of "Supply and Demand". But he's still willing to throw Mr. Ocean under the bus to save his wife, and at times really treats him like shit in ways that he'd never treat his wife, so...there's that.

TL;DR: They probably weren't lovers in a romantic sense, and any romantic feelings between them were most likely one-sided (Mr. Ocean loved Roach romantically, Roach loved Mr. Ocean too but just platonically).

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Questions/Comments?

Well, first things first: Mr. Ocean didn't say anything against violence. He understands that sometimes violence is necessary. He just said that exploitation of the dorikori isn't necessary because he was trying to make the point that if the cause was worth fighting for, then people would join it willingly. The fact that Roach had to start luring new soldiers in with drugs and buy them as slaves was a big sign that he'd lost sight of what he was fighting for in the first place.

Roach wanted revenge against the Sovereign for exploiting his people...and he started exploiting people himself to get that revenge. Mr. Ocean was trying to make him realize that he wasn't solving anything, he was just continuing the cycle of oppression. Roach was already becoming a small-scale version of the Sovereign. If he continued on his path and succeeded, he would just replace the Sovereign completely and become a full-blown tyrant.