#callsign7299

notes:

original clip - Omfg this was so serious for me this was the closest i got to crying duringthe whole server. For reasons i shall explain (clearing throat)

clip breakdown:

Cortado is returning back to PD from somewhere (i dont rember Hehe) and as he gets out of his car he hears the familiar sound of a chopper overhead, so he looks up.

It's the trademark appearance of the Annihilator, which means only one person can (most likely) be its pilot...

(as an aside, adler is one of the only pilots in the server and definitely the most skillful. i like the concept that the sky is her domain, and the idea that when you hear a chopper overhead, it's most likely her. and, adding on, i like the idea that when cortado hears this helicopter sound, he somewhat expects it to be her at this point: maybe subconsciously hoping that it is)

As the helicopter descends slowly, he can't help but chuckle, realizing that it's her, eyes glued to the sky. He speaks, "Well hello, Captain," into the radio. It's Shelby who answers, Adler stays silent, the helicopter continuing to descend. and god damn the silence is heavy

(i think it's at this moment that it sunk in for Me, The viewer, like oh the server's ending. yeah it's all coming to a close. this is probably a farewell. because i feel in most situations adler would say something back but she's generally quiet for this entire sequence)

i also think it's so poignant that the camera remains trained on her the entire time the helicopter descends.......... because, of course, cortado is restrained to the ground, while adler owns the sky. maybe if he looked away for a second she could disappear... that's what this moment feels like to me. there's nowhere for him to look but up at her, waiting for her to greet him.

theres a sort of childish wonder in this scene too, playing back to cortado's general "naivete" and generally more playful personality around adler specifically.

When the helicopter touches ground, he laughs again while walking up to take the shotgun seat.

OMFGGGG it's just so melancholic and poignant its such a good scene like i blew up everythign it was so serious 4 me

Okay now i gotta be crazy:

holy projection/delusion alert coming up OMFGGGG

he's still rather naive, "green", rather new to policework/the world of crime/ while adler, in comparison, is a seasoned "ex"-criminal, and throughout the course of the server she often tells/teaches cortado various things.

i think in this way cortado does feel at adler's mercy most of the time -- at the very least, in the symbolic way that she has seen and done and experienced so many things in comparison to cortado's sheltered lifestyle growing up. Of course he can still handle his own for sure: and he's shown it time and time again: but he does keep coming back to her, and for good reason. she shows him a new perspective of the "criminal" lifestyle that he had so deeply abhorred his entire life due to his family, and gives him a perspective on the "gray" middle-ground in his black-and-white thinking up til now.

and i think the more he learns about her, and vice versa, it becomes more and more obvious of the stark differences between their histories, their families, their lifestyles. practically everything. their paths will diverge: they're already diverging.

i think there is also an inherent romanticism (in the fond, poetic sense) in never talking to someone again for the rest of your life LMFAOOOO and letting them live in your memory. the safest place to keep someone is in your heart. at this point it's obvious to cortado that they must go their separate ways, their own paths, and it's the end of the line, and there's nothing left to cling to.

(but the memories will be "good enough", i think, and that's what he wants to convince himself. At Least There's This. At Least I Have This. and again adler is the "kickstart" for a change in his thinking since growing up under his criminal family. reconsidering his police occupation, for starters.)

again, he's at her mercy: she made the choice to land her helicopter next to him and pick him up tonight: but she didn't have to. she could have just left. (and later on she did. but it's meaningful to me that she stopped to tell him, specifically, that she would be leaving.) i think parts of them will always live in the spaces of the other: you'll look up in the sky searching for her, you'll hold a cup of coffee searching for him.

you can kind of feel the emotion in these pieces.. (At least. I tried. Heh)

the alternate caption for ^ that post was "is it okay to miss you" <- or something Because i get the "i don't know anything about you, not really, and i can't really begin to know/understand, but i want to, and there's not enough time, but i already know that i'll miss you when you go, and i can't ask you to stay nor can i go with you and

Just thought about how they both briefly exchanged the idea of taking the same flight out of los santos knowing full well they're not doing all that. sickening really

their final conversation is also rather brief, not too deep - cautious, careful somehow. their friendship feels tenuous, but not necessarily in a tense way: it's like they made it to the midway ground but not one way or another. comrades, partners, friends, but how far is too far, and how much is enough? when i was watching this scene, there is this lingering idea that you always have to say goodbye eventually, and this is the final day, and they both know full well they have to say goodbye. so there's no use in trying to go deeper. they just have to leave it here. and hope that, if they get to meet again, they can simply pick up where they left off.