#this got...long

First! Thank you for reading and rereading!

So. Fun fact. I set out to write the Like a Hinge sequel focusing on Dick and Tim having some shenanigans, but then Jason more or less kicked in the door and took it over completely. There are still Dick and Tim shenanigans...but there's also a lot of Jason stuff directly related to the answers to your questions. Meaning, I'm not gonna go too in depth answering this, but here's the shorter version! Some spoilers for the follow up fic if I ever get it finished and posted so if you're not interested in that don't read under the cut:

*deep sigh* I absolutely HAVE to make a masterlist post because I know we have talked about Earth. I know we have. But do you think I can find it anywhere? No. No I cannot. 🙄🙄🙄 So I’m going to apologize if anything here ends up being repetitive from when we did this one for Malex, but I’m thinking in this case I’ll be okay because this song has very different vibes for me on the Malex front vs the Buddie front. 

ANYWAY, I’m so glad you’re feeling better and the pep talk helped! It’s our first Monday of hiatus (😭😭😭) and I’m so glad the fandom is being totally normal about this. By that, I mean that everyone is absolutely unhinged and making wrench memes and yelling at Oliver to explain what TF he’s talking about and I love that for us. 

Okay, so as much as I was looking forward to going into the hiatus on a higher note and maybe having a “January White” Eddie discussion (maybe next year?), I am...a little excited about all the angsty songs we’ll get to talk about so I can’t be TOO upset. And this is a great start! Not too angsty and hopeless, which I think we’ve all had enough of for now this season, but not overly cheerful so it matches the tone of where we are now. And whooo boy if these lyrics aren’t Eddie Diaz right now (though I feel Like Buck’s turn is coming in 5x11)!

i dig ’til my shovel tells a secret, swear to the earth that i will keep it, brush off the dirt and let my change of heart occur.

sold soon after the appraisal, the hammer struck the auction table louder than anything i’ve ever heard.

Okay, so this part is really hitting me in my Eddie Begins feels. Like, Eddie has these moments of “big” trauma that reveal the secret traumas of his life (feeling like he’s always failing-his parents, Shannon, Chris, like he’s not good enough, like he can’t trust his instincts or make good decisions etc) and he has these “oh” moments that those “big” traumas dig up about how really not okay he is, but instead of dealing with these realizations, he just....shoves it all back down and locks it away, only acknowledging as much as he needs to in order to adjust his parenting and not have Chris turn out like him. (Spoiler alert, this is....not working)

fault lines tremble underneath my glass house. but I put it out of my mind long enough to call it courage to live without a lifeline. i bend the definition of faith to exonerate my blind eye. “’til the sirens sound, i’m safe.”

Oof oof oof. This is what we have been seeing since the shooting. That gunshot was the thing that triggered those fault lines and I find it....interesting, that it comes up right after Eddie has been helping Buck to process his childhood trauma. He so gently and insistently validates Buck’s feelings while just...totally ignoring that his own feelings about his own parental/abandonment/not good enough for them to stay trauma (”if that’s how you feel? How they made you feel?”) is also valid. Glass house much, Eddie? But as always, there is another emergency, another person who needs help, another homework assignment or parent teacher conference for Chris, another friend in need, so he puts it out of his mind and pretends that he’s doing the right thing and just moving on. Like turning a blind eye is the same as acknowledging and moving past something. And I am feeling some kind of way about “’til the sirens sound, i’m safe” because Eddie has been falling apart since that shot rang out and we saw him jumping back into the job but repeatedly struggling on calls. Because at this point it’s all sirens all the time and nothing is safe anymore.

meanwhile, my family’s taking shelter. the sparks send the fire down the wire, a countdown begins, until the dynamite gives in.

the echo, as wide as the equator, travels through a world of built up anger- too late to pull itself together now.

I am in my “Fight Club Arc” feelings about this verse. Like, Eddie. My dude. My guy. *siiiiiigh*. He may have been struggling before but he has kinda been falling apart since Shannon died and the tsunami hit and he nearly lost everything. I know there are...divisive feelings about the fight club arc but I don’t mind it because it makes so much sense to me. A man who has been taught his whole life that the only feelings and emotions men are allowed to show are basically fuck or fight? A man like that losing someone he loved once but that he was still angry at and never got closure? A man like that doing everything in his power to be gentle and soft and understanding with his son which he thinks means hiding those “uglier” emotions? And then “losing” the one person he might have felt safe discussing those more difficult emotions with so he could process them? Because that person is going through something too but Eddie is drowning and he doesn’t have his best friend and he feels like he’s failing his son and it’s all just so much? That is a man who is a powder keg and knows it, so he did something he thought would mitigate the collateral damage. But fun fact! You can’t fuck or fight your way out of stuff like this, and no matter how you try to hide it, those closest to you will eventually get hit with some of the blowback.

fault lines tremble underneath my glass house. but i put it out of my mind long enough to call it courage to live without a lifeline. i bend the definition of faith to exonerate my blind eye. “’til the sirens sound, i’m safe.”

I am still in awe of the Eddie reveal in 5x10 because it felt a bit like it came out of nowhere during the episode when it starting hinting he was going to leave the 118, but it didn’t. Not really. Those fault lines have been opening up bigger and bigger cracks all season and Eddie has been pushing through, and pushing through, and living without that lifeline and he is officially out of rope. (Also, not to make this about a different SaL song, Two, interesting fact! A lot of parents can mistype as enneagram type 2′s because so much of who they are is wrapped up in being a caregiver to their child, and even more so for parents of disabled children, or single parents. And Eddie is both of those with additional things heaped on top of Christopher’s little shoulders such as “absent military parent who came home injured”, and “traumatic parental separation, brief reunion, then traumatic parental death”, and “traumatic near-death experience”, and most recently “nearly another traumatic parental death”, and that’s not even counting how Chris must have felt about all the times Buck has been injured! So Eddie defaulting hard into making everything about Chris without putting his own oxygen mask on first is...not unexpected but also not something that’s going to be sustainable in the long term. I cannot wait to dig deeper into that one with you because whooo boy is that going to be A Lot for both Eddie AND Buck.) 

there was an earthquake. there was an avalanche of change. we were so afraid, we cried ourselves a hurricane. there were floods, tidal waves over us, so we folded our hands and prayed. like a domino, these wildfires grow and grow until a brand new world takes shape.

So of course this is going to make us all think of the various natural disasters we see in the show all the time, but I think it’s important to note how the unpredictability of life and those strong emotions that come with those life changing moments can feel like incontrollable natural disasters. They can feel like everything is cracking and buried and flooded and burned to the ground but out of all that chaos and change, a new world can take shape. And Eddie can’t see it now, he’s still in the middle of all the upheaval, but I think we things settle down and he’s doing his therapy (good god, get that man into therapy!), and he’s unraveling everything, he’s going to find that the old world that crumbled was making way for something new and beautiful and something without those hidden fault lines underneath. He’s going to find that he already has everything he ever wanted, but he has to actually do the work and reach out and grab it.

fault lines tremble underneath my glass house. but i put it out of my mind long enough to call it courage to live without a lifeline. i bend the definition of faith to exonerate my blind eye. “’til the sirens sound, i’m safe.”

I usually lump the last repeated chorus in with the last verse or the bridge, but I’m feeling like this chorus is going to fit Buck pretty soon when we come back from the hiatus and I cannot wait. Because as much as Eddie has been cracking all season, so has Buck. And it’s in a different way, but we are seeing the fissures in the way he tries to put in a transfer (pushing as a way of begging his family to tell him not to go), and the relationship he’s in that has him falling into old, self-destructive habits (isolating, chasing after people because he thinks he’s not good enough, repressing and hiding his true feelings etc). And OOF if “long enough to call it courage to live without a lifeline” isn’t just the most Buck line of all. Because that’s what he tries to play it off as. Courage. And people call him “reckless”, and “indestructible” and “invincible”, and Eddie, only Eddie, sees it for what it is. Expendable. And I think Eddie leaving has some interesting potentials. I know we are all chanting for a Divorce Era 2.0 storyline with upset!Buck this time because season 5 is a warped season 3 mirror and I am all on board for that, but I’m thinking of what Oliver said that he’s going to struggle but he’s going to have to “get used” to being without his partner. I’m thinking maybe we get early days without Eddie, then a flashforward, but I’m not sure if Buck is going to break before or after. Either way, I can’t wait to see it. I can’t wait for both of them to let out all the hurt and anger and sorrow and everything and then start building their new world. Together.

Sansa begins shivering in earnest after dark falls, but she cannot stop moving--either Petyr’s army or the Boltons will find her if she does, and Sansa isn’t sure which outcome she fears more. The cold seems to sink into her bones, frozen and deadly, but she forces herself to keep rushing forward. She’s only a few miles outside Winterfell, and though she’d never been one for the wolfswood the way Arya or her brothers had been, Sansa remembers where they’d kept a hunting cabin. If only she can get there for the night, hide until the battle between the Vale and Winterfell is over--

She will be found eventually. Petyr will know she’s missing soon, and he will send men after her, men with hounds that will sniff her out, no matter how much snow falls to mask her scent. He will find her and force her to marry him, and then he will take Winterfell and her father’s seat, and Sansa will not be able to stop him, no matter how far she runs. 

Leslie: 3, 18, 21, 27

Philotes: 19, 26, 35, 54

Leslie:

3. Orientation and Relationship status (single, taken (by who?)), (crush? (on who))? Fucking gay ass home of sexual and in love & relationship with Cutter (because I'm equally gay at and need to project). Also has a massive crush on my friend's OC Jackie and they have a thing going on. Leslie doesn't label themself but they sure do have 2 hands

18. Have any special keepsakes? They have this very old fuzzy coat they've had forever and practically lives in at times (despite the Florida heat, idk how they do it). It's the only thing they kept from the family home and has kept them warm and safe for years and countless journeys. High-key sentimental value plus it makes them look fancy, a win for all

21. Fave food(s) and drink(?) Cucumber. Don't ask me why, I have no explanation. They do have a cucumber garden thry tend to tho. Coffee drinker (derogatory), enjoys cold brew

27. Whats their family like? Who's in it? What's their relationship with them? Uuuh well, short story is that they don't really have a family anymore. A bit longer story is they do have a close group of friends they still see from time to time and concidertheir found family. All this - and more! - is unlockable in their ~Tragic Backstory~

Phil:

19. Hobbies: Sewing! And everything creative and crafty. She loves creating stuff and use her hands to form and set free whatever he holds in her imagination. Also enjoys singing and testing the limitations of his body by doing fun physical activities like cartwheeling

26. Guilty pleaures: This might sound weird but; standing in the shower, pretending to shower. No water, no soap, just the vague feel of being able to do it. Maybe adds a hologram of rain or something for flavour. No clothes ofc, for authenticity. Sometimes he's been walked in on and asked what the hell is going on, but in reality he just want as much of the human experience she can manage to create for herself

35. What are they like as a friend? Very caring and can and will attempt to help you with everything if needed/asked. Very affectionate too, but it takes a while for her to warm up and accept said affection in return. He cares a lot for his friends and in big dosages it can get a little overwhelming at times (the helpfulness is a lot of his core programming, cannot change dis😔). Trying her best to work on boundaries along with the rest of the crew tho! Will fuck you up if you hurt her firends tho, don't be fooled

I think I had a little bit about Nila in Caduceus’s section, but since I’m too lazy to go check: Nila has a field mouse! I mentioned it in this post, but basically, firbolgs aren’t born with daemons, and many of them don’t really see the need for one. Some of them though, like Nila and Caduceus, will happen across an animal that they connect with in some way. In Caduceus’s case, it was a puppy who wandered into the graveyard, and in Nila’s case, it was a field mouse she encountered in the middle of a blizzard. She was still fairly new to the druidic arts at the time, so when it started to snow she didn’t start heading home right away, and before she knew it she couldn’t even see through the snow. Looking for shelter, she found a stand of trees that offered a little protection, and started piling up snow around herself. While she was digging, she found a field mouse, half-buried and nearly frozen. She tucked it inside her robe, and talked to it through the night to stay awake. In the morning, the mouse stayed with her as she traveled home, and eventually it became her daemon.

Calianna has a lovely sleek black snake daemon. He’s a shy noodle who spends most of his time hiding in her hair and encouraging her to talk to people. The cultists who raised them were probably thrilled that Cali had a serpent daemon, but honestly, he’s just as gentle and sweet as she is.

I really should have anticipated an ask about Keg, because ever since I decided that dwarves and gnomes make their daemons I’ve been thinking “but what about Keg though?” In the books there was that whole subplot with the armored bears, and I love the idea of something like that on a larger scale, with lots of different kinds of souls and daemons. See, for Rissa I had in mind that she has this necklace, with little bits and charms and things, and she’s been adding to it and changing it and messing with it ever since she was little. Rissa’s father, well, he makes fantastic little machines, lots of them! Why limit yourself? Norda, the dwarven lawmaster in Trostenwald, she has her armor, which is the very traditional dwarf thing to do. Not everyone has that, of course. It would be silly for tailors or charcoal burners or fishermen to go around in clanking plate mail all day just so they can be close to their soul, but most people have something at least. 

You start with the relatively lighthearted 20k Leagues: fun music, imaginative visuals, an adorable trained seal, and two Serious Actors in not-so-serious secondary roles.  This is prime popcorn-inhaling material.  James Mason and Paul Lukas provide the real emotional gravitas at the center of the film; although Disneyfied, angst still manages to abound amid questions of revenge and redemption.  James Mason’s voice echoes around you as the Nautilus’ spire slowly sinks below the waves, the score swells, the film ends...

Then you clean up your popcorn bowls and put in Lord Jim.  It opens with waves crashing over a ship at sea as Jack Hawkins’ voice tells of “a nameless man who would prefer to live and die unknown.”  The titular Jim fucks up royally and almost instantly, and he spends the rest of the film trying to attain personal redemption: or rather, to prove himself a hero rather than a coward.  This film is unapologetically angsty and introspective, a good complement to and continuation of the dark undertones of the first film.  Along the way, we run into some familiar faces: Paul Lukas, now eleven years older than when he played Aronnax, plays the fatherly, melancholy merchant Stein in what should have been an award-winning performance.  Nearly two hours into the film, who else should emerge but James Mason, playing a deliciously perceptive antagonist to Jim’s would-be hero.  Here is no misguided idealist like Nemo, but a dry cynic who nevertheless seems to comprehend exactly what Jim is putting himself through.  Though I won’t spoil anything, the two films’ endings are oddly similar in tone despite very different circumstances.

Sure, I don’t see anything objectionable there!

I should specify that for this one, I wrote it in the vein of dealing with Santi’s very definite PTSD following the events that transpired in the film. In my headcanon, Santi lives somewhere in the U.S., now, and has lived there for a few years, and none of Lorea’s men have ever figured out anything about what took place, much less been able to find him, but Santi still experiences bouts of paranoia, increased tension, and anxiety about his worst-case-scenario fears and the guilt he has regarding Redfly’s passing.

As such, this piece does deal with some of the pieces of the PTSD puzzle in Santi’s life, and I wanted to include that as a potential content warning for anyone who might get a little stressed about it. There are also mentions of guns and weapons, just as a follow-up warning about the content.

So, TL;DR: Content Warning: Discussions of PTSD, mentions of paranoia, anxiety, violence, guns, and weapons. Nothing explicit or detailed, but mentioned in passing in regards to the concerns of a veteran adjusting to civilian life. 

It’s going to be okay, I promise! (Since we all know I don’t do dreadful angst). While it does center on the difficult topic of love and relationships with a partner who is dealing with trauma and the associated stress, there is hope, love, and compassion at the heart of it. So, in the end, it will be alright!

Without further ado, let’s get into it!

Santi’s worked in a difficult, frightening field since he was a young man. Well over a decade spent in the service of the U.S. Army and then three years deep in the Colombian police has taught him to be tense, cautious, vigilant. He sleeps with one eye open, as the saying goes, long after he’s left the live fire behind, and there’s only so much he can do to curb that natural inclination towards tension. But things only get more complicated once he’s no longer alone in his life, and he has to factor in a whole new set of variables; namely, his beloved.