too many fandoms? no such thing

Planning on and in the process of, lol. Of the ideas I have made note of and done enough work on to consider them WIPs, I have:

Post-S2 Vee-centric fic in which Vox is somewhat traumatized by his own actions and doesn't trust himself not to cause further harm to the Vees, while the other two try to navigate being both mad at and worried about him (inspired by a lot of fics where they ostensibly care about him, yet their top priority is basically punishing him for having a mental breakdown. Also inspired by the fact that Vox is very protective of the other two, and I wanna see him struggle with perceiving himself as the threat).

Post-S2 StaticApple fic where Charlie gets to be a main character, and upset about her dad's new maybe-sort-of relationship. Also has elements of a sick fic/recovery fic, because "what if plugging directly into a malfunctioning angelic weapon was harmful, actually," ended up being the thing that got StaticApple interacting (includes lots of Chaggi, and Vox & Velvette friendship. Val is around, but so far he's a more antagonistic presence, on account of he's not coping well with Vox not doing well. Also featuring Alastor prying into everyone else's business, and Shok.wav being protective of his dad).

RadioStatic time travel fic where Vox decides not to make his offer to Alastor, then does such a bad job of pretending he's not carrying around seventy years' worth of trauma that Alastor figures out something is wrong within 48 hours (or 48 minutes if you only count the time they spend interacting). Kind of both RadioSilence and StaticSilence at the same time, on account of Vox knows Alastor will turn on him if he can't manage on his own, and Alastor wants to get his hands on whoever hurt Vox while being pushed away every time he gets too close (metaphorically or literally).

Post-S2 Angel Dust & Vox one-shot in which they are both lonely, depressed, and touch-starved (starved of safe touch in Angel's case), and it leads to the world's most uncomfortable cuddle session (there are consent issues and a power imbalance. Neither of them knows what a healthy coping mechanism looks like. They hate themselves and each other. Both of them think it's the best they can do under the circumstances, and frankly better than they deserve. Maybe they'd do it again, who knows).

We see Alastor getting attached to the hotel crew in s1 and then beat himself up about it after he almost dies for them, we see him almost foil his s2 plan to defend Niffty — so we know that, despite what he proclaims, he gets attached quite easily.

if you’re already a reader, either catch up or reread, because we are careening toward the bigger plot points. if you haven’t read it yet/just started following me, i assume you follow me for my takes on the characters, and this story is when we get to see those interpretations in action!

Not only does it make sense, it pretty much puts into words my first impression of both characters, lol.

My first exposure to the show itself was through the songs, and my first three songs, in order, were Brighter, VOX POPULI, and VOX DEI. So Vox and Lucifer were the first two I heard singing, and that was like.

First off, I am a sucker for a good growl. Not like death metal vocals, but give me a character who has some gravel in their voice when it gets low and I can listen to that for hours. And Brighter starts off with some very low notes (plus Vox grumbling to himself in the singalong version, which was the one I watched), so not only did it land as the best villain song I've heard in years, the voice hooked me immediately (very appropriate).

And then VOX POPULI introduces Lucifer, and knowing absolutely nothing about his personality, I'm already thinking, this doesn't fit his voice. Not in the sense that it sounds bad, because it sounds great, but it isn't scary. Then his voice smooths out on "'Cause I'm the serpent" and I'm like, there we go. You're just trying to be scary, and it isn't working. And from there I'm completely unsurprised by "I am so spooky!" and by Vox's complete lack of concern (which is one of the reasons why I don't get it when people say Vox would have been scared if he hadn't known Lucifer couldn't hurt him. I didn't know that, and I thought it made perfect sense that Vox didn't take him seriously. The guy was clearly bluffing).

Vox? Very much not bluffing. VOX DEI sounds every bit the declaration of war it is, and if Brighter hadn't already won me over, the growling in this one would have. Like, I love both his and Lucifer's delivery on their respective "motherfucking King of Hell" lines, but Lucifer sounds like he expects his target to submit, Vox sounds like he's going to make them submit.

I think Lucifer would scoff at the idea of a mere mortal having that kind of power over him, and deny having any problems that would necessitate such intervention in the first place. He can totally do anything he wants to, any time he wants to (and underneath all of that, I feel like he just has trouble asking for things he wants, especially if it would "inconvenience" people he cares about. Case in point, he's ecstatic about Charlie calling him and inviting him over in S1, but made no apparent effort to reach out himself. Presumably because he thought/knew it would be unwelcome).

All of that said, I can imagine him "casually" asking a bunch of leading questions about how Vox's hypnotism works, and what the limits are, and if it matters if the subject is willing (he thinks he is being very subtle. He isn't). But Vox doesn't actually need hypnotism to get people doing things, so I feel like the moment he realized what was going on (it takes about two questions), he'd basically be like, "challenge accepted".

So then he starts asking some leading questions of his own to figure out what Lucifer is after, under the guise of "it depends". And then a few more questions under the guise of simple interest. And then pushing Lucifer to actually do the thing under the guise of wanting to see for himself. Depending on what it is, maybe trying to get involved and intentionally messing something up so Lucifer "has to" show him how to do it right. And the whole time he's just getting increasingly smug until Luci realizes he's been "tricked" into doing the thing. And he can't even be mad because it's technically what he wanted.

I also really dislike "Not In the Mood," and my favorite part of that is ill-mannered Arianna.

First off, "the kind of ADHD who's too lazy" is ableist as fuck, and you have earned my animosity.

Second off, he is fully and demonstrably capable of playing. If you are so certain that he's faking, then explain to me this:

His hands are on exactly the right keys at exactly the right time. There are no discordant notes from pressing keys randomly, and no keys down that shouldn't be. He knows which keys to press when, and he has the muscle memory to follow along perfectly. He has spent significant time on this, he could play it completely unaided, and he could literally play it with his eyes closed, because they are closed almost the entire time.

Every single scrap of evidence points to, not only the ability to play, but a high level of tactile familiarity with the keyboard, which requires time and effort to obtain. You could convince me that he doesn't know how to read sheet music, but only because he's a very tactile person who isn't relying on sight here, so I could fully believe he learned to play mostly or entirely through touch and sound.