spinejackel

[spinejackel]

I hate the “open floor plan” that everyone is obsessed with in houses now. I want nooks and crannies and bizarre floor plans. I don’t need to be able to see what someone is doing on the other side of the house. I want places to hide and lurk and dwell in the shadows. I am the beast who awaits in the labyrinth

#cory core

[spinejackel]

it’s just me and this fake man i want to eat me out against the world

#i’m gonna eat him out too #this can apply to several of my faves

[spinejackel]

men should be whores. and you can quote me on that.

#🫡

[spinejackel]

my boyfriend told me to share snippets from the oc/canon stuff with vincent valentine that i write purely for myself in my notes app because i’m apparently very good at writing romance

i don’t have a reference up for the oc in my stuff (yet!!) but have this anyway. if there is enough interest i MAY share another snippet

#vincent valentine #writing #cory speaks #gonna keep this with minimal tags for vince cause i know not everyone is a fan of oc/canon #can also copy/paste the words from my notes app if necessary #the unspoken solidarity between a trans man and a cis man who had the ability to take other forms unwillingly forced upon him

[spinejackel]

Fwoom (intimidatingly)

#love this piece #the motion in it is so wonderful #maul #stars wars

[spinejackel]

sometimes i forget he kills people for work

#thats just how it is sometimes tho #vincent valentine #protect this old man #baby boy era

[spinejackel]

Precious baby demon boy. 🙇‍♀️

#he’s so beautiful #vincent valentine #protect this old man

[spinejackel]

I've never done a full breakdown of everything that happened to my version of Vincent while he was under the knife (although there is a partial breakdown from like 12 years ago on Ask Vincent Valentine), but @spinejackel tagged my recent Vincent doodle gushing about autopsy scar (Vincent Has a Y-Incision headcanon supremacy!) so I figured it was probably a good time. This is also probably the best method, since I can apply the right tags and trigger warnings to hopefully keep it from hitting the people who would be disturbed.

For anyone who doesn't know, figuring out the fucked up physiology of victims of science is like my entire jam. I think this is what happens when you let a chronically ill child watch Akira and the original Bubblegum Crisis OVA and most of the works of Masamune Shirow. All that before FF7 even existed. This means that the explanation under the cut may seem excessive, and this post is very long. I've been building it over over a quarter century, I don't think there's any avoiding it at this point.

Warnings for body horror, nonconsensual body modification, medical horror and torture. Basically, if there's anything you can think of related to becoming a victim of science under the rule of an unethical sci-fantasy oligarchy, it's probably in here to some degree. It's explained plainly and simply, in clinical but not visceral detail.

My headcanons for what Hojo did to Vincent are pretty specific, albeit not precisely comprehensive; 27 years later I still don't really have a particularly solid concept for how he turned Vincent into a shapeshifter, although at least we know it's not something entirely specific to Vincent—Hojo repeated that facet of the experiment in Azul, but not in any other SOLDIER operative even in DeepGround, implying that it's only possible if very specific physiological conditions are met. The minimal concept I do have involves a twisted application of the concept of incarnate summoning as it appears in FFXIII-2, but it's very vague and also not the topic of this post. Maybe later.

Regarding the Y-incision/autopsy scar, my headcanon is that once Hojo tweaked Vincent into being able to regenerate from any injury—an enhancement that is confirmed to be entirely Hojo's work in Dirge—the professor of course felt it necessary to run various tests quantify the usefulness of his handiwork. He did this first by inflicting various surface injuries, then by causing more extreme bodily trauma, which eventually culminated in Hojo removing the majority of Vincent's internal organs in order to measure how long it took them to grow back and, assuming they did grow back, how the new ones compared to Vincent's original parts.

To be able to observe this as closely as possible, Hojo kept Vincent's torso open for the entire process—which he repeated twice more in order to check the weight, size and structure of the newly-grown organs in comparison to the originals. This study proved that most of them* did grow back, but the majority of them stopped developing much earlier than was appropriate** for Vincent's age and size. The difference was consistent, Hojo just never figured out why most of them grew back smaller and less-developed.

The reason this happened is based the fact that most of the organs in the human trunk are used in digestion and other related processes, and Vincent's regeneration means he doesn't need to eat or drink anymore. His body only expended as much energy as was completely necessary to develop those organs to the point of being functional rather than normal, because they're not really necessary. Vincent is glad he still has them, though, because he does still occasionally eat (usually in social situations) and also he'd be really sad if he couldn't even have coffee.

Vincent's brain activity remained normal during the entire process, although that may have something to do with Hojo driving a bunch of fluid lines into his head and flooding the inside of his skull with mako to keep him awake the whole time even while deprived of oxygen. (Rebirth spoilers, but seeing the bit in the Nibelheim Protorelic questline where Hojo does something super similar to this, after this has been my headcanon for decades, was a trip.)

Two organs didn't grow back at all: Vincent's appendix and one kidney. This was also the result of efficient energy expenditure, as the human appendix isn't necessary for survival, and only one kidney is really required. (Each time Hojo removed the new kidney, the one that grew back would be on the opposite side, which bothered Hojo to no end.)

His lungs grew back a little larger, possibly because his skeletal structure never quite recovered after his first transformation into Galian—his arms and legs are noticeably too long for his body, although not to the point of looking impossible, and likewise his ribcage settled to breadth that would allow for larger lungs. He doesn't really need these anymore either, related to his brain being exposed to so much mako during the process that it can now operate without oxygen if necessary, but switching himself over from aerobic to anaerobic respiration is really unpleasant and Vincent tries to avoid it when he can.

His heart was pretty normal by the time Hojo was done with him, although his heartrate had dropped to like 20bpm even when elevated. Again, if respiration isn't necessary, there's not much reason for the system to be active. (By the time Lucrecia was done this had dropped to around 5bpm on average, although it's completely arrhythmic and jumps all over the place when he's not either particularly active or on the verge of a transformation.)

This was the experiment that left Vincent susceptible to degradation, which Hojo didn't realize until after finally closing him back up. Upon realizing that Vincent's body wasn't responding properly to a different test (a repetition of an earlier experiment related to the regeneration of external tissues and features), Hojo just kinda threw him in a tube to be disposed of at a later date, kinda like that scene in Arrested Development where there's that dead dove in a bag in the fridge. The incision healed at some point during the period that Lucrecia was working on him, but early enough in her work that the tissue couldn't flawlessly regenerate (like it does in the present), leaving him with one more gnarly scar on top of all the rest.

Vincent is self-conscious about all the physiological changes brought on by what was done to him, often to the point of loathing. His left arm is the worst—it rotted off while he was in the throes of degradation and grew back as something that he hesitates to call his arm—but Vincent hates that Y-incision scar almost as much. Some days they tie.

(It has come up in appropriately horrified conversation with Shalua that, considering how his regeneration works, Vincent could probably get rid of all the scars on his chest if he somehow peeled the skin off his torso in a single swath. He will not be doing that. Besides, it might grow back the wrong color/texture/etc, like his left arm. Not worth the risk, much less the suffering.)

Also I gotta finish off this entry with the extremely stupid headcanon reveal that Vincent's (honestly fairly impressive) dick was cut off during the first round of bodily trauma regeneration tests—and Hojo has never felt the sort of rage he experienced when upon discovering that it grew back bigger than before. This occurred early enough in the experiments that Vincent was not awake for it, and thus has no idea how the fuck this happened, and does not want to talk about it ever thank you very much. I've never mentioned it in public anywhere because it is extremely stupid, but I hope someone out there finds it as funny a concept as I do.

#YYYYEEEEAAAAAHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!! #HOOTING AND HOLLERING!!!! #this poor guy #cursed to walk between life and death #never one nor the other #vincent valentine #protect this old man #was excitedly reading this post to my partner as soon as i saw it #he was very into the medical horror side of these headcanons #would LOVE to talk more about vince with you if you are ever down

[spinejackel]

Yeah i have a dark past (being 13). Just an absolutely horrible backstory (being 13). It would keep you up at night if i told you about it (i was 13 one time)

#killian dotsero

[spinejackel]

John Carpenter's The Thing offers many lessons in filmmaking. For example:

Have an actor wear a giant cowboy hat

Put a Fucking Thing in there

#text

[spinejackel]

im not thrilled on the whole ‘having a vagina’ concept but i must accept that this is a gift god gives to the boys he knows will have the most constant and embarassing boners. at least im given some peace in this life

#thank god honestly

[spinejackel]

If I was luxord and I found out I wasn't being sent to castle oblivion I'd have been pissed. Oh no it's ok, send the others to the card-themed hellhole. I didn't even want to go. I'm sure fucking marluxia has it handled

#kingdom hearts

[spinejackel]

i will say. even before shmi was tortured to death, even if you don't process the harsh slave labor or literal implanted explosive device to keep her from running away, shmi is a body horror character because her pregnancy is not consensual. obviously lucas is recalling mary and her immaculate conception but mary was TOLD what was going to happen. she was told she was carrying the child of the lord. that is an essential part of the story. and shmi was not!! she just woke up one day and was pregnant. she didn't know anything about the force. she probably knew next to nothing about pregnancy. she had to carry and give birth in the unimaginable conditions of slavery, with no idea what was happening to her . that's the kind of fear i don't think could ever be tackled properly in a kids movie (esp with it's real world parallels) but that it's not even discussed in fandom is unfortunate

#star wars

[spinejackel]

2009 deviantArt artists telling you to fill an entire layer with neon green and place it behind your lineart to check if there's any unwanted stray lines or unfilled pixels were the elderly sages at the end of the spirit path atop a secluded mountaintop you reached just as the sun was setting

[spinejackel]

on that note saying taylor swift is the songwriter of the century when kendrick lamar exists is a crime in itself

[spinejackel]

girl who does not play about vincent valentine

yeah i like to think he has a reason to hide his forehead with bandana and wear that arm armor thingy

#[pointing at this and hooting and hollering] #IF YOU EVER WANT TO TALK ABOUT ALL THE WAYS THIS GUY IDS FUCKED UP INTERNALLY #IM ALL EARS #(am a guy that doesn’t play about this man) #vincent valentine #protect this old man

[spinejackel]

two things i wish spotify had were the ability for me to leave footnotes in playlists for why i have certain songs on them, and i also wish people could leave comments on spotify playlists because i need to know how much damage i’m inflicting on people with my meticulously curated song selections

i have honed my craft to a point that, according to my partner, is like i’m hitting you over the head with a steel chair again and again with the lyrics

#my miguel o’hara playlist is my crown jewel rn #cory speaks