#dickson SAYS he wants power but i suspect that long long ago what the giant dickson really wanted was SURVIVAL.

[dying-suffering-french-stalkers]

god help me i'm going insane about dickson xenoblade again

#this is what i get for thinking about lord of the rings too hard this week (specifically denethor / gríma / saruman and the like) #thinking about the way anthony may delivered “when will you learn you HAVE no future?” #he thinks shulk is fully DEAD at that point. he thinks HE killed him. which he very much meant to. but now that the kid is no longer there #now that the terrible future he's been preparing for and actively working to bring about has in fact come about #i don't know that dickson really cared anymore. he played his part he did the deed expected and he did it unquestioningly. So What Now? #well. now nothing. now the world that he spent so long biding his time in; so long getting enmeshed in (even for nefarious purposes) #is about to end; is about to be gone forever. #sure zanza will probably just create another world and maybe he (dickson) will have Even More Power in the new one #(though that's not a given! he doesn't know for SURE his lord and god will keep his promise!) #but like. what the hell does he care at this point #dickson SAYS he wants power but i suspect that long long ago what the giant dickson really wanted was SURVIVAL. #we never get to know just how he became a disciple or what the giant civilization looked like in its heyday or how it ended #but in MY headcanon dickson saw that some kind of destruction coming and he wanted Out #and maybe he hated his peers and figured any power and prestige that came from this bargain was just a bonus #i think he thought of himself as a saruman type: powerful; remote; far above the petty troubles of mortals (even the long-lived high entia) #but i have always headcanoned that by his later days (i.e. when he started engaging w/colony 9; machina village; etc. in earnest) #he committed too hard to the bit and started “going native” as it were; started to give a shit in ways that he would never dare admit #maybe not as much of a shit as; you know; a regular guy would. but more than an immortal disciple and horseman of the apocalypse should. #and all the time knowing that all the world he'd seen would soon be gone #maybe everyone else can get fucked. but shulk had to die too. and that's what their god MADE them to do. #he can't allow himself to care or to hope for another option bc in his mind it's already over; decided; that's it #what else can you do in the face of ultimate power but bow to it and take whatever scraps may fall to an obedient servant? #“you have no future” nor does he except that shulk came back. except that the peoples of bionis/mechonis just wouldn't accept Fate. #and in some final rebellious corner of his mind he starts putting eggs in shulk's basket. “if they can't even defeat telethia they won't #stand a chance against me (or zanza)” so let's see if they CAN. oh they did? how about a dragon? oh fuck they defeated the dragon too? #well fuck. maybe there WAS another option all along. but will/can they stand against me; the final disciple? oh they can?? #guess i'll die then bc i'm not looking THAT in the face. i am NOT unpacking my cowardice/failure/lack of vision after all these years. #good luck with that tho <3 you're welcome for the training btw. where i'm going i don't have to see your trauma assuming you live that long. #dickson #xenoblade