stultifera navis rerun AKA thinking about Iberia hours again because a lot of the Iberians have such fascinating relationships with the concept of home but specifically Thorns and Lumen are eating at my brain. like where do you call home when the place that is your home Just Fucking Hates You? Elysium's rewinding breeze specifically makes a point to hammers home how differently Iberia treats its Liberi and its Aegir
(which is especially interesting since this comes right after a conversation where Purestream commented on how despite Leizi being a high ranking government official, there are still some experiences that are universal for all Yanese people - because the experience of what Iberia itself is like isnt universal for all Iberians)
But all that being said, Thorns also straight up states that Aegir is not his home, and yeah, how could it be? How could a place you've never been to, never truly known, ever be your home? How could it ever feel like a home?
so where do you go when the place that you are from hates your people and the place your people are from is completely unfamiliar and alien to you? Thorns' answer at the end of the conversation with Aya is: my home is where i chose it to be. my home is where there are people I care about and people who care about me
in the complete opposite direction, Lumen's oprec asks: why do you still stay in a place that wants you gone? because the people of Gran Faro like Jordi well enough but when push comes to shove, they will want the only Aegir in town gone
and yet, when Rald the messenger offers him a chance to leave Jordi turns him down and when he's forced to escape Gran Faro after the people there literally try to send him to his death (or worse) at the hands of the Inquisitors he keeps trying to go back because like everyone in stultifera navis, Jordi is clinging to his own dreams of a golden age
but the shape of that dream is unique to every character and for Jordi, his dreams are deeply, inseparably bound to the Eye of Iberia, the legacy his parents left behind
and it's this dream of becoming someone great, of bringing about that golden age that his parents devoted their lives to help create that ties Jordi to this nothing town because despite everything, despite the mistrust of the townsfolk and the hostility of the Inquisition and the danger from the ocean, he simply cannot leave it behind
(or, because i personally dislike the official translation,)
"I just see this place as my home"
so yeah. not sure what overall point i was trying to make here i'm just. deeply in love with these stories about chosing what is and isn't your home, of saying you will not call a place your home because it has given you no reason to or saying you consider a place your home even though it has given you every reason not to. deeply unwell about them <3
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going feral over stede and the bar scene in the finale, send help.
because in some ways, this is a continuation of the party scene in e5; only now, ed’s not here. his pain is theoretical, and stede still thinks they’ll never see each other again.
ed would never know if he let it go, this time. no one would ever know.
it’s tempting. stede’s brokenhearted and feeling utterly alone, and these men are offering him attention alongside a fucked up poison pill masquerading as acceptance.
all he has to do is share a couple stories, so long as they’re the stories that confirm the horrible things these men so desperately need to keep believing, or realize they only thrive and profit off endless cycles of human misery. if that ever happened, they would be forced to make an active choice to keep perpetuating the misery or step away and become part of the solution.
which means: that cannot fucking happen. under no circumstances do they want to be in that very uncomfortable place. they like their lives, they like their clothes, they like their nice houses. they are just doing their best, they tell themselves; they do not go home at night and feel like they’re The Bad Guys.
so they do not want to hear about ed, who is lonely and confused and strong and super hot and very complicated and the most lovely person stede has ever met.
ed would fuck with their emotional economy. if ed exists and he is not subject to their definitions of the world and the reasons they made up and codified into science and law to explain why they have what they have, then hooooooly shit kids. holy shit: what the fuck else are we wrong about???
these are the thoughts they cannot think. world-shaking, identity-sundering thoughts. these thoughts fucking suck.
all they want is blackbeard. they do not want a man in all his beautiful nuance; the ways in which he is angry, the ways in which he is tender or silly or looks like an elvish prince or romance novel cover without the beard. ed, who kissed stede on the beach and was willing to give it all up for him isn’t the story they want.
they want a monster, born of the devil. they want to go gawk at the locals like the poverty tourist shtick from the republic of pirates, but without even having to leave the comfort of the home they stole. they already feel so fucking superior, but they want more.
the hunger that gnaws at them has nothing to do with the food they can afford to take for granted. they will always want more.
and now they want stede to feed them. they want him to show them that he had his wild fun, off with those little urban friends of his— now he’s back where he belongs, intemperate fit of madness over.
he’s still weird, and he’s definitely still gay and they still do not like that at all, no sir, but in this moment they decide: for right now, he’s one of them.
this is how he can do it. this is how stede can win, just this once. now, he can give them someone else to gleefully chew on and bask in the shared glow of keeping somebody else down.
because here’s the catch: stede will no longer be one of them if he defends ed even a little, their pushback says.
so make your choice, stede, these fucking assholes/the narrative says. what’s it going to be?
and because this show is very real and heartbreaking and understands that good and bad is not so much something people are, it’s something people do: stede slips up. the words come out of his well-meaning mouth, and he can’t take them back.
because mary hasn’t yet attempted murder with a skewer, stede’s still in his belly of the whale moment, so instead of remembering what he learned at the party (that now is the time to say fuck you fuckers, here or not ed would be horrified to hear this and thus i am horrified, because his pain is my pain now that i know it exists and then burn their lives down) he backpedals, but he doesn’t take it back.
ed’s a killer: the worst thing he could possibly say.
the secret ed told him—the secret i would guess ed has only spoken aloud to stede in that exact way— alone in their little bathtub confessional: he denied it. he knows that ed has hurt people and let people die, and while the morality hair is being split admittedly fine there along with the exact definition of murder, to ed that makes a difference.
and because stede is flawed and human and kind of an asshole sometimes but at the end of the day, so so wonderful: he knows that even if ed will never know he said this, it matters. stede will know it happened, that these gross men wanted to point and laugh at his friend and the man he doesn’t yet understand he loves, and that stede didn’t protect ed from that.
the world ed moved in means he was told the acceptable methods of protection only have to do with the physical world; you teach a man to fight, you shield him with your body, you fuck around and jostle. he was starting to test those limits and move outside his box to allow his other instincts and desires to surface alongside the parts of himself he allowed out already, but these men don’t care about any of that.
it’s supposed to be stede’s job to protect ed here, because ed is perfectly fucking capable but he shouldn’t have to, and because these are stede’s people — or more accurately, it’s everybody in the crew’s job to protect each other because that’s what a fucking family does, and without frenchie and abshir and the rest of his compatriots, stede wouldn’t have been able to do what he did at the party.
unfortunately stede left the crew when he left ed, even if he didn’t see it that way. they would have reminded him who he actually is: the gentleman pirate, thieved plant and all. they know he’s a weirdo and he might misuse all the oranges again, but they love him. part of loving him is knowing he’s still on his way to figuring it out, and giving him a little more room to grow within their space. that’s what you do when you love someone: even when they drive you nuts, you give them way more benefit of the doubt than you would some asshole on the street. (or in a bar.)
because he’s worth that love and kindness and does the same for others, stede tries; he redirects, won’t say another mean word about ed (won’t say a single word about ed, in fact) but the words he already said ring in his ears. he lied in a way that would be a particularly rough blow to ed’s feelings, he didn’t stand up for ed enough after that, and he fucking knows it.
so he stumbles back into the party and is a real shithead to mary (while... acknowledging she should absolutely be mad at him... for being a shithead. stede fuckin bonnet, i fuckin challenge you to c’mere a second i wanna give your complicated, sad face a gentle hug) but what he says is very, very important.
the gentleman pirate, he called himself at the bar. ed called him that when they met; the crew went full sports movie locker room speech vibes confirming it in front of the royal fucking navy and thus probably god. stede finally believed it in that moment, that he was achieving his vision of forging a new path in piracy. maybe all the nice things people said about him were... not something to just brush off???? seems fake, but big if true!!!!
and then chauncey’s big dumb mouth and big dumb gun blew that rising thread of confidence to absolute shreds along with his big dumb face, so here stede is: yelling at mary and pretending he’s not just yelling at himself.
he says mary needs to give up her fake title: he means, i hate myself. i was never actually that strong and loved man. i was not a gentleman or a pirate and i did not have a family. i was pathetic, there and here, and i will never be anything other than that.
my father was right.
and then mary has fucking haaaad it and tries to STAB HIM! IN THE EARHOLE! and we get like, the most gorgeous move into a journey out of the underworld/reverse lot’s wife deal where stede’s sin was not looking back and it’s going back and dying that heals him and i am. i am honestly sort of lowkey forever wanting to chew on this show like old bubblegum but it never seems to lose any flavor!!!!
love it.
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Been forever since I've shared anything for my cryptid blorbs so yeahhh ajskdl some sketches of Link and Zel, concepts for skvader blupees and reimagining of majoras mask keatons, and one with tiny Link and his pa ♡ Was looking through old posts the other day and don't think I've shared any backstory for these guys so akdkf I'll put some under the cut TvT
So uhh forget how much I've said but basic concept for the AU and why Link and Zel are monsters is because they were given too much power from their patron goddesses (Nayru for Zelda and Farore for Link.) Mortal Hylian bodies weren't created to possess divine power and being touched by it in such a raw state warped them.
Setting for the AU is the downfall timeline, when the goddesses seem distant and most all monsters are seen as evil and dangerous. Friendly Zora are a thing of the past, Goron's are scarce, and the sight of monsters and creatures near a village fills it with fear.
Link grew up in this kind of small village. His family never had much but they made it day to day and were all very close. Link's the oldest of 4 and has 3 younger sisters who all love him a lot. He's close with all of them, but especially the youngest, Avalina, who he's sort of taken under his wing. Link is very fond of music and pretty skilled with his ocarina, something he picked up from his dad (who taught him everything he knows.) The guys never been the most comfortable with words, he has a mild stutter, but his music speaks where he struggles to. It's something he would have loved to pursue further but since his dad passed, he's felt responsible for his ma and sisters and had been working really long hours to do his best making sure they're taken care of.
Things changed for him as word started spreading about rising monster attacks through the kingdom. Links village was so remote and he was so caught up in day to day life he didn't pay the rumors much mind, just continued working himself thin and stealing away to the forest outside the village occasionally for solitude and a few moments to lose himself in his music and clear his head. He probably should have been paying more attention though because one night, deep in the forest, alone, and where no one could hear him scream he was attacked by moblins. As he was lying on the brink of death, Farore intervened. She's the most impulsive of her sisters, and as goddess of the forests, life and winds she had taken notice of Link, his gentle soul and appreciation of her work. She couldn't stand the thought of him being lost so young and breathed life back into him. It came at a cost though, Links hylian body couldn't handle such direct contact from the goddess and when he came to,, he didn't recognize what he'd become as an amalgamation of the goddesses power. Deer features from forest life, wings that could master the winds, his own face and hands intact to keep the ability to play, and the mark of the goddess seared onto his forehead so anyone could see she'd claimed him as her own.
Link couldn't stand the thought of his loved ones seeing him alive this way and figured they were better off assuming he'd passed so they could move on. Ashamed of what he had become, he resigned himself to his fate of being tied to the forest, another one of the lost woods' enchanted creatures.
Zelda's plight is a bit different. Her parents both passed when she was young and the kingdom is waiting for her to come of age to be queen. She's done her best to prepare for the role, learning all she can from within her palace under strict supervision. She could tell though that her advisors, regents, and the kingdom at large viewed her as young and weak. With word of growing unrest in the kingdom and rumors about the return of an ancient evil, she knew she needed to establish herself before her position and Hyrule as a whole crumbled. She prayed endlessly to her patron goddess, and eventually her pleas for blessing, strength and wisdom were granted but not in the way she was hoping. After much consideration, knowing it would come at a steep cost, the goddess of wisdom and waters gave in and began to give the princess an abundance of her power.
Like Link though, Zelda got more than she asked for; she began to notice more and more changes, shortness of breath and thirst giving way to scales and gills. With growing panic she started to realize if she didn't act fast, if too many caught on to what was happening to her, everything she had worked for to try to establish herself and gain her castle and kingdoms trust would be for nothing.
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