>> That was painful to read -- largely because I agree with everything it says about our timeline. <<
Yeah, I figured that would happen.
>> Having Calliope actually reach out to Vagary as a touchstone of reassurance at the end helped a lot, though.<<
Yay! I'm happy to hear that.
>> It says, "Yeah, maybe I don't like this, but there are worse things." Perspective is always good. <<
Sooth. It helps.
>> Noting, because now I feel that I should, that just because Thing Y is worse than Thing X doesn't mean that Thing X isn't a problem. <<
I agree. That's why I hate the phrase "first-world problem." Just because it won't kill you, doesn't mean it can't wreck your life or simply make you fucking miserable. Calliope and Vagary have problems, even this far down the timeline, because of their respective backgrounds and mutual collision. But they also have resources for working on those problems, which are much better than a lot of what's available here.
>> Would it help their situation if Vagary could get to the point of becoming a blue-plate special instead of a supervillain? <<
Yes, it would. Conversely, it would help if Calliope would unbend a little and consider working with supervillains or gray-capes on projects that are not actually illegal. I have some ideas along these lines. They haven't figured it out yet, because their bond is such a wreck, but those connections do tend to enhance abilities. They can give each other a boost, even on non-matching superpowers, and that's valuable. Their greatest area of overlap, the phasing, should be much stronger when working together.
>> Because it seems to me that their two worst points of conflict are the non-consensual nature of the bond and him being a supervillain, in that order. <<
I think you're right. Calliope has some baggage of her own, some of it older and some of which descends directly from the aforementioned factors. She really needs to stop abusing him just because he's a major pain in her ass. It is not helping. Trouble is, even after she stops doing it, the damage will remain and isn't easy to clean up. That's not just the typically devastating effect of abuse -- it's that Vagary is especially vulnerable to rejection and abandonment. That makes her aversion to him a real crotch shot, and she does it all the time. So it's going to take a while to repair.
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dancing_serpent
Thoughts
Date: 2016-12-12 11:55 am (UTC)Yeah, I figured that would happen.
>> Having Calliope actually reach out to Vagary as a touchstone of reassurance at the end helped a lot, though.<<
Yay! I'm happy to hear that.
>> It says, "Yeah, maybe I don't like this, but there are worse things." Perspective is always good. <<
Sooth. It helps.
>> Noting, because now I feel that I should, that just because Thing Y is worse than Thing X doesn't mean that Thing X isn't a problem. <<
I agree. That's why I hate the phrase "first-world problem." Just because it won't kill you, doesn't mean it can't wreck your life or simply make you fucking miserable. Calliope and Vagary have problems, even this far down the timeline, because of their respective backgrounds and mutual collision. But they also have resources for working on those problems, which are much better than a lot of what's available here.
>> Would it help their situation if Vagary could get to the point of becoming a blue-plate special instead of a supervillain? <<
Yes, it would. Conversely, it would help if Calliope would unbend a little and consider working with supervillains or gray-capes on projects that are not actually illegal. I have some ideas along these lines. They haven't figured it out yet, because their bond is such a wreck, but those connections do tend to enhance abilities. They can give each other a boost, even on non-matching superpowers, and that's valuable. Their greatest area of overlap, the phasing, should be much stronger when working together.
>> Because it seems to me that their two worst points of conflict are the non-consensual nature of the bond and him being a supervillain, in that order. <<
I think you're right. Calliope has some baggage of her own, some of it older and some of which descends directly from the aforementioned factors. She really needs to stop abusing him just because he's a major pain in her ass. It is not helping. Trouble is, even after she stops doing it, the damage will remain and isn't easy to clean up. That's not just the typically devastating effect of abuse -- it's that Vagary is especially vulnerable to rejection and abandonment. That makes her aversion to him a real crotch shot, and she does it all the time. So it's going to take a while to repair.