m4rk-has-arrived - Tumblr blog

m4rk-has-arrived · 3 days ago

Note

I love Viz so much you have no idea (actually you do he's literally my whole blog </3)

What if the aliens did get therapy? I know it was mentioned in your book once, and they didn't know what it was, and it's all I can imagine sometimes!

Have they considered... staying on Earth? After the whole mess, obviously, since I think their homeplanet was destroyed? I understand why they didn't, but did it ever cross them? If it did, how would they deal with that?

Ok, so I never know whether I’ve effectively answered a question, but I can definitely say that This Particular Answer is all over the shop lmao

I think the issue for them with potential therapy would be twofold:

The First is that some of their issues are genuinely, like, a result of what they are — which isn’t really touched on in Riddle V.I.Z.ion, but since we’re out in the bleachers behind the playing fields I don’t mind elaborating. They were designed to be part of a war, one way or another — the whole damn species was perfected for use in conflict. The way they interact with stress is fundamentally different, and there are limits to how much they could ever be changed from the species baseline.

It’s like… you can desensitise a horse to reacting to certain parts of its nature, but you can’t… make it not be a horse, you know? They're always going to be more confrontational than you'd probably want something as dangerous as them to be; they're always going to have a slight superiority complex to other living things, the same way most humans don't consider worms or goldfish social equals; they're never going to completely get rid of their segmented, highly hierarchal ways of thinking. Any therapy with them would have to be done with the understanding that they’ll never end up in a state a human would regard as Well-Adjusted or Socially Normal, and there are coping mechanisms that work pretty universally on humans that would do Absolutely Nothing for them. Ideally, they would have a therapist from their species/culture, but that's… really not an option (they were more in favour of, you know, Blowing Difficult People To Smithereens.)

(A good example of this disconnect in their priorities is how they emphasise that they were lied to by The Enquiry instead of, you know, the part where they were made a sacrifice of: It was not unthinkable that they should be murdered, but it was untenable that they should be lied to. It's a very different psychology which would probably be hard to navigate.)

And The Second, and perhaps larger, obstacle is that, in my understanding, therapy does have��some requirements for a person to engage with before it’s really effective. Like a stable home environment and a therapy style which works with you. It also seems to be the sort of thing which goes a lot better if you acknowledge your problems and cooperate, which takes a certain amount of trust in the therapist in question — not to mention confidence in one’s own ability to reach out and be received by an accepting society. Trust that someone is there to help and at least some belief that you yourself are a thing which can be helped. It takes a willingness to be vulnerable, not only with other people but with yourself, and internal compassion, and an ability to permit yourself the time and space to heal and meaningfully change…

…

Yeah, look, I’m not saying the intensely paranoid, unimaginably repressed, vainglorious active criminals who are still on the run for the other shit they did outside Enquiry records and who were conditioned to absolute fortitude under a regime of nightmarish discipline couldn’t manage it ever, but I am saying they would make it hell. Any potential therapist would probably rather set themselves on fire than perform the psychological equivalent of pulling teeth with mile long chopsticks. They are really, really not optimal patients for anything that formal. Not in this state, at least.

(I do play with the idea a little in the post canon parts of my sequel/prequel project (which is very much still a thing; everything is just taking me forever rn and it’s a much bigger project than I thought it would be). They obtain a Space Therapist through Legal And Irreproachable Methods (they break into his house) and, after several sessions over a few months (listening to them argue with each other about nothing for an hour precisely each time, never getting to the point, his head in his hands) the guy is like: ‘you’ve spent ten years stuck together. Maybe take some time apart, tf????’ because theres codependency and then there’s whatever the fuck this nonsense is, and maybe that’s a good place to start?

And they give it a go! Because they are trying. The three of them spend three months separated… and it goes okay for a short while! It’s nice to establish some independence outside each other. It… does not last. Trouble is, they’re a very social species which forms very strong attachments with each other, but their instinctive reactions to other life forms range from ‘dismissive’ to ‘hostile’ with little variation. Diz spirals quickly without something else there to ground him and give him direction; Viz gets himself in over his head because he forgets that he doesn’t have the other two to rely on (and then disregards the idea that he relies on them at all); and Quiz’s Enquirer mindset makes a grand comeback because, as mentioned, they don’t bond outside their species very easily and his reaction to it being difficult is to just Not Do It. Upon noticing all this, they cut the experiment short and reunite.

Of course, they then break into the therapist’s house again to berate him for being wrong and, having spent three whole months thinking he’s escaped them, the dude promptly quits his job and takes up pottery.)

Anyway, tangent over. I know I'm the one who essentially proposed the idea but, in isolation, I don't know how much actual impact it would make on their behaviours; I don’t think their situation is stable enough for that sort of thing to stick, and I’m not sure the infrastructure would be able to accommodate them regardless

I think community would help them more, as cliche and sentimental as it sounds, and, in astronomically different circumstances, Earth and the people they met might have offered that. They’ve got criminal records a half mile long in most of the rest of populated space, so Earth is the first place they’ve been in a good while which doesn’t have a preconceived bias against them (they earn it again allllll on their own XD). It takes them off the defensive a little and let’s them relax — which they don’t do very well or very much but it’s something. And they were genuinely fond of the Riddle group by the end, in their aloof, inscrutable way… Had it worked out for a long term (had they not threatened to blow up the world again) that relationship could have been good for them, in large part because the kids’ resounding opinion wasn’t 'you're terrifying, unfixable monsters' but 'you're kind of a dick and a loser lmao.' They’re unserious and informal and irreverent, and all three of these idiots could stand to be taken down a few pegs. It’s nice to have people who don’t need to be scared of you

I doubt they would have been close exactly, but they certainly wouldn’t have been too intimidated by the aliens to call them out; and the aliens would never have viewed the ex-kidnapped-ex-children as a threat, and therefore they could be listened to without too much suspicion. Just in general, a more varied support system to balance out the echo chamber of each other would do them a lot of good. But also, having something to value in a manner which isn’t as immediate and vital as life or death (as it so often is in their violently turbulent lives) would go a long way towards fixing their myopic lack of consideration for literally anyone who isn’t Them.

Of course none of the Riddle kids deserve to have to deal with Imperial Alien Bullshit after the sort of traumatic experiences said aliens have ALREADY put them through. The aliens burned those bridges before they realised there was water to cross and they’re astute enough to know that by the end of the day. Sadly, they would also all be too proud and stubborn to think of reaching out again unless they were really desperate (accrue another debt to the humans who want nothing to do with them after barely paying off five life debts with a planet? Risk being rejected by some of the only points of contact you have? Nah. Somebody would have to be dying. Again.)

Did the aliens ever consider staying? No. As much as they could have and in some ways did form connections there, all three of them very much viewed their time on Earth as an exile. And what would life look like if they did stay? Certainly none of them have the ambassadorial skills necessary to be First Contact (‘Do you come in peace?’ “For now. But you should know that we are a superior species and are capable of obliterating your little planet outright.” *has no intention of doing this but threat displays are a common self defence tactic in their usual parts of space and they’ve seen the sort of sci-fi films humans enjoy. Like hell are they going to be taken advantage of* *every country unites to declare them hostile within the hour*) And that’s not even counting the fact that, if they did want to integrate to Earth society, they would likely face some sort of consequence for all the illegal and disturbing things they’ve during their unlicensed tenancy (murder, kidnapping, and experimental surgery come immediately to mind, but there’s more.) It’s either that or enact a takeover and I don’t think they’d know what to do with a whole planet to be honest; something about dogs chasing cars…

I imagine they would hole up undeclared in Zone 5.1, feeling rather lost and wary of discovery. Perhaps they would explore a little more, but they’ve been on Earth for years already; there’s little left to discover in their opinion, and a lot more that they’ve lost and don’t know how to deal with. They don’t have a reason to be there anymore. Ultimately they would start to feel isolated, stuck on the other side of the galaxy from anything familiar. There's another element to it, which is part maladaption to trauma and partly a result of how they were designed, but the lack of conflict would start to wear on them just as much as purposelessness. It would be too peaceful — too quiet

To be honest, after having thought about it for a while now, I think they probably would try to go back home — the planet hasn’t been destroyed, and even if it had there’s still a few hundred million of their species kicking around in that corner of Andromeda. In their usual fashion, they have rather fucked everyone else over in their bid to escape their Terrible Fate and, with two of them lacking a reason to exist, I can very easily see them wanting to go back and help (try to help. The poor useless things try.) They wouldn’t be met with open arms, and they’re likely heading back into some sort of conflict which won’t be good for them… but that’s probably the place with the best chance of them finding an equal understanding with other people about what they’re like and what they went through. Particularly now that The Enquiry has been destroyed — there’s going to be a lot of people who are in similar situations to how they were ten years ago. It would give them something to do and people to lean on and, while that’s only part of what they need, it is a big part, and it’s something they’d be hard pressed to find anywhere else.

(Because these characters are My Beloveds and I drag them around with me like dolls, I do sometimes keep them on Earth with the lads, just for fun. No plot, no continuity, just vibes (plot and continuity Do Not Permit these vibes.) In those scenes, it rather pans out like this:

(Phred and Zach go urban exploring and stop being surprised when they find one or more of the aliens following along like a stray cat. The kids force them to stay for Halloween, watch Smile, and spend the whole time pointing at the monster and going ‘Diz, it’s you.’ Anyone who sees the aliens in public assumes it’s just the best cosplay they’ve ever seen and wants to know what it’s from, so Phil has to help them work out what game works as a cover; they hate this (except for Quiz, who thinks the whole thing is hysterical and let’s people take pictures.) Silly stuff like that… things that Would Have Been Nice.)

5 notes · View notes