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Carlos and Sergio ^^

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“one must imagine thomas lawrence happy-” CHALLENGE NOT ACCEPTED!! PUT THAT OLD MAN IN AGONY!!

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Vincent, after living in warzones for decades of his life is obviously very good, and completely natural in crisis and it is very interesting to think about.

I imagine he's developed a very accurate sixth sense for danger, like he's out in Saint Peter's square and there's someone with a weapon, and he absolutely picks up on it before the Swiss Guards who are assigned to him. Which leads to the pope tackling the man assigned to protect him, who has a good head of height on him, before the would be assassin can get a shot off. (We can discuss how Vincent would feel about the 20 to 30 year olds who are swore to give their lives for him, when he has buried many many young soldiers before coming to the Vatican)

Like, he knows how to disarm someone who's holding a gun on him. He know how to safely handle the firearm. He knows how to disarm it. Knows how to talk someone down when they're determined to commit violence against you or others. Knows how to stall, how to delay. Probably can lie pretty damn well, if the situation calls for it.

And with so much of his ministry health focussed, I have to assume he knows a lot about medical care. He knows how to triage, how to determine who can be saved, and who should be made comfortable, he can splint limbs, and stitch wounds, and calculate doses of morphine in his head. He knows how to comfort those in pain, and those in mourning, and those who are going to die. If need be, he knows how to deliver a baby. (I don't know how that particular one would come up after his election, but I really want to think of a scenario where it does).

If he is injured, he probably knows exactly how bad it is, and what steps should be taken, and whether he's able to continue on for a bit before seeking help (not that people would let him). He probably has a very high pain tolerance, and can grit his teeth, and carry on.

He is so good, arguably at his best in a crisis. And I sometimes imagine sometime into his papacy, he is faced with one- not a diplomatic crisis, or a political crisis, but a real on the ground disaster, and and after jumping into the thick of it, despite the warnings of his guards, and officials, he realizes he finally, once again, know exactly what he's doing.

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Had a bad pain day yesterday and now I have to make Vincent suffer sorry 🙏

Pain has been Vincent’s constant companion. Some of his earliest memories include crying in his mother’s arms, his hips feels as if they’re on fire, when he twists in pain he swears a knife pierces the bones in his back. “Growing pains” his mother tells him, “When you’re older they’ll go away”

The pain doesn’t leave. Vincent learns to stop mentioning it. He walks to church on Sundays, and his trembling legs ache for days afterwards. He prays to God, and when it doesn’t work, he wonders if the pain is a punishment.

Vincent tries so hard. He does everything right. He helps others whenever possible, he spends hours on his knees, both praying and working in gardens, scrubbing floors, picking flowers for his elderly neighbors. No matter what he does, the pain remains.

In seminary, he learns how to write. His fingers feel stiff around the pen, the joints ache as he spends hours writing. He cracks his fingers for relief until a nun notices and finds the sound so distasteful that she uses a ruler to try to beat the habit from his already pained hands.

Vincent spends countless nights awake, the pain moves around his body as if it were a fire, consuming him from the inside out. He bites down on his aching hands to stop cries of pain from escaping.

At age 16, Vincent accepts his fate. He has always been in pain, the pain will never leave him. He ignores the ache whenever he can, he learns how to make his smile hide the agony. He holds his shaking hands behind his back and locks his knees in place to stop them from trembling. Clenching his jaw makes it hard to eat and speak as it locks up, but it gives him a feeling of control as the pain is expected for once.

During his ministry it’s easier to ignore the pain. When those around you are suffering, your own pain feels negligible. Vincent bandages wounds and holds the hands of the injured, and no one comments on his tremors or the way he sometimes falls into a limp.

After the surgery, Vincent is sure. The pain has been a punishment. A warning, perhaps. One that Vincent has ignored. God has been telling him how unworthy he is from the moment he was born - and Vincent has ignored His command.

Blades twist inside his knees as he kneels in front of the Holy Father. He deserves the pain. His shoulders shake with his sobs, and the movement makes his joints klick and ache. It’s God’s will.

The holy father’s words may convince him that the organs inside of him aren’t sinful, but the pain must be a sign. Perhaps it is his penance.

Vincent is called to Rome for the conclave. The hours of traveling makes each joint in his body protest. He arrives at the Vatican in a cold sweat. His legs are shaking as he’s led into a small room, and he has to close his eyes to escape the nausea crawling from his muscles into his stomach.

He’s presented with a cassock. It’s too big, and the buttons are too small. His aching fingers can barely grip them. He cries in the darkness of his room. When he steps out to join his brothers in Christ for dinner, his face is washed, and his vestments are immaculate.

The long hours of voting makes daggers envelop themselves in his back. His hips are on fire. His face betrays none of this.

Thomas finds him crouched in front of the turtle pond. He isn’t lying as he speaks about his love for the tiny creatures, but he does omit the part where he only found himself in the position after his knees gave out. Walking back to the sancta Martha, he smiles at Thomas even as electricity is running through his body, stinging him wherever possible.

A bomb goes off, and Vincent is on his feet immediately. His mind is full of memories of broken bodies and crumbling houses, yet his body trembles not in fear but in pain. He relishes in the ease of ignoring it as he walks around the Sistine chapel and administers first aid to his fellow cardinals. He doesn’t notice the cut on his own face until it’s pointed out to him.

Vincent has to hold the bannister of the balcony as he looks out over St. Peter’s square. He is terrified, but the pain in his knees and hips keep him grounded. His aching fingers curl around polished stone, and he presses his hands into the material until he can feel the pain radiate into his shoulders and onto his back. The pain is all that is left of the man that was once Vincent Benítez.

Pope Innocent XIV does not mention the pain. It has been with him since his birth, and will stay with him until he takes his final breath. Innocent is a prisoner of the Vatican and the pain alike.

It’s harder to hide the pain now. Being the pope means being public property. He has no privacy, he is constantly lonely yet never alone. His shaking hands are visible in meetings and masses alike. The sleepless nights and red-rimmed eyes are obvious to those around him. There’s no proper way to excuse oneself to go vomit from pain in the middle of an audience with a president or king.

A doctor is called. Innocent doesn’t know by whom. He refuses to tell the doctor about his pains. They are between him and God. The doctor moves Innocent’s joints around, pokes his muscles, pulls his skin, takes notes on each and every scar that litters his body. His feet are examined, and so are his teeth. The scribbling in the notebook the doctor carries drives the pope insane. He smiles politely.

The doctor takes his hand as he speaks. A diagnosis. Innocent’s heart races. Chronic, the doctor says, no cure.

Vincent is 57 years old as he learns that the pain is real. The doctor says things like nociceptive, genetic, instability, chronic pain. Vincent’s head is spinning. He’s conflicted.

An answer. Finally.

Yet… there’s no cure. Despite never having hope of a pain-free existence, the confirmation is somehow still horrifying. He cannot bring himself to call the disorder a punishment anymore. Doing so would mean that others would be deserving of the same pain. Vincent doesn’t think God would punish others with this pain.

It takes 57 years and becoming the Vicar of Christ on earth for Vincent to get the help he never knew he needed, the help he never thought he deserved.

Splints for his aching joints are delivered from the doctor. Thomas buys him pen-grips that makes it possible to write without the extreme pain. Aldo brings him a heating blanket that soothes his aching joints. Ray is constantly making sure there’s a chair close to wherever he’s standing.

His schedules are reworked, Vincent doesn’t know how anyone managed that, but suddenly there are breaks between meetings and half-days off after traveling or public appearances.

A chair appears in his shower, and the umbrella stand suddenly includes a cane.

For the first couple of months, Vincent hates it. He’s been handling the pain alone for his entire life. He doesn’t need help, doesn’t need adjustments or mobility aids, or splints over his joints. He glares at his friends as they ask if he wants assistance.

Slowly… he notices that his pain lessens whenever he lets his friends fuss over him. He starts wearing the splints, starts curling up under the heating blanket after long days. Starts spending his time off resting instead of working.

The first time he asks for help, it’s the most terrifying thing he’s done in years. He spends hours contemplating his words. Wonders if it’s selfish, if he’s taking advantage of his friends. fears that they will make a big deal out of it. That they will see how weak he is.

He can’t procrastinate it any longer once the workday is over. Thomas is packing up his papers, Aldo is shutting off his computer. Ray is looking at something on his phone. Vincent is still seated. His knees have been bothering him all day, and while he knows he could make it back to his room, he knows that it will make the pain worse.

He clears his throat. His face feels hot, and he’s ashamed as he speaks. “Would… would one of you perhaps be so kind as to bring me my cane?” His eyes are closed. He’s waiting for the reaction.

There is none.

All that happens is that his friends look at him for a second. Ray is closest to the door. He smiles, not in pity, but in encouragement. He grabs the cane from the umbrella stand, and passes it to Vincent without comment. Thomas wordlessly offers him an arm to help him up. Aldo grabs Vincent’s papers and puts them in his own bag.

Vincent hasn’t felt such love in decades.

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Okay look I don’t have the energy to write a full one shot about this rn but I had the idea and I need to post it here so I’ll remember it later but ,,

Aldo as a young priest in New York during the AIDS epidemic - his friends dying around him, suffering. The pain and fear and anger. Praying over bodies in black bags. The conservatives calling it the gay plague - a punishment from God.

Vincent working in the Congo during the same time. This who get sick there aren’t primarily homosexuals. It’s sex workers, young women. Babies born to infected mothers.

The sentiments expressed by conservatives are similar. Both Aldo and Vincent are looked down upon. People spit at their feet as they enter the HIV/AIDS wards to pray. They both hold the hands of dying patients, they wipe the tears from emancipated cheeks - even as doctors and nurses refuse to touch the bodies of the sick.

Aldo has a hard time trusting Vincent at first. He was close to the late holy father, and Vincent is so inexperienced, so naive. Despite Thomas’ insistence that Vincent is the right man for the job, Aldo cannot help but to question him.

The stalemate only ends when Vincent holds mass on December 1. It’s one of his first sermons. Most popes would stick to non controversial statements this early in their pontificate.

Vincent doesn’t.

He speaks about World AIDS day. Not only that.

He speaks of the men and women affected by HIV/AIDS he’s met. He speaks of teenage sex workers, of those given contaminated blood transfusions. He speaks of children born with the disease in the same breath as he talks about the gay and bisexual men who died in masses. He doesn’t place blame on any of them.

Aldo hasn’t cried at a sermon in years. But he can’t keep the tears from falling as Vincent speaks of victims by name, as he keeps the love in his voice and how his voice doesn’t waiver as he speaks of a gay man he once knew. Aldo has to put a hand over his mouth to silence a sob when Vincent casually mentions still being in contact with the dead man’s boyfriend.

They don’t speak about it. Not for years. But from that day onwards, Aldo stays at the pope’s right hand. There’s a connection between them, a shared history of love and mourning.

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babe wake up, full canon accurate and up-to-date map of the star wars galaxy just dropped

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It's hard to get them to kiss (mostly because of Lawrence)

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I am what God made me

very much inspired by one of my favorite manga artworks:

https://x.com/shirahamakamome/status/1894770502369214690?s=46&t=rgrqd0uE0eOp-oGkBhiPTA

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looking for monsignores who are cute and clumsy near me...

lolololololol

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Someone talked too much...

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the potential of a fuck or die-scenario... an anti-church saboteur sneaks sex pollen into the grocery delivery to the casa santa marta and half an hour after lunchtime they make a public announcement about their actions. the cardinals, already feeling the effects of the drug have to make a decition: break their vows or risk death. Thomas is soooo willing to die, this is the perfect way for him to die! except of course everyone else wants him alive (they also wanna fuck him but that's besides the point).

Half of them are like "Yeah whatever I'll do anything to survive" and the other half are like "In the interest of The Church I will bear this burden and allow myself to be defiled with the knowledge that my flesh is of this earth but my soul is of a higher nature!". They start arguing about who should fuck who but the moment someone suggests they should draw lots everyone is suddenly very open about who they would perfer to fuck...

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Innocent changes the rules to allow priests to marry, but they can only marry other priests bc of issues regarding inheritance and nepotism and potential distractions that might come with family life (also heavily implied that they are expected to still be chaste so it's not really a marriage it's more... "lifetime partnership").

Queue bellesco chaos wedding. Aldo agrees after Tedesco proposes for the eleventh time (while Aldo was fucking him, mind you). Thomas almost dies on the spot when he hears about the engagement.

They're both bridezillas. Mandorff has to study ceremonial code for three weeks to figure out how it's supposed to be done while both Aldo and Tedesco ague about it (with him and with each other). The ceremony is heteronormative to such a degree that Tedesco (being lower in the church hierarchy) has to be referred to as the "bride".

The media is going nuts about it, the coverage is on the level of a british royal wedding. What do you mean the progressive secretary of state and the archconservative patriarch of Venice who were both trying to become pope six months ago are getting married?????

The ceremony is public (and live-streamed) and Vincent panics while pronouncing them "husband and wife in their service to the Lord" and blurts out that Aldo "may kiss the bride". That was not in the script AND it's their first kiss.

When they are sent off on their honeymoon Aldo realizes this entire thing was just a scheme to force him to take a vacation and to keep Tedesco distracted while Vincent pushes through his most radical reforms.

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The fact that both Tedesco and Sabbadin smoke is so important to me because it makes it possible that they went to have a smoke a the same time in the same place and they either

a) pretends the other doesn't exist

b) one of them sees the other and change spot

c) have a passive aggressive fight about who gets the biggest smoke cloud

bonus points if Tedesco smokes so much that he finishes his vape cartridge but doesn't notice until he's next to Giulio and has to ask him for a cigarette

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You all talk about Vincent's Converse shoes but I think Vincent has heavy duty hiking boots he got on sale somewhere obscure 30 years ago and they have remained in good shape since and have saved his ankles and his life multiple times. He is unwilling to part from them for one moment.

They make him stomp quite loudly in the echoey spaces of the Vatican, so everyone knows when the pope is approaching

For reference:

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Warsan Shire, from “Backwards”, Bless the Daughter Raised by a Voice in Her Head

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They are finally finished... This took way too much time and I truly am more fond of Vincents version. I love these old men so much.

These can also be found in my shop as bookmarks and stickers!