#I DIDN'T KNOW MY MENTEE WAS A COWARD

[magic-and-necromancy]

sooo, telemachus [cole cleared his throat, a totally inconspicuous expression on his face. he seemed a bit more nervous than usual, maybe it was because of what happened yesterday, maybe some clarity hit him. he avoided eye contact quite a bit, twiddling his fingers around as he tried to find his words]

just a question because i'm curious, no other reason— but, are you getting married anytime soon? [he paused, taking in a deep breath before continuing on with his thought]

I would assume that by now at least a love interest would be in mind, considering you are the prince of ithaca after all [cole tilted his head up, looking at the sky before finally looking at telemachus in the eye]

you're kind of the future of this nation, which honestly sounds like a lot— sorry for bringing it up in case it stresses you out. but I would think because of that, you would have found your other ruling partner. whether it be on your own accord, or an arranged marriage. though, I trust that queen penelope wouldn't make you do anything you wouldn't want to.

sooo, any special someone? [he asks this with a faint smile]

— cole 🪻

Um, I do have someone in mind...

[He starts avoiding eye contact as well as fidgeting with his cloth]

But I don't know if they like me back, let alone marry me so I don't think I'm tying the knot anytime soon

[wanderingaldecaldo]

I have Feelings ™️about them, and have been turning them like metaphorical rotisserie chickens since this morning when I wrote my response to a my own Writers of Night City prompt based on Big Thief's "Shark Smile".

I don't think they had a romantic relationship but there is absolutely something more there than just a president and her personal netrunner. Friends, but not quite. Rosalind called her a friend, and I am sure that So Mi reciprocated the same approximation of that feeling at some point based on some of the things she says about (and to) Rosalind.

In general I will argue it's difficult to have a truly open friendship in the employer-employee dynamic. There is always a power imbalance, and the employee should always be considering how their thoughts and feelings could affect future employment, leaving the employee to sometimes choose between their authentic self and the necessity of said employment.

For Rosalind and So Mi, it's even worse. So Mi would never have associated with FIA or Militech except under duress, so any relationship she develops with superiors will always have that underlying current to them — she did not choose to be there but was compelled. She has to stay on her employers' good sides. Not only is her future employment at stake, but her freedom and even her life.

So Mi's friendship with Sol was probably the least tainted, at least in the beginning. He would have been the only person she knew at the FIA and, as her handler, her main contact. It would be easy for them to fall into a mentor-mentee friendship, and maybe So Mi even believed that he did save her in some respect. If Sol hadn't been the one to walk through her door that night, it would have been people with guns sent to take out the target. And even then Sol was ready to pull the trigger if she didn't agree.

Then for Rosalind to force So Mi to be the one to terminate him? What a way to coerce her loyalty. She's smart and calculating; she has to know the risks of pushing So Mi like that while she was also doing her dirty work beyond the blackwall!

And from Rosalind's side... I know a lot of people think she's devoid of emotion, cold and calculating, blah blah blah. Yeah, she is, that's the whole trope, right? But if that's all you got from her, well, buddy, I'm sorry you missed out on the incredibly nuanced character that she is. There are so many beautiful deliveries from Kay Bess that give a humanity to the calculating persona and hint at the woman behind the mask. Rosalind the Real Person is still in there, and we get glimpses from time to time, like her relief when she hears So Mi's voice, and her concern after the Chimera. Or my favorite example, if you choose to not be welcoming to Jacob and Taylor, her lines after that show that her humanity still exists.

From the flashback of So MI's swearing in, Rosalind is openly affectionate toward her. I've wondered before if the president is regularly the one to swear in new FIA recruits, or if it's only the more important ones — the ones who will be doing super-secret illegal things — who receive the honor, which will likely bind them to the president even further than simply working for the agency that functions as her left hand.

When So Mi takes the oath, Rosalind's tone and body language, the way she grasps So Mi's arms, offer a display of affection, even if everyone involved knows it's a show. But Rosalind is also adept at believing fictions, and to that end her affection is genuine, even if the source isn't pure.

Even as Rosalind cares for her, So Mi is still a weapon, a tool. How can you love a tool but except for what it does, for its purpose? And Rosalind has to understand that about her feelings as well, even if she ignores them.

She seems self-aware based on some of her dialogue, and at times disillusioned by her life choices; and given we know she has committed war crimes, she's made some very bad ones along the way. This self-awareness is, of course, me reading heavily into the subtext of the game through dialogue and body language, as well as Kay's acting — especially the previously referenced scene with J&T.

At that point, V has shown themselves loyal to her. Not only have they safely delivered her to the rendezvous, their instinct is to dispose of the first threat that comes along, no matter how innocuous the threat. They could have easily deescalated things and had allies for the night, and Sol would be the one to clean up that mess.

I didn't particularly care for either of dialogue options when taking the... less friendly route with J&T, but both give subtle insight to her self-awareness. If V tries to reassure her, there is hesitation in her voice as she agrees that she had no choice. She knows it's not true, but she is allowing it to become true; and if V chooses to challenge her on the decision, Rosalind directly acknowledges her willingness to believe a falsehood if that's what it takes to survive.

Rosiland received reports detailing concerns about So Mi's mental state dating back to before the end of the war, even before she was forced to play part in Sol's (attempted) termination. The report from the doctor suggesting she be pulled from active duty can be found on a terminal underneath The Moth; after Sol and Ros leave the safe house, Ros has left a to-do list that includes calling that doctor.

Ros had to know that So Mi was at risk of, yet she still holds onto hope that she will remain loyal.

What happened when she found out the truth that So Mi orchestrated the whole thing? The woman she had cultivated and honed into her own personal weapon, who knew her deepest, darkest secrets. Who sat across from her that morning, unflinching smile on her face while waiting for the intercepting signal from BARGHEST.

In my mind, I see the blonde lady freakout gif in the private quarters of the White House with no witnesses, except possibly the closest FSS agent in earshot.

Blinding rage at the betrayal as she tears through her home, her throat going raw from screaming and smoking alike. And then she accepts it and immediately moves into self-defense mode; she has no idea what So Mi might have shared about her with V, let alone Kurt Hansen.

I want to see this. I want to be emotionally destroyed by Kay Bess going through all the stages of grief in a span of minutes before the presidential personal drops back into place and she starts making phone calls.

Give it to me, you cowards!

Not me back on my bullshit thinking about how CDPR didn't even show us one of the most emotional scenes from Phantom Liberty — when Rosalind figures out that So Mi is the one who betrayed her.

I am FERAL.

[stxleslyds]

I have read your thought about the Batfamily, now I really want to know your thought about the one who started it, the Batman himself. We can't ignore the fact that Bruce is abusing his children, but there's also some moments where he's being a good father to them. But some of his act doesn't make sense.

He's beating his children, then calling them his son after. He act like a mad man after Damian's death (yeah, they did Jason dirty in here), feeling sorrow and desperately wanting to ressurect him, but then neglecting him continously in the future. I didn't know much about Cass, Bruce seems to always be a good father to her. But her fans once pointed that Bruce (or DC) is too hard on her to not killing/too soft on the others, because the other batkids has killed some villains while under Batman and still got to continue putting on their costumes.

What is exactly Bruce character? How is his relationship with every one of his children?

I feel like Batman can't be in a good relationship with one of his children without destroying his relationship with the other. I always love parents and children relationship in comics, but with batfamily sometimes it just so 'fanon-y' and some are hurtful.

I stopped reading Batman book for a long time. And come back reading that wedding and city of bane arc, because I want to know how they killed Alfred. And honestly those run are terrible. The issue basically just a batcat fanservice, with the worst Batman and Catwoman characterization ever. The batkids didn't even got many appearance and treated awfully as if they are just extras, even if they all are capable and have connection with Alfred.

Hey there Anon!

My thoughts on Batman and Bruce have changed over the last few years, he wasn’t the character that introduced me to DC comics but what I got to read from him at the time seemed good. As time went by, I started to feel like the whole concept of Batman was overrated and he kinda tired me in entertainment such as movies and all that. He never truly was a character that I actually liked so by the time that I read Under the Red Hood I knew that I liked Dick and Jason better than Bruce.

Batman was interesting but I was completely indifferent about Bruce. That whole thing changed around the time that the New 52 was sort of ending, there I started to heavily dislike Bruce and then that turned into pure hate. Now, I am just tired of the guy and every time that he appears in Dick or Jason content my day is ruined.

I hate that DC has been writing Bruce as an abusive and manipulative person and father to his “kids”, he has done a lot of wrong to them in comic history but all went to shit (in current comics) when Bruce tried to manipulate Jason into reliving the day that he died and his resurrection in Batman and Robin vol2. #20 and when he beat Dick and manipulated him into becoming a spy after telling him that he had told everyone that he was dead in Nightwing vol.3 #30.

Bruce was a horrible human being in the pre-New 52 timeline too sometimes, mostly towards Dick but in a way, it felt like Dick was able time and time again to get away from him a little bit. Now none of his kids are given the opportunity to turn their backs on Bruce, they are kept in his surroundings no matter how abusive he becomes towards them.

My biggest problem with Bruce’s abusiveness is the fact that the writers never treat it like he acts in an abusive way, they never make him apologize or have an internal discussion where he realises that he was in the wrong. “Bruce is a horrible person to his sons but it doesn’t matter because he is right and he is Batman so that’s that”, that’s the message that I feel DC is selling us. Bruce never receives punishment or is called out for his behaviour, Dick was never able to tell Bruce that what he did to him was unforgivable, he never got the chance to explain to anyone that he didn’t play dead, and when he came back from Spyral he took all the shit from his “family” himself.

Sometimes DC does something even worse, they try to hide Bruce’s neglect with things that never happened like they did with the Ric thing in Dick’s case. Dick was passed around from villain to villain when he was most vulnerable and at the end of it all DC had the guts to say that Batman had been watching over Dick all the time. Like, why lie in such a blatant way? Does Bruce enjoy watching his son suffer from a far or was he too much of a coward to tell Dick that he was a shit father, got stuck in a hole and then decided to play “Cat and Bat” with Selina instead of caring for any of his children?

The situation with Damian’s death and resurrection was a whole thing that was meant to prove that Bruce loved Damian and considered him his son. But in their effort to make Bruce look like a good father to Damian they completely destroyed his relationship with his other kids and that was also the start of Bruce referring to Damian as his ONLY son. And like you said after Damian was resurrected Bruce ended up neglecting him afterwards which ultimately led Damian to run away.

His relationship with Cass and Duke is something that I cannot explore because I am not into those characters and they are involved in books that I am not interested in. So I cannot say anything about that.

With Tim it’s complicated because I feel like his relationship with him was never actually father/son it was more like mentor/mentee and that seemed to work better for them, ever since they started the whole family thing Bruce started to act a little bit too rough towards Tim and that ended with Bruce punching Tim during the “City of Bane” arc. Bruce never apologised or was shown realising his mistake, but DC made sure to explain that Bruce was going through a rough time so that’s why he did it. It was pure rubbish and I dislike it a lot.

I answered an ask a while ago about how I thought Dick and Jason could become family the way that DC treats the “Batfamily” within comics and I came up with the idea of the “Dickfamily” because I felt like DC made a big mistake the moment they revolved the Bat family around Bruce and not Dick. Bruce is a character that is known for being lonely and for being surrounded by darkness that he only manages to escape through the light of Robin (Dick Grayson because he was the first), he was always depicted as someone who is hard to work with and considers his teammates only co-workers and not friends. He is a difficult person to connect with, so why on earth did DC come up with a family surrounding that man? (I actually know the answer to that question and it is: money, DC did it to sell more comics under the Batman name but we are going to forget about that here, let me be petty).

Why would DC make it all about a man that doesn’t connect or goes out of his way to say that he “works alone” when Dick Grayson is standing right there? DC hates that they created a character like Dick because he is just better than Bruce at everything, he just is, he is better family to Alfred, Jason, Tim and Damian, he was even written as a better father to Damian than Bruce ever was!

Bruce is just not a people person or a person that forms strong bonds with people. And that makes the whole “Batfamily” concept suffer and come off as something forced that doesn’t actually work.

Tom King was one of the writers that tried to kill the concept of the “Batfamily” with Bruce and Selina becoming a couple and by continuously saying that Selina was who was the most important person in Bruce’s life and the one that made him a better person. All Tom King did with that is make fans and non-fans of the “Batfamily” feel rage. Like, I might not like the “Batfamily” but there is no way that Selina comes first to Alfred, Dick or Damian, there is just no way and if that were actually true then that’s boring.

All the writers that have pushed the “Batfamily” concept (try) do it in a way that makes it look grand and of actual essence but without putting any work on it, if you ask me the “Batfamily” (if there has to be one) should only include Bruce, Alfred (he do be dead though), Dick, Tim, Cass and Damian (I suppose Duke too, I don’t know much about him). The “Batfamily” has to be small because that way you can actually build relationships and make them matter. Having Kate, Steph, Jason and so many others involved in a concept that was made to fit around Bruce looks stupid! Bruce has had almost zero connection to Kate and Steph in the last ten years and Bruce’s “relationship” with Jason is a complete joke!

Bruce is just not the character that is meant to be surrounded by too much people, and he is not a good person towards his family so the whole ass concept should be thrown to the trash and finally let it die. But money is important and if there is something that DC will never stop doing, is milking Batman for content that can be (sometimes) pretty basic.

All in all, I think Bruce sucks and that his “kids” shouldn’t be dragged back to him ever again or at least for a long while. All of them would actually benefit from not being involved with anything relating to Batman. Dick could benefit from Bruce and other Bat-related characters staying away from him and letting him live his life in Bludhaven. And Jason? My sweet Chonky? He would be in such a better place if Bruce disappeared from his life, imagine the actually good books we would have if Jason was free to act the way he was meant to do as the Red Hood…

(We saw a little bit of that in the back up story of Detective Comics by Rosenberg, Batman is still involved but he and Jason are definitely not on the same side of the story! So excited for Task Force Z!)

I don’t know If al that I just said answers your question but I hope you have a fantastic week Anon!