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moonshynecybin · 3 months

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Hey! Just wanted to say I’m in awe of how your writing it’s just so GOOD and FUN and TORUROUS. It’s rly hard to nail the voices and dialogue of characters (especially when writing them speaking in english!) but you always make it so believable. Ur Vale especially is sooo charismatic which like hats off bc a more mercurial man has not been made.

Re ur charged-airport-conversation fic, I’m intrigued to find out how Marc will handle his sexuality crisis. Will he be in denial? does he very seriously study gay culture like telemetry data? is he getting Grindr? is he seeing it as something to incorporate into his PT routine & somehow translate this to a competitive edge? how did he feel about the pope saying frociaggine????

Also I loved the goofy brother shenanigans, Alex strongest most patient and silliest man alive truly. Extremely funny to think of Alex “please get a girlfriend you’re 30 and annoying me” Marquez having to cope with Marc coming back like “I found one! :3” holding hands with Cervera’s enemy #1 undisputed champ 2015-2024

Anyways, would love to hear any thoughts u had but no pressure! I just wanted to thank u for ur brilliant mind & forget about whatever fresh hell that sprint was

this one. is one that i plan to maybe actually and fr write out so i shant answer in full because i hope that you'll find out eventually. um. i CAN give you chapter two! of THIS fic where Marc and Vale get stuck in an airport and have a somewhat fraught little bonding session. i have not proofread this OR reread the original so if there's inconsistencies just chill out. theres also a lot of liberties taken with the amount of privacy these guys have on a given race weekend again just chill out. please. they live in different countries and are bitter rivals its hard to get them alone into fictional scenarios. its about 1.4k.

(Part ONE !)

The next time he sees Vale is in the paddock.

It's not unusual to see him— the paddock is small and Vale is always a presence, felt even when he’s gone, indelible—but it’s on the television more often than not these days. Maybe a glimpse of him zooming around on his scooter, ignoring the swing of the camera phones tracking him in his wake. But it’s not like this, never this close up. Vale maintains distance, and Marc has adapted to take his cues from that same distance. He’s not going to be the first to engage, not anymore.

All that being said, Marc is trying to grab some alone time in between sessions, communing with his lunch and contemplating ways to improve his breaking into Turn 11. He’s tucked into a shady place out of the way, generally out of the range of any stray cameras, when Vale catches him, sliding next to him on the table and leaning forwards on his elbows.

He starts picking at Marc’s food.

Marc reacts reflexively, not even processing that it's Vale who’s at his elbow who is reaching over to snag a bit of his chicken. He lifts his bowl out of reach like he would with Alex. “Hey— that's mine,”

Vale’s game, apparently, shooting him one of those dangerous grins, eyes crinkling at the sides towards Marc like he hasn’t seen in years. He’s brimming with the confidence of someone used to getting away with breaking rules. Marc puts down his food. Lifts a hand, adjusts the cap at the top of his head, and tucks his hair behind his ear.

This means something. He doesn’t know what.

“Allora, you were not eating it.”

And Marc has always been easy for it—the simple skill he has in spinning a situation into the brightest version of itself, mood turning on a dime. Even when he was destroying Marc, he would do it with a smile.

It’s that same silverbright thread that makes Marc laugh, disbelieving, a shock of delight. He shoves at the edge of Vale’s arm, jockeying with his elbow. He bites his lip, shakes his head. Would you look at that?

“Presumptuous,” Marc scolds, and tucks back into his lunch, forking another bite into his mouth. Vale grins and leans closer, conspiratorial. That same hot, embarrassed feeling from the airport rears its head, giddy. Marc glances around. There’s no one here. He feels like there is. LIke there’s eyes on them, even though he’d chosen a place where there shouldn't be.

It feels like crossing a line, teetering on the edge of some cliff, one toe over the edge. Hot and anticipatory in the pit of his stomach. There’s a breeze going, and he shivers. Vale leans closer.

He likes it.

He also knows that he shouldn't like it. He’s gone through this song and dance before. This feeling, this hero worship that he has with Vale never leads him down any good road. He thought– six premier class titles and nearly ten years of vitriol had been an effective cure. Not so, he’s finding out.

Vale corrects, “I see what I see. This I cannot help.”

“Oh yeah? You’ve been watching me?

Vale shrugs, steals another bite. “You do manage to put on a good, ah, show.” He finds the words in Spanish. Marc can’t remember the last time they spoke in Spanish.

Marc takes a breath in. Settles himself. He doesn’t know what the end goal is here. Curiosity wins out— it’s better than wondering why Vale’s here in the first place. What game he’s trying to play. What he thinks he’ll get out of being nice to Marc, aside from that shivery feeling clawing its way up the base of his spine. He should really at least find out if he’s doing this because he plans on not being nice to Marc.

“How did you find me?” Is what he goes with. Neutral enough.

“You are not hard to find.” The answer is vague, but frank. Vale loves to speak around things.

Marc raises an eyebrow, decides to just keep looking at him. They both know he’s bullshitting. Vale breaks, and makes a face, shrugging.

“I have been racing here longer than you. I know the hiding spots.”

Marc gives him a minute roll of the eyes. It's still not an answer. “You know, they remodeled not too long ago. The entire layout changed.” Vale would’ve had to work to find him.

“Not too much!” Vale spreads his palms cheerfully, seizing on a diversion. “The bones are still the same. The stands are over there,” he juts a thumb, “The pits are here. The bathrooms change, but bah. It’s a facelift.”

Marc wrangles down a smile. Vale’s not being serious— he’s being fun. Maybe he’s trying to get him comfortable for some reason. “A lot changes, I think.” He says frankly, and he means it.

Vale’s eyes flash. He sees Marc’s conviction, catches the double meaning. Another one of their conversations centering around two different issues on the surface, but coming back to their history all the same. The elephant in the room butting into other topics. History, division, and rivalry, all sneaking its way into the cracks in their words.

Vale keeps going, the lead in their little play.

“Maybe. But it’s not— like, aerodynamics, new regulations, new tires— all that changes. Small stuff. Opinions, riders. But it is still a paddock. I’ve been in paddocks my entire life. You can’t change much.”

Things change a lot, in Marc’s experience. People. Teams. Bodies.

Friendships.

And Marc is brave usually, has made a career out of it, so he feels like he has to ask. No use avoiding it and feeling half out of his skin for the rest of the day. Vale’s knee bumps into his own and he closes his eyes briefly. When he opens them Vale is already looking at him

“Why are you here?” He levels.

Vale throws him a soft smile. It comforts exactly no part of Marc.

“Maybe I was looking for a hiding place.”

Marc hesitates, choosing his words carefully. It’s always a spar with Valentino; even when they were friendly, they were still competing.

“Am I the hiding place?”

“Well, I am still more famous than you, is true. Less photographers on you than me. It’s peaceful.”

“What do you want from me?”

“Now there’s a good question.” Vale says, stealing something else off of Marc’s plate. “Today? I was hungry. I thought I’d stop by and eat with an old friend.” The words jolt through Marc like a highside. He’s in the air— lost, flying, falling.

Vale stands, towering. He claps Marc on the shoulder. It burns white hot. Marc keeps his eyes on him, trying to catch a hint, a clue as to how this all happened.

An old friend.

“Is that what we are?” He asks, more earnest than he should be. Vale can be such a bastard.

“Well, what would you call it?” He responds, turning the question on Marc, voice quiet. Serious, like he knows whatever hangs between them is as thin as a spiderweb. Marc swallows.

“I don’t know,” Marc answers. still too honest, even now. Something flickers on Vale’s face, too quick and complex for him to read.

“Think about it.” Vale prompts, and walks away.

Marc finds out that they weren’t alone, in that section of the paddock the next day. The pictures hit the news after the race, headlines rolling in thankfully after Marc has left for home. Valentino Rossi and Marc Marquez sharing lunch, alone on a race weekend ten years after their falling out. What could it mean?

But Marc’s eyes look at the photo and just catch on Vale’s shoulders, leaning towards Marc, the palm of his hand, arcing through the air as he gestures, frozen on the screen of his phone, and himself, eyes crinkled at the corners. He was wrong. He didn’t manage to reign in that smile after all.

FRIENDS AGAIN?, the headline asks, and Marc wonders.

#to answer your quastion. a little bit.#marc thinks its adolescent hero worship. which is good excuse until youre thirty and supposed to hate someone #and then youre maybe friends again and you STILL feel the same and also are having sex dreams at ur big age.#motogp #callie speaks #asks #rosquez #my fic #airport au

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drifting-pieces-blog-blog · 1 year

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Breaking down the Comics: Elias Spector's Death

Okay. Okay. I'm going to try to be....a little comprehensible.... I'm going to fail. Just a warning.

I want to talk about the first run of Moon Knight. Specifically the last issues of the first run. There were 38 issues in the very first run of their own comic. After that, they reached out to a larger audience and started to print differently and started over with #1 because comics suck at a comprehensible numbering system.

In the start, we meet Marc Spector, see him have a conflict of heart, die, come back, and become Moon Knight. He starts to add in identities of Jake and Steven as a way to be anyone else but Marc Spector and claims they are just him starting over and trying to use their lives as a way to do things better. (a system that has not yet realized that it is a system. Denial is not just a river).

We see him fight some of his villains that start to play bigger parts later in the series. We see him make friends as Jake and money and love as Steven. We see bits of his past and some stories of Marc Spector’s adventures. We meet Randall and even get to see Marc fail to save people (Crowly’s son, Randall, Gena’s friend). We see him struggle with Khonshu and his identity a bit. We even see him break down a couple times.

But the way that fist run ends is to me the real defining moment for Moon Knight. Let’s take you to:

Issue #37, The Ghost.

It opens with Elias dying of cancer in a hospital in Chicago. On his deathbed, he calls for Marc.

The comic notes that they have been estranged for 18 years.

In this comic, Steven has finished organizing the files on Marc and is still grappling with the fact that he and Marc are in fact two different people. He thinks once he has organized Marc’s life, he can lock it up and they can become Steven Grant forever and never have to deal with that unpleasantness again.

Up to this point, we have been seeing them struggle with their identities. Still under the illusion that they are one man putting on different identities who can't decide what life to live.

Understandable, considering that Marc does not want to be Marc anymore. Steven detests the life that was lived as Marc and Jake pushes back on both lives, wanting to be with friends and a simple man of the people.

In many ways, Marc only surfaces when things of the past come up. He refuses to acknowledge that he's still around and when he is faced with that fact, he is stressed and full of rage.

We've seen clips of Marc's past. We see him working as a guide for not always good people through tough parts of the world. We see him working for hire with the Feds in capturing a runner. We see the CIA and world organizations hiring him. Is it any wonder that he's so skilled? That his past is often overlooked when it comes to SHIELD and other entities, because he probably not only worked for them, but probably also carried out shady business for them. But that's a different story.

In this issue, we see Steven watching a recording of one of the missions Marc was on. "Spector led a scout team. We took a terrorist camp in a cross border operation. The only problem was that our .50 caliber gunners couldn't be bothered with fine distinctions between terrorists, women, and children."

As much as we'd like to see Marc as a man of misfortune and circumstance, he wasn't always a good guy. He often tried his best to be good in his missions, often feeling conflicted and trying to save people or turning on those that he found to be of bad character, but sometimes he was a bad guy.

It's important to see these bits so we can better understand Marc and his intense trauma, his guilt, and his self hatred.

This issue uses this to show how far away from his father's teachings Marc fell. How he pushed so hard against his father that he ended up on the other side.

In my books, this is the most important Moon Knight story. The story of where he came from. Of his father and his faith.

His parents fled to America when Germany took over Czechoslovakia. In Europe, his father had been a great man that was "ordained a Rabbi at eighteen, and went on to become a brilliant scholar in the Kabbalah, Jewish Mysticism."

They moved to the poor side of Chicago where his father tried to teach him that "God loves a poor man. [...] Poor in goods, rich in spirit." (Something Jake Lockley adheres to).

Here, they suffered antisemitism. They were beaten and used as scapegoats for everything wrong.

Interestingly enough, he sites that his mother died when he was just a child. with the frequent beatings, fear, and death of his mother, it's any wonder Marc suffered some trauma?He became angry at his father for not standing up for himself or them.

His father wanted him to study to become a Rabbi and Marc turned to boxing and self defense.

When his father tries to stop him during a fight, he punches him. His father disowns him and kicks him out.

The next day Marc joined the Marines. He focused "for eight years" to become the best. When he was the best, he became a mercenary.

If you jump forward several writers, you find out that he was dishonorably discharged from the Marines for bouts of dissociation and mental health. But let's stay focused on the original story.

Steven has found out that their father is dying and he is refusing to go back. "He said he never wanted to see me again, he meant it. I won't go back."

An important aspect of this comic is that Marlene notes herself to be Steven's lover, confidant, and guru.

She acts as their guide in matters of the mind and heart. She's always the one that calms them and helps them to reconcile when the three of them start to fight one another and don't know who they are.

Despite her not understanding his DID, and they themselves not understanding it, she is a huge help for them.

I have a lot of conflicting thoughts and opinions on Marlene, but it's good to note that she was originally written as a very important part of his story.

"Marc Spector was always an escapist. When your relationship with your brother Randall soured you just forgot him for ten long years until it was too late and he died hating you. I can feel what kind of spin you're in, Steven, but you have to accept the responsibility, make amends now. Steven Grant and Moon Knight have no fathers. Only Marc Spector does."

That's a very interesting view into all their relationships and how they keep one another at arms length. Jake, Steven, and Marc refuse to believe they have the same past, responsibilities, or life.

Yet, when Marc is struggling with dealing with the approaching death of his father, and facing him, Steven takes the floor and tries to help Marc get out of it. (Just like Jake jumping out the window later in Lemier's version of the story. Always running...Maybe I'll do something on that later...)

While out being Moon Knight, he comes across a Synagogue on fire. He sees a man run into the burning building and finds a Rabbi struggling to save the Torah from the fire.

"The five books of Moses. He put his life on the line for this. My father would have done the same, I'll bet. Though he wouldn't lift a finger against the thugs who bullied him. I guess every man's got his own reason for being a hero."

He finds out that the fire was set on purpose by NeoNazis. It reminds him of when he was a child and he flies into a rage.

"I'm not about to let these Nazi goons get off with 'Malicious mischief' and a slap on the wrists."

He's been through this before. There is weight to the thought that a lot of Marc's childhood trauma stems from dealing with religious trauma and antisemitism.

I think as time moves on, we forget the time period that Moon Knight is set in. He isn't just a child of a jewish immigrant.

His father fled the Holocaust. There is a high likelihood that friends and family did not make it out. Marc grew up hearing about relatives he lost. Knowing that his blood line probably didn't make it out of Europe. That there are no pictures of his ancestors. That he can't go back and see the old houses and towns.

His father was a Rabbi, which means he was in a big part of a Jewish community that also probably fled or flat out came from the camps. He grew up seeing the tattoos, the poor health, the people with PTSD, and hearing the stories.

We're talking severe Generational Trauma.

When Marc finds the Nazi scum that burned the synagogue he has some of my favorite lines that define him:

"You know where I belong, punk? I belong with the decent and innocent folk who can't find a moment's peace. Not in the streets, not in their own homes, so long as punks like you terrorize them. I belong with the persecuted."

Detective Flint shows up and stops him before he kills them. (I honestly forgot Flint went back to the beginning. That poor man has dealt with so much Moon shit.)

Marc realizes he needs to face things and heads to Chicago.

But he is too late. He arrives in time for the funeral. He's handed a kippah and he puts it on for the first time in years.

Now, we get to learn a bit about Elias.

We come to find him as a man in desperate search of Self and Spirit. A man who was so stern and severe but also a man that sought truth and a just way to live.

His line of research focused on the "knowledge to see beyond the physical. To know the universe as a reflection of the divine image and to see mankind redeemed..."

It discusses how the body cannot meet G-d, but only the spirit and only in death can the spirit travel.

We find out later that he was seeking a way to bring back the departed who have met with G-D and the other side.

A man that refused to fight back against those that had done him wrong, who believed that given enough time that G-D would punish those that had brought them harm.

A man that sought for a way to face G-D after watching a world try to wipe his people off the very earth. An interesting thought.

During the eulogy, Marlene reflects that "It's almost as though he were speaking of you as Steven Grant. A man in search of self and spirit who rejected Marc Spector's materialism to become Moon Knight - A social conscience and moral force, just, severe, unknowable."

Steven later goes to visit their father's grave at night and comes across some thugs spray painting a swastika on some of the grave stones and vandalizing them. He’s emotional and outraged that even here there is no peace to be found. It turns out this was all a distraction as someone has stolen his father's corpse!

Issue #38, And the dead shall rise: (I love that cover).

We see Moon Knight struggling with his identity. Elias was not a father to them all. Marc is emotional and pissed, but still refusing to take responsibility for his part in all this.

"Moon Knight will find his...Marc Spector's father and return him to the dignity of a final resting place..." Steven refuses to say ‘my father’. Any mention of Elias is always in relation to Marc and even Marc can’t make himself be present when talking about his father.

Marlene is tasked with helping to clear out Elias' study and donate his papers and books to the university when she's attacked by someone who runs off with some of the papers.

Steven returns and has a small break down. "I'll find him, Marlene, and I'll kill him for desecrating my father's grave and memory!" "That's Marc Spector the cold - hearted mercenary talking, not you stev--" "How long can I deny it, Marlene. I AM Marc Spector!"

And Marc is finally taking charge. The first time he has taken ownership of his father and how he feels.

He sees his father in a new light.

"I may have misjudged my father's saintliness for cowardice and his genius and moral zeal for fanaticism. [...] And isn't moon knight in his own way a moral zealot fighting perhaps for the very same values Marc Spector once rejected?"

Now that is an interesting way to look at it. Moon Knight is about doing the right thing. About protecting those that need it. About believing in something unkillable and powerful. Moon Knight is about an idea of man being more than he is. Is this not what his father believed in?

We learn that Elias had uncovered a way to bring a soul back to the dead body with necromancy where it could then "utter its knowledge of God to a living Kabbalist."

Turns out one of Elias' students decided to test this out on Elias' freshly dead body.

He does manage to resurrect the dead body of Elias, who zombie walks towards Moon Knight.

Marc immediately starts having flashbacks and intense guilt. Even with his dead father trying to strangle him, he refuses to fight back: "No! I'll die before I ever lay my hands on him again, I swear it! Father, forgive me-"

Marlene shows up and manages to break the spell, sending Elias back to death.

Marlene tends to save him a lot in the earlier runs. Just something to note.

Marc once more is not present. Curled up on the floor after melting down, he is beyond emotional and most likely dissociating out the wazoo. "I found him, Marlene... I found...Spector's father."

Once more, Marc is being protected. Marc, who hated how his father sheltered him and wanted to feel the real world in violence and brutality is often in need of being sheltered. Steven, who wants to rid himself of Marc and the past is often doing the sheltering.

When it comes to emotions, Marc is often the one being overcome. Either in fits of anger and rage, guilt and regret, or just overwhelmed in sadness or traumatic responses. Steven Grant is usually the one that is shown to be calm and collected.

In fact, at the start of the issues, when Steven is watching Marc’s tapes and going through his things, he’s detached and unemotional. Steven has the ability to see things from a different perspective of ‘useful’ and ‘Not useful’. It’s rare that Steven responds to things with emotion unless Marc is involved and they are arguing or Marc has put them or someone he cares about in danger.

Frankly, it’s possible that Steven is the caretaker in the early comics. Mackay has shown that Steven not only manages their finances, but their hygiene and body care. He’s the rational and logical one. The one that can face down a villain without reacting. He’s also the one that does all the exercises and rehab when Marc puts them in a wheelchair.

The story ends with them returning home to New York. Steven notes that they almost died because of Marc's emotions. He also notes that Marc seems to have resolved some of the bitterness that was held with his father's memory. He comments that he feels a peace of mind and like a whole new person.

Steven and Marc featured heavily in this with Steven shielding Marc without even realizing he was doing it. And as a system that has not come to full realization yet, it is possible that Steven is starting to understand here, which is why he feels like a whole new person at peace with himself.

This is also how the first run of Moon Knight as a stand alone comic ended. 1980-1984.

Before this issue, Jake was featured heavily. Steven was the mansion party pretty boy that lounged around with Marlene. Jake was the one out doing his reconnaissance and hanging with Gena and Crowley.

It was a good connection to link Steven and Marc’s past with the father and Jewish faith. Jake would have been easier to connect. Jake is the son that Marc wishes he had been.

But Jake is emotional. Jake wants nothing to do with Marc’s bloody past. Calls him a killer and would be happy to spend all day in his cab. If anything, when Steven and Marc talk about Jake, it often feels like two older brothers talking about a goofy but kind younger brother.

A few issues earlier, when they ended up in a wheelchair for a time, Steven lamented that he didn’t think he could give up driving Jake’s cab, as it brought him too much joy.

So I can see why this issue needed Steven to be involved. Steven doesn’t know who he is at this point. He hasn’t been defined and given the chance to figure out what makes him happy and tick. Jake has already broken off and figured out who he is. He knows he’s Jake Lockley. But who is Steven Grant aside from Marlene’s eye candy and the rich boy?

Settling Marc’s past, seeing who he was and where he was coming from, protecting him, and facing down the Nazi threat was eye opening for him. Much like in the show, Steven needed to see where they came from to see where he belonged.

Does it get easier for Steven and Marc to interact after this? Not really. Marc is still self destructive and a danger to them. But I think when Marc falls down that path, it’s easier for Steven to know where Marc is coming from. To help him get out of the spiral and let them function.

An interesting aspect is how much Marc’s past has been re-written over and over again by different writers. His mother’s role, his relationship with his brother, his religious handlings, his trauma, and his violent past are redesigned each time a new writer gets their hands on him.

No one really knows how to handle Marc’s relationship with G-D or his specific type of trauma. Marc’s guilt is’t because he betrayed his culture or religion. He didn’t turn his back on that. His fate with heaven and hell are constructed by Christian writers that don’t understand or research things well enough.

Marc’s pain is that he can’t let go of the choices he made. The regrets of relationships that he turned his back on weigh heavily on him. His inability to save people and the times he didn’t try when he should have are agony to him.

“You can’t save everyone, but you have to try.” Marc’s problem is that he will break himself trying. He can’t handle the thought that he can’t save everyone. Each one he loses is a scar on him that eats away at him as another example of him destroying everything good in his life.

Marc has gotten to the point where a flower would wilt and he’d take it as a personal hit that he didn’t try hard enough.

He lost his brother. He was too late for his father. He couldn’t help Marlen’s father. Marc needs the reminders that sometimes he has to lay down and rest. Steven tends to be that reminder.

When Marc forgets that he’s more than just a killer, Steven steps in and tells Marc to sit down and shut up. He is balance and control that both Marc and Jake lack and I really wish we got to see more of this, especially in current writings.

I want to see that Marc is the emotional hot head. That Jake is the heart and soul. That Steven is the cool and collected protector. I want to see them wrestle with G-D in a way that makes sense to them. I want to see how Marc has healed and how they are processing their trauma. I want them to show that they can work together and know what one another needs. I want them to show that healing is possible without losing any part of themselves.

Sometimes healing looks like three guys sharing time and doing their own thing. Not one guy being in control of the body full time. Sometimes healing is one guy celebrating Purim while the other two take a back seat because it isn’t their thing.

I’m prepared for disappointment, but I hope I’m pleasantly surprised.