#merbedo au

[cake-wlk]

getting held like this > every other method

[dourpeep]

"To join them above the waves and discover the lands beyond would be my greatest joy"

- The Little Merbedo, probably

Please do not repost my art!

[cake-wlk]

ponder the aether

[cake-wlk]

big sad fish...........

[cake-wlk]

merbedo... merbedo behavioral hcs or just general things he does? if you don't mind talking about him 🤲

hmmm. mixed in a bit of his brother too to help me come up with some things.

sorry i've written more than i expected, so i hope its what you wanted at the very least

neutral - typical albedo behaviour, quiet and observant. most likely to be resting against the ground, if in the company of other people, because it helps alleviate weight. enjoys listening to people and studying their mannerisms closely, but won't really make any advances to actually touch or get close to someone. just enjoying the peace.

happy - will prop up his torso when he's particularly interested and happy. digging and flexing his claws into the sand. ear fins are more propped up. he tries not to move his tail too much in case he hits something, or someone, but its a good indicator of his mood. it'll grow more restless with a happier mood as his thoughts wander. he loves holding people, especially klee. a guilty pleasure of his to get as close as he can to people he trusts, being able to see and feel everything they do sates his curiosities completely. said curiosity will come out in full bloom if he recognises someone going out of their way to make him happy, but he will typically not go and physically touch someone unless they recognise his reluctance and give him permission of their own volition. *

sad - his fins are going to droop immediately, although it takes a lot to upset him, so it's not a common sight. he isn't one to back away from the situation though, after all he wants to understand humans properly and possibly make amends to the situation as quickly as he can. if he is truly consumed by sorrow, he will probably sink into a corner of his tank in the facility and curl up, or find a nice rocky beach to hide away and recollect himself.

* - its ingrained behaviour from the facility that created and 'cares' for him. none of the personnel are allowed to get close to him, treating him as a mere means to discover the secrets of the ocean. the only kind of contact he gets with humans there is through a thick glass window. rhinedottir and her crew don't exactly... take care of him and dorian very well, her lack of treating dorian as a being with human sentience made him lash out eventually, which in turn made her attempt to dispose of him after multiple casualties occurred... and this would've repeated with albedo too, if klee hadn't befriended him by chance.

extra - being touch-starved is shared between the brothers, albedo will snap up any chance for physical touch. dorian, on the flip-side, is too traumatised to accept it from humans, except for aether and maybe klee. as such, he can come across as particularly possessive with aether, coiling around him like he's going to be taken away at any moment he lets down his guard. albedo very much likes to rest on beaches for the warmth and also being able to draw in the sand. he absolutely adores it when sucrose or klee are there, doing their own things or taking part in whatever he's doing. he takes them for rides out into the water too. conversely, dorian much prefers the depths of the ocean, but will sometimes come up to silently observe, just barely peeking out of the water. klee attempts to get his attention on multiple occasions but it always results in him fleeing. the only one that really gets any success with him is aether... albedo's job primarily is to research the ocean, but he always brings back more samples than needed so he can give them to sucrose, as they both enjoy trading various specimens with sucrose's being from the surface and albedo's being from the sea. it helps lighten up his time at the facility, though they have to be sneaky about it. (rhinedottir eventually finds out, but decides to just stay quiet because of it helping albedo focus on his job, much like his friendship with klee keeping his spirits up) albedo and dorian tolerate each other a lot more than in canon, because dorian recognises that rhinedottir mistreats albedo too. there is a bit more mutual understanding from them because they're the only merfolk to exist. dorian was extremely rough and hurt albedo pretty bad, but he did try to help him when confronting him for the first time, ripping off his tracking collar. though it was a volatile mix of emotions and trauma that made him do it in such a hostile manner.

[cake-wlk]

aether accidentally falling asleep in mer dorian's company and poor dorian panicking because he doesn't know what to do, although he does feel honoured that aether trusts him so much 😭

[cake-wlk]

HELLO YOU CAN CALL ME X OR JUST LIKE SCREAMING ANON BUT I AM CURRENTLY OBSESSED WITH UR MERBEDO AU SPECIFICALLY DORIAN BC I LOVE LONELY LITTLE (BIG) GUYS </3

AETHER BREAKING DOWN DORIAN’S WALLS AND DORIAN DESPERATELY WANTING AND NEEDING TO LET AETHER IN EVEN THO HES SCARED TO- SCRWAMS

aether definitely will have trouble gaining his trust... though, there's no knowing what will happen around a large merm with trauma and trust issues

i'm sure they'll be fine... probably 🤭

[cake-wlk]

hmmm i think i've decided that aether's role in the merbedo au will be to assist ruby he won't actually meet albedo for a while and will help deal with ruby's trauma and get him comfortable interacting with others again

rubether...

[cake-wlk]

just a merbedo design i cleaned up for mermay + bonus rubedo/susbedo/subject 2 version 

i have a bunch of ideas for this au... though i'll only elaborate if people are interested

[cake-wlk]

they are cosy!!!

[cake-wlk]

just a boi i doodled as an icon... except it didn’t end up looking good as an icon so RIP i guess

[cake-wlk]

pretty much finished merbedo, might add a little edited version that will be rubedo's design

i really like how his body design came out hehe (though not so much his clothing, but i'm terrible at clothing designs, so its whatever)

i'll probably upload it for mermay but if anyone wants to draw it, i can send it through dms 👀

i have lots of ideas for the au but i don't really know how to put it all into a nice format, my ideas are always a mess 😔

[cake-wlk]

HI SO UH I think your Merbedo design is literally super neat and your artstyle is very cool- and aa I am very much curious about your AU and the purpose of the tracking collar on Merbedo/who placed it on him. 👁👁

hello!! thank you so much for the ask! and aaaaa thank you for the compliment!! >w< i am glad you are interested in the au! i’ve been thinking about it a lot hehe so i’m happy someone else wants to listen

i’ll stick the answer under a read more, because it got pretty long

as for the tracking collar, that was rhinedottir! albedo and subject 2 are still synthetic lifeforms created by her. in fact, they were made to research the depths of the ocean! i like to think in this au they are the only merfolk to exist and are specifically made for this task alone. (that doesn’t stop them from being in an au where there are other merfolk, though!)

the collars, of course, track whatever they are attached to, because the ocean is a very big place and rhine wants to keep an eye on her experiments, but it also doubles as a shock collar as well to keep them in line she doesn’t exactly treat either of the boys very well in this au to be honest, seeing both of them as less than human, given their unnatural bodies and size, treating them more like tools.

subject 2 initially did have a collar as well, but rhine’s mistreatment of him led to him developing a very aggressive temperament, and she struggled to control him. rhine gave them efficient methods of defense (claws, teeth, size etc.) and resilience to survive in the depths of ocean, which of course backfires once subject 2 starts becoming aggressive. she decides to put him down once it gets out of control, probably using some paralysing serum-- or something similar-- and leaves him to die in dragonspine trench, where he barely manages to subsist off durin’s remains until he recovers.

this leads into him getting the scratch marks! rhine left his collar on, given that she didn’t need it anymore, and deactivated it as a result. however, the collars are hard to remove and he really scratched himself up trying to break it off :(

rhine, of course, made more counter-measures for albedo’s resilience when she created him, still refusing to learn that treating her creations appropriately would solve a lot of problems i like to think that she could’ve given him a mechanical heart, or something? so she can modify its settings to better keep albedo under control if he acts out of line, and can use it to monitor his body for more valuable scientific understanding into artificial hybrid lifeforms.

[cake-wlk]

OHHH HE GOT A SNACC....

[cake-wlk]

Heyy I really enjoy your merbedo au! If you don't mind me asking, does he still know Klee or Sucrose in this au? And if yes, how did they meet? I'm so curious!

hello!! i'm glad you like it so much

as for klee and sucrose, yes! i managed to come up with some ideas with a friend a while ago.  i’m sorry if this is a mess, i have a habit of going off on a tangent

— klee is actually the first person albedo meets that he can properly interact with, without restrictions on physical contact. i can't remember if i mentioned it, but rhinedottir restricts any of her personnel from physically getting close, because of subject 2's past aggression.

albedo meets klee when he is coming back from a research expedition. klee, quite obviously, throws bombs at his tail, mistaking his tail for a really big fish. though, albedo is alright, his scales protect him. he ends up very interested in klee, given that he’s never really seen anyone other than his master and the other researchers. needless to say, he thinks she’s very colourful compared to them. klee’s also very interested in him! she found a mermaid! and, of course, she wants to be friends with a mermaid, especially because he looks a lot different to the ones described in her bedtime stories.

albedo is pretty conflicted about interacting with her because of the restrictions he’s used to-- although its not like she’s one of the facility’s personnel... so surely he wouldn’t get into trouble... right? before he knows it, he’s already absorbed by klee’s endearing personality. she even teaches him a lot of things that rhine hadn’t, like what family is and how to have fun. klee very easily sates the touch-starved side of albedo. — sucrose, on the other hand, works at rhinedottir’s facility, except she doesn’t dabble in the more... dubious experiments involving the creation of life. she researches marine botany instead. she is very much aware of what they do though, and knows about albedo. she has witnessed a lot of the times albedo has tried to bond with rhinedottir, just by chance, and over time she starts to develop the belief that he’s incredibly lonely and deprived of more friendly interactions. 

cue sucrose concocting a plan to sneak into his holding grounds one night. her efforts to slip in unnoticed go off without a hitch-- but now that she’s where she wants to be? she's a bit of an awkward mess, wondering how she should confront him. although, before she can figure something out, he's already breached the waters of his tank, which only succeeds in making sucrose panic. she very frantically tries to explain what she’s doing, given that she’s the one intruding. meanwhile, albedo is initially bewildered by someone from the facility wanting to get close to him, but it soon turns into a warm smile, as he rests his head on his arms and watches her.

sucrose eventually comes around though, her face probably going deep red when she sees such a warm smile on his own features. she’s also quite excited when she realises that her suspicions were true, because there are so many questions she wants to ask albedo about all the things (especially plants) he has encountered in the ocean! the two bond over their love for discovering new things. albedo makes an effort to bring extra specimens back for her, and she brings him plants from inland that he never would’ve seen otherwise.  he especially loves the cecilias she brings.

[cake-wlk]

oh yeah dw i probably will be drawing more merbedo regardless of the fact that it’s not may anymore i love the au a lot!

i just get very worn out from drawing so i can’t draw as much as i want to...