#thanks for letting me ramble about my ''but what if Grima and Robin could talk'' fic idea

[loregoddess]

📓?

Recently I got the idea for a fanfic about Robin and Grima but expanded with the lore from Echoes, and weirdly enough Yen'fay. It would follow the general gist of Awakening's story but instead of being totally unaware that she's the vessel for Grima, Robin totally is aware that there's another entity existing within her, and can even kinda "talk" with Grima to some extent. After getting memory-wiped (or, in this version, having her and Grima's memories sorta just messed up and jumbled into a mush of confusion) Robin still joins Chrom and Co. and becomes the Shepard's tactician, but has this feeling like something terrible will happen, like she'll do something terrible (bc surprise! she also now has the Other Robin and Grima's memories tangled with her own and therefore knows bits and pieces about the other timeline, but again, it's a jumbled mush so she's not able to sort through everything right out of the gate and only starts to piece things together after various key story events). More focus would be put on Robin's inner struggles and sorting through memories and stuff, rather than just straight retelling the story to Awakening.

There would also be a lot of focus on Robin's ability to dialogue with Grima, and she'd gain a lot of insight into Grima's "heart" so to speak, which is to say their general attitude about humanity born from their messed up past as a Frankenstein's monster homunculus born and confined to an ancient lab filled with dead things puppeteered by bugs. In the original timeline that Other Robin comes from, Other Robin eventually came to agree with Grima and willingly became their vessel to destroy the world due to like, severe feelings of self-doubt and unresolved issues regarding her dead mom (who of course I would expand on, I love to give dead moms stories). The Robin of this timeline, with both her own memories of her altered timeline and the original timeline of Other Robin, would come to a different conclusion, but it wouldn't really be a clear-cut path to defying her destiny or anything right out of the gate because to Robin, sealing away or even using Grima's power to destroy Grima, aren't really good options since, again, she's started to kinda understand Grima, but wants to prove to them that humanity isn't all evil, and that Grima also deserves a chance to live in peace and be treated kindly.

Of course, in line with how long it takes before any of the spotpass characters can be recruited, it takes nearly the entire plot of Awakening before Robin's able to find an answer, because while lots of events are different in this timeline, she's still not finding an answer to how to defy Other Robin's decision while also not giving up on and forsaking the Grima living within her. Enter various story arcs from the spotpass stories, and from the DLC stories with heavy emphasis on the Future Past stories (and a headache-inducing amount of theories around Morgan and the DLC stuff). Which is how we get to Yen'fay (bc I actually like his character a lot despite the fact that he's *vaguely gestures* really, really not popular with most fans, but his Heroes quotes are what actually kickstarted this entire little idea in the first place so). In this story, Yen'fay is still a different Yen'fay from an entirely separate timeline and therefore has lots of stuff to resolve with Say'ri, but in regards to Robin instead of following the conversation arc of F!Robin and Yen'fay a la the game script, the conversations between the two would follow as a mix between M!Robin and F!Robin's leaning towards M!Robin's (and a mix of stuff from Heroes), and through trying to get Yen'fay to work through his self-worth issues and get past thinking he's nothing now but a tool of destruction (and later talking with Morgan and seeing things in the Future Past timeline), Robin is also able to start addressing her own issues with feeling like she had been "destined" to be nothing more than a vessel for Grima who was nothing more than a failed experiment, and in this way is able to finally start devising a plan to face Other Robin. (If this part reads as kinda messy it's bc I haven't actually figured out the exact way any of these conversations and side stories would fit in with the main plot thread).

Anyhow, the final confrontation would come, and when Robin get's like, sucked down into the darkness before the final battle, she's actually able to use her renewed sense of self-worth and hope to try and sway the Other Robin, and to speak to Grima directly (which she'd been trying to do on and off, but Grima's pretty set on hating humanity, so it was an uphill battle). In the end, Robin isn't really able to come to any sort of compromise with Other Robin, but does convince Grima enough to lend her a bit of their power via a deal. She then returns to the battle, the fight with Other Robin ensues, and Robin allows Chrom to "seal" Grima away, but also uses Grima's power to do...uh, something that I haven't been able to work out in a way that doesn't sound insane, but essentially Other Robin ceases to exist in some way, and only Grima's power as a world-ending dragon gets sealed, with Grima's consciousness still existing within Robin. In essence, Robin made a deal with Grima to allow her to seal their power and try to show them that the world was worth the effort of protecting or at least ignoring, rather than destroying. Grima tentatively agrees to this bc Robin truly does not see them or treat them as some failure of an experiment or tool, but in Grima fashion also tells Robin that if she doesn't convince them, then they're going to destroy the world anyhow when they get their powers back, which Robin concedes is the best deal she'll be able to strike, noting that future generations will fight against Grima just as desperately if Grima does decide to destroy them. Despite Grima's attitude, I'd want the fic to end on a hopeful note, with the sense that even though Grima's saying these things, there really is hope that once they can experience a better life, they won't be hell-bent on destroying everything, and moreover, that Grima is given the chance to have a nice life, and so is this version of Robin who's spends a lot of time dealing with issues (and Yen'fay, and Morgan, and whoever else would work their way into the narrative weave).

So...yeah? I think despite what kicked this off being a few Heroes' quotes from Yen'fay, my imagination really ran with the extended Grima lore and was just like, dude, Grima's entire existence really sucks and I just feel like they deserved better, got a chance to be loved and happy, y'know? So, yeah.