Boat Trolls planning thread! (full of spoilers, non-players enter at your own risk)

oh fuck poor boys :(

 

yeah! like! this is the first time erskin's had to function without his first mate since he got him, and he's been relying on him, and now he's back to the bad old days where it was pretty much just him and lainey and the old hands, and almost all of those old hands are dead now. this is not a good emotional situation to be facing on three hours sleep and a dawning hangover.

 

btw bel has been pointedly ignoring lycaon all through this so as not to draw attention to him. but it's probably obvious he wasn't eating alone, since there are two trays. dunno how well lycaon is hidden.

 

"I'm biologically an adult," Bel says to the guy who's used to him being half a ton more grown up.

 

i mean, it's true for what it's worth, his eye color has filled in and his reproductive equipment is fully functional. he's 19 in human years, he could enlist and go to war. so i think he's got some basis for being upset at the "bitty baby lost in the mall" characterization. i think he's also defensive because he feels guilty for leaving after he said he wouldn't. like, he knows that was wrong, but hell if he's going to apologize while he's getting yelled at. big bel is probably mature enough to do that, but this one's not.

 

haha yeah, that's true. and young bel is still actually closer to erskin's age than most anyone else on the ship! but he did just drop from like 35 to 19, so he's really coming off as bitty. and he did just do a very immature, impulsive, naive thing, so erskin's not feeling charitable like at all.

 

oh my god look at this adolescent chris evans. this is how smol erskin thinks he is right now. this is what he's looking at. this is what's telling him 'i'm a grownup!'

 

ahhh what a smug, i love him

 

what's cute is he DOES look like the coolest and most confident senior in the highschool movie and junior erskin would certainly think he's hot shit. it's just that exhausted principal erskin does not. like at all.

 

going to go watch tv with seebs, so i reckon i'm done for tonight. the boys can just have a staring contest until next time. :D

 

thanks for letting me know! this was really fun, i hope you feel up for doing it again soon. but of course take care of yourself first.

 

you know what, i think this erskin is also dealing really badly with being in love with someone who regularly risks their life. arguus and lainey want to be safe as much as erskin wants to keep them safe. they keep out of danger and cooperate with his efforts to protect them! so erskin is very confident that lainey and arguus aren't going anywhere— he thinks lainey's probably going to outlive him, even. but now here's bel, who he really really wants to keep, and who categorically refuses to be kept, and it's driving him bonkers.

also man i just realized!!! okay, ex-marine bel has lost a lot of comrades in battle. and probably plenty of guys under his command. and he's had to deal with that. but he's also gone through training, and he knew what he was getting into, and he was surrounded by guys who also had the same deal going on. also he's kind of a grim and fatalistic motherfucker about death anyway.

erskin has lost most of the crew members he first knew when he was dumped, with no fucking preparation, into a leadership position, pretty much either alone or at odds with others of his rank. so almost all of the people he first learned to be a captain from then went on to die on his watch, while he was desperately trying to have that happen, because he wasn't a good captain.

so he's not really in any kind of mindset of 'this is war and we're laying down our lives and it's unavoidable that some of us die', his mindset is 'my people are dying and i don't know how to save them'. erskin's a civilian, and he's also a civilian who never even really got used to the casual interpersonal brutality of regular troll society back on the homeworld. he takes all the deaths on his ship personally, they're his fault.

so all of this has impacted him emotionally in a completely different way from bel, and is why he keeps 'not trusting' bel to take care of himself or survive danger. erskin desperately wants to keep him out of danger entirely. it also doesn't help that bel's thrown himself into REALLY EXTREME DANGER, like a zombie-packed ship, or a clown that has murdered every one of erskin's crew who's ever crossed him right in front of erskin. or that one time he split off from bel in a fight and found him with his horn snapped, getting bludgeoned to death by a robot. so like emotionally, erskin is going to be almost incapable of sitting back and letting bel fight stuff. he's always going to try to keep bel safe.

i think neither he nor bel have actually consciously realized this? like if bel knew erskin lost a lot of comrades too, it'd be a 'yeah who hasn't' kind of thing, not a 'oh, that's why you insultingly flip your shit over me getting into fights i can obviously handle' thing. lainey might get it, but not know that bel doesn't get it.

 

jkflds;fjdsafds I just got caught up with things and MAAAAAN this is an lovely bouquet of snark and issues and more issues and it is interesting as heck. also GALLEY YOU JERK. XD

(also wow it just clicked that this Lu (who I assume has just kinda been huddled up in Twitch's block making pathetic puppy eyes for paps and occasionally flipping off the camera when Galley makes a comment and otherwise very quietly recovering from various withdrawal symptoms) just very narrowly escaped Cloris and younger!Bel just reduced Cloris's head into a fine green mist. OH GOD CAN THEY MEET UP IT WOULD BE AWESOME)

 

poor erskin aaaaa his ptsd and bel's ptsd do NOT play well together at ALL

maybe erskin can give bel the task of keeping baby clown and baby helm entertained and out of the way, to keep HIM entertained and out of the way so erskin doesn't have to worry so much.

 

i like that bel keeps saying erskin should stop treating him like an unreasonable baby when erskin is repeatedly trying to get bel to act like his adult self and work out some kind of acceptable compromise with him. i guess they're both kind of talking past each other to their own versions of... each other? dimensional travel is funky.

also you know what, this erskin doesn't know that bel's erskin has no authority over him whatsoever, and is going to be baffled and horrified when he finds out. like wait, your erskin just lets you rampage around willy-nilly? THAT'S RIDICULOUS.

 

i was thinking erskin would offer him a couple options! he doesn't WANT to sit on bel for a week or throw him in the brig, it's going to be hell on everyone if he's gotta do that. he'd much rather assign bel to work under one of the department heads for awhile— either heinsz in mechanics or lainey in administration— and help out somewhere. it'd keep him busy and every hand they can get on deck is great. assigning him to pancho or lu is an option but it might slow the rp down if you have to play two characters or if you and aud do long stuff on your own? the section you guys were gonna rp as lu and pancho seemed to kind of overload you both, if i remember right. if you're up for it, then cool. i just would like to not have things stalled out for months....

 

yeah no i would def stall out. sorry aud.

 

==> erskin: hope like heck this kadros has the same kinks

 

bel, why won't you just admit you're feeling scared and trapped and weirded out and inadequate?

bel: *covers his ears and shouts LA LA LA I CAN'T HEAR YOU*

 

you know what, i figured out why this bel is so stubbornly furious about erskin's position. he's just deprogrammed enough to have an inkling how awful it is that kids are left to murder each other, and that he's done so much murder already, and so recently. for this erskin to talk about keeping him safe, when he's going to be going back to Planet Hellmurder in a week, gives him the worst sadrage.