Cavalry Masterpost

[speakveryclearly]

this is for brainstorming & headcanon shenanigans plus the first week there won't be anyone in the graveyard so the popcorning will be just between the three ladies until then...........................

On set:
Gundam
Stiles
Kaoru
Spain

Graveyard trio:
Rapture
Kanaya
Annie

Off set:
Lithuania
Ukraine
Beat
May
Poland
Susan
Alice
Sonia

Comments

[godwhisperer]

Gundam is also now twenty and kind of a badass. No, really. Although he'll always be the same strange and over the top guy, the years have largely changed him for the better. Gundam never fit in back in his ordinary life on earth, but being in a resistance and fighting for his life and the lives of his friends has actually put him in his element. Gundam has always been very intelligent and much more useful in a genuine crisis than he is anywhere else. While he's normally something of a joke, when everything gets serious, Gundam actually tends to have a very cool head, is extremely brave, and is very good at strategic thinking. When the group was thrust into a dangerous situation, he would have been one of the players to immediately start fighting and figure out an avenue of escape, and one of the players whose mindset would have adjusted to survival extremely easily. Because of that, and because the others in the group of survivors actually came to realize the extent to which he had hidden talents and was secretly always extremely capable, Gundam stopped playing aloof dark lord and started getting down to actually being a serious member of the group.

While that's an obvious extension of lessons he learned in MM, spending three years having his own, actual talents recognized and respected by people who care about him has been pretty transformative for him. Even though he still sees the world through a pretty odd filter that involves demons and dark magic, he doesn't lie about his abilities anymore, and doesn't feel the need to try to impress people by exaggeration or fake magic. He is pretty confident that he is genuinely a badass, so there's no need for that kind of posturing anymore. So, for example, he's still likely to call animals demons or refer to himself as an angel/demon hybrid or explain what he's doing in anime supervillain terms. But he will not say things just because he thinks it sounds impressive that way, and he's actual prone to moments of real honesty - he'll never sit down and explain his childhood, but if it comes up, he'll drop information that reveals just how mundane it was and just what an isolated, sad kid he was. He now refers to his life in stages - before his curse was activated and he thought he was a mere human (early childhood), when he succumbed to the darkness of his destiny (his teen years), and after he overcame his fate and learned to tame the dark forces inside him (post-MM). He understands just how transformative that experience was for him.

Relationships wise, he's become a lot more open. He still sometimes plays at mistrust of the others, but it's mostly in a playful way - for example, he'll imply he thinks Susan or Stiles intends to betray the group and are secretly the Mastermind, but he would only imply that because he thinks saying someone is a threat is a compliment. He does genuinely trust the others and feels protective of all of them even if he doesn't always like all of them. He's likely to reveal that he has a pretty caring and compassionate side: his talent, after all, is a nurturing/caring one, but he previously only ever cared for animals. In his own weird, awkward way, he's pretty likely to be the one to go after someone who is upset, or try to take care of someone who is sick or hurt. He's also pretty ruthless in protecting his friends, but still abides by a fairly inscrutable moral code.

His closest relationships are Sonia, Stiles, and May. He and Sonia are still together and have had some sort of bizarre and creepy betrothal ceremony. They may not be officially married because there are no makango to be found for a Novoselic wedding, but they are married on the astral plane and Sonia is his dark bride. They did this really soon after escaping, but their weird relationship seems to work. Stiles is his best friend; he takes pacts of broship very seriously. He tries to maintain a weird antagonistic rivalry with Stiles and always talks about him like they're fated rivals joined by a sworn bond, but it isn't very convincing because of his obvious crush. No homo, though. May he refers to as his apprentice, but treats more like a younger sister. A younger sister who is much smarter and more capable than he is.

He's likely gotten closer to everyone, though, and has a lot of respect for the others, especially the more warrior and leadership minded. His anime martial arts have probably been improved by combat training.

After three years the hamsters would all be dead but since they were a MM regain he made it out with I'm just going to...say they're still alive...he's also probably picked up a weird little army of stray animals.

[speakveryclearly]

Being putatively teen married is hard and Kanaya only kind of understands; as happened often, she does not always have any effective working idea of what he is talking about (in spite of her canonical inherent fondness for boys who bluster nonsensically to cover their benevolence), takes the metaphors too literally, and just in general they can often have a conversation and she knows she didn't get it at all. She has a fairly significant friendly affection for him that has only deepened over time; she finds him charming, just confusing. Sometimes she remembers that Sonia and Gundam promised to carry on her life's work which is pretty much on hold under the circumstances and cries alone where she hopes no one will hear her but they are probably in close quarters.... If he ever went looking for her during other similar happenings and attempted to assuage the natural distresses afflicting the souls of a discrepancy between planes of existence that whole situation would be delightfully awkward

[godwhisperer]

Yeah, Kanaya is someone he liked even before he decided to just be friends with everyone, and Annie is also someone he likes. He'd get along well with her. But he wouldn't be any good at comforting, just kind of awkwardly like 'get over it.' But he would mean well.

[souredsweet]

oh no an army of stray animals... kaoru would have tried to befriend literally every animal gundam ever appeared with. i also think he probably would have become a regular sparring partner if gundam allowed it! he'd probably really grow to respect him over the years even if he's an inept moron and would never mention anything even remotely indicative of that. they'd definitely be on the same page re: warrior/leadership minded, either way.

[godwhisperer]

I'm pretty sure over the years he and Kaoru would just establish an unspoken understanding with each other. It doesn't need to be said. He has no moral objection to being a ruthless psychopath, especially not one who is kind to animals, and as much as he didn't like who Kaoru was in MM, he meant it when he said that if Kaoru treated Clyde's death as an obligation to live a worthwhile life, he would respect that. Kaoru being a rabid attack dog for the group would definitely fulfill those terms in his opinion, since in his own moral code, being kind of malicious is okay as long as you're honest about it and aren't betraying your comrades.

[souredsweet]

YES that is what i was trying to put into words, i think they'd be on the same page about a lot of things without necessarily talking any of it over. i'm cracking up though he really is the rabid attack dog of the group... good lord... using your life well, clyde. he would definitely not betray any destructocomrades at this point at least, even if it's largely just because he's a freak and people who suffer alongside him are precious to him...

actually speaking of that, i think gundam will be a big part of the reason that kaoru will feel kind of weird about having to jump back into his old persona, since he'll have come to terms with the fact that pretty much everyone prefers flawed and honest to fake and polite. gundam and sonia would just be among the people who'd make it most obvious to him so he'd be like "OH....."

[pasodoble]

THE HAMSTERS ARE SO TOTALLY STILL ALIVE

Nation immortality rubbed off on them so they get to live forever with Gundam, okay. If anyone asks the nations just casually explain how Lithuania's dog is still a puppy and Spain has an immortal bull back home and etc.

... I guess this goes for all of the animals Gundam collects.