look, i'm trying here

[seventhe]

I'M NOT GOING TO TALK ABOUT WORK, OTHER TO SAY THAT IT IS A SHIT SHOW!!!!!

So my brain is in that (bad) place right now where my only "comfort" (pronounced ironically) is knitting to Criminal Minds. I get this way occasionally; I've acknowledged it as a sign that my depression is [about to hit / hitting] hard, and I have ways to deal with that (namely, sleep until I forgot my own name), but in the interim: Criminal Minds and knitting it is.

In my own idle-brained way as watching the show I started thinking about how I want all these beautiful people to touch each other more - this is a core fundamental part of watching Criminal Minds, you know - and it got me thinking about fandoms in which I omni-ship the "team".

I'm not really in Criminal Minds fandom, but I read fanfic occasionally, and I don't have a pet pairing - sometimes I'm in the mood for one thing over another, but my favorite concept is the team together as one big omni-ship: an understanding between them all, where they can turn to one another for whatever it is that they need -- or whoever it is that they need. There's something about that kind of emotional setup that really, really appeals to me; and whenever I'm binge-watching the show and idly thinking about all the porn I should write, it's within that kind of context.

And that got me idly thinking about other fandoms in which I ship this way: FFVIII is one; Gundam Wing is another. Even FFIV I see as a chain of oddly-linked open pairings and threesomes: Rosa/Cecil, Cecil/Kain, Rosa/Cecil/Kain, Rosa/Rydia, Rydia/Edge, Kain/Edge, Rydia/Kain/Edge, all happily existing in the same place and on the same plane. STOP YOUR LAUGHING. STOP IT RIGHT NOW

Gundam Wing is pretty self-explanatory: G-Team of boys who end up paired off in all kinds of combinations at different parts of the story, with unique interactions to build on, that eventually learn to fight together: right up my gay, gay, alley. (DON'T TALK ABOUT MY GAY ALLEY LIKE THAT)

FFVIII is really just an omniship. Give me any pairing or threesome in FFVIII and I will make it work with canon justification: plain. as. that. Bam. Anyone, everyone. Anything, everything. It's a bag of marbles and I can just pick two or three and instantly see how they fit.

FFXII is kind of like FFIV, where it isn't a natural gangpile like CM or VIII, but where I see links of interacting, inter-tangled relationships across the board.

Weirdly, other fandoms aren't like that: FFVI, FFX, FFVII. I'm open to all ships but don't see the communal relationship thing quite as strongly.

Having identified this as something I am strongly, fiercely drawn to makes my original-fic concept (A MAGICAL GIRL PILOT, A LESBIAN WEREWOLF, AND A TRANS VAMPIRE EXPLORE SPACE WHILE MAKING OUT) make weird amounts of sense now.

Anyone have canons like this? Other omniships? Thoughts?

/back to the couch

Comments

[sathari]

OMNISHIPS 5EVAH OKAY?!!?!??!?!?!??!??!

Oh, man, just yeah.

FFXII: I ship... wow, large entanglements. Like, "Ashe/every main male character except Vaan and some of the boys also get it on with each other at the same time"? (Seriously, Ashe with a male harem that includes some, any, or all of Basch, Balthier, Vossler, and Vayne is pretty much my default in this fandom. Not least because Getting There Is Half The Fun, i.e. working out how people who have a lot of reason to hate each other's guts can have sexyfuntiems.) And then also "Penelo/both Solidor brothers" and "Penelo/Larsa/Vaan yes in that order". (Poor Fran is getting left out but she seems to like it that way, as in sitting back and snerking about the short-lived humes and their hot blood.)

FFVII: Okay, point the first, I will 5EVAH ship "Tifa/Sephiroth and she holds his leash and he loves it that way" and then basically I can dump anyone else who works for Shinra into that bed in some way in a variety of configurations. (I think the endgame pairings for the first fic I ever thought up in FFVII were "Tifa/Sephiroth with Zack/Aerith intersecting, Elena/Tseng, Tseng/Rufus, Rufus/Yuffie/Cloud, and everyone knows and is happy about it".) But basically you can dump all the Shinra-affiliated characters in bed with each other and with Tifa for all of me. Although FIGHT ME! on how much better that game would have been without Cloud at all and with Tifa as the protag instead (because OMG a woman whose revenge story is not "rape-and" and is also not about a dead child! She just wants to avenge her town and her father like IDEK EVERY DUDELY PROTAG EVER.) (I also want Penelo to be the MC/VP character for FFXII, that's just how I roll.)

FFIV: I am with you as far as any and all permutations and combinations of Cecil/Kain/Rosa. I cannot work myself up to the Edge-and-Rydia parts. And also post-TAY-era Kain/Porom, I have FEELS about their ~bittersweet bonding~.

And those are just my Final Fantasy polyshipping feels. (Also Dissidia means never having to say you're sorry about crossover-crack-poly-ships, IMO. As in, the number of times I've made up my Five-Man-Bands for that game based on "what would the fucktagon look like?" is to LOL.) AHAHAHAHAHHA.

[thenicochan]

Dissidia is pretty much EVERYTHING X EVERYONE FOREVER.

(with special consideration for 5/8/9)

[sathari]

Yes, Dissidia is just one giant excuse to dump any characters from anywhere in the franchise into bed with each other. sometimes with added innuendo from their battle quotes. (Seriously, Chaos/Sephiroth? PRACTICALLY IN THE GAME.) Though I will always have a soft spot for the idea of an AU in which it's Sephiroth and not Vaan who overhears Kefka torturing Terra, and let's just say Seph gets some of his memories of Hojo back in a serious hurry and then Seph/Terra as fellow tortured experimental supersoldiers happens. (Also, Final Fantasy Record Keeper with its *ahem* ever-expanding cast begs for this effect--- I am just keeping my fingers crossed that they get round to some of my baby darlings who have never been playable, like the brothers Solidor, sometime in the next few years.)

[thenicochan]

Dude, I love what Dissidia did (and it’s like one of my favorite games ever). The idea that other FF characters could have existed in previous cycles is really appealing as well (and I have a few fic plot bunnies related to that- hilarious since I haven’t ficced in years- but I really want to detail Gabranth’s fall into a disgraced Warrior of Chaos who tried to protect Larsa, a Warrior of Cosmos, but couldn’t tell why and FAILURE AND ANGST AND MY WEIRD AGE-DIFFERENCE SHIP IS WEIRD BUT I LOVE IT)

Seph/Terra as fellow tortured experimental supersoldiers happens

…I never wanted this. I would say I never would ever want this. But I want this. This is…this is awesome. Someone write this. Stat.

Final Fantasy Record Keeper
I’ve never actually played this. Is it awesome? The chance of using all these awesome characters together excites me a lot, but I just don’t trust IOS games haha.

(Also, you seem pretty ballin, and I need more FF fans. Friends?)

[sathari]

...okay, Gabranth protecting Larsa. BECAUSE REASONS ONLY ACTUAL REASONS. Hi, awesomeness. (And, okay, I digress, but I am bitter 5ever that the only FFXII I get to play with in Dissidia are fucking Vaan about whom I am NOPE FOREVER and Gabranth who is cool, but, um, that game has BALTHIER. And ASHE. And BOTH SOLIDOR BROTHERS. And PENELO. And BASCH. And basically, hi, I like everyone in the game better than the two characters they chose to represent it in Dissidia, in fact I almost didn't bother with FFXII based on playing Dissidia first, and I will forever love and honor the Let's-Play'ers who converted me to FFXII because possibly favorite game.

Seph/Terra as fellow tortured experimental supersoldiers happens

…I never wanted this. I would say I never would ever want this. But I want this. This is…this is awesome. Someone write this. Stat.

...okay. I might have a first draft of something like that somewhere on my hard drive, but I wrote it several years ago, before playing either FFVII or FFVI (my fannish asynchrony, let me show you it), haven't touched it since, and if it's as bad as I remember, I now really need to go back and unfuck everyone's characterizations, STAT. Clearly I know what I am doing with my spare time for the next several days.

FFRK is AWESOME. HARDCORE AWESOME. The only thing Dissidia beats it on is... well, cool graphics, but more to the point cool character quotes and cutscenes. The gameplay is glorious old-school and... okay, I lied about my spare time above, I actually meant "my spare time between stamina recharges in FFRK" because, um, that game owns me.

And you seem pretty awesome too, and ditto on needing more FF fan pals in my life! Friends indeed!)

[thenicochan]

Y’know, I actually really love Gabranth. He’s one of my favorites. I pretty much dig every single possible interpretation of his relationship with Larsa and Basch and it just yes please (I am being especially eloquent today, y’feel?)

In my Dissidia- maybe one day fic- headcanon, Gabranth encountered Larsa on the opposite side and remembered ‘something’ regarding him. His discordant understanding of his own feelings would be even further twisted without his memories for context, and thus he thought Larsa may have been an enemy, and thus broke off from the other Chaos Warriors in the hope of slaying Larsa and learning more about himself. He encounters Larsa, who has a better recollection of his original life, and Larsa’s kindness catches him off guard. STUFF AND THINGS including the Emperor trying to take advantage of the situation to kill Larsa without WoC Vayne finding out and Gabranth sort-of defecting to help Larsa but failing and Larsa’s “death” leads to Gabranth completely giving up and being a victim of the cycles and THINGS AND YEAH imma stop now

[sathari]

I actually don't dislike Gabranth! It's just that he has REALLY stiff competition for favorite-character status in FFXII for me. In another game, he might be a favorite, but if I have to choose between him and the others I mentioned... yeah.

...OH GOD I LOVE THAT HEADCANON. Except that, being, you know, ME, as in, that person who BROKE THE CHARACTER LIMIT commenting to you about my Vayne-feels earlier, I am immediately jumping all over the "Vayne and Larsa in Dissidia part." Because STUFF AND THINGS about the Emperor targeting Larsa and how Vayne would react to that? HI I AM HERE WITH THIS *CHINHANDS FOREVER*. But, yeah, that is an AWESOME headcanon/plotbunny. And some AWESOME Gabranth angst. (Also, my new headcanon for why Vayne and Larsa did not return? BECAUSE VAYNE THREATENED THE SHIT OUT OF CHAOS AND COSMOS IF THEY LAID HANDS ON HIS PRECIOUS BROTHER EVER AGAIN. Like, seriously, he would rip the fabric of the space-time continuum to come fuck their shit up if they took Larsa again. And HE MEANT IT. And they knew it. So poor gabranth gets to bear the brunt of Vayne's fraternally-overprotective machinations and violence once again! YEOUCH.)

[thenicochan]

...OH GOD I LOVE THAT HEADCANON.

I kind of wanna write this now. While Gabranth is basically going against all protocall to hunt down Larsa, Vayne- who seems to only remembers bits and pieces of things- is being manipulated by the Emperor to enable Gabranth in killing Larsa and stealing his crystal (I have the headcanon that every warrior in the Dissidia realm has a “crystal”- a fragment of their soul- that empowers them and their patron god. I have no idea if this totally flies in the face of lore though) and so once Gabranth defects and swears to protect Larsa with a vengence- he ends up thinking Vayne is their enemy.

Larsa is killed despite Gabranth’s intentions, and Gabranth follows shortly after once he’s given in to despair.

New cycle. Larsa does not seem to have retained his memories, but Gabranth vows to protect him. Vayne’s huge plot ends up blowing up in the Emperor’s face when Vayne reveals he retained enough of his memories to remember who Larsa is, and Vayne is able to- along with Gabranth- vanquish the Emperor in that cycle. The stuff, things, and somehow Larsa finds his crystal. Upon Larsa’s death, Vayne takes the crystal and swears to find a way out of the loop. He offers Gabranth to accompany him, but Gabranth- the fatalist that he is- feels that his failure to save Larsa twice makes him unworthy of returning home. Vayne departs.

The Cycle resets. Gabranth finds the voids of the chaos realm where he becomes trapped and forgotten. Vayne and Larsa do not return with the renewed cycle. ANGST INCARNATE

[sathari]

...man, we have jacked this thread so hard, lol. Sorry, Sev!

And now I want this fic. Mostly because I just want to think about the Brothers Solidor in Dissidia (why oh why did this not happen, I want it like burning!) but just YEAH.

[seventhe]

NEVER APOLOGIZE FOR AWESOMENESS

[sathari]

:D :D :D :D Seriously, this post you made is such fertile soil, it's like an awesomeness-garden. Because Final Fantasy OMNISHIPS. (Actually, omniships in everything ever, really, lol.)

[seventhe]

I haven't been able to keep up with it but I LOVE EVERY IDEA PLEASE DO AND THEN LINK ME