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littlenightmares2 · 2 months

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continually pointing towards the harm that six and mono inflict upon the monsters within the little nightmares universe as evidence of their moral ambiguity (or lack thereof) is an inherently flawed manner of exploring their characters and values.

killing the monsters is a means of survival. neither of them actively seek out confrontation- each one of the entities relentlessly pursue the children with the intention of harming them in some way or another. the brutality of how the children manage to dispatch the monsters doesn’t matter either.

slicing off the janitor’s arms or lighting the doctor on fire are not actions that can (or should) have morality attached to them. every interaction six and mono have with the cast of antagonists is a largely cut and dry case of ‘kill or be killed.’

we know that everything in the nowhere exists with a purpose. there is a distinct emphasis placed upon this by people who have worked on the game. (for example, “the maw exists because hunger exists, and the pale city exists because the need for escapism exists.”) each monster plays some kind of role within the maw or pale city that is critical to perpetuating the cycle that the realm encapsulates. beyond this, they are harmful, unreasonable and actively malicious. their lack of humanity and inability to be appealed to is something else the developers have confirmed.

the only way to judge six and mono as characters with any degree of fairness is by examining the interactions they have with other unfortunate children. even this perspective has to be heavily scrutinised and take into account the abnormality of their circumstances. we have to continuously reframe the picture to ensure we are empathising with the fact that their circumstances will cause their emotional reactions to be distorted by trauma.

mono met one other child during his journey- six. he reached out his hand from the very moment they first met. over and over again, he extended kindness, compassion, a gentle disposition, active concern for her, and active desire for her company.

six met mono before she set foot on the maw. from the jump, her reaction to mono’s presence appears to be one of apprehension to say the very least. she turns away from his attempt to reach out and runs ahead. while understandable, this is already very telling of the differences in their characters. trusting and open, distrustful and avoidant.

over the course of the story, we see glimpses of compassion and a desire for company begin to manifest in six too.

she opens up to the idea of working together upon realising there are things she can’t do alone. she is the one to initiate handholding when the two of them are creeping through the tall grass around the hunter. she gestures to mono to be quiet and crouch down when they’re first sneaking past him.

when mono saves her from the bullies, he approaches her. it seems he wished to help her up, or offer some kind of comfort or reassurance. six almost seems to turn away from the offer and rebuff it somewhat. again, she isn’t being faulted for this at all- she has just been through trauma. but to me, it suggests that at this point in the story, mono is still being kept at an arms’ length.

one of the most notable shifts for her character is when the thin man breaks free from the screen. mono is pressing himself against the television, and she is lingering for him in a way she never had before, to the degree that it actively endangers her to do so. she stays beside him, she reaches out to him, she desperately urges him to follow her in fleeing- and she only begins to run away at all once the danger is no longer escapable if she remains.

then, of course, we have everything that transpires with monster six, which i believe undoes all the work she has done emotionally that allowed her to trust and care for mono as closely we she did. no matter your interpretation of why she did it, what she did to mono remains the same. she knowingly and deliberately dropped him to his death, and she did not look back. nothing implies remorse in that specific moment.

when we next see her, after the events of the pale city, she is in the maw. six has no interest in helping other children. she pulls on cages with other prisoners inside to climb and access higher places. (i’m not going to confuse outright inaction with six’s purposeful choices, because we don’t know her thought process, so i won’t get into the logistics of her not waking the children in roger’s room or helping children seen caged around the maw). she can hug the nomes if we so choose, but embracing every one of them results in an achievement that stipulates “kindness will be [her] undoing.” she also ends up sinking her teeth into one to sate her hunger. another necessary act, born of survival, but to a degree it shows an empathetic disconnect for another vulnerable creature all the same.

at her core, six values survivalism, self-sufficiency, independence and pushing through trauma. mono, in direct contrast, appears to engage in a degree of dependency with her, and seeks out companionship and support where his counterpart would just as rather go it alone.

#little nightmares #mono and six #mono ln #six ln #ln2 #ln #lee talks

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regrettablewritings · 4 years

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F,h,k, and m for bhodi please!!

Glad to see the Bodhi fandom is alive and kicking! Stuff’s below the cut

F = Feelings (When did they know they were in love?):

Surprisingly, Bodhi is someone who handles the realization of his feelings the best out of the Rogue One squad (second only to Chirrut). He’s not necessarily emotionally congested like Cassian or Jyn, and he’s most definitely not the type to bombastically deny anything like Baze; he’s actually very self-aware and in tune with his feelings. Because of this, he’s not in denial to himself when he recognizes he has romantic feelings for you. However, it is also because of this that he doesn’t fully buy into the depth at which he feels for you: Bodhi knows he’s a romantic at heart, and it’s caused him some heartbreak in the past with a rejection or two.

It actually doesn’t register to him as a real, genuine form of love until it one day clicks with him just how much of a calming presence you were to have in his life.

He already knew you helped him relax: You could get him to melt like butter with just a hug or a few scritches of your fingers against his scalp. But these were arguably short-term stims; they weren’t unappreciated, he just never thought to look into them as anything particularly beyond what they appeared to be. At first.

There wasn’t anything particularly special about the day that it hit him. There wasn’t even anything mind-blowing about the moment: There had been plenty of days that ended with his head in your lap as you rubbed his scalp soothingly. Yet he still found himself thinking about the day: There had been no immediate errands assigned to either party, so you both were able to take your time with breakfast; he helped you deliver spare parts scavenged from wrecked Imperial TIE-Fighters to the engineering department for their own use; you helped him apply minute repairs to the small ship he’d been assigned; you both sat in on a counsel meeting; and then you managed to convince him to ditch training (“C’mon, they’re just gonna make you run laps on those spindly legs.”).

And you’d been sitting together, under this tree, ever since. He wasn’t sure if it had been an hour or less, but whatever it was just wasn’t enough; he wanted to always be in a feeling like this, with his head on your lap and the warm sun cradling you both in silence. Well, relative silence: The tree you’d sought refuge beneath was just close enough to the base to still be able to hear a bit of the commotion, but neither of you seemed to mind. In fact, if it weren’t for the X-Wings and pods were flying over head, the whirring of droids, and drill instructors shouting orders, one might’ve forgotten that there was a war going on.

. . . Bodhi had forgotten there was a war going on. Well, maybe not completely, but just enough that it didn’t once hit him hard enough to make his stomach clench with fear. His brain hadn’t been invaded by an intrusive thought all day: There was no “What if this doesn’t last?” or “A bomb could drop any moment” or even “Any moment now, somebody is going to come find us and tell me I have a mission to go on.” Even now, he hadn’t once thought about the very real possibility that an instructor would come find him and drag him from the sweet comfort of his significant other’s arms to the brutal reality of training.

Instead, he’d spent the entire day just being present with you. The most of the future he considered was, “I wonder what comes next?”

And if you could make someone like Bodhi think that, then surely you had to be pretty darn special.

H = Hands (How do they like to hold hands?):

As much as he loves your touch, Bodhi isn’t one for public displays of affection. It just doesn’t sit well with him, hence why hand-holding tends to be reserved for when the two of you are alone. If you’re relaxing by one of the designated “Bodhi Relaxation Trees”, there’s a good chance that in some way, your fingers are entwined.

The cute thing about it is that it feels so very schoolboyish: The grip isn’t too tight, and there’s a fluttering sense of nervousness. But not in Bodhi’s usual line of nerves: It’s more akin to that of a little boy finally being able to hold his crush’s hand. Complete with a slight dampness of sweat (but not damningly so)! Nevertheless, it’s part of the methods you can use to calm him. On the rare occasion, however, you can slip a handhold or two in. But usually only due to a very certain criteria: If you’re at a council meeting, and you’re in the very back, and/or Bodhi’s built-in stress-o-meter is rocketing so hard that you can feel it radiating off of him.

In which case, he certainly could benefit from feeling your hand in his, grounding him with every gentle and consoling stroke of your thumb across his knuckles.

K = Kiss (How do they kiss? Who initiated the first kiss?):

Bodhi’s kisses are short and sweet, more like pecks than anything. But that’s not a bad thing: They leave you wanting more!

When it came to the first kiss, you two had to meet halfway. Initially, to your intrigue, it was Bodhi who seemed intent on closing the distance between the both of you as you sat on his cot in his section of the sleeping quarters. As tempting as it was to poke at how he must’ve felt pretty confidence, you were far too pleased with what his body language appeared to be telling you: His lips slightly puckered, eyes nearly closed as if relaxing, breathing quickening --

You nearly pouted when he froze. Dammit, you scowled, where did all that courage go?! Still, you were quite proud of him for even trying to initiate physical contact, especially for such a big first. That was a big deal; it deserved a reward.

Bodhi, on the other hand, wanted to kick himself. He’d been so sure of his confidence -- right up to the last moment, when his stupid anxieties just had to come crawling back into his senses. He began to lean back, trying his best not to visibly pout. But then, maybe this was for the best? What if his lips were too dry? What if the kiss was way too moist? What if he accidentally smacked his forehead against yours, or poked your eye, or clashed your teeth together, or --

He barely had time to process your hands cupping his face before he found himself being pulled back towards you. Toward your lips . . .

He always did work better with your help . . .

M = Memory (What’s their favourite memory together?):

For as little as there generally is to do on Yavin IV, you two still manage to find the means to harvest memories out of: In little walks, in conversations, in sleep-muddled talks about the future. To narrow it down when the two of you had only just begun your story together would be a crying shame. Besides . . . You’re both holding out for a good memory off-planet, out of a war-riddled period. Fingers crossed that it involves a night out on Canto Bight with plenty of hijinks to get in and out of without Bodhi having a panic attack or going crazy at the betting tables.

Thanks for asking! Hope it turned out okay . . .

#bodhi rook #bodhi rook x reader #rogue one x reader #star wars x reader #bodhi rook imagine #bodhi rook imagines #rogue one imagine #rogue one imagines #regrettablewritings #fluff alphabet #*in sing-song voice* guess who wrote while tired but ambitious?#this bich this bich 🎶

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