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Blorboposting 6.2.
Monday, 6 February 2023 07:51Frustrated by how the TaiLanz I keep seeing gives them the dynamic Taion has with Eunie, and the TaiEunie I see gives him the dynamic he has with Lanz.
Like, Taion is not mean. Yes, he's a petty bitch, but that's far more of a question of affect than attitude. He's got a soft heart, and ultimately he gets nothing out of behaving in ways that are injurious to other people. Lanz is the same way. These are the grounds on which they concur, they're both deeply empathetic and very bad at expressing their sincere feelings. They're both also quite sensitive to being condescended to, and would struggle to not accidentally come across as dismissive of each other's feelings. They'd struggle with feeling like the other has every reason to dislike them, actually, that the affection between them isn't mutual.
Lanz' feelings for Taion would also strongly filter through his relationship with Noah, rather than Eunie. He would never be quite sure how hard he can go on Taion, the way he is with his own team, where he can be sure that him calling them fucking idiots to their face will always be understood as a sincere form of affection. I don't think Lanz could bring himself to talk to Taion any more harshly than he does to Noah, he'd get that urge to remind him that he loves him, for all he is a pain in the arse.
Taion and Eunie, however, absolutely treat being able to call each other a bitch to their face as a love language. Their relationship is one of mutual one-upmanship, keeping each other on their toes, mentally stress-testing and poking at each other to keep the other from slacking off. Either one of them can do what the other does, and both of them do it better when they have the other at their side, and they know that, and appreciate that -- but also someone being good like they are is also fucking frustrating and so they gotta grumble and bicker to relieve that tension occasionally. They can't be sincere with each other all the time, that's conceding ground. They need the other by their side, they need to remain equals.
Which isn't to say they can't go too far with each other, they absolutely can, a big part of the two of them learning to talk to each other is figuring out where the hard limits are for both of them, when undercutting each other is unproductive and cruel, but outside of that, outside of the edge cases, the two of them rely on the other to be a devil's advocate, to provide the work-hardening stress. Both of them are in on it. They're on the same page about how they're gonna live and die by the bit.
