assorted Kanes
Jul. 20th, 2016 12:07 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
beccaelizabethI've had a series of dreams lately about Lindsey McDonald and Eliot Spencer.
Because my subconscious is well trained.
But they turn into weird little meditations on the nature of identity and attraction, which isn't exactly where I was hoping they'd go.
Like, I was friends with Eliot, but one day he changed his clothes and how he walked and presented himself and suddenly he was Lindsey. And it was the most disconcerting thing. I mean, way more than generic cover identity for a con. It wasn't just that he wasn't him, it was that he was a complete someone else, someone I knew already. And I was like, wait, what, are you? And he was, yep. And it felt like going downstairs and missing a step. They are him, and the nature of reality is not as it was.
And this is weird because sometimes I have vague thoughts about how Lindsey would probably much rather be Eliot, by the end of Angel, and Lindsey lives in a world where cut and pasting lives is entirely possible. So it's just a question of if he'd sell his soul again to get it done. Perfectly logical. Kind of a happy ending, comparatively speaking.
And yet, the thing of knowing both of them yet not knowing there's only one of them?
Whoosh, falling feeling, much disconcerting.
Like you have to recalculate absolutely everything.
*blinks a lot and stares into the distance*
Okay, but, then there was the logical next bit: What if Eliot was Lindsey, but, like Connor, had no clue? What if L had sold or traded or bargained and got another chance as El, but the retcon worked even on him?
There'd be a weakness in the spell, like Connor, so you could break it and get... what exactly?
Because you wouldn't get Lindsey back, not exactly, not with years of growth on an entirely different set of experiences involved. But you'd probably lose Eliot. Kind of. Sort of.
I mean, worst case, they hate each other, and it's a total Banner-Hulk experience, and they have to sort out a timeshare but Eliot would just hate-hate-hate Lindsey... except actually arguably so did L by the end, so, possibly no fighting about it?
But the thing where you end up with one person who is neither of the before people is also worst case.
Except we're never the people we were ten years ago.
But the retcon makes it a jarring discontinuity. But is there, like, karmic equivalence? Like they're both killers, just one did it so he could see it, not with signatures. So they'd understand each other, just via the parts of them they least like. And Eliot learning they're signed up to go to hell would, I feel, not surprise him in the slightest. But it would be unfair.
So then I just kept spinning my wheels over the ways they are-and-aren't the same, and what would happen if all those memories were in one head, without the actual Christian Kane acting wrapper obviously.
But then, what would be important enough to need to go get Lindsey, if he was someone else already?
Which is actually an ethics question that comes up with resurrection spells if you believe in reincarnation. Like, that soul was already busy somewhere else, what are you doing going and getting it? Or is the time limit on bringing back that one person in fact because you've got a small window before they become another person? And if they're going to come back to life anyway, why do you need them back in that life?
So what would Lindsey, specifically, be needed for, enough to risk Eliot's whole existence?
Which actually boils down to, what is Eliot willing to die for? And we actually have an extensive list on that one. There's a ton of situations where he'd be willing... if he could be having with whatever he knew of Lindsey. If he thought bringing him back was a risk, then it gets complicated. But Lindsey knows a whole ton more about demons and magic and demonic contract law than Eliot could find out in a hurry elsewise, so, there's plenty of situations you could put the rest of the team in that would need L... but in the hypothetical situation, El wouldn't know it. What would someone else need specifically Lindsey for?
So then I looped through 'secret offspring' and that started me thinking of the two guys as basically twins that didn't know about each other, and that spins the whole ethics question differently, because then it's under what circumstances is it ethical for one twin to risk their life donating organs to save another? Except instead of organ singular it's, you know, all of them. Potentially.
But also, if they're genetically identical, and a test could prove the kid was a close relative, there's nothing El wouldn't do for that kid. Even without L's memories.
Buuuuut, answering my criteria, Wolfram and Hart were big on selling them your firstborn. And Lindsey skipped out on his contract, possibly by the devious means of becoming someone else entirely, who the contract couldn't bind. So maybe this secret firstborn is about to be claimed by evil lawyers, and only Lindsey would know the details of the contract, or be able to fill the criteria to get the kid out of it.
And that answers Eliot's half too, because there's a kid in danger, so of course he'd willingly risk his life.
But team Leverage would approach the situation completely differently than Lindsey would have. I mean just for starters they're a team, a real one, who value each other, and will not shoot each other even when they get the job done. Lindsey has not had one of those before. At all. So he'd have a wider skill set and people he could absolutely rely on. But they'd want their Eliot, not the 'new' guy.
And now I kind of want to write this story, where Lindsey gets called back in Eliot's body to rescue his secret probably teenage by now offspring from the clutches of Wolfram and Hart. That could go through so many excellent twists.
But my dreams were less excellent and mostly kind of puzzled and thwarted?
Because the last one was like, okay, so, L or El is in love with you, excellent, and now you're sharing your interests and what you do to relax... aaaaand they're just, like, not? it? Like, they're very nearly the things I like, but just sideways of them. If they were completely not my thing it would be simples, parallel, he'd do his hobbies and watch his films and I'd read my books and wait for my turn with the TV. And if we liked exactly the same things then big win. But instead it was like the uncanny valley of shared interests. Things that I know well enough to know why I don't quite like them, or things I liked when I was younger that I grew away from and now make me feel kind of squirmy embarrassed, or things where I haven't watched them yet but I just don't get why he is.
So then that was a whole heaping dose of 'do I really like this person or just the outsides with what I was making up and projecting on them'. And, duh, they're characters I write from very cherrypicked canon, I am clearly making up the guy I like. But if the canon guy was exactly the same and he just like, say, Sailor Moon, would he still be the guy I thought I liked?
So that was weirdly uncomfortable and full of self examination.
And probably the short explanation of why I've never got around to dating. Like, nobody agrees with me perfectly enough. But I don't want to be that person, that person sounds ridiculous.
So.
Lots of dreams of my current favourite pretty, and yet, the upshot is feeling philosophical and kind of foolish.
*sigh*
Because my subconscious is well trained.
But they turn into weird little meditations on the nature of identity and attraction, which isn't exactly where I was hoping they'd go.
Like, I was friends with Eliot, but one day he changed his clothes and how he walked and presented himself and suddenly he was Lindsey. And it was the most disconcerting thing. I mean, way more than generic cover identity for a con. It wasn't just that he wasn't him, it was that he was a complete someone else, someone I knew already. And I was like, wait, what, are you? And he was, yep. And it felt like going downstairs and missing a step. They are him, and the nature of reality is not as it was.
And this is weird because sometimes I have vague thoughts about how Lindsey would probably much rather be Eliot, by the end of Angel, and Lindsey lives in a world where cut and pasting lives is entirely possible. So it's just a question of if he'd sell his soul again to get it done. Perfectly logical. Kind of a happy ending, comparatively speaking.
And yet, the thing of knowing both of them yet not knowing there's only one of them?
Whoosh, falling feeling, much disconcerting.
Like you have to recalculate absolutely everything.
*blinks a lot and stares into the distance*
Okay, but, then there was the logical next bit: What if Eliot was Lindsey, but, like Connor, had no clue? What if L had sold or traded or bargained and got another chance as El, but the retcon worked even on him?
There'd be a weakness in the spell, like Connor, so you could break it and get... what exactly?
Because you wouldn't get Lindsey back, not exactly, not with years of growth on an entirely different set of experiences involved. But you'd probably lose Eliot. Kind of. Sort of.
I mean, worst case, they hate each other, and it's a total Banner-Hulk experience, and they have to sort out a timeshare but Eliot would just hate-hate-hate Lindsey... except actually arguably so did L by the end, so, possibly no fighting about it?
But the thing where you end up with one person who is neither of the before people is also worst case.
Except we're never the people we were ten years ago.
But the retcon makes it a jarring discontinuity. But is there, like, karmic equivalence? Like they're both killers, just one did it so he could see it, not with signatures. So they'd understand each other, just via the parts of them they least like. And Eliot learning they're signed up to go to hell would, I feel, not surprise him in the slightest. But it would be unfair.
So then I just kept spinning my wheels over the ways they are-and-aren't the same, and what would happen if all those memories were in one head, without the actual Christian Kane acting wrapper obviously.
But then, what would be important enough to need to go get Lindsey, if he was someone else already?
Which is actually an ethics question that comes up with resurrection spells if you believe in reincarnation. Like, that soul was already busy somewhere else, what are you doing going and getting it? Or is the time limit on bringing back that one person in fact because you've got a small window before they become another person? And if they're going to come back to life anyway, why do you need them back in that life?
So what would Lindsey, specifically, be needed for, enough to risk Eliot's whole existence?
Which actually boils down to, what is Eliot willing to die for? And we actually have an extensive list on that one. There's a ton of situations where he'd be willing... if he could be having with whatever he knew of Lindsey. If he thought bringing him back was a risk, then it gets complicated. But Lindsey knows a whole ton more about demons and magic and demonic contract law than Eliot could find out in a hurry elsewise, so, there's plenty of situations you could put the rest of the team in that would need L... but in the hypothetical situation, El wouldn't know it. What would someone else need specifically Lindsey for?
So then I looped through 'secret offspring' and that started me thinking of the two guys as basically twins that didn't know about each other, and that spins the whole ethics question differently, because then it's under what circumstances is it ethical for one twin to risk their life donating organs to save another? Except instead of organ singular it's, you know, all of them. Potentially.
But also, if they're genetically identical, and a test could prove the kid was a close relative, there's nothing El wouldn't do for that kid. Even without L's memories.
Buuuuut, answering my criteria, Wolfram and Hart were big on selling them your firstborn. And Lindsey skipped out on his contract, possibly by the devious means of becoming someone else entirely, who the contract couldn't bind. So maybe this secret firstborn is about to be claimed by evil lawyers, and only Lindsey would know the details of the contract, or be able to fill the criteria to get the kid out of it.
And that answers Eliot's half too, because there's a kid in danger, so of course he'd willingly risk his life.
But team Leverage would approach the situation completely differently than Lindsey would have. I mean just for starters they're a team, a real one, who value each other, and will not shoot each other even when they get the job done. Lindsey has not had one of those before. At all. So he'd have a wider skill set and people he could absolutely rely on. But they'd want their Eliot, not the 'new' guy.
And now I kind of want to write this story, where Lindsey gets called back in Eliot's body to rescue his secret probably teenage by now offspring from the clutches of Wolfram and Hart. That could go through so many excellent twists.
But my dreams were less excellent and mostly kind of puzzled and thwarted?
Because the last one was like, okay, so, L or El is in love with you, excellent, and now you're sharing your interests and what you do to relax... aaaaand they're just, like, not? it? Like, they're very nearly the things I like, but just sideways of them. If they were completely not my thing it would be simples, parallel, he'd do his hobbies and watch his films and I'd read my books and wait for my turn with the TV. And if we liked exactly the same things then big win. But instead it was like the uncanny valley of shared interests. Things that I know well enough to know why I don't quite like them, or things I liked when I was younger that I grew away from and now make me feel kind of squirmy embarrassed, or things where I haven't watched them yet but I just don't get why he is.
So then that was a whole heaping dose of 'do I really like this person or just the outsides with what I was making up and projecting on them'. And, duh, they're characters I write from very cherrypicked canon, I am clearly making up the guy I like. But if the canon guy was exactly the same and he just like, say, Sailor Moon, would he still be the guy I thought I liked?
So that was weirdly uncomfortable and full of self examination.
And probably the short explanation of why I've never got around to dating. Like, nobody agrees with me perfectly enough. But I don't want to be that person, that person sounds ridiculous.
So.
Lots of dreams of my current favourite pretty, and yet, the upshot is feeling philosophical and kind of foolish.
*sigh*