True Story:
Around the dawn of time (read: two months ago.
Now Read:
this original response was written in 2008), I got an e-mail from
someone saying that I needed to settle a betfor her. She and her
friends had bet money on whether SWAN/ISH!Johnny had pierced ears. I
told her he did. She then owed everyone 30 dollars and had to get her
ears pierced.
She's
sent me another e-mail since then with a reference to the ongoing
debates she has with the now slightly richer friends about who 'tops'
in the SWAN-verse set up. I haven't answered that one, though it's not
for lack of an answer - quite the opposite, really. I've got this
relationship dynamic down so hard that I think maybe my blabbing about
it to her would have either been tl;dr or TMI. God, that sounds weird.
Pretend it didn't. So basically, what I've got here is some random
facts so you don't have to give your friends money and get holes in
your head over my little blip on the internet. You never know. A better
description is '
things that aren't neccesary to move the story along, but things I have thought about anyway.'
Basically, when am I ever going to find a relevant spot to put 'Jimmy
has this many earrings! This many in each ear!'? Yeah, no where but
here. Obviously, this stuff is the SWAN/ISH-verse, though a lot of it
is closely based around canon information. Still, don't take this to be
anything but an expansion on the verse as it be in fic-land.
(This
was written before Banshee was any large component of this, and so her
info has been added in some italics where it's relevant.) ****
Ear Piercing: Everyone in the Homicides actually has at least one.
Jimmy with several lobe and cartilage piercings in each ear has the most, with everyone else tailing behind him somewhere.
(Banshee
has the second most under Jimmy, I imagine she has at least six in each
ear, and an uneven amount. So maybe it's 13, haha.)Edgar
has the side cartilage of one ear pierced, but doesn't actually have
any holes in the lobes. I decided this well after the spot in the
timeline where it would have happened, so it was never written, but
Johnny did it for him. There was some stolen peroxide and rubbing
alcohol poured on in copious amounts later, after the thing got
infected. The tiny witten snippet of this is posted on the ISH
Dreamtime page.
Tenna has two or three. She often forgets to put things in the holes.
Devi has several that she just leaves things in, except for the ones in her lobes, which do occasionally get changed.
Johnny has the lobes
at least, and perhaps another on some cartilage. He rearly wears
anything in them, though. He does most of everyone else's piercings for
some reason, but has few himself since he doesn't really even trust
Devi not to stab him when he's not ready and such. She did the holes he
does have, though. I draw these with varying levels of accuracy or
laziness.
I
used to know someone who very often just pierced the hell out of the
Homicides when she drew them, which looked great when she did it. When
I do it, Edgar looks just sort of gay. Which would normally be fine,
but is not the look I wanted for Edgar. Working on that.
Tess has the standard ear lobes.
Edgar and Johnny Top and Bottom Issues:
For people who were upset that SWAN didn't have much sexin, you may
find some explanations here (beyond my own issues with writing it).
I
have issues with this top/bottom concept, mostly, so I feel bad that
this is what I was asked and my answer has to be, "Not Applicable and
This Concept Is Damaging to Actual Humans.' Slash cliches are really
pretty awful things. Frequently, it's the shorter guy who ends up as
the bottom.
Frequently, it's the more aggressive personality who becomes the top.
Johnny is both of these. The cliche is equally damning to Edgar, just
in the puzzle piece kind of reverse way. So, for those of you who want
to know how I have this thing set up in SWAN, here you go. For those of
you who want to imagine them in bed all the time and acting like
rabbits, then I guess don't read this next bit, though I have to wonder
what fic you've been reading.
Johnny
is the final word on what happens, or if anything happens at all. Like
his prior self, he's not really big on anything sexual, so if things
get into that realm, it's sort of rare thing. He understands how other
people operate and he uses this to his advantage. Most of his reverse
seduction madness from the end-ish of SWAN was flexing how much control
he had over the situation/Edgar. For the most part, Johnny is not
interested in seducing anyone, but he knows it's a skill he can use on
people he wants to see things his way as long as those people are
particularly fond of him.
This is pretty horrible of him, actually, but we've not really come to
expect better.
Johnny's ego and vision of himself prevents any interest on
his part in thrusting away at anything, so his position when things get
that far tends to be something like being in control from the bottom.
He's still largely in charge of the whole affair (almost because he's
the one getting the least enjoyment out of it). Most people see the
bottom position as the more humiliating or 'feminizing' of the options,
but Johnny doesn't see it like that. He struggles with the feelings of
objectifying people through the entire act, but that is present
regardless of the position imagined or taken. I have reasons for this
too, but I wonder if that is getting way too far in. In Johnny's eyes,
thrusting wildly at someone is showing you need something animalistic
more than letting it happen to you, so while neither position is
particularly enviable in his eyes, he has a place he'd rather be to
feel less horrible afterwards.
Anyway, this, coupled with a
pretty well non-existent sex drive means that he doesn't respond to
advances or initiate anything terribly often. Maybe the times he does
let something happen he just feels bad for Edgar.
Edgar is pretty okay with things the way they are. Johnny isn't really
cruel to him or holding some kind of sex carrot out on a string over
his head or anything. There's understanding there of it being low low
low on Johnny's priority list and that forcing it would be rather
detrimental.
That
all said, with my repeating 'this doesn't happen often!' over and over,
they are close. There's a sort of intimacy there that's a more
traditional interpretation of the word. They're close, they know a ton
about each other, they spend a lot of time together, and they're
comfortable with the levels of close that they have. It's more the
little 'intimacies' of the whole thing that keep them close rather than
loads of sexin' even though that can happen too.
Heights, Ages, Names, and Preferences: As mentioned
in ISH, Johnny is the youngest of the original group, and shorter than
Edgar and Jimmy. He's younger probably by a year and a half at the
most, so it's not alarmingly different.
The crew started SWAN
1 as sophomores in highschool, so around 16 for the mess of them.
Johnny may have been just on the border of 15/16, depending on the time
of year. (I still have only given Edgar a birthdate. I've debated
giving Johnny Jhonen's birthday, but, weirdly enough, Jhonen and I
share a birthdate, so I'm not sure how that would be taken.)
Oldest to youngest:
Devi
Edgar
Tenna
Jimmy
Johnny
(
Banshee)
Tallest to shortest:
Jimmy Edgar
Devi and Johnny (
and Banshee at final height)
Tenna
-It is suspected that Tenna slouches. Even as the shortest, it's only by a couple inches.
-Devi and Johnny have never had shaved heads at the same time, so no
one has ever been quite sure how to guess under their combined hair
disasters, but they're about the same height.
-Tess is somewhere around Edgar or
Tenna's age, and near Tenna's height. No one has seen them close enough
to compare.
Last Names:
Edgar's last name has been pretty much abandoned by the end of SWAN.
The others of the group don't have whole last names, so if Edgar is
just Edgar V he fits in considerably better with the comic-given Johnny
C and Devi D. I give Tenna a G (it stands for Gordon or George in my
head. Yeah, I don't know.), and Jimmy a D (for reasons). Because they
have to rhyme, guys! Tess was destined to be odd man out with her R,
apparently.
(Banshee uses Edgar's V.)Percieved Orientations:
The group as a whole has a weird kind of view of the whole sexuality
thing. Since they were really the only options for each other, they've
all got a sort of bisexuality going, but usually just for each other.
Jimmy'll sleep with
just about anyone in a certain physical description, but given a
strange woman and a strange man who want him, he'll usually take the
girl. He'd happily sleep with anyone who was a close enough friend,
though, male or female.
Pretty much any member of the original cast is fair game to him as far
as sexual attraction. Of course, Johnny is what he really devotes his
attention to, but most of the people he sleeps with after shows are
women.
Edgar
is in a unique situation that pretty much means that Johnny is the only
person who is of interest to him, though he appreciates Devi and Jimmy.
It's a different kind of appreciation than he has for Johnny, but he
does tell Devi that it could be her if it wasn't Johnny, and my beta
and I carry a secret torch for Edgar/Jimmy (and Edgar/Johnny/Jimmy as
the Extras page will attest).
Devi
sits on the borderline, but mostly in straight land. She's more
interested in men than women, but she contemplates her is-it/is-it-not
relationship with Tenna pretty often.
Since she's sitting in a world where her options for men seem to be
Edgar, Johnny and Jimmy (also Dib?), she isn't super optimistic about
her future with a man. She finds Johnny attractive, and she eventually
warms up to Edgar once he becomes a little less bland. Tenna will tell
her that Jimmy is objectively just as attractive, but Devi can't get
over his personality enough to be attracted to him.
Tenna
likes people in general and thinks all her friends are adorable in
their own way, but actually has lots of other things she prefers to do
than have sex. She does have a stronger tie to Devi than anyone else,
though if she was making a list, Edgar would be next in line.
Johnny
is not sexually attracted to many, if any, people just on a whim. There
needs to be something about a person that’s special or interesting to
him to get his attention, and even then, the attraction is not sexual.
Sex is something he has done, something he sometimes does, but not
high on his list of drives. He finds Devi attractive from the
beginning, and Jimmy manages to pass into 'not hideously deformed and
intolerable' by the time ISH starts.
Tess
is almost entirely straight. She is mostly interested in Edgar, but
can sort of see the appeal of Jimmy too. She's looking to avoid anyone
who could be construed as an asshole, though, so with Edgar taken...
Yeah.
(Banshee doesn't know.)