(no subject)
Dec. 9th, 2018 01:59 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
the_ragnarokthis concept has been conceived by takiki16 and ![[tumblr.com profile]](https://www.tumblr.com/favicon.ico)
bemusedlybespectacled, then i squeed about it a bunch with findundergrounddragoutofwater and, well.
so basically the idea is that in the D/s au there's this division - in the original concept it was only a thing for super rich americans, butfindundergrounddragoutofwater and i expanded it to be a general society thing - where subs are divided to upstairs and downstairs subs.
upstairs subs are pretty. they are decorative and highly mannered and presentable. they are status symbols.
downstairs subs take the heavy punishment and do the heavy labor. they are the ones who get shared with other doms/households. they can serve as whipping boys/girls for upstairs subs.
if going for the wider-society thing, one can postulate subs who are sort of "in between", ones that became more common with the rise of the middle class - stairwell subs, who do white collar jobs.
to get fandom-specific, the original idea contained some nice Leverage headcanons, centralizing on downstairs sub Eliot who has strongly internalized the upstairs/downstairs division - of course he's the one who'll take the punishment, would it be better to let some pretty, delicate upstairs sub take it instead of him? and please let us consider: some upstairs sub catching Eliot's eye before he's about to be punished, the upstairs sub looking concerned if not horrified, and Eliot smiling to set them at ease.
other leverage character headcanons include Hardison who believes all subs should be upstairs subs; Parker who often goes undercover as an upstairs sub, but has a lot of experiences with doms treating her like a downstairs sub; and nonsexual mommy dom Sophie. and stairwell sub Nate.
for POI, there is a plethora of possible readings: John of course sees himself as a downstairs sub in a way very similar to Eliot. Harold can be a dom, or a stairwell sub, or made to be an upstairs sub and going slowly insane with boredom. (He can organize parties and pick nice outfits with the best of them!)
another thought we had was - upstairs subs are not supposed to have sex with anyone but their dom, they don't get shared, but they might have nonsexual romance with other upstairs subs and have that treated as cute and nonthreatening. So upstairs sub harold having courtly love with Grace, the upstairs sub from next door - consider john going on hands and knees so Harold can climb over him and kiss Grace through a window.
takiki16 and so basically the idea is that in the D/s au there's this division - in the original concept it was only a thing for super rich americans, but
upstairs subs are pretty. they are decorative and highly mannered and presentable. they are status symbols.
downstairs subs take the heavy punishment and do the heavy labor. they are the ones who get shared with other doms/households. they can serve as whipping boys/girls for upstairs subs.
if going for the wider-society thing, one can postulate subs who are sort of "in between", ones that became more common with the rise of the middle class - stairwell subs, who do white collar jobs.
to get fandom-specific, the original idea contained some nice Leverage headcanons, centralizing on downstairs sub Eliot who has strongly internalized the upstairs/downstairs division - of course he's the one who'll take the punishment, would it be better to let some pretty, delicate upstairs sub take it instead of him? and please let us consider: some upstairs sub catching Eliot's eye before he's about to be punished, the upstairs sub looking concerned if not horrified, and Eliot smiling to set them at ease.
other leverage character headcanons include Hardison who believes all subs should be upstairs subs; Parker who often goes undercover as an upstairs sub, but has a lot of experiences with doms treating her like a downstairs sub; and nonsexual mommy dom Sophie. and stairwell sub Nate.
for POI, there is a plethora of possible readings: John of course sees himself as a downstairs sub in a way very similar to Eliot. Harold can be a dom, or a stairwell sub, or made to be an upstairs sub and going slowly insane with boredom. (He can organize parties and pick nice outfits with the best of them!)
another thought we had was - upstairs subs are not supposed to have sex with anyone but their dom, they don't get shared, but they might have nonsexual romance with other upstairs subs and have that treated as cute and nonthreatening. So upstairs sub harold having courtly love with Grace, the upstairs sub from next door - consider john going on hands and knees so Harold can climb over him and kiss Grace through a window.
no subject
Date: 2018-12-09 07:01 pm (UTC)If a dom has both an upstairs sub and a downstairs sub with them, frex, it would be socially acceptable for another dom to come up and speak a little bit with the upstairs sub a bit, remark on how cute and pretty they are (always subject to their dom's rules, of course). It would NOT be okay for the other dom to try and touch the upstairs sub (other than little things like chucking them under the chin or kissing their hand), or to play with them or discipline them. Upstairs subs are traditionally Not For Sharing.
Downstairs subs, on the other hand, are traditionally For Sharing, if sharing is happening. Dom A, approaching Dom B who has an upstairs and a downstairs sub with them, would consider it good etiquette not to notice the downstairs sub at all unless its in terms of "bring me another glass," or Dom B saying "you can use their mouth if you want." And then there is my BULLETPROOF kink, which is that downstairs subs are whipping boys for upstairs ones. So if there is any kind of honor code protocol where mistakes are made, and now for some reason I, another dom, get to punish one of your subs, the downstairs one is the one everyone expects to get belted.
(I'm envisioning a lot of historical romances where the villainous dom kidnaps the upstairs sub, and the social taboo being broken is part of the villainy. Also imagining a lot of sub/sub romance stories between upstairs and downstairs, where the whipping boy aspect being over-used by the dom creates a lot of the nobility and the dramatic angst)