Poe praising, befriending, trusting, humanizing, accepting, embracing, complementing, and encouraging a former child soldier whom he could have easily seen as nothing more than an enemy.
I love how Thor learns to interact by watching and listening. Look at that last gif. She is showing acceptance and appreciation to him by touching his arm, so he reciprocates! Because he appreciates her too.
john loves the stars, that much is true, clear, undeniable.
but how could anyone think that they were what he loved above all else?
how could he possibly love them more than the earth?
his love for the earth is what keeps him out there, up where the stars are. the stars are bright, faraway, incredible, but they’re nothing on earth.
earth is beautiful.
below him, it is blue and green, swirled in white with edges aglow and a thousand points of light within to make it shine.
and heaven knows that john has seen the worst of what he world has to offer from up there. there are guns and scorched ground where wars had touched the earth and made it rough, years before he had even come into being.
“but the world is not a cruel place.” his parents tell him, when he’s still little in their arms, and his mother’s voice is something lovely and distant. “i know that it seems that way, and that there is horror and sadness and crime unforgivable, but the earth is kind. it sends rain to wash away the blood and burning – when the skies cry it is all for you. it turns things green and growing up from the earth no matter how much is stripped away. it is always trying to grow to keep you alive.”
she brushes the hair from his forehead as he stares up at the stars in his father’s eyes.
i want to protect the earth, john thinks, in his little brain and his little heart it is already coming together.
when he grows up, the stars are waiting for him. he waves hello – yes, they are even more beautiful from up here.
and so is the earth, his true love, his home and the home of all he loves. the earth is the smiles of his brothers, the strength of his mother and father and everyone else who’s got him this far.
he will watch over the earth, as it had watched over him.
