Archive of Our Own

A series of meta posts by me, that I've been making notes about since fucking January and am finally finishing now in honor of 'Ohana-thon, the July 2021 Old Guard fandom event celebrating the team as a whole!

First of all, how does NILE relate to Nile?

We see her using exercise and music to cope with her feelings while she's deployed. In her first few days with the team, we see her using deep breathing as well. Throughout, we see her coping with emotionally stressful situations by leaving. She leaves the tent on base, she escapes the truck, she tries to escape the plane, she goes outside after the Quynh explanation, she goes outside after her nightmare in the cave. She leaves the debate over Booker's sentence to go join him on the porch.

She does not, however, run from gunfire, and she adapts very, very quickly to the new knowledge that taking a bullet is often the more strategic option for an immortal. Early in the lab escape, Joe tells the team to cover Andy, and Nile is the first one to interpret that to mean "cover Andy with my body and take a bullet for her."

Nile makes a point to fold her uniform to regulation on the plane. When Andy gives her orders, she either obeys promptly or loudly objects to the content of the order — she doesn't question being given orders generally, or by this person who is very much not in her USMC chain of command.

Her very first thought once she's finally accepted her immortality is for her family worrying about her, followed quickly by "I'm a Marine. They think I went AWOL."

When Nile gives her own name to someone on screen, she gives her first name. Which brings me to...

Part 2: Names

Every time Nile gives her name to someone on screen, she gives her first name. And we see her fluently shift between different ways of identifying herself based on her relationship to whoever she's interacting with.

First, deployment:

Nile, Jay, and Dizzy call each other by their first names in the field. Nile identifies herself by a call sign on the radio moments after taking a kill shot on a human being for the first time, and then moments later calls Jay by name.

Nile: Lima three, this is India five. Contact, over. [She looks up.] Jay, go check on the women.

Nile introduces herself as Nile to the women whose home she is invading.

Nile: As-Salaam-Alaikum. [continues in memorized(?) Pashto] My name is Nile. I am an American Marine.

Nile answers to Freeman and Corporal, which we only hear her referred to as by her COs.

Sergeant: Freeman, where you at?
Nile: Here, Sergeant. [Stands and goes to him, followed by the interpreter.]

Then, immortality:

Andy tells Nile her name in the middle of knocking her unconscious. One (sexy af) plane fight later, we get this:

Andy: [steps forward to stand over Nile.] You're very good. [Nile tries to ignore her, breathing deeply into the pain. Andy squats beside her.] What's your name?
Nile: [pauses a beat, still defiant; her eyes flick sideways to Andy, then away.] Nile.

Andy in turn introduces Nile to Joe, Nicky, and Booker off-screen, presumably with this line cut from the screenplay: "Boys. Meet Nile."

The next person Nile meets is Copley. His first line to Nile is "Who are you?" to which she responds by shooting herself in the foot. His last line to her is "Good luck, Ms. Freeman," which means at some point on the drive from that fancy-ass house of his to downtown London she gave him her full name. Copley is the only character to refer to Nile in this way, a civilian title of formality/respect.

The next and final person to ask Nile who she is: Merrick. The progression of responses to the question "who are you" throughout the movie shows that either Nile's starting to model herself after Andy, or the way Nile and Andy operate in the field is already pretty damn similar. Observe:

Nile: Who are you?
Andy: Andromache the Scythian. [She uses the pistol to club Nile on the side of the neck; Nile drops, unconscious. Andy looks around; they're still unobserved.] But you can call me Andy.

Nile: [stands, panting, regards Andy suspiciously.] Who are you?
Andy: I lead a group of immortals. An army, I guess. Soldiers. Fighters like you. [softer tone.] Look… [Andy steps toward her; Nile steps back.] You've got questions, kid. I get it. [tiny smile, small nod.] You want answers? Get back in the car.

Copley: Who are you?
[Nile takes a breath, firms her mouth, shoots down into her own left foot.]
Nile: Ahh! Son of a bitch!
Copley: [amazed, pointing at her foot.] You're another one.
Nile: Yeah. [breathes deeply] I'm new. [Deep breath, advances on Copley, voice determined.] Where are they?

[Nile proceeds down hallway, pistol extended. Turns a corner, goes through a doorway; Merrick is there. Seems to be some kind of lab – long counters, beakers, jars, and bottles on top, boxes/containers for various items. Nile aims at him.]
Merrick: Who the hell are you?
Nile: Where's the lab?
[Guards burst through door across room, start firing. Nile ducks and fires back, drops labrys as she runs.]
[Nile runs, firing behind her, heading toward metal doors with a 'Restricted Access' sign. Keane runs in, fires, hits her just as she reaches the doors, stumbles through, falls to ground, the doors swing shut behind her.]
Keane: Shit! [together with Merrick.] There's another one!

Next up, "kid" — that shit needs its own post.

Part 3: "Kid"

Stop writing people calling Nile "kid" 2k4ever

Andy calls Nile a baby one time, minutes after first dreaming of her. Andy then calls Nile "kid" three times, all to her face, all in the first few hours of their acquaintance. Booker calls Nile "kid" once, on the porch outside the bar. That's it. The context for these lines is super interesting, and calling Nile "kid" in fic doesn't make any sense without the original context.

When Andy, Joe, Nicky, and Booker wake up from first dreaming of Nile, Joe and Nicky immediately start sharing facts they noticed, and Joe starts sketching. Booker is in his feelings but he contributes a few things to the saying-facts-out-loud rally.

Andy is 100% in her feelings. She starts the conversation with "No, not another one." Then once the boys have gathered a bunch of facts and Booker says "I felt her die" Andy comes in with this:

Andy: [stares at nothing straight ahead, voice is remote, detached.] She's a Marine. [Joe and Nicky look up together.] Combat. Or near combat duty. Afghanistan. [Shakes her head slowly, wearily.] It's been over two hundred years. [Whispers, anguished, buries head in hands.] Why now?

Got it. Joe and Nicky are the competent soldiers, Booker is the semi-competent drunk, Andy is the boss. Andy is the fucking depressed boss. It's in this context that Andy, having analyzed the information her direct reports just gave her, made the determination that Nile is a Marine in Afghanistan, and let her team have a brief back-and-forth about whether to change their plan to go retrieve the new one before announcing the decision that is ultimately hers to make, refers to Nile as a baby.

Andy: Get to France. Use the Charlie safe house. I'll meet you there. [Joe examines his sketch, blows pencil-dust off it. She stares at Booker.] Find Copley. [Joe tears out the page and hands her the sketch. Andy stares at it.] Jesus. She's just a baby.

Andy's metric fuckton of I AM BEYOND DONE just leaps off the page/screen. Keep that existential exhaustion in mind as we see her early interactions with Nile.

Nile: [stands, panting, regards Andy suspiciously.] Who are you?
Andy: I lead a group of immortals. An army, I guess. Soldiers. Fighters like you. [softer tone.] Look… [Andy steps toward her; Nile steps back.] You've got questions, kid. I get it. [tiny smile, small nod.] You want answers? Get back in the car.

Andy: [lightly] And I was the one who cut your throat. Right? [stares at Nile, who stares back, then looks away; she has no answer for that.] Listen, kid. You already believe in… [points upward, follows it with her eyes.] You should just keep following that illogic. [Pulls her jacket over her shoulders as a blanket, turns on her right side, back to Nile, lies on the pile of duffel-bags like a reclining chair.] You're already on board with the supernatural. [Speaks with eyes already closed; it makes no difference to her.] If I were you, I'd get some sleep.

[Nile stands slowly, glaring at Andy, sets her body as she prepares to continue the fight.]
Andy: You really want to do this, kid? [Andy's eyes are bright, her expression relaxed but anticipating; she looks like she thinks this will be fun.]

Andy is looking at this retrieval mission as something that must be done, but quickly and with as little disruption as possible to her team's ongoing mission to find Copley and protect themselves from exposure. And then here comes Nile Freeman, competent as hell, taking no shit, questioning everything, stabbing her and escaping a moving vehicle and just fucking fighting her at every turn.

"Jfc kid will you just get in the goddamn car" feels pretty reasonable in that context, yeah? At least from Andy's perspective. From Nile's, you're fucking right you're gonna ask some goddamn questions before getting on a drug-smuggling plane with someone who just shot you in the head.

It's worth noting that Andy doesn't precisely say "jfc kid will you just get in the goddamn car" — she says "I need you to get back in the car please." She says "can you please not do that again" when Nile fucking stabs her. She's exhausted and frustrated and just trying to get through this and back to her main mission, and from what we see of her so far she's generally gruff as a person, but she's not an asshole, and she's really showing Nile some respect here, all things considered. I mean, imagine being this polite when someone stabs you. This is a tired adult trying to get another tired adult on board with a sensible plan.

Andy: Argh! [Andy grabs Nile's knife hand.] Fuck! [throws it violently aside, forcing Nile back a step. With the knife still in her, Andy sighs deeply and looks at Nile. Nile recovers her balance and stares that Andy is hardly reacting to having a knife in her.] Can you please [grabs the knife with left hand, yanks it out] not do that again? [throws the knife on the ground.]

Once they fight on the plane, Andy never calls her kid again. Andy is already starting to regain some of the energy her long life has worn away from her after just 10 minutes on screen with Nile. Andy went into this retrieval determined to be someone Nile can rely on, and that still stands, but by the time they're in France she's realizing she'll come to be able to rely on Nile too. She introduces her to the boys as Nile and that's that.

The only other time we hear the word "kid" in the entire movie is near the end, outside the bar with Booker.

Nile: Yeah. [takes a breath.] Talked to Copley. Said he could fix it. Make it look like I was killed in action. [nods gently to herself] My family will mourn, but, uh… [tiny shrug, head-shake.] …they'll be able to move on. It's just like what we did with my dad. [sighs. Turns to look out over the water. Voice wavers.] I just really want to hear my mom's voice one more time.
Booker: [looks down, pauses, turns to lean next to Nile.] You're a good kid, Nile. [looks at her, speaks earnestly.] You're gonna be great for the team.

Sébastien le Livre, whose greatest tragedy is that his children disbelieved and rejected his love for them, would be very moved by Nile's concern and love for her mother. "You're a good kid, Nile," in the sense that she's honoring her parent in a way he, a bereaved parent, appreciates.

There's also the fun shippy reading that he's preemptively friend-zoning her because there's about to be several lifetimes between him and spending any more time with this woman he was having an obvious "oh no she's hot" reaction to over dinner in Goussainville, but I, a feral Book of Nile shipper, like the first reading even better.

But the point is, calling Nile "kid" is an element of the movie that says a lot about the characters using that word. When it gets repeated in fanfiction, it says something about the author.

If you're reading this and reflecting "oh shit I wrote the team calling Nile kid without thinking about it at all beneath the surface" I have a really cool suggestion for you: just edit it. Or at least consider not doing it again. We all make mistakes. We all run with things that we pick up in canon or see in other people's fic that seem funny and harmless, and once we think about those things more deeply we might find that actually it's kinda fucked up, or not what canon was trying to say, or fine on the surface but not fine if it becomes The One True Fanon. Having characters who are either white, men, or both call the adult protagonist who's a young Black woman "kid" all the time carries a weight to it. Please let's let that weight fall off Nile's fully-grown shoulders.

Next up, orders, suggestions, assistance, and other flavors of mentoring Nile and/or telling her what to do.

Part 4: Orders

Nile joining the team both magnifies and changes the others' existing character traits and relationship dynamics. Remember what we got in the train scene? Joe and Nicky are the competent ones, Booker is the semi-competent drunk, Andy is the fucking depressed boss. Let's look at how that changes over the course of their time with Nile.

Andy gives Nile tons of orders, start to finish. She's the boss, and we've already talked about USMC Corporal Nile Freeman accepting orders from Andy just like she does from her COs. (I was about to say the only difference from the Marine Corps is now Nile can and does say so if she disagrees with orders, but Nile fucking argued — "but I'm fine" — when her sergeant told her she was being sent to Germany for more tests, fuck I love Nile so much)

Most of Andy's orders are about missions, and we also see Booker and Joe give orders in this vein. Booker reinforces Andy's orders when he and Nile are alone in the church waiting for "the signal" that Andy's done slaughtering an entire mercenary team by herself. Joe orders the whole team, Nile included but not particularly focused on, to "cover Andy" in the lab fight.

Over the course of the movie, Andy goes from seeing Nile as a new dependent to deal with to seeing her as a delightful sister in arms and her heir apparent. Early in their acquaintance Andy does a lot of telling Nile what to do beyond what's necessary for missions, like two separate times instructing Nile to go to bed.

Talking to Nile about going to bed happens to be a super interesting and efficient distillation of how this movie characterizes the dynamics between Nile and the other immortals:

• Andy: On the plane, "If I were you, I'd get some sleep," followed by in the cave, "You know how it works, Nile. Get some sleep while you can."
• Nicky: At dinner, when Nile looks overwhelmed af after learning that their immortality eventually ends, "It is a lot to understand. I think you should get some rest. Come with me. I'll show you."
• Booker: In the cave, immediately after Andy tells Nile to get some sleep while she can, "I brought you a change of clothes."

"Do this" vs "I think you should do this" vs "if you want to do this I arranged something that might help". Coming from, respectively, the boss, half of the mom-friend couple, and the other member of Team Baby.

This same dynamic is reinforced over something much more serious than sleeping: Nile communicating with her family. And this is a big place where we see the dynamics start to change.

We don't see Andy directly forbid Nile from talking to her family, but we know Andy confiscated Nile's phone, and we see Andy make Nile hand her phone back over after their conversation outside the cave. (Nile clings to her phone for another moment, looking at the lockscreen picture of her family, then hands it over without Andy having to say anything.) We also see Andy tell Booker to tell Nile that talking to her family won't help.

Booker obeys that order. He doesn't directly tell her what to do, he gives her information and lets her draw her own conclusions, but it's clear he thinks there's a right answer and a wrong one: he tells Nile how his family reacted to his immortality, and he talks about it like it's a foregone conclusion that Nile's family will react the same way. (It's also clear that he's having a trauma response and not considering the ways in which her family is operating from a pretty different understanding of the world than his was — he's not giving fully rational advice. He was wrong and here's a funny joke at his expense that you can reblog!)

From start to finish, Andy thinks she knows best. She insists on going first into the penthouse despite Nile's very reasonable point that only one of them is bulletproof and it's not Andy. (Not one bit coincidentally, this is the exact same argument she'd had with Copley at the very start of this sequence. Nile won the argument with Copley, but not with Andy.) In the closing scene, Nile says "maybe this is the why, Andy," and Andy integrates this feedback from her direct report just like she did with the boys' dream-intel back on the train, and Andy makes the final decision and informs Copley he will now be working for them.

It's crucial that while Andy's "I know best" attitude extends to what Nile should do, and the boys agree with Andy and back her up on this, they all treat Nile as a full-ass adult. The boys give Nile information, they give her advice, they give her resources, but they don't ever force her to do anything. Andy only ever does two things to force Nile to obey: knocking Nile unconscious and driving her miles across empty desert, and confiscating her phone.

When Nile refuses to go into Copley's house and asserts that she still has time with her family, Andy accepts it — she doesn't argue, and she even gives Nile the car. By the end of the movie, Andy's given Nile her phone back. Andy's still the boss, and she'll still give Nile plenty of orders in the field right alongside the others, but there will be no more confiscating resources, and there will be no more telling Nile to go to bed.

Next up, these character arcs and relationship dynamics continue in how the other immortals answer Nile's questions, how they share information with her.

Part 5: Questions and Answers

Let's start by comparing the different ways these characters respond in these two instances Nile asks the simple question, "Why?"

Nile: I thought you said we were going to Paris.
Andy: We're just outside of Paris. This is Goussainville. This place has been abandoned for fifty years.
Nile: Why?
[Andy looks up, toward the sound of another plane passing overhead; she turns and grins at Nile. Nile also gazes upward, then turns and continues to follow Andy.]

Far be it from Andy to give a direct answer to a question.

Nile: [finally breaks the silence.] So are you good guys or bad guys?
Joe: [looks to Nicky, then back to Nile.] Depends on the century.
Nicky: [leans back in his chair.] We fight for what we think is right.
[Nile looks skeptical. She lifts her eyes to see Andy enter the room, cross to the stove.]
Nile: How are you all in my dreams?
Joe: We dream of each other. They stop when we meet.
[Andy is listening as she dishes a plate of food.]
Nile: Why?
[Joe opens his mouth to answer, but Nicky speaks first.]
Nicky: [watches Joe meaningfully as he speaks] I believe it's because we… we're meant to find each other. [Joe gives him a quick wink. Nicky smiles briefly, turns back to Nile.] It's like destiny.
Booker: No, more like, uh… misery loves company.
Andy: [looks up, points toward Booker.] What he said.

In the church scenes, Joe and Nicky are the ones giving direct, informative answers to Nile's questions. They're the ones who tell her who Quynh is. And then Joe and Nicky get captured and have very little interaction with Nile for the rest of the movie, but there's nothing in those fight scenes and their body language at the bar or in the closing scene at Copley's to indicate this dynamic would change significantly as they get to know each other better.

Joe and Nicky welcome and adapt to Nile. Andy CHANGES as a result of Nile. And Booker acts differently with Nile than he does with the others.

Andy doesn't lie to Nile, but she's not forthcoming like Joe and Nicky are: when Nile asks questions, Andy takes her sweet time getting to the details Nile cares about, with plenty of color commentary in the meantime. She responds to Nile's pressing — "You said you had answers" — with "I didn't say you'd like them." When Nile presses her again later, replying to "Me and those three men in there will keep you safe" with "Like Quynh?" — ouch. Andy had just started opening up, reassuring Nile that she knows this is hard, she knows she's scared, but when Nile pushes, Andy shuts down. "We're all you've got."

Andy shares a handful of details about herself without Nile asking. But telling Nile she was once worshiped as a God is a snarky aside. Andy telling Nile she can't remember what her mother or sisters looked like is a turning point, and one that comes after they've escaped a mercenary attack and fled across a border to regroup while they figure out how to rescue Joe and Nicky. This turning point comes after Nile talks effusively about her family with only the slightest prompting from Andy. Andy's already seen Nile's skill as a fighter, but now she's starting to see Nile is skilled at something Andy's been sorely lacking: Nile has confidence in who she is and where she comes from and what she contributes to the world. Nile believes that a life fighting for the people you love is a life worth living, a life to be proud of.

Andy gets better at sharing information with Nile after this turning point, but by the time she's answering "What happened in São Paulo in 1934?" with "1834. You'll see." it's clear that this business of pointedly not giving direct answers to reasonable questions is part of her personality. Now that Nile knows Andy better, and now that Nile has more information about what the fuck is going on, we see on her face that Nile is starting to read it as playful and find it endearing as hell.

Now for the precious cranky depressed jackass. Booker almost exclusively gives color commentary, except when he and Nile are alone. "I died fighting with Napoleon" is the only non-snark information he gives her in front of the others.

I think Booker is honest with Nile in a way he hasn't been with the others for a long time. To talk about that, first we need to talk about the dreams.

Canon doesn't tell us whether Booker still dreams of Quynh, and I've seen a range of headcanons from the dreams stopped a century ago to the dreams still happen occasionally to he still dreams of Quynh drowning in visceral, revolting detail every fucking night. When everyone wakes up after Nile dreams of Quynh, Booker is the first to speak — "What's going on?" — and then he's completely silent for the rest of the scene. Once he realizes what in fact is going on, he lays back and gets this look on his face that feels like a combination of upset and exhausted and concerned and a little bit eye-rolling. His face goes sorta blank as the camera pans away from him to Joe and Nicky, and the camera doesn't focus on him again for the rest of the scene.

Andy looks devastated by the news of Nile's dream — and she looks shocked that Quynh is still alive for Nile to dream about. She doesn't direct any accusing energy at Booker, so it's not like she thinks he lied to her. Joe and Nicky are both so concerned and supportive with Nile but don't give any indication that it occurs to them that these dreams also affect Booker.

If Booker were still dreaming of Quynh, Andy wouldn't be shocked that Nile is now dreaming of her too. She would've been upset, maybe still devastated, but grimly determined to manage this painful but anticipated part of welcoming a new immortal. That Andy's so surprised tells me that Booker either hasn't dreamed of Quynh in a very long time, or he's still having the dreams but he's not talking about it.

Andy and Quynh dreamed of each other for centuries before they found each other, right? If Booker stopped dreaming of Quynh, Andy would reasonably assume Quynh had permanently died. It's possible to interpret this differently, like say Booker's dreams of Quynh stopped because whatever magic causes the dreams knew they'd bring him no useful information and a shit ton of suffering. But I think the most likely interpretation of canon is that Booker has continued to dream of Quynh and he's been shielding the others from this continuing source of significant pain and absorbing all that pain by himself. Hang onto that idea. Here's more about my personal headcanon about Booker dreaming of Quynh; now back to how he relates to Nile.

Here's the opening to the first of three scenes where Nile and Booker have a conversation alone together:

Andy: They're coming back. They want all of us. ['Warrior mode' engaged; speaks as she strides toward the door.] You stay here. Wait for my signal. [Grabs a sword from the umbrella stand and hurries out.]
Nile: [to empty doorway.] What signal? [turns to Booker.] What does that even mean?
Booker: [laughs raggedly, still in pain.] You'll know it when it comes. [Gasps, looks down at his body, looks up to reassure Nile.] And, by the way, it's not always like this, Nile. Big wounds take longer to heal.
Nile: [skeptical sideways head-bob.] Sure.

The rest of their first conversation continues like this, mostly Nile insisting they help Andy and Booker repeating the boss's "wait for the signal" order while he packs a few essentials and waits for his gut wound to close. He answers her questions with a mix of Joe and Nicky's directness and Andy's snark.

Nile: [quiet disbelief] Andy did all this herself?
Booker: Yeah. That woman has forgotten more ways to kill than entire armies will ever learn. [He hurries past her, checking (loading?) his rifle as he walks.]

He also lies to her to hide his betrayal.

Nile: [following slowly] Who are they? How'd they find you? [lags behind, still staring at the carnage.]
Booker: [at door] I don't know. [commanding] Let's go! [Booker moves quickly outside. Nile runs to catch up.]

Next, they're in the cave with Andy, and he's lying to both of them, pretending to track Copley. While Andy's still there with them, Nile starts a back-and-forth with Booker about the technical details, you got a satellite link, follow the money. Booker definitely doesn't want Nile taking over the search but he's not an asshole about it. He responds to her like a peer, and instead of rejecting her idea he says it can't hurt to try again.

Once Andy leaves (to go treat her not-healing wound what the fuck) Booker watches Nile stick her own hand into the fire just to see what'll happen. He makes no move to stop her, and he doesn't judge her or ridicule her. Compare how Booker responds to Nile's pain over her new immortality with how Andy responds outside the church.

Nile: There isn't one good thing in any of this.
Andy: I know this is hard. [Nile stares at Andy, stone-faced and defiant. Andy's voice is calm, reasonable.] It's happening whether you want it or not. [Nile looks away; that truth is too hard. On the other side, the intruders proceed along the wall of the church; they approach the door to the living quarters.] I know you're scared, Nile. [Nile isn't watching Andy, but she's still listening.] Me and those three men in there will keep you safe.

[Nile looks almost hypnotized. She slowly puts down the stick, then carefully extends her right hand into the flames. Booker watches as she holds it there for several seconds; we hear a slight 'sizzle' before she gasps sharply and yanks it back, grunts at the pain.]
Booker: [slightly amused] Just because we keep living doesn't mean we stop hurting.

Where Andy reassures Nile that the family will keep her safe, Booker commiserates with Nile as a peer.

Booker gives Nile his honest assessment of Andy's age and where she's coming from, he's honest with Nile that he's wondering why she was made immortal and why it's happened now, and he's honest with her about how much pain he's still in over his children doubting his love for them.

We know he's been lying to the team about the South Sudan mission and Copley and all of that. He started that lie because he was desperate to die permanently and he thought lying to the team about one op where scientists could collect samples before they woke back up would be worth that. When that plan went to shit, he started lying more to cover his ass, and he and Copley got way in over their heads real damn fast and it ended in a shit ton of trauma, mostly for Joe, Nicky, and Andy.

Likewise, lying about his dreams of Quynh probably started from a more understandable place before it spiraled. Andy, Joe, and Nicky would be understandably upset when Booker dreamed of Quynh, and I think after a while of waking up from visceral terror to heartbroken faces, maybe desperate questions of if he noticed any useful details this time, it might've looked like the best option, the kindest option both for him and for the others, to just pretend he stopped dreaming of Quynh.

This is a man who died repeatedly at the end of a noose in front of a field full of soldiers for three days and successfully avoided anyone noticing he was still alive. Being able to lie that convincingly, under such extreme stress, is a skill borne of trauma. He'd been through some kind of hell before he became immortal to give him that awful skill. He's been lying about the dreams for decades, maybe longer, long enough that Andy could be shocked that Quynh is still alive for Nile to dream of. And I don't know about you, but I recognize the kind of lying it is when you're suicidally depressed but you still joke around with your family (about salt, perhaps) and pretend you're ok when you're not.

Fuck, once you read between the lines, Booker is so much more honest with Nile in their three scenes alone together than he's been with the others for such a very, very long time.

The one time Booker doesn't answer a question of Nile's got cut from the screenplay:

Nile: Are you in love with her?
Booker: We all love her.
Nile: That's not what I asked.
Booker: I know what you asked. (then –) You have somebody?

This evasion that got cut is another example of Booker lying in an attempt to protect other people from his feelings, which you can interpret either as not wanting to say the thing out loud that's awkward between him and Andy, or as not wanting to lock himself into one unrequited romantic situation when another unrequited romantic situation is starting to hit him over the head. (Imagine Nile Freeman smiling at you across a fire as you bond over your similar tragedies what the fuck)

I didn't say his attempts to protect the others from his feelings was effective — it's clearly the opposite. But this is a thing he does. The evasion about his feelings for Andy got cut from the movie, and while he lies to Nile as well as the others about his betrayal, he's otherwise open with her about what he thinks and feels.

Then one big honkin' NO MAN LEFT BEHIND later — which, am I crazy, or is that the only time in the movie that Nile gives someone an order and they obey? (on reflection, it's not, see end note) — Nile leaves the others to their sentencing decision and goes to join Booker on the porch. She pulls out her phone and he says "Oh, she gave it back?" which tells us Nile had previously mentioned to Booker that Andy confiscated her phone. He's betrayed them all, Nile included, but Nile still treats him like a peer, and he accepts it from her. Nile tells Booker about her decision to have Copley make it look like she was KIA, tells him how upset she is about it. Booker tells Nile she's gonna be great for the team.

I've tried to be as specific as possible, but ultimately there's something subtle about how Nile and Booker interact with each other that's different from how each of them relates to the others. Andy and Nile have a ton in common, they have a vibe, Nile sparks new life in Andy — Andy feels responsible for Nile, though she doesn't baby her, and she changes her outlook on life as a result of just their first few days together. Booker and Nile have a ton in common, they have a vibe, and Nile sparks something in Booker. He doesn't exactly change as a result of meeting her, more that something in him takes notice. After all this trying to define it, what it comes down to for me is Booker and Nile have an indefinable vibe of seeing each other as equals. It's why I ship them so hard.

Maybe this indefinable thing is this. Throughout the movie all four of them, Andy, Joe, Nicky, and Booker, all offer Nile material and emotional support in their own ways, no questions asked, no need for her to do anything in return. Booker is the only one who verbalizes what's subtext elsewhere, that Nile's gonna be great for the team, that she's the best suited to take over for Andy as leader. Booker, freshly exiled, doesn't expect to benefit from that personally — but just the fact of Nile, her very existence, gives him hope for the future.

Next up, what little we know of Quynh and Lykon in canon, how Nile relates to knowing they exist, and how Nile might relate to them as she gets to meet Quynh and learn more about Lykon in the future.

Part 6: Past and Future

We know almost nothing about Lykon in canon. We know he was fucking gorgeous, and we know his permanent death was sudden and surprisingly early compared to Andy and Quynh. We know from that deleted scene that he was playful in battle. I want to know more about Lykon.

Nile will never see a picture of Lykon let alone meet him. But she's connected to him. As far as we know, they're the only two immortals of African descent who've existed so far. Nile, whose ancestors were stolen from West Africa and whose histories white supremacy did its level best to erase, might feel an especially strong urge to learn about Lykon.

What might Andy or Quynh remember about Lykon's history that Nile might treasure as a restored piece of her own stolen history? I don't know what comics canon says about his birthplace or where he lived, and I doubt Greg Rucka put that much thought into it, but what Andy and Quynh remember of Lykon and his family might have some kind of link, some kind of at very least spiritual kinship to ancestors Nile has been separated from since before she was born.

Nile might also find a kind of solace in hearing Andy and Quynh talk about Lykon, a solidarity with her own loss. I think the three of them will talk about Lykon how Nile's little brother and his potential future children will talk about Nile, and Nile will think about that, and when it's too awful to bear, she'll ask her big sisters to hug her and tell her stories about her big brother who died before she was born.

Quynh, though. Quynh is alive.

We know Nile got flashes of Quynh alongside the others at first, and we see her have one devastatingly visceral dream of Quynh. We don't know whether Quynh can have the dreams, because there's no fucking way she's getting REM sleep while constantly drowning to death, but if she does, her first dream of Nile would probably be the same as the others': snippets of her deployment in Afghanistan. We don't know if the dreams choose to show details that would make it easier for the immortals to find each other, or if it's more of a general highlight reel. Quynh might get snippets of Nile entering and then, uh, exiting the Merrick building — the dreams would probably consider that a helpful landmark. She might see both Nile and Booker's perspective on the family turning around up those stairs and leaving Booker behind at the bar.

Between the end of the movie and their eventual meeting (2 Old 2 Guard now also confirmed by Veronica Ngô Thanh Vân what!) Quynh is likely to dream snippets of Nile traveling, training, getting to know her new family. If she hasn't been having the dreams underwater, when Quynh finally resurfaces she'll start having dreams for the first time of both Nile and Booker. What a confusing juxtaposition that would be. We don't know how long Quynh and Andy took to find Joe and Nicky, but Quynh does, and if this is the first she's learning of both Nile and Booker she's liable to be confused as shit why the seemingly newer immortal has been found and brought into the family but they don't seem to be searching for the other one at all.

Once whatever happens happens and the family is reunited, Quynh and Nile will both be playing major catchup about family history, just from different directions. Quynh will be able to join Andy in telling Nile about their adventures from before Joe and Nicky came along. Nile will be able to tell Quynh about modern history (at least what she's able to given that she may or may not have interest in it, and the basket of yikes that is US public school curricula) and what the family have been up to lately. Nile and Quynh both missed the first 200 years of Booker, so they'll be united in watching the others puzzle at and grieve and rage over whatever the fuck happened that sent Booker into such a catastrophic spiral.

Based on that gorgeous red coat alone, I think Quynh is going to prioritize beauty and pleasure and comfort whenever she can, now that she can. Nile wanted to get an art history degree after her Marine service. I think these two alongside Joe are going to enjoy the shit out of all the modern fashions their mercenary bank accounts can afford.

And that's all I've got, for now at least, on what movie canon shows us of how every character in The Old Guard relates to the main character, Nile Freeman. You can reblog the series here on Tumblr and I love getting asks if you want to talk more about Nile and her new family!