Innae

i've been thinking about the rat king, and i have a theory about his name that i really want to explore. a rat king is a rare phenomenon where multiple rats become tangled together by their tails, sometimes so tightly that they can't separate themselves. they're stuck together, unable to move independently, and the thing connecting them can eventually become the thing that kills them. i think the rat king might be creating something similar with his own people, just emotionally. he's so terrified of losing them that he may eventually become the very thing keeping them from being free. i don't think his hatred of humanity is something he was born with. rats have spent generations being experimented on, poisoned, imprisoned, and killed for existing in places humans don't want them. i think he's seen enough of that suffering that he's stopped believing humans are capable of treating his people any differently. his conversation with deadman danny really stuck with me. he remembers 31 rats dying screaming because of vermicide, and when danny explains that he only presented the product, the rat king doesn't let him distance himself from what happened. 31 rats. he's responsible for millions, and he remembers those 31. i think that's what makes him so sad to me. he doesn't just care about rats as a species. he knows them by name, remembers their deaths, and even worries about their relationships. his conversation with victor about valerie is genuinely sweet. he's trying to make sure someone he cares about doesn't get hurt, and for a moment there's no war or kingdom involved. i can't imagine being responsible for millions of lives that the rest of the world barely considers worth protecting. especially when you know how vulnerable they are, and that there's always going to be someone you couldn't save. how do you ever stop feeling responsible for what happens to them? i think every rat he loses makes him a little more afraid of losing the next one. and the more afraid he becomes, the more convinced he is that they need him. his conversation with seven says a lot about that. seven dismisses the safety of the rats accompanying him, and the rat king is willing to threaten someone considerably more powerful than himself over it. he doesn't care who he's speaking to. those are his people, and their lives aren't disposable. but he's perfectly willing to make human lives disposable. his plans for ratannia involve taking long island, declaring it a sovereign nation, and executing any humans who refuse to leave. he's watched humans drive rats from their homes and kill them for being somewhere they're unwanted, and now he's prepared to do the same thing. i think he's spent so long trying to prevent another loss that he's started justifying things he would condemn if someone else were doing them. and his conversation with violet makes me wonder how far that could go. violet tells him she had pet rats when she was younger, and he calls her a slaver. she insists they were her friends, but he doesn't care. from his perspective, she kept them captive, and loving them doesn't change that. i don't think either of them is lying about how they feel. violet loved her rats, and the rat king believes they deserved freedom. but there's something painfully ironic about him refusing to accept that someone could imprison a creature they genuinely love. because what happens when ratannia is established? what if one of his rats wants to leave long island? what if they want to live among humans, or make a decision he thinks is dangerous? we don't know if he'd actually stop them, but i think he'd struggle with it. he's spent so long trying to keep everyone alive that allowing someone to willingly leave his protection might feel like abandoning them. and i think that fear could become a trap of its own. his relationship with mo & krill makes me wonder about that. he thinks they should have accepted him as their king, and while i'm sure some of that is pride, i think he may genuinely believe they would have been safer with him. celeste is another interesting example. she understands his anger without agreeing with his methods, but he considers her a traitor for passing as human. i think he's reached a point where choosing to live alongside humanity feels like turning your back on everyone who's suffered because of them. but he's not incapable of making exceptions. he's friendly with baba, willing to negotiate with billy, and accepts ivy despite her protecting humans. he can recognize goodness in individuals, even if it doesn't seem to change how he feels about humanity as a whole. and that makes me curious about what he actually wants ratannia to look like. does he want his people to eventually coexist with humans under his protection, or does he think they'll only ever be safe if they're completely separated from the rest of the world? and if he gets everything he wants, will he actually be able to let them live? because i think that's where the emotional rat king theory really comes together for me. he's made himself responsible for so many lives that i don't think he knows how to imagine a future where their safety isn't his responsibility. every rat that leaves is someone he might lose, and every loss is something he could convince himself he should have prevented. i don't think he wants to imprison anyone. i think he wants his people to have everything they've been denied, and he's convinced himself that he has to be the one to give it to them. but i think he's become just as dependent on being their protector as he believes they are on his protection. and that's what makes the significance of his name so interesting to me. a rat king is a group of rats that can't separate themselves because they're tangled together. and i think there's a possibility that he's creating the same thing through his fear of losing the people he loves. he wants them to be free, but what if he can't bear to let them leave? i think he may become the knot in their tails. right now the thing holding them together, keeping them safe, and eventually the thing preventing them from going anywhere at all.