#“We will win! And it'll be a victory for the heroes who gave up their beds!”

[badjohnspeakeasy]

I've been looking for a clean version of this manga artwork for a while! Finally found it, so I figured I'd share it.

[comicaurora]

Hey Red, sorry if this was asked already, but do you have any advice on writing a trickster hero? And do you have any favorites yourself?

Huh! This is something I've never really thought too hard about before, but I do have some loose and unformed thoughts!

So the trickster archetype is, broadly, a character who wins by being cunning and tricking the people around them. Typically this is because they are an underdog facing a powerful opponent, and if they face that opponent on the terms that opponent defines, they'll lose. For instance, a physically strong opponent might want to make everything into a contest of raw force; a politically powerful opponent might want to make things a legal battle; a commander of a large army might want to battle on a flat terrain-less battlefield and overpower the smaller enemy force through raw numbers; etc etc.

A trickster doesn't have the raw power to make a scenario happen. Instead, they achieve that scenario by making other characters make it happen, usually by misleading them into thinking it'll have some other outcome they want.

A classic example of this is found in a Brer Rabbit story where Brer Rabbit has been snatched by Brer Fox, and Brer Rabbit begs and pleads with him to not throw him into that briar patch, oh the torment he would experience in that briar patch would be unimaginable, drowning or burning would be bad but still better than that briar patch. Brer Fox naturally throws him into the briar patch, at which point Brer Rabbit vanishes into the underbrush and helpfully clarifies that he was born and bred in a briar patch. He was unable to escape through his own power, so instead he convinced Brer Fox that yeeting him into the briar patch would give Brer Fox something he wanted (Brer Rabbit's unimaginable torment) when in actuality it gave Brer Rabbit exactly the cover he needed to escape. It only worked because Brer Rabbit understood that Brer Fox was fundamentally not just hungry, he was cruel.

Tricksters usually achieve victory through lying, stealing, sneaking around and generally being dishonest. These are usually not seen as heroic traits, but the trickster hero is an archetype of character who is broadly heroic - and uses trickster tactics to win. It's an interesting suite of character traits to balance. In order to make a trickster heroic, them being the underdog usually needs to be played up. It's not really easy to root for someone with power to manipulate people for their own ends, but it's easy to root for someone scrappy and underleveled to manage to gumption their way to a victory over a broadly superior opponent.

A sympathetic trickster usually isn't someone who picks fights. Trouble comes to them, and then they need to find a way to escape or stop it. This is the paradigm that makes Bugs Bunny work as a trickster hero - he starts off basically every adventure minding his own business, and when someone comes around with a blunderbuss and a hankering for rabbit stew, their actions are what prompts him to unleash absolute hell on them by using toon physics and trapping them in ironclad social conventions to completely unbalance them until they're eventually defeated.

If we see a big, loud, powerful jerk try to stomp on someone small and innocuous, we're inclined to root for the small and innocuous person. This setup makes us very eager to see the small and innocuous person use tricks and shenanigans to make a fool of the powerful jerk, and it automatically makes us more okay with the sympathetic character doing on-paper unheroic things like lies and manipulation as long as they're doing them to someone we're primed to dislike.

So trickster heroes are usually fundamentally reactive characters. Something bad happens and they respond by unleashing hell. Another easy way to make a character instantly more heroic is to give them an even weaker, even more sympathetic character to protect or assist. Thus, many trickster heroes have a suite of supporting characters they're protecting who are not tricksters by nature, and are instead just there to be endangered or bullied by Nasty Mean Powerful People. Our trickster heroes stepping in to aid and protect other people thus gives their actions an even more heroic cast, because not only are they reactive to an outside threat, they're selflessly reactive.

This is the framing that's used in Leverage, where every episode has a victim of the week being cruelly taken advantage of by a jerkass of the week, at which point our team of liars, grifters and thieves roll up to ply their trade on the jerkass and award the spoils of war to the victim of the week. Because the person they're tricking is proven unequivocally to be truly awful and completely insulated from legal consequence a solid 98% of the time, we don't feel particularly bad seeing our team of heroes manipulate, gaslight and eventually absolutely destroy them over the course of a crisp 40 minutes. The vileness of the villain combos with the innocent powerlessness of the person they're advocating for, and thus their assorted unheroic qualities become reframed as absolutely heroic due to the circumstances under which they use them.

Crucial to the formula is the horrendous nastiness of the villain of the week, because if we were even kind of sympathetic to them, the schemes of the protagonists would be kinda scary. They are very good at quickly getting the bad guy to trust them and then taking apart everything they've built, and that's only fun to watch if the audience is 100% sure the villain deserves it and is not going to spend too much time thinking "wow, it would be terrifying if that happened to me." The fact that our heroes almost always take them down simply by leveraging (heh) the bad guy's badness is a big part of what makes the formula work. Almost every episode is functionally similar to a Briar Patch scenario - "oh gosh I sure hope no SOULLESS CAPITALIST VAMPIRES take advantage of how MANIPULABLE I am to try and get my MONEY and/or VALUABLES", and then the villain's own established cruelty cascades into their downfall when it runs into the dominos our heroes have set up to expose them. And that does a lot to make the audience sympathize with a crew of four self-admitted terrible people (and Hardison, who's an angel and we're delighted to have him)

Another way to get the audience to root for a potentially nonstandard protagonist is to set them up against a villain who is smug. Smugness is a very dangerous trait for any character to have, because it primes the audience to want to see them break. A villain who thinks they are too powerful or too strong or too smart to be defeated has the audience immediately rooting for them to be proven wrong just so they can watch the expression on their face. This is the strat they use in Columbo.

Every Columbo villain is rich and powerful and very insulated from legal consequences, and we start every episode seeing them arrange and execute an attempt at a perfect murder. We know from the start how they did it and usually why, and because they are smug - they are almost never regretful or reluctant - we become invested in seeing how Columbo figures out what they did, how they did it, and how he can prove it and get them arrested. Columbo is a nonstandard kind of trickster hero, because he is deeply and fundamentally a Lawful Good archetype, but he is also a very casual liar. The only time the audience sees Columbo almost certainly telling the truth is when he's dealing with background characters, his fellow policemen or his dog, or when he's by himself silently putting the pieces together; at all other points in the episode he will typically conceal how much he knows, how he knows what he knows and why he's asking specific probing questions. The audience has a tremendous amount of dramatic irony in terms of information about the perfect murder Columbo has to disassemble; we'll see Columbo zero in on exactly the one small detail that pokes a hole in the supposed airtight alibi, but instead of saying "I think you killed them and I am determined to prove it" he'll dance around why he's focusing on those details - just curiosity, just a desire for completeness, his superiors told him to continue the case and he doesn't know why, his wife is just such a big fan of their work, etc etc.

As a rule, the first time in any given episode that Columbo admits he's suspicious of the villain is the beginning of the last scene of the episode when he proves that they did it and they subsequently surrender. When Columbo is dealing with the villain, absolutely nothing he says can be trusted until that final scene - and it's a rare treat to get a glimpse of Columbo showing an honest emotion, especially something like genuine fury. Most of the time he maintains a very harmless and affable attitude, but sometimes when the villains are very smug and they know he's suspicious of them but can't prove anything yet, his righteous anger peeks through and we see why he does this.

He's a trickster hero because he can't unravel the case, the villain's motivation and the shape of the crime if the villain knows everything he knows and can correspondingly keep up with him. But he is 100% committed to exposing the truth of the situation and making the murderer face justice. Their perfect alibi is supposed to protect them from everything, but it's their confidence and certainty that they could never be caught that Columbo leverages to win. They never know entirely what to make of him, and he's never wholly honest with them - and with the audience - until the very end of the episode. It's good, cathartic payoff to an episode's worth of lies and manipulation from both main players, and it's always fun to see the non-smug party on the side of justice come out on top.

Some trickster heroes are more like standard heroes with trickster tendencies that occasionally surface. These guys are usually pretty straightforward, but in a pinch they can bust out a surprisingly cunning scheme or two - one such moment hits at the climax of Across the Spider-Verse, and it's a great moment of characterization for Miles, who has thus far been a pretty typically heroic guy who has unfortunately spent the entire movie thus far being lied to by people he trusted. It kicks off an enormously long and complicated chase sequence that takes the entire spider-community out of the home base chasing him through an absolutely massive complex and eventually onto a space elevator. It's such a fluid scene, you kind of just accept that it's a desperate chase sequence - Miles is just running. It doesn't occur to the other spider-people that Miles might have a plan beyond running until he basically tells Miguel that, hey, he did just get every other spider-person out of the facility that has the portal to get him home. He wasn't just running away, he was luring everybody away so he can leave.

And this moment is fantastic on a meta-level, because Spider-Man is traditionally a bit of a trickster hero. Most of his enemies are able to physically outpace him, and he needs to use mobility and strategy to take them down, often luring them into environments that work against them - like a fun moment in Spectacular Spider-Man where Spidey defeats the Rhino by luring him into a steam tunnel and basically giving him heatstroke through his armor plating. But because the entire core theme of this movie is "Miles isn't a real Spider-Man," it literally doesn't seem to occur to the other spider-people that Miles's seemingly panicked running might be him pulling a Spider-Man on them. We're so used to being in Miles's head and knowing when he's got a plan or a ploy that this is a very fun moment to watch. He's successfully deceived an entire army of spider-people, and the audience is just as blindsided as Miguel - and a little less electrocuted, so it's a lot more fun for us.

So yea, trickster heroes are a fun little space of character, but you gotta be careful to put them in the right kind of situation, lest their fundamental dishonesty come across as alarming rather than extremely rad.

[leclerc-s]

paint the town red - part seven

THE PEOPLE'S PRINCE IS VICTORIOUS

series masterlist

MONACO 2024

scuderiaferrari posted new stories

mr. lechair hard at work before media day for the monaco grand prix

pouty chili in his chilli hat

I'M GIVING THE PEOPLE WHAT THEY WANT! YOU ASK FOR SEB CONTENT I GIVE YOU SEB CONTENT!

working hard or hardly working mr. mcqueen?

everyone could sense the pressure ferrari held today. everyone seemed to expect them to lead to charles to victory for the first time at his home race. it's not that it was impossible for them, they could do it, they knew that better than anyone, but they had an entire country counting on them. the pressure had been there for imola, but it was completely different for monaco. time and time again charles had been failed by his team and people hoped this would be the time things would change for the monegasque. everytime victory or a podium had been within his grasps ferrari had found a way to rip that away from him. not this time though, this time things were different, no matter what happened charles leclerc would be on the podium in 1st place at his home grand prix.

the camera's caught the moment sam wilson waved enthusiastically at will buxton. he laughed before approaching sam, who was wearing a ferrari shirt. he had both driver numbers on his shirt, all the avengers and co present did, as a way to support both drivers.

"captain america, a pleasure seeing you at the monaco grand prix," will said. sam smiled, "please, i'm off duty, it's just sam."

"well, sam, how excited are you for the race today?"

"super excited," sam answered. he gestured towards charles garage, "i know those guys are more excited than me, the hometown hero is on pole."

"do you think he'll win today?"

"hell yeah. there is no doubt in my mind about it."

"very well, it was nice talking to you," will said, excusing himself.

"bye!" sam shouted as he walked towards charles garage, most likely to find bucky.

the cameras focused on charles, as he pointed to something, bianca at his side. she gestured towards the wheels and charles nodded.

"it seems charles and his race engineer have great communication this year," will pointed out before he and the cameraman left towards a different garage.

inside the ferrari garage charles turned to bianca, "do you think it'll rain today?"

"yes," the brunette replied, biting her lip, "which is why we're putting you on mediums, that way we can extend our first stint. once it starts to drizzle, eventually leading to harsher rain, we'll pit you for inters. everyone will go for hards, starting on softs, meaning they'll have to pit again for inters."

"you really thought this through didn't you?"

bianca sighed, "i'm running on 3 hours of sleep because harley and i stayed up all night creating a backup plan for every little thing that could go wrong. we have an entire nation's eyes on us, waiting for their prince to be crowned. i needed to have back up plans."

"i'm not a prince," charles laughed.

"you are to them. you're the people's prince, they've been waiting for this victory since 2018. you've been waiting for this moment for so long, i'll be damned if you don't win today."

charles placed a hand on her shoulder, "i trust you, which is saying a lot considering my last engineer. we've got this."

bianca shook her head, "you've got this. you'll win today, i know it."

charles gave her a cheeky smile, "if i win today will you go on that second date with me?"

she laughed, ignoring the fact that there were two super-soldiers with super hearing in the ferrari garage. she was lucky there was too much noise for them to focus on her conversation with charles, "yes."

"great," charles said, "now i know i'll win."

"go get in the car," she ordered, laughing a bit. charles also laughed, "okay."

the moment he sat in the car, he tuned everything and everyone out. it was the same thing he did for every race, but this time it was amplified by 10, nothing and no one would stop him from emerging victorious at his home grand prix for the first time ever. this win wasn't even for him, it was for his papa, who had wished to see charles win their home grand prix. there was a certain determination in him for this race, a determination he hadn't felt in a long time.

"radio check," charles heard bianca's voice.

"do you think you could convince peter to play that one lady gaga song when i win? he knows the one," charles replied. bianca's laughter rang in his ears, "copy."

the five lights went out charles was gone, carlos behind him defending from max. red bull's upgrades seemed to help them out but it wasn't long before carlos was able to get away from him, leaving the red bull in the dust. a safety car during lap 27 allowed ferrari to double stack it's cars, a move that had previously failed them in the past. not this time, the team was ready with both sets of interns, the rain beginning a lap earlier. the other teams having to pit for inters again after already having pitted for hards, just like bianca had predicted.

charles was going to prove to those that had called him a waste of seat last season that he was a great fucking driver. he was going to win his home grand prix. the when didn't matter anymore, after today charles leclerc would be a winner of the monaco grand prix, the first in nearly 100 years to do so. he was going to go down in monaco's history. charles was so focused on his race that he failed to notice the checkered flag, or even hear the crowd roaring in glee and pride.

the ferrari garage had erupted into chaos, bucky was seen lifting arthur onto his shoulders and running out towards the pitwall, sam and steve grabbing lorenzo. pepper stark-potts stands with pascale, comforting the woman who is crying tears of joy. some team members are seen running out, waving the monaco flag high.

"with this of the late jules bianchi, who said to ferrari, ‘you’ve got to take this guy, you’ve got to make sure that he gets to formula 1’ and what a gift that was to give. in 2017, charles leclerc lost his father and in his final days he told his father a white lie, that’s he’d made it to formula one, that he’d signed the contract. it wasn’t true then, but his driving has made it true now, and look what he’s done with the opportunity! the grandstand he saw built as a kid growing up, now rise for him, and for the first time in 93 years this fabled race is won, by one of their own! charles leclerc wins the monaco grand prix to achieve his dream, victory in his home race! well done charles leclerc, it’s mission accomplished, destiny fulfilled, you’ve got that one forever.”

"CHARLES, YOU ARE THE WINNER OF THE MONACO GRAND PRIX! TU L'AS FAIT!" lorenzo's voice was heard telling charles. charles voice was a mess of italian, french, and english, but one phrase was clear, "we did it papa. we did it."

the car comes to a stop at the parc ferme, where charles jumps out of his car, standing on top of it his finger goes up, a classic nod to sebastian who laughs in the crowd. the camera pans to his family, who stand surrounded by avengers, in the middle of it all, watching him as he basks in his win. carlos and max, who complete the podium, rush to him before he has a chance to jump into the arms of his team. the moment the helmet and balaclava come off, the tears are evident, he jumps into the arms of his team, who slap him congratulating him, they're just as ecstatic as him, they know how long he's waited for this. he ends up in front of his family, all four of them crying together, before he parts ways with them, his mother whispers something to him and he nods. he hugs bianca, the brunette returns it, and charles moves on to hug sebastian. he's whisked away to do his interviews and to the cool down room.

“you did it,” carlos tells him in the cool down room, “you finally did it.”

"you're next," charles whispers and carlos laughs, it's a tender moment between the two teammates before emotions get the best of charles.

charles cries again and carlos hugs him. max enters the room to spot charles crying, he frowns at carlos before joining the hug. despite whatever angle the media will try to spin later, they know it’s simply a friend comforting another. later, charles will sob in the arms of his best friend as he realizes his childhood dream has come true. he is a winner of the monaco grand prix.

on the podium he shines, a prince finally crowned, twitter will say minutes later. the people’s prince of monaco had finally earned the win he fought so hard for. the tears still glisten in his eyes. his finger goes up again, and crowd's cheers are deafening. as he receives his 1st place trophy, he gives it a kiss holding it up and pointing it towards the sky, a clear reminder of who this win was for. the crowd scream with joy as their prince finally gets the win they all longed for.

liked by pierregasly, arthur_leclerc, tonystark and others

scuderiaferrari charles leclerc, winner of the monaco grand prix, future world champion.

tagged: charles_leclerc, arthur_leclerc

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username i sobbed. i literally sobbed when i realized what had just happened.

username THE CRYSTALS WORKED BITCHES! CHARLES LECLERC IS THE WINNER OF THE MONACO GRAND PRIX!

↳ username HELL YEAH THEY DID! WE CAN FINALLY SAY CHARLES IS THE WINNER OF THE MONACO GRAND PRIX

username this is the most normal ferrari caption i've seen. now carlos to win his home grand prix next

↳ scuderiaferrari that's the plan bestie! both our boys will win their home grand prix this year.

username ferrari being cocky about charles winning the championship is so hot of them. they've got such a lead over everyone else that they know they're going home with the championship one way or another.

pierregasly tu l'as fait charles!

landonorris congrats charles! you deserved this one!

↳ scuderiaferrari are you implying he didn't deserve his other wins 🤔?

↳ landonorris DO NOT PUT WORDS IN MY MOUTH PARKER!

olliebearman arthur's still crying...

↳ arthur_leclerc MY BROTHER JUST WON THE MONACO GRAND PRIX BEARMAN! LET ME BE!

↳ user28 supportive brother arthur crying over charles's win is so cute.

samwilson YEAH! THAT'S IL PREDESTINATO RIGHT THERE!

america_chavez who knew an f1 race would make tony emotional?

↳ c_barton TONY CRIED? AND I MISSED IT? THAT'S SO NOT FAIR!

joaquintorres well that was an experience. congratulations charles!

↳ scott_lang C'MON THE NEW GUY WENT BUT I DIDN'T EVEN GET AN INVITE?

↳ tonystark you said you were busy, that's why you didn't get an invite. joaquin was available, hence the invite.

harleykeener HELL YEAH! NOW IT'S TIME TOPARTY! DRINKS ON TONY!

↳ alex_albon i'm in!

↳ tonystark i never agreed to that?

↳ biancastark-potts you're a billionaire, you can afford it. don't be stingy.

liked by peterparker, america_chavez, katebishop and others

biancastark_potts monaco, i think i like you

comments have been restricted by user

samwilson PAUSE! WHO IS THAT!

america_chavez monaco? is that what we're calling him now?

↳ biancastark_potts don't make me tell stephen what happened the other day

↳ america_chavez understood, i know nothing.

harleykeener so that's why you left the party early

↳ carlossainz55 you know who else left early, right?

↳ harleykeener no?

↳ carlossainz55 i will text you

tonystark STOP HIDING MY PHONE! I'LL FIND OUT WHO HE IS ONE WAY OR ANOTHER BIANCA!

↳ biancastark_potts no, you won't, because not even nat and buck have figured out who it is. if the two spies can't figure it out, you won't either.

↳ natasharomanoff she's good tony. i haven't got a clue who it is.

↳ buckybarnes i desperately want to know who it is so i can warn the poor guy to run for the hills.

↳ biancastark-potts fuck you bucky.

alex_albon you're telling me i know something the avengers don't? oh my god this is great.

↳ samwilson spill albon. what do you know?

↳ alex_albon no can do wilson. i'm being blackmailed, my own girlfriend has turned against me.

↳ lilymhe i want to know how far they're willing to take this thing. both bianca and the avengers.

↳ georgerussell63 the avengers wish they were us right now

↳ biancastark_potts WHO ELSE KNOWS?

↳ landonorris me and charles know too!

↳ biancastark_potts oh for fucks sake.

wandamaximoff second date?

↳ biancastark_potts went well, a third one is up in the air.

↳ michellejones she says this so no one will follow her on her date.

↳ biancastark_potts zip it jones.

↳ michellejones tell me everything

↳ biancastark_potts deal.

you just had to tell someone didn't you?

AMERICA KNOWS! AND WANDA! AND MJ! I'M ALLOWED TO TELL PEOPLE!

can those losers be trusted to keeping a secret?

the twitch quartet has been vowed to secrecy! except for alex, he accidentally told lily. she scolded him for telling her, so the secret is safe with her.

they are more so happy they can hold something over the avengers.

oh god. we're doomed.

series taglist: @celesteblack08 @be-your-coffee-pot @evans-dejong @elliegrey2803 @bingewatche @arkhammaid @sunflower-golden-vol6 @lorarri @melanier7 @ironspdy @mypage-myfandoms @vellicora @you-bleed-just-toknowyouarealive @enchantedthoughts @stopeatread @hobiismyhopeu @lilsiz @alessioayla @niniluvsainz @au-ghosttype @fulla02 @cowboylikemets1989 @six-call @embrosegraves @justtprachisblog @bionic-donut @rmeddar123 @nichmeddar @landonorizzz @unluckyyoshi @raizelchrysanderoctavius @burningcupcakefire @spilled-coffee-cup @jamie-selwyn @cool-ultra-nerd @kami10471633 @int3rnetgf @fernandoswarcrimes @skynel09 @arieltwvdtohamflash @mimolovescookies @brekkers-whore @camdensreg @mycenterfold @dear-fifi @chiliwhore @tygecjjd @nothaqks @nataliambc @formulaa1d @prongsvault @kaa212 @julesbabey1 @julesbabey @georgeparisole

strikethrough means i couldn't tag you

¡leclerc-s speaks! monaco is so special it deserves it's own chapter. i hope i did the racing scene justice, they are not my forte. if the race strategy seems familiar, no it doesn't (i'm unoriginal and i know nothing about race strategies. lol.)

¡disclaimer! this is in no way making assumptions about the people involved in this story, this is all fake. it is a fanfiction please don't take any of what is said seriously. this is all for entertainment purposes and as a creative outlet for me. enjoy!

[atangledfate]

Sonic was so lost in trying to express his own feelings that the shake had snapped him out of it and he stared listening to Jet again. "But that's just it, you can be angry about it about what actually happened and I am the reason yes.. but I didn't want you angry at me." He fell silent watching the other let go and move to the window. "Good the last thing I want if to see you give up. That isn't you. Ive always seen you reach to new hights Jet that won't change just because I happened to beat you in the past.." Sonic gave his own shrug at the next choice of words Jet spoke rolling his eyes but not feeling attacked by it.

"Like I said if you hating me or at least blaming me helps I accept that…oh shut up i'm not that easy of a target.." A pause thinking back. "Am I?" A joke at himself he knew he could get easily upset Jet knew that what surprised him again was the laugh. He preferred this than assuming the other wanted him well dead to suffer even if that was still true Sonic couldn't really hold onto the hatred he began clinging too, towards Jet. "If I wasn't a hero in this timeline i'm pretty sure i'd me my actual anti self known know as Scourge. The evil thing wouldn't stick with me i'm just so soft unless well you hurt me or my friends than it's different i'm way to emotional protective��Hey i'm not expecting any apology -- you are Jet after all." He replied smirking back the smug sass hinted. "Do you…Recall the stuff from back then..not the situations you mentioned but..our fights? I..know it's in the past and it'll stay there yes just..i need my own closure on that so I let my anger go, Jet" He Didn't want to question it, hoped that is was just a wrong to assume this Jet - and he knows multiple versions use to run around.

Sonic became anxious himself he wouldn't dare make this worse or make Jet regret talking it out. "…Don't you think that's better? If you let go of the anger and hate we can..you can enjoy the race far better and the victory you still could win back." Sonic tone was supportive. "I don't doubt you as my rival so don't ever doubt yourself keep reaching and before you know it, I'll probably be…the one trying to catch up wouldn't that be a change." His smirk turns soft looking away out the window too to avoid this awkward feeling of letting the past go.

"If my wolf friend doesn't get you the nicest baguette i'll buy you one." Another shrug with his own light laugh.

Jet's eyes remained on the horizon in the distance, he knew he'd done some messed up shit in the past. There was this time in his life when everything fell apart and he just wanted to hurt people. He took his rage, and frustration out on everyone else. He was willing to gain victory at the cost of everything! Worse he had it in his head that if there was no sonic, then he would be the fastest--- that was a dark time in his life.

" Like i said... what ever anger i had toward you--- it's in the past. When i thought you died, when Infinite took ya, I thought i'd be fuckin' happy about it. But i wasn't, how could I prove i was better if you were a corpse! i just... couldn't accept it, "

He sighed and leaned against the wall of the cabin and stared down at his feet.

" So i helped the resistance... was pretty glad when you showed back up... guess i realized i needed you, to push me further. You being dead? Didn't work for me... "

He laughed at Sonic an d sneered a bit at him as he just stared at him! He was an easy target, sometimes to easy but, it was part of the guys charm. He was easy to make fun of, easy to push around and his unwillingtness to go to far made it fun!

" you were pretty fun to mess with yea... then again you could fire back just as easy...i liked our banter ok? don't make me say it again... "

" Your Anti-Dork huh? makes me wonder how awful i'd be... or would i just be the same? who knows--- Ancestor id be a creepy hero wouldn't i? NO THANK YOU! guess i'll keep yer lame ass around hero or not... "

Oaf, so he wasn't gonna just ignore that was he? Not that he blamed him but Gaia that was a long time ago. He fidgeted a moment with his chest feathers, and sighed as he couldn't even look at Sonic. He was pretty ashamed even if it wasn't entirely his fault. That Gear fucked with his head something awful.

" Ah, no ... i did that, but--- well, it's kinda complicated. Wave made this crazy new age Gear, using the old Babylon technology. It used some crazy sub-space warp tech. Quite literally jumping between space ... fastest gear on the planet... faster then you even... "

He slicked back his crest and sighed closing his eyes.

" But nothing like that is ever gonna come free of charge---dunno all the details. but it started to effect my head, i was convinced my whole team was against me, and only thing i cared about was crushing my enemies... Wave thinks it was the Gears AI, i dunno, but it fucked with me and i did alot of bad things. I almost killed some people and i even hurt Wave and Storm... luckily Wave got it away from me and locked it up. "

He gave sonic this sort of fearful look as if he still was super afraid of that thing. It wasn't just fear though, he wanted it back! he wanted to ride it again so bad, but he knew what it would do to him but that urge was always there.

" That's the truth... wave wanted to destroy it but, she says the core could go create a singularity if we did. So we just locked it up... her greatest creation, and no one can use it. "

He shook off the feeling and just shrugged his shoulders and focused instead on that baguette it was more comfortable then thinking about what he almost became.

" I'll hold you to it... don't make promises you cant keep! "

[missremember]

Do you have any character headcanons for Hero of Another Story? (Sorry to randomly drop into your inbox, but I'm curious-)

Please don't apologize for dropping into my inbox stop by anytime pspspspspsps

Sorry this took so long to get to, HoAS is basically just a parade of my HCs loosely arranged in a narrative format, lol, so I was trying to think of ones that either wouldn't come up in the story or wouldn't be obvious.

But!!! Here are some!!

Jecra

Like most of the fandom, I think Jecra has a bit of a golden-retriever-esque personality, what with the high energy and inability to shut up.

In some ways, he's the most grounded one of the Trio, for he is the Resident Normal Guy.

His drive comes from the relationships he forms with others, and he forms MANY, because he develops a strong impression of people pretty much the second he meets them.

If he decides you're stuck with him, then you're stuck with him.

His accent gets harder to understand the more woiked- uh, worked up he gets.

Garlude

She comes from a really communal background, everyone regularly depended on each other's support and gave support in kind, so working as a team comes pretty naturally to her.

This is already kinda plainly demonstrated I think but she's also a natural-born marksman!

She's pretty no-nonsense, and has a pretty keen sense for when someone's trying to pull one over on her.

She can match pretty much anyone in a fight.

She has that heroic pitfall where she acts on instinct when someone's in danger...it'll prolly be fine.

Meta Knight

Made this question really hard to answer cuz half the HCs I have for MK are spoilers lmao.

He does NOT like to be dirty. Is it about his image? Feeling dirty feeling bad? Who knows?

Out of a lineup of any weapon ever made ever he will always, ALWAYS choose a sword.

He think it's the perfect weapon because its efficient use relies purely on skill, making any sword fight an equal playing field, and as everybody knows (...probably. he at least thinks that everybody knows this.) emerging victorious from such a fight proves your greatness.

He really, REALLY likes proving his greatness. Or lack thereof. In which case he will improve until he ACHIEVES greatness.

He's...he's a real big fan of winning.

But we all knew that.

Misc.

Assume that in any time that passes between chapters, Jecra and Garlude spend it gushing about their kids

Meta Knight only has a very loose grasp of what a kid is

MissRemember did not mean to make as many OCs for this story as she did on God it was just supposed to be the kids from Chapter 5 and a bunch of monsters what happened who's Ciraco how did she get here why do people care about the Poppy Bro Watch Captain-