#caine Soren

[aliciarose-art]

I’ve been rereading a series that I haven’t read for at least a decade? If anyone remembers the Gone series by Michael Grant? So yeah time to draw some of the characters!

[badlydrawngoneseries]

i saw a post reblogged by @edilio-escobar and this was the first thing that came to my mind

[dianaladrislovebot]

caine: i think i’ve learned some valuable lessons from this

sam: i’m assuming that they’re all horrible distortions of the lessons you actually should have taken away

caine: death isn’t real and i’m basically god

[inkskxtch]

heres digital circus caine and caine soren together bc ive never ever seen another character called caine with it being spelled exactly that way so now that everyones talking abt digital circus caine my brain always immediately goes GONE SERIES CAINE ??!? and im disappointed every time. still a TADC enjoyer tho😼

[jinxiguess]

hey guys sorry i died for like three months but now im alive again anyway take these

[sigmaaegoniii]

Sam with Caine and his crew at the end of Gone

[gone-series-orchid]

sam and astrid or caine and diana, and why!

sam and astrid, definitely! both of them appeal to me a lot more as individuals and at least a little more as a relationship; i think sam and astrid are much more realistically drawn than caine and diana (diana is written better than caine, imo, but not by a whole lot).

but that’s kind of a difficult question, since i’m a huge hater and find both relationships dysfunctional (in a largely uninteresting way) and hard to root for. sam and caine both feel entitled to astrid and diana’s affections at some point, and the narrative never really takes sam to task for this—it does do so for caine, but not super convincingly, imo. then again, i think mg’s narrative has very different evaluations of character morality that i personally disagree with. so, definitely sam and astrid, but not because i like their relationship—their dynamic is at least a little more interesting to me by dint of having astrid in it (she’s my favorite of the gone girls!), and sam’s very well written (though i don’t have a ton of opinions on him—he’s alright). caine and diana are lacking in comparison as a dynamic and as individuals. at least, in my opinion.

thank you so much for the ask, feel free to send more!!

[pepsinutellaandlaptops]

FEAR: The GONE Series, Pages 224-229

[drawyourbow]

yknow that audio/song that goes “do i look like him?” that w sam ab caine…..

[abcwordsurge]

[z0mbie-d0ve]

Do you think Drake and Sam both reached for the gun??

Progress photos under the cut

[mewhiphand]

honestly i am plagued with the debate of whether drake would love or hate the terrifier movies

reasons he'd love it : gore, particularly violent deaths for women, who doesn't love art the clown

reasons he'd hate it: sienna - bc drake hates to see a woman winning lmao 😭

[quinn-gaither]

sam and drake as the trial before pilate; or, an analysis of the powerplant incident

religion is all over gone. it's there in abundance, from the names to the internal dialogue to the very acts and events that happen. the overlap of traditional religious idiosyncracies between different characters are so plentiful it is difficult to sit here and say that this character represents this religious figure; they are an amalgamation of different gospels, showing how theology and the themes of the bible can apply to gone as a wider subject matter to stretch out the dystopia, show how the worst of people brings out the very humanity of them.

as such, i don't know for certain if this parallel or idea was intentional or ever in MG's mind as he wrote the scene, but it is something that has stuck with me a lot in my reread: how the drake/sam whipping in the powerplant strongly mirrors jesus' trial before pilate. the extract sticks out to me particularly in terms of understanding how the whipping of sam impacted his arc and his character for the rest of the novel. full disclaimer, i am not an expert in christian theology nor am i christian, and this comparison only came to my mind recently, so it may not have the depth and nuance of others, but it’s something i have thought and researched a lot about, so i hope it will suffice!

under the cut i go into some brief religious context, followed by how this fits in with the scene in the powerplant alongside quotes pulled from the various books to underscore how pivotal the lashings were for sam. so, if you're looking for some unnecessarily deep analysis of sam and drake as religious paragons: look no further than under the cut!

pilate's court: a contextual debrief

for starters, what was the trial before pilate? in brief, it is as follows. in the christian gospels they refer to the final period before jesus' death as 'the passion'; or, 'the passion of jesus'. the passion includes jesus' entrance to jerusalem, his anointing, the last supper, his agony and arrest, for example. it does also include his trial before pilate, the governor of judaea.

this trial is what essentially preceded the denouncement of jesus before he was sent to be crucified. throughout the trial, much to pilate's confusion, jesus was silent, perhaps accepting his inevitable fate or not seeing reason to protest something when he knew he would never win. pilate, at first, didn't believe there to be enough reason to sentence jesus to death and, consequently, elected to flog him as punishment. the bible does not outright state the amount of lashings jesus received, but it is thought the number could have been 39 (due to jewish commands restricting the amount of flogs from surpassing 40).

and so jesus was lashed, and then he was sentenced to death. it is widely agreed that the punishments jesus endured represent him absorbing everyone's sin, seeing him become the icon of rebirth and allowing humans to start all over again.

so, i hear you ask... how does this relate to the drake and sam incident in the powerplant?

drake as judge, jury & executioner

as i mentioned before, i'm not here to say that sam and drake are direct reflections of jesus and pilate. quite the opposite is true, really, and it is more the themes rather than the behaviours and characteristics that tie them together with this gospel. the theory and symbolism behind the trial before pilate can apply in a somewhat inverted way; sam is whipped though he doesn't necessarily die (more on that later), and drake isn't necessarily trying to find ways to punish sam without killing him as pilate was for jesus. drake wants sam dead and, had brianna not interfered when she did, he probably would have killed him. the events at the powerplant are not a complete mirror image of the trial but are, rather, foils to it.

the lashing of sam sees drake attempting to denounce all the perdido beach kids, trying to assert a specific way of thinking over the whole fayz. whether that be the beliefs of caine and the coates clan or the legislation of the gaiaphage is up for debate, but he is still decidedly torturing sam in response to disagreeing with the word he is spreading and the way he is leading. in the same way the roman crowds saw jesus�� behaviours as undermining the king ceasar, drake is acting out as he sees sam undermining his own personal king.

in terms of the text, this all occurs within hunger. however, before diving into that, i'm flashing forward to plague for an interesting excerpt from a conversation between brittany and astrid. it is, in fact, the very passage that got me thinking about all this to start with:

here we have a direct reference to pilate in the books themselves! how crazy is that? pay attention here to the specifics of "and pilate... to crucify him so that he might redeem us." if, in this instance, we are perceiving sam as a jesus-emblem, what brittany is essentially saying here is that sam needs to be punished for hope he might redeem all people. all the perdido beach kids, all the fayz inhabitants.

sam stands to be the symbol for all those who follow him. he is a leader, first and foremost, but he is at base level the most direct representation of all the lives he, begrudgingly, protects. sam is a microcosmic perdido beach resident while also being one of the most powerful mutants. see, then, how jesus is said to represent all despite being the son of god.

the lashing of sam kickstarts the redemption of the fayz kids, even so early into the book series. this happens in hunger, before any of the real horrors begin, but it is in this scene when the tides perhaps turn and the chance of a tunnel out of here manifests within sam's mind. the lashing is part of the passion of jesus, or the passion of sam, and as a result it sets him on a different path that places him in the mindset to understand that murdering drake is something which must happen in order for the barrier to come down. even if he doesn't quite have the foresight to see it at the time - perhaps more focussed on the murder angle rather than the reason - the seeds for drake's death are set in motion right here at the end of hunger.

just to contextualise the whipping within the timeline of the book. it starts halfway through chapter thirty-seven, with 1 hour and 6 minutes before the climax of the novel. brianna appears at the end of the chapter. thirty-eight sees us with 53 minutes later. so, with that knowledge, we can assume that the lashing lasted, at most, thirteen minutes. brianna administers the morphine packet within this chapter, too.

so, after about fifteen minutes since the lashings began he gets his first pain medicine. in thirty-nine (47 minutes) he wasn't feeling particularly intense pain as he was starting to hallucinate. at 33 minutes, he is still under morphine but is once again in pain. note: 33 minutes is when he first declares his intent to take a life. this is, obviously, a very instrumental part of sam's character arc. when he goes from seeing killing as something to be done only as mercy, to put someone out of their misery, to something that is to be done to avenge.

sam notes that the morphine is wearing off with 7 minutes left. so, with all this textual information in place, we can determine that he underwent torture for approximately thirteen minutes, and saw the pain mostly off with a dose of morphine that lasted 46 minutes. it's important to note also, i think, that this lashing happens concurrently with the human crew hunting and essentially sentencing hunter to death in the church.

it is interesting that two heavily religious events are happening at the same time, especially as the events are both underscored by the overarching sense of sacrifice, lawfulness and establishing dominance. the human crew are wanting to metaphorically crucify hunter while drake is flogging sam: they both want to be the power in charge, and they do so without taking into account any jury or justice. they act singularly, for their own gain.

the first 'death' of sam temple

now, earlier up, i mentioned that sam "doesn't necessarily die". he is, after all, not crucified or murdered in any way, he is just flogged. however, i believe that he was fundamentally changed after his encounter with drake, and while he didn't perhaps die physically he did die mentally.

he was on the brink of real death, all but bleeding out on the powerplant floor, and spent at least 46 minutes in a sort of purgatory state where he was hallucinating his better moments in life and wondering if he was going to make it. under the effects of morphine he sees the school bus incident, perhaps a demonstration of him walking towards the light before he awakes and finds himself back in the powerplant.

the lashing of sam is unequivocally the worst experience he endures in his time in the fayz. the worst experience of his whole life, something that shifts his entire perspective of not only drake but also the type of pain he can endure. the memory of it lasts even through light:

even after everything - four more whole books of action - nothing lives up to or usurps the agony of his lashing in the powerplant. it does not kill him, but it kills his soul. similarly to how the darkness kills lana and sucks the light from her life, sam's experience with drake does the same for him.

taking this back to the gospels, then, jesus is battered and bruised when he gets to the crucifix and, as a result, doesn't last long up there. sam is similarly battered and bruised, literally on his last legs of life after drake is done with him. brianna is able to come and administer the morphine and bring him back to physical life, but he is psychologically different after the whippings. jesus's trial before pilate is a distinctive turning point in christian theology; it is where he essentially admits to his fate, refuses to put up a fight, and leaves the ending of his life in the hands of pilate. he understands that his people have given up on him, that he has lost the crown of king of the jews, that he has been so betrayed by those closest to him. and, yet, in the aftermath of the trial and even after the crucifixtion and rebirth, jesus is different. the world is different. it turns into a place where a better ending rests at the end of all the trials and tribulations.

sam accepts his fate. sam understands that he is losing control of perdido beach. if drake wasn't the one to beat him down, the human crew probably would've tried to at some point. in this analogy where drake is a twisted version of pilate, the human crew are perhaps the crowd outside the temple who are calling for the death of jesus; the death of sam. for fifty-nine minutes sam was reduced to nothing but a boy bruised. he was no longer a four-bar mutant, he had no use of his hands, and he was no longer school bus sam either. he was just sam temple, a fifteen-year-old kid dying on the floor at the hands of someone who took it upon themselves to play judge over his life. jesus, in his trial, became the same thing. just a person enduring the worst sort of torture. god couldn't save him, didn't save him, nor did his people or his reputation or his powers.

the powerplant scene puts the fayz over the precipice. it sends drake down a path from which he never recovers, and it pushes sam to the brink of something he almost doesn't save himself from. it sets in stone that sam will come back - stronger - and those who put him through the agony will repent for what they did. in such a short extract, MG essentially plots out the ending of their relationship: sam will prosper while drake will die.

so, overall

i could expand on this entire thing further because, as i said before, there is such an astonishing amount of overlapping religious theology in these texts that it's impossible to sum them all up in one go. but i like to think of this powerplant moment as an opening, as something thematically intrinsic in the way the rest of the novels work out. it's an instance which can be explored even more if one is to bring caine into the narrative too, and consider sam/caine as twin versions of jesus/judas. which doesn't even take into consideration the very on-the-nose naming of them as sam and david and the way that gospel plays into the whole series, too.

i could even bring in one of my favourite pieces of artwork, the angels hovering over the body of christ in the sepulchre by william blake, and perhaps analyse how the angels are symbolic of drake/brittany in later novels, how their constant back and forth as they oversee the rebirth of sam as he conquers them, and the fayz.

anyway… gone is crazy detailed when you look at it through these sorts of theological lenses. i think, to a certain extent, some of the overlaps must be intentional. the fayz is very much a microcosm of particular religions, of the way gods contend against each other and leaders prevail against crowds of opposition.

either way, to conclude: the meeting between drake and sam in the powerplant greatly mirrors the trial of jesus before pilate, just before his crucifixtion. it perhaps represents how sam is forced to shoulder the sins and the misgivings of the perdido beach kids in order to see through to a way of beating the darkness and freeing them from the barrier. though neither drake or sam are perfect reflections of pilate and jesus respectively, the way their actions correspond to and follow those of the gospels brings to surface really interesting observations about the ways the characters and their fates are almost predetermined, how you can see how the books will end even from only the second one in the series.

[dianaladrislovebot]

i’ll never understand how some people come up w this stuff and actually like it

[inkskxtch]

what if the gone series and mortal kombat had a crossover,,,,,

No secret that lately my hyperfixation has been Mortal Kombat 1 and i can’t stop imagining a universe where Gone is a hit tv series and a character gets introduced into MK as a guest fighter (like Omniman, Terminator etc). ive been thinkin about this for like a week straight now and had to write out some of my ideas cause this will literally never happen BUT.imagine if it did .nothing wrong with imagining right?? (im insane🫶)

Gone has a LOT of characters that would make great fighters in the game, but Drake would definitely be the most likely choice since 1) the MK series already includes characters with telekinesis, fire power, gravity etc so his whip hand would be a unique addition to the roster, 2) he’s a Gone fan favourite and 3) Drake’s character fits in perfectly with all the over the top blood & guts of mortal kombat lol. I can’t see a character like Sam or Dekka willingly carrying out the unnecessarily gory kills that happen in the games LMAO

Some stuff to mention before I actually get into the notes ive scribbled down about drake as a fighter: in my mind it’d be Gone/Hunger drake before brittney & their regeneration, just cause it saves things getting too complicated with the bodyswapping etc etc plus MK already has characters like Havik that can regenerate so it makes for fun dialogue lol. I wrote up this stuff based off the gameplay in MK1 so just.visually imagine that in ur brains when reading ok thanks

In MK1 each character has two fatalities - Drake’s first one would feature the coyotes since they were a major part of him as an antagonist near the end of the first book. The second fatality would bring in the wire he tries to slice Brianna up with during Hunger, while referencing ahead to Plague where Brianna splits him through the neck & waist.

I have a rough idea of what Drake’s fatal blow would be like - starting the fatal blow with a basic whip slash, then after the kameo fighter does their hits Drake would move in and whip the opponent again, spinning them around then kicking the back of their legs to knock them down onto their knees. The camera would shift to show the opponent’s hands encased in a cement block (signature coates academy move lol), before Drake grabs the back of their head and smashes it down against the block for the X-ray hit.

Haven’t thought of the actual brutalities for him yet (he’d definitely have a couple with his guns) but I think each character has around 4 or 5 different lines they can say after completing a brutality - i did have ideas for those so i wrote some down :>

Last thing i though up for fun was a bunch of fight intro dialogue against different characters on the roster; these r all so stupid and some of them aren’t thaaat great but yknow what. i had fun thinking them up (if anyone has any more ideas pleaassjsje let me know and ill add em lol)

I know i talk a lot about how much id love to see Gone as a 2D-animated series, but thinking about 3D models of the gone cast in the style of MK1 would be so sick… would also be fun to see other characters carrying out their fatalities on drake LMAO, always love to see that guy getting his ass kicked

[jinxiguess]

GONE characters in a british highschool

this is like the stupidest post ive ever made also disclaimer i know NOTHING about the american school system so i think half of them are probably in the wrong years also i didn't want to put all of them in the same year so ignore how some of their ages dont even match up😭

SAM

year 11

ALWAYS forgets ingredients for food tech

and then burns everything

and then forgets to take it home and just leaves it in the fridge at the end of the day

never remembers to put money in his school account and quinn has to buy him lunch every single day

sleeps through maths

has the most obvious crush on astrid and the entire school knows

ASTRID

year 11

made it her life goal to get head girl when she was in year 7

and got it ofc🤭

try hard in every single class

and top set in everything

always has so much stationery

goes to homework club EVERY SINGLE DAY

besties w the librarian

somehow oblivious to the fact sam likes her

QUINN

year 11

always late to every lesson no matter WHAT

somehow keeps ending up front row in school fights and gets interrogated abt them

"can i go to the toilet?" and takes like 20 laps round the school before he comes back

takes 0.5 pictures of everyone

sells overpriced sweets at lunch and makes bank

threatens to fight people after school but never does

joined the football team but nobody ever passes to him bcs he cant play to save his life

EDILIO

year 10

accidentally downloaded a virus on one of the computers and nearly got expelled

gets squashed in the lunch queue

buttons up his blazer to look smart

makes sam join clubs with him so he isnt alone (he's scared of the year 8s)

tried to feed the seagulls outside the school

hangs out in the library w roger and denies that they're dating but literally everyone knows

so bad at pe that he doesnt even bother bringing his kit anymore n just gets sent to iso

LANA

year 11

literally never in class

vapes in the toilets w diana

ALWAYS in iso

dated quinn for like a week in year 8

somehow pulls absolutely everyone

so popular but everyone is also scared of her because one time she scrapped w drake and bashed his head in

brings alcohol to EVERY party

CAINE

year 11

head boy even though he does NOT deserve it

leads the year 7s to the wrong side of the school

pe try hard (screams "WHAT ARE YOU DOING GET THE BALL" at his teammates)

year 7s all have a crush on him

acts like he caught a disease after he touches a year 8

has like 60% attendance but the teachers still love him

never goes to form

always shoving in the canteen queue🙄

gets way too competitive over kahoot

literally never been sent to iso except that one time he shoved drake off his chair in the middle of class

DIANA

year 11

rolls her skirt up and always gets in trouble for it (and refuses to roll it back down)

vapes in the toilets w lana

sprays entire bottles of perfume every time shes near the year 7s

and then makes friends w them specifically to slag them off later

stalks the teacher's socials

uses xx or 💋 after EVERY SINGLE TEXT

has a pandora bracelet and wears different charms on it everyday

somehow untouched by school air

DRAKE

year 11

"WHAT DID I EVEN DO???" every time he gets sent out of class (he was literally jumping on the tables)

starts like half the fights in the entire school

scraps outside tesco like every single day

LOBS paninis at the year 7s

steals tesco trolleys

should probably just go live in iso atp

got kicked off the football team bcs he wouldnt stop slide tackling

literally on the verge of being expelled

DEKKA

year 10

1000% done w everyone elses shit

sits in empty classrooms at lunch n pals w the teachers

way too stressed abt gcses

actually really really good at music

so quiet but somehow everyone knows who she is

used to take the bus to school but decided she didnt want to have to deal w all the year 7s and stopped

got hit in the face w a netball in pe

BRIANNA

year 9

absolutely sprints to the lunch line

gets so mad whenever someone doesnt pass the ball to her in pe

and always fighting w caine in pe

shoplifts from tesco

forgets her pe bag at least once a day n leaves it everywhere

always getting sent out for talking back

LOST the form pet hamster

nearly blew up a science classroom

TAYLOR

year 8

always talking shit about everyone

makes those tips for year 7 videos

defo has pe first on a friday😭

snitches on EVERYONE

makes tiktoks in the bathrooms

spends half the lessons making her titles cursive and pretty

makes fun of the year 7s as if she wasnt one like two months ago

JACK

year 7

GIANT backpack

and probably gets trampled in the corridors

probably wears undertale or harry potter keychains (and gets bullied abt it)

always gets hit by paninis travelling at 1000kmph

got given a top locker and cant reach it

cries when he gets in trouble

PENNY

year 8

rolls her skirt up unevenly

side eyes EVERYONE

vaped in the toilets and taylor snitched on her

REFUSES to wear her blazer

falls over in pe and everyone sighs when she gets put on their team

got put in iso for insulting all the teachers

ORC

year 10

stabs his radnor fizz w a compass and sprays it at all the year 7s

also starts like a million fights

NEVER has a pen

grabs peoples bag straps and yanks them backwards

always steals the year 7's footballs and boots them into orbit

wears black airforces instead of school shoes

and is never ever ever wearing his tie

HOWARD

year 9

keeps getting mistaken for a year 7

hangs out with older kids to look cool

and then brags about it

sells vapes behind the school at break

tries to break up orc's fights and gets flung halfway across the pitches

MASSIVE blazer (looks like a roblox character)

SANJIT

year 10

probably a theatre kid

runs to every class so he isnt late

always skips pe

that one kid who highlights EVERYTHING

somehow manages to record EVERY SINGLE FIGHT (and then sends it to everyone)

holds therapy sessions in the toilets

that one asthmatic kid who screams whenever anyone sprays anything