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fascinatedhelix · 2 years ago

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Okay, so I got inspired by this post by @skylinx2o some time ago, and wound up spiraling into making a whole OC and AU out of it. Close ups of the different drawings and their explanations (numbered in chronological order) are below the cut:

This is Cassidy/Arra/Artara. She is our unlucky isekai protagonist. She was just kind of a regular lore fiend with little going on in life before getting ganked by some unknown force and turned into something cat-adjacent. At least, whatever passes for a cat on Spherus Magna; cats don't have metal bones, teeth, and claws.

She's got the Hordika brain problem, hence a lot of the catlike mannerisms. Very helpful when it comes to survival and flying under the Makuta's radar, but also really embarrassing.

#1 is our focal character, freshly fished out of Aqua Magna by Gali during one of her routine swims around Mata Nui.

This is the face of someone who has not only been thrust into an alien world out of nowhere, but got turned into some kind of beast in the process.

The Ga-Matoran presume her to be just another weird Rahi, and let her bum around the village for a while as she recovers. If there is any advantage to be had as a cat, it was that Matoran have little desensitization to fluffy things, so weaseling a free fish or two was pretty easy.

#2 features Arra catching her lucky break, moving to Ko-koro to live with Matoro.

Her attempts at learning the local language lead her to repeat words and phrases she hears from the Matoran. Tagging along for the Kolhii tournament, she repeats Takua's name following Jaller, and Takua delightedly named her "Arra," meaning "echo."

They wind up dropping her off at Ko-koro during the search for the Toa of Light, as they figured things would be a little too dangerous for a soft little Rahi like herself to tag along any further. Matoro takes her in as a companion, figuring that a warm fluffy Rahi like herself would be good for Nuju's sleep troubles.

He winds up taking her with him to Ko-metru following the migration back into the GSR, and they live happily together for many months, up until he gets a visit from Jaller and she realizes what comes next. She tries to warn him about Voya Nui, but learning how to put together a full sentence from just a few months of observation is beyond difficult, and he simply promises to bring back some dried fish when he returns, leaving her in the care of Nuju.

She would never see her friend again.

#3 shows Arra's less than eager reaction to being approached by the Order of Mata Nui. After a struggle, she is locked in a basket and brought to Daxia by force.

The Order has eyes everywhere, and a future-predicting Rahi just running around would screw up a lot of their plans, so Helryx ordered her capture.

Like, Arra understands the motivations, but at first she thought she was getting kidnapped by the Dark Hunters. It's at this point she learns her claws are properly metallic, scratching the shit out of her captor.

#4 shows Arra with Helryx. Upon being kidnapped by the Order for future prediction crimes, Arra's presented a choice: either join the Order as an informant, or be its prisoner. She picks the former.

Helryx commissions a translation collar from Artahka to allow for ease of communication, after realizing that the critter barely speaks any Matoran. Once that's squared away, Arra tells her everything. I do mean everything.

This information goes forward to prevent a lot of unnecessary deaths over the course of the story, and prepare the Order for the epic shitshow destined to take place later on. In the mean time, though, Arra winds up getting a little side job as Daxia's resident therapy cat. They need a lot of therapy.

Arra's particularly fond of Axonn as a perch, but Helryx herself tolerates Arra's shenanigans during meetings.

#5 is Artara enjoying head pats from Lewa.

Might've mixed up the timeline a little, but then again, he'd probably pat her with or without the collar. He seems like the kind of person who'd gush over a "tiny Muaka."

This sketch was originally Axonn's hand, but I realized his hand would be way bigger relative to her body, so I modified it to look more normal. Axonn could probably hold her like a baseball.

Artara's the nickname she gets during more "formal" occasions, when acting as an agent of the Order of Mata Nui (albeit mostly as an advisor). Up until the epic giant robot showdown, she's working with Helryx and the others to minimize the casualties when Makuta ultimately falls.

After that... well, Helryx starts giving her a little more freedom. Artara's told her already that her knowledge cuts off after a certain point, and with the Order's psychic protection training she's far less vulnerable to mental incursion than would be a serious risk.

Arra only really asks for one thing once things have settled down some: to see the Mask of Life. "Not to touch it, obviously, I don't want to get cursed."

#6 showcases Artara's Agori form, attained after the Order of Mata Nui retrieves the Mask of Life and allows her to see it.

Originally, she went in with the intention of saying her goodbyes to Matoro, seeing the Mask as his grave in an odd sense. But as she rambles mournfully, she expresses frustration at her situation. She has lost her ability to communicate without an aid that can be taken away at the will of its donor, she can't even hold a stylus for herself, and worst yet she can't even cry for her friend.

It's at that moment Mata Nui decides to remind everyone that he can still hear them, and temporarily reforms to have a chat.

As it turns out, the Mask of Life was what turned her into a lybik (the Spherus Magnan cat species), during its escapades clinging to the back of Vezon's head. An unexpected portal, probably having something to do with Brutaka's broken Olmak, spat out a being very high in the air that the Mask knew would not survive the fall. So, it turned the being into something that would survive. Only, it got sidetracked looking for a new host, getting chased by the Piraka, Teridax's scheming, and all that other stuff, so it never had the chance to follow up with the mysterious outlier.

Until now.

Mata Nui admits he cannot send her home, and it'd be a bad idea to turn her back into a human. From what he can tell using the Ignika's power, her old form would likely collapse into a broken mess due to the planet's higher gravity. But, he points out, he can give her something that works just as well, and brings her up to touch the mask...

And as the light fades, she realizes she has hands again. And starts bawling like a baby.

Beyond the story bits, she now has shapeshifting powers. They are limited to mostly organic beings (so, she can't pretend to be a Toa), as her original form and her cat form were organic in nature, but she's just glad she has hands again. She can partially transform to do things like grow claws, speak more clearly as a beast, or in most cases just forget to put her tail away in Agori form.

#7 shows Artara trying to socialize with local Agori, this time with Kirbold. They... don't really know what to make of her.

In general, Agori tend to be at least a little xenophobic by default, and an interdimensional alien that knows the future is kind of a lot to deal with, even beyond the shapeshifting and slightly immodest dress.

While I imagine hissing and growling are probably things Agori and Glatorian can do naturally, based on the vocalizations of the Vorox and Zesk, it's considered extremely rude. She does it all the time out of habit.

I haven't figured out what she does after this point. She just kinda hangs out with her old Matoran Universe buddies most of the time and confuses the shit out of any poor Spherus Magnan she runs into. Maybe she lends a helping hand to the Sisters of the Skrall and throws a monkey wrench into Velika's plans, but otherwise I'm open to ideas.

#my art #headcanons #bionicle #original character #matoro #helryx #kirbold

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