Hoorah bitches! Hoofucken-rah

Sketches:

Homestuck-esque:

Armor Painting:

First off, yes some of this stuff is technically retconed/not 100% true based on the lore of restoration, or theorized by my own head... But idc. ALSO this is not a snark or blaming these characters, they're all my scrimblos.

Carolina:

The first one I always think of is Carolina. She was the CO of the freelancers, it was her job to keep them in line and command them. SHE feels responsible for keeping them safe/sane to an extent that is probably unhealthy for her. We see that she did have strong bonds with her team, even if she doesn't show them. She talks about freelancer with such shame that you can tell she carries a metric ton of guilt with her about its downfall, she sees it as her own failings (despite it all being her fathers). In S13,E13 "The thin fed line" we get a scene of Carolina talking to church, specifically about him not being able to run her armor equipment. The conversation is heavy, but laced with comedy ofc; but specifically at 4:21 church says something that greatly upsets Carolina "and you know what happened to the Meta". Carolina pauses for a second, and then says "What did you just say?" the conversation carries into church explaining what the Meta was, and its motives, and how it lead to his death; and then Carolina delivers a gut punch (at least to the viewers). "Don't you EVER talk about Maine like you knew him."... I'm fucking sat, the first time I heard this (sitting at the family computer a a child) I nearly cried. Carolina doesn't view the Meta as Maine, she doesn't see a power hungry brute who stole her AI and threw her down a cliff, she thinks of MAINE. In that moment she remembers a rounded soldier who was manipulated by the AI that she gave him. Then she goes on to talk about her time in the gateway, how she saw her former team, and how she had to watch them die (meaning she saw the meta kill north). She continues to speak, complaining the freelancers to her current team, "Wash, tucker, the reds..." She tells church that "I can't loose another family." OH MY GOD, she calls the freelancers her FAMILY. The moment is then interrupted by Doyle, but that's besides the point. In that moment we are watching Carolina remember her friends for who they were (She sounds like shes crying at some points.), and that means Maine too. She feels guilty about sigma, about not noticing that something was off about him, and mostly for not being able to save him. She couldn't have, and while deep down she knows that Maine was probably already gone, she wishes she could've done something different.

Conneticut/Connie:

Connie is such a double edged sword to me. She does what she thinks is right, but it leads to all of her former colleagues dying and turning on each other. I don't know if her and Maine were close, but I like to think they were at least a bit friendly. That being said, we don't see Connie actively sabotaging them until the heist in season 9 (which is where Maine happens to get injured). We do get a bit of a foreshadow in episode 13, at roughly a minute or so. Carolina mentions "...suspected insurrection activity in this area" and we are deliberately shown CT. We're given the teams of the mission, Team A: Wash, Maine, Carolina, and York, Team B: North, Wyoming, and CT. We don't get to see if there is actually any deliberate sabotage in the episode (I think... this is all mostly off the top of my head), Team B gets pinned down fairly quickly, Wyoming gets injured and CT cares for him/his wounds which leaves them with no cover fire. While A team retrieves the briefcase Maine gets injured (what a downplay of what happens), which is the first step to him becoming the Meta. We don't know that CT is the informant until later in the series, but my point still stands that they foreshadow it from technically episode seven... but the most obvious one is in episode 10. North and Wash are talking about his trip to internals and Wash says "Lots of questions about the insurrection and questions coming out of our...", he doesn't finish the statement, but the implication of leaked information is there. Connie isn't discovered to be said informant until later, meaning she knows that Maine got injured. HOWEVER, Connie never meets or learns about the Meta. So she doesn't feel guilt for that, but instead for Maine's injury.

And of course...

Wash:

I am a MaineWash lover, but I'll try to keep it out of this. We get a few glimpses of Maine and Wash's relations to each other outside of Maine's time as the Meta, but the implication of a fondness/friendship is there. In the season 9 trailer, Wash calls Maine buddy, which is of course a scrap of information, but it is enough for this fandom. This one piece leads us to the possible conclusion that Maine and Wash had some kind of relationship, whether that be friendship or just friendliness between brothers in arms, it doesn't matter. What does matter is the context of this, Wash is the only one aboard the ship that brings Maine to the Angel, he was the only one helping keep Maine stable as they rushed him into the operating room. Even in his time with the Meta, there seems to be a kindling of friendship, or at the least a kind of banter between the two. I'm not going to leave out the most recent piece of this either, which happens in restoration (spoiler warning ig?). In a conversation within Wash's subconscious/hallucination of doc, a particular moment comes up that struck me a bit harder than I thought it would. Its around the nine minute mark in the first episode where 'Doc' and Wash talk about their experience with AIs, how Wash was disabled by epsilon committing suicide in his head, he mentions how two AIs nearly killed Carolina. Then, doc says this "Maine had eight, nine? Oof, so many voices... at some point it must be hard to tell who's real and who's not." That's a subtle hint to the fact that doc isn't real, because he never knew Maine; but then wash responds. "I can't even imagine what that's like." Wash, even in his subconscious, doesn't see Maine as the Meta, like they're two separate entities. He is attached to the memory of Maine, and not Meta. So with that in mind, we can see that Wash at least thought of Maine when the Meta was using his body. This is why I think they were probably close, and why Wash might blame himself for not noticing when Maine began to change into/become the Meta.

YIPPIE! you made it the end of my 3AM rambling!! here's some gummys for you.