#bluegrass

Dolly Parton Esquire Magazine 1978.

the van der linde bluegrass band

Pharos is an AU specific thing… kinda? So he’s the same Darkrai you see in PLZA’s Mega Dimension DLC. After the events of that, he’s left with some patterns that act almost like “scarring” (idea I had that all rogue mega pokemon end up adorning some subtle design attributes of their mega evolution like trauma scars, mostly because of the extreme power strain on them). Pharos was, like many Darkrai, nameless at first. But upon meeting his savior, requested that they be the one to give him a name to remember them by. Pharos wears the name with honor. To him, it’s a mark of what he’s been through.

There might be different depictions of him here and there that relate to more canon-centric and canon-divergent (an RP AU with my friend with more focus on Pokemon OCs rather than humans and trainer OCs). In the canon-centric AU he’s of course taken in my my own player character, Emmylou, who then goes through the hurdles of rehabilitating the poor thing and getting him in a comfortable state of mind, since with all that happened, he’s left terrified and only with a fraction of his natural power remaining as the rest is slowly coming back (can’t even Dark Void at the moment 😭 he’ll gain it back naturally but his energy is kaput right now). In the canon-divergent RP AU, he’s accompanying a bunch of other Pokemon and sticking in the friend group only because the savior of his is with them, and he swears to stick by him. Unfortunately that ends up in him being a tad bit clingy and over reliant because he doesn’t have his shit figured out yet and is dependent on the assistance of getting his guidance back.

There’s an idea currently in the works that in both AUs, Pharos ends up in a similar position as AZ’s Floette where he’s now considered a “special spawn” where there’s a unique DNA to him (potentially rewritten by the mega power) that gives him some unique talents of his own. However that’s something that’s so recently thought of that I don’t know where all that’s gonna go yet… assume he gets a signature move of his own like Floette’s Light of Ruin. We’ll see.

Next is Bluegrass. So Bluegrass was actually supposed to be a future iteration of Pharos, however I ended up wanting to separate the two after getting attached to what I already had of Pharos, and just tweaked the design a bit. Bluegrass is more inspired by the potential scarecrow inspiration that Darkrai may have, as looking at other Darkrai OCs I’m surprised hasn’t been adorned too much yet. Think of Bluegrass like the brooding ol’ westerner cowboy type. Despite the admittedly adorable outfit, Bluegrass is still one to keep to himself like any Darkrai would. However, he’s not unknown to Pokemon around his territory, and while typically he would get outta dodge as to not make any trouble, he ended up “befriending” this little shiny Caterpie that keeps coming to him for food after he fed her once. I say so in quotations because she’s more like “stray cat that keeps coming for food” kind of creature to him, but he cares enough that it would be concerning if she didn’t show up. He keeps calling her “Lil Ol’ Buttontop”… much to his dismay as he realizes he’s essentially given her a nickname, or a name to begin with.

I headcanon that most Darkrai are drifters and the moment that active life nestles in their territory… they’re outie! Darkrai don’t really fight for their territory back as it’s just unnecessary trouble for them, and just move on to find somewhere a little more solitary. Bluegrass would have been the same had he not accidentally started caring for Buttontop… and also because he may or may not have a little grove he grows his own berries in. But also with time, the Pokemon around sorta started… relying on him for protection. Rather than be anxious about the attention, Bluegrass is more rolling with the punches in a semi-disappointed, semi-admirable way, not wanting to upset the Pokemon but also longing for the solitary life again, and definitely not really wanting to waste unnecessary time regrowing his grove. His mistake he’s chosen to pay for. He keeps the pesky Murkrows and Corvisquires that keep picking on the little ones out, at least, as any scarecrow would.

Bluegrass is at least honest. He’s a good guy under all that brooding energy with a heart good as gold. But he’s still a Darkrai, and the nightmarish struggles don’t pause even for good hearted souls. He’s more worried about if his presence is radiating nighttime terrors. In which case, he usually looks for somewhere a little deeper to conceal himself for slumber if it means not disturbing the peace he didn’t quite anticipate having to accommodate for. Oh well… such is life. Everything’s a fuckin’ rodeo when you’re a Darkrai.