Some VERY experimental ideas for Color of the Mind. I’m working on a full rewrite and figured I’d start with the main cast. All or none of these could stay, who knows. I will say what I like and don’t like, though.
Dayne’s claw-hands. I’ve always liked the idea of voidan hosts resembling aspects of the voidan that they’re corrupted by. For a while, Dayne had white eyes to symbolize this, but now he has claws too! This will probably stay.
Nick’s new design. He’ll be older, now, right around thirty and with a gnarly beard. I like this a lot. This will probably stay.
Ilia’s whole… deal. She was human from the start, and I experimented with making her a hybrid—a cross between a finis and a human—but I’m not so fond of it. I think it’d be a cool concept, but just not what I’m aiming for in the story. Not yet, anyway.
New finis legs. I never wanted to make finis look too animalistic, and while I do like the look of the skinny animal legs, I just feel like it leans too far into “beast.” They’ll probably keep their humanoid legs.
Ilia’s height. I love that she’s taller than almost all of the boys now. I just don’t know how well I can implement that without making her a hybrid, yet.
Havi’s mask. I feel like he looks too much like Elijah (a Minecraft fic character) in that regard. I gave him a mask to hide markings on his skin that he doesn’t like to show, because they come from being a voidan host to Nightmare. I do like the air of mystery it gives him, but he could just as easily do without the mask / face markings and get the same message across.