#rabbit-rays

first of all. this is technically worldbuilding but i think urban magic would work slightly different from rural magic. the plot reason for this is so that junhee can see some rural place for the first time and be like “what the fuck is that” and the other two can go “???” and then realize there is something deeply wrong with him

so like. every town/landmark they hit has to be significant to one of the characters even if the rest don’t realize it. one of the towns is going to be where sasha’s parents were killed but delwyn & co. obv don’t realize that when they stop there for the night (they only know that its like irradiated with magic; haha turns out that’s what killed sasha’s parents). the town where sasha & co. catch up to them is the sight of the last family vacation hana and chan went on together. the idea here is that the metaphorical ghosts that motivate them are also made very very real by forcing them to revisit the scene of the crime so to speak. like yes tsh is a story about the future but it’s also about the past. that which haunts us. time is circular. etc etc

on one hand i like the idea of them making it to the west coast. beachside confrontation* and all that. plus it’s got a very final “you can go no further” feeling. on the other hand i also like the idea of them almost-not-quite making it. very sexy in a “falling short of expectations” way. or “trying and failing”, which resonates w tsh’s whole failing to stop the apocalypse thing.

(* just to be clear by confrontation i actually don’t mean sasha and co. that happens earlier in the plot. this climactic deal is the one where delwyn goes supernova and blinds junhee. i’m still undecided what the main threat is actually. i like the idea of a magical governing board that keeps tabs on mages and thinks delwyn is too powerful to allow him to go rogue. but also monsters never fail me. like to be more specific the magic governing board appeals more to my “commentary on human nature” instinct but i don’t think they’d be such a threat to junhee that delwyn would need to cause an apocalypse to stop them. a congregation of ppl who happen to be magic beacons drawing a shit ton of monsters to them, on the other hand… i might do both and give the board a smaller climax-type but i’m literally inventing that as i type this so i haven’t thought of consequences or long-term ramifications for any of this)

btw the journey itself uses chan’s car (delwyn and junhee, being new york boys, do not own cars). i imagine it being a mildly beat-up subaru or smth. chan apologizes for the mess in the backseat and junhee is like “we have bigger problems right now”. also lots of stops in run-down motels, dusty midwest towns, rusty gas stations and laundromats that sorely needed a remodel in like 1980. sort of the americana vibe. probably a quarter of the story? takes place in nyc until chan sees a vision of sorts that makes him think the apocalypse will start in nyc so like. if we just take delwyn out of the city everything will be fine! (spoiler alert it is very much not fine)

(also i think the aesthetic vibe is supposed to be a little bit “the world has already ended/been abandoned.” does that mean it doesn’t matter whether delwyn causes an apocalypse? or are we trapped in a story, where the environment knows already where the narrative intends to go? just a little bit of spice for u and me 🤝)

for both junhee and chan this whole apocalypse thing is also the first time they leave their hometowns (nyc and rural georgia respectively). for chan it’s a little bit self-discovery, a little bit hero’s journey (also significant i think that although delwyn is sort of The Main Guy, chan’s the one undergoing the transformative process of the hero’s journey). for junhee it’s a lot more symbolic of his willingness to follow delwyn anywhere (not to make his character sound like that’s his only personality trait?? if it weren’t for chan tho junhee would probably never leave nyc in his life). but it is also very much a “leave behind everything familiar and comforting” moment that does freak junhee out. part of it is that rural magic Does Stuff that urban magic doesn’t and it makes him very jumpy.

also sasha’s crew is following a weird and disjointed set of clues, courtesy of kei, that doesn’t so much lead them to delwyn as it leads them to places that are of emotional significance to him. (this is also how they manage to end up behind delwyn; tw worlduilding but the first clue leads them to new york, so they hop on a flight and then break into his apartment, but he’s already long gone. from there tho kei and sasha can both use the sort of. increased proximity to delwyn’s energy to track him a little more precisely. the more data points the better, which is why they get closer faster with each new city/town.)

delwyn’s hometown is gonna be pretty close to the west coast/end of their journey, around when delwyn’s coming to the conclusion that he is going to cause the apocalypse for real, that he has that power etc. the entire reason for him hailing from the west is that tsh is very “consequences of your own actions”-based; delwyn’s family still lives there and we’ll meet his parents and younger sister. haven’t decided her age yet but the important part is she is completely innocent. she’s sort of the connection to the real world, and delwyn has to be confronted with the reality of everything he’d be sacrificing, and it has to be fresh on his mind when he does it. he has to admit to himself that he is dooming everyone, has to decide for himself that saving junhee is worth that.

aderyn: fashion vlogger. he'd be so annoying too bc the thing is his goal is to show ppl how to dress for their body type but also their level of comfort w/exposure, the weather, the occasion; like he wants ppl to rly think about what they're putting into a fit instead of just following trends. also he's constantly following keldan around like "let me give you a makeover next time ur in town" and keldan refuses. obviously. they have ongoing twitter beef about it so there's actually a surprising amount of fandom crossover

keldan: travel vlogger. like he lives out of a van/rv so he'd do periodic van tours, show off where he's staying, what he saw, etc. he always posted the videos like two weeks after he was actually there so no one could predict where he was going next. sometimes he does campsite reviews but they're all super vague like "the views were great! bathrooms were kinda gross if ur not a fan of bugs" and everyone's like "what does that mean. how many bugs were there". his viewership is all ppl who romanticize vanlife but would never actually do it.

melati: cafe reviews. luckily she lives in like... nyc or some other large city so there is no shortage of cafes to visit. she'll do repeat visits to cafes if she likes them or if they're the type to do seasonal specials or change their menu a lot. she's also active on tiktok where she does "what to order at starbucks" and it's those insane drink modifications that no reasonable human being would ever actually order. (except if you did for some ungodly reason actually order them, they'd be pretty fuckin good.)

seia: not actually on youtube. he shows up one day on keldan's channel and it's like... kind of extremely obvious that the two of them are traveling together but it's not like he shows up in every single place they visit (is keldan just not filming him? is he really not there? no one knows) and also the two of them never clarify their relationship (also true to canon) so comments are like "theyre dating for sure" "uh you can't just assume that" "theyre sleeping in the same bed tho?" "maybe seia has his own van" "it's homophobic to imply that they're just friends" "can't we just have rep for non-toxic male friendships?" etc etc. seia screenshots the best ones and sends them to the sky sea gang's discord server.

delwyn: daily vlogger, but it's clickbait-y shit like "i almost died doing parkour today" and then u watch it and he actually DID almost die and ur like. how did yt allow this to be uploaded. luckily he doesn't do any of the cringy prank stuff but he doesn't need to bc he's cringy enough on his own. the secondhand embarrassment is so real but he has a ton of followers anyway bc ppl are like "no way how is this guy still alive". it's like watching a train wreck or seeing a car crash. you just HAVE to find out more

chan: chan would have a cooking channel. he'd post recipes and tutorials and stuff and would have a long-running series where he invites other big-name youtubers and tries to teach them how to cook, except theyre always atrociously bad at it and it's funny. 90% of the ppl subbed to him don't cook, don't know how to cook, have never and will never try any of his recipes (even tho he'd make it SOOO easy for beginners) they literally just think he's funny and like to listen to his jokes. there's a small minority of ppl who do try his recipes and post rave reviews on their tumblr blogs about him. he never sees them bc he doesn't use tumblr

junhee: junhee would inexplicably have one of those asmr craft channels. i like to think he's really dedicated to those paper theaters (exhibit a, exhibit b) so most of his content is making those (he does a lot from scratch, zero pattern/template etc, but he also does requests for pokemon cards and stuff like that as well as theme requests. if someone requests like a ghibli movie or maybe a minecraft inspired one he'll take that into account. he's got a whole list he's working through). but he also sometimes does mini diorama stuff (exhibit a, exhibit b). those are extremely rare uploads bc theyre so time and resource intensive but ppl go crazy for them. he's got almost a million subs even tho ppl have never seen his face or heard his voice. he rarely even replies to comments. it's literally like he just logs in to upload a video and leaves again. no one's gonna say he's their fave youtuber or anything but no one hates him that's for sure

sasha: sasha would be a daily vlogger. just like here's my life etc. except they still work in a hospital/medical care so the vlogs are supremely censored bc of hipaa and other privacy policies and also bc some of the stuff they do on the daily is actually gross and would get taken off youtube. they have like max 6k subs but those 6k subs are dedicated. they love sasha's content and are like genuinely invested even tho sasha's extremely vague all the time

hana: hana would literally be one of those tech review vloggers. she gets free stuff and sponsorships etc from cutting edge companies and startups. microsoft sends her care packages. she has like a billion subs. it's like 63% male viewership so she says it's only bc they think she's mildly attractive but all the comments sections are ppl genuinely interested in her reviews and opinions. healthiest yt comment section on the planet no joke

kei: SUPER into astrology. she posts videos like "how to interpret your daily horoscope" and "what mercury in retrograde means for YOU". but she's actually more into tiktok where she does vids like "zodiac signs as vines" and "zodiac songs as hit 1999 singles" etc etc. has a cult following that takes everything she says super seriously even tho she herself is like "guys it's not that serious"

other fun trivia:

junhee has a tumblr that's totally untraceable to his yt account. the last time he reblogged a post was in 2016 and he only uses it to find the recipe reviews ppl post about chan's channel.

the tsh main trio have a weird poly thing going on. they're not out about it but junhee's guested on chan's channel ("this is my bf junhee", zero mention of said bf having a yt channel bc that's how junhee prefers it) and there are brief glimpses of delwyn's filming through the apartment where ppl see the kitchen and are like "isn't that....?" somehow delwyn always sees those comments and replies "idk who this chan guy is :/" and no one can tell if he's being serious

in this universe sasha and hana are madly in love because there's no "you literally killed my brother" "well he came back didn't he?" conflict to tear them apart. they're so gross and mushy about it. sasha catches hana in their vlogs, they do unboxing videos together, and every time they kiss or are generally in love on camera ppl post fan edits on twitter like "omg they're so in love" "get you someone who looks at you like hana looks at sasha" etc.

no one knows hana and kei are friends until they both show up in one of sasha's vlogs. the entire internet explodes bc the whole jokey rivalry their fandoms have built up ("theyre so different they wouldn't get along if they knew each other irl") just crumbles.

if seia DID have a youtube channel it would be asmr bullet journal/calligraphy stuff. also stationery-from-aliexpress unboxing videos. but his current lifestyle (driving across the country in a van with his not-boyfriend) doesn't really suit the stationery hoarding thing. so.

tsh:

(biblically accurate angel, @images_ai on twitter)

(hands, louise bourgeois)

(almost touching, hannah lock)

sky sea:

(seascape study with rain cloud, john constable)

(the oxbow, thomas cole)

assuming they're just dropped in as they are. picked up from universe and stuck in the other. the biggest thing for aderyn and keldan is gonna be the technology!!! modern tech in general is gonna be super weird because their universe is just sooooo different. they're gonna see a plane in the sky and be like okay weird that it's a tube but ok. then they'll see the ocean and aderyn will go what the FUCK is that.

(aderyn and seia are both gonna adjust much faster i think. depending how long they're there. keldan and melati are both annoying and snobby thanks to the ~royal influence~ like they literally don't know how to interact with ppl normally. this works to their detriment in tsh universe, which is basically just modern-day new york with magic. that being said keldan would LOVE to have a cell phone. he'd send aderyn the most annoying memes at all hours of the day.)

because of the lack of magic* in the sky sea universe, i think the biggest thing is that the tsh characters are gonna feel like. Empty. they no longer have that well of power to tap into. super fuckin weird. i think delwyn would be relieved about it actually but chan and junhee would not react well at all. sasha's crew is relatively more normal so they would probably notice the no magic thing but care less. they'd be way more focused on the changes in society. hana especially would be fascinated by the tech (which in my head is very steampunk-inspired for some reason)