#voidbreak

Adel is paranoid about car crashes and refuses to drive unless everyone in the vehicle has their seatbelt on. He gets anxious on highways.

Zivon is afraid of heights and gets really bad vertigo, she also has hemophilia and emetophobia, and trypanophobia [fear of needles/injections] from growing up chronically ill.

10. Name an OC who has a unique fashion sense

TBH i'm personally very preoccupied with fashion so i would say most of my characters have their own unique style, but this is def the most sci-fantasy one.

Nova Kane is the alias of a shapeshifting pop star, known for its iconic clashing palettes of both clothing and physicality. It easily flows between any body shape and gender presentation, with no one 'true' form - no, this does not give it identity issues. In contrary, Nova Kane embraces the impermanence as a sense of freedom, a freedom also expressed in its fashion choices. Big statement pieces, and a distinct focus on form and color, each outfit from Nova Kane is an art piece. Its been known to use these outfits - especially for music videos and live performances - to become part of its own sets and to portray scenes on its own body, such as a sunrise-to-sunset transition or portraying itself as a living mountain. For the tenth anniversary tour of its eponymous debut album, Nova used a series of costumes and appearances to perform as various celestial bodies, including a planned encore as a sparkling holochromatic nebula; an elaborate headpiece of lights and gemstones, and a sprawling dress of atzmut, the physical matter of majiq energy, which could reflect the sensory output of any element. 11. Name an OC who doesn't outwardly show much emotion. I love this question. I actually have two that come to mind. Juliette Gæshônêsh [geh-show-neesh] is a horned dragon who is terra-dominant. In my writing, the element of Terra is associated to apathy and can cause and alexithymia. Juliette is the center of a conspiracy led by her father and several other neo-fascists who seek to create a second Drakonic Imperium. Because dragons are largely matriarchal, the former Imperium founded and led by an Empress, Juliette was born to be a figurehead for this new Imperium, claimed to be blessed by the First Dragons. Grooming and other abuse triggered alexithymia and apathy as a defense mechanism, which unfortunately also makes it easier for her to be used as a puppet for the Drekivald schemes. She's not lacking autonomy or agency though - in spite of her inability to express emotions with body language and tone, she does feel and want to escape her situation, and resents the adults around her. Her path to rebellion begins when, in the garden of her isolated home, a Fey boy stumbles out of the woodlands and steals her father's second favorite object to her, his prized motorcycle. The relationship she forms with him, Dorian, sets of the chain of events that for better or worse, change her life forever.

Perhaps less melodramatically, though she'd resent the statement:

Samara Morgenstern was born to a Chimera mother, in an unexpected group of triplets. While her brother Ewan was born normally, she and her sister Magdalena were born with their tails wrapped around one another's throats and needed emergency intervention. In addition to the oxygen deprivation in the womb, Samara was born with two sets of accessory fox ears intersecting one another, underdeveloped ear canals, and abnormal cochlea. As a result she is completely deaf to material sound, and her cochlea only pick up the vibrations of the leylines. The only thing she can hear is the music of majiq energy. Samara and Mags had a rough few years health-wise, and the two formed an extremely close bond, to the exclusion of even their fellow triplet. The two girls developed a cryptophasia sign language, and even as Samara was taught standard signing, she and Mags never stopped their twinspeak, which remained incomprehensible to nearly everyone except Ewan, who learned some of their common signs over time.

All of this early enmeshment between Samara and Mags led to emotional stunting, some language development delays, and other issues and quirks. Samara was the only deaf member in a family of yappers, who did love her and did their best to not neglect her socially, but this combined with her other neurodivergent symptoms led to her withdrawing into herself and creating a rich internal world - a world that only Mags had access to. Tying all this rambling back into the question - these factors lead to Samara having a very atypical expression of emotions, often using signs to state how she feels rather than outwardly expressing it. She does have moments of expressing emotion, but it takes extreme or specific circumstances for her to naturally physically express her emotions, and its usually when speaking to Mags in their personal sign language.

Dante Morgenstern becomes a triple amputee over the course of work as an Imperator [i'll do a write up on Imperators eventually]; he loses most of his right arm to a Belial's infection, his right leg just above the knee to a territorial Tarasque who settled itself too close to a school, and has his whole left leg ripped off by a hungry Roc which had roosted in a local quarry and devoured some workers. The Roc particularly sucked, cuz it also threw him a number of yards down into the quarry and he had to finish fighting with a self-cauterized wound and massive concussions, and his reward for surviving was hospitalization, and over a year in recovery.

I've read a lot about how real world amputees feel about prosthetics, especially hand prosthetics, and taking all that in; I think Dante grows to really like his specialized leg prosthetics, but his arm prosthetic is a bitch to deal with and he only wears it for work. He definitely just chills in a wheelchair at home, though, he probably has a pretty simple chair in comparison to his high tech prosthetics. It feels like, only appropriate to pay homage to Guts from Berserk with Dante's arm prosthetic though, with it being a weapon; I think, also, that kind of thing makes it deeply impractical as an everyday prosthetic. I'm not sure exactly where to take the weaponized prosthetic aspect of the arm, though I do think if it fires any projectiles [ala Guts] it's gotta be a pain in the ass and have the potential to dislocate Dante's shoulder if he uses it improperly or even just too frequently.

So, I'm going to focus on the leg prosthetics first and foremost. I think they're simple, elegant devices that are no bullshit like the over-designed arm prosthetic [I also am thinking, his colleagues pressured him about the arm prosthetic, and he has regrets about it even though it does provide useful function.] Dante is, in practice, a kind of spellsword, and battle majiq in Voidbreak is taught as a form of martial dance. His legs need to provide good support for running, jumping, lifting, and quick movements. With one being a through hip amputation, we're probably leaning a bit on the suspension of disbelief and saying that he had a successful hip implant and helps with mobility, shock absorption, etc. Definitely has residual hip pain, especially when he's been on his feet for a while, another reason why he still uses a wheelchair pretty often.

There are two prosthetics I found that I think are a good place to start for designing Dante's legs: one for mountain climbing, one for bobsledding. clicking images will link to the articles I found.

Mountain climbing one had real world tests and prototyping, I'm a big fan of the hoof-like sole for gripping. I'm keeping the tester critiques in mind, mostly, over the visuals of the prosthetic.

Bobsledding one seems more conceptual, and I'm not sure if it moved past designing stages, but for my purposes as a scifantasy writer that's alright with me. In particular I like the elegant, digitigrade-esque silhouette and the adjustable air shock system.

Dante is a big guy, and I think the musculature of the bobsledding prosthetic fits him very well. I'm thinking of using this as a base design, and adding the rubber hoof to the foot area, maybe as something he can drop down and pull up like landing gear or Heelys. That way he maintains the sleek low profile, but could like, kick his heels or smth to drop the goat hoof sections to help climbing.