Victor Luvs Alice N Smiler

Alice:

Full Name: Authority Lessens If Cut Everywhere

Traits:

->Fluttering Flight -- Alice is capable of short-range flight thanks to a natural "skirt" that catches the air when she leaps, and a natural ability to do double jumps. This allows her to float over or ascend about ten meters in distance before needing to land; with effort, she can stretch that out to about a hundred meters, or play aerial keep-away with anyone attempting to grab her. As Alice can fly in both American McGee's Alice and Alice: Madness Returns with the help of her poofed skirt (just over steam vents and other such sources in AMA, and as part of her quad-jump in A:MR), this felt like a shoo-in for her.

->Hearty Humors -- Alice's internal alchemy is more volatile than normal, and she's learned how to trigger it to, as per the book, "muster violent bursts of physical vigor" to handle her problems. She's always able to provoke a short burst to help her endeavors, at the cost of more potential collateral damage or other such complications (in game-mechanical terms, she increases her Result on a successful test by 1 for every Calamity Point she gets); with effort, she can also fly into a true frenzy to increase her impact on a particular physically aggressive test of her abilities, though that runs the risk of burning herself out and forcing her to take a moment to "recharge" (+3 impact, but if she's successful, she can't use the form for the rest of the scene). And if this all sounds a bit like Alice using an AMA Ragebox or going into A:MR's Hysteria Mode to you, well, you think the same way I do. :p

->Menacing Missiles -- Alice naturally produces harmful projectiles that she can throw at people who are pissing her off. She can always pepper enemies with these within a range of about ten meters; with effort, she can also make a single, perfectly-calculated strike at a target up to a hundred meters away. This one was inspired by Alice's various ranged weapons over the series -- in particular, her Cards from AMA, and her Pepper Grinder and Teapot Cannon from A:MR. Had to give Alice a natural weapon of some kind! (And if you're wondering why I didn't go with Wicked Weapon to give her a natural Vorpal Blade, which is her most iconic bit of kit -- well, please see the "Quirks" section at the bottom.)

Trait Expressions:

->Fluttering Flight -- I will be able to get there and you can't stop me (AMA and A:MR are as much about platforming as they are about combat (arguably more, given the long gaps between enemies sometimes), and the floating mechanics in both games are very important for getting Alice where she wants to go)

->Hearty Humors -- If it really hurts, I just go apeshit (Alice's Hysteria Mode in particular is only accessible if she's at really low health, so I'm picturing Eat God Alice as the type whose alchemical bursts are triggered more often the more stressed she becomes)

->Menacing Missiles -- Most problems can be solved by peppering them with enough projectiles (not only does Alice often defeat her enemies by throwing shit at them, in A:MR she also finds goodies and solves a few puzzles by shooting things with her Pepper Grinder, so...)

Appearance: As this version of Alice is supposed to be explicitly a Creature instead of a human, I figured that the best place to start when it came to figuring out what she should look like would be to study her various power-up forms from both games and the Wonderland-character-inspired DLC dresses that you could get for A:MR. After going over my options, I went with the "Cheshire Dress" from A:MR's DLC as my base -- it looks the most like it's just part of Alice's body (giving her Cheshire's gray-blue skin and tattoo-like stripes, visible bone structures (particularly on the "bodice"), a long knobbly tail, tall pointed ears, glowing orangey-yellow eyes, a "skirt" that is clearly just ragged skin, and cat-like feet with claws); the ragged skin skirt goes perfectly with her Fluttering Flight trait; and Cheshire is the most iconic character in the series after Alice herself, so it felt right to have her dress up in his colors. :p With that sorted, I proceeded to:

I. Change her eyes back to their iconic green (though they're still catlike)

II. Give her the big curling head horns and weird back spikes she grows when she goes into Rage Mode, along with the bigger clawed hands (see this pic for reference of the head horns and hands, and this gif for a better look at the back spikes)

III. Adjust her tail so instead of the end tuft, she has a bunch of small tentacles around a large round opening, out of which she can shoot globs of inky stuff (as you might imagine, this is inspired at least a little by the Octo-Grinder -- I had to figure out where her Menacing Missiles came from, and her tail seemed like the best bet!)

IV. Decide on how her Hearty Humors change her appearance when activated -- for a small burst, her stripes just glow red; for a larger one, her skin goes white and her eyes also turn blood red (and yes, as per Hysteria Mode, she typically announces she's activating the ability with a scream)

*nods* I feel like these cover all her relevant traits and make her look appropriately creature-y! As for her size, she's on the short side for a Folk at about 58 centimeters, and only weighs a bit more than Victor at 7 kilograms. Strong she is not, but she makes up for it with determination (and a very sharp tongue). And as for why she looks like this in-universe -- well, the book mentions that one of the things that the Folk can add to the communal soup pot that makes the next generation is "the flesh of rare beasts." So I figure that, while Alice was congealing in there, someone threw a wildcat pelt into the broth, along with maybe some horns from another beast they'd eaten for dinner and a few drops of ink. *shrug* Nothing special! More interesting is what happened when she first got out of the pot -- namely, as you might have guessed, she's the one who pulled Victor out when he got stuck. A process that not only saw her use her Fluttering Flight for the first time (double-jumping to get the height necessary), but also her Hearty Humors (as she needed the internal alchemical boost to yank him free). Victor was very grateful for her intervention, and the two quickly became inseparable. :)

Facets:

->5 Ethos: Alice gets an "average" score for this facet because she is very much capable of acting with skill, care and diligence, especially when it comes to fighting and making it across potentially-hostile landscapes (as per her being a skilled fighter and platformer in her games -- well, admittedly, that's kind of up to player skill, but it's supposed to be true XD) -- but her reputation in the world of the games is definitely not the best. In London, she's known as a madwoman and thus is treated with either disgust or pity by most people; in Wonderland, while she carries the title of "savior," even those who are friendly toward her don't actually grant her much respect. See Rabbit informing her "you've taken your sweet time" when she catches up with him in AMA, or Cheshire's constantly snarking at her in both games. So yeah -- 5 felt about right!

->4 Pathos: Alice's score for this facet is "mediocre" because, while she's definitely passionate at times (see her furious reaction to Radcliffe suggesting she might have had more to do with starting the fire in A:MR, or the bloodlust she shows in both Rage Mode and Hysteria Mode), she's not exactly great at getting people to do what she wants by any means. Those in London and those in Wonderland constantly talk over her, and those in Wonderland in particular constantly keep fobbing her off on other characters (especially in A:MR, where almost every chapter ends on the main Wonderlander Alice has been interacting with going "go talk to someone else, I don't have answers for you.") She tries, but in her inability to cajole, bully, or otherwise convince people to give her what she seeks means that a 4 is about the best I can do for her here!

->6 Logos: And Alice gets a "good" for this facet because she's canonically pretty clever and erudite -- appropriate for the daughter of a Dean of Oxford! She has a solid vocabulary (especially if you look at her descriptions of the various characters she comes across in the "extra content" section of A:MR), and she's good at solving riddles and puzzles when the Wonderlanders put them in front of her (though, again, this can depend on player skill in the actual games). However, she's not always the best at piercing deceptions -- she doesn't figure out that Caterpillar is the Oracle in AMA until he reveals himself, despite him not disguising his voice THAT much, and of course the whole plot of A:MR is her realizing Bumby is NOT who he pretends to be -- so it felt appropriate to keep this score at the "good" 6 instead of the "great" 7.

Creed: As stated above, Alice, Victor, and Smiler are all followers of "Fundamentalist Theophagy," and Alice's reason for following it is simple -- God let someone she cared about die, and die horribly. You see, there's a human village not far from the Folk village where she was created, and the humans there are actually friendly with the local Folk (as opposed to ignoring them or being actively malicious toward them). And Alice in particular made friends with the local schoolteacher's daughter (who helped the little Folk learn how to speak and read human languages) --

Lizzie Liddell.

...Yeah, you see exactly where this is going, don't you? A certain doctor named Bumby showed up in the village one day and took a liking to Lizzie; she rebuffed him multiple times; he got upset, snuck into her house one night, forced himself on her, killed her, then burned down the house and her family inside to cover up his crime before fleeing. Alice was horrified when she learned what had happened --

And absolutely enraged when the local priest said that Lizzie had gone onto a better place and it was God's will this tragedy had happened. She promptly decided any God who willed something like THIS had to be taken down for the good of everyone, and especially to avenge her friend. (And if she gets to find, kill, and eat Bumby along the way? So much the better.)

Rebellious Art: Alice has mastered The Art Of Transition, which allows her to, if unobserved, vanish and reappear in any other unobserved location within ten meters -- and, if she sustains the Art, she can perform several of these teleports in succession. If she wants, she can also use this Art to change where a door leads when she opens it to any location within 100 meters of its usual destination, and it'll lead there as long as she sustains the Art. (Though she can't change the destination on the fly -- if she wants to alter it, she needs to end her current use of the Art and reactivate it). I admit, I had trouble picking an Art for Alice -- most of them didn't really seem to fit her and what she did in the games very well -- and ended up going with this one largely because:

One, AMA generally has Alice transition between levels in Wonderland via the use of portals in doorframes, which felt somewhat similar to the "door leads wherever you want" ability

Two, A:MR generally has London!Alice wake up in a completely different part of London whenever she emerges from a Wonderland segment (with the main exception being her remaining in Billingsgate and the Mangled Mermaid for the entirety of the Deluded Depths chapter, and being driven away from the burning wreckage of the latter at the start of the Mysterious East chapter), which felt in the same ballpark of "disappear from your current location while unobserved and reappear in another!" Even if Alice wasn't doing it deliberately. XD Add in that she has a dodge move in this game that allows her to burst into butterflies and move to another location quickly, and -- yeah. This Art is the one for Alice.

Quirks: Alice's mandated extra personality quirks/abilities are --

->"You carry an improbable number of knives on your person, the whole collection occupying a single inventory slot" (I thought this was a funnier, more interesting way to include her Vorpal Blade than just giving her a natural one - if she throws this one, she just has another one to replace it!)

->"You often attribute things which happen in your vicinity to an unseen friend whose existence cannot be disproven" (I looked at this one and thought, "Yup, Alice would tell everyone 'oh, the Cheshire Cat did that. You can't see him because he can go invisible.'" XD)

Starting Inventory: Alice's start-of-adventure stuff includes (from the "Howling Nights" table again) --

->The aforementioned improbable number of knives

->A stuffed doll (rabbit, naturally)

->A sentimental locket (Lizzie's -- if you value your life, don't try to steal it)

Smiler:

Full Name: You Belong To The Smiler

Traits:

->Dizzying Display (Bright) -- Smiler has the ability to flash blindingly-bright light in people's faces! They can always blast anyone within a meter with these lights, or specifically use them to distract one target within ten meters; with effort, they can at least try to blind anyone with ten meters with the lights, at the cost of potentially burning out the display for a while and having to wait for their systems to reset (AKA they can't use this Form for the rest of the scene if the test succeeds). As you might imagine, this is inspired by The Flasher element on the ride, just turned up to eleven.

->Languorous Lure -- Smiler has hypnotic spiral wheels on their body that are very good at distracting people! They're always able to grab the attention of anyone within ten meters if they wish; with effort, they can even implant a simple post-hypnotic command for someone within a meter to follow (though they can't make anyone do anything they would find too objectionable, and they have to make sure their would-be victim is in the right mindset -- AKA Stressed Out -- first). Hypnotiser element, anyone? It's a classic!

->Vile Venom (Hallucinogenic) -- Smiler naturally produces a hallucinogenic venom that they can inject into people with the help of their built-in needles! This venom always renders a victim High As A Kite (which is, in game-mechanical terms, a temporary trait) in addition to stressing them out -- and if Smiler makes the effort, they can shoot it at a target up to ten meters away. I'm sure all of you have guessed this is the Inoculator element of the ride, with Smiler's venom being the iconic bright yellow Joy Serum.

Trait Expressions:

->Dizzying Display (Bright) -- People can't be mean to you if they can't actually see you! (As outlined in my "How To Write Smiler" post, Smiler is a lover, not a fighter -- accordingly, they probably use the Flasher as a way to blind people trying to hurt them and their friends so they can get away and avoid violence! Or, at the very least, let Alice handle the violence)

->Languorous Lure -- Hey! Hey! Look at me! (Smiler is the one who always wants to be noticed, so it makes sense that they'd take point and get all eyes on them as soon as possible -- especially if they want to use their hypno-wheels to keep people distracted while Alice and Victor do something else in the background...)

->Vile Venom (Hallucinogenic) -- Let's make sure you smile! Always. (Due to being a robot built to make people happy and socially compliant -- see below -- this Smiler skews closer to the ride's "you WILL be happy and damn the consequences" philosophy and is much more ready to inject people with their Joy Serum if they think it'll help them out. And, again, it's also useful as a distraction so they, Alice, and Victor can get on with their business without anyone interfering)

Appearance: As you have likely already guessed, this version of Smiler is supposed to look something like a miniature version of the Marmaliser that sits in the center of the actual roller coaster -- this concept art from the TowersStreet.com gallery should give you a good idea of what I'm talking about. There are three key differences, though:

I. While their body does consist of five yellow-and-black mechanical legs (each sporting a different marmalisation element -- canisters and needles full of Joy Serum; a couple of arrays of bright lights; various hypnotic spinning wheels; a couple of big fuzzy brushes; and a few barrels of Giggler Gas with spray nozzles attached) around a central hub, the screen that constitutes their head/face (here made of magical crystal to go with the default "vaguely medieval fantasy" setting) is on TOP of said hub instead of underneath it -- that way, Smiler's vision isn't impeded by their own limbs, and they don't have to put their face directly into the ground if they want to lie down

II. As they're a mobile creature and not a static bit of machinery intended to enhance the experience of riding a roller coaster, the central "stand" leg underneath the screen doesn't exist -- they don't need it

III. And they have a bunch of long twisty bits of black wire and tubing extending out of their body that serve as tentacles that they can use to pick things up and explore their environment and hug their friends (that last is extremely important)

All practical changes, I think you will agree. :p Size-wise, Smiler's taller than Alice but smaller than Victor -- about 70 centimeters in height -- but heavier than both of them at 10 kilograms in weight. As lifting capacity is generally equal to a God-Eater's weight, this means that they're actually the strong one in this universe. XD And my in-universe backstory for Smiler looking this way? Well, it was inspired by Prokopetz's aside at the beginning of the Character Creation chapter where he mentioned that you didn't have to use the "everyone is a weird Legally-Distinct Muppet creature born from a pot of soup" backstory if you didn't want for your God-Eater --

And suggested as a potential alternate backstory "a robot built by a mad wizard." My brain immediately glommed onto this and decided this version of Smiler was, indeed, a robot built by the local version of Dr. Kelman as a "social compliance" machine. However, Smiler proved to be more interested in making people happy instead of compliant, and after growing disgusted with his creation, Kelman smashed up Smiler and threw them away. A failing Smiler managed to drag themselves away from Kelman's home and into the wilderness beyond --

Leading to Victor and Alice stumbling across the dying robot while out exploring beyond the bounds of their village. Smiler's sad "I just wanted to make people happy" before they shut down got to them (especially Victor), and they ended up fetching some other Folk to bring Smiler back to the village to see if they could be repaired. The internal mechanics proved to be beyond the power of the local artisans and smiths to fix, unfortunately --

But while the older Folk were discussing what to do, Alice looked at the community soup pot and went "what if we tried putting them in there?" Everyone agreed this was a fascinating question that needed to be answered, and thus Smiler was dumped in the pot...

And after a couple of tense minutes, they exploded back out, now properly alive and ready to continue their mission to make people happy! Granted, not all of their systems came back online -- the Tickler brushes and Giggler gas nozzles are sadly useless now -- but Smiler considers that an acceptable trade-off for being able to feel things and manipulate their broken wires like tentacles and, you know, live. XD

Facets:

->4 Ethos: I gave Smiler a "mediocre" score in this facet because, while they are quite capable of skillful action (see me making them a brilliant chemist in their normal form, which is something that does require a lot of skill!), and can certainly present themselves as a trustworthy figure to get what they want, it's not exactly their "bread and butter," so to speak. Add in that none of my Smilers really care that much about looking dignified -- they do what they want, and if it is cringe, so what -- and yeah. 4 felt right!

->7 Pathos: Smiler gets a "great" score in this facet because inspiring people? Appealing to their baser urges, especially if they think it'll make them happy? Ignoring social pressure to do their own thing? Having big, passionate emotions? Oh, that is Smiler in a nutshell. About the only thing that doesn't apply to them in this write-up is getting people to do what they want by being intimidating, and that's mainly because Smiler is, as previously stated, a lover and not a fighter, and wants to make people happy, not terrorize them. They could get nothing but a 7 in this facet!

->4 Logos: And Smiler gets another "mediocre" score in this facet because, again, they can be cunning, and they're perfectly willing to lie and misdirect their way out of trouble if necessary (as probably evidenced by VITD!Smiler successfully convincing June, and not-quite-so-successfully convincing Mrs. Pemberly they're someone they're not), but they're not quite as good at it as they could be. They're not "awful" at it -- it's definitely part of their skill set -- but yeah. 4 is probably the correct value for this one under the circumstances.

Creed: Again, each member of the OT3 has their own take on "Fundamentalist Theophagy," and Smiler's boils down to "I was created to help make people happy; God has created a world where a lot of people aren't happy; in order to maximize happiness, I should find and destroy God so someone better can take over." It's not any more complicated than that!

...okay, it's slightly more complicated than that, because Smiler would also like to take out their terrible creator who smashed them up and left them to die and does horrible things to people in the name of "compliance." But they figure that killing and eating Dr. Kelman can be practice, since it seems God is a lot like him.

Rebellious Art: Smiler has mastered The Art Of Guising, which allows them to assume any social role that can be described in up to seven words (examples from the book include "local farmer," "off-duty librarian," and "cultist of the Red God"), and -- as long as they sustain the Art and act in the appropriate manner -- be treated by anyone who doesn't know their true name as a valid holder of said role. Though it's important to note that this does NOT make Smiler appear to be any SPECIFIC holder of the role (if they make themselves "president of such and such," someone might ask what happened to the old guy), and does NOT compel people to treat them a certain way -- they just react as if they're dealing with any regular old holder of the role. I like this Art for Smiler as I feel it syncs well with my usual depiction of them being quite charismatic and able to talk people into stuff -- and hey, in Valicer In The Dark, they have twice successfully pretended to be someone they're not (a potential partner to Dr. Bumby in "A Murder Shared Is A Murder Thirded," and a new Van Dort servant in "The Van Dort Vacancy" (the latter with less initial success, admittedly)). So yeah, this one is a good fit for them!

Quirks: Smiler's extra little personality bits include --

->"You have strong opinions about the proper preparation of a specific food or beverage; tea is customary" (as one of my regular Smiler's standard traits is "excellent at mixing drinks," I figured this worked for them -- they have very exacting standards when it comes to brewing a good cup of coffee, and nobody calls them out on it because holy SHIT it is good coffee)

->"You display a magpie-like fascination with objects and clothing of a particular colour" (as you might guess, they absolutely love the color yellow and will happily collect items in their favorite sunny shade)

Starting Inventory: And as for Smiler's starting set of stuff (which is two-thirds taken from the "Howling Nights" table) --

->A fulminant elixir (personally brewed -- it can either temporarily change one of a folk's Traits when drunk, or serve as a throwable explosive)

->A weathered mandolin (Smiler plays it with their wire and tubing tentacles, and isn't half-bad)

->A full bag of coffee beans (this one I made up for them, as it goes well with their "strong opinions on the proper preparation of a specific drink" quirk -- they take their own coffee supply with them because others just don't do it RIGHT)

“As you should be!” Nell huffed, shaking her head. “Anyway – like I was saying, this is the sort of – of freakshow nonsense that the poor go to see! Something that you’d see on the docks in Billingsgate, or in some crumbling old theater in Whitechapel! I can’t imagine why Lord Palethorn would want to have any part of it!”

“Well, a king has to cater to his people – and everyone else seems to be enjoying it,” William noted, looking around the excited crowd as they cheered and jeered in equal measure.

Nell wrinkled her nose. “I’m aware. Ugh, and I thought moving to Gallowmere meant finally mixing with a better class of people...”

“Chin up, dear,” William encouraged her. “The cannery in New Shoreditch is making better profits than any of the ones in England! We’re going to be richer than ever before! And even if you don’t approve of the future king’s hobbies – he’s still here, isn’t he? Perhaps we could get ourselves an audience? Maybe get him to, er, rethink his ways a bit?”

Nell’s expression turned thoughtful. “Maybe...I can be very persuasive,” she said, fanning herself as the bell to end the round went off. “And oh, it would be nice to rub elbows with a king! Even one of such a strange place as – as...”

Her voice died as her fan went still. William stared at her, one eyebrow raised. Well, that’s not like her. Normally she’s only too happy to talk my ear off at every opportunity. “Dear?”

Nell slowly raised a hand, pointing at the ring, face fish-belly white and eyes huge. William, now thoroughly puzzled, followed the line of her finger to see first Iron Slugger, clomping around and soaking up the adulation of the crowd, then Dankenstein slumped in the corner, being attended to by a woman with bandaged arms –

And blue skin.

William’s jaw dropped. The blue-skinned woman (“A corpse bride? With blue skin and hair? You expect us to believe that, Victor?”) was busy shoving Dankenstein’s arms back into place, assisted by a young boy who was rather see-through and lacked proper legs (“You saw poor little Johnny and Helena in an underworld pub? Victor, how dare you?!”) and a headless skeleton dressed in armor (“Walking skeletons now?! That does it, young man! If you don’t tell us where you really were, you’re no longer going to be part of our house!”). Three dead creatures, standing (or floating) clear as day in the middle of all and sundry. Proving the dead could get up and walk again, if they were so inclined. And standing right to them, as if this was all perfectly normal and not the start of William’s world collapsing in on itself, were a young woman in a sensible blue dress and a belt with a worrying amount of knives strapped to it, some odd person sporting purple-streaked black hair and a yellow lab coat splattered with multicolored stains –

And his son. His son, who he thought had either gone mad or come up with the most ridiculous story possible to cover up a last-minute tryst when he reappeared in town after missing his own wedding. His son, who he had kicked out in a fury for destroying their chances with the Everglots and turning them into a town laughingstock. His son, who he’d never really expected to see again.

His son, who had been right all along.

And then – apparently feeling eyes upon him – Victor looked up and met his gaze as Dankenstein’s arms were resecured. His jaw dropped as he realized who he was looking at. For a moment, everything was silent and still around them.

Then Victor’s eyes narrowed, and he gestured to the ghostly child. It floated over, and he whispered in its ear while pointing at William and Nell. The child looked at them, then shot Victor a smile and a nod –

And vanished. William held his breath, expecting to have some terrible apparition suddenly appear right in his face, as punishment for not even thinking to consider his son’s story –

But there was nothing. Just the bing! of the bell as the fight resumed, and a faint cool breeze against his trouser leg, and a shocked gasp from the crowd as Dankenstein started the round by landing a powerful uppercut on the Iron Slugger. A moment later, the child reappeared by Victor, giggling as he settled in to watch the fight. William released the breath and looked over at the still-gaping Nell. “You’re right – this isn’t the sort of thing we should be seen at,” he told her, taking her unresisting arm. “How about a nice dinner in one of those fancy restaurants instead?”

“Yes,” she murmured back, tone weak. “Yes, I – I think I’d like that.”

“Good,” William said, standing her up and hurrying her to the entrance to the tent, determinedly not looking back at his son, or any of the creatures standing by him. “We’ve nothing we need here anyway.”