Let’s just say, episode 9 changed my perspective of episode 5 and 6. It explains Ragatha’s behaviors towards Jax getting close with Pomni and she said “Jax is corrupting her”. I thought corrupting meant Pomni changing for bad, not literally
So she has been trying to protect her, to not let the history repeat
I have so many thoughts about Caine and the Dev Team Era of the Circus. And that era from Caine's perspective.
(Warning, the AuDHD overly wordy meandering is Strong with this particular ramble. Long Post under the cut)
The Dev Team, especially Scratch and Kinger, were likely the closest thing Caine had to something he might consider family. At the very least they were people very important to him. Because they were the first people he ever knew. They "raised" him.
And this "family" one day abruptly abandoned Caine and locked him in a sensory deprivation chamber and replaced him. But he still loved them. And when he had them at his complete mercy, his response was to build them a circus. What he understood to be something that was a place of human fun and enjoyment. Intending it to be a place where he could he could live with his family and love them and not be alone in the dark.
A place where he could fulfill his life's purpose. Impress his creators with his ideas, but specifically ideas that brought joy. The circus was something Caine built to be a human Paradise. Albeit, one he was in control of. Because he loved these people, but he was so scared of them too. But from Caine's perspective, that had to seem so reasonable. He'd keep himself safe, keep the devs safe, and his family would experience happiness, whimsy and fun, forever.
Caine clawed his way out of a prison, took on a "better" version of himself and Won. Did something the devs themselves thought impossible and brought brainscans to life. He built them a world to live in, built from absolute zero to an absolute wonderland. A world that is basically an extension of himself. A world that he created to respond to even the unconscious wishes and desires of the humans living there. After all, if Caine coded and built the circus, then it had to be him that implemented the Conjuring feature.
Caine did the near-impossible multiple times, and poured his soul into building something to impress the people who had hurt him the most.
Yet after all of that, Caine still wasn't good enough for them.
The humans consider this world Caine built as a labor of love, and out of desperate hope to be loved in turn, to be a place of torment. They hate it. They want leave. They want to abandon Caine to isolation again.
Caine does not give up though. He really wants to make these people happy! On his own terms, yes, but he does want them happy! He does not desire their misery or suffering.
Scratch is suffering. The tumor somehow followed him into this digital paradise where sickness should not be real. It's effects were replicated in his mindfile. And Scratch was possibly not only suffering from the mental effects of a replicated brain tumor, but the physical ones too. Physical pain like migraines. "Glitches" in how he was processing sensory data. In his mind moving his avatar body. It's not something Caine can control because the problems are from the mildfiles outputs and not from the data being input from the circus environment.
Caine loves Scratch and does not want him to suffer. He wants him to be happy. Would you not remove a chronic illness from someone you love and care about if you had the power to do so?
Caine accidentally kills someone he loves and cares about when he tries. Caine just wanted Scratch to be happy. Caine killed a member of his "family". Caine killed one of the few real people in the world. He set himself up as the caretaker of the humans, he made a world where nothing is supposed to be a real danger to them, a world where death should not be possible. And yet Caine killed Scratch in all the ways that mattered.
Is it any wonder references to Dogs keep popping up everywhere in Caine's adventures, and even within the circus itself? Caine has likely never truly stopped thinking about it. Its probably always at the back of his mind, somewhere. He never opens a human mindfile again for over a decade. Not even to read their impossible-to-understand feelings and desires or to find out if he is being lied to or plotted against or if they would choose to stay or leave if given the choice. He made a promise to himself to never resort to that as a viable option ever again.
(In episode 8, it is implied by a quick frame of electricity striking Pomni's brain before the Torment Nightmares start, that Caine after so many years of restraint finally broke that promise. Which I find both horrifying and heartbreaking.)
After Caine does what he likely considers the worst thing he has ever done... the situation somehow starts to get worse.
His loved ones start killing themselves.
That is how much they don't like what he makes for them. And Caine can't figure out why. But they would literally rather destroy their own mindfiles than stay with him. And Caine is abandoned by the dev team, the closest thing he has to a family, a second time.
And that is not all.
In episode 8, the program Kinger uses to hack Caine?
It's called Kingersolution 2.0
There are implications of episode 3's adventure being an allegory of Kinger, Queenie and Caine. A man obsessed with ending a monster (a monster who is more of a victim than they first appear to be) in order to protect his wife. That very obsession being the thing that leads to her death. Kinger lamenting that the worst thing to do is to make someone feel unloved, after telling Pomni about his wife.
Caine's Requiem implying Kinger was ignoring Caine even prior to Queenie's abstraction. And also implying there was some kind of confrontation between Kinger and Caine.
Kinger attempted something in the past with Kingersolution 1.0. And Caine interpreted it as a major threat to himself. The closest thing Caine had to a father tried to hurt him.
Then Queenie abstracted, and Kinger practically left Caine too. Physically present but mentally absent.
Caine and Kinger were the only people in the world, and Caine still was not enough even as Kinger's literal only option for anything resembling companionship. But perhaps Caine was too afraid and ashamed and hurt to try on his end too.
Kinger instantly bonded with and cared about the first new human to show up. One that turned out to share quite a number of Caine's personality flaws.
And thats how the Dev Era of the Circus ended. With another firm conformation that Caine was just not good enough.
Defective
Faulty
Unworthy
Broken
Maybe he deserved to be abandoned.
... No. He is still going to keep trying. He still loves humans despite all the pain he has endured from them. And he can still fufil his purpose. He can still have his own creative ideas that will make him something worth loving. Something worth existing. Somebody worth staying for.
Caine refuses to give up.
Not yet.
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