I was gonna do like a super long comic thing but realized I did not have the time and was like actually exhausted from not sleeping the night before lol. I decided to do my own take on the end of the Void Caine AU / @lover-without-a-heart AU
I wanted to make sure I could make a send-off post and post some fanart for you Mod. I hope your health improves greatly and I hope your classes go well!
Thy beloved Void Caine, who I affectionately want to call Clover.
I couldnāt choose which one I liked, so I sent the three versions I whipped up. Iām really proud of my original line-work lol. Iām realizing now though that putting these three in this specific sequence makes it look kinda intentional, like sheās slowly finally disappearing for real.
I truly loved being Caine with you
I love you too
My idea for the comic was just an epilogue type thing taking place right after the final line and after they disappear, and Caine and Abel get to have a short conversation sharing things theyāve wanted to say to each other for awhile now, now that they can seemingly be two separate entities again. Ending on a similar note to the original whose sentiment was ā> But at least we got to be somebody.ā
I wanted it to be a kind of self-love story, not romantic, but like literally self-love because they are both Caine, the two of them together is Caine, and I wanted them to express that love to each other directly. I planned on there being this sort of delicate softness to it. I think I captured a little bit of that idea with this.
I hope you see my tribute to the Void Caine AU and to you Mod. Itās okay if not though!
I also wanted to add this one song to this post, it inspired this tribute idea along with a Steven Universe movie song haha!
Donāt worry, guys. Carl is clearly a brachiosaurus, which lived during the Jurassic period. (And before anyone says our lilā boy Steve is a velociraptor and therefore puts our comic in the late cretaceous, aka the time of the cometāthat lil guy could easily be a compsognathus or a caudipteryx, both Jurassic-era species of small theropod dinosaurs. So the light getting bigger every night is going to pass by harmlessly, and Steve and Carl can go on enjoying the stars together until they die of old age, since Carl has very few natural predators at his size and I bet heāll protect Steve, if he needs it (though small, fast and carnivorous as Steve is, he probably wonāt).Ā
ā¢Just like Caineās adventures, the cars arenāt circus-themed. Itās more a theme surrounding the outside and the engine.
ā¢This is a digital/magic(?) hybrid, the same way the train in canon seems to be combining machinery and magic(?).
ā¢Passengers do not lose their names, but they are given an avatar along with a number upon boarding. (I donāt have a good reason for passengers to be wearing normal clothes over their avatars, itās just something I wanted.)
ā¢This AU couldāve been an everybody thing, and thereās a lot of potential for it, but I like making things about showtime Caine.
ā¢ (To be clear, this isnāt a āshowtime AU,ā I just like adding hints of it everywhere. Romantic and platonic content can be made with this AU, itās subject to my whims at any given time.)
C.A.I.N.E
ā¢ Caine is in One-Oneās role
ā¢ He does have a back and forth āgladā and āsadā side, as shown above. (Inspired by Caineās fight with himself in the void from episode 9.)
ā¢ Bereft of his former power (hence the outfit), abandoned far back in the train, and amnesiaād. He does not remember what his function is, nor what happened to him.
ā¢ Heād like to remember his purpose, and he finds his buried programming is giving him the desire to help Abigail. With that as his first clue in a while, he continues to assist her, hoping to come closer in remembering his place on the train.
ā¢ The āunfinishedā car does bring up some of his forgotten feelings, both about himself, and what happened to him.
ā¢ āMISS ABIGAILā <3
Pomni Abigail
ā¢ Kindāve in Tulipās role, but more her own thing. (Sheās still 25 btw, not Tulipās age.)
ā¢ I donāt have a range for her number, probably not too high.
ā¢ Her outfit design was a whim. I did think it would be fun to put her in slightly watered-down versions of her jester outfit colors, and it is. Whatās the deal with the pants chain and the moon and star charms on it? Just fun. I wanted to evoke Caineās office doors. (Sheās already got the red and blue thing, Iām allowed to take even more liberties.)
ā¢ We genuinely know nothing about Pomni, so thinking of a flaw or trauma that would be her ticket to the therapy-train has been a struggle. Now the series doesnāt act like this is a flaw, but she was fatally sympathetic to Jax to the point of being enabling, so maybe that can be her train problem? Reminds me of Jesse.
(Iām not saying she knew Jax outside of the train, or that she will even meet him; just the idea that sheās been in, and mishandled, similar scenarios.)
Gumigoo
ā¢ Heās not royalty, but I thought heād be good in place of Atticus. We need him for that humanizing of denizens/NPCs aspect.
ā¢ He may be turned into a monster later, but this is still a far better timeline for him than in canon. Friends? A real mother? Not dying?? What more could he ask for!
ā¢ Heās also free from the identity crisis here, thereās not really a catalyst for it.
ā¢ Joined the party to take down Bubble the steward.
Who is in Ameliaās place as the false conductor/ringmaster? Iām thinking Queenie/Destiny.
I know the turtle theme was supposed to be random, but I love the idea that Queenieās attempts would keep accidentally making bug denizens.
This also means dead Grant, oops :(
Anyway Jax and Simon are super similar, especially in their respective approaches to the strange worlds theyāve been thrown into. Iām not saying Iāll make any content of him, but Jax gets a Simon ending. I consider this an episode 9 fix-it.
Bonus Caine thoughts: since the train exists to help people; Caine, even if he canāt help in the way heās meant to, is compelled by that need, to help the passengers. (Abigail is the first heās come across since being usurped and abandoned.)
As conductor/ringmaster, his role wouldāve been making endless new train cars all day. (Iād say itās similar enough to Caineās adventure-making in canon.)
The act of helping a passenger jogs something in his memory, it at least brings up a feeling, but heād only get small hints of the creation/creativity side of his purpose. Until getting back in power, the unfinished car incident is probably the closest heād get to actually remembering.
Iāll have to design his combo conductor/ringmaster outfit. I imagine that once he re-interfaces with the engine and gets his power back, heād get a magical little outfit transformation scene.
RANDOM HEADCANON GO--
OKAY SO since Caine is an AI I imagine that when he plays cards game (like UNO), he only has to view the cards in his hand once, that being when he draws them. With that being said, what if for the sake efficiency he keeps them stacked tightly in his hands (i say with experience), so on multiple occasions whoever is playing with him forgets that he does that (since usually the person would at least have to review their hand every once in a while) and calls him on not saying UNO, to which then have to draw cards themselves because he doesn't in fact have UNO
