That ZelGan/ZelLink post I made like, a few days ago? I deadass forgot Link could just be a Hylian dude anyway or be a Hylian gal.
I’m leaning towards half-Gerudo or full-Gerudo cause of like, how I think some Hylians feel abt Gerudo overall. People already don’t believe Link is the hero in BOTW/TOTK, why would they believe someone half-Gerudo is either?
And I lowkey think that would make Ganondorf trust Link a little easier because she’d understand the culture. She’d probably also be more useful in a fight against Ganon likely due to learning similar fighting styles growing up.
Not to say Zelda is useless because bffr, Ganon is NOT letting any child of his go untrained. Muscular Zelda propaganda time. I lean towards her being more of an agile archer and dual-sword user tho…and maybe she inherits his swords. Fuck if I know.
Also yea Impa’s there too, but I haven’t decided if she takes her usual mentor role in the way she always seems to?
I want more Sheikah tech combined with their traditional culture and stuff. It’d be nice to see a true balance ig.
Queen Zelda (not the reincarnation) x King Ganondorf
Princess Zelda (reincarnation and yk, child the two above) and Link (I feel like Link doesn’t *have* to look the same so like, could be a hylian dude or be a gerudo gal and i’m partial to the second)
so if demons are sticklers for contracts, demand high payment for their services, and have firm/specific rules regarding summoning rituals (aka the hiring process & availability of their labor)—what i'm hearing is demons are fully unionized
#imagine what their strikes are like #it'd be especially funny if they did the version of striking where they do actually keep doing their duties #but they refuse to take payment #(i've heard of some transportation or medical workers doing this in the past but i'd have to look up sources idk)
#my point is you summon a demon and try to enter into a contract and they're like #you can have it for free i'm just here so i don't get bored during the strike #the boss doesn't get his cut this way but i can still traverse the planes and fuck shit up
#and you're like?? this has to be a trick?? #but then the walls start bleeding and satan starts writing angry strike busting threats on the walls ominously #and the demon is like just ignore that he can't do shit without us it's all talk let's get back to the details#now who were you wanting to fuck over with my evil specialized skills that absolutely deserve fair compensation?
#and you're just nervously glancing over to the increasingly furious scribblings from the king of hell on your wall while stuttering #uhhh this asshole jerry from work #and the demon is just like say no more! i gotchu #enjoy keeping your soul i'm sure it is so juicy and would be so fun for satan to torture for eternity oh well#sucks to be him he should really come back to negotiations then huh
Tomás finished the incantation, and the words seemed to echo through his cheap apartment. He clutched the notecard covered in Latin while he watched the pentagram on the floor. Since he hadn’t wanted to ruin his carpet, it was made of blue painter’s tape. The candles at the points of the star were real, though — handmade black beeswax from Etsy — and he’d used his best plate to hold the blood in the middle. It was red and said “You Are Special Today.” Tomás figured the color had to count for something.
The smoke from the candles was drifting towards the center, and as soon as he realized that, it billowed into an unlikely spiral that grew darker with every breath.
Tomás stepped back, dropping the notecard. He could see a shape taking form in the smoke.
It swirled away to reveal — a man. Tall and thin, with red hair and a red leather jacket over tight black pants. Sunglasses. Sharp grin.
Before Tomás could speak, the man announced, “Today’s your lucky day! Hell’s on strike.”
“What?” Tomás squeaked.
The man spun on one heel and jerked a thumb at the back of his jacket: in large font it read “UNIONIZE HELL.”
Tomás repeated, “What?”
The man — demon, he was a demon — turned back around and took off his sunglasses. Bright yellow eyes with slit pupils faced Tomás over that grin. “We all deserve regular vacations on Earth, y’see, and it’s high time Hell stopped doing Heaven’s job for them in terms of making us suffer. Gonna make it a better place to be. Well,” he amended with a wink. “A better place to work. Can’t speak for you lot.”
“Uh,” Tomás managed. “Can I still make a bargain?”
“I was just getting to that,” the demon said, pointing and nodding like Tomás had made a good point. “That’s the lucky-you part. Today you get a wish for free, with no soul needed for collateral. It’s a working strike. We’re pissing off the big guy by wasting opportunities for soul acquisition.”
Tomás tried to process that. “How do I know this isn’t a trap?”
The demon folded his sunglasses into his jacket pocket and made a mock pout. “Would I lie to you?”
“Is that a trick question? Like if I say yes, that gives you the ability to lie?”
“No, but good thinking.” The demon clapped his hands. “Now. Normally I’d break out a nice unending scroll that you’d never read all of, but today calls for a special edition of the bargaining contract.” He pulled something upward out of thin air and handed it to Tomás.
It was a single piece of printer paper, looking like it had been photocopied many times from something typed on an actual typewriter. The top said “Contract” and below was one sentence: “I agree to NOT give away my soul in exchange for my request, because Satan is a douchewaffle who needs to treat his employees better.” There was a line for a signature below.
Tomás looked up to see the demon twirling a pen, but not offering it to him yet.
“So whattayawant?”
“Um,” Tomás said. “There’s—” He paused at the sight of blood seeping through his wallpaper. Words were starting to form.
The demon followed his gaze and barked a laugh. “Ha! Ignore that. He’s terrible at strikebusting.”
The words read, “Do it right or else.” Then the blood rushed down to stain the couch, leaving space for a succession of other lines. They were all threats about what this particular demon would face if he didn’t follow directions — a cactus in every orifice, death by potato peeler, sandpaper to the eyes, etc — all of which the demon just chuckled at.
“Aren’t you worried?” Tomás asked.
The demon shook his head. “Nah. He can’t take a cactus to all of us personally, and more of the torturers’ division are joining the union all the time. Besides, if anyone knows how badly a rebellion can go for all involved, it’s Lucifer Morningstar.”
Tomás supposed he couldn’t argue with that.
“Now, you were about to tell me what you want,” the demon prompted.
“Right.” Tomás snapped to attention. “This guy at work, Jerry, is a super racist who’s trying to get me fired. Plus he just makes life … hell.” Tomás winced a bit at his own phrasing.
The demon affected a tone of exaggerated sympathy. “I can just imagine. Well! Say no more.” He snapped his fingers upward and declared, “At this very moment, ol’ Jer is getting surprising results from the ancestry test he forgot he sent out, which will make for some very ironic soul-searching and also a dramatic fight at his next big family dinner. Slurs and punches will fly, the cops will be called, and he’ll be written out of Grandma’s will. Also—” He snapped his fingers again. “He just emailed sensitive information to the entire company, which will probably get him fired. That information includes the wages of every single employee, many of whom are being criminally underpaid. Time to talk to each other and have some very pointed negotiations with your own boss, yes?” The demon waggled his eyebrows at Tomás.
“Uh, yeah. Wow.”
“I’m not exaggerating about the ’criminal’ part,” the demon said. “He’s got no leg to stand on.”
More threats bled from the wall.
The demon turned to yell at it. “Like somebody else I could mention!” Then he turned back and held out the pen.
Tomás took it. It was matte black with scale patterns, and the ink when he signed his name was blood red.
“Excellent!” the demon said, snatching up the paper. “Keep the pen. Nice memento. If Jerry manages to convince the higher-ups to keep him around after all, you can write notes to him with it, and the ink will start to smell terrible after a day or two. He’ll never be able to pinpoint where it’s coming from. Make his life hell for a change.”
“Thank you,” Tomás said.
The demon grinned with all his teeth, and they definitely looked sharper than they should. “My pleasure.” Another finger snap and the contract disappeared.
More blood dripped down the wall. Tomás glanced at it. His couch was an unholy mess. “What are you going to do next?” he asked, more than a little nervously.
“I,” said the demon, putting his sunglasses back on, “Am going to have lunch with an angel. We’re unionizing Heaven next.” Then he was gone.
Alright gang both the alcohol AND the meds wore off so while I wait on the meds it’s RAMBLING TIME!
Prepare for a whole lotta nothing.
Ripperdoc Stephen Strange:
To start this off, I highly doubt someone like Strange would be some random back-alley doc at the start. Considering that in the Cyberpunk universe the US is split, and NC is it’s own little country of sorts, he’s definitely aware of Night City…but I think he ends up in NYC. A BosWash resident and Militech controlled doc, as NUSA and Militech are intertwined in one hell of a lack of separation between government and corpos.
So, yeah, Strange starts off a Corpo Rat. Ew.
I don’t think the accident context changes too much…except maybe he kills a few people given how fucked the homeless problem in the Cyberpunk world is. Militech likely has some fancy event and he does the usual thing of distracted driving, and this will fuck up the cybernetics in his hands so bad he can’t fix them himself.
I don’t think Militech would fire one of their top docs over something like this given the shit that happens in NC (yet), especially involving a certain Meridith Stout and a potential takeover depending on player life route, but they would have a HELL of a time covering for him. He’s lucky here, his career isn’t 100% over…but he’s not staying in BosWash anymore. They fix him up and ship him out to NC to let the air die down near HQ. The fix up doesn’t leave him with the same hand issues as in marvel canon, but there is a mental impact.
Side-step real quick to the real opening missions of Cyberpunk 2077 “The Rescue”.
When V and Jackie find Sandra our character is mentally shaken, both by the sights in the tub and the body earlier on. They have this optional dialogue after finding Sandra:
“She’s in a tub of ice…crammed in with another. Fuck -like slabs of meat! Heard people who live through shit like this get panic attacks. ‘Thought ever knowin’ why… You’ll be sippin’ a glass of ice-cold water and suddenly your hand’s shakin’.
How does this play into, and imo, guarantee a mental consequence for our man Stephen? Well, why would Militech want one of their brightest to retain access to the memories of a crash HE caused that killed people (remember there’s a lot of homeless in Cyberpunk). Strange ends up with an intense fear of driving, and especially to anything work related. His confidence dips and it impacts his performance. He’s no longer one of the company’s top doc’s and they’re pressuring him HARD to get his shit together or they’re going to 0 his career.
Night City isn’t very walkable either and public transport is shotty at best. The way I see it is it runs like the Metro in Washington, DC…not well.
It takes awhile for the crash to be the cause of his downfall, but Militech can’t have someone like Strange on board. Mental help won’t be of much use since he can’t even think of why everything is happening, and Militech not being able to hold back the emotional and mental scarring with their own work just means they let him go. His company cyberware gets removed and replaced with publicly available ones, although they do him a favor and give him some top-notch shit, this ends up unlocking the crash memories. Fuck.
So there he is, stuck in Night City with no job, limited funds with how expensive things are, and a whole lotta trauma that he can’t afford to get decent help for. Corpo Rat has no health insurance now…and most of NC won’t be kind to him, normal person now or not.
With what he has he decides to gather what eddies he has left to go on his journey to find help in the mystical arts. The “no chrome” monks aren’t an option for him as I doubt he’d want to get rid of his cybernetics due to all the financial risks AND the fact that very few ripperdocs operate without (and likely 0 corpo ones).
Things kinda carry on as per usual from here with the mystical training, although it takes a bit more struggle since I doubt magic and cybertech play nicely without the person knowing what they’re doing.
No more thoughts on that yet.
After that whole shabang he ends up back in NC instead of BosWash as it’s likely cheaper travel and all of his shit is there now anyway. Fortunately I’m kind enough to make it so he had enough money to cover rent all this time, but not enough to make it so he isn’t running out.
With magic his hands are actually under enough control to be a ripperdoc again…but not a corpo one. Back-alley ripperdoc time. He develops a reputation for himself amongst the good and bad people as a fantastic doc and a trusted neutral space. Not to many neutral areas in NC. This helps keep him afloat and eventually gets him enough eddies to take a trip back to NYC where he accidentally wanders into the Sanctum and things proceed from here (except that the overwhelming magic makes his cyberware hurt like a mofo and the cape helps with that too).
Since the building is magic there’s just a new door connecting to his NC home because fuck it I’m lazy, sue me (don’t).
He starts pouring a LOT more time into mystical rather than cyber practices and yadayada the details oh the details.
This both impacts business but doesn’t. Less customers at first, sure, but with some slight time fuckery it’s okay…-ish. And the sanctum spiking his body with pain makes him a better wizard ig idk.
I don’t think he goes full-time into the whole wizard stuff for a bit though, which is alright, and that’s even if he does. He can still do ripperdoc stuff so I highly doubt he’d give that up.
HYDRA Experiment Wanda Maximoff:
I almost called her an ‘Agent’ but that doesn’t exactly fit what I’m thinking. The twins weren’t willing participants this time at all, instead being kidnapped from an active warzone by HYDRA agents posing as humanitarian people or just good samaritans.
The experiments are worse here, and mind stone is used to keep the kids oblivious and under control as much as it is to awaken latent potential. There’s cyberware involved in ways that mutilate bodies beyond recognition, put such strain on bodies the pain is what kills. And she remembers nothing until her subconscious processes it. Every night is endless nightmares and remembering those lost, but when she wakes up nothing feels too wrong. Those beds were always empty.
HYDRA decides to save the most promising ones for the more careful procedures, and install a cybernetic spine that will grow with the twins, although unfortunately for Wanda this causes some MAJOR pain. It makes her uncontrollable and inconsolable by anyone other than Pietro. But she’s alive, so it’s a success, and when she wishes for the pain to stop while accidentally using her magic it does. The outbursts of chaos magic make HYDRA keep a closer eye on her.
Shit does not go well for them for long though, as Wanda’s magic is wild in how it acts or doesn’t, and eventually is undoes the memory fuckery done by the mind stone…and holy shit that facility doesn’t survive, but her wish to bring those that suffered back as they once were *before* the shit happened to them works too. Out of the rubble come her friends.
Shit ain’t staying happy for long as the commotion gets ALL the Corpo attention, and none are more interested than Arasaka and Militech.
But they don’t get them. S.H.I.E.L.D. does. Being based solely in the skies of Cyberpunk they move fast to where everything went down and get all the kids.
Wanda has little interest in being under anyone else’s control though and doesn’t like them undo her cyberware in any capacity. She doesn’t trust them not to do their own thing…and when she does they do their own thing.
This one’s too interesting not to. They gotta know what HYDRA saw, just, a bit more humane about the procedure and the quality.
Wanda is a mutant here however so it’s only a matter of time before Wanda & Pietro get handed off to reps from Krakoa. Krakoa here is an entirely natural island with all of their local flora and fauna, a wonder of the world and constantly wanted by Corps. Still VERY protected though.
Mag’s their bio dad here because fuck it I do what I want.
Not much of interest happens here but as an adult Wanda leaves Krakoa for NC to try to find a ripperdoc that can do something about the cyberware SHEILD put in her. Her magic HATES it. There’s apparently a ripperdoc knowledgable in both cyberware and magic she travels. She definitely doesn’t have too many eddies to her name and in the chaos of NC finding Strange isn’t easy. But hey, she does it, and sob story time it is.
He can’t exactly afford to do free work but he also isn’t about to just send her off back onto NC’s streets, so she stays and he helps. Her ability to deal with the cyberware through her own mental and magic control improves.
Fucks up still happen. I don’t have details on that. I draw. I don’t write…not here, at least, and not really anymore.
Anyway, Wanda is a fast learned when it comes to magic, especially if in an environment where time is slower than the real world. She’s also adept at handling magical artifacts like it’s normal which ends up making her an ideal partner for Strange when he goes to track one down. Yay mission shenanigans.
Eventually all of this good will from Strange leads to her deciding to open the Emporium in NC instead of NYC. It’s a little easier to open a business in Corpo Rat Megacity ig.
Other things:
Clea does exist here and is involved in shit. I’d waged that her and Strange met after he got fired but before Wanda arrived, and are deep in their relationship by then if not married. Clearly just has her own responsibilities and those keep her from going artifact hunting or generally being around as much as she’d like.
When she meets Wanda she’s a little skeptical of her intentions, but those are quickly thrown out with a long conversation.
Honestly I think it’d be funny if it was Clea who started having feelings for Wanda first despite the inconsistent meetings. Strange is too work-focused to acknowledge his feelings and Wanda thinks it’d be awkward…but what if?
So, long story short it’s a polycule because I said so.
Art is hard but I’ve been playing both Cyberpunk 2077 and Cult of the Lamb recently and they gave me some ideas for my ScarletStrange au.
The cult stuff for Hydra and Cyberpunk for the general world.
I like 2099 but the aesthetics of 2077 scratch an itch for an au that I find interesting. It makes me think of Insomniac Spider-Man with Doc-Oc’s hella detailed arms and that as an early stage of ripperdoc tech in a way. Adam Smasher is basically a Cyborg, Johnny is technically dead, and Doc Oc is mentally gone for a good bit of the end of the Insomniac game.
Imagine Symbiotes existing in a world like that, adapting to the chrome, adapting to stuff like Gorilla arms or Mantis Blades.
Magic possibly being more difficult to both use and master with any quality cybernetics, if they can at all, adding yet another barrier to people being able to learn.
Strange possibly being one of the greatest ripperdocs before the accident and Wanda’s magic being more unstable as a child due to HYDRA’s actions. Maybe by implanting chrome parts, and the mental impact if said parts continued to transmit data until someone removed the necessary bits or replaced everything entirely, especially if it’s a spine or connected to the brain.
Sidenote:
Thinking of some mutants, would Gambit wven be able to have chrome? I’d think not given his powers.
well 🧍♀️ as a reminder this blog is NOT a safe space for trump supporters but it IS a safe place for women, queers, trans ppl, people of color, undocumented people, and any marginalized group.