Elder Raal’Maker in his usual garb before he gets injured and degeneration really kicks in and he’s forced into his sarcophagus early and takes on human shells. Had a strong tendency to let his glowing eyes show which frightened a lot of his workers until they realized he’s actually nice.
Got a good kick in the pants to get this finished and pretty pleased. Learning more and more as I toy with painterly pieces. Need to do some texture and material studies for practice and fun.
First off, so sorry to the anon that asked this like last year+, but how so many things went around that time it just completely slipped from my mind. Read more for ~~spoilers~~.
So why are Maker’s shell-bodies human-looking and don’t look more like the Hybrids?
Technically, all of his shell-bodies are spliced to varying degrees, but human DNA makes up the majority of it since human DNA has been rather pliable and fairly compatible with a plethora of DNA. They definitely look less human under all the clothes.
In the early days of his experimenting, there was more Elder, Sectoid, and other DNA spliced in them leading to the faces and skin color leaning more towards a Sectoids or the Elders, and some even had four arms as I personally believe the Elders wouldn’t want to give that up.
But that all changed after his one incident with Jynn(or any of my other Commanders) when trying to pull Asaru out of her again(not fully realizing it was just strands and he wasn’t there). Instead, what he found was a nasty psionic bomb of a backlash with a touch of something else. This nearly killed him and sadly killed or drove a few of the nearby workers mad. He barely had enough strength to quarantine his entire facility, cut the room off from the rest of it, and cut it off from his brethren as the psionic poison ravaged his system.
Ever since that day, he had to be interned into his sarcophagus earlier than projected and cut himself off from the hive mind with his brethren as his psionics have become unstable and risk affecting the rest of them.
In addition to his psionics becoming unstable, it’s like they have a mind of their own and actively hate his old shell bodies that had a higher concentration of Elder DNA, and somewhat the same towards Sectoid DNA and a few others. He went through a great deal of trial and error to find just the right amount that allowed compatible possession.
One bonus from the unstable psionics and power increase is it’s allowing him really test how much power a body can handle before damaging itself via feedback or burning out the synaptic nerves. It’s concerning, but the others support it since, of course, they want to be able to use their full power unimpeded and want to continue to grow said power in the future.
Though, Maker has had to shift any tests with bodies with heavier amounts of Elder DNA to the others, his current work is still useful for them as the less of their ailing/corrupted DNA they have to use to make new bodies is a good thing, but their collective superiority doesn’t exactly want to admit that. Such an attitude leads to one incident with an early prototype they had to semi-shelve due to recent events with XCOM and the Resistance becoming more of a nuisance, they’re going to bring it back out after some heavy indoctrination and more active brainwashing. Will be stealing Specimen Zero a.k.a. “Void” from that Legends game.
The shift to more human shell-bodies with the occasional experiment with some other compatible races when Va’lo’Fe supplies him with the genetic material has also left him estranged from most of his kind. They already aren’t too fond of any from or influenced by Va’lo’Fe (as the old Elder changed eons ago becoming a great deal less like they are now, (but they respect his position and most of his wisdom)), and then for Maker, they find he’s becoming more “human”/like the lesser races to their disgust(and some horror wondering if they could be infected with humanity if they’re not careful building their new bodies.)
Through a lot of inner contemplation and reviewing what he learned under Va’lo’Fe, Maker finds it all enlightening and poetic. Even before the incident, he was enjoying all the sensations and feelings that came with possessing the various prototype bodies. Things he only felt in a tentative vicarious way when possessing a being with a will; that was always distant. But these prototype bodies with no wills, or if there were any it was quickly subsumed by his power, he felt everything with none of that distance or disconnects. And then there were none(at the time) of the subtle pains, weaknesses, and numbness that plagued his Elder body.
So he’s been embracing his human shells a little more every time he makes a major iteration. He’s still going to work on a body he can properly inhabit(or die trying) or one for those he can trust and can seem some could be persuaded to change. He’s lost a lot of love for the majority of his brethren minus those with Va’lo’Fe.
Hey, when you’re young(and he’s still “young” compared to most Elders) and soar in the ranks pretty fast to get your own custom helmet and garbs I think most would make it dramatic. He toned it back the longer he was under Val’lo’Fe. Really got humbled.
And he can tone down or turn off the “psionic fire” when he feels like it.
