#adeline colbum

[kkmcshouty]

Was practicing some new brushes, anatomy tweaks and clothing designs with a base ft Adie and for fun to mess with a friend haha.

Tried REAL hard to find the original artist for the base but the best I could find was art using it from 2016 and even then it was uncredited, so if anyone knows the original artist do tell cause I just spent far too long scouring google in between uploading other posts

Base and Speedpaint below the cut!

[kkmcshouty]

Writing Masterpost

So... I’ve started work on a webtoon, no clue what the title is, but ya know what that means? (Well yes I know it means I now have a webtoon to promote but aside from that)

Yep. It means that my fav characters Adie and K (from a story that actually has a title [Soular Flare]) and my second favorite characters Elias, Holly, Taylor and Leo (no I totally didn’t forget the last two names and had to look em up in my files) who live in the same universe and ALSO have a named story (Binary Pair) all of which are supposed to become webtoons are NOT getting produced anytime soon.

If you can’t tell I’m a bit (very) grumpy about that.

So, today (21/05/2022) I have made a clear and rational decision with a completely level head (I currently have a fever of 99.9 degrees fahrenheit) to post the writing bits I found in my documents that include said characters here on tumblr, and all of them shall be linked to this post (and also the webtoon in question should be linked at the top once that gets released)

So yeah, have my shitty writing that quite frankly wasn’t supposed to see the light of day when it was written. Feel free to send in asks about terminology I never explained since I was writing for myself or comments about what your liked or didn’t or questions about things in the world/universe. Spoilers be damned I plan to answer everything openly because I’ve had this stupid story cooped up for almost 6 years now so I figure by the time I publish it people will have probably forgotten.

Without further ado:

(So I’m starting to realize a lot of the stuff I have in my drabbles folder isn’t done, or at least on a neat end so, there’s less here than anticipated, but hey I should update with more soon, also if the link isn’t there that’s cause I’m currently putting it into a tumblr post and you were way too fast, slow down for a minute speedy gonzales [wow I hope that reference didn’t date me] I need to post the stories first)

Dubiously Canon: (these ones have facts that are VERY likely to change or just straight up are an au of sorts but I wrote em cause they were fun and living rent free in my brain)

Visions (series) - Adie

Likely Canon: (these SHOULD stay consistent but lets be real here the gender K’s attracted to seems to change 3 times a year so who knows if any of these facts will still be consistent when this story is FINALLY published)

The General

The General’s Arrival

Elias & K

The Last One Standing

[kkmcshouty]

Visions - Adie

Word Count: 1003 Canonicity: Dubious Characters: Adeline Colbum (two versions of them in fact), Elymus “K” Pechman, David Alvarez (Note: he’s the one referred to as WLS here, not K) Date Written: August 27th, 2021 Date Posted: May 21st, 2022 Content Warnings: Brief description of a knife, panic, falling from a very high place, and just general unhinged-ness

Series Summary: Visions is a series where past versions of characters meet who they become, for more of the same check out the rest of the series.

Summary: Disclaimer - I use WLS in reference to two different people in this one, the first time is in reference to K, but after Adie wakes up it’s in reference to David who isn’t actually name dropped in this but I love him all the same so I’m putting his name here. Anyway, this is a “what if...?” scenario on what if Adie’s past self, their self uncorrupted by time, were to meet their future self, The General. (For more on The General, click the link to go to the story that’s titled thusly)

Writing Masterpost is here

~~~~~

Adie checked the time on their brand new datapad, 8:01 AM October 13th 2015, also known as both K’s birthday and the day he was to be announced as protege to the WLS. A big day indeed and Adie wanted to see him off, he was practically their brother after all and they were so proud.

Adie snagged a piece of toast and hopped on their hoverboard rapidly zipping around the familiar buildings of their city and through the building that was under construction that while not allowed, they still loved to weave around dodging the construction robots. They had to pause for a moment in a nearly complete office as a larger robot passed through, blocking the hallway.

Adie checked the time once again; 8:06 AM. They were making great time today, normally this took far longer. They hopped off the hoverboard and walked over to the glass overlooking the city, it was so bright and brilliant, bustling and full of life. They loved looking at this scene from high above like this, they knew there were plenty of problems back on the ground, but up here it was like nothing was wrong, like everything was at peace.

Sure they’d thought about doing something about it, but they were just 18, not a whole lot they could do quite yet.

They reached up to place a hand on the glass, and in an instant it seemed to ripple outward, rapidly becoming covered in grime and the view outside turning to one of ruined buildings with plants beginning to reclaim it all. Adie stumbled backward and straight into someone, they spun around to look but they moved too quick and ended up falling onto the floor.

They winced, they definitely hurt something, but there were bigger things to worry about right now, like the fact that the face of the person now standing in front of them was an all too familiar one that they’d normally only see in a mirror, except they looked like they’d been through hell and back, perhaps several times. Adie couldn’t place what it  was but there was also just, something about the way they looked at them that made Adie think that there was something VERY wrong with their double.

This other Adie simply looked at them with cold indifference before muttering more to themselves than Adie, “Hm, a hallucination, a trick or perhaps... reality?” They thought for a moment then everything cold about them seemed to melt away, replaced with the familiar friendly smile Adie knew all too well, “Hi! Need some help there?” They reached out a hand for Adie to take, and Adie hesitantly did, sure that their unease was showing, but not caring when the feel of this other person’s grip made their skin crawl.

The other Adie went to grab Adie’s hoverboard and looked at it for a moment, eyes widening for a moment with sudden realization like something had clicked, though it happened so fast that anyone else probably would have missed it. The other Adie chuckled, and it sounded warm, but Adie could feel it. There was something twisted with this other person and that seemed to become more and more clear with every moment.

The other Adie tossed the hoverboard back over to Adie with a smile, “Nice hoverboard. Custom models are always the best.” Adie simply nodded, wary. “By the way...” The other’s tone stayed even and friendly, but their eyes... Adie practically felt like they were pinned to a wall with a knife at their neck despite this other person being across the room, “...how old are you?”

“E-eighteen...” They stammered out, honestly surprised their voice was still working.

The other laughed, this time not bothering to hide the coldness, “Eighteen, wow.” They moved a hand up to run it through their hair, stopping halfway through, their gaze slightly wild and unfocused, and honestly scaring Adie as their voice got low, “I can’t remember being eighteen. Things must still be good huh? Isn’t the WLS- I mean, Isn’t K’s, protege promotion happening sometime around now?” They practically cackled wildly, any facade of stability now starting to fall away as Adie stepped back, feeling the cold glass behind them.

The other Adie strode straight up to them, and stopping within a hair’s breadth, “Let me give you some advice.” They then slammed their hand into the glass next to Adie’s head and Adie flinched and heard the glass crack but couldn’t bring themselves to move any further as the other Adie leaned into Adie’s ear, “Brace yourself. Things are only going downhill from here.”

With that, the other Adie shattered the glass and Adie fell straight through and into the air, hoverboard in hand but they were still in too much shock to put it on. Who was that? Was it them? But how? Why? What had happened to them? How did they go from who they are now to... that twisted...? Adie closed their eyes, sure they were about to hit the ground.

“-ie! Adie, wake up!” They opened their eyes to see K above them, the WLS a little ways away both looking at them with concern.

“What just...?” Adie’s head and back were pounding like they had actually hit the ground, but nothing seemed to be actually injured.

K gently helped them up, “You got here and suddenly passed out, are you okay?” His eyes were full of concern, Adie glanced at the WLS, K must trust him quite a bit to allow it to show.

“Yeah, I’ll be fine, I must’ve descended on my board too quickly or something...” They smiled and put a hand on K’s head to which he protested about messing up his hair like usual, making the WLS chuckle. No use worrying K, he’s got enough on his plate without having to think about some strange vision or whatever that was, but what the other Adie had said... It was hard to say that it didn’t bother them.

[kkmcshouty]

The General's Arrival

Word Count: 884 Canonicity: Likely Characters: Elias Dellarobia, Holly Thaxton, Adeline Colbum, Al (We don’t talk about Al’s name this has changed so many times over the years) Date Written: September 6th, 2021 Date Posted: May 21st, 2022 Content Warnings: For once nothing that I can actually think of that’s even remotely warning necessary.

Summary: Disclaimer - I HIGHLY recommend that you read Elias & K before you read this one as that one pretty much sets up everything going on here, but you don’t NEED to. Anyway, this is really just a short drabble on Adie’s arrival on Terra Tectus + Elias’s reaction as viewed from Holly’s perspective. For context, this happens POST Binary Pair’s main story while Elias & K happens PRE Binary Pair, so at this point the relationship between Holly and Elias is dating and the knowledge from Elias & K has been tormenting the poor boy for quite awhile

Writing Masterpost is here

~~~~~

Everyone stared in awe watching the spaceship far up in the sky, not close enough to be clear during the day, but enough so that everyone could see it was the size of a small city. Every other ship that had arrived on Terra Tectus had been nowhere near that size. Elias stumbled back, straight into Holly who had just caught up behind him.

“Holly.” His voice was quiet and serious, but she could hear unease in it as well, “That ship... it’s a Terra Prima model.”

“What???” She turned him around to face her, his face was stoic as ever but... he was ever so slightly biting his lip, “I thought your ship was the last one off Terra Prima before it’s destruction!”

“It was.” He looked back up at the ship and so did Holly, the speakers around the spaceport came on with a pop and a hiss, silencing the crowd, all waiting for news on what was happening.

“Ahem, is this on, can you all hear me?” It was an unfamiliar voice, everyone knew who the spaceport controllers were, there were only three of them, and this voice wasn’t one of them. The crowd began to murmur.

“I’m sure you’re all wondering what’s going on here, so allow me to explain while we land. Oh and speaking of, please clear the area around the spaceport, in fact you should probably go inside, our vessel is too large to fit inside so we’ll be making an outdoor landing so do stay clear.” Holly noted that whoever this was was used to authority, was it the ship’s admiral? Probably. Good thing she and Elias were already inside, she could see people flooding in.

“Alright, now that that’s out of the way, hello Terra Tectus! My name is Adeline Colbum, currently in command of the Starship Sagan-B. We are the final vessel from Terra Prima, we were only able to leave at the last moment which is why we were unable to warn about our approach in advance.” There was a pause as another voice came on momentarily.

“Sir, aren’t you forgetting something?” There was a kind laugh over the speakers.

“Ah, yes I am, thank you Al. I’m not just in charge of this ship, I am the World Lead Scientist.”

The room was silent for quite some time, then people started clamoring to get a look through the window at the now landing ship, the WLS was more of a myth to most than someone who actually existed, and everyone wanted to get a look at the person in charge of the entire human civilization.

The WLS kept talking but Elias grabbed Holly’s shoulder distracting her, “Holly, we need to get out of here.” His voice was quiet but urgent as he grabbed her hand leading her against the crowd.

“What? Elias, it’s fine it’s not like we’re going to be trampled or something, and didn’t you hear them? It’s dangerous to be out there during landing!” She tried to pull back against him, but his grip was firm.

“No. We need to get as far away from here as possible, I’ve almost figured out a path through the gravitational field around Terra Tectus, we could get a ship and we’ll make it off planet-”

“No!” She pulled on him hard as people kept moving around him, seeming to get more excited as the WLS kept talking, “Elias what is going on!? You know it’s not possible to leave the planet! Even if you solve it, why would I!? My family still lives here!”

His face looked normal but there was a slight crease in his brow and his grip tightened a little around her wrist, while the other hand seemed to be clenched tight enough to dig into itself, “Fine whatever we can take them but we need to go-”

“Elias! That’s not the problem!” Holly was getting worked up, “Why do we need to leave, I’m sure this will be fine, Terra Prima has always respected our culture. I can’t see why this would ever change with the WLS here! You’ve even talked to the WLS and you said you trust them so what’s your problem!?”

He swallowed, silent for a moment, and she simply waited.

“That’s not the WLS. That’s The General.”

Holly wasn’t sure whether to be shocked or incredulous, “What? Who’s this general person?”

“Bad. That’s all you need to know. We really need to get out of here before they take control here, because once they do we’re fucked.” He gave her another tug, but it was much gentler than before, like a request rather than a command. She noticed he was shaking somewhat. If this general was so bad that he was this nervous... Well, she trusted him.

“Alright. But we need to talk further once we’re out of here.” She let him lead her and he seemed to relax somewhat.

“Alright. Thank you.” He pulled her quickly through the now cheering crowd and they managed to get on his hoverbike and away from the landing zone just in time to be outside the danger area. Holly looked at his face, he  had a tendency to let things show while on his bike and... he looked like he’d just seen the end of the world.

[kkmcshouty]

The General

Word Count: 938 Canonicity: Likely Characters: Adeline Colbum Date Written: August 26th, 2021 Date Posted: May 21st, 2022 Content Warnings: There’s the destruction of one’s past self, and what I would call a spiral into insanity, but Adie would beg to differ calling it a “moment of clarity”, otherwise not much

Summary: There’s two parts to this, the first merely sums up a bit of the world, specifically on The Resistance and The General and how they’re perceived in said world, the second focuses on Adie’s deteriorating mental state as The General.

Writing Masterpost is here

~~~~~

The Resistance, perhaps not the most original name, but certainly the clearest. They all banded together against the current governmental structure and the elusive World Lead Scientist, aka the WLS. For the past two centuries the same WLS had taken control of the government and used the resources at his disposal to make himself immortal, while he left the rest of the world to fend for itself. In this world those who were born without enough intelligence were sent to serve as foot soldiers if they were lucky or as general workers, and treated as less than the service robots they worked beside. Worse yet, if they were born as an Altered then that person would have little more than a sliver of personality or will, making it so that they’d be ordered around left and right like slaves. Almost everyone in The Resistance personally knew someone in this situation, and some even blamed the WLS for the condition of the Altered as they’d first started being born a few years before he took the position.

Regardless of motivation, everyone in The Resistance had one common goal; Usurp the WLS and bring about change.

Ironically though, The Resistance had an equally mysterious leader; The General.

The General was known for their ruthless efficiency. Supposedly their plans were ironclad, and if they’d had the same resources as the WLS, they would have won the war by now. Some said that they could smell traitors as there’d never been a single one in the history of the resistance as they either talked potential traitors out of joining early or those who tried to join as double agents were killed on the spot. Even with a reputation like this, what really kept The General on a complete other level compared to anyone else in the resistance was a simple fact; They were older than the WLS, but looked to be in their late 30’s and fought like they were in their prime.

Most in The Resistance ignored their leader’s mystery with any excuse they could think of. Some said that The General was just a figurehead and it was tradition for whoever the next one was to disguise themselves as the original General, others said that the general stole the immortality technology that the WLS had and became immortal from a blast that ensued while destroying it. At the end of the day, no one knew the truth, but the rumors were believable enough that they didn't lose any sleep.

No one knew what The General’s motivation was to originally go against the WLS, but everyone knew that they certainly had a personal grudge against the WLS which had festered into a deep hatred over the last two centuries.

Despite all of this, no one who had directly met with The General would ever call them ruthless or vengeful, in fact, they’d be more likely to call The General kindhearted, patient and focused. A person who put the needs of those under them first, and who would leap into the line of fire if it meant one more of their soldiers would make it home that day. A person who could inspire others even in the darkest hour.

A person who was so much more than the rumors that were spoken about them.

Of course, such is the nature of rumors, most were untrue, but there were some that had a grain of truth; “The General was once friends with the WLS,” and “The General is heartless.”

-------

Adeline Colbum, also known as Adie.

The General’s eyes lingered on that line on the datapad in front of them. The room was dark and silent, the only illumination in the abandoned building that they’d made into a base coming from the outdated datapad before them.

They leaned back and let out a sigh, closing their eyes. “Adeline Colbum... Adie. Aah dee...” The name felt foreign on The General’s lips, how long had it been since they’d heard it? How long since someone had addressed them by it? How long since The General had replaced Adeline Colbum?

They couldn’t remember.

They sat back up, turned off the datapad and stood. They walked to the grime covered window and looked out at the abandoned ruins. They still looked as they always did, but The General knew better, they knew that the main force of the resistance was diligently working away in almost every structurally stable building left in this city.

They wondered for a moment what else they’d forgotten, but the thought was quickly dismissed. “Too much” would always be the answer, but there was nothing they could do about it, the human mind wasn’t designed to handle this many memories no matter what anyone said. Sure they had daily, weekly, monthly, yearly, and even decadely journals to log events so that they’d have a record if they needed it, but deep down they knew they’d never read it, especially the first 50 years. The Resistance was on the verge of victory, they couldn’t risk going soft now just because of some heartfelt words they’d written so many years ago.

They tried to conjure up a memory of those times, just for the hell of it. A memory of being children, a memory of the days when the titles of The General and WLS meant little, a memory of the days when Adie and K would bicker over the smallest things like siblings.

Nothing.

A cold smile crept up their face, they knew nothing would happen but the confirmation was always nice. Adeline Colbum truly was long gone, and all that remained was The General.

[kkmcshouty]

"Tell me, when was it that I started enjoying the violence?" -Adie

Needed a break from comic stuff and finals so Adie got drawn again since for some reason I've been on a kick with them and I'm not sure why.

[kkmcshouty]

A new drawing out of the blue at 3AM? More likely than you'd think.

Been working on a bunch of art lately but havent really finished much of anything and needed a break, so I ended up doing a quick doodle of Adie being dramatic as hell. Expect to see more of em, they've kinda booted K out of my brain for a bit and I've been drawing them more than I really should be.