Hi guys. Seeing as I've got chapters [09] and [10] of CYWB wrapped and ready, please entertain me while I yap and lose my sanity CAUSE HOW HAVE I HEARD NOTHING ABOUT THIS?? DOES THIS CHANGE EVERYTHING?
---So I was very very slowly inching through my first actual playthrough of SWTD (we're talking over 12 hours and I just got up to the Accommodation Roof) when I entered the washroom by the transformed crew lounge and found these bloodied and feral handprints near the floor, just by the entrance to the washroom. Being as incredibly normal about Trots as I am, I immediately thought "Trots?? Trots! That has to be Trots!!" and ran up to them, crouched, and investigated further---when this little gremlin of mystery and doom graced my eyes.
TW: pictures of bloody SWTD horrors/growths/whatever the fuck this is I don't even know any more a-coming!
Plus, turning up your brightness might really help (it is so incredibly dark in this game)
A FUCKING TINY MEATBALL WITH A TAIL??
Now listen, I'm not a very squeamish person and I can very well handle the all-too-common sight of ill-fated crewmates fused to the walls via inexplicable cosmic growths---but this is completely different!! This guy is not only completely free and mobile to move around as would be a regular puppet, but he is also VERY VERY TINY?? Like those hands are normal hand size btw; he's actually just a very small meatball-fish thing.
like ok I was supposed to look at and scrutinize these handprints. Look at them. Look how absolutely bonkers whoever left them (Trots, most likely) went. Look how they start a good ways in front of him and disappear by the point his body begins. Pay attention to these details btw cause they will come in handy later.
For now, have a snipe of his body (and is it even actually a 'he'? I have trouble believing this can be a normal human crewmember)
As you can see, he's very stiff and curvy; no tendrils in sight but a very distinct end to his little tail that suggests he could have been a mobile enemy (though is very still and probably dead/never got to living in the first place).
Before I continue my yap, let us take a good look at his face.
Alright so we have many eyes, a split face (perhaps replicated a couple of times), A couple of brown eyes and a couple of cloudy ones can be seen. What's more, the most fucked-up mouth I've seen, with little suspiciously finger-shaped whiskers/mandibles/whatever they are I mean I have a picture of them right here.
And like ok...
EXCUSE ME?? THE DEVS JUST PLANTED THIS TINY FLESHBAG GREMLIN IN A RANDOM SPOT IN THE MAP AND DID NOT MENTION HIM AT ALL? NOT IN 2 YEARS DID I SEE ANYONE SO MUCH AS BREATHE IN HIS DIRECTION??
Guys I have the artbook. I have the artbook. I read through the entire artbook and nothing like this was ever mentioned. Seriously who is this guy.
NOT ONLY THAT BUT CAZ DOESN'T SAY ANYTHING ABOUT IT?? HE SAYS NOTHING??
Like am I supposed to believe that the horror is reproducing?? Cause that is not a puppet---that was never a man! That is too tiny and too insignificant to have once been a man---and yet that makes it all the more significant!! Like yeah, I know TCR had a bunch of puppets and levels in store for us (until the budget came along) but this couldn't have been one of them, right?? This isn't an actual puppet, right???
You know what he reminds me of, actually? That one old puppet design of Muir who liked to ram into people and got called 'The Meatball' cause he was just a meatball with a bunch of eyes and a tail (and had to get changed into the spider boy we all know and love cause a giant meatball isn't actually that scary). Then I started thinking that this was something like Muir and Innes' lovechild because I am very mature like that---and then I instantly spiralled into the craziest most crack-theory depths trying to think of where this thing of pure myth came from.
Like could an affected Finlay have dropped off one too many pluripotent stem cells in there and let it fester? Wait, how old is she again?
Actually, you know budding? The thing that yeasts and hydras do? What if a puppet tried budding but only passed an underdeveloped meatball-man instead---or even ripped out the tiny thing when it kept getting stuck in things? AND GUYS IS THE HORROR ACTUALLY REPRODUCING??
It's come to my attention that since no mechanism is yet known for the ribbons of sea bacon/the forbidden fruit rollup to create a little gremlin with eyes (AKA actual human genetics) out of seemingly nothing (AND VERY WELL DISCONNECTED FROM LITERALLY ANY NEARBY GROWTH, MIND YOU), the most likely reason for this tiny man's occurrence is some sort of mode of reproduction/replication by an affected crewmember (and let's rule out sexual reproduction due to firstly my own sanity but also to stray away from overly-ambitious assumptions; consider a puppet tried to clone itself---AKA asexual reproduction/budding---as something the horror has already been shown many times to do).
RETURN MR. IAN 'TROTS' CAMPBELL TO THE PICTURE!
Trots stands out as the most likely source of this budding due to many reasons of which I will name right now:
1) He is the only MOBILE (guys cause the gremlin was disconnected from the other growths) puppet in the Accommodation module; he even transformed right there behind the door.
2) This "puppet" is so primitive-looking (a mere fetus, if you will) that I would instantly rule out later enemies (I'm assuming those like Muir, Rennick, and Addair would be able to replicate themselves with more precision). That being said, perhaps me calling it 'underdeveloped' rules this one out
3) BROWN EYES!! I can't with all of the SWTD characters with blue, green, heterochromia---you name it---eyes. As far as I know, the only characters with brown eyes are Trots and Rennick (and guys, let's rule out Rennick over Trots)
4) Hands!! Who else has actual hands but Trots and Addair (and lets rule out Addair) -> also notice that these handprints are very close to the ground and quite little (Addair, who hovers around, probably has like six arms or something atp while Trots, the slimy crawler, only has 1 on that side; 2 on the other)
5) Trots has a tail!! (that literally only rules out Muir, but I'll take it) Furthermore, Trot's 'tail' bears the most resemblance to that seen in the image. They're both long, thin and smooth.
6) Trots is always throwing up?? Now this one might be a stretch but this man keeps retching and letting up nothing like he's constantly traumatized by the experience of letting up something terrible (little meatball gremlin?) by mouth. Could he have been passed by mouth? Maybe. Is it likely? Maybe not.
In fact, my best theory at the moment is that it either budded out from his slug-like midsection, past where his hands could reach (perhaps with some pushing/dragging from Trots, hence the prints in front of it), or the poor guy had to rip out the 'fetus' from his mass with a great struggle (albeit the trail of blood leading to it is very light, so I probably wouldn't default to this). When had this happened? Realistically, it could have been at any point. The handprints are quite dark so probably not very recently, but my guess is somewhere between Trots turning and Caz running into him in the laundry (but later is also possible).
And I know what you guys are thinking at this point: "But Duke! Didn't the artbook say something about wanting to add lots of infected seagulls and rats?" to which I will say: Yes, they did---but this doesn't look like a rat; IT LOOKS LIKE TROTS!!
Either way, abortion/stillbirth or not, I still can't get over the fact that someone literally delivered a tiny meatball fetus in the washroom and there's been radio silence about it for two years. AND CAZ WON'T EVEN SAY ANYTHING ABOUT IT? SOMEONE GAVE BIRTH HERE AND HE'S JUST CROUCHING THERE LIKE 👁️👄👁️
Like Caz at least say something nice about Trots' journey into fatherhood or something I don't know. I still can't believe my eyes like this was last night. In fact, I started writing this an hour ago and I am still losing my mind who the fuck is this guy/thing/what the fuck what is going on I didn't know the horrors could reproduce what what who in the fuck in this guy
Also in honour of my discovery, the likeness to 'The Meatball,' and my Trots headcanon/crack-theory, this little goober shall be named 'Snowball' until further notice.
Thanks for tuning in (cause seriously this ended up very LONG). I'm gonna go cry now.
I’m performing my monologue on Thursday, so I’m doing research on different ways the speech has been performed. I think I know what I want to do, and I’m running through it with a script, but I feel like I’m just...not Hamlet. I think I need to keep practicing in the right headspace. Finish memorizing the speech so I can just get lost in the character.
It's kinda funny how the moment I thought to myself to draw something I got hit with sickness so bad I had a fever dream that I was Starscream and also a bunch of other aerial Decepticons
