#oc stormcloud

[gemfeathers]

Ominous cloud cover moving in with a 100% chance of overkill!

[notwritinganyflufftoday]

Did I just write an enemies-to-mentor&student-relationship... because I think I just did that?

[gemfeathers]

Do you want diplomacy or do you want results!

[gemfeathers]

Oh what, pixel art has been this fun the entire time?!

[notwritinganyflufftoday]

Underwing Challenge Day 20 Q:

Hi, Liz! How are you today?

Is Jonah’s caretaker actually negligent? Or is there something deeper at play?

Hey Aye, I’m doing great today, I hope the same goes for you! Thanks so much for your question!

This is getting into spoiler territory, but I’ll try to keep the details vague. There is most certainly something deeper at play here.

We can’t ignore the fact that from Jonah’s perspective he’s not been supported by his caretaker during some of the toughest years of his life. So in that sense, we can say that his caretaker has neglected him.

Assuming that neglect comes from a place of wilfully ignoring the calls for help... is not true. Jonah’s caretaker is troubled, mentally and emotionally, and has no support system to help her. She is definitely traumatised and afraid to return to the human world while her human is in pain.

Unfortunately I can’t go into more detail, because it’s a really interesting topic for me as a psychology student. I hope I can do her character arc justice.

[notwritinganyflufftoday]

Hello! Day 14: how do your characters relate do forgiveness? More specifically, which of them must learn to forgive themselves, and why? How common is guilt in the caretaker community?

Hello to you too, thanks for the question!! This is a heavy one and I love it.

Forgiveness is most prevalent in Dewdrop and Stormcloud’s character arcs. And like you said, it’s mostly about having to learn how to forgive themselves.

Dewdrop has done some unspeakable deeds that by all means are unforgivable. So Dewdrop doesn’t ask (and doesn’t want) to be forgiven for their actions, but for the reason WHY they did these things. But (and this is super important for me personally as a person with anxiety) the reasons behind their actions are nothing to feel guilty over. Only Dewdrop doesn’t think so and it’ll take a lot of patience and love for them to accept that and begin to forgive themself.

Stormcloud’s journey to forgiveness is less complicated than Dewdrop’s, but no less important. Stormcloud feels guilty for things that happened which were out of her control. But since “it’s a caretaker’s duty to take care of a human” is a mantra that’s been taught to her from the first day of her existence, it’s no surprise she blames herself for all the misfortune that falls on her human. Stormcloud’s arc about self-forgiveness comes to a climax when Stormcloud learns to differentiate when things are out of her control and when she can step in to help her human.

With so much emphasis on caretaker’s duty and how much responsibility gets put on the shoulders of caretakers, I’m surprised there aren’t more sapling caretakers like Stormcloud who are so traumatised by the hardships their humans have to face that they completely burn out in their first century. The only reason guilt isn’t more common is because it’s more of an empathic caretaker thing and most caretakers are good (or become good) at compartmentalising.

[notwritinganyflufftoday]

Finally at the scene where I’m gonna introduce Stormcloud! I’m so excited to bring my girl into the chaos.

[notwritinganyflufftoday]

Final day of the underwing challenge! Is there anything about your WIP that changed over the past month? Anything added or taken away?

Thanks so much for your question, sorry it took me so long to reply~

Well, as a matter of fact, I did change a major thing, but I did it in June so I don't know if it still counts?

But, let's just say Jonah is demoted to side-character once more, because I was simply not vibing with him anymore. He'll still be important and feature heavily in the story as an adorable, sensitive teenage boy, but we'll see all his development from Dewdrop's perspective rather than from inside Jonah's own head.

It does give me an idea for a potential sequel following Jonah in college being helped by Stormcloud as both of them try to survive in their new environments and Jonah tries to deal with his long-distance relationship with his boyfriend. It would have to be a dual pov between Jonah & Cloud, because the two of them are so chaotic and dumb together.