May I pretty pretty please have Thelen deep lore?
Alright! Emigre Deep Lore Snippet: The Thelen Problem!
Thelen was actually supposed to be Dagmar's initial love interest.
Emigre was a simpler story then. It would have been a sweet office romance type thing, with minimal unnecessary sci-fi elements and no intrigue or sub-plots whatsoever. Or rather, there would have been those things, but they'd be in the background. Secondary. B-plots.
Obviously, that didn't happen.
As I've mentioned in my previous deep lore snippet, sometimes my characters have very different ideas as to how the story should go than I do. Writing them sometimes feels more like interviewing them, to be honest. So, when I was first preparing to write Emigre, I had a plan. Dagmar/Thelen was the goal, as the primary relationship for the eventual quad, and I had it all worked out. Only...
Only, Thelen kinda shrugged when I tried to write it and said, "Well... okay, but what about her?"
And I, the actual person theoretically in control of my brain, wondered, "Who?!"
And Thelen pointed to a rapidly forming, nameless blob of a half-formed character that I had previously been quite unaware of. Which is especially alarming given that I am supposed to be in charge here.
"Her," he said. "She's the one for me. Don't get me wrong, Dagmar's great. Absolutely would, you know? But just trust me on this. You'll understand when you get there."
Which, of course, meant that I now had no plan for Thelen outside of a nebulous 'you'll figure it out' promissory note. I kept writing anyway, periodically prodding the character-blob in the half-hearted hope that it would develop into something useful. It didn't.
To be honest, I was starting to make backup plans for Thelen to remain a bachelor forever when I hit that first, big hiatus.
And then, years later, @the-lady-general wrote The Sheriff of Kumari Square and the nameless blob finally, finally had a name and a budding personality. Now, at last, I could work this blob into the actual story and make plans!
It could be a meet-cute! It could be another office romance! It could be a will-they-won't-they flirt fest! It could be--
And instead of cooperating with the faintest notion of an easy b-plot romance scene, the former-blob now known as Vrath effectively rugby-tackled Thelen out of nowhere, screaming, "WHY ARE YOU SO FUCKING PRETTY?!"
And I did, at last, understand.
