The first thing I would like to say is that Rachael Davidson is a character I have had for a long, long time. She came from a project that myself and my brother had when I was 11 and he was 13, a show we thought would be hilarious called This Won't End Well, about a class of misfits who go on stupid adventures at a boarding school. It was highly anime inspired, and as such, Rachael's idea as a character was stupidly simple. She was to be the Kululu equivalent (if you don't know who that is, I highly recommend the anime Sgt. Frog, it's fucking hilarious), the "mad scientist" type who could create whatever device would drive an episode. She was our "we can do anything we want" plot device.
Eventually, we matured, and realized that the show was bad and unfunny. Well, it was still funny to us, but that's besides the point. We had grown attached to these characters, though, and one that really stuck was Rachael. I'm not sure… why. But, it being clear that we were never going to make the "show" that these characters originated from, our only other option was to write them into other stories, and develop them past 2D joke machines. I decided that I wanted to take Rachael Davidson, a mad scientist, and put her in the SCP universe, where I felt she would fit quite nicely.
How she became "traumatized woman with powers over electricity" is a bit beyond me, eheh. It just sort of happened that way. This whole tale series really came about from myself pondering an 001 proposal. My main idea was that anomalies followed a sort of dream logic, or otherwise made sense while still existing outside of the norm, and I realized, "what if everything is a dream?", and then this whole tale series happened. I decided to make Rachael the main character, I decided halfway through to tie URA-1902 into it (they were not originally intended to be the same series but damn look how it worked out!). It was by the time I had posted We Didn't Do This For Nothing that I had a whole plot worked out and staged in scenes.
I think it bears repeating that I didn't realize I was writing a Mary Sue until I was committed. I mean, it made sense, seeing as she was from a project I had started with my brother before I really knew how to write. But. She's a young adult with crazy powers that let her get away with almost anything, and she achieves her goal without too much resistance. It's. Strange how it played out, but having made the character this way, I saw no other option then to go for what I had already written. I do hope that I have built the story around her well enough, and characterized her well enough, to make that not such a bad thing.
Anyways, here come spoilers for the tale series Vend-a-Friend, as I am going to compare the two tale series (this was my second ever tale series, Vend-a-Friend was my first). Highlight the next big section of white to read what I have to say:
What is it with me and writing homicidal protagonists? And not just that, writing borderline unlikable protagonists? I wonder what that says about me. Anyways, this is quite different from Vend-a-Friend, and really intentionally so. Vend-a-Friend was, while very dark at times, also full of hope and whimsy, legitimately. After a Wondertainment based tale series, I felt it was time to tackle something with darker, grittier themes, with some more down to earth characters. Strangely enough, the "darker" tale series had significantly less murder and death. Well, at least, less murder caused by the protagonist. Plenty of death in URA-1902, and Howard killed himself (himselves?) off. Anyways, yeah. Vend-a-Friend was a purely emotional journey. I wanted to write a mystery.
But yeah. I loved writing basically the premise of a young adult book and then spinning it into something more than that. I loved trauma fueled genius. I loved optimistic doofus Dorer. I loved everyone from Waiting on the Good Times, I loved Hillenburg's golfing scene. I loved the LaFerrier plot, I loved the imagery I got to write for the Scott Industrial complex. I loved staying up late to finish this series. I loved writing a dramatic ending. I loved writing how Tom and Abe become apathetic towards their creation, I loved the existentialism of their predicament.
I loved Brahman.
I loved this whole damn thing.
Do I love it more than Vend-a-Friend? I'm not sure. Probably not? There are definitely things I would change about both series, now, 'cause as you write you learn and as you learn you notice how little you knew before. But, these are finished products, and I'm only going to go back and make grammar and spelling changes.
MaliceAforethought :: For making █████ Industrial in the first place, and allowing me to use them in my own very strange way for the plot of this series.
