#nancy starfell

[mozart-the-meerkitten]

Alright, I said I’d try and make a character introduction post for The SOS Chronicles because I’ll be posting whumptober stuff from it so here we go:

Main characters:

Oliver- an 8-12 year old boy who in the first book escapes slavery in order to find help to rescue his best friend Silas. He becomes a member of the crew of the spaceship Catacrome and spends the rest of the series trying to free every enslaved person he meets so no one has to suffer like he did. He is gentle and kind, but also very brave and determined when he sets his mind to something. Loyal and self-sacrificing to a fault. He has light orange hair and brown eyes and is well below average height after being kept as a slave for eight years.

Silas- a 9-13 year old boy who is Oliver’s oldest and best friend. An extremely skilled natural navigator, Silas is one of the only people in the galaxy who can navigate The Net, a mass of anomalies, portals and magic that is particularly dense over one specific point... he is also one of the only people who can get through to Oliver when he is taken over by Almitak’s powers. He is anxious and often fights bouts of hopelessness and depression, but his love for his friends can bring him out of this darkness. He is taller than Oliver, but still small and skinny, with black hair and gray eyes.

Silvie- a 10-12 year old Aguithan girl that the boys find and befriend after accidentally discovering her planet (Aguitha). While not a slave, she lives in constant fear of the Enforcers who patrol her planet- but you wouldn’t know it. She has lived on her own since she was 5-6, and deals with prejudice from her own people for her strange autistic behavior. She is fierce and easily angered, slow to trust and quick to bite (literally). However it doesn’t take long before she’s willing to fight and die for her new friends, and once earned her loyalty is unyielding. She is small and slight, with brown hair and fur on her face, arms and torso, which gives way to scales on her legs, feet, and lizard-like tail which has a tuft of fur on the end of it. She has catlike yellow eyes, sharp claws and pointed teeth.

Almitak- a 3000+ year old Space Dragon who has been imprisoned and being used as a weapon on Aguitha. He does not remember who he is, only his name and that he hates the Aguithans for trapping him. After he meets Oliver and Oliver offers to help him, he transfers his soul and conciousness (and immense power) into the small boy so that they now share one mind and body. When Almitak first meets Oliver his only form is a black sphere surrounded by waving blue, gold and purple tendrils, but as he remembers who he is he recovers his humanoid form and, eventually, his dragon form. In humanoid form he has blue, scaly skin that shimmers purple, and yellow hair on his head and arms. He has also a long tail and can manifest wings if he so desires, and his eyes are purple. In dragon form he has a body like a Chinese dragon; long and sinous, but with legs and wings. He has almost limitless magical powers.

Algol- the Villain. Another Space Dragon and the current leader of Aguitha. He believes that by conquering the universe he can bring peace and order to it, as he believes he has done on Aguitha. He also happens to love and crave power, and despite already being one of the most powerful creatures in the universe he is always trying to find ways to make himself stronger. He is manipulative and analytical. His colors as a humanoid and a dragon are red, gold and black.

Other important characters:

Nancy Starfell- the 20-something captain of The Catacrome who adopts Oliver, Silas and Silvie as she finds them. She can be very fierce and determined and she is extremely capable after being raised by a former space pirate. She loves her crew and her children fiercely and she would do anything for them.

Andy James Danson- The Catacrome’s first mate and Nancy’s childhood best friend. He and Nancy are deeply in love with each other and both of them don’t know how to admit it. Friendly and easygoing unless you threaten someone he cares about.

Cassieopeia (Cassie) Storm- Oliver and Silas’ optimistic friend from the slave compound they grew up in who joins them on their adventures on The Catacrome. She’s a year younger than Oliver.

Milo- the cadet who rescues Oliver and then befriends him and either helps with or inadvertently causes several other adventures. Cheerful, carefree, and a prankster by nature. He has dark orange hair and green eyes and is four years older than Oliver.

Dora Starfell- a former space pirate and Nancy’s adoptive mother. She is 75-80 when the series begins, but you’d never know it from watching her. She is the most successful pirate of her age and was never once caught or had enough evidence gathered to convict her of piracy. She now works at the Space Academy on Earth training cadets. She is terrifying, kind, and utterly unflappable. She has long wavy brown hair streaked with gray and green eyes speckled with brown.

Esthe Storm- Cassie’s mother who raised Oliver and Silas alongsid her daughter in the slave compound. Extremely jaded and pessimistic about everything in her life.

Luna and Sirius- twin siblings who can shapeshift into kittens who Oliver meets while captured by EUNAP (the space government, think the Federation in Star Trek but infinitely sketchier). Luna is cheerful and friendly and has long white and gray fluffy hair as a human and kitten, while Sirius is shy and reserved and has sleek black hair as both a human and kitten.

I think that’s it, but if I think of more I’ll add them in!

[mozart-the-meerkitten]

*spontaneously posts about her sci-fi series*

Bad habits the SOS Chronicles kiddos have as a result of their pasts: food.

Oliver, Silas and Silvie will eat anything. Literally, in Silvie’s case. Oliver and Silas are a little better but not much.

Silvie can and has, eaten garbage. Like, actual pieces of garbage. Paper bags that smelled like they might have once had food in them and such. When the boys are on Aguitha she can tell them which plants are poisonous, except she doesn’t know the word “poisonous” she just knows, “yeah, that plant is bad it made me sick for a week.” “oh yeah and that one made me lose feeling in half my body for four days.” “oh that one’s not so bad, it only made me sick for a day or two.”

Oliver and Silas are a little better, but only because they had someone to tell them the difference between edible and non-edible items. They will eat moldy food without question- they didn’t even know what mold was until they came on board the Catacrome. “Wait, that fuzzy stuff on food is bad? It was on all our food at the slave compound.”

Nancy, their adoptive mother, has a hard time correcting these behaviors because she’s had similar issues in her past. Like, obviously she tells the kids not to eat actual garbage and moldy food, but if it’s been in the fridge a week and it smells kind of weird but no fuzzy stuff? Probably fine. It’s not that she doesn’t know that this stuff is bad, she just doesn’t always think about it.

Almitak, the space dragon sharing headspace with Oliver, is no help because he doesn’t understand human food until months after he starts getting his memories back.

Andy James is the only one who knows anything about what food is healthy. And thank goodness for that because everyone else is a mess.

[mozart-the-meerkitten]

me, thinking about my WIP: but how does the crew get weapons to fight the aliens with when they break out? they’ve been locked in the brig! the aliens are everywhere!

my brain: the captain has a secret stash of weapons under the floor panels in the brig for just this scenario because no one else would ever think to look for them there

me: .... sure why not