When she's exasperated she usually goes for "fok fokken gefok," Afrikaans for "fuck fucking fucked" and she likes to shout "tsa mor kaka an eefa" which is Zulu for "eat shit and die" when she's really pissed at people.
Cassie wakes up to the morning news on February 18, 2097. Tired, filthy, and with a splitting headache, she showers in a filthy bathroom, puts on dirty, falling apart clothes, and wakes up her brother to get him to do laundry while she's out at work. All while two very perky news anchors chatter on and make her headache.
#writesky #cyerpunk #WIP
Page 1 of 277 and 190k words. Cassie's morning routine in the Kill Zone. Shower's broke, laundry's filthy, little brother's a shithead, drug withdrawal's starting to kick in, and she's got a 12 hr+ work day ahead of her.
Just another beautiful day in 2097.
She speaks Mexican Spanish mainly - and yes, it's good for filthy language - also English, and a little Afrikaans and Zulu from her step-father. Sometimes she'll do all four in a single sentence when she's really pissed.
She's 5', thin, black haired, Asian/Latina, blue-eyed, always looks tired and dirty, never wears make-up, wears cheap falling-apart clothes with lots of pockets, always loaded down with tools, and always wears a peace sign around her neck. Very surly-looking.
Mostly all at once. I decided immediately she should be multi-ethnic, I wanted her to curse in multiple languages because that's fun, small and vulnerable, techie, tired all the time, added a drug addiction just for fun, big family she cares about. All of that was basically 5 minutes thought.
The basic descriptions in the thread (a little confused - still screwing up Blue Sky posting), but I've got a very good idea of what she looks like.
Cassie is a 19 year-old Mexican tech gremlin living in a dystopian housing complex in 2097 - think Kowloon Walled City: dirty, decaying, everything jury-rigged. Her job is to keep the place from falling down. She puts on an aggressive front but inside is a small, scared kid just trying to survive.
I'm a bit a way off from actually commissioning anything right now, plus I need to assemble a whole bunch of reference images (which I'm actually doing right now instead of going to bed 😂).
It'd just be her. Given the story is told entirely through her POV she'd be the central focus.
A cybernetically modified child surrounded by crumbling ruins. His face is damaged, one arm is cybernetic, his clothes are dirty, and his gaze is vacant.
A dark, narrow, trash-strewn hall in Kowloon Walled city. The floor is uneven concrete, the ceiling is covered in pipes and wires, and the only light is buried in cables.
For the record, though I'm sure I can't avoid the guy, this is the vibe I'm going for: dirty, ugly, painful, frightening. Cassie's story isn't heroic: she lives in an updated version of Kowloon Walled City, barely surviving, and she is not strong, tough, or brave, and has NO plot armor.
No problem. Good luck to you! As a fellow creative I know how hard it is out there and I hope you find yourself rolling in commissions!
Well, for the reference I'm quite a ways from actually commissioning a cover - maybe a month from finishing then 3-4 months to revise. I'm looking for something fairly realistic, dark, and gritty. The story's a dark, pessimistic, low-tech cyberpunk novel and my MC is pretty grungy and cynical.
If you asked Cassie who she'd pick: real Coralie or in-game Coralie she'd pick real Coralie before you even finished the sentence.
In the game she and Cassie play her character is a lavender skinned elf type with swirling white tattoos, long white hair, 2 pearlescent horns coming out of her forehead, and a swishing horses tails. Like basically all game characters she's ravishingly beautiful.
Her personality is bright and lively; she loves learning and her face is always lit up in excitement as she info-dumps her latest obsession.
Her eyes are brown and warm. She wears glasses with huge, round lens and dresses somewhat plainly: simple pants and usually long-sleeved shirts, sometimes dresses and skirts, tennis shoes. Her only jewelry is a pendant with the Islamic crescent moon and star; she's not observant but her parents are.
Coralie is Algerian, brown skinned, on the short side, a bit chubby, and a bit plain looking. Round face, big forehead just accentuated by black hair in a pulled-back pony tail, slightly too-big nose, and a rather wide-mouth with a permanent smirk that's opposite of her actual personality.
Kowloon Walled City was an absolutely fascinating place: 35,000 people in 300 buildings crammed into about one square mile. Everything kludged together and on the verge of falling apart but it was a real, functioning community that people missed after it was demolished.
Oh, and the interior hallways would look a bit like the real world Kowloon Walled City:
She's dirt poor and desperate. Everything she owns is old, dirty, and worn-out. Equipment held together by duct-tape, hand built, scratched screens. Boot soles and bag straps taped up. Clothes with holes, patched pants. Oil and grease stains.
She personally always looks tired. 80+ hr work weeks.
We'll have to see how the current project goes. The ending is mostly written but still very much in flux . . .
Well I'm an angry, cynical, pessimistic misanthrope who votes Killer Asteroid every 4 years so obviously I prefer happy endings. However, I want my characters to absolutely earn it and they'll come out the other end with the scars to prove it.
I am a sucker for a "Fuck yeah!" ending though . . .
I'm thinking a welding torch though she doesn't actually use when in the book (that's probably change in the second draft). She's a handyperson so she can basically fix anything within reason).
Oh I left her messenger bag out of the description - she's always got one full of more tools.
My mental image is of her in work get-up standing in a dark hall in the dystopian housing block she lives in, staring at the viewer with a slight scowl on her face. Half the lights in the background are out and she's surrounded by garbage and debris. She's holding a tool in her hand.
Fun fact: unlike some authors I never based on my characters on living human beings. Luke is the exception: in my mind he looks like Henry Rollins.
Oh, forgot: his hair's salt-and-pepper black and buzzed.
He dresses to show off his physique, usually in dark colors, and when on gang business he adds an expensive-looking long coat in black and vibrant green, gang colors. He's always armed with at least a pistol and a knife. He absolutely looks dangerous and capable of killing anyone without a thought.
Luke looks mid/late 40s, tall, muscular, and grim-looking with a gravely voice and dark, intense eyes. He always looks serious and brooding. His body is covered in faded Marine Corps tattoos and scars from his services, particularly his face - his eyes are implants and his right leg is cybernetic.
He's a mechanic and fix-it guy in his day job so his clothes usually have grease and oil stains that won't wash out and he kinda doesn't care; being fashionable just doesn't appeal to him. His general vibe is good-natured but awkward.
He usually wears a long coat in the colors of the Five Saints Gang - gray with blue wings on the back - and he tends to hunch down into it, especially when he's embarrassed or feeling awkward (which is often). He almost always carries a pistol in his waistband, but never draws it; gang stuff.
Ratch is African-American with a broad, friendly face, a bit short with a stocky build and a little paunch. He dyes his hair yellow-orange, causing Cassie to call him "Cabeza de Queso" - Cheese Head - or "cabaqueso" for short. He just silently accepts it.
