~Remember that time I asked you guys what lore you were most interested in? Yeah…~
Hi… this took so long to finish that I had to redo the intro because it was just so outdated and would just be confusing. Anyways, Missy I am now bringing you your long overdue character dynamic lore dumps, and Eebie, even though you said you’re fine with waiting, you’re getting The Purge of Decay lore sooner than originally planned, which is what I’m currently working on :)
Now with that said, here’s some character dynamics, woo!
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Usually I would immediately go for explaining my B.A. OC OTP (that string of letters mean something I swear), Sadie and Willow, but I’m currently workshopping those two and their dynamic feels so unfamiliar and not solid enough even for my note posts, so for today I have selected these character dynamics to discuss:
-Penny, Brielle, and Ben
-Brielle and Jolie
-Jolie and Josephine
Some will be short, and some will be paragraphs, but I figured lore was lore and even if it’s short it’s still something that would otherwise be unknown to y’all, so here we are, starting with the Brown Siblings, because I can’t believe I’ve been working on B.A. for over a year and have barely talked about those three.
~The Brown Siblings (Penny, Ben, Brielle)~
The Brown Siblings! The original main characters. Despite originally being more illustration centered they actually have a lot of lore to share, Brielle and Penny even has quite a lot of lore within the STEPs, meanwhile Ben stays more chill and illustration focused. So, let’s talk about them!
Before jumping straight into their dynamics, you first need to understand their escapism, as it plays a *very* big part in how they interact with eachother.
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Brielle is the most straightforward out of the escapism tendencies each sibling has, she’s avoidant in nature, so despite being able to handle herself and defend against attacking forces, she’s also the first to run away when she’s scared. Even the way she defends against the Infection is avoidant. If you go out into the forest you’re going to have to understand that facing the Infection head-on is inevitable, however it was also taught to most River Town residents that the best corse of action is to stun and flee, they’re taught that the Infected can’t be killed and that is exactly how Brielle handles it. This is also how Brielle handles her trauma, “stun and flee” is basically another way to describe avoidance, is it not? When given the option to choose, Brielle will *always* choose avoidance, it shows in her main form of escapism- workaholism, it’s a distraction and therefore a form of avoidance, if she’s busy she doesn’t have the *time* to think about what happened to her parents and her community and therefore pushes it off. It shows in her action, her personality, her guilt- when she accidentally “kills” an Infected Townsperson and hurts her brother, what does she do? She runs, she flees, she avoids, it’s the same tactics she’s always followed that was even more built up ever since coming to Brooklet Avenue. It even shows in how she interacts with others, but I’ll get to that in a moment.
Penny’s escapism is the least controlled, it’s also the most innocent-looking of the three, as she struggles with maladaptive daydreaming, imagination cranked up to 100% to the point of being harmful, she’s pulled out of reality, and when forced to experience reality folds in on herself. She doesn’t know how to handle real complications, she’s babied, kept safe from harsh realities, and has been given too much false hope that she can no longer perceive when it is *false.* Her optimism comes from naïveté masquerading as hope, and when exposed as such she reverts back into her sweet dreams of a better, more gentle reality. Penny is also avoidant, but it is a different kind of avoidance. While Brielle’s avoidance is more controlled, Penny’s came from a place of misunderstanding and being nurtured in the wrong ways, protecting someone from the harsh reality of life doesn’t mean keeping them from it.
Ben is easiest summed up with a phrase: you can never fully move on, but you sure can try. Unlike his sisters who are stuck in an escapism limbo, Ben has actually worked through a lot of his trauma, but *like* his sisters, he too engages with escapism. Ben’s escapism has always been the hardest to explain, hence why it was always just described as “music,” but that’s not all there is to it. Ben puts up a front, in order to “move on” he believed he had to put his past behind him, and in order to do so has to become a new person, essentially the complete opposite of his twin, and this is primarily thanks to his Aunt who helped him work through his grief. To briefly explain Sadie’s flawed reasoning, she believes that the only way the Brown Siblings can heal is if they move on and live new lives, might I remind you this is someone who grew up with an absent “father,” only to later in life lose her mother, and due to her previous losses, Sadie has a reoccurring pattern of “casting aside” her past in search of a new future. This is basically what she teaches Ben. Sadie (with permission from the twins, although they were hesitant) burns down their family home to prove to them that they don’t need to focus on their past and can instead build a new life, a fresh start, and Ben takes this opportunity and runs with it: new people who doesn’t know him, a new culture and environment, he can be whoever he wants, and he can shape it himself. Ben’s way of escaping his trauma is by living in the moment, he follows life wherever it takes him, and he refuses to fit into a singular mold (or at least he tries), this is why music is so prominent in his escapism. Whether it’s listening to a record on his phonograph with his little sister by his side, or playing the violin with his friends, he listens to every note, every lyric, the sound of a bow gliding on strings, and for a brief moment nothing else matters and he feels weightless. While Brielle immediately “moved on,” and Penny was shielded from the truth, Ben fully caved in on his new reality, it hit him hard but he also allowed himself to feel the grief, and that’s probably why he was the first to move on, and the one with the healthiest coping mechanism.
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With all that said, I’m going to explain the dynamics in this order:
-Brielle and Penny
-Penny and Ben
-Brielle and Ben
Brielle and Penny:
Brielle, being Penny’s older sister, does have the tendency to baby her like Sadie, however there’s also more to it. Brielle will do anything to keep the Infection away from her little sister, and that includes keeping her in the dark about it. While Brielle is out in the forest fighting the Infection, Penny is safe and sound in the town living a calm childhood. However, little kids aren’t stupid, they catch onto more than you’d think, and Penny could always tell there was something going on, she just never knew what. Penny would eventually get curious about the forest, the place she wasn’t allowed to enter, and would find a little spot where it was difficult for people to see her leaving, and cross the river by simply swimming across. This would be the time when Penny meets Millie, an Infected who had conflicting feelings upon reuniting with “her” lost friend, and Penny would get out safe and sound, Millie Mayfield being the only Infected to ever hesitate when it came to infecting. Then there was Brielle. Brielle’s relationship with Penny is a complicated one, because while she is incredibly overprotective of her, she also doesn’t set aside the time to play with or hang out with her little sister, causing their relationship to be primarily lead by a type of “do you actually care about me?” attitude from Penny’s side. And after discovering that Penny had been sneaking into the forest, Brielle’s attempts to keep Penny safe changes from “there’s nothing wrong” to “there is something wrong and you must stay away from it” which just damages their relationship further as Penny distances herself from Brielle to keep her from learning about Millie. They never fully make up, as Penny and Brielle only ever grow more distant as neither of them work through their destructive coping mechanisms, and Brielle never gets the chance to truly connect to her little sister, nor Penny to her big sister. (How sad…)
Penny and Ben:
While Brielle was strict and distant, Ben was quite the opposite, he has a very healthy relationship with Penny as he would actively put aside time to play with her, and would often invite her to hang out with him whenever he went off on his own to de-stress. Ben and Sadie basically raised Penny together, as neither of them could fully take up the space of her parental figures but did their best to make sure she had a happy childhood. Ben raises his little sister similarly to how he lives his life, unrestricted and free, which is probably why Penny, a imaginative little girl, gravitated more towards her fun-loving older brother and his friends rather than her busy, closed off older sister. Ben actively encourages Penny’s imagination, and tries to give her the space to be herself, however he too would avoid the “Infection Talk,” and isn’t fully clued in on her forest escapes until Brielle brings it to light when she becomes furiously anxious about it.
Ben and Brielle:
Ben and Brielle, despite being twins, aren’t really characters I thought much of together, as they’ve always had their own lives separate from each other. Due to Brielle’s busy life and Ben’s own relationships with his friends and Penny, there isn’t much to comment on in regard to how they interact. Which is honestly a plot hole on my part, they grew up together so there should be *something* there. If there’s one thing I can comment on, it’s that Brielle’s trauma sure does screw up any relationship she was barely holding onto, because the single thing I can think of where Ben and Brielle was involved with each other’s storylines is the end of STEP II: where Brielle accidentally decapitates the Infected Honey (The Carpenter’s wife), which is something that was heavily looked down upon by the River Town community as they consider it inhumane to do so to Infected Humans. Ben stumbles upon the scene, and Brielle panics, begging him not to tell anyone and not to see her differently and that she didn’t mean to do it. Ben doesn’t know what to think and tries to leave after Brielle won’t clam down, which is when Brielle suddenly lashes out, her hands turning to wooden claws as she slashes her brother in the chest. Seeing what she had done, Brielle is horrified, and with panic and adrenaline through the roof, she runs, leaving Ben to bleed out in the melting snow… obviously he survives, but.. yikes.
~Jolie Cardinal and Brielle Brown~
Jolie and Brielle! Probably the shortest character dynamic in the list, it’s simple but sweet, and I’ve had an illustration idea based off of this very duo since back when I was first thinking about the story. (I still really want to draw it but it requires The Huntsman to be designed and I just haven’t gotten around to that yet)
As you probably already know, Jolie’s main goal in life is to find a cure for The Infection, by Step III onward she’s kind of shifted her perspective and changed her goal to trying to learn as much as possible about The Infection and write down all her research in her journal for others to use, so that they can continue on her research to hopefully one day find a cure, but that doesn’t mean she’s lost hope for her own lifetime… But I’m getting carried away, I’m talking about STEP I, Springtime Survival, with little 12 year old Jolie Cardinal and 16 year old Brielle Brown. The very beginning of Jolie’s cure studies, in the midst of Brielle’s trauma-based workaholism. I will admit, this dynamic is a bit one-sided, but that’s because Brielle is just distant like that, I mean, you’ve seen how she is with her own siblings, what do you think she’d be like with others? Brielle was one of the youngest River Town residents who would go out into the Infection infested forest to do chores and come back usually unscathed, she has both training in logging and medical care and because of all of these traits she quickly gained the awe and attention of young Jolie Cardinal, who had been studying medical care and botany through limited books in determination to find a cure, and had been wanting to study under someone with experience. Perhaps even gain experience herself… but unfortunately for Jolie, being a young girl who didn’t seem physically or mentally prepared for the forest, would be turned down by basically every person she tried to study under. Therefore she turned to her last resort, someone closer to her age who surely would understand her perspective and determination, someone like Brielle Brown! Someone who… also turned her down. Look, Brielle doesn’t have the time to teach someone else, and she certainly doesn’t have the mental energy to let anyone in, and above all she wasn’t going to send a twelve year old girl to her inevitable fungal demise. Unfortunately for Brielle, being turned down by her last resort only made Jolie even more determined, and caused her to turn to her true last resort: gaining experience through trial and error, learning firsthand what the Infection is like by going into the forest by herself without anyone else’s help. Because her guardian certainly wouldn’t be coming with her, gosh he doesn’t even know she’s doing such things! Jolie would get herself into trouble and if she couldn’t get herself out of it, Brielle would often miraculously be there to save her. Brielle would try to convince Jolie to stop coming into the forest if she couldn’t handle it, but Jolie would keep showing up, time and time again, and eventually Brielle would feel inclined to teach Jolie a thing or two, but would ultimately still stay distant and refused to actually mentor her. These two, while not forming any close bonds, has always stuck out to me as a STEP I dynamic, as they were thought out so early on and is just that: a character dynamic, so it felt like a bit of a breather in between the two long dynamics :)
~Jolie Cardinal and Josephine Solara~
Jo-Jo! *cough* I mean Jolie and Josephine! These two are such cuties to me, which is funny because they live very dangerous lives. A bit of a side note, but I was originally hesitant to pair these two together because Jolie looked so much older than Mary in Step I, but they’re actually incredibly close in age (only a one year difference), Jolie just looked old for her age and Mary had the same base as Penny, besides Mary gets a few growth spurts somewhere between Step I and Step II, so she doesn’t look younger for that long. Anyways, back to character dynamics!
Sooo… fun fact about these two, they’re the prime example of “Stitch makes too many romantic duos and doesn’t go in-depth enough with most of them,” because I have so much going on in B.A. that I don’t think of stuff unless they’re plot relevant enough and therefore can’t give you a specific answer of how these two met, and if I did know once, I’ve long forgotten by now.
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“Mary” also known as “Marigold” was a little eleven year old girl, very small for her age, who came to Brooklet Avenue with her twin brother, named “Spider Lily,” those names were given to them by Sadie Foxglove due to the fact that they were both selectively mute and refused to talk to anyone. Marigold and Spider Lily were both often seen scampering around the River Town, usually seen by townsfolk as Spider Lily causing some type of ruckus or commotion while Marigold would follow him around and help him out of tight spots, however she never engaged with any of his shenanigans. Despite clearly coming from the Mill Community, it was clear that the two were on their own, but no one could ever figure out where they would disappear to when they weren’t causing trouble, their home was a completely mystery.
Jolie Cardinal was a twelve year old girl, often described as “studious” and “mature” for her age. She is known as “the girl who floated down the river,” as she would be found floating down the river of Brooklet Avenue on a branch not long after the start of the Infection. Jolie would be taken in by the Carpenter, and later it would be known that her mother was attacked by Infected and tossed Jolie into the water, supposedly in hopes her daughter would make it out alive. Jolie was often found studying, either medical or botanical books, and when she wasn’t trying to get out into the forest and putting herself in danger for her studies, would often be carving something out of a little piece of wood.
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To give a timeline, Jolie and Mary starts interacting sometime in STEP I, Springtime Survival, probably about a year (or a year and half) into STEP I (for reference, STEP II is three years after STEP I).
Jolie and Mary would run into each other a few times in the forest, usually while Mary was trying to bring her brother back to Knell’s Treehouse, but Mary and Spider would always disappear the moment they got the chance. However Jolie had already started noticing signs of what Mary and Spider kept secret from the entire town: Spider was ill, in what way she didn’t know, it could’ve been some chronic illness she didn’t know much about, but she also didn’t want to ignore the signs. Jolie would begin to keep an eye out for the twins, and whenever she had the opportunity would try to interact with Mary.
Eventually the two would warm up to each other, and would start to get to know each other on a personal level, learning that one of their goals were the same: they both wanted to find a cure for The Infection. Mary also officially introduces herself to Jolie as Josephine Solara.
This would bring us close to the end of STEP I, where Spider is outed as Infected and the town kicks him out, forcing Mary to test for the Infection before letting her go with him. Jolie believes that Spider was treated unfairly, but also understands why the townspeople reacted the way they did, he was Infected after all, and the town was never hesitant to cast out their own people if it meant keeping the Infection out. Jolie was aware by that point that Spider was Infected, but Mary never explained the details of how he was keeping it at bay up until that point.
Fortunately, by STEP II, Mary finally trusts Jolie enough that she knows she wouldn’t react poorly learning the information, and brings Jolie into the woods where she introduces her to Knell The Creature. Mary explains to Jolie that Knell is her’s and Spider’s caretaker in the same way how the Carpenter is for her, and that his natural Creature magic was how Spider was able to fight the infection (even if it was a loosing battle). Jolie is shocked by the information, but her shock is quickly overcome by the revelation that she may have had a breakthrough- the Infection can be kept at bay, and if it can be kept at bay, surely that means it can be reversed? Despite Knell’s attempts to explain the situation properly to Jolie- how the Infection can’t be reversed and even he could only do so much to fight it- Jolie was already filled with more hope and determination.
This would be when Jolie and Mary would share everything they know about the Infection with each other, and would officially consider each other partners- no, sorry, not romantic partners, partners in the sense of working together for the same goal, that comes later.
Jolie and Mary would run into Gabriel Flintlock in the forest, who was snapping photos of frozen Infected, and this is how Jolie would learn that Gabriel had some knowledge of the Infection himself and would start seeking him out to question him on such things, however Mary was incredibly hesitant to trust him. Mary would later be proven correct. Throughout STEP II Gabriel would interact with Jolie, Mary, and Penny, pushing Penny into interacting with Jolie and Mary and introducing them to Millie, manipulating them all into believing there was hope for a cure and traveling out to his old Academy (University?) where the Infector lay asleep from the freeze. He would also manipulate little Colette and bring her to the university himself (now you guys understand why Gabriel isn’t that great of a guy, but that can be a whole post of it’s own). After manipulating the three girls to travel with Millie to the old academy, Gabriel arrives with Colette and the Infector is freed from the thaw and wakes up (it’s a whole thing that has nothing to do with Jo-Jo), they trap Jolie, Mary, Penny, and Colette and removes Millie’s flowers. Then Spider is brought to the academy (I haven’t quite figured out the details of how he gets there, I’ve gone through a few ideas and just haven’t figured out which one would work best), and the “experiment” begins. (I’m having to remind myself this is about Jolie and Mary, not Step II lol) Mary becomes distraught over her brother (supposedly) becoming Infected, and Jolie quickly gets out of her branch restraints during all the commotion and frees Mary, running off with her before they catch The Infector’s attention.
Knell ends up explaining to Mary that he knows from a trusted source that Spider is alive, and this is how STEP III begins for Mary and Jolie.
Phew, this is where I can finally describe their dynamic. Yeah, that’s right, this was all leading up to me being able to actually talk about these two, my goodness! This is why I had to cut out so much…
STEP III is when I’ve always thought of Mary and Jolie the most, probably because this is when the plot picks up and they become romantically involved- Mary even picking up the surname “Cardinal” in preference over “Solara” despite nothing being official (it’s the same scenario as Sadie Foxglove still legally being called Sadie Brown). Jolie is a stoic girl who doesn’t often show much emotion on her face, and only really warms up around those she loves, one of which being Josephine, an overprotective and passionate girl who is compared to sunshine. Jolie and Josephine both had similar feelings when it came to “growing up too fast,” as Jolie was always considered too “mature” or “adult” for the other kids her age, and Josephine was neglected by both her parents and her older sister and only had the company of her brother within their harsh environment. Alongside this and sharing a similar goal, they were able to get close pretty fast. The only time the two clashes with each other is Jolie’s inability to see when she’s gone too far for her research, particularly when it comes to putting herself in danger, and usually values others more over herself. Part of this is due to Jolie’s overconfidence, as she’s survived many a scenario and truly believes she can get herself out of most situations, but living on the edge like this usually causes Josephine to stress over her and has caused many an argument. They have attempted to work through this, with Jolie being convinced to be more cautious with her life, and Josephine being less overprotective and trusting that her girlfriend knows what she’s doing, however the problem will always remain present in their relationship in one way or another. The two never officially “dated,” at least not in the typical way, as they confessed their feelings for each other and became romantically involved while simultaneously putting their goals first, but they both preferred it that way, as neither of them are very fond of the concept of “dating” and simply fell into their own version of a romance. Out of the two, Josephine is the most outspoken about their relationship and her love for Jolie, she adores her girlfriend and finds her determination and hope admirable, and is always in awe with how intuitive Jolie is, one of her favorite compliments to give her being “you beautiful genius!” Jolie shows her love in more quiet ways, her love language is quality time and she isn’t much of a public affection type of person, she doesn’t mind if Josephine is the one who initiates public affection as she knows Josephine is a very openly lovey person, but she won’t be the one to initiate it. Jolie enjoys quiet quality time with Josephine, she will gladly help Josephine with whatever is important to her, and having someone so dedicated to her and her own goals means the world to her. Jolie’s heart melted when Josephine asked if she could take up her surname, Cardinal, as her own, as to her it meant she truly saw her as family.
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The character dynamics list originally had Knell and Nico, as well as Mary and Spider, but I quickly realized that if I explained Knell and Nico’s dynamic on top of all the others I’d be writing this thing for like two months, soooo character dynamics part two anyone? Also remind me to never do this many dynamics in one post, I’m doing one dynamic per post from here on out…
-Stitch 🌱
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