#02 | Chester thoughts: ft. Alexandros and Achilles

Thinking about Chester again... Every so often this character plagues me personally. I made her, after all, but like... I think he over all my characters is the most personal. I cry and writhe over Machiavelli and Rev and Vinna's relationship, but out of all of my characters, Chester always has a way of hitting me in a personal place.

Anyways. I want to talk about his guilt when it comes to his father's death and her connection to Achilles that stems from it.

To begin: I think it's fascinating that Chester directly causes Alexandros's death and is very aware of this fact.

Chester as a character has always been too friendly- it is something that has gotten her into trouble on multiple occasions. Chester, pre-Alexandros death, had a tendency to poke his nose into absolutely everything because she had this worldview that, yes people can be untrustworthy, but why not give them grace? She adores humanity, he thinks humans are inherently good. Alexandros could rarely keep a hold on him whenever they stopped by towns- which leads to Chester finally poking his nose into a bad situation: a robbery.

Chester wandered into that situation, which led to Alexandros protecting her by telling him to run and leave him while he tried to diffuse the situation. Had Chester not wandered into this, Alexandros likely still would be alive.

But... He had too, because that's his daughter. So, he talks to them and tells Chester to run- and then Chester hides instead and watches from that place of hiding as Alexandros is shot down and killed. Hence the gilt that stems from that incident: this legitimately traumatized Chester when it comes to weapons, outlaws, etc. It's the reason he doesn't speak to people who look like a stereotypical outlaw and why he gets antsy around guns.

But... With all of that said, it doesn't stop Chester from interacting with people in general. She is still extremely friendly and talkative with most folk- her love for humanity won out over that fear and guilt. Chester, despite having witnessed violence like that, still adores humanity and thinks that they are inherently good, even if she now approaches that a bit more cautiously.

That part of Chester's character will always be so special to me... He was born weak, was aware that she was going to die earlier than most people, not from her own actions but just because fate worked out like that. His own mother wanted to sacrifice him. Her father was killed by her own actions. And YET. And yet, Chester is one of the most friendly, beam-of-light people on Gunsmoke. His adoration for humanity and desire to live won out over all of that... He did not want to spend the small life she has being bitter and angry over what she does not and will never have.

And man... on the topic of that small life: one of the most fascinating parts of his character to me is that fact that like... I don't know how to explain it, but it is how Chester actively avoids the topic of her own incoming death yet his character is so so SO surrounded by it. She is around tombstones all the time. It's his job. He gives the dead one last thing to respect them and harbors such care and respect for them ("I'd like ta know someone would do the same for me, eheh.") and is surrounded by the fate that she knows is coming. Something something his character avoids the topic of her own death but is physically around it constantly. Much like how she's never able to erase that fact from her mind, he cannot separate himself from the physical reminders of it. Chester is intertwined with the concept of death, yet no one in her life expected it to come for him when it did. He runs and runs (her knees are the first thing to give out...) but this part of him never goes away, it is a part of her. Just... ough.

Guh. I also wanna yap about how this ties in with Achilles.

I think all of this makes her connection with Achilles a bit more interesting too, because while Chester does not have near the amount of blood on his hands, he understands Achilles when it comes to having guilt about being the cause of people's death. Outside of her just general compassion, this is one of the reasons she had grace and understanding with Achilles over it: Chester knows what that feels like. Hence why Achilles is the only person outside of Jerboa who knows about the Alexandros incident. God, this guy helps Achilles so much...

I have mentioned to the others before that Chester initially wants to bother Achilles and weasel into his head because when she first meets him, she looks at him, sees the guilt in his eyes, and was reminded vividly of his father. She recognized that face of guilt in his eyes because she saw it so often out of Alexandros. But, I think too... that she also saw her own guilt reflected in there, and it made her curious. Chester as a character acts really goofy, but when it comes to people, Chester is sharp. He picked up on something there. Then, later, when Achilles chooses himself over his men, she's able to truly begin bonding there, because she's like, 'Ah, I know that feeling of causing people's deaths. I don't think you're a bad man, I think you were just given bad choices' etc etc. And then after Valley Haven is destroyed... Well. Something about her seeing Achilles nearly frozen in utter shock, and remembering how long she herself stood in the same spot and stared at the remains of Alexandros. Seeing Achilles grieving and pitifully scratching Gabriel's name into a stone for a grave, and remembering how she made Alexandros's...

Guh. These two mean a lot to me. Chester, you helped that boy so much... You chose to step in and help him despite knowing fully well that you were going to be another death that he has to carry.

I'll stop yapping now because I really could go on for forever but... Man. Man...

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#03 | Character Connections in Nick's OCs

I had the realization that Chester and Revelation likely would have met when they were younger- which is very interesting to me actually. Both their mothers, Leah and Neha, were very close and raised Chester and Kiran in the same town, so it makes sense that they would have met, right? Kiran and Revelation are pretty seperate people by this point though- there's similarities, but Rev themself sees Kiran as a different person than who they are now. Hell, Rev doesn't even know what their name was before Revelation. So, it's interesting to me that Chester got to meet this very early piece of Revelation, but by the time they are both adults, neither of them recognize one another. These are the only people who knew each other as kids, and yet neither recall one another, because Kiran was very different from Revelation and Revelation lost all their memory, so they have no idea who Chester is. Hell, Chester straight up refuses to be around Revelation in the two's adulthood because Revelation looks too much like the outlaws that killed Chester's dad. They'll never know how they're connected, that their parents were so close.

Honestly, I love little connections like that in characters in general. Revelation has a few within the story- in that, they are connected to both Chester and especially Faron. Faron's sister, Dahlia, was their closest friend in the EOM after all. Its just so good to me to see how much Revelation's actions have affected other people's lives- because now its physical, you know? Rev has done terrible shit. Revelation killed Chester's mother - Leah - along with their own mother, the entire town of Little Enora, and Dahlia. Dahlia's death literally affected Faron so much that it led to fae traveling and meeting Ctimene, kicking off that entire thing. Just... that chain of events is so interesting and very satisfying to me. Rev will never know how many lives they affected through their actions and will never be able to make up for it all.

On the Dahlia thing- I think it would be interesting for Faron to at least recognize Revelation. See, Revelation is dead by the time Achilles and crew meet Faron, so there's no way they'd ever meet physically- but in my head, I like to think someone has a photo of Vinna and Revelation (likely Achilles, from Teddy) and it is given to Faron to look at, since Achilles is explaining his own family. I think Faron takes a look at Revelation, and remembers the letters Dahlia wrote about a kid with a pardah like this, dawned in blue. And Achilles says oh, my sibling, they started using Purandare- Rev's original last name, and Faron knows that last name, fae saw it in the letters fae used to read over and over from Dahlia. And then Faron gets quiet, and asks Achilles "...The Eye. The Eye of Michael. Were they apart of it?" It's a name Achilles hasn't heard in a while, one he didn't expect to hear from someone like Faron, so, taken off guard, he is honest, and then Faron just... knows. Faron knows that this was them.

I have this very messy three panel comic thing I did of Faron staring at the photo with this thoughtful expression, sometihng sad in faer eyes as fae says, "Ah. So... It was you, then?" before sighing, smiling a bittersweet little smile, and saying, "I would have loved to have gotten to meet you." GUH that interaction means a lot to me.

I need to make more character connections, I'm always so unwell (/posi) about them. I'll find a way to tie them all, haha. For now, I'm going to be rotting over this SO bad, it's so delicious to me.

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