{"body":{"post":{"id":"5u2r29190e10312r116b","title":"Valentin_Char Background","content":"---\ndescription: character development\nlink: https://obsius.site/5u2r29190e10312r116b\n---\n#### Lunar Colonies\nUS Military/NASA built the Artemis Base on the Moon in 1989, and in 40 years it's developed into a strip mall of resorts/vacation homes for the wealthy and the corporations who have a vested interest in space exploration (I believe the colonies were described as being Las Vegas adjacent, its not dissimilar to a strip mall of casinos/hotels and everything is hyper-commercialized). Once commercial space travel became a thing (2010s?), incentives for businesses to bring people to the moon to build infrastructure followed which \"created\" new jobs. Temporary housing was built that became permanent low income housing for the working class, things like schools were created by respective corporations as a tax incentive if they could make it look like they are providing a \"social service\" and \"investing in the future of their workers.\" There's a stark disparity between the working class and the wealthy tourists. Many wealthy business owners retreated to the Lunar colonies during the 2nd Civil war (2050-2060) as a means of protecting themselves and their investments.\n\n#### Devaux Family Background\nLatino/mixed (there's a Louisiana cajun grandparent that they get Devaux from). Parents relocate to the Lunar Colonies due to economic pressures at the time (artificial job scarcity on earth + job incentives for the colonies) and mislead by the promise of the American dream, \"every person has the freedom and opportunity to succeed and attain a better life (material wealth, upward social mobility)\" - and if they don't succeed, it is a failing of the individual not the system. Valentin and Mercedes were born in the colonies and grew up watching their parents get worked to death. Socioeconomic strains put on the family (all working class families) made home life relatively hostile. I think both parents relocated as young adults who were recently married and starting their family.\n- **Luis (father)** - worked in the SynapTech warehouse; classic toxic masculinity, some kind of substance abuse, physically abusive particularly to Valentin (he HATES his dad). Aggressively believes in the concept of the nuclear family above all else, that the man of the house provides, likely because its the only aspect of his life he feels he has control over (through fear and abuse). Puts unrealistic traditional gender roles on both his children, expectations are never met with Valentin while exceptions may be made for Mercedes, who is a woman and therefore inferior and needs male protection. I think he's also loyal to SynapTech in the sense that he's bought into the corporate lie of eventually getting his in retirement, the company provides so stay on their good side. Died in a workplace accident that is partially Val's fault.\n- **Gabriela (mother)** - works janitorial in the resorts; she was meek and goes along with whatever Luis does/says; her husband more or less forced her to go to the moon with him, effectively cutting her off from her family and extended communities. There are \"womanly\" lessons she tries to impart on her daughter, mainly in the vein of \"keep your head down, submit to men\" or otherwise making excuses for dad's behavior. Rewarded good behavior with kindness, but always let Luis deal with the bad behavior however he wanted.If her children came to her with something they were afraid to tell their father, she'd still tell their father and uphold his standards. Succumbed to cancer due in part to not having access to proper medical care in the colonies.\n- **Mercedes (sister)** - Dee or Dee-Dee for short; 3 years older than Valentin\n- **Extended Family** - Aunts, uncles, and cousins (on mom's side) who are back on Earth, survived the 2nd Civil war (2050-2060) and migrated to NYC afterwards. Extended family is primarily working class with some loose involvement in the criminal underworld (\"I know a guy who knows a guy\"). Marisol (the matriarch) is Gabriela's aunt, Gabriela has a number of brothers and sisters that are still alive as well. TBD where dad's side of the family is, but there's been no contact for decades. \n\n##### Family Dynamics\nNuclear family riddled with emotional neglect, toxic masculinity, mother supports/doesn't prevent abuse from father (their marriage was more about survival than mutual love), Mercedes is also suffering abuse albeit a different flavor (traditional female gender roles/expectations put upon from mother AND father). Valentin and Mercedes are on the same team in terms of surviving their parents/socioeconomic situation, but Mercedes eventually abandons Valentin to get herself out of of this situation. Father is particularly abusive towards Valentin, who's had a go at his dad a number of times in retaliation.\n\nMercedes is sympathetic towards Val who gets the worst of their dad, I think as a result she tries to make her brother feel better the best way she can i.e. kid promises like \"we'll run away together\" that become more viable as they age into adults with money. She is not immune to eldest daughter syndrome, but as she gets older she comes to the conclusion that Val isn't going to get it together and she'd do better without him (AKA leave the colonies). She would often placate/manipulate their parents to attempt to get her way with things, and Valentin hates that it works for her (with mixed success) and not for him.\n\nValentin knows its not fair the way he's treated and acts out about it - maybe a cry for help (with other adults), but also he knows its not right and he's going to stand up for himself if no one else will (Dee included). The problem is that, as he gets older, he gets violent, starts breaking laws and *any* authority figure becomes an adversary, including his sister who for a time tries to reign him in for their collective survival. There is no positive authority figure/constructive presence in his life, for most of his youth.\n\nValentin ends up working at the SynapTech warehouse with his father, is/was the easiest way to get him any job (likely has not had any luck getting or holding a job on his own and has been dealing with the consequences of that at home). Valentin is experiencing a) the whiplash of Luis behaving shitty at home, and then very differently at work to keep up public appearances, wherein Val is expected to go along with it and pretend everything is normal when its not or b) all the men at the warehouse are exactly like his father(generational thing). Anything Luis can weaponize against his children, he will (i.e. poor grades at school, Gabriela getting sick)\n\nGabriela gets sick probably sometime in Val's late teens, she says nothing, doesn't get it diagnosed until a few years later. This puts an additional financial strain on the family and an extra layer of emotional guilting now that they have to take care of their sick mother. After Luis dies, Gabriela might become more honest with or kinder to her children since she's not living in fear of her husband anymore and knows she's dying, but the damage is already done and it doesn't make up for anything.\n\n##### Mercedes Devaux\nI think she's smart and she knows it, in terms of manipulating people, planning ahead and bending the rules in her favor. I can see her doing really well as a corporate administrator in another life. I think her story is that she plans, schemes and manipulates too close to the sun until it backfires on her, but she still thinks she can control the situation. **Where Valentin is failed by the system, Mercedes fails because she thinks she can beat the system.**\n\nMercedes finished high school, she would have liked to go to college but it's not something the family can afford/its unavailable to her (I can see there being no higher education available on the moon, you'd have to go to Earth for that). also working to survive (working in the resorts/casinos/malls). Dates a lot in highschool, a good amount of older dudes, earned the \"slut\" title from her peers (as teenage girls do) but they're not entirely wrong - she is dating to get things out of people, and she likes having that kind of effect over people. Starts out as things like affection/attention, gifts (stuff she'd either keep or pawn off), but could escalate to gaining access to certain social circles and/or \"resources\" she wouldn't normally have access to. \n- Valentin (who is going steady with one person at the time), thinks she's kind of mean and shitty, for doing this, but he's not gonna complain too much when she gets him into the \"cooler\" parties on account of whatever boyfriend at the time.\n- What Mercedes takes away from this is, she dates people she thinks she can manipulate, and not people she actually likes or is attracted to.\n\nGets into the sex work industry (18-20 y/o) on the side (does not tell family, Val finds out that she has a side hustle but not WHAT the side hustle is), likely also has a part time day job so the money doesn't look like its coming from nowhere. She needed/wanted the extra cash, this was lucrative, she had already been \"selling\" her body to her past boyfriends to get what she wants, and she knew she was hot shit. Work place standards were iffy at best; trying to keep this on the down-low and squirrel the extra cash from her family. \n\nMercedes and Valentin aren't exactly working together towards the common goal of getting out of the Colonies as much as just, trying to get money/resources/connections in tandem, and if one gets out the other will help them escape. Mercedes has had a plan to leave for a long time, Valentin does not have a plan and isn't thinking long term. As Gabriela gets sicker, Val becomes more volatile and angry, Mercedes comes to terms with the fact that her own survival means she has to leave her mother and brother behind - she feels bad, but in the way people validate themselves when they make a \"sacrafice\" that isn't really a sacrifice.\n\nLeading up to and after Val's accident, Mercedes starts \"targeting\" a repeat client that is a wealthy tourist/corpo type who appears to be in love with her and has a means of getting to a from earth, so she starts playing him to gain access to transport. I think this guy also has to be a piece of work that is placating/manipulating her back, and she can't see it because she's convinced she has this guy under her thumb (perhaps some red flags like, he gets mad when she pays attention to anyone but him, but is sweet again when they're in private). This dude wants to take her back to earth so she can be his mistress, Mercedes knows now that she's in danger but is too close to her goals to back out now and leaves for Earth with this guy.\n\nI think she doesn't tell Valentin (afraid of what he might do to stop her), and lies to Gabriela about where she's going - an option she's going to stay with her (Mercedes') cousins in NYC (I think Gabriela would have some loose contact/information about her family that her children would know about for the sake of making that connection work).\n\nAs soon as Mercedes gets to earth she intends to ghost this guy, but she didn't account for real gravity and is stuck at this guy's place as his play thing until she's physically able to run away from him (might take weeks to months). Worst time of her life, feeling powerless and stupid for walking into his trap, didn't think this could happen to her. She may even need to physically assault (but not manage to kill?) this guy to get away, and that's a problem that will come back to haunt her later. Seeks out extended family because what other option does she have. Her aunt (Gabriela's younger sister) takes her in. When Asked about Gabriela and Valentin, Mercedes tells them they're both dead (true in Gabriela's case and figured it'd be a matter of time before Valentin got himself killed).\n\n>_I have some thoughts/hazy vignettes about how this interaction goes down, but that's for another time. The Santos know of Valentin and Mercedes, I think there was communication between Gabriela and her family on earth but she kept it secret from her husband and children until Luis was gone._\n\nWithin the year, meets a nice local guy (she's not trying to manipulate him on account of this experience with the corpo guy spooking her a bit), they hit it off. They have a son (Cameron), things are going good for a year or two - then the corpo guy finds her. \n\n>_Again, I do not have specifics, but using this this situation to get Cameron's dad out of the picture i.e. he's arrested/killed for assault/murder of the corpo and it puts Mercedes back into a bad situation, now with a young child. \n\nFrom this point on, Mercedes spirals - lost a good thing in her life, struggling as a single parent despite extended family helping her out, doesn't feel in control of her life, crashes out and returns to old habits and sex work to feel like she has an effect over people. Cameron is primarily raised by his aunts.\n\n##### Valentin & Mercedes Reconnecting\n**Its been ~15 years since they've seen each other.** Valentin doesn't have a clue where Mercedes went after she left, and Mercedes assumes Valentin is dead or never getting out of the colonies and has put the thought of him out of her mind. \n\nValentin seeks out extended family after his smuggling contacts drop him off in NYC with no kind of support/resources for him to lean on when he gets there (they were only meant to get him there, not take care of him after), as is also struggling with gravity and needs help (maybe there's a fun drug that provides temporary relief). He runs into Mercedes during this time he's staying with the Santos.\n\n**Mercedes and Valentin reconnecting as adults is messy.** On the one hand, there's some relief and joy in finding out the other is alive, but a lot of hurt resurfaces as well which estranges them. Mercedes believes she did the only thing she could, Valentin remembers it as her abandoning him and their mother. They also see each other for what they've become. Mercedes sees the angry man he is and fears what he might do. Valentin recognizes that she stills uses people to get what she wants and dumps them when they're not of use to her - I think they see aspects of their parents in each other and it makes them uncomfortable. \n\nRegardless, there's a sense of obligation to each other as the only family they have left (that trauma bond has hands). \n\n#### Other Connections from his Backstory\n##### There's a girlfriend\nIt's a high school romance; two kids who think that as long as they have each other they can do anything type shit. This is likely the only romantic partner Val's had that meant something to him (besides eventually Phori). I think she's slightly more well off than Val's family, doesn't get into trouble, is genuinely a nice person and is a good influence on Val. During this time in his life he's lashing out a little less, feels safe with her, someone he can trust and is trying to be better (for him).\n\nValentin's relationship with Phori reminds him of this person, and a time in his life where he felt cared for and safe.\n\nTheir relationship falls apart sometime after Val's accident, when he starts to have his psychotic break. She stays with him through the recovery period, but can only do so much to help. Sees him suffering and struggling, knows she can't fix it, but hoped that offering her support and unconditional love would help/mean something to him, but its not reaching him while he's in this state. Regresses back to violences, is getting more involved in crimes, she becomes afraid of him and leaves him (family moves or something). They never reconnect in the future.\n\n##### Social Circles & Communities\nVal and his family are deeply integrated into the lower working class communities due to economic disparities, his parent's generation has a traditional mindset of \"the man provides for the family\" and \"hard work pays off\" which make's Val feel stuck and not knowing what to do about it while also feeling that there's something deeply wrong about the situation he's in and *must* do something about it. Likely very little in the way of community centers, events or places for teens to hang out on account of most adult's are working for the corporations.\n\nOutside of work and school, Val spends time with his girlfriend and friend groups, likely that its other people his age that get him into petty crimes as a way to rebel against the status quo - there's an understanding amongst the teens that working in the factory until you die like your parents is not the way they want to go, and generally the working class youths fantasize about leaving the Colonies, going to earth or even the Jovian moons.\n\nPost accident, likely that Val connects with other people at his job that have taken the same deal from SynapTech, learns that this seems to happen a lot and that no one seems to live long enough to pay off their debts, or they just end up with more and more cyberware until they're more robot than human (property of the company, not really a living being anymore). He's given resources from these people for blackmarket augments/mods that he could seek out in an attempt to void SynapTech's monitoring software (something that connects to the session two whistleblower thread, plants the seed in Val's memory).\n\n##### Petty Crimes & Smuggling Rings\nValentin is already doing petty theft and maybe running stuff for blackmarket contacts, not so deep in that he couldn't get out of it. Once he starts working at SynapTech and learns he can make a good amount of cash from skimming supplies, he's formally inducted into the smuggling rings. I imagine a lot of what is smuggled to the moon (by whichever guilty party, gangs or corpos) is contraband like drugs, weapons, exotics, people, as well as cyberware components and normal imports that these gangs are reselling on the blackmarket and/or to the poor/working class citizens. \n\nProbably around this period of time Val is feeling confident he'll make enough eventually money to solve his problems, and confidences makes him get cocky. Luis finds out what Val has been up to, likely catches him in the act at work and is furious - if the security had caught Val instead, they would have both lost their jobs and it would have ruined the family financially.\n\n#### The Accident, how he lost his limbs\nWorking in an OSHA violations warehouse, he is an OSHA violation waiting to happen, and is already confrontational because home life is not good, he's stealing from the warehouse - its the consequences of a lot of things coming to a head. \n\nDon't know what the accident looks like beyond, Valentin and Luis are fighting on a shift because Luis has caught him stealing components, it comes to blows in which Val is literally fighting for his life/thinks dad is going to kill him and/or is trying to stop dad from rating him out to security. Both Val and Luis get shoved into/under/around some heavy machinery (i.e. something used in the warehouse/manufacturing department, some conveyor contraption thing, some item from inventory, atmospheric bulkhead doors). It can be freak accident adjacent, like shouldn't have happened except its an OSHA violations warehouse. Val is maimed, Luis dies from his injuries, there aren't any witnesses to their confrontation so no one knows why they were fighting, but its a huge mess. They discover that Val has stolen goods on his person once admitted to the ER, SynapTech is notified of this.\n\nGabriela is distraught/inconsolable over the death of Luis and not thinking clearly and going with whatever SynapTech has told her about the situation - they got into a fight, Val shoved Luis, Val had stolen goods on him, they have reason to believe he's been doing this for a while. Mercedes would have known that Valentin was pawning off stolen goods for cash, but didn't know he was getting them from SynapTech. She sees the writing on the wall: they're loosing Luis income, Gabriela already has medical expenses, adding Val's ER bill and future disability care is not something they can afford. In addition, SynapTech might press charges. \n\nVal is not aware of what is being discussed behind his back (drugged up for pain management) nor is he lucid enough to consent to anything himself, he's in shock and hasn't processed what's happened to him. There's talk of salvaging what they can of his limbs, but there's only so much that can be done. The hospital is looking to the family to make a quick decision on his behalf so they can move him out of the ER and free up the bed. \n\nSynapTech steps in and presents the family with an alternative: if Val/they agree to a cybernetic prosthetics procedure, they'll cover the cost of that *and* foot the ER bill today, Val can keep his job (so long as he behaves) and work off the debt to the company in the form of a long contract with a repayment plan of some kind. Gabriela agrees on Val's behalf and/or they get him lucid enough to agree to it himself at the behest of his mother and sister. Mercedes feelings on this are that, she agrees that this is the \"best possible outcome,\" she may also believe this is what Val would have wanted (freedom of movement, despite the toll).\n\nThe pitch goes something like this: *your son can be discharged in a few days increasing this visit's bill, but he'll need meds for pain management and he'll be disabled the rest of his life (a drain on the family and society). He'll need prosthetics, we know you can't afford the top of the line stuff. Wouldn't you rather he be an abled body member of society? The procedure is simple and he'll be back on new feet within 24 hours if you agree to this procedure. We will also drop the charges against him for stealing company property.\"\n\n1. it will in debt Val to the company forever, he'll never work that off and they will use repossession of they cyberware as a threat.\n2. Some amount of reconstructive surgery is/was possible, he'd likely need prosthetics anyway for his legs, and in the grand scheme of awful medical situations in a cyberpunk world, its more \"cost effective\" to replace limbs with cyberware than go down the path of natural recovery.\n3. the diabolical corpo mission statement of \"we are helping disabled people be not disabled\" by owning parts of their bodies\n4. Valentin was told it was a necessary procedure and the details of the agreement where not explained fully to him beyond there being a payment plan. \n\nThe move ahead with the procedure, mangled limbs are amputated and fit for prosthetics. They give him the baseline models (very industrial/mechanical looking, not the sleeker models he has now) with the option to upgrade at a later time (for a price). \n1. right leg is the most fucked, it has to go. A decision is made to amputate his crushed left leg (trans tibial) to make integration with the cybernetics cleaner.\n2. His right forearm/wrist is broken/crushed, hand severely damaged (broken bones, missing fingers), could have been partially reconstructed but would inhibit his ability to do work (he's right handed) plus aforementioned long recovery/disability \"problem.\" \n3. More was amputated than was initially injured to make it easy to install the the baseline make/model of the augments. This was more \"cost effective\" than ordering a custom prosthetic to fit the injury.\n\nPost procedure, once he's lucid again, Valentin is unable to process the things that have happened to him in the last 24 hours, doesn't have the emotional maturity to deal with how he's feeling about anything and its overwhelming him. Knew that his limbs were gone, is disassociating from the new prosthetics (he can feel them but its not him); Val is being blamed for his father's death and/or otherwise has to listen to people mourn Luis' memory and stuff like \"this wouldn't have happened if that boy wasn't stealing from the company\" - he can't really say what happened without admitting what he was doing either and his family wants him to keep his mouth shut because SynapTech agreed to drop the charges.\n\nIts not until much later that Valentin finds that his family basically sold his body to SynapTech without his permission, and that betrayal from his sister feels unforgivable. Mercedes breaks the news to him and tries to explain that she \"thought this was the best option\" and \"what he would have wanted\" but I think Val takes it as \"this was the most convenient outcome for _you,_ you weren't thinking about what i wanted.\"\n\nI think this is more or less how Valentin and Mercedes leave their relationship as Mercedes leaves not too long after. A year or two later Gabriela dies, Valentin snaps and has his psychotic break and career change.\n\n##### Amputations & Cybernetic Prosthetics\nPossible that he already has some cyberware by the time he's 18-20 if that's part of the societal expectation, low grade simple stuff (i.e. the things everyone has/needs). He's had augmentations for 15-20 years of his life so some of it visibly older and not as cleanly integrated as newer stuff. I think a lot of that gold wiring comes with cyberlimbs and subsequent upgrades to cyberlimbs.\n\nValentin is bent out of shape over the circumstances surrounding the accident and the loss of his limbs, more than he's upset about the augmentations themselves - its more about the pain of having his bodily agency taken away from him when he thinks back on the situation. He gets by convincing himself that the augments are \"cool\" and \"better\" and something that he would have gotten eventually, but there's lingering resentment from not having a choice to begin with.\n\nFor a time he experiences some phantom limb pain and also disassociates from the neural feedback of his prosthetics, the adjustment is hard for him in the beginning. Finds out that the make/model of his cyberware has fatal flaws (or some other shady corpo malware) so as soon as he is able, Val get's SynapTech's kit removed/replaced with blackmarket hardware, and eventually upgrades to the current make/model of cyberware he has now.\n"}}}