If your character hadn't ended up on a death island

[Cicada]

We've had a couple of versions of this thread in the past!

The premise is simple: your character does not end up on murder island. Butterfly effect. OooOOoooOOOOoooo, spooky, etc. How does their life go? Where do they end up? What whacky and degenerate what-could-have-been ship with another handler's character is allowed to blossom when they aren't killed before first rolls on some island far away from home?

It's like, marginally useful as a way of analyzing your character from a different angle that might help you enrich their actual island content/storyline, but like. Mostly this is just a for fun kinda thing, getting to post your own musings and also check out other handlers vision of their kid's futures in a peaceful alternative timeline. You can go into as much or as little detail as you want. More food for thought: where do they end up going to college? What sort of job do they end up having? How do they resolve the traumas you gave them to make their island storyline more interesting and dramatic, if they resolve those at all? Sky's the limit. Have at ye!

This is open to ANY VERSION. As long as its your character, go nuts.






Table of Contents b/c why not:

• Fred Hobbes, Chloé Delacroix (midnight_twelve)
• Marty J Lovett, Joshua Krakowski, Maxwell Lombardi, Vera Osborne, Brian Zhdanovich, Ruby Forrester, Jenna Rhodes (Fiori)
• Eden Zima, Ren Vu (Zetsu)
• Ashlyn Graves, Salem Fox, Cedar Dalisay (Cicada)
• Melanie Miles, Amy Chen (Yonagoda)

[midnight_twelve]

Copied directly from discord to artificially inflate my post count:

Fred would go to college, drop out, get out of shape as his metabolism slowed down, sometimes open instagram and stare at his old friend's new lives and almost reach out but close the app and crack open a beer and watch the sunset from his parents attic window.

Chloe is literally the secretary general of the United Nations.

[Fiori]

Actually did a thread like this a while back, so will just copy paste what I put up there:

[+] Marty J Lovett

Marty and Joshua began to drift and go their separate ways after school, with Marty studying Ancient History at college and Joshua returning to LA to pursue his dream of becoming a rock star. Even with his degree Marty struggles to really find himself, going through a stint of dead end jobs before finally landing a long-term gig as an archivist. By the 2020s he's married with a child, granted said marriage is likely to not last in the long term. He does however reunite with Joshua in 2022, where the two bond again over the past and muse on what the future holds. Overall, while he's not exactly living the dream, he didn't have much of a dream to begin with so it could be worse.

[+] Joshua Krakowski

Oddly enough, Joshua's idea of showing up in Hollywood with a guitar and becoming a rock star overnight doesn't really work out, but through sheer persistence he does eventually land a job as a roadie and has been working as one for the past 14 years. He's married with kids, and all things considered doing pretty well for himself and is content with his lot in life.

[+] Maxwell Lombardi

After his brief stint in the US, Maxwell would return to the UK to study at Oxford University, where he quickly makes a name from himself as a member of the Bullingdon Club. Though he is quick to give up on his aspirations of becoming a composer, he does discover a niche for politics, and thanks to his Bullingdon contacts ends up with a cushty gig as a member of the Conservative Party. He slowly rises through the ranks through to the 2020s, gaining some powerful friends due in no small part for his contributions towards the Leave campaign, and through the following years makes a habit out of siding with whoever looks most likely to become prime minister next. Slowly biding his time and building up his reputation, so that he may secure himself a comfortable position in the next decade or so...

[+] Vera Osborne

Attends a fancy art school and ends up doing pretty well for herself, eventually managing to get a piece put on display at the Guggenheim and become successful enough to move to New York. Though she's not exactly a household name, she has a decent following and lives very comfortably, still espousing her various political causes whilst enjoying the benefits of her Manhattan elite lifestyle

[+] Brian Zhdanovich

After finishing high school, Brian, Ruby and several others would opt to take something of a gap year to go on a road trip across America. By the end of which Brian still found himself unsure what to do with his life, deciding against college to instead go through a handful of jobs before becoming a bartender, which in turn would lead to a career as a mixologist. He currently works at a popular bar serving fancy cocktails, and seems content with his lot in life serving drinks and offering words of wisdom.

[+] Ruby Forrester

After taking a gap year Ruby would study English at college, though said degree wouldn't amount to much as she struggled to get her writing career off the ground. She would however discover an interest in education after working as a teaching assistant, going on to get the appropriate qualifications to become a full-time high school English teacher.

[+] Jenna Rhodes

Follows her father's footsteps to become a police officer, during which she would have a brief but distinguished career in the SPD. After marrying in 2019, she would find herself deeply conflicted during the 2020 protests, eventually deciding to resign from the force to focus in raising a family when she became disillusioned by the realities of US law enforcement.

[Zetsu]

For my V8 kids:

Eden

I don't know that Eden would ever escape his self-destructive tendencies. He's self-destructive as a way to cope with his self-loathing tendencies, but all his self-destructive actions also hurt people and cause him to loathe himself more, and it's a vicious cycle that he probably doesn't escape. He likely continues the pattern of lashing out at others in the hope that they'll hurt him like he deserves until he ruins himself. A slower, less lethal version of what happens in his death thread, basically. Less lethal still means he likely dies young and alone, but not until after twink death has come for him.

Ren

Ren was intended to be an almost-escapist character thrust into inescapable circumstances, so their non-sotf life path is going to be mildly escapist for me. They get a phd in classics, become a prof. Aside from scholarly work, they'd also write translations/reinterpretations of ancient greek poetry and theatre, with a big focus on metafictional tragedy. They'd find some success, I imagine they'd be decently well-known within the circles of people who would read that kind of thing but those are small circles. Eventually they learn to stop scaring the hoes by swearing to be their friends' loyal blade or whatever, and instead write those desires into their (meta)fictional work; they'd still be really intense about their friendships, but it'd be a healthier kind of intense, I think.

[Cicada]

Cicada's V8:

[+] .

Ashlyn Graves - Talked with Turtle a bit about this one (she said, in the long term, Ash is forgivable). It will take a long time for Ash to really start to apologize properly and make amends to Kitty. We're talking about a decade of mellowing out and healing from her own trauma. Breaks up with Salem on amicable terms the moment high school ends (each swears they were the ones who initiated the break up, when asked). She strictly dates women from then on for the rest of her life. Ash goes to U Mass Amherst with a decent athletics scholarship, makes some great memories on their volleyball team. Low key a peaks in college type of girl, works hard, plays harder, has a queer af time and attends all the parties. Her major would be, like, a history major or the sort.

Her swag kind of stagnates after and she becomes more listless. Moves out to NYC on a whim, becomes a bartender for the remainder of her 20s and eventually meets the woman she marries, a super tall and butch af women's basketball pro player. Ash gets some of her motivation/mojo back and manages to work her way into becoming head volleyball coach for a university in the Northeast. She settles down into a chill and relaxed DINK lifestyle and eventually reintegrates properly back into Kitty's life and they acheive some degree of healing. Ash ultimately kinda just settles into living a perfectly okay life and is quietly happy the excitement of life is long behind her. She maintains a good amount of contact with any interested peers in Endecott- she was always that kind of person. Sort of person to hit up all the reunions. Eventually she and her wife do divorce by the time Ash is 50 or so. Ashlyn moves back home, and would either be down to rekindle something with an old Endecott flame or otherwise peacefully live a single life.



Salem Fox - A long time ago Salem himself joked that he'd be a nobody loser with a lame political podcast nobody listens to while Chloe (brief gf in Freshman year or so) goes on to... become the Sec Gen of the UN, apparently. But he goes on to some decently big things in life. Salem's goal for working for HuffPo is one he wisely opts out of considering they become a pretty trashy publication in present day. He ends up discarding journalism and studying polisci in Tufts instead, where he is indeed heavily engaged with student government and also lands a high profile internship in the US Department of State. He keeps a close eye on his family, especially California, but otherwise kind of vanishes from the lives of everyone from Endecott. He might reconnect with like, Big Dick or Chloe or other folks destined to be important people.

Salem spends his full political career as a Squad-esque Democrat/progressive, with a kind of trollish almost [SOTFverse version of George Santos] dadaist public persona where his social media meme game is peak. But he's pretty good at his job and ends up with some solid progressive priority bills under his belt, even as America lurches to the right. Sort of guy who can carve some decent wins out of Republican dreck. He works his way up from legislative assistant into winning an upset primary against the generic Dem in Massachusset's 6th House district in his early 30s. He has a major run of Ws focusing on big flashy strides with LatAm policy on the Foreign Affairs committee and leverages this into earning a Sec of State position, prob around the time Chloe is Sec Gen of the UN (she mogs him etc). His career peaks about there and he retires in his mid 50s into a cushy tenured professorship back in Tufts after.

He never settles down or marries, and to be honest kind of leaves the whole relationships thing on the back burner pretty much his whole life. I'd say by the time he's 30 he comfortably accepts he's aromantic and additionally too career focused.



Cedar Dalisay - Cedar attends a community college and continues to focus a lot of her attention on slowly burning out as she tries to be a shoulder to cry on for like, all of her high school friends at once. She drops out after two years and makes a living for a while falling back on her art presence online to crank out commissions while her physical health remains in pretty sad shape and she has some medical scares throughout her 20s. Her parents remain protective of her and help paper over the gaps in her income, pay for medical expenses, so on. Cedar takes the inevitable drift from her high school friends as they move on with their lives in various ways pretty hard. Near lonely shut in status at some point in her late 20s, who through apathy and depression quietly falls out of the lives of any friends that stuck by her side. She's able to keep on arting, and she also eventually picks up streaming and content creation.

Her disabilites continue to worsen: colonostomy bag and confined to a wheelchair by her mid 30s. She eventually moves out on her own and back to the Philippines with her dual citizenship, where she settles in Manila. Not much family to drawn on, but low expenses help a lot with her quality of life. She meets a local guy in IT, intelligent and affable if a bit dull, and settles down with him. Avoids having children due to concerns about her own health and the health of the child, but she has one unplanned daughter regardless who does end up being in perfectly good health. Cedar being a mother revitalizes her to an extent and she's able to enjoy a simple life as a middle class woman in a growing urbanized market. She's a good mom and raises a good daughter. Her health stabilizes but she still ultimately dies due to complications from her eternally weak immune system in her early 60s. Her child emigrated to the US at some point during college, and she ultimately takes her mother back home to be buried in Salem along with Cedar's parents.

[Yonagoda]

V8:

Millie- probably would actually get Professional Help (desperately needed) and mellowed out and sorted through her various issues with food, anger, her mom, and general doomerisms (not a term yet for her time) about the future. A lot of her problems are related to her being an easily stressed out teenager who is very much influenced by her environment, and I think college would be a nice change of pace for her. I dunno, maybe it's my optimism or whatever. I see her switching her career path from food science/nutrition to marine biology and conservationism. One thing that I don't think she'll ever truly fix is her lack of close friends even as she gets older; it's not a bad thing per se, but she'll likely deprive herself of a close support system in favor of superficial, mostly online interactions. I can see her going through a string of bad breakups in her twenties/thirties and then staying single forever, most likely. Drifting apart from her family is a hard decision but she'll bite the bullet eventually.

Amy- I think she'll go to a small liberal arts college and then not know what to major in until the last moment. She'll probably do worse there than high school, and it wouldn't be particularly fun for her because she's expected to be a Mature Adult now with Accountability and she's not able to do that, and she has absolutely no support system (does not interact with people much) to help her through things. The earlier she gets medical attention for her chronic fatigue and also possibly schizoid personality disorder, the better. After breaking down in her first or second year I think she might power through with a mediocre GPA, a degree in something esoteric, and, while certainly not being sociable by any means, find a few friends who like she's not particularly close to but they're there for her when she needs it. Builds a website for her worldbuilding project.