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anonymouspuzzler · 8 months

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more cally o'pia stuff because it's my blog and i can do whatever i want forever. below the cut is a very rough broad written timeline of How Things Shake Out In Da AU. i hope you enjoy, very dry timeline notes

>20 years ago…

The Psychic 7 (namely Ford, Bob and Cassie) raid a hospital that is performing lobotomies on psychics. In the resulting scuffle, Cassie impulsively rescues-slash-kidnaps one of the patients, a 10-12 year old boy, Caligosto Loboto.

Ford and Otto eventually reach an arrangement with Cal’s birth parents, convincing them not to press charges and to release Cal into their custody. They’re secretly quite happy to be rid of their troublemaking psychic child and to not have to face the consequences of the botched lobotomy attempt.

Cal is raised collectively by the Psychic 7 (minus Lucrecia, who’s already left for Grulovia by the time he arrives), becoming a powerful psychic, voracious reader and writer, an amateur tinkerer, and very much a next-gen hippie weirdo. He’s particularly bonded with Cassie, who stepped into a maternal and teacher role for him early on, so she takes the role of his legal guardian on paper and he assumes her surname, becoming Caligosto “Cally” O’Pia.

20 years ago…

The Psychic 6 have their fateful battle with Maligula. Cal, by this point a teenager, remains behind to watch the Gulch and keep an eye on the then-ongoing construction of the modern Motherlobe. He ends up finding Ford, mind shattered, wandering through the woods one night. Cal is unaware of what happened to him but keeps watch over him until the rest of the Psychic 6 - minus Helmut, of course - return from Grulovia.

Helmut’s funeral is held. Cal is particularly affected, especially seeing Bob’s subsequent mourning and breakdown - Cal looked up to the two as a model relationship and they helped him realize his bisexuality, so the incident gives Cal significant hang-ups around emotional intimacy and relationships.

Cal becomes part of the first class of Psychonauts agent trainees after the Motherlobe’s opening, alongside Truman (who he sees as a sort of cousin-slash-honorary family member).

Between then and Psychonauts 1…

Cal graduates and becomes an official agent, though by this point he’s already started becoming disillusioned with the Psychonauts mission, due to the continued breakdown of his family in the Psychic 6. He deliberately puts on an ineffective, slacker persona to avoid being put on missions, despite being a powerful and capable psychic. By the time Cassie leaves the Motherlobe, his role is primarily head janitor and semi-official steward of the Gulch. He also writes for True Psychic Tales under a pseudonym.

As his disillusionment grows and he becomes less trusting of the other Psychonauts for help and answers, he adopts the Loboto persona to go undercover unofficially. He’s especially looking for more information on Grulovia and Maligula, since he suspects he hasn’t gotten the full story from his family or the official press.

Cal befriends Oleander after the latter becomes an agent, eventually progressing to a tumultuous on-off relationship, which becomes something of an open secret around the Motherlobe. Each of their unaddressed issues, combined with assuming the worst based on the other’s unaddressed issues, makes each successive breakup worse and sabotages their secretly-mutual hopes for a serious lasting relationship. The big breaking point occurs when Oleander is badly injured on a mission (losing his eye and gaining his facial scar), making Cal panic over the idea of losing him like Bob lost Helmut; he encourages Truman to reassign him to Whispering Rock, which Oleander finds out about and takes as a tacit rejection-slash-lack of belief in him due to his own issues.

Shortly before meeting Oleander, Cal also has an extended affair with a married woman that he breaks off when she objects to him also seeing other people on the side. He remains unaware that he fathered a child through this affair.

Just before Psychonauts 1…

Oleander’s father dies, which causes him to finally snap and start up the Brain Tanks Plot. Having learned about Cal’s moonlighting while they were dating, he blackmails “Loboto” into helping. Cal agrees so he can secretly sabotage the project from the inside and attempt to keep Oleander safe.

Around the same time, Cal also gets a lead about the Delugianaries and infiltrates them as "Loboto". He begins to learn more about Maligula’s history with the royal family and the movement to reinstate the lost prince.

Psychonauts 1…

"Loboto" interferes as best he can with the Brain Tanks Plot without revealing his true identity to the other inmates, nor making it obvious to Oleander what he’s doing. He leaves massive openings on the psychic radio communications in hopes someone at Whispering Rock will catch them, stations Sheegor and Crispin to intentionally create weak points for an intruder, leaves the kidnapped brains out in the open to be recovered, and intentionally stalls debraining Lilli (to whom he’s an honorary uncle as Cal).

When Raz finally gets to the tower, Cal secretly trails him to make sure Raz can get to the top safely and unopposed. Once he does, Cal bails to return to the Rhombus of Ruin and continue his undercover work. Unfortunately, his boss there has figured out his true identity as Cally O’Pia, and blackmails him into kidnapping Truman by threatening his family (namely Cassie, Oleander and Lilli).

Rhombus of Ruin…

“Loboto” kidnaps Truman, and much like with the brain tanks, does everything he can to sabotage the plot without getting caught. This mostly entails poorly packaging Gristol’s brainless body, failing to dispose of the brain case, and capturing the Psychonauts after they crash rather than leave them to drown. Recognizing Raz and realizing he can excuse not “knowing” to put him under high-security restrictions the same as the other agents, he deliberately leaves Raz the means to navigate the facility via clairvoyance.

Raz learns of “Loboto’s” true identity from Oleander after rescuing him, and ends up using Oleander’s PSI-Portal to enter Cal’s mind. There, he sees the projected "Loboto" persona and meets Cal himself, who plots with him how to fake capturing “Loboto” and escaping in order to rescue Truman without giving away his betrayal. He will not give Raz information on his employers, however, still fearing for the others’ safety.

The Rhombus’ self-destruct auto-engages when “Truman” is released, to Cal’s horror. However, Raz and the agents are able to escape with their “captive”, though he still refuses to talk about his employers.

Psychonauts 2…

Sasha attempts to use a psychic construct to get the information out of Cal. It goes very, very poorly. However, Raz does manage to learn more about Cal’s backstory and get a glimpse of his boss and Maligula.

Sasha continues to attempt to interrogate Cal through the first part of the story, to no avail. After the Lady Lucktopus heist, Sasha’s forced to release him, and he returns to monitoring the Forgetful Forest. He drives away the psychic bees when Raz disturbs them, and Raz can talk to him about the undercover work as “Loboto”, his upbringing with the Psychic 6, and his apparent complicated relationship with Oleander. (There’s an optional sidequest where Raz can go back and forth between Cal and Oleander uncovering and pointing out their misinterpretations of each other, eventually convincing them to talk things out post-game.)

Post-reconstructing Ford, Cal discovers the three in the Gulch and is looped in by Raz. Cal still can’t help directly out of fear of his family being targeted, but gives Raz some tips for trying to talk to Cassie and Bob, and moves to the entrance of the Gulch to keep watch and feign ignorance of Raz, Ford, and Lucy’s presence. Raz can go back to him after helping either Cassie and/or Bob, and Cal is grateful for their apparent steps towards recovery, and baffled yet amazed by Compton and “Nick’s” arrival (with a hint that he already knows what’s up with the brainless Nick).

While Raz and company are doing final preparations for the Astralathe, Cal is distracted by Augustus trying to make it through the Gulch (and experiencing distress due to his repressed familiarity with it), allowing Norma to sneak by and witness the Astralathe activating. She comes back with Truman, and Cal is forced to let them by, knowing Truman is actually Gristol. He also witnesses Lilli tailing them and, realizing everyone is at risk no matter what and he has nothing left to lose, Cal instructs Lilli to distract “Truman” as long as she can and get out of dodge with Raz if the worst happens.

Cal runs back to the Motherlobe to search for the brain case just as Sasha, Milla, Hollis and Oleander are about to leave in pursuit of the mole. Cal begs Oleander to help him and he reluctantly agrees. The two find the case hidden in the mailroom and rush out to deliver it just as Maligula’s storm is released; they end up finding and protecting Lilli during the storm, and turn up just after she reunites with Raz to help with re-braining Truman.

In the post-game, if Raz either already completed or completes the sidequest with Cal and Oleander, they will be found together in the Gulch cleaning up around the Heptadome, and will confirm they’re talking things out. Cal will thank Raz with a signed copy of True Psychic Tales, though Raz doesn’t quite make the connection between Cal and the author. Cal also reveals Truman’s punished him for the kidnapping and undercover work by putting Cal back on the active agent duty he’s worked to avoid, intending for “Loboto” to start doing officially-sanctioned undercover work to clean up the remaining Deluginaries.

#anonymous puzzler writes #technically. look for categorization on this blog purposes we count it #long post /#psychonauts spoilers #rhombus of ruin spoilers #psychonauts 2 spoilers #tw death mention #tw implied eye trauma #psychonauts #ok i think that's post. enjoy #tw lobotomy mention #tw medical abuse mention #forgot those two !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

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