#lisa hardman
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'but girl she killed people!' so. she deserved to what do you want me to do about it
#no morals when it comes to traumatised beautiful people#morgana#morgana pendragon#my girl#also#sophie of woods beyond#sophie of gavaldon#my girl as well#hearing no slander for her#pippa fitz amobi#merlin#bbc merlin#blue rewatches merlin#school for good and evil#sge#a good girls guide to murder#nina zenik#inej ghafa#six of crows#grishaverse#theres more#tagging girls i think deserved to kill people but didn't#allura#reyna avila ramirez arellano#marlene mckinnon#mary macdonald#lisa hardman#alina starkov#mia cooper#shapeshifter
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What if Robert Jones gave his son the Neetanite earlier?
I think it’d be a completely different experience, almost tragic in a way, if Dax had learnt of the Corridor too early. What would it have done to him? I have some ~ theories ~
(this is set just after FTF, also sorry if this sucks LMAO)
Robert finally visits Dax at the end of term. Fumbling with his hands, he gives Dax a strange crystalline prism then ruffles his hair. He keeps it a secret. Dax names it Neetanite: after all, it’s from his mother, right?
Gideon eventually sees the prism underneath Dax’s pillow, and so the secret is spilled. Gid is excited, but agrees to keep it subtle. Not even Barry finds out. It will soon be the end of the term, and the students’ excitement begins to bubble over - plans get formed over the common room fire and sofas, whilst others read or finish off the final pieces of homework.
5 days since first contact. Lisa looks at him, concerned, but she dismisses ever having done so. Mia begins to notice something, too, something imposing, and sends some healing warmth to Dax. Perplexed, he laughs it off and returns to the end-of-term activities. When he goes to sleep that night, he dreams of the wolf, but no words come through; only a warning. Wolf Boy wants him to throw the Neetanite away, to renounce that which has been imposed, for nobody is ready yet for the truth. Perhaps this warning helped enough: Dax takes the odd prism and chucks it in his suitcase, not his pocket, as the group head to Lisa’s for the summer.
7 days. The group are outside in the shade, still marvelling at the Hardman wealth; Dax has a headache. Mia offers to help, despite warnings from the others. Her hand pulses the warming energy, but it changes nothing; “oh.” The headache’s drumming turns to concern to panic; Gideon makes a small joke about the LOB, but the humour heals nothing either. Dax excuses himself, saying that he’ll go for a foxy run, just to see if that helps. Lisa joins him.
As he shifts, his mind is hit with an overpowering smell. A gunshot of meaning: it reminds him of that earthy, peaty stench from his first shift. There is something here, now, something drenched in understanding and purpose and truth, yet it has changed. The rotation of earth points only north, it’s as if it guides him, a lure forcing the taps in his mind open. Dax sees nothing but that which he must do: he must head northwest. Faintly, outside, he hears Lisa. She grabs his ruff, demanding an answer.
One word comes back to her. Corridor.
Over the next month, it makes its way north. It crosses asphalt, granite, dirt, and mud. The fox’s jaws, fuelled by that urge to reach the Corridor, find their first prey in the crepuscule. Perhaps Owen and Mrs Satre have tried to find him, or perhaps they even asked Lisa to dowse, but they see no success. The fox is of the Corridor now.
The others worry themselves sick, fearing the worst: what if he was hit by a car, or ended up in a foxhunt of all things? How could they find something so mundanely wild? Lessons return, after a week of supposed holiday, but unease and malaise wash over Dax’s friends like a wave. Gideon, drenched in regret for not speaking up, gets berated by Lisa. Her anger, however, shifts to worry; Dax is the first one she cannot find. Perhaps this is how it is with the shapeshifter types, she thinks, maybe they must face such challenges alone. Be it in one realm of another, she at least rests assured that he is somewhere on the earth.
When he reaches the cave, the fox is exhausted. Such a long shift and yet so little to do, but this thought doesn’t change much. It falls idly, as if the throat of the Earth were just a slide and the fox were once again a person. The Neetanite rolls out of its jaw as it hits the end. Fur turns to hair and Dax, once again lucid, realises at length the extent of his actions. Perhaps he is scared, or perhaps he feels accomplished. Perhaps the calls of his friends finally reach his skull, and he drowns in the guilt; but perhaps instead he looks at the Neetanite and pushes it deep into the stone.
Yet nothing happens.
He checks his watch. It is 1:34 am. The bliss distracts him from his failure.
The wolf tells him that he is Unanchored; that he has learnt.
#the shapeshifter books#dax jones#lisa hardman#gideon reader#ali sparkes#children of limitless ability#tpg:what if?#the shapeshifter#thepointingghost
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Running the Risk
The second book in the series starts in April and finishes in May of the same year.
It’s said that the children started showing their powers when they were 11/12, and it hasn’t been long Lisa is still 12.
If they’re eleven or twelve that would put them in year six or seven, stretched between the two separate English academic school years. Which it might be because there are the Teller brothers, Alex and Jacob, who aren’t twins and have at least an age gap of 9 months so are unlikely to be in the same school year.
If Lisa is 12 she’s in secondary school, year 7. And has done her SATs.
I’m going to say Mia is 11, in year 6 as she hasn’t done her SATs yet:
In this book we see that Dax & Gideon are in the same class as Lisa so maybe they’re in year 7, secondary school, too. Or maybe classes are mixed based on intelligence more than age which is uncommon but not impossible. I can’t remember if Mia was in their class too.
This is just based off of the second book in The Shapeshifter series, Running the Risk. I don’t know how right i am or how much sense i make, ive started rereading the series after yearsss. This may be me thinking too much into it its a kids book; as a kid i just assumed they were all in the same school year and left it at that.
#someone ask ali sparkes#actually dont#its not that deep#the shapeshifter books#dax jones#lisa hardman#gideon reader#mia cooper#alex and jacob teller#runningtherisk#i dont think catherine was in their class or dax would definitely have been more annoyed this whole book
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Attention all Shapeshifter fans!
Discord server link:
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Mama, the inverted stillmother
Kojima loves his parallels. Higgs and Sam (the "tom and jerry" archetype he made a tweet about), the two Lous (self explanatory), Amelie and Cliff (the parents at war). Mama herself already has a natural double in her twin, Lockne.
but she's also an inversion of a concept the game doesn't mention much: stillmothers.
a stillmother is where BBs come from, a pregnant brain-dead woman whose fetus is removed and sealed in a pod. this teetering between life and death, the unborn child taken from a functionally dead mother, is what allows the BBs to function like they do, making a bridge between the living and the dead and not only seeing BTs but allowing others to see them too via a connection with the umbilical cord. the stillmother and BB maintain their connection through womb data, which is essential to the BBs continued health, as it must always believe it is in its mother's womb.
Mama is the opposite: a mother birthing a child that dies in the same instance, a BT before the umbilical cord was even cut. this tethers the BT to her instead of the other side, but it also holds her in stasis. she's not dead but not really living either, and the tension of the cord pulling in both directions is the only thing that's keeping her breathing. once it's cut, the snap back kills her.
where BBs are in constant portable motion, facilitating connection, Mama is stationary, solitary, disconnected from her sister because of her condition. both metaphorically and literally, Mama lives for the dead. in a way, she's also a more extreme reflection of Sam, or maybe a warning to him, where reconnection with the living literally saves her soul.
the BT baby is literally an attempt at connection gone wrong. the baby that was meant to be raised by both Lockne and Malingen, that was meant to bridge the divide between living a dead by being made from what was left of Lockne's lover, died, severing all of those connections permanently. that this is practically the only other child character we see in the game apart from Sam and BB seems important. Sam and the BT baby were both children that were meant to create personal bonds at their birth/ removal from the pod, Cliff and Lisa (and even a severing of bonds if we consider Cliff Vs Bridget and in lesser part, John/ Die-Hardman), the BT connecting the the sisters and the dead husband. but BB 28 is collective child, impersonal, working for the future of the whole. only once BB 28 has completed her job and reconnected the whole of America is she allowed to become Lou, the personal child, only required to connect herself and Sam.
children connect the collective, but cannot be relied upon to connect the personal for anyone but their own sake, maybe?
in any case, Mama is fooling herself, same as the BB must be fooled to continue on. she knows her child must return to the other side, that she is no longer the BT baby's mother in anything but name only, but she holds onto that umbilical cord with both hands, until she literally can't anymore, until she realises that her connection with the living has to be rekindled for the sake of America and the chiral network, her life's work.
#death stranding#mama death stranding#malingen#lockne#lou#bb 28#sam bridges#character analysis#? i guess
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If Amelie IS what they think she is then..
(An EE, Extinction Event) if that IS right and Die Hardman is working with Higgs or whomever instead then...wouldn’t us going to Amelie be exactly what they want us to do? Because then once Sam is there they can..idk, kill two birds with one stone and create the next event?
But if the guys like Deadman and Heartman want us to get to her before that then isn’t this kind of a moot point? Because we *the player* already know Higgs has reached Edge Knot City, according to Holo Amelie, and we haven’t been able to contact her since so ????
Also, I guess the game is hinting that Lou was the first BB? And if that’s the case then are the flashbacks we see of Cliff via Lou’s vision is he stealing Lou because he didn’t agree to the experiments? He didn’t agree to Lisa being a still mother? Or..something. (I’m not wording that too well, more like didn’t agree to Lou being an experiment after Lisa became a still mother). These are just my as I go along thoughts anyway.
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Death Stranding: colors, trinities and dualities.
Let's talk about black, white and red?
I'm not literally talking about it, but showing the parallels between these three colors. Kojima also uses blue for the symbolism of death or the "dead state" and the chiral network (if I'm not mistaken). But there are other things linked to the other colors such as: body, spirit, entity of extinction and death stranding itself, etc. So here we go.
Do you remember that we have Amelie/Bridget in 3 stages?
1) Young girl; Amelie as daughter and sister.
2) Mature woman; Sam's adoptive mother and mother of "Amelie from the beach".
3) The elderly; Bridget old and on the verge of death.
So here we have not only an entity of extinction, but also the basic representation of a triple goddess.
And you can do a lot of research on the internet, since triple goddesses are common in many cultures. And not only the triple goddess, but also the concept of trinity.
-> Triple goddess
-> Trinity
-> Three colors
Death Stranding is full of the concept of opposing sides (duality) and trinities.
--- oppositions/duality:
black and white
blue and red
life and death
good and evil
friend or foe
truth or lies
etc
--- trinities:
black, white, red
blue, red, white
amelie daughter, amelie mother, amelie elder
sam, fragile, higgs
cliff, lisa, sam
fragile's father, fragile, coffin
bridget, die-hardman, cliff
etc etc
And it's all good! Let's continue with the parallels themselves.
At the start of the game, we were told that the bedridden woman would be accompanied by three basic colors that would tell us, as the story progressed, that they were the same person. Old Bridget is lying in bed with very thick black cords and they are apparently attached to her bed, which is what provides the "energy" to keep her alive for a little longer.
-> black cords
And then we have a take that focuses exactly on the various other strands that are keeping her alive, or are "directly connected" to her. The medical tubes are red and white.
-> red cords
-> white cords
And where do we see these colors in DS1 and DS2? Let's see:
In DS1 we have Amelie/Bridget appearing to us in her three colors and in her three phases, as I explained above when we compared her to the triple goddess.
-> In red we have her spirit and her "maiden" phase
In white we have Bridget herself, as the body both in her "mother" phase and her "elder" phase.
-> White for the body.
And in black we would have either body and soul united, or the entity of extinction itself. I didn't delve into research on this thing because I honestly never looked into it, I'm just seeing it now (shame on me, sorry).
-> Black would be the "supreme" form.
Now the colors applied in other places, which made me wonder if there was a similar connection in terms of meaning.
-> Black cords
It's the most common thing for us, if they're there it represents that there are BTs and so we need to be on our guard, we're in danger, but the black cords are in other parts too, especially in the DS2 trailer where they seem to behave differently than usual.
-> White cords
Totally new to us, it's in DS2 that we'll know what it really meant, but in DS1 if we look at it from Amelie/Bridget's side the color itself would represent the body, corporeal, incarnation, everything related to the body, the "being in the land of the living" or "walking among the living", life or something like that, right? But in DS2 the color seems to completely carry the meaning of being manipulated, being under someone's control, being controlled by something or even the state of "being controlled FROM ANOTHER dimension" in a sense that things on ANOTHER PLANE are controlling these other things on the PLANE OF THE LIVING.
And forgive me for using the word "plane", but in my religion we use the term "spiritual plane" and "earthly plane" to talk about the "spiritual realm" and the "fleshly realm" (the realm of the living on earth; spirits incarnated in material bodies).
-> Red cords
And now we're going to talk about a cord that's there, but that nobody comments on. We also have the red cords… And here I wonder if Kojima is using this color in OPPOSITION to white, instead of using black and why do I say that? Because this is where red and white seem to me to become opposite things in DS2.
-> We have Lou with an angel wing that is white while alive and then we have Lou's ghost inside the pod in red, not to mention the octopus that is also red.
There are several other things about DS2 where we can see red and white.
red robots with white strings
those first images of the game, entirely in red with white cords
the hell zone with the bright-eyed things
While DS1 was more focused on blue, because of death itself, remember that blue is the color of death, here in DS2 it will all be red. So I suppose the focus will be on the meaning of the color itself and here it's worth remembering that I would quickly research the meaning of colors for the Egyptians and the Japanese (does anyone remember if DS1 explains anything about the color red?).
I think Kojima chose red concluding that we will certainly associate the color with danger, with something terribly frightening, with the enemy… I know he calls Higgs a villain, but in the DS1 trailers we all thought Cliff was the bad guy too, and it kind of wasn't true…
And then, if red means "everything negative" then certain things don't make much sense anymore...
If they wear red and are fighting, then not all red is bad...
Just as not every white cord could be a good thing…
After all, it was Bridget in white who shot Cliff and Sam, wasn't it?
That's the end of it (for now), because I would need to research the meaning of the colors separately, just as we could also study more about trinities and dualities and all of this can be applied to the game to understand it better, or to understand it through another field of vision.
See you later!👍🏼
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books 2017-2021
2017
A View from the Foothills, Chris Mullin (2009)
The Noise of Time, Julian Barnes (2016)
The End of the Party, Andrew Rawnsley (2010)
As I Walked Out One Midsummer Morning, Laurie Lee (1969)
2018
A Death in the Family, Karl Ove Knausgård (2013)
A History of the World in 10½ Chapters, Julian Barnes (1989)
Never Mind, Edward St Aubyn (2012)
Reservoir 13, Jon McGregor (2017)
In Love, Alfred Hayes (1953)
Autumn, Ali Smith (2016)
Educated, Tara Westover (2018)
The Children Act, Ian McEwan (2014)
The Only Story, Julian Barnes (2018)
Bad News, Edward St Aubyn (2012)
On Chesil Beach, Ian McEwan (2007)
The Power, Naomi Alderman (2016)
Conversations with Friends, Sally Rooney (2017)
Swimming Home, Deborah Levy (2011)
Amsterdam, Ian McEwan (1998)
Less, Andrew Sean Greer (2017)
Convenience Store Woman, Sayaka Murata (2018)
Cassandra at the Wedding, Dorothy Baker (1962)
Lincoln in the Bardo, George Saunders (2017)
The Swimming Pool Library, Alan Hollinghurst (1988)
Wide Sargasso Sea, Jean Rhys (1966)~
Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close, Jonathan Safran Foer (2005)#
This is Going to Hurt, Adam Kay (2017)
Normal People, Sally Rooney (2018)#
Asymmetry, Lisa Halliday (2018)
2019
Things Fall Apart, Chinua Achebe (1958)#
The 100-Year Life: Living and Working in an Age of Longevity, Lynda Gratton and Andrew Scott (2016)
Purple Hibiscus, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie (2004)#
Outline, Rachel Cusk (2014)
Florida, Lauren Groff (2018)
The People in the Trees, Hanya Yanagihara (2013)#
Things I Don’t Want to Know, Deborah Levy (2018)
The Tattooist of Auschwitz, Heather Morris (2018)#
Ordinary People, Diana Evans (2019)
The Sailor who Fell from Grace with the Sea, Yukio Mishima (1999)
The Line of Beauty, Alan Hollinghurst (2004)
Flowers for Algernon, Daniel Keyes (1966)#
Brilliant, Brilliant, Brilliant Brilliant Brilliant, Joel Golby (2019)
Love, Nina: Dispatches from Family Life, Nina Stibbe (2013)
On the Road, Jack Kerouac (1957)
The World According to Garp, John Irving (1978)#
Good Morning, Midnight, Jean Rhys (1939)
Love in the Time of Cholera, Gabriel Garcia Marquez (1985)
Never Let Me Go, Kazuo Ishiguro (2005)#
Why We Sleep, Matthew Walker (2017)
This is Pleasure, Mary Gaitskill (2019)
Some Hope, Edward St Aubyn (2012)
Mr Salary, Sally Rooney (2019)
2020
We Should All Be Feminists, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie (2014)
Three Women, Lisa Taddeo (2019)#
Twas The Nightshift Before Christmas, Adam Kay (2019)
The Future of Capitalism, Paul Collier (2018)
South of the Border, West of the Sun, Haruki Murakami (1999)#
Smile Please, Jean Rhys (1979)
So You’ve Been Publicly Shamed, Jon Ronson (2015)#
Reunion, Fred Uhlman (1971)
Night Boat to Tangier, Kevin Barry (2019)
A Little Life, Haniya Yanagihara (2015)
Lolita, Vladimir Nabokov (1955)#
Boomerang, Michael Lewis (2012)#
Exciting Times, Naoise Dolan (2020)
An American Marriage, Tayari Jones (2018)#
Nothing to Envy, Barbara Demick (2010)
Calypso, David Sedaris (2018)#
Why I’m No Longer Talking To White People About Race, Reni Eddo-Lodge (2017)
Any Human Heart, William Boyd (2002)
Slouching Towards Bethlehem, Joan Didion (1968)
The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, Junot Díaz (2007)#
Lullaby, Leïla Slimani (2016)#
Summerwater, Sarah Moss (2020)
Intimations, Zadie Smith (2020)
The Appointment, Katharina Volckmer (2020)
Brighton Rock, Graham Greene (1938)
Frankenstein, Mary Shelley (1831)#
The Secret Barrister: Stories of the Law and How It's Broken (2018)
The Order of the Day, Eric Vuillard (2017)
2021
I'm Afraid of Men, Vivek Shraya (2018)#
Letters to a Young Poet, Rainer Maria Rilke (1929)
Why We Get the Wrong Politicians, Isabel Hardman (2018)
The Spy Who Came In From The Cold, John Le Carre (1963)#
Emma, Jane Austen (1815)
News of the World: A Novel, Paulette Jiles (2016)#
Transit, Rachel Cusk (2018)
Good Behaviour, Molly Keane (1981)#
Deep Work, Cal Newport (2016)
The Unbearable Lightness of Being, Milan Kundera (1984)#
We Are All Birds of Uganda, Hafsa Zayyan (2021)
One Hundred Years of Solitude, Gabriel García Márquez (1970)
Dead Souls, Sam Riviere (2021)
Piranesi, Susanna Clarke (2020)#
Hangover Square, Patrick Hamilton (1941)
My Brilliant Friend, Elena Ferrante (2012)
The Rachel Papers, Martin Amis (1973)
Sorrow and Bliss, Meg Mason (2021)
Kudos, Rachel Cusk (2018)
Remains of the Day, Kazuo Ishiguro (1989)
The Nickel Boys, Colson Whitehead (2019)#
How to Write a Novel in 6 Months, Thomas Emson (2020)
Writing a Novel, Richard Skinner (2018)
Where There's a Will: Hope, Grief and Endurance in a Cycle Race Across a Continent, Emily Chappell (2019)#
Arbitration: A Very Short Introduction, Thomas Schultz and Thomas Grant (2021)
No. 91/92: Notes on a Parisian Commute, Lauren Elkin (2021)
Metroland, Julian Barnes (1980)
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here’s a quick Spook Williams doodle
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finished lisa sketch, still getting used to this ipad.. looking forward to making more shapeshifter art in the future!!
#well. finished as much as possible#want to move onto other things#the shapeshifter books#ali sparkes#lisa hardman#my art#ndfhsnfns something about this looks awkward but. cant be bothered to spend time fixing it#when i could spend time drawing something else instead
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the shapeshifter aesthetics >> lisa hardman
#wwolfs shapeshifter aesthetics#the shapeshifter books#ali sparkes#the shapeshifter & unleashed#lisa hardman
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I see you too are filled with righteous anger over Bridgets BS. That makes us comrades
HELL YES.
Its nice to meet you friend, cause we seriously need to form a protection squad for all the people Bridget screwed over.
Sam, Cliff, John, Lisa, Lucy...
MUST. PROTECT.
#hi anon#death stranding#death stranding spoilers#cliff unger#clifford unger#sam bridges#sam porter bridges#john#john blake mcclane#die-hardman#lucy strand#lisa bridges#bridget strand#amelie strand
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Death Stranding Timeline
I put together a rough timeline for the overarching narrative of Death Stranding. I was able to piece together some parts of the timeline almost approximately, but admittedly, much of it is based on headcanon and conjecture due to parts of the lore being rather scant. Regardless, I tried to make it fun and I utilized invented details to enrich the worldbuilding. I also put together a few paragraphs explaining my methods in obtaining the more approximate dates. I’ve seen people talking about character age headcanons and attempting to pinpoint the duration of the Death Stranding, and I think I got pretty close to the truth with a few of these. Anyway, enjoy, tell me what you think. The full timeline is below the cut.
Death Stranding Timeline
August 25th, 1975 - Bridget Strand is born
November 27th, 1979 - Clifford Unger is born
August 16th, 1984 - Lisa Bridges is born
May 18th, 1985 - John Blake McClane is born
February 7th, 1995 - Deadman is ‘born’
March 13th, 1995 - Amelia Strand is ‘born’
May, 1997 - Bridget Strand earns a Bachelor’s degree in political science
August, 1997 - Clifford Unger enlists in the United States Army
October, 1997 - Bridget Strand becomes a political consultant under the campaign staff of
democratic senator Scott Faulkner
June, 1999 - Clifford Unger is one of 7,000 ground troops deployed during the end of the Kosovo War
September, 2000 - Clifford Unger joins the United States Army Special Forces
September, 2001 - Clifford Unger participates in the invasion of Afghanistan following the September 11 terrorist attacks
March, 2003 - Clifford Unger participates in the invasion of Iraq
September, 2003 - John Blake McClane enlists in the United States Army
November, 2003 - Bridget Strand is promoted to campaign manager of democratic senator Scott Faulkner’s reelection campaign
May, 2005 - Clifford Unger earns a Bachelor’s degree in Criminal Justice
May, 2006 - Lisa Bridges earns a bachelor’s degree in Fisheries and Wildlife Law Enforcement
September, 2006 - John Blake McClane joins the United States Special Forces
January, 2007 - Lisa Bridges begins her career as a Law Enforcement Ranger at Whitewater State Park near Rochester, MN
April, 2007 - Clifford Unger is promoted to the position of commanding officer (captain) within ODA 1116, Alpha Co, 1st Btn, 1st SFG
May, 2008 - John Blake McClane earns a bachelor’s degree in Strategic Intelligence
November, 2008 - Bridget Strand is elected into a democratic seat in the United States Senate
July, 2009 - John Blake McClane is transferred to ODA 1116 following the death of one of its Intelligence and Operations Sergeants
June 30th, 2010 - Heartman (Rudolph ‘Rudy’ Jacobsen) is born
July 16th, 2011 - Lucy Dimmonds is born
December 18th, 2011 - Iraq War ends
October, 2012 - Clifford Unger meets Lisa Bridges while on military leave, encountering her in Whitewater after he stumbles across her escaped German Shepherd,Victoria. A romance soon blossoms.
November, 2012 - Scott Faulkner and his running mate Bridget Strand win the presidency
October, 2014 - Clifford Unger and Lisa Bridges are married
February, 2015 - Lisa reveals to Cliff that she is pregnant, he retires from active duty to be with his family
March 15th, 2015 - Death Stranding occurs
May 29th, 2015 - Målingen and Lockne Leifsdottir are born
June, 2015 - President Faulkner creates the government organization ‘Bridges’, which is designed to create a network across the fractured America in order to administer aid to the civilian population. Its other, classified purpose is to research the cause of the Death Stranding and to synthesize potential solutions to the social, economic, and infrastructural issues it has caused.
July, 2015 - John Blake McClane leaves the United States Army Special Forces to pursue a career opportunity as head of Bridges security. Much of Bridges’ security personnel is comprised of military veterans.
August, 2015 - President Faulkner is killed during a voidout that obliterates Manhattan Island. The voidout is caused by the death of a stillmother during the preliminary embryonic chiral experimentation trial runs conducted by Bridges, experiments which would go on to become the blueprints for the ‘Bridge Babies’, also known as ‘BB’ units. The existence of the embryonic experimentation being brought to the public eye causes widespread outrage, and the research is discontinued. Following Faulkner’s death, his vice president, Bridget Strand, succeeds the presidency. While the embryonic chiral experimentation is officially discontinued, President Strand continues it in secret, desperate to discover the secrets of the new element ‘chiralium’ and its vast potential to bolster technological development.
September, 2015 - Cliff and Lisa are hit by a drunk driver while driving home one night after attending a play. Both receive serious injuries, Cliff; a shattered collarbone, humerus, and ulna, and Lisa; severe whiplash and head trauma, which leaves her comatose. Miraculously, the 7 month old fetus is largely unharmed.
October, 2015 - Cliff enrolls his family in an experimental medical care program that promises to utilize state of the art technology to provide them the best chance at recovery, as recommended to him by an old military buddy. An emergency C-section is conducted, and the 28 week old Baby Bridges ‘BB’ is placed in a portable pod synchronized with his mother’s heartbeat.
Bridget Strand acts as overseer of the experiments in secret, under the pseudonym Dr. Samsa. She hides her true identity behind a steel masquerade mask.
February, 2016 - Cliff grows increasingly irritated and untrusting of Dr. Samsa as she continues to avoid his questions and lie to him. BB is kept in his pod long past his due date and prevented from growing through the usage of hormone blockers.
December 23rd, 2016 - When John realizes that Cliff’s family is being harvested for chiral experimentation, he warns Cliff of what is going to be done to them. When Cliff tries to escape the facility with his baby, he and his entire family are killed. Baby Bridges is revived by Amelie on the beach, and he is christened ‘Sam’. Bridget Strand makes the decision to raise him as her own, as he was no longer a BB candidate after Cliff released him from his pod. After this unnatural resuscitation, the laws of nature are made gravely upset. Sam becomes the first repatriate and DOOMS sufferer, one who can travel between Earth and Hades and detect the spectral dead using his 5 senses. The dead, the Beached Things, return physically to the land of the living and claim more human souls, dragging the damned with them as they returned to the other side. Timefall, rain that rapidly ages anything it touches, begins to fall in showers across the American continent.
December 31st, 2016 - Sam Strand is ‘born’
March, 2017 - John Blake McClane fakes his death with the help of President Strand. He returns to the broken political scene under the pseudonym Die-Hardman and becomes a personal aide to the president.
October 1st, 2017 - Fragile (Giselle Depardieu) is born
November 8th, 2019 - Higgs Monaghan is born
April, 2020 - The United Cities of America (UCA) is established, as the state governments and boundaries have all but crumpled as a result of continuous voidouts, and only a few key cities remain.
June, 2020 - Deadman earns the position of Bridges head coroner as a result of his government-sponsored artificial personhood program.
May, 2033 - Lucy Dimmonds earns a Bachelor’s degree in psychology
March, 2034 - Lucy Dimmonds becomes a licensed therapist
February, 2038 - Sam has his first meeting with his therapist, Lucy Dimmonds. In the following months, the two begin to form a close and unprofessional relationship.
December, 2039 - Sam and Lucy are married, and Lucy retires from her practice.
February, 2040 - Lucy contracts DOOMS after becoming pregnant with her and Sam’s child Louise. She begins to have horrible visions of the apocalypse, which Bridget assures her are real portents of the future.
September, 2040 - Lucy chooses to commit suicide in order to avoid bringing a child into the world where the apocalypse is imminent. Her death causes a voidout, and Sam, who was busy making deliveries at the time, returns home to a smoking crater; all that’s left of his hometown. The survivors eye him warily and he can tell that they blame him for the disaster. In shame and grief, Sam resigns from Bridges and begins work as an independent porter. He changes his name to Sam Porter Bridges.
January 11th, 2045 - President Bridget Strand dies of metastasized uterine cancer. The plot of Death Stranding begins.
References and Reasoning Used in Creating Timeline
Deadman mentions that WW1 took place more than 100 years ago, meaning that the present day in Death Stranding is past 2014-2018
Deadman mentions that WW2 took place a century ago, which places the timeframe of Death Stranding’s narrative anywhere from 2039-2045. I opted for the late estimate as to make Sam a little older and give the timeline some room to breathe
Based on appearance, behavior, and age in relation to other characters (he was a baby when Cliff, Die-Hardman, and Bridget were all mature adults), I placed Sam at around 28-30 years old. If he were any older, characters such as Die-Hardman and Bridget would appear much too young in the present day. This would also make the period in which the Death Stranding occurred around 30 years.
Deadman explains that Clifford Unger took part in the Kosovo War, the Afghanistan War, and the Iraq War. This would place his years of service from 1999 to right before the Death Stranding and Sam’s birth, around 2015. We know his military career did not begin any earlier, as there is no mention of him serving during the Balkan Wars or Persian Gulf War. Assuming that he was around 18 for his first deployment during the Kosovo War, it can be pretty reasonably inferred that Cliff was born around 1979, and was therefore around 36-37 when he was killed. This lines up nicely with the age restrictions surrounding combat in the United States Army Special Forces (ages 20-36). Essentially, Cliff must have been 36-37 in 2016, for if he was any older he would not have been only recently retired from combat, and if he was any younger he would not have been old enough to have served during the Kosovo War.
Bridget Strand’s age is determined similarly. As both vice president and president, she would have had to have been 35 years of age or older, if she was vice president in 2012, she would have had to have been at least 35. I placed her at 37, which is still very young, but not quite the youngest on record. But, since she assumes the presidency in 2016 following the death of the president, she would have become president at 41 years of age, which would make her the record-holder of the title of youngest American president. Assuming she is 41 in 2016, she would be 70 years of age at the time of her death in 2045, which seems reasonable.
Most other aspects of the timeline are built around these key definable pieces of the puzzle and are subject to change as more lore is revealed.
Essentially, this is full of headcanons that I’ll be happy to alter if and when we get more information.
#death stranding#death stranding headcanons#death stranding spoilers#sam porter bridges#cliff unger#cliff death stranding#fragile death stranding#die-hardman#mama death stranding#lockne death stranding#hideo kojima#death stranding lore#amelie strand#bridget strand#higgs monaghan#beached things#chiralium#death stranding timeline#death stranding timefall
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Gideon, doing maths: god, this is like putting lipstick on a fox
Lisa: umm, I'm pretty sure it's lipstick on a pig, besides, this isn't the right time for that expression anyway
Gideon, who definitely tried to put lipstick on Dax while he was a fox: nope, this is like putting lipstick on a fox
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For fic writers, artists, or people who just want to know what on earth is going on with this game, I’ve created some resources, this is the Character Profiles but there is also a…
Glossary / Plot Outline
ALL OF THESE CONTAIN HUGE SPOILERS - THEY ARE THE FACTS AS I KNOW THEM - READING THIS WILL SPOIL THE GAME FOR YOU. YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED. If there’s anything that’s wrong let me know with a source to the correct answer, but I haven’t written anything I’ve not been sure of, but this is all based on my memory of the game, if there’s characters that should be added, please let me know.
Sam Porter Bridges - Also known as ‘Sam Strand,’ ‘Sam Porter,’ ‘Sam Bridges’ / DOOMS - Lvl 2 / Repatriate / Porter (Bridges, then Independent, then Bridges)
The son of Clifford Unger and Lisa Bridges. Born to a still mother and placed into a BB pod, Cliff attempted to rescue Sam from the Bridges facility and failed resulting in both their deaths. When an infant Sam made it to the Beach, his bullet wound to the stomach was fixed, causing a cross scar on his stomach which is still present in adulthood, and was sent back into the ‘real’ world by Amelie and therefore made into a Repatriate. When back in the ‘real’ world he was brought up by Bridget (Amelie’s older ‘Ha’) as her son. Sam has nightmares in his youth and he ends up on Amelie’s beach where she helps him. Amelie gifts him a dream catcher to try and help him with his nightmares. He had a partner and an unborn child (a son he was going to call ‘Lou,’) lost prior to the start of the game. When the game starts Sam has no attachments, is living as a porter. He has a delivery to Capital Knot City and gets caught up in the death of the President, the woman who raised him, she asks him to complete the chiral network to bring the UCA together again. Sam acquires his BB during these initial tasks, from someone in corpse disposal who passes in a void out Sam survives. Sam is asked to incinerate BB because they believe BB is faulty, but doesn’t. Sam is pursuaded by Amelie to complete the task as laid out by the president, but not because Sam wants to bring America back together again, but because Amelie asked. Sam has to travel cross country connecting the Chiral network, he continues his job as a porter, making deliveries as he goes to help people and to persuade people to join the UCA. Sam has lots of success doing this, and word quickly spreads giving people hope. Sam begins to discover through his connections that the situation and the science aren’t as simple as he thought. He also starts to see what be believes are BB’s memories where Cliff is attempting to free BB from the control of Bridges but they aren’t sure what they mean. He works closely with Fragile, manages to defeat Higgs who heads up a terrorist organisation and makes it to the West connecting things up as he goes. Sam creates a close bond with BB and expresses a desire to live with BB, rejecting the idea that BB is equipment. After travelling all the way West Sam is told he needs to come back East, to meet up with all the scientists he’s met along the way in an attempt to end what the Death Stranding started and avert the extinction of humanity. They learn that Amelie is the key to the extinction and is causing it. Sam is transported to Amelie’s beach to convince her to give humanity a chance. Sam manages to do this, and Amelie will hold up the extinction as long as possible. Sam is rescued from the Beach and returns to life as a porter. After the inauguration of Die-Hardman as the new President, Sam learns of Die-Hardman’s betrayal of Cliff, and is then told that his BB, who he affectionately calls ‘Lou’ after his unborn child, has passed with the strains of their journey. Sam take Lou on one last delivery to the incinerator to stop Lou becoming a BT. Deadman deactivates Sam’s cufflinks so he can leave Bridges if he wants. Sam connects with Lou’s pod in an attempt to wake her up and see’s memories of Cliff attempting to save him as a baby, managing to talk with Cliff properly and they discover together they’re actually father and son. After this Sam burns his cufflinks in the incinerator but can’t bear to burn Lou and breaks the pod and resuscitates her successfully. Sam leaves with Lou giving up with life with Bridges. In connecting America back together again, Sam learns that humanity is worth it, worth saving and that if the whole country is worth saving, maybe he is too. Sam for a large part of the story has a fear of touch which affects him profoundly, but by the end of the story it seems to affect him less.
Fragile / DOOMS - Lvl UNKNOWN (Greater than Sam) / Porter Company Owner (Fragile Express)
Fragile DOOMs gives her the ability to teleport to her Beach and then teleport in the ‘real’ world, so she is able to travel long distances quickly. She took over her father’s porter company, Fragile Express, to continue her father’s dream of bringing America together again. Fragile worked with Higgs for a long time, but was betrayed by him as Higgs hid an armed nuclear bomb in her cargo bound for Middle Knot City. The bomb detonated and the city destroyed. Higgs takes Fragile hostage, and has a second bomb which he gives to her in the middle of South Knot City, Higgs causes timefall and tasks Fragile with running the bomb, in her underwear through Timefall to save the city, or to vanish and save herself. Higgs only give Fragile covering for her head so everyone always knows her face. Fragile saves the city, but exposes her body to Timefall which drastically ages her skin. There was a lot of speculation about whether Fragile Express was a terrorist organisation or used by Higgs, so the company causes a lot of controversy in certain areas of America. Sam isn’t sure what to believe and doesn’t trust Fragile for a long time. Higgs attempts a false delivery again to get Sam to take a bomb to Fragile, but they discover it ahead of time and Sam throws the bomb into the tar pit. Sam and Fragile build trust over this. Fragile helps to send Sam after Higgs in an attempt to rescue Amelie on the condition that Fragile can finish Higgs off. Sam delivers Higgs to Fragile, weak but alive. Fragile gets information from him, but cannot bear to shoot him despite her desire too and offers to leave him stranded on the beach forever or he can shoot himself. Fragile offers to take Sam back east but Sam decides to go with Amelie and is stranded. Fragile transports the team working to end the extinction to Capital Knot City, hugely weakening herself and putting herself in a coma, and can’t manage to get Sam. Fragile then sends Sam to Amelie’s beach to stop the extinction at the end, at great pains to her. Once the extinction is avoided, Fragile gets the first private contract for Porters from the UCA, she offers Sam a job with her which Sam refuses in order to go off grid. Fragile says that Sam doesn’t have run and hide anymore, that he’s changed, got something to fight for.
Clifford Unger - Also known as ‘Cliff,’ ‘Veteran’ / DOOMS - None / Soldier
Cliff is in the American military, fought in many wars contemporary to us. Fought with Die-Hardman and was his Captain, Die-Hardman credits Cliff with saving his life repeatedly. Cliff is married to Lisa Bridges and Lisa falls pregnant with their first child together, Cliff leaves the military in order to be there for his wife and child. Unfortunately Lisa falls ill and is turned into a still mother, their unborn child removed from the womb at 28 weeks. Cliff is told repeatedly they’d attempt to get BB and Lisa out of their states, but this was a lie. Cliff is told this by Die-Hardman, that BB will be taken away and used as the base code for a Knot City and he gives Cliff a window to end Lisa’s life, a mercy, and take BB and try and get him out of the hospital. Cliff attempts this, but fails, is shot and captured by hospital/Bridges security. Cliff removes BB from his pod, and he survives against the odds, Amelie shoots Cliff to try and get BB back but accidentally shoots BB too. Cliff is seen on the beach in the distance when Amelie sends BB back into the ‘real’ world. It is presumed, but not shown that Amelie convinces Cliff to work for her in exchange for being able to get his child back again. Amelie gives Cliff powers and Cliff sets about attempting to find his child in the world. Cliff’s military background means that he connects with beaches created from the mass slaughter of millions of soliders in battles and his connection with Sam, as Sam is secretly his son, drags Sam into these battles. Both Sam and Cliff are of the belief the BB Cliff is looking for is Sam’s BB (Lou), and Sam fights Cliff to try and weaken him so Sam is allowed back to the ‘real’ world and Cliff tries to take Sam’s BB (Lou) by mistake. Bridges are of the opinion for a time that Cliff is actually controlling Higgs and the mastermind behind the extinction event. In the last battle, Cliff and Sam bond over their care for what is perceived to be the same BB, and Lou expresses a happiness to stay with Sam, which Cliff accepts, he hugs Sam and disappears. Cliff is next seen when Sam is accessing what he believes to be the memories of Lou who was dead at this point. Sam thinks he’s just watching the memories, but he’s able to influence them, he puts himself between Cliff and Die-Hardman’s gun. Cliff realises that Sam’s full name is ‘Sam Porter Bridges’ and puts the pieces together that Sam is actually his son. Cliff puts himself between Sam and the gun and Amelie shoots him, killing Cliff and what has been discovered to be the infant Sam at the same time. Cliff has associations and seems to gain his power from the BT tar, and has an army of dead soldiers he can command. He also uses Amelie’s substitute BB’s - the creepy dolls. Cliff’s motivation is simply to get his son back and show him the world. He gets peace from knowing that Sam has done that, lived a good life, done good things and helped connect America. At the end, Cliff says that he’s always been a stopping point, obstructive like a cliff face, but Sam has always been his bridge to the future.
Deadman / DOOMs - None / Doctor (Bridges)
A Bridges doctor, who was grown from embryonic stem cells and flesh harvested from cadavers. Because of his he has a Ha, a physical body, but no Ka, no soul. Deadman has a self-confessed dislike of BB’s, and Lou is aware of this and leaks artificial womb fluid all over him deliberately. Deadman says that he has no mother, no family, no friends, no beach. But in helping to save humanity he gains friends, and a bond with Lou. Deadman does a lot of research for Sam, finding out information he shouldn’t have access too and digging up details on Die-Hardman for him. Deadman pulls Sam off of Amelie’s Beach back into the ‘real’ world, he helps when Lou gets sick and helps them get better for Sam and helps Sam disappear at the end of the story for a life with Lou undisturbed by the UCA. Despite Sam not liking touch, he voluntarily hugs Deadman at the end of the story which clearly has a profound effect on him, finally building connections with people who aren’t dead.
Malingen - Also known as ‘Mama’ / DOOMs - Lvl UNKNOWN / Hardware Technician (Bridges)
Twin sister to Lockne with whom she has an intense bond, they’re believed to be one Ka separated between two Ha’s. Malingen created the Chiral network and Q-pid hardware, is a genius of unknown proportions. Malingen had no viable eggs, and her sister was unable to carry a baby to term, so when her sister needed a surrogate, Malingen stepped up to carry her child. Whilst awaiting a C-section a terrorist attack meant the hospital was bombed, Malingen was trapped inside and gave birth whilst trapped in the rubble, the baby passed and became a BT whilst still connected to Malingen. Her child’s crying caused Mama to be found and rescued, but she was unable to leave the site because of her child’s connection with the site and the other side. Mama’s child is a harmless BT whom she can cradle and touch, but this is because Mama is dead, hiding her status by not wearing her cufflinks properly. There is an issue with the Q-pid, which requests Lockne’s help to fix, but Lockne and Mama grew apart after the issues with their child. Mama knows that to get the Q-pid fixed, she needs to see Lockne, to build their bond again and convince her to help bridges. Mama creates the umbilical cord cutting cufflinks for Sam using Sam’s own blood and gets Sam to separate her and her child by cutting the cord. Mama only has a short time to live without the connection to her child, and Sam transports her to Lockne and Mama passes once she meets her sister again. As Malingen and Lockne are on Ka, Mama is still able to converse with Sam through Lockne.
Lockne / DOOMS - Lvl UNKNOWN / Software Technician (Independent, then Bridges)
Twin sister of Malingen with whom she has an intense bond, they’re believed to be one Ka separated between two Ha’s. Lockne wrote the software enabling the Chiral Network and the Q-pid, is of equal genius to her twin and runs Mountain Knot City. After issues with the UCA she wouldn’t accept joining until Malingen was brought to her, and accepted joining as one of her final wishes. Lockne felt Malingen return to her after her Ha finally passed and continued help to fight the extinction event with her and everyone else. Lockne takes care of Lou whilst Sam goes to convince Amelie to stop the extinction.
Die-Hardman - Also known as ‘John Blake McClane’ / DOOMS - None / Head of Bridges, President of the United Cities of America, Former Soldier
Formerly a soldier in a unit with Clifford Unger for the American army and credits him with saving his life on multiple occasions. Die-Hardman then joined Bridges, and was part of the security team supervising the hospital where Cliff’s wife and son were being treated. Die-Hardman gave Cliff the advice and window needed to attempt to escape. This escape is a failure, and Die-Hardman is ordered to shoot Cliff by Bridget, in the first timeline we see, he does this. Die-Hardman continues to serve Bridget until her death as the President of the UCA. He wants to finish her work and attempts to persuade and help guide Sam across the US. Die-Hardman is primarily the one giving Sam orders during the story. As time goes on, Deadman and Sam become less sure they can trust him, because of his involvement with the BB program and potentially hiding files. Die-Hardman is taken to Amelie’s beach but he manages to smuggle a gun. He comes face to face with Cliff once more, Cliff doesn’t kill Die-Hardman on sight which is what he expected, Die-Hardman believes this means Cliff has forgiven him. Die-Hardman is spared from the beach and reappears in Captial Knot City weak but alive. It’s unknown what happened to him. When we next see him he’s being inaugurated as the President of the UCA, in his speech, he thanks Sam for his work as an ‘unsung hero’ but doesn’t name him directly as he knows Sam wouldn’t want that. After the ceremony, Die-Hardman catches up with Sam and they discuss Cliff, Die-Hardman breaks down with the weight of what he did and expresses that he thinks that Cliff would have forgiven him and Sam reacts badly, Sam recovered the gun Die-Hardman left on the Beach, and gives it back to him, advising Die-Hardman that “the gun won’t work here.” When Sam manages to get back into his own memories, he’s able to be present there as an adult and effects them, he puts himself between Cliff and Die-Hardman’s gun, this forces Bridget to take hold of the gun and the trigger over Die-Hardman’s hand and shoots Cliff. Die-Hardman wears a mask for most of the story, it’s believed that his face is badly burned which is why he wears it, but actually it’s Bridgets mask, worn by Die-Hardman so people wouldn’t recognise him, after being inaugurated he removes the mask.
Heartman / DOOMS - Lvl UNKNOWN / Research Scientist (Bridges)
Heartman lives and works in a distant lab, South East of Mountain Knot City. When Sam meets him Heartman is dead, an AED device he permanently wears over his check shocks his heart and he wakes up. Heartman advises Sam that he was undergoing heart surgery in a hospital when an attack destroyed the hospital’s generator, and Heartman was dead for 21 minutes. His wife and child were killed in the attack and Heartman lost them on the Beach. Since then, every 21 minutes his heart goes into cardiac-arrest and he dies, he’s dead for 3 minutes before his AED shocks him back. During this time, he searches Beaches for his wife and child. Heartman dies and is resuscitated 60 times a day, he has a collection of media which can be consumed within 21 minutes, he says that largely bodily functions can be fit into a 21 minute window, with the exception of sleep and sex. Heartman’s heart is drastically malformed because of the strain it’s under and is more
BB-28 - Also known as ‘Bridge Baby,’ ‘BB,’ ‘Lou′ / DOOMs - None / Bridge Baby
BB-28 is first seen being used by a member of Corpse Disposal, Sam goes with CD and they’re attacked by BT’s, the CD person using BB-28 is taken by BT’s and he throws the BB away to save them. Sam survives the attack as he’s a repatriate and uses BB-28 to get back to Capital Knot City. Sam is tasked with taking the Presidents body for incineration and they include a still living BB-28 in the cargo for incineration as they believe BB-28 malfunctioned, leading to the void out. Sam doesn’t want to incinerate BB-28, and is attacked by BT’s in the incinerator, he uses BB again to get back to Capital Knot City, and says that he’d continue to use BB. Sam and BB bond through deliveries, avoiding BT’s and travelling together. BB’s usually don’t work for people with DOOMs, despite this Lou and Sam work well together and their connection is undeniable, Sam starts to refer to BB-28 as ‘Lou’ which we find out is the name Sam and his partner would have given to their unborn child who passed. When Sam gets to Mountain Knot City, Deadman says that Lou needs treatment as they’re drifting off balance and leaning more to the world of the living than the dead like other BB’s, and Sam said that this isn’t a problem for him as they want to live together. Deadman is able to restore the balance, but in doing so he wipes Lou’s memories of Sam and they have to rebuild their bond again. But they do this without issue. As the circumstances with Cliff become more apparent and they continue to visit him in the supercells, it’s believed that Lou is Cliff’s child, the lullaby that Cliff sings to his child makes Lou happy with Sam whistles it to them. As Sam travels to Capital Knot City again Lou gets more unwell, is unable to connect fully in their incubator. Sam leaves Lou behind to go Amelie’s beach with Lockne for safety. When Sam returns from Amelie’s beach and Die-Hardman is inaugurated, Deadman advises Sam that Lou has passed away, presumably from the stress of the journey. Sam takes it upon himself to deliver Lou to the incinerator to stop them becoming a BT. Sam at the last minute rescues Lou from the incinerator, breaks open their pod and attempts to resuscitate Lou, with only a 30% chance of success, but is successful. Lou is awake and alive when Sam steps out of the incinerator. It’s revealed in a post credits scene that Lou’s full name is Louise. Lou controls Sam’s Odradek which waves BT’s goodbye once they’re defeated and gives a thumbs up when you’re clear of BT’s. When Higgs shoots Sam, Lou uses the Odradek to protect him from the bullets. You can rock Lou, and Lou will give you likes. If you fall off a high ledge or walk in too high water Lou will cry and you need to soothe her by rocking her. Too many attacks from BT’s will give Lou autotoxemia and she needs to go back into her incubator in a private room to recover.
Amelie Strand - Also known as ‘Extinction Entity,’ ‘EE,’ ‘Bridget,’ ‘ Amerigo,’ / DOOMs - Lvl UNKNOWN / Extinction Entity, President of the UCA
Amelie’s story is complex, to start with, she’s shown as someone who soothed Sam on the beach as a child when he had nightmares. She ran Bridges Expedition I which set up the Chiral Network, but was taken hostage in Edge Knot City and is unable to leave because of the terrorists. Sam can speak with her through Chiralgrams and Amelie convinces Sam to travel West and connect up the Chiral Network, Sam does this for her and her alone, as Bridget, the President of the UCA, brought them both up and Sam feels for her strongly. As Sam travels West he hears lots of stories of how wonderful Amelie is but that no one has seen her physically for a long time. Heartman and Sam come to the conclusion Amelie is an Extinction Entity, able to create an extinction and end humanity, that she is powerful and her Beach is greater than any other humans. As Sam gets to Edge Knot City, he reveals Amelie’s location to Higgs who supposedly takes her hostage on the Beach. Sam travels East again so Fragile can jump Sam to Amelie’s Beach, but they realize that actually, Amelie tasked Higgs with speeding up the end of the world, and gave him his powers. The creepy doll’s are Amelie’s version of Bridge Babies with ties to her beach and therefore it’s discovered that she also brought Cliff into the fold, again in an attempt to speed up the end of the world. Sam manages to get to Amelie’s beach, and Amelie said that she didn’t feel she had a choice, extinction was inevitable, and she thought she was doing a kindness by making it quick, Sam convinces her humanity is worth it, and convinces Amelie to hold back extinction as long as possible to give humanity a chance to evolve to avoid it. Whilst Sam is awaiting rescue from the beach, Amelie explains her true story. Amelie reveals Bridget is not her mother, but in fact they’re the same person. At 20 years old an operation meant that Amelie’s Ka and Ha were seperated, her Ha - ages and therefore becomes Bridget so people aren’t suspicious. Amelie and her Ka are stuck on the Beach, but can project herself forward. Amelie created the Chiral network as a part of the Bridges 1 Expedition to speed the extinction process up but increasing the amount of Chiralium in the world. Amelie planted the Bridge Babies at the centre of cities and that’s what she needed Cliff’s child for. When Cliff and the infant Sam are shot by Bridget, Amelie finds Sam on her beach, and sends him back to the ‘real’ world and in doing so grants the world with DOOMs and makes Sam a repatriate. Amelie then helps Sam through the nightmares and gifts him a dream catcher, Sam as a child gifts Amelie with a necklace, Quipu, which becomes a tailsman for their connection and helps them find each other on the beach. Amelie is left on the beach, holding back the antimatter back for what could potentially be hundreds of thousands of years.
Higgs Monaghan - Also known as ‘Peter Englert’ / DOOMs - Lvl 7 / Ex-Porter, Terrorist, Leader of the Homo Demens
Higgs was abused by his father, who he killed and watched become a BT. He worked with Fragile, but betrayed her and became a terrorist, tricking her into sending a nuclear bomb into Middle Knot City. Higgs is a separatist, claiming to be working for the independence of Edge Knot City and wants to stop UCA expansion. Higgs tortures Fragile by sending her into Timefall in her underwear to avoid another city being bombed. Higgs is found to have been given his powers and orders by Amelie, to speed up the extinction. Higgs has the power to summon timefall and BT’s and can control them. Sam chases Higgs to the beach to rescue Amelie when Higgs claims to kidnap her and weakens him, refusing to use weapons to do so. Fragile gives Higgs the choice between being stuck on the beach forever or shooting himself and Higgs chooses to shoot himself. Amelie is presumed to have created the terrorist cells to make the UCA believe building the Chiral Network was the best thing, when in fact that helps to trigger the extinction and also to find an excuse to being using Bridge Babies again. The UCA discontinues BB’s because of ethical grounds, but says that since the terrorists bring the technology back, they must start using them again, when in fact the terrorists are using Amelie’s doll sensors, linked to her beach and drawing their power from there. Higg’s terrorists have no desire for Cargo like MULEs, just to capture Sam and stop him.
#Death Stranding#Hideo Kojima#Mads Mikkelsen#Norman Reedus#Character guides#characters#profiles#resources#info#mine#SPOILERS#SPOILER ALERT
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Guilt and Love
My first John/Cliff fanfiction! I do hope I nail it right and hopefully you guys enjoy this short piece. I do plan on writing more John/Cliff fics in the future so keep a look out for more of them.
It’s been a week since Sam had disappeared off the face of the Earth with the BB that he was supposed to bring to the incinerator. God knows where the man was but John found that he did not mind that in the slightest. So long as Sam was alive and well, he was fine with it. After all, Sam had always been a lone wolf.
Not to mention he also had to attend to the many tasks that came with being President of the UCA. So he wasn’t exactly left with enough time to attempt searching and investigating Sam’s whereabouts. He could send out some porters but they were as busy as it is and the UCA needed all the porters right now to move this country forward.
Still even as he tried to keep busy with his duty, the nightmares plague his dreams still, always looping from the very beginning of watching his Captain die over and over again right in front of him. Sometimes it was just the Captain, other times it would have both the Captain and Sam dead on the floor.
Every night, he would wake up with sweat dotting his forehead and tears brimming in his eyes. Guilt ate at his soul. He would always blame himself for not being able to protect and save his Captain, his son and his wife.
Poor Lisa. He wished there was some way to save her but it was clear that she was brain dead before he even arrived to visit the Captain and his son and there would be no saving her. But even when it came to the Captain and his son, he couldn’t even save them. He shook his head and gave a sad chuckle. It was always his Captain that saved him time and time again from the battlefields that the brass sent them out to but when it came to him saving his Captain and his son, he failed miserably.
He was Die-Hardman because he couldn’t die easily but when it came to the people around him, they would drop like flies all because he was weak.
He was not like his Captain. Brave and ready to face danger and death in the face. He wasn’t like Cliff’s son, Sam. A repatriate and a person with DOOMS. Like he left in his recorded message before he was summoned to Amelie’s Beach, he was just a man. Nothing more.
A weak man. A worthless soldier.
A few tears managed to escape and rolled down his cheeks as he sat there on his bed in the pitch black darkness of his private room. A sob slipped past his lips and then another as he started to break down, clutching onto the sheets as he trembled.
He made an oath that he would do the best he could as President of the UCA. But he feared that he would even fail that job. After all, he failed his Captain. The man he still loved dearly to this very day.
At first, that love was familial but then it started to change over the coming years. It became something more but he didn’t dare tell the Captain then. It would not do anyone any good if he tried to pursue a relationship with the Captain and the Captain himself had fallen in love with Lisa.
He swore he was never going to be a homewrecker and while he ached of his lost love, he did not mind settling as friends with the Captain and his girlfriend who would later become his wife. They took him in, accepted him in their little family. Bless Lisa. She was the kindest person he had ever met and he knew she would have been a good mother if she had not ended up in that accident that would render her brain-dead.
Unfortunately, he lost contact with them when Bridget Strand made him her presidential advisor. The only time he would ever see them again was in that room and in the worst circumstances possible.
Seeing her in that glass capsule hurt him just as much as it hurt his Captain.
He lets out another sob, more tears falling onto the sheets.
“I’m sorry, Captain. I failed you and your family. I should have just taken you and Sam out, not leave you to find a way out on your own. I should have listened to my heart rather than my brain. And now I lost you.” He sobs.
“I still love you, you know. I never told you because it would just be wrong of me to interfere in your relationship with your wife.”
But he knew his Captain would never hear his words. All he had now were just ghosts of the past. He was all alone. Would be until the day he died.
If only he knew that there was a ghost from his past literally in his room.
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Cliff watched with sorrowful eyes and a heavy heart as the soldier he once took in and trained sobbed his eyes out. He had grown older. No longer was he the brave but cocky and reckless young man but rather a hardened but broken man.
The silver-haired man had always suspected that John had feelings for him. He had noticed when the first time when the man started to act differently around him. Even catching him blushing whenever he got too close to him.
So to hear John finally admit it wasn’t that surprising.
Truth be told, he also had started to fall for the other man. But he was the Captain and he had to focus on keeping his team alive. There was no time for any relationships. But yet he fell in love with Lisa. Even when he fell for the woman who would become his wife, his heart still had space for the other man even if he didn’t act on it. Bless his wife. Lisa was just as sharp as he was and noticed how John and he would act around each other and was just understanding of their relationship. She did not mind that he kept John in his heart just as he kept her in his.
As she told him, he had big heart for the both of them.
Funny that he, a man who was good at dividing others, had such a big heart.
Hearing John sob his heart out made his no longer beating heart ache. He just couldn’t sit back and watch the soldier and the man he still loved break apart.
Walking over silently, Cliff slowly manifested into the physical world then sat on the edge of the bed, reaching a hand out and resting it on John’s shoulder.
John stiffened then. What was this weight on his shoulder? Why did it feel like his bed had dipped to one side?
Looking up, John’s eyes widened when he saw the man right in front of him.
“C-Captain Unger? But you’re… you’re dead.” John muttered in disbelief.
Yet here was the Captain right before his very eyes.
“I am. I’m a ghost that is haunting this world now John. I’m not like those… things. I can’t rest. Not when I’ve finally found my son.” Cliff explains. And you.
More tears rolled down John’s cheeks. “Are you here to kill me? If you do, I won’t resist. After all, I deserve it after what I’ve done.”
Cliff shook his head, clearly not happy of John blaming himself to the point that he was willing to die for his sins. “John… what happened wasn’t your fault.”
“I. Shot. You!”
“Bridget did. You were the gun John. She was the one who pulled the trigger. Who manipulated your love and loyalty to her and filled you with guilt.”
The other man shook his head. “No. No, you don’t understand.” He chokes out. “Even if I didn’t pull the trigger, I should have done more. I should have just gotten you and Sam out instead of just overriding the security systems and giving you a small window to get out. I should have known better that escaping that Bridges facility would be harder than expected.”
“John…”
“Why don’t you hate me!? I failed you Captain! I failed you, your wife and your son!” He cried out.
Cliff could hear the silent words behind those cries. Hear John shout that he did not deserve his love. Did not deserve him.
Without speaking, Cliff pulled John into a tight hug, a hand on the small of John’s back and the other on the back of John’s neck, tucking John’s head underneath his chin. “I never hated you John. You did what you could. You were trapped in between loyalties to me or Bridget. And when it came down to it, I never wanted you to suffer if you fail to obey the President then.” He said.
“But…”
“Ssshhh. Enough of your self-loathing. Again, let me be clear once more. I never hated you John. In fact, I have and will always love you.” He said softly smiling as he finally confessed to John of his true feelings.
John stilled, stunned at what he had just heard. Was he mishearing things?
“You… You love me?”
“Yes. I started to fall for you back when we were still in the army even when I fell for Lisa. Lisa knew too. She didn’t mind that I still held feelings for you even after we had gotten married. It never changed even after I died.” Cliff whispered before then planting a soft kiss on John’s temple.
John’s arms wrapped around Cliff, tightening his hold on him and clutching onto Cliff as if he were his lifeline. It just felt like a dream. It had to be.
But he could feel the solid frame of his Captain, feel how cold he is. And he noticed that the Captain’s chest never rose or fell. The Captain was dead yes but for some reason, he was able to physically manifest in the world of the living.
“I-I love you.” John chokes out. “I never stopped too.”
Cliff then smiled, “You should sleep. You’re a busy man now.” Cliff joked.
John shakes his head. “And you can still be the jokester when you want to be.” He laughs, wiping the tears from his eyes.
They both fell back onto the bed, with Cliff shifting slightly to let John lay his head on his chest. It was strange not hearing the Captain’s heartbeat. But the man after all was dead so it wasn’t too surprising. “Sleep, John. Now.” He heard Cliff speak up sternly.
Slowly as John drifted off, he had never felt as much peace as he was now. And this time as he fell back into a deep slumber, no nightmares came.
#die-hardman#john blake mcclane#john#cliff unger#clifford unger#hardcliff#john x cliff#jif#jiff#death stranding#death stranding spoilers#death stranding fanfiction#clishon
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