[Timeline Information & Headcanon]

[endoftheuniverse]

TIMELINE

Here are the list of the choices the Liam I play (et al) made.

-He comes from the "Choose Everdusk" timeline, though many of the icons I drew are from the Xenolifer timeline. This is purely aesthetic.

Shrine of Commitment: Liam chose to carry the commitment stone.
Shrine of Regret: Donald chose to remain in the real timeline.
Shrine of Temptation: Liam chose to have Shaman sent to the peak.
Shrine of Sacrifice: Liam mistakenly killed Donald. Everyone else made it to the peak.

HEADCANON

Here are some details on my headcanon for Liam's origin. If, by some miracle, a Shaman player comes along and has refutational headcanons, I'll be willing to work it out with them! Until then, here's what I think:

AGE

-I headcanon Liam as about 20 years younger than Shaman. Liam and Shaman have an intergenerational friendship, but I imagine that they have had a mentor-mentee relationship in the past, and that their friendship sometimes bleeds into familial due to the difference in their age.

-I play Liam as ~45 years old; one could take his comment about 20 years being "half his life" seriously, but this would refute the events of the (admittedly often canon-noncompliant) prequel comic. However, if one assumes he is actually 40, Liam's comment that he has run a revolution for ten years no longer makes sense. Thus, I've assumed that the comic is correct in saying Xenolifer has been around for about 7 years, and I've made Liam as young as feasibly possible (18) at his earliest appearance in the prequel comic, making him about 45 or older at the time of the DLC. The explanation I use for Liam saying that he ran a revolution for ten years (which would make him 15 at the start) is that he has included the years he spent as the leader of the revolution in the tech-hive. This matches nicely with Rahdika's age in The Red Strings Club, and I like literary parallels.

NEUROIMPLANT

In Red Strings Club, which is tenously attached to the world of GWBW, we learn that neuroimplants such as Liam's can run various subroutines on the human body, such as voice modulation, antidepressant/antianxiety neurotransmitter activators, pacemakers, gender calibrators, etc.

I headcanon that Liam only has the neurohacking interface/storage and the gender calibrator active, but this has the potential to be changed if he really needed other uploads and the means was available.

TECH-HIVE - GENERAL INFORMATION

-There were no plants or animals in the Techno-Hive where Liam was born; everything is artificial. The controlled, artificial atmosphere keeps the planet a static 20 degrees C, but temperature and climate fluctuations due to acid rain, smog- and other pollution- storms, etc are very common. It is not advised to be "outdoors" during these events, but not many go outside to begin with.

-The Tech-Hive exists on an artificial planet smaller than Earth with approximately 30 billion humans (though average lifespans are quite low). Going into public areas generally means being shoulder-to-shoulder with someone. Most stay in their own homes and live and work Online.

-All food is lab-grown (think 3D printed) and often served as a nutrient-rich thick fluid a la soylent; texture and taste are luxuries for the mega-rich.

-"Outdoors" constitutes roads and tops of buildings exclusively. Wide open spaces are rare to non-existent, save for occasional parks and courtyards built on top of Hives. Builders build upwards; a Hive is as tall as it needs to be, sometimes extending into the upper reaches of the atmosphere. That said, materials that can interface with neuro-implants are expensive, and it is not common for the average person to have more than a closet-sized living space; cheap builders often sacrifice height before width, and it is common for the very poor to live in small capsules (To fit with theme, these are space-efficient hexagons).

-Every human in the Hive is given a neuro-implant to interface with the Colony; individual colonies are as wide as their government's territory (see below). Interfacing requires that one be plugged-in, but one is plugged-in whenever they are not moving. Wifi isn't really a thing; there are plug-ins everywhere one could reasonable sit. Once you plug-in, you are immediately identifiable. Governing bodies usually buy neuro-encryption to protect their identities; it is common for enemies of governing states to try and break neuro-encryption, so these must be constantly updated. You can't do much at all without being plugged in.

-Last names aren't really a thing. Everyone has their own unique ID based on the sector they were born in. First names are simply colloquial identifiers (like an internet avatar). Etc, SECX-IDXXXXXXX-[AVATAR].

-Neuro-hacking is common; well-maintained firewalls are important to keep a person from being manipulated and from receiving deadly doses of neuro-toxin.

-Classism via caste is the main form of oppression. While bigotry isn't completely gone, it would be considered extremely archaic to be homophobic, for example, but there are variances depending on the sector.

TECH-HIVE - GOVERNMENT

-A la Neuromancer, corporations represent nobility in Liam's home planet. These corporations govern of the sectors (hexagons of land) in which they make the most money; if this were to change, they would lose territory. Thus, competition is cut-throat, maintaining consumer allegiance to companies is critical, and claims to sectors ride on the edge of a knife.

-The amount of power and freedom a citizen has is entirely determined by their birth, and there is no upward mobility in their mega-capitalist society.

-Public infrastructure doesn't exist; every imaginable resource requires a fee. Charging for essentials is a staple in maintaining coporation control over a sector.

-Heads of corporations are often succeeded by their children (who are shareholders in the business), the heirs to megacorps are referred to as royalty, as per hive-theme (etc. a Queen).

-It is common for Queens to have many children to ensure succession; it is extremely common to masquerade slightly-younger children for their older counterparts to avoid assassinations (very common) of an heir apparent.

-Medicine and contraceptives are a luxury. The mega-rich but not noble (say, families who run a corporation, but not a governing one) usually have few children. Other castes usually have many children with a high mortality rate.

-Liam was the eldest child of one of the weathliest tech-corps on the planet, representing the 8th largest super-power. He had 10 younger brothers before his defection, and was the only female child.

-It is expected that the (current) eldest male and female heir are educated in the methods of maintaining power from an early age; they are brought up with ruthless expectations, and empathy is not a treasured trait. Liam's willingness to listen to the plight of non-family and act against his own self-interest would therefore be extremely rebellious, and did indeed arise as a way to rebel against his parents.

BACKSTORY

-We know Shaman's family was murdered for resisting enslavement, and that Liam and Shaman met under circumstances Liam is very reluctant to reveal. My headcanon for their history is this: as a human raised by aliens, Shaman was considered "sub-human" and thus an exception to the "no human slaves" law. He was sent to Liam's planet to serve in the house of one of the noble families; which turned out to be Liam's. Shaman secretly taught young Liam - who would have been destined never to leave the planet, as royalty - about other planets and aliens, and challenged him to question the imperialistic material he was given. Liam, who was already looking for an excuse to turn on his shitty family, took Shaman's words to heart.

-After Shaman was framed for a crime he did not commit, Liam, now around 13, broke him out of his family's prison and fled, disguised as one of his brothers (a common guise he often took in public to avoid assassination as the eldest child - which he discovered he was much more comfortable in). The two of them lived in the streets in poverty for some time (hence Liam's "speck of dust" comment). Liam then rallied the dispossessed against megacorps, dismantling them through violence and theft, and becoming extremely wealthy in the process.

-The endgame for Liam's revolution, other than fun and profit, was to get himself and Shaman off the planet so they would no longer be hunted; by 16, he was able to procure enough wealth to flee and live the rest of their lives in comfort.. or so he thought.

-The two of them lived peacefully for a couple years before Liam grew restless and the prequel comic begins.