Characters / The Seventh Player

The Bad Kids

The original adventuring party of six from the first Fantasy High campaign, now plus one.

Adaine Abernant

Adaine Abernant

The youngest daughter of Fallinel's Elven ambassador. Ends up at Aguefort after failing the entrance exams to Hudol Academy due to a panic attack. A child of wealth and prestige, she's painfully aware of her shortcomings... for the most part.

• Adaptational Jerkass: Downplayed even moreso than Kristen, who was similarly subjected to this trope. Unlike the cleric, Adaine has several moments outside of the "script" of the original campaign where she acts more in line with her relatively Nice Girl personality, mainly involving her interactions with Machaira. Nonetheless, she's still more temperamental and self-centered than she is in Dimension 20, which also casts her truer-to-canon pride and stubbornness in a far more negative light.
• Adaptational Sexuality: In canon, it would take until Dimension 20 Live, in the Sophomores Start campaign, for Adaine to make a judgement call on what her sexuality might be (asexual, specifically), and even then, she wasn't ironclad in her certainty. Here, Adaine develops concrete feelings for Machaira long before the events of the second campaign, and comes to identify as being demisexual in "First Kisses And Last Words- Dating".
• Alliterative Name: Adaine Abernant.
• Amazon Chaser: A selective example, in that she ends up developing feelings for Machaira; during her Love Epiphany, she recognises Machaira's ferocity as just one aspect of the tabaxi that she's attracted to.
• Because You Were Nice to Me: The root of Adaine's friendship with, and eventual attraction to, Machaira.
• Berserk Button: Despite being on average the most rational and level-headed of her friends, her family serves as this for her without a doubt, with her often dropping most or all inhibitions whenever she interacts with them.
• But Liquor Is Quicker: Initially downplayed, then subverted. Adaine convinces Machaira to have a drink in "First Kisses And Last Words- Acquiescence" with the hope that the alcohol will loosen her up and make it easier for Adaine to confess her feelings and get them together. However, she underestimates how little alcohol it takes to get Machaira drunk, and things soon get out of hand and nearly result in sex anyways, although thankfully, a slip of the tongue from Adaine creates a situation where she can't bring herself to go through with it.
• Character Tic: When she's being smug towards or is mad at someone, she tends to flip them off with a double bird.
• Crystal Ball: Fitting for a Wizard specializing in the school of divination, her arcane focus is a crystal ball.
• Declaration of Protection: She makes an internal one to herself in respect to Machaira, vowing to return the love that the she's given to her with the intent to help her heal her own trauma. Not long afterwards, she promises the same when Kristen expresses concern that Machaira's parents will return for her, insisting to both Machaira and everyone else that "they aren't her family anymore".
• Disabled in the Adaptation: She's given coeliac disease here, which she's never been said to canonically have.
• Don't Say Such Stupid Things!: Mostly comes into play once Adaine fully learns of Machaira's Dark and Troubled Past. While Adaine usually keeps to a You Are Better Than You Think You Are approach to Machaira's self-esteem issues (among other things), if she ends up saying something particularly egregious or ends up in a particularly deep rut of self-pity, then Adaine doesn't have any qualms with using this, either.
• Eating the Eye Candy: Adaine quite appreciates catching looks at Machaira's physique after developing feelings for her.
• Entitled to Have You: She spends a solid two to three months pretending to be oblivious to Machaira's feelings for her, but by the time she starts reciprocating and actively pursuing her, she's pretty quick to get angry or moody whenever the winds of fate don't bend over backwards to let her claim Machaira as hers, or whenever Machaira unwittingly complicates Adaine's efforts to get together with her due to emotional baggage that either Adaine herself was partially responsible for or simply became worse as a result of her initial negligence.
• Fortune Teller: She's a Divination Wizard and the next Elven Oracle, as per canon, and as such gets visions from the future from time to time; one such vision occurs in "Cool Kids, Cold Case- Opportunity", where she sees a vision of her family's ultimate abandonment of her during the events of "Prompocalypse".
• Helpless with Laughter: Weaponizes this with Tasha's Hideous Laughter, which she uses most notably against her sister (twice). The first time, on her first day of school, Aelwyn successfully resists the spell and causes it to rebound back on Adaine. The second time, Adaine succeeds thanks to Fabian restraining Aelwyn beforehand, allowing her to relish in her sister's resulting humiliation as the spell takes effect and she begins laughing uncontrollably in front of her fellow Hudol associates.
• Hypocrite
  • In "Cool Kids, Cold Case- Opportunity", after reassuring Machaira that she's safe to talk with her and express her feelings and concerns with her, she proceeds to get angry at her for questioning whether Adaine actually values her and the other Bad Kids or only finds them interesting because of their temporary novelty, given her immortality as an elf. Granted, under most circumstances, her anger would be fairly understandable, given that Machaira has praised Adaine in length before for not acting in the same vain, superficial ways that her own family does and insists that she's her best friend and closest confidante, yet seems to doubt her integrity of character in such a way despite all evidence to the contrary. This being said, Adaine still lacks the moral high ground to complain, taking two matters into account. First off, she herself has doubted Machaira's character and integrity, to the point of being ready to disown her, with a comparatively weaker justification (specifically, failing to call her once, after a night that was just as emotionally charged for the other six Bad Kids as it was for her, Machaira especially... and after Machaira had once again stood up to Adaine's family on her behalf, no less). Second, this is coming off the heels of Adaine having chosen to convince Machaira to play out how she used to seduce people, all for her personal pleasure, when she knows full well that Machaira hates that part of her past and doesn't like to revisit it, thus warranting Machaira's fears on some level. Bonus points for Adaine swiftly recognizing Machaira's hypocrisy while remaining completely oblivious to her own.
  • In the same chapter as the first example, when Adaine rubs solvent into Machaira's back to soothe a number of injuries that she recieved as a result of a scuffle with Aelwyn, things end up getting steamy between them, but Adaine keeps her conscience and stops things from going too far, vowing that "she would need to talk to Machaira before taking such privileges". Three chapters later in "First Kisses And Last Words- Dating", no such sentiment to finally talk to Machaira about her feelings first prevents her from deciding to convince Machaira, who is currently intoxicated out of her wits, to have sex with her (and while, to be fair, Adaine was a bit tipsy herself, she still wasn't drunk enough to be bereft of her mental faculties like Machaira was). No such principal prompts her to stop, either; its only because of a moment of impulse on Adaine's end that ends up fixing things that prevents her from going through with it, causing Machaira to break down sobbing in a drunken stupor and killing the mood enough for Adaine to get a grip on herself.
• It Gets Easier: On her first kill, she's completely horrified, as it was mostly accidental. Halfway through the story, she's completely fine with killing her enemies, even venomously declaring her intent to kill Aelwyn in the (initial) culmination of their mutual arc.
• It's All About Me: Downplayed. Unlike the rest of their family, who play this straight, she actually does cares for people other than herself, and mostly doesn't expect the world to cater to her every whim. Nonetheless, enough of Adaine's thought processes and actions are self-centered enough, especially compared to her canon self, for this trope to qualify as part of her being an Adaptational Jerkass. To elaborate on what stand as the most apparent examples of this:
  • Her being more of a Hypocrite than her canon portrayal (as elaborated above) stems predominantly from this.
  • How does she repay several months worth of Machaira showering her with the very friendship and support that her own family actively denies her, come "Cool Kids, Cold Case- Scars"? Mentally prepare herself to disown her and keep her at arm's length going forward for failing to call her back one time after her parents scolded her for going to jail after killing Coach Daybreak... and only hours after Machaira had once again stood up to them on her behalf, no less. Even when she comes to regret considering this, it is only after she listens to the full extent of Machaira's Dark and Troubled Past, and even then, Adaine still only regards Machaira's trauma as almost making Adaine's own issues seem minor in comparison.
  • Similarly, when Adaine secretly overhears Machaira's Anguished Declaration of Love (while in the midst of processing her own feelings about her), how does she choose repay all of the honesty and transparency that the tabaxi has (mostly) shown her? By simply remaining silent about knowing about Machaira's feelings under the logic of, "If she won't act on her feelings, why should I?", despite knowing that the matter is clearly causing the tabaxi no small amount of emotional turmoil, and continuing to say nothing for nearly two months instead of confronting Machaira about her confession so the two could at least partially resolve things between them, all the while Machaira only continues to shower her in more of the same unconditional love that she has always shown her throughout those two months, which doesn't once prompt her, or even cause her to consider, coming clean.
  • Once Adaine well and truly begins returning Machaira's feelings, she really begins taking to this; nearly every single thought she has and action she undertakes is influenced by her sudden obsession with officially becoming Machaira's girlfriend, to the point of allowing her emotions to dictate her actions and perspective of things even more than she would normally allow and even causing her to forget about (or choose to ignore) Machaira's feelings, traumas, and personal boundaries in the process, and thus usually resulting in either Machaira or both of them being hurt by her recklessness.
• Love Epiphany: While she begins developing feelings for Machaira as far back as "Cool Kids, Cold Case- Sex", it's only during, and after, she masturbates to a fantasy of her and Machaira having sex in "Cool Kids, Cold Case- Truth" that she recognizes her feelings as being in love.
• Love Hungry: Adaine's romantic feelings, and even some of her platonic feelings, towards Machaira have shades of this; see Hypocrite and It's All About Me above and Love Makes You Dumb below.
• Love Makes You Dumb: Both downplayed and deconstructed. It's downplayed in the sense that Adaine's brain doesn't turn to outright mush over Machaira whenever she thinks about her or is near her, and it's deconstructed in that Adaine still seems to pick up the Idiot Ball in her desperation to officially partner up with Machaira after "Cool Kids, Cold Case- Truth", which results in her acting less rationally than she normally would (which itself ends up causing problems between the two). For perhaps the most prominent example of this in action, see But Liquor Is Quicker above.
• Mayfly–December Friendship: Discussed between Adaine and Machaira in "Cool Kids, Cold Case- Opportunity", given that Adaine is an elf.
  • Mayfly–December Romance: What Adaine's relationship with Machaira would inevitably be, assuming that they manage to get together, under the exact same circumstances.
• My God, What Have I Done?: She is deeply remorseful over wanting to disown Machaira once she fully learns of her Dark and Troubled Past in "Cool Kids, Cold Case- Scars".
• Nervous Wreck: As per canon, she is prone to panic attacks due to her family's expectations and the general pressure of high school. Unlike in canon, this aspect of her is explored more in-depth, mainly due to Machaira helping her work through her issues as her friend.
• Only Sane Woman: She's usually the party member, besides Machaira, that's least likely to commit wild errors of judgement, though she does have a strong temper, both when it comes to her family and in general, and has a stronger ego than her canon self is presented as having; see Adaptational Jerkass above.
• Seers: She's a Diviner, which means she has an affinity for scrying and gaining knowledge through her magic, which includes being able to catch glimpses of the future.
• Sibling Rivalry: Absolutely hates her older sister.
• Single Woman Seeks Good Man: A same-sex example in Machaira; the tabaxi satisfies the starvation for love and affection that Adaine's family leaves her with in their favoritism of Aelwyn, with Adaine recognizing Machaira's compassionate and loving nature as another reason why she's attracted to her in her Love Epiphany.
• The Smart Guy: Shares this role with Riz, being the most learned and book-smart of her friends, while having the common sense that most of them lack.
• Squishy Wizard: As expected from her vocation, but further emphasized by her panic attacks; she's not exactly super fit.
• The Unfavorite: Is constantly compared to her older, more successful sister Aelwyn. This is emphasised even more than it is in canon, as it serves as the primary reason behind Adaine and Machaira bonding, and Adaine ultimately falling in love with her.
• Ungrateful Bitch: As her perspective in "Cool Kids, Cold Case- Scars" reveals, she was ready to renounce Machaira as a friend after Machaira's confession in the prior chapter that she was hiding things about herself from the rest of the party- namely, her Dark and Troubled Past and the fact that she's living on her own with no adult guardianship- and after Machaira didn't check in on her later that night when her parents grilled her in regards to ending up in jail in the wake of killing Coach Daybreak, choosing to think that Machaira never actually cared about her in order to justify her feelings and vowing to keep her at a distance from then onward. This, in spite of the fact that Machaira has done nothing but lavish her with the very love and support that her own family makes an active effort to deny her, and has done so every day in abundance leading up to that point (which oftentimes included standing up for Adaine, or helping Adaine stand up for herself, against the very people in question, which itself is something that Machaira had just done for her yet again only hours before). While she sheds this mindset fairly quickly, and even feels guilty for it when Machaira fully explains her past to the other Bad Kids, its implied that it was only the utter and unbelievable cruelty of Machaira's prior circumstances, rather than Machaira's transparency about it in and of itself, that motivated this change of mind.
• Uptight Loves Wild: The intellectual and organized Adaine Abernant ends up falling for the scrappy and sensual Machaira Mekhit.
• Violently Protective Girlfriend: She's not officially with her just yet, but she's developed this mindset towards Machaira.
• You Are Better Than You Think You Are: Even before she develops feelings for Machaira or even knows about her Dark and Troubled Past, Adaine is usually the first person in her party, if not the only person in her party, to offer Machaira reassurance whenever the tabaxi self-deprecates herself or expresses self-loathing in some way.

Fabian Seacaster

Fabian Seacaster

The half-elf son of notorious pirate William Seacaster. He's trained his entire life to become the next Big Man on Campus and strives to make his father proud.

• Amazon Chaser: As per canon, he develops a strong infatuation with Aelwyn. In addition, its suggested on occasion that he finds Machaira attractive as well, although he doesn't pursue her.
• Big Ego, Hidden Depths: As per canon, his ego mainly serves to hide his secret fears that he isn't doing enough to prove his worth as a Seacaster.
• Dating Catwoman: Assuming that things continue to unfold as they do in canon, this will become a prime goal of his by the end of the school year, regarding his attraction to Aelwyn.
• Hidden Heart of Gold: He was the one who bought the anonymous gifts for the Bad Kids.
• Insult of Endearment: Always refers to Riz as "The Ball".
• The Leader: Is a natural fit for this role, but subverted in that the group is more of a democracy than a strict autocracy.
• Lovable Jock: Has the letterman jacket and ego to match, but cares deeply for his friends.
• Nouveau Riche: He lives in a large mansion created from his father's old pirate ship.
• Screw the Rules, I Have Money!: Had no problem with his father bribing the Owlbear coach to get him on the team.
• Verbal Tic: Fabian has the same characteristic swashbuckling laugh of "Ha-HA!" that he does in canon.
• Vitriolic Best Buds: With Riz, at least to begin with. Fabian continues to refer to Riz by the insulting nickname "The Ball", long after Ragh's Heel–Face Turn and the Bad Kids becoming Fire-Forged Friends.
• Weak, but Skilled: Downplayed. While he's pretty strong and proficient in athletics, Fabian's preferred weapons are finesse weapons, which require dexterity, and he prefers to use his environment, like tables or the halfpipes (with varying success), to give him an advantage over his foes.
• "Well Done, Son" Guy: Even though his father dotes on him, he still works his hardest to earn his respect.

Figueroth "Fig" Faeth

Fig Faeth

A wood elf girl who recently discovered she's a tiefling and thus is going through her rocker rebellion phase. With her base guitar and a massive chip on her shoulder, she starts the school year ready to lash out against the world.

• Alliterative Name: Figeuroth Faeth.
• The Bard: A hardcore rocker version of one.
• Chocolate Baby: Assumed to be an elf until her teen years where her tiefling features grew in, and it became obvious that her elf father wasn't her biological dad.
• Cool People Rebel Against Authority: After discovering that her father is a devil; prior to this, she was one of the popular crowd.
• Demon Lords and Archdevils: Her father, Gorthalax The Insatiable, a pit fiend (and by extension, a devil of high rank of the Nine Hells).
• Disappeared Dad: A major reason for her current attitude. She's on the search for her real fiendish father and practically asks any demon or tiefling if they could be him.
• "Eureka!" Moment: As per canon, Fig is usually the one who reminds the others of clues they discovered earlier and gets the ball rolling on piecing everything together.
• The Face: Having the highest charisma of the party, they usually let her handle the deceptions or persuasions necessary for them to advance in the cases.
• Fille Fatale: Only 15 years old and already trying to flirt with much older men.
• Half-Breed Angst: Completely denounces identifying as an elf due to no longer passing as one.
• The Power of Rock: Most of her bardic spells come from her sweet bass guitar.
• Smoking Is Cool: Deliberately invokes this with her clove cigarettes. As a former smoker, in addition to taking much worse things than that, Machaira firmly doesn't believe in this and expresses her concerns about this habit of hers in "The Pixie And The Mosh Pit: Downtime".
• Tsundere: An exaggerated version of one. A Running Gag involves Fig often telling the group that while she seems hard to read and puts up a tough cool girl persona, she tells them that she trusts them and considers them her closest friends. And then she immediately follows it up with a comical display of aloofness - one time by abruptly sprinting out of an ice cream shop and another by telling them all to shut up and kicking over a chair. Her closest friends eventually learn to see through it.

Gorgug Thistlespring

Gorgug Thistlespring

A half-orc teen who was adopted by gnomes. Is having trouble coping with his place in the world.

• The Berserker: Fitting of being a barbarian, and the result of being a socially awkward teen with few emotional outlets.
• Disappeared Dad: To the point where he asks nearly everybody if they could be his dad.
• Dumb Is Good: Both the nicest and dimmest of the PCs, so much so that half of his insights end up with him asking someone if they're his dad or wondering about his dad.
• Emo Teen: Has the hoodie, headphones, and hair to match.
• Gentle Giant: He's the tallest of the other kids, but is genuinely a very kind person at heart and tries his best to not scare others.
• Happily Adopted: Though he asks many people if they're his father, he loves the Thistlesprings dearly.
• Interspecies Adoption: An Orc Raised by Elves (well, technically gnomes).
• Kindhearted Simpleton: He's incredibly sweet and generous, although not very bright.
• Locked into Strangeness: During the fight in "Arcade Ambush", two particular attacks from two ghosts give him wrinkles and a shock of white hair.
• Misunderstood Loner with a Heart of Gold: He's a lanky, awkward half-orc who just wants to make friends.
• No Social Skills: Has absolutely no idea how to interact with his peers.
• Ship Tease: With Zelda.
• Shrinking Violet: He's very shy and nice to a fault, with low self-esteem.
• Unskilled, but Strong: Gorgug's usual strategy is to just use brute force over and over again. Thankfully, he's very good at it.

Kristen Applebees

Kristen Applebees

The eldest child of the Applebees family and faithful follower of the corn god Helio. She comes to Aguefort to rub elbows with the diverse student body and experience everyday teenage life.

• Adaptational Jerkass: A downplayed example. Kristen is presented as being far more ignorant and obnoxious, and much less respectful of other people's boundaries and opinions, than she was in canon. Word of God justifies this by stating that these are already qualities that Kristen exhibited in canon; he simply wanted to touch down on and address the realistic complications that her kind of behavior would cause. Additionally, Kristen largely still follows the "script" of canon, which means that all of her kind, sweet, or otherwise humanizing moments are still present.
• Betrayal by Offspring: As per canon, she disowns her family after finally getting sick of their dishonesty as people of faith, as well as their general close-minded, bigoted perspective of the world.
• Crisis of Faith: As in canon, she goes through one that serves as a major element of her character arc.
• Crystal Dragon Jesus: Her former god as a cleric and her family's current god, Helio, who is literally a rough parody-equivalent of Jesus Christ.
• Disorganized Outline Speech: As per canon, she situationally gives "inspiring speeches" that aren't all that inspiring, often being devoted to whatever personal trouble faces Kristen at the moment.
• Family of Choice: Is accused of this by her biological parents, saying that she clearly sees her friends as her new family, a sentiment that Kristen readily seems to embrace.
• Granola Girl: Has a tye-dye shirt and at least once worshipped a god of the harvest.
• Innocently Insensitive: Deconstructed as being part of her Adaptational Jerkass status. Kristen is presented as being far more prone to putting her foot in her mouth and accidentally disrespecting people out of naivety or impulse than she is in canon; regardless of how well-meaning she is whenever she does so, it's often made a point that she usually does more harm than good whenever she opens her mouth.
• The Klutz: A trait of hers that's elaborated on a bit more than it is in canon.
• Nay-Theist: As per canon, she ultimately stops worshipping Helio even after meeting him in death, although she's nonetheless still looking for some kind of god to follow, making this a very selective example.
• Platonic Kissing: When she comes out to her friends the second time, she kisses them all. Unlike in canon, this is deconstructed almost immediately afterwards in the very same chapter; Machaira quickly realizes that, in doing so, Kristen effectively stole Adaine's first kiss, and Kristen only continuing to joke about it in response to Riz's own reaction to the kiss causes her to fly into a rage that she takes out on her via a Forceful Kiss.

Machaira Mekhit

Machaira Mekhit

A tabaxi outlander first established as being bereft of the same support networks and resources as the other Bad Kids, living on her own in a camp in the woods north of town, as well as the author's Original Character and the titular seventh player. A worshipper of Bast, the goddess in question has Machaira enroll into the Academy in order to further train as an agent of her will in the world.

• Anguished Declaration of Love: Of the subdued kind, towards Adaine, in "Cool Kids, Cold Case- The Best Day Ever", though Machaira thought she was asleep and didn't expect her to hear or listen to her and likely wouldn't have said a word if she had known that Adaine was awake.
• Alliterative Name: Machaira Mekhit.
• Amazonian Beauty: Actually downplayed. She lacks the height of most examples, being only a little over five feet tall. But besides that, she's very fit and muscular for someone of her age, and is regarded as attractive by several people that she encounters, including some of her own party... Adaine in particular.
• Amazon Chaser: She often finds herself turned on at women kicking ass or otherwise excelling in a fight. This comes to include Adaine, although she stands as a less traditional example of an "amazon" than most.
• Big Sister Instinct: Develops an adoptive example of this mindset towards Riz over time.
• Blood Knight: Whether it's in hunting for food or throwing hands with another humanoid, Machaira thoroughly enjoys a good fight.
• Book Dumb: Machaira's intelligence lies more in respect to the nuances of the world than anything academic.
• Boomerang Bigot: Implied. Towards the beginning of "Family In Flames- Captivity", she is offered the Sword Of Shadows (a shortsword crafted and used by tabaxi ninjas that allows its user to teleport a short distance) before Riz ends up taking it. She refuses the offer, with her very first stipulation being, "[...] If tabaxi made it, then I want nothing to do with it."
• Bruiser with a Soft Center: Machaira is one of the strongest (and most eager) fighters in her party. She's also one of the most forgiving and compassionate people within the same party in question.
• Brutal Honesty: She isn't always, especially if being so would do more harm than good in a given situation, but generally, Machaira doesn't mince her thoughts.
• Can't Hold Her Liquor: As shown in "First Kisses And Last Words: Acquiescence".
• Cat Folk: As a tabaxi.
• Closet Key: She's Adaine's.
• Dark and Troubled Past: Revealed to the party in "Cool Kids, Cold Case- Scars" and hinted at in bits and pieces before then (though detailed a bit more clearly beforehand to the readers due to Machaira's internal narration). Machaira was born shorter and broader than most tabaxi, as well as with longer fangs that protrude past her lips, marking her as "primitive" and making her an outcast in tabaxi society. Subjected to a childhood of outright savage bullying and abuse from the other children in her community, which would result in one of her ears being ripped off, that the adults in her community turned a blind eye to (except whenever she defended herself, which would result in her being punished), she would only finally choose to run away when she overheard that her parents were planing to file down her fangs once her milk teeth fell out and her adult ones grew in. When puberty struck her and she developed heat and hunting cycles, she had no idea how to control these urges of hers since she had never been taught to, and nearly destroyed her life partaking in rampant drink and drugs and having reckless sex, all of which was also partially driven by a desperation for the love she had been denied her whole life. It was only an ill-fated encounter with an ursine that ended with Machaira killing him in self-defense that convinced her to set her life straight, and that was only after she lost her other ear to his claws.
• Demoted to Satellite Love Interest: While she starts out as a character with a solid personality and strong potential to distinguish herself as a Bad Kid with her own independent character and story arcs, halfway into The Seventh Player it becomes fairly clear that her primary purpose is to merely be an ideal and effortlessly-obtained love interest for Adaine, and a figure of shallow sex appeal for the readers; the moment that its established that she has feelings for Adaine, her every waking thought suddenly becomes devoted to pining for her to some degree, and its treated like the biggest and primary thing that seems to motivate her and give her purpose is Adaine... in complete disregard of Machaira's aspirations, personality, and motivations as they were established prior. On Adaine's end, the narration plays up her sexual attractiveness and sensuality far more than it did prior, once again to the point of disregarding or downplaying the importance of her other attributes and traits, in both personality and capability.
• Determinator: You'd have to wake up really early in the morning, or manage to really touch a nerve of hers, to take the fight out of her.
• Eating the Eye Candy: Occasionally does this to Adaine after she develops feelings for her.
• Fatal Flaw: Her martyr complex. A lifetime of being abused, mistreated, and despised has left Machaira with little-to-no self-worth, and it shows. At its most benign, she actively downplays or brushes off her accomplishments and capabilities out of a genuine belief that she doesn't deserve the praise. More explicitly self-destructive is her willingness to secure the happiness of the few people who show her love and appreciation, even at her own expense, and there are times where she even actively seems to undermine any opportunities that she has to make herself happy, even when making someone else happy in her stead isn't an option or issue. Within a similar vein, she has little issue potentially giving up her life in a fight if she's fighting for people she's come to care for, often recklessly throwing herself into the fray while being careless as to whether she lives or dies, even if the fight wouldn't strictly require her to do so; for the most apparent instance of this, Machaira becomes so willing to aid Adaine in killing her sister in "Sisterly Showdown" that she effectively allows, or at least pressures, Aelwyn to nearly kill her for good (with the Bad Kids not noticing Aelwyn dropping her until it's almost too late); it's only because of Riz having access to and using an adrenaline shot, and critical application of healing spells immediately afterwards, that she makes it by a hair's breadth.
• Fille Fatale: She's surprisingly adept at seduction for someone of her age, and unlike Fig, she's actually attractive enough, and has the proper experience, to make pulling it off actually work. However, between both her general principals and a sordid past where she had made use of it quite liberally, often to her own detriment, she applies these skills sparingly and doesn't take pride in them.
• Good Is Not Soft: While she certainly can be, she's still a Blood Knight and a Religious Bruiser who honors a War Goddess through example.
• Had to Be Sharp: A necessity when you live by yourself with no parental guidance or guardianship, and quite literally reliant on the land around you to survive.
• Heroic Self-Deprecation: She often downplays her competence, skill, and capabilities when complimented about them.
• Hidden Depths: She's a solid tailor, often sewing and repairing her own clothes (as well as also being a talent very much born out of necessity), and in "Cool Kids, Cold Case- Truth", it's shown that she can be a pretty good cook when she has the right equipment on hand.
• Hypocrite: She usually makes it a personal principle not to be one, but her abysmal self-worth inevitably causes her to hold certain beliefs (mostly about herself) that are self-contradictory. For example, she practically makes it a personal incentive to constantly support Adaine and reassure her about how she's better than her family and her upbringing, and yet in "Cool Kids, Cold Case- Opportunity", she briefly wonders aloud (albeit at Adaine's behest) if, due to her longevity as an elf, Adaine actually cares about her and the other Bad Kids, or merely sees them as temporary novelties. From a broader perspective, Machaira usually makes it a point to stress that, despite being a Beast Folk, she is no less humanoid at her core than the more "human"-appearing humanoids and is thus no less of a person than people tend to treat her and others like her, and yet at the same time often disregards her individual life as being less valuable than the lives of others, and is frequently implied to have internalized the idea that she herself is little more than a savage animal dominated by her instincts.
• I Want My Beloved to Be Happy: Machaira certainly tries to invoke this in regards to Adaine, with limited, if any, success. This is also deconstructed; not only are Machaira's efforts suggested to be rooted more in her belief that she doesn't think she deserves to be happy rather than necessarily believing that Adaine would be happier with someone else, but her efforts, which already usually come at her own expense, usually backfire or fail and only serve to make Machaira feel worse in the process. That, and Adaine likes Machaira back anyway, which means that all of her effort is completely unnecessary.
• Jerk with a Heart of Gold: A very minor example. For the most part, Machaira is only Good Is Not Soft (see above), but she can still dip into Good is Not Nice territory at times, having a ferocious and violent temper that occasionally gets out of hand (although she's usually quick to rectify or make up for any harm she might have done in acting on it) and not being above dishing out Tough Love when she feels its necessary, primarily towards her own party.
• Kissing Under the Influence: While drunk out of her mind in "First Kisses And Last Words- Dating", Adaine convinces Machaira to have sex with her, which starts off with a series of passionate kisses from the latter. Thankfully, it doesn't progress any further than that thanks to a slip of the tongue from Adaine.
• Love Epiphany: The entire chapter of "Cool Kids, Cold Case- Crush" seems to be this for her towards Adaine.
• Martyr Without a Cause: Machaira downplays this for the most part; while she sincerely doesn't seem to invest much in her own life, her being this trope has more to do with her almost obsessively being willing to sacrifice her contentment and happiness so that others can have it in her stead (with varying results), rather than a willingness to give up her life to an actively suicidal degree.
• Mission from God: The entire reason why she's at the Academy, although the mission in question is far more oriented around the individual follower than most examples.
• Ms. Fanservice: The narration invests no small amount of detail in describing how sexually desirable her body is and has placed a fair deal of emphasis on her sensual side, especially in the second half of the story. Of course, this narration is usually from Adaine's perspective, but it's also made blatantly clear that some of the other Bad Kids are attracted to her as well, and it's a known fact by now that Machaira used to sleep around, so she's clearly this to more than just Adaine.
• Ms. Vice Girl: She's arguably the most actively and consciously noble of spirit out of all the Bad Kids, but she also has a strong temper that serves as one source through which she draws her force of will and fighting spirit. She's also surprisingly sultry for her age, although this comes up less often.
• My Instincts Are Showing: Just like non-sapient big cats, Machaira goes through hunting and heat cycles, and she often purrs or growls in response to emotional situations just like a feline. By extension, all tabaxi have these traits as well. This is also deconstructed; the animal attributes of both tabaxi and other half-animals often leads to them being dehumanized by more "human" humanoids, and modern tabaxi culture actually reviles "primitive" behaviors and physical qualities and actively tries to hide them away from both the world and themselves beneath superficial charm and beauty (through training their children to control these parts of themselves for the former and actively shunning and driving away tabaxi that are born "primitives" and reducing them to community pariahs for the latter).
• Nice Girl: She's potentially nicer than even Gorgug... most of the time.
• Not Afraid to Die: More pronounced than most examples given her age, but otherwise par for the course for a Blood Knight with a Dark and Troubled Past. "Sisterly Showdown" arguably showcases this most prominently, given that she nearly does die for good in that chapter.
• Only Sane Man: She shares this role with Adaine, often acting as a voice of reason and experience in regards to the undertakings and schenanigans that the Bad Kids deal in, although she's a caliber taught by experience rather than being The Smart Guy.
• Really Gets Around: She used to, anyway.
• Religious Bruiser: She worships the War Goddess Bast and acts in her name, who, by Machaira's own account, actively encourages her followers to be this.
• Sexy Cat Person: She's an Amazonian Beauty (albeit shorter in height than most examples) with a sultry and sensual personality, a tabaxi, and Adaine's Love Interest, and is overall the most explicitly sexualized out of all the Bad Kids. Tabaxi culture, as a whole, is also stated to value physical beauty and charm above all else, although Machaira herself, as a "primitive", was considered to be too ugly to be desirable.
• Shadow Archetype: Discussed in "Cool Kids, Cold Case- Family", when the Bad Kids hunt down a gang of gnolls who potentially have a link to the Palimpsest Conspiracy. Specifically, Machaira explains in detail that gnolls, as well as all who ally with them, draw their savagery and ferocity from the demon lord Yeenoghu, who unites them as a community rallied against what they perceive as a cruel world that is constantly out to kill them, stripping away all pretensions of personal burden and responsibility in return for a twisted sense of security; Machaira elaborates that she's never joined them and has even hunted them in the past, but she still sees the worst parts of herself, and what she could have been in another life, in them.
• Single Woman Seeks Good Man: A same-sex example in Adaine, being drawn to her kindness, humility, intelligence and determination, especially in spite of the family that raised her.
• Smoking Is Cool: Averted. Machaira expresses her concern about Fig's habit of smoking and why she's doing it in "The Pixie And The Mosh Pit- Downtime", revealing during the conversation that she used to be a smoker, and a doer of much worse drugs, when she was even younger than Fig (given that the two, as of current, are about the same age).
• Street Smart: Living alone without any kind of guardianship whatsoever and being forced to drift from town to town for a good percentage of her life made this a necessity.
• Tomboy with a Girly Streak: She's blunt, brusque, and tough (occasionally to the point of being a hardass), with a preference towards direct physical combat and raw strength. She's also surprisingly compassionate, sensitive, and emotionally open (to arguably the point of detriment, even), has a strong sensuous streak, and is a competent (and even passionate) seamstress and cook.
• Unskilled, but Strong: With the exception of her being quite nimble as both a rogue and a tabaxi and an assumed propensity towards stealth as both a huntress and a rogue, Machaira's main approach to combat is brutal and direct force with practically zero strategy.
• Violently Protective Girlfriend: She's not officially with her yet, but she's developed this mindset towards Adaine.
• Walking Spoiler: As all of the spoilered tropes here can attest to, it's hard to say anything about her without giving away important story information, even from the very beginning.
• War Goddess: Bast, the goddess that Machaira worships.
• Wise Beyond Their Years: Often shows her hand as this, in both her mindset and her interactions with the other Bad Kids. Specifically, she's of the "traumatic life destroying one's innocence" caliber of this trope. That being said, this is also somewhat downplayed, as she's shown to still struggle with many of the same issues, in terms of both mindset and perspective, that many teenagers do, although even then she tends to handle them from a more insightful and grounded disposition than most her age would.

Riz Gukgak

Riz Gukgak

A young aspiring private eye with a knack for detective work and trouble. He's on the search for his missing friend Penny and also hopes for a new start in high school.

• Babysitter Friendship: His former babysitter, Penny Luckstone, was his first friend. Finding her after she goes missing is his primary motivation during his freshman year.
• Badass in a Nice Suit: His character art depicts him as dressed way too formally for high school, in a three-piece suit with a vest and a newsboy cap. This makes him look simultaneously professional and incredibly dorky.
• Cool Big Sister: Comes around to seeing Machaira as an adoptive example.
• Cowboy Cop: While mostly as by-the-book as his mother, Riz nonetheless has shades of this, such as willingly disobeying the law and his Mom's orders in order to get deeper into a case or do the right thing and shooting Biz's fingers off to get information out of him. Of course, this behavior, whenever it does pop up, is usually deconstructed, such as disobeying the rules getting him into genuine legal trouble and his Jack Bauer Interrogation Technique encountering one of the fundamental flaws of the practice... that being that that the victim might not know a thing, or may have been magically beguiled into believing the wrong thing.
• Embarrassing Nickname: Was called "The Briefcase Kid" in middle school, and earns a new one as "The Ball" due to literally being dunked by the local jocks.
• Good Is Not Soft: One of the party members most concerned with morality and saving people, but completely merciless when it comes to dealing with his enemies, having one of the highest kill-count of the party (one of which will also stands as the most significant, if things unfold as they do in canon).
• Kid Detective: Has the magnifying glass, briefcase, and cards to prove it.
• Nice Guy: He's overall a kind person, going out of his way to protect his friends when he can. One of the reasons he started his investigation was because his babysitter went missing and he considered her his first friend, before even the other Bad Kids.
• O.O.C. Is Serious Business: He's usually sweet, good-natured, and enjoys having adventures very much. However, when it comes to the Palimpsest conspiracy and his babysitter's kidnapping, he becomes coldly efficient and pragmatic.
• The Short Guy with Glasses: Doesn't wear glasses, but has the height and affinity for green due to being a goblin and uses his wiles to his advantage.
• The Smart Guy: Shares this role with Adaine, being a Street Smart Rogue private eye and the party member that does the most actual sleuthing and finds the biggest clues.
• The Sneaky Guy: Comes with being a rogue and a private eye.
• Tranquil Fury: When threatening Biz with his gun, he doesn't yell, but he's obviously furious as he quickly counts down to each gunshot he threatens to take.
• Vitriolic Best Buds: With Fabian, at least to begin with. Fabian continues to refer to him by the insulting nickname "The Ball", long after Ragh's Heel–Face Turn and the Bad Kids becoming Fire-Forged Friends.
• Workaholic: He's demonstrated many times throughout the series that he's unable to relax and stop working on his cases and making theories, prompting no small amount of concern from his mother.