Profile
A new member of the illustrious Cŵn Annwn -- and, more newly still, one of the faces of Llawes' Calon Ddi-waed department. Unique among their coworkers, August's work seldom involves combat. Instead, they find themself awash in photoshoots and interviews, their sincere and thoughtful nature an easy match for the camera.
Still, all Cŵn are specialists in some way or another, and August is no exception. Their primary talent lies in robotics -- and the smaller the better, given their knack for the delicate and detailed.
Bright-eyed and fresh off their college degree, August is clearly more at home holding a Llawebot than their weapon, and they lack the pristine polish customary to most Hounds -- a distinction that has won them an impressive legion of fans. Well, that and the Corporation's dedicated marketing team.
As for that crown insert of theirs, dripping sakura petals everywhere they go... well, it caused quite a stir when they first signed on. Why was that...? Oh well. Couldn't have been that important.
all gendered terms okay!
(and glass)
crown; floating hands; two koi-shaped anchors
First Face : The World
August's nature is, truth be told, a bit hard to pin down. Earnest though they may be, there's a sense of playful evasion to them -- lakewater slipping through the fingers only to pool, dutifully, exactly where it's expected to be. It's this essence that so many of their photoshoots cater to: dreamy in blush, but always within reach.
Still, photoshoots are only part of the job. It's hard to linger too long on the semantics of having versus holding when August is so forthcoming -- and excitable! True enough, August is enthusiastically kind and wont to geek out over things they like. Their ability to walk the line between distant and down-to-earth while maintaining their trademark sincerity has stolen the hearts of many.
Second Face: Close ones
How does one get close to something on fire? August is, existentially, so much perforation, the sea reduced to a web of wind lanes.
Still, their memories aren't quite gone -- just scrubbed. A careful distinction. So it isn't impossible to get to know August, to pull them close and realize they're... actually very similar with everyone! Though they're more comfortable rambling about whatever random topic strikes their fancy -- or, inversely, going silent for long stretches, to work on something -- August is rarely different with the people close to them than they are with acquaintances.
In fact, some would say August has only ever really been "close" with any amount of significance to one person. But then, that's hardly relevant anymore.
Third Face: True Reflection
At their core, August is a very normal person in very abnormal circumstances, doing their very best to convince themself life is worth living. Perhaps understandably, they're loath to be alone with their thoughts.
They work hard to ensure everything around them works as it should, and they'll keep working hard until there's no more work to be done. When that day comes, they can only hope that reflection looks back at them -- however many holes may have been poked into it; however much light or wellwater may leak through -- is one they can bear.
Sakura
- Tinkering
- White peaches & sweet fruit
- Ice-skating
- Obsolescence -- planned or otherwise
- Mazes
- Spicy food
- Fire
- Loss
- Failure
- Make things work with the Hounds
- Help January get through high school
- Stay friends with Bast
- Robotics
- Video games
- Reading
- Rarely seen without their Llawebot, Hyde (short for Hydra).
- Their best friend had a pond in their backyard growing up. Every winter, it would freeze up, and they and their families would ice skate.
- Has restraints for their floating hand inserts. They don't do much with too much movement, but they're useful for sleeping without knocking tons of stuff over!
- Hates replacing things. They'll keep anything as long as possible.
- Considers Thoth a pseudo older brother. He's been there for them their whole life, and they love him to pieces!
I kissed my mouth, it was no longer a mouth. I threw a spear at my head, I didn't have a head. Fox. At the throat of. The territory is more complex than I supposed.
Want something to chase you? Run. Take a body, dump it, drive. Take a body, maybe your own, and dump it gently. All your dead, unfinished selves and dump them gently.
In their college days (and indeed, most of their life before), August's wardrobe was relatively one-note: hoodie or cardigan (the baggier the better), jeans, boots, repeat. As a Hound, they -- or rather, marketing -- have swapped this for corsets and billowing sleeves, all strung together with ribbons.
Fortunately, August has taken to their new attire seamlessly. Any old friends seeing them now, on the other hand...
- They have heterochromia; their left eye is blue, and their right eye is green! This precedes their death...
- ...and, since they're quite shy about their eyes, they tend to wear their bangs over their face.
- They sometimes wear hair extensions! Before joining the Corp, these were raggedy little tufted pigtails. Now, they have long, koi-like tails that trail down their back.
TL;DR: "Too Long, Didn't Read"
WARNINGS: parent death; implied suicidal ideation
- Grew up normal an hour or two outside of downtown Caer Sidi. Attached at the hip to their lifelong (literally) best friend, Bast.
- Took an early interest in robotics. Together with Bast, they started tinkering at a young age, leading to eventual admission to CSU.
- Lived together for several years; started developing what would eventually come to be known as "Llawebots."
- August's parents died in a ████ ██ █████ fire. They moved back into their childhood home to take care of their little sibling, January.
- They drifted. The world went on, and Bast with it. August, moored to the same spot, could not.
- Bast continued to excel in robotics downtown; January mired themself in obsession. August seemed increasingly unnecessary.
- Unnecessary. Entrenched at the bottom of a still-rising sea, with less and less to live for, they seized the last opportunity they could find to keep their ████ friendship with Bast: Project Atlantis.
- Now, they enjoy a new lease on life furnished by new memories, Llawes' newest Ci Annwn and media darling.
Chapter One: "Sea Green"
WARNINGS: parent death
August St. Clare grew up with a blue garden gate, two doting parents, and a best friend they loved more than anything in the world.
Anytime something broke, August would do anything they could to fix it. This is the attitude that led them to robotics: tinkering with puttering old coffeemakers or toys with wheezing motors. Eventually, they and their aforementioned best friend, Bast Shepherd, developed into a team: Bast would design robots, the fantastic delicacy of which could only be fully realized through August's fine-tuning ability.
The two of them grew entwined. Bast was disinterested in sex or romance, so August -- only ever interested in Bast -- feigned disinterest, too. Either they'd develop that way eventually, or they'd stay as they were forever: perfectly in tandem.
This partnership buffeted them through high school; through college at CSU, with honors; and to a promising job with Llawes' robotics department. It very nearly launched them to the top thereof...
...until August's parents died. Arson. The flip of a coin. It could've happened to anyone. At 23, it felt like the world opened up beneath them. Then there was January: barely fifteen, in need of a guardian.
So back home they went -- away from Llawes, away from robotics, and away from Bast.
Chapter Two: "See Blue"
WARNINGS: implied suicidal ideation
August learned a great deal in the following two years. Namely, things involved in grieving, in raising a teenager (or trying to), and growing up.
Life went on. Elsewhere, at least. Behind the garden gate, things remained in stasis -- one year, two. The water froze; cracks formed. As Bast worked longer and longer hours, the two continued to miss each other, separated indelibly, unable to really touch.
The immediate popularity of Llawebots ensured Bast's position as head of Llawes' robotics department. As for Bast's newfound interest in romance--
What point was there to living, August wondered, if Bast could do so much without them? With their parents gone? With January further and further out of reach?
Perhaps this was why August was offered participation in Llawes' ever-secretive Project Atlantis: a two-pronged experiment. First, to make an Unbleeder using the remains of another's broken insert. In this case, disgraced ex-Ci Fukushima Jun.
Second, to manipulate memory -- with starmetal as a conduit. This started not with memory itself, but with feeling attached thereto. They were asked for a key: a central place to start unraveling. A closed circuit, so they didn't lose anything else. The answer, at that point, seemed obvious: their love for Bast.
It bleached them out. Under careful observation, they were placed in the Cŵn Annwn -- where they remain now, a valuable repository of scientific information and loyal worker. And, if their popularity serves to scrub Fukushima Jun's betrayal from the public consciousness...
I talk to you as if you’re really there.
You see, I take the parts that I remember and stitch them back together to make a creature that will do what I say, or love me back. I’m not really sure why I do it.
Here is the repeated image of the lover destroyed, crossed out. Clumsy hands in a dark room. Crossed out. There is something underneath the floorboards. Crossed out.
Kuchibeni — young love, stained mouth
August did not fall in love with Bast Shepherd. Rather, they grew around each other. The St. Clare and the Shepherd parents were long-time friends; when their children were born in the same year, of course they opted to raise them attached at the hip.
They were never without each other. Sleepovers, exams, secrets, troubles, triumphs -- the two of them shared everything, including their first apartment. Their work in robotics, too, was built into each other: Bast designed, both built, and August handled fine detail-work.
"Falling in love" implies a state of transition, the dichotomy of before and after; for August, their love for Bast has been their entire life.
Asagi — vein blue, bone white
When August's parents died, their life stopped. August moved back to their childhood home with its little blue garden gate to take care of January; Bast stayed in downtown Caer Sidi. August learned how to get death certificates and take care of a garden, to pay bills on a mortgaged house and help a teenager through high school; Bast worked long hours, weekends and long into the night, at their new position in Llawes' robotics lab.
They were separate. Weeks stretched into months. Bast's successes increased; August became increasingly isolated. Their schedules missed each other again and again. Half of August felt increasingly rent away -- compounded by Bast's newfound interest in romance.
And then Llawebots' release got Bast a job as the head of the robotics department.
Kumonryu — transformation, consumption
It was only at this point that August realized they had taken certain things for granted. They and Bast were not going to end up together, whatever that might look like. They and Bast weren't going to work together. Bast was hours and lifetimes away in either direction; January was increasingly distant; Thoth had successfully crossed the bridge into adulthood, and all the way across the city, at that.
And so August found themself confronted with a question: What's left of someone when they lose their other half? What was there to August without Bast?
When they signed onto Project Atlantis, it was, in many ways, to answer that question. In others, it was because it was the only way to justify their continued existence -- to make it bearable. Now, so much of their memory of their life are bleached out, spilled like sun spots on water. Eaten up by love.
For now, they're doing their best to walk a fine line: not falling back into old habits, but not jeopardizing their existing friendship, either. That's half the point, after all: staying friends, as they always have been. The other...
"Funny thing about grief, its hold is so bright and determined like a flame, like something almost worth living for."
Cool and sarcastic, January is separated from August by eight years and a gulf of personality. After their parents' death two years ago, August moved back in to their childhood home to attempt -- blindly -- to take over as their guardian. Whether the experience strained or strengthened their relationship, it's hard to say.
"If our city sinks, I hope
that the fishes build
a happy home
in the house where I
used to live."
They've never met. Still, August credits Jun with their survival -- part of him, anyway. The part he gave up, directly or otherwise, has sustained August's will to survive. At the corner of August's every day, lingering in the shadows of every conversation, Jun's spectre lingers -- along with all of his memories of the Hounds.
