Elmir

Within a self that is shifting, the power remains to keep it journeying toward where it needs to be.

If there's a name you'll hear over and over again from my OCs, it's this name. Elmir is interesting for a variety of reasons, to put it simply. Not only does he drive the conflict of his home universe's story, and have a unique, complex, and interesting character that tends to be difficult to fully sort into one idea or the other, but he has infinite potential to have new things noticed about him by all who are introduced to him. Overall, he's simply a unique experience.

Created as a secondary character and later main villain in what was originally meant to be a short story to explain a characters' backstory, Elmir has come a long way and gone through two separate development cycles to get to where he is now, and has truly become an icon. Nowadays consistently prominent and one of the most recurring characters ever to date, he is one of the most beloved and well known characters I have ever made, and his central importance to my creative universe will forever remain. 

Story

-There will be a link here to explain the universe someday, but not today; therefore, content warning for abuse, violence, and murder-

Elmir was born as the fourth child down to parents who had violently and forcefully taken over the Celestial Tower of Pokemon's Unova region, after it had previously been nothing but a simple tower to honor the dead. Even despite being born into this inherently abnormal position and with parents who became more and more emotionally abusive to him the older he became, he generally had a normal, if not incredibly sheltered childhood, with a lot of thanks to his older siblings' love and support, until he hit around the preteen area. At that point, in part due to beginning to realize the abusive reality he was living, he became more troubled and had behavior problems manifest, and when it transitioned into the teenage years they were full of angst and rebellion. This eventually calmed down once he began to reach adulthood, and during the same period his parents told him he was old enough that he should take on a position of responsibility within the imaginary monarchy his parents created for themselves and him and his siblings thanks to their position of power over the others living in the tower. They assigned him to learn about security measures, which basically meant learning about moves and their potential applications in the area. He didn't really want to take this position on, but he didn't exactly have a choice. He only grew to hate it as his parents consistently gave him a hard time anytime he made a mistake, often calling him an idiot for it. And for several years that was the position he was stuck in; it's no surprise his emotional health and self esteem suffered for it, just as they had for a long time. But he still had his siblings the way he always had, all of them helping to look out for him and him doing the same in return. It was the way all of them helped each other through their situation, as they hoped for the day their parents would pass and their position would be inherited by Lennox, the eldest sibling, who would then be able to run the tower in a much more humane way and let them manage their lives the way they wanted. Elmir for one couldn't wait to not have to work with the security and endure his parents' remarks.

A couple months prior to the beginning of the plot of the story, however, his ability to take all of it felt like it was reaching his limit, and one night this frustration caused him to sneak out the window of the floor him and his siblings resided in onto the narrow ledge outside, just to get the breath of fresh air and try to calm himself. It was in the middle of this that he overheard chatter from the floor below, one of the ones the other people living in the tower were confined to, and the conversation he heard was rather dark in nature. He kept his breathing quiet as he listened to these people talk about planning to rebel and kill the self-imposed monarchs to free themselves; while rumors of rebellion had happened occasionally in the tower, Elmir had never heard one developing firsthand. He came back to the ledge the following two nights to continue to listen in on them, and on the third night, he brought himself to make a risky move and edged down the ledge to the window of their floor and slip in to join them. Already aware that being a child of the monarchs would immediately bring them to mistrust him and think he'll expose them, he spent that time assuring them he wasn't going to do any such thing, that he wanted to help them get rid of his own parents. He told them a story about his entire family buying into the tyrannical rule his parents started, and that he was the exception who felt for all of them- while this was a blatant lie and he knew it, as all of the siblings felt for the others, he figured it was more believable to them if he lied than if he was truthful. He also appealed to his knowledge of security measures to help them break the ones in place at the tower. They all hesitantly bought it, and as he met with them in secret more and more, they began to trust him on it. However, his story backfired on him when their plans of killing the parents shifted to the entire family except for him- the idea being he would therefore inherit the position in the eyes of the guards and use its familial authority to force them to obey their agenda. Elmir hadn't planned for this at all- he had already tried to bring himself to terms with the idea he would be helping murder his parents, but all of a sudden it was about his entire family. Now he was forced to either admit he lied and risk losing their trust- or worse, them turning on him and targeting him, warn his siblings and admit he was plotting against them, or stay quiet and go along with them.

Unable to bring himself to speak up, he chose to stay quiet. He chose to play along, even as his insides burned for it. The plan would still free from his parents, and even more, allow him the control over his life he needed. Even as the rebels planned to kill off the eldest child to encourage the rest of the tower a full scale rebellion was possible, the only thing Elmir told them was the rotation patterns of the guards. It was as if the true reality of what he was doing was simply something he couldn't process, all his negative emotions being suppressed as best he could in his mind. And on the night the plan was to be enacted, Elmir was in no way able to sleep. He pretended to be asleep and waited. He heard the approaching footsteps. He heard noises he could never forget. He was there, emotional with his other siblings over it once they woke, but for somewhat of a different reason.

This aftermath he continued to disassociate from in the weeks that followed, as the rebels continued planning their full on takeover. One day, he witnessed his now-eldest brother Edsel go up to the roof of the tower in the middle of a workday. While he went up there frequently, he never did it in the middle of the day, even if his parents weren't in the room as was the case. Quietly, Elmir followed him up there, and witnessed him standing right on the edge of it. Thinking he was about to jump off, Elmir called out to him to ask what he was doing, and it turned out that was in fact not the case. As Elmir walked over to stand next to him to inquire what he was really doing, his brother hesitantly revealed to him he was testing out an escape plan, one where the six of them would gather on the roof and use fire attacks to catch the attention of a passing human trainer, and ask to be caught. This set off a panicked reaction in Elmir's mind- he most certainly didn't want to be caught by a trainer first of all, but he couldn't have the rebel's plan ruined like this either. The more the two of them talked about it there on the roof, the less Elmir was able to hide the panic welling up inside him. It finally drove him to make a rash decision and confess to Edsel what was really going on, before telling him to go off to a trainer alone and giving him a hard push, sending him off the edge of the tower towards the ground. While he ducked down to avoid being seen by the guards below, he peeked out to see that a trainer had happened to be nearby at that moment, and he watched as she threw a ball at Edsel and then ran off with him. He then made his way back to his desk downstairs without being noticed, playing unaware when the guards came up with the news.

While the rebels were impressed by his deed, it meant their plan had to happen sooner due to the anxiety it caused on the top floor. He continued to help them with preparations, until finally one winter night, everything was in place and ready. And as the siblings questioned the increasing noises of footsteps from the lower floors, Elmir prepared himself for what was about to happen.

It wasn't long before the guards at the entrance to their level were overpowered by the oncoming mob and the parents were slaughtered by it. As the siblings then ran to the roof and tried for their only means of escape by going down the ledge, they realized Elmir hadn't come with them, and looked up to see him staring down at the three of them.

He knew this was the time to tell them what was really happening, and with the others in the tower all listening behind him, he kept it brief and to the point before stepping back to allow them to chase after his remaining three siblings. He watched as they made it down to the ground and ran off into the nearby trees giving way to woods with the mob in pursuit. He waited for them to return with news they had lost them. And he knew they'd be back. But not yet, not for now. And that left him alone as the sole ruler of the tower.

It was a strange position to be in. Everything seemed quieter now, and the rebels he had originally planned with became his inner circle of sorts, the ones he now had to listen to his orders, provided it pleased them. Not that after all they had done to help kill his family he really trusted them, but they were what he had. And being in that leading position was perhaps the strangest part. He didn't really know what to do with it besides enjoy not having someone order him around and control him. He decided to just leave the others in the tower alone; still keeping them contained in the tower, but doing nothing to hurt or displease them. For a while, everything was okay. Things just stood still and were... calm. But eventually the others in the tower grew dissatisfied; while Elmir was certainly an improvement over his parents, they came to realize it still put them in essentially the same situation of being trapped there. It likely didn't help that he was still related to their conquerors. And as they grew more upset and angry, he didn't know what to do to calm them. But it reached a high point when one day as he was checking in on everyone on the lower floors, someone got close to him and literally stabbed him in the back. Before they could get any further, his inner circle closed in on them, causing them to let off a dark purple fog and flee out the window. Elmir was fine physically after being bandaged, but the experience shook him up mentally and made him begin to question if this had all been the right decision. Then during another time amongst the others, a desk flew up via the powers of the move Psychic and crashed down in front of him while his back was turned, barely avoiding crushing him and leaving him with a lot of splinters to pick out of his back. He never figured out which one of the psychic types had done it. And then finally, another person tried to come at him with a weapon, but he saw it coming and stopped her in her tracks. Instead of having her killed, he opted to keep her under guard, effectively a prisoner. But by the time the third attempt had happened, his mental wellbeing had been thrown into an imbalance and he was considering fleeing the place. In the meantime, he learned how to mimic the foggy move the original attempted assassin had done as well as another move of his own accord, and a weapon as well, but he had doubts as to if they would be enough. 

And then one day, his siblings came back. 

He had little time to prepare as a whole group of people showed up to the tower with them in lead and utilized sleeping and stunning moves to subdue the guards that came for them. But knowing they were coming for him, he stood ready at the top floor for them to come up. Taking advantage of their want to speak to him, he got into a brief talk with them before letting off a dark fog, covering the room and cuing his inner circle to attack them. In the meantime, he fled to a lower floor through the roof and the ledge, and waited for them to come to him. And by the time they came, as he unleashed walls of impenetrable fire over all the exits, the mental imbalance he had already been experiencing had escalated into a high point of emotion. Holding a stake-like weapon in the middle of the room, Elmir refused to listen to his remaining siblings as they begged him to talk this out, saying how he wouldn't make himself their prisoner, unwilling to let his position be taken by anyone but himself and not wanting to be forced to face down the consequences of his actions. So he quickly let off another fog and moved in to attack.

What followed is somewhat hazy to recall in his memory. The rush of emotions and adrenaline he experienced almost made it seem like it didn't really happen. But he vaguely remembers the wounds he inflicted upon them, how he had to get his weapon back after Damita took it from him, and having to chase both her and Alanna down, and how his desperation grew to get rid of the threat in his way. He also remembers the sound of the bell on top of the tower said to calm the spirits being rung by all the others blocked from entering.

He especially remembers the next minute. The balls of light that descended from the ceiling and that surrounded him, suddenly making a forcefield that trapped him in his spot. The forms of his parents and dead brother materializing from them and closing in on him, the fear and panic he felt at that moment, followed by his insides being on fire-- and then, nothing at all.

A few minutes later, he woke up to a white void and his deceased family members staring at him. He stared them down, the look on his face not terrified... but confused. He proceeded to ask what was going on, if he was dead, how he had died and since when either of them had died. The others quickly figured out he had subconsciously induced amnesia on himself of all the events he had made unfold as his first action in the new reality he existed in, later on admitting it to it being an impulsive choice done out of terror. And with that terror his subconscious did nothing as the three of them played along instead of telling him to stop it, and his completely unaware conscious self went along as they showed him their home they had created in the afterlife. Finally, though, after spending some time like this, his subconscious couldn't take the burning feeling it had from wondering why they didn't scold him or do anything to him and tried to act as if nothing was wrong, and removed the blockade to his memories to confront Lennox about it, at least after he experienced the emotional meltdown that resulted from reuniting the two halves so suddenly with such drastic information. Through an intense heart to heart conversation in which his brother told him he played along so Elmir would know he wanted to make amends and try to move past what had happened, Elmir finally apologized for everything, breaking down in front of his eldest brother, knowing he didn't deserve his kindness or forgiveness for what he had done to him, but hesitantly accepting it and swearing he'll do anything he can to make up for his actions.

After that point starts the third and final act of the story, in which Elmir becomes the main character. Still adjusting to accepting the reality of both his current situation and that which he had avoided involving his actions, he is filled with regret and intense self hatred. As the story begins, Lennox approaches him while he is in his room reflecting over everything and asks him if he would like to go someplace with him. The two end up going to a city in which each building is either a replication of a real world architectural wonder or something imagined by somebody. As the two are exploring the interior of a building, Elmir has a sudden and unexpected loss of coordination and falls backward into another person, phasing through them onto the ground. He awkwardly apologizes for this, saying he doesn't know what happened there, and the other person, a young lady appearing around his age, jokes about it and shrugs it off. After a brief conversation in which they seem to connect, she goes off, but not before Elmir asks if they could talk again another time. He then tells Lennox how the idea of making a friend out of her both terrifies and makes him feel a little happy, and after Lennox reassures him about it, they continue on their way and then go back to their home they've all made together. Had the story been finished beyond this point, it would've been a redemption story for Elmir that went through him developing and growing and learning how to come to terms with what happened and move himself past it through the actions of both himself and characters like Lennox or his new friend, Abby. While he is unable to reverse the consequences of his actions, he makes an effort to improve himself as a person and slowly try to learn how to forgive himself, all while waiting for the day he can properly make amends with his family and try to live out the rest of his existence as peacefully as possible.

Beyond the original version of the story, across all AUs where all the siblings get to live, Elmir usually breaks apart by seeing the spirit of his parents and in the moment of calmness and clarity it provides him, is motivated to burn the weapon to ashes and surrender to his siblings, finally unable to hold back his doubt and regret over his actions any longer and horrified he has really come this far. What follows as he is effectively arrested by his siblings and the people they brought with them to the tower and taken back to the forest they've made their home in is a tense period of reevaluation and recovery for him. Finally willingly facing the consequences of his actions in the eyes of his family head on, the emotionally broken Elmir apologizes over and over again to his family, trying to convince them of his remorseful nature and that he doesn't have some other motive in surrendering at the last moment after having already refused. No matter what, though, he willingly accepts the lack of trust and the period of constant surveillance his siblings give him, obeying their terms for him being around without a single complaint, and keeps to himself the internal meltdown he experiences as he reflects over his actions and the implications of them on himself over and over again. In the meantime, he confesses everything to them with brutal honesty, and tries to do whatever he can to make their experience trying to recover from the trauma of his actions move along more quickly. Months pass of this awkward period, with Elmir slowly being less and less constantly monitored, and he goes through a depression as his emotions bounce between an intense feeling of desperation to want to redeem himself in the eyes of his family and not ultimately be disowned or cast aside by them, or a feeling of hopeless that there's no way this is possible and it would be best if he disappeared. But things do slowy get better, and his efforts to make amends eventually result in tentative forgiveness from his family. He's eventually able to take this and the self evaluation and intense desire to change himself for the better he's had since his surrender to pull himself through to a more sound and stable state of mind and being, with the support of his siblings, and put distance between his actions and his present day self. By the time the timeline picks back up with the Canleds a couple years or so later from the time of the incident, he's reached a state where he can function normally as best he can and not have to think about the past constantly, back to being how he was before, but now having grown and become much more considerate and aware of his actions almost to a point of nerosis at times. He remains forever grateful to his family for their choice to keep supporting him, and has no hesitation in frequently expressing his affection for all of them and doing little favors or acts of kindness for them. While he still struggles heavily with his self esteem and hasn't reached the point he wants to be at in life, he's at least better able to manage it and tell himself he's needed in the world.

His first significant AU beyond the ones related to canon was his time in Reverie Sanctuary, a universe where the Canleds are a wealthy family in a rich part of the world, having escaped from their parents' emotional abuse a few years ago. Without having gone through anything like the events of canon, Elmir is overall better off, but he still suffers from low self esteem and a dissatisfaction with his job working in a company's security department. While he never did anything significant in that universe, he managed to produce a fun collage of awkward and hilarious moments and a lot of memes, and it was enjoyable to watch him simply be himself. Probably my favorite roleplay with him ever is one in which he interacts with the group's Jirachi, who ends up manipulating him into buying a large load of candy for her, and the entire interaction I found rather hilarious, with second place being one in which a character attempts to flirt with him, only for him to completely miss that fact and cause the character to walk away a couple minutes later.

There is also a developing AU for him going on in Knochen Lust, where instead of him being responsible for the parents' murder, it was a collective effort on the part of all the siblings and a secret that weighs heavily on all their consciences. I'm considering making him into a detective with Acel as his partner, not because he has any desire to be one, but in order to make sure the law enforcement of the area stays off the trail of his family, at least until he's confident they'll never pick it up and can comfortably quit. This version will likely be the most confident one yet, but he'll never lose the awkward edge everyone is so used to with his character.

Personality

"I'll just try my best not to seem odd to others. I can learn."

Elmir is someone who is both normal and weird at the same time. While he’s easy to read as an overall average person, and may be such at his core, his personality is full of little contradictions that add up to create a picture strange to look at in its full resolution. 

"I mean I see what you're saying, this doesn't seem too hard, but I kind of wonder if I'll mess something up. (The way I always seem to do.)"

On an average encounter, Elmir is somewhat laid back and friendly enough, usually letting his extroverted nature show through his willingness to let little conversations happen and talk to people. He has somewhat of a liking for taking interest in all the little things people have to share about and hearing their stories. The problem is, this is combined with an awkwardness to his attempts to socially interact. He often makes a conversation have an awkward moment or embarrasses himself despite his best attempts, and has come to painfully accept it as the story of his life. This is further hindered by his tendency to be judged quickly by others, typically because of his simplistic way of dressing. Overall, despite what he tries to do, he’s sometimes unable to make a positive impression on others, and often ends up being somewhat of a magnet for misfortune, sometimes just by bad luck, sometimes because others correctly assess him as a doormat. It is no surprise these qualities contribute to his crippling self esteem issues.Beyond all this, though, it’s also easy to see him and his awkward but friendly demeanor as cute or endearingly dorky, and he places a lot of value in friendships, especially ones that end up intimate. Even if neither of these things are the case, he often enjoys just making an acquaintance out of someone on the street.

"I mean, it's cool and all, but it's not my thing or anything. (Nothing really is...)"

Elmir’s desires tend to be simple in nature. Going out and enjoying the world around him, movie nights, or maybe even action novels are all common activities for him that make him happy. He sort of goes through life as it comes, to a fault. Even when given a lot of time to think it over, he can’t figure out what exactly he wants to do with his life in the long term. He has always had a driving desire to be something- do something important, be something important, but has never been able to discover just what that is. This ambitious nature with nothing to be funneled into often leaves him frustrated with himself and adds to his feelings of worthlessness. 

"But no, you had to try and do this. And now you're leaving me no choice....I'm not leaving with you....It's not going to happen, Alanna."

Even without something to drive his ambition, Elmir’s drive is a powerful force within him. If he truly feels like he should do something, then he will put everything into achieving it, and little will be able to break him out of this determination. This is either to his benefit or his detriment. 

"I hope that you are [sorry]. Because if you don't mean it... what does that say for your morality? What does that say that this destruction isn't a starting point of something worse...?"

Furthermore, Elmir’s nature is unstable, not through any fault of his own, but simply having always functioned that way.  He exists on a spectrum of composure and falling apart. Depending on the environment and its factors on his emotional state, he can end up being anywhere from completely normal and stable to off the rails and not in control of his emotions, making him seem more chaotic in nature and prone to end up hurting himself. Typically, though, he ends up somewhere on the stable end. He usually has access to resources like his siblings that prevent him from allowing himself to come undone, that motivate him to control himself.For when he doesn’t, bad things can happen. Elmir’s prone to give into his emotions, and combined with a tendency towards impulsive reactions and not thinking through his decisions, he is more than likely to end up making bad decisions. While he’s not any more aggressive than the average individual, his awkward and weird or cute demeanor people often grow used to drops to a much more frightening and intimidating, venomous one when he acts on it (and has once made a man twice the size and weight of Elmir terrified of him). 

"This doesn't feel right. Shouldn't you look and act different? Shouldn't you be somewhere else?"

What happened in the canonical version of his story is in fact an extreme scenario of this, an absolute worst example of what he is capable of doing. If you were to observe multiple copies of him over may universes and changed the circumstances, chances are nothing of the sort would occur twice. But it depends on how far into the unstable end of his spectrum he’s allowed to dive. 

"And when your older siblings are just so good at something people are hard at mastering you kind of want to try and follow them..."

For at his core, Elmir isn’t an inherently bad person. He is capable of anything the way any person is, and his choices make up where he ends up. Usually, Elmir ends up with a compulsion drifting towards wanting to do the right thing, the motivation usually involving a desire to match up to the seemingly inherent niceness he sees his siblings as having that he lacks and to feel better about himself. Often times it also ends up being a desperate measure to make him feel like he deserves to be alive. 

"I was a selfish monster who couldn't take it. And now everything is gone with little to no hope. ...I... there's nothing left for me. I'm not somebody worth loving and protecting anymore."

With all this taken into consideration, though he is the type of person to be susceptible to them no matter what, Elmir is plagued by deeply rooted self esteem problems. He feels like a person with no talents or interesting features that’s stupid and unappealing and offers nothing that can’t be matched and outdone by any person around him. He often amplifies his pushover nature by letting himself be walked on, as most other people are better than him and he’s not worth it. A lot of this is made much worse by the emotional abuse he endured from his parents and his mother often calling him an idiot, and even much, much worse by the events of the canon, which leave him questioning if he should even have existed in the first place, that he’s an inherently evil person, that the world might be better off without him. At its worst, his self hatred can end up being the force that ends his life. It’s the most difficult problem he faces in his life, and something that nobody can truly solve but himself. But what it would take to get him there is perhaps the biggest mystery of the character. It’s often best one doesn’t delve into the depths of how deep his thoughts about how he hates himself go on for; such content is very depressing and possibly even equivalent to experiencing a psychological horror. 

"No matter what's going on, I can't lose myself in my own emotions and pain. I have to remember what I truly value and who I am and what gives me purpose in life."

Even despite his self hatred, unstable nature, and emotional vulnerability, Elmir has more internal strength than he gives himself credit for. He’s able to pull himself through years of emotional abuse and back from nearly destroying himself and do what it takes to better himself and bring himself to a position where he can manage himself and his life. Through the persistence in his mind and with the support of his family, he’s strong enough to hold on to the hope that gets him to the state where he can begin to find peace with himself.

"It's the best feeling in the world to be home again."

Creator's Comments

There's about fifty million things to say about Elmir and I've probably said about twenty million of them so far.

He's come a lot farther than I ever expected him to, and a lot of that comes from a past decision to take pity and explore further into a character that I had decided the fate of a while ago. While that decision may have resulted in a now attention-cursed and constantly memed on present day result, it also created one of the most prominent, interesting, and notable characters I have ever made, as well as making something a lot better and more interesting out of his awful and stupid original conception idea. So in the end, it's worth the occasional annoyance and insecurity over his tendency to suck all attention to himself to have him around. If nothing else, it keeps the fire going for this project that I want to keep alive, that I want to be the first project not to die and burn out with time.

He is my character mascot for 'Problematic Favorite', as well as being one of the most affectionately picked on characters by both myself and everyone else who comes across him, both in and out of character.

Maybe he’s downright awful at selective times, but he spends most of his time on different scales and varieties of positive and negative, and overall, despite mocking him consistently and calling him trash, people seem to like and hold affection for the character, given the time to understand him.

I'd be quite surprised if he went away anytime soon, and I feel that if given enough time, he'd hopefully be as interestingly received in a public eye as he is with the friends who have suffered through and enjoyed him.

Fanart by Tea that I absolutely love

Another cute piece I requested from Momo

Trivia Facts:
-He has the award for stupidest original concept as mentioned; he was originally conceived as more of the dumb-but-funny trope, and to everyone's benefit this slowly died in a fire with his development.
-His favorite drink is cherry pepsi or whatever equivalent and his favorite food is pizza. He doesn’t really drink alcohol because he finds soda superior. Yet another way he manages to be both basic and weird.
-He has the habit of being a movie junkie. According to himself he likes the ones with interesting concepts.

-The weapon he uses in the climax lacks a formal name, as Elmir himself never saw the need to name it. It is formally simply referred to as the weapon, but has the more informal nickname of being called the stick. It sometimes makes appearances in other universes as something similar to a switchblade knife but larger, in which the blade part slides into the handle part. 

-There is a strange recurring trend with him in which characters attempt to flirt with him to his obliviousness or dismay; most of them lose interest quickly, but not all. One of them getting over it is even being indirectly explored as a plot point in a timeline.

-Some earlier works with the character have implied him as either straight or ambiguously bisexual, but he eventually manifested in his permanent aroace form. Not that this seems to stop some people.
-According to a certain roleplay, his favorite movie is Inside Out.
-No matter what anyone tells you, he doesn’t have any hidden muscles. Don’t listen to my friends. 

Links

Here is his list of writing pieces he appears in

Here is the only Reverie Sanctuary Roleplay that needs to be linked from him

Also worth reading is the entry I wrote for him on the group's discontinued wiki; good for if anyone wanted a more in depth explanation of that AU

Blog Tag

Here is another more recent roleplay world he is involved in