PERSONALITY

Autumn Effect has an independent personality from its user. Unlike other sentient Stands, it is completely non-verbal, communicating with its user entirely through gestures and body language. Although Autumn has a humanoid face, it does not typically emote outside of its default expression, save for instances of extreme emotion.

It has a tendency to work outside of Impala's direction, regularly mainifesting at random times to check its surroundings or perform small tasks. It is curious by nature, and shows a particular interest in rummaging through things.

Despite acting independently of its user, Autumn Effect is loyal to Impala and will actively protect him from anything it perceives as a threat. It becomes noticably agitated and aggressive if it feels that its user is in danger, though its reasoning isn't always clear or rational.

ABILITIES

Autumn Effect is a close-range stand with moderate strength and speed, but tends to rely more heavily on its other abilities, using to hand-to-hand meelee only as a last resort. Impala usually tries to avoid fighting, but often can't predict or control how Autumn Effect will react to a threat.

One of the main reasons Impala avoids using Autumn Effect's abilities in combat is that he is not immune to its attacks.

SPORE DISPERSAL

Autumn Effect has the ability to expel clouds of spores from its chest in quick, forceful bursts. If inhaled, the spores will latch onto the victims's lungs, restricting their breathing. The spores multiply rapidly as the victim struggles to catch their breath, stimulated by the spastic movement of the lungs. Inversely, if the victim is able to control and slow their breathing, the spores will begin to detatch and eventually exit the body.

If one of Autumn Effect's spores comes in contact with an open wound, the cells in the area will begin to die, inducing rapid decay of the surrounding tissue. The speed at which this decay spreads varies based on the size of the initial wound, i.e. a large gash will spread much faster than a small cut. This ability extends to most biological matter, but has no effect on dead or otherwise inorganic materials such as metal, stone, etc.

CREATION AND DEVELOPMENT

While first designing Impala, I had originally planned to name his stand Wasteland, but decided against it because it made him sound like an antagonist. I chose Autumn Effect because, to me, it had a more neutral connotation. Its main ability was inspired by a line in its namesake song. I chose to add two different kinds of "corpse flowers" to its design to keep with its overall theme of rot and decay, as well as giving its face a more skeletal look. I don't really have any reason for giving it 4 arms, other than thinking it looked interesting.