[Cosmosdex] The Universal Encyclopedia
[Cosmosdex]
You
Social Parasite / Fault in our Stars
You
No art currently, maybe you can help
- Strength-1
- Intelligence-5
- Charisma-10
- Endurance-5
- Agility-5
- Luck-10
Age: 2000+ years
Size: Unknown
Species: Unknown/Anomaly
Job: None
Likes: Famous things, Being friends with famous things, Showing off for famous things, Being involved with famous things
Dislikes: Being involved with worthless nobodies
Notable contributions: Hundreds of shattered careers and crushed dreams.
Traits
This character boasts about their skills, and often want people to watch them do things to show off how good they are at it.
This character is confident in what they do and rarely ever doubts themselves or the people they believe in. They’re able to trust people and can raise the morale of people they trust.
This character not only has a way with words but people are ready and willing to listen. This trait means this character has a better chance when trying to convince a character to do a deed. Sometimes this character might even be willing to convince others to do things they'd never even consider before.
This character will, if given the chance, take advantage of a character for their own gain. This character is likely to tell others to do things that help themselves but not the person being told to do the action. Manipulative highly lowers the morale and may lower the sanity of a character if it happens too much.
This character displays an obsessive focus on a single thing or related group of things. It may be difficult to get them to do things unrelated to their obsession, and can be extremely agitated when their obsession isn't "respected".
This character is utterly in love with themselves and will make sure that everyone knows about it. This character will commonly move conversations to be centered around them which can mean that the conversation completely misses its point or everyone else in the conversation become increasingly agitated.
This character will commonly say one thing, then proceed to not hold themselves to their own words. Characters will quickly either feel devalued as people or, become highly agitated everytime a hypocritical statement is made.
Original Creator: Dorf
Physical Description
It is very difficult to describe You in any kind of meaningful way, because You is that rarest of oddities - A true shapeshifter. Nobody is quite sure whether You even has a real form, or what it would look like if they did, because of the one restriction that seems to exist on their shapeshifting - They will only (and almost always will) shapeshift to look exactly like the person they are currently talking to or interacting with. Sometimes they will assume the form of fauna if left alone for long enough, traditionally those culturally associated with wilderness or cunning, especially if trying to get attention.
People well known or widely famed do not get the body double treatment, and although the boundaries of what exactly You considers fame are poorly defined, it is perfectly consistent with the same person. This is for a very significant reason, as stated in a later section.
In the absence of any “valid” targets to shift into, they have been observed to either remain as they are, or turn into random previous forms repeatedly until someone approaches.
Personality & Traits
You's personality is perhaps best defined in relation to their relationship with other people. When interacting with those people deemed famous enough not to imitate, You is typically ingratiating and kind, almost always seeking to establish themself as a ‘nice person’ and become a satellite friend of said famous person, frequently following them around and going to the same events as them, even when that would be wildly inappropriate for the random person that they seem to be. If they are brushed off rapidly or directly told to leave the other person alone, You will almost always simply let it go as there are plenty more fish in the sea. However, the more famous the person who they are trying to get ‘in’ with is, the more likely it is that instead of going away You will instead begin stalking them, constantly finding contrived ways to ‘accidentally’ run into them, especially during chaotic or climactic events such as a house fire. If the famous person continues to ignore them, You has been accused of actually setting up increasingly grandiose disasters in which they can encounter their object of intent until the famous person finally acknowledges them or outright spurns them for good.
Once the person acknowledges them and they have inserted themself into their friend group You typically tries to become the “best” friend possible, becoming closer and closer to the person in question. They’ll give out life advice, try to help in their daily lives, and ultimately encourage their target to become emotionally dependent on them. While You isn’t exactly unknown, many famous people, especially newly-risen stars, either misunderstand the dangers of allowing this to happen or incorrectly believe themself to be “too good to get got”, that they are somehow stronger than all the people who came before them in You's attention, or that they can “leave at any time”.
They are usually wrong.
This dependency built by You will tend to increase until the shapeshifter is virtually running their life for them, gently chivvying them into a lifestyle of their own desire, based all around them, them, them. They may attempt to start a romantic relationship with their prize star, but whether or not they do, they will ultimately manipulate the life of the other in order to revolve all around them. They go on adventures at You's behest, they are led in conversations by You, they cancel appointments to hang out with You, and You is all that they can think about. This is the last chance to catch them before the obsession is total.
The manipulative state will only intensify until the targets dreams and aspirations are secondary to the goal of pleasing You, content going unmade, interviews missed and contracts rejected. They may feel helplessly trapped by things and the way the world seems to have become, and only by being with You can they free themself and feel good, as if their friends are not also famous they are likely to slowly be erased from their life, supplanted by the presence of the shapechanger. They lose interest in the world, giving it little thought because of the suddenly-controlling nature of You. You doesn't want them to be save villages, You wants to go on a romantic seaside date. You doesn't think they should be worrying themself about obligations, they should go work at a coffee shop with You. You doesn't care about them but it makes them think it does and snips their connections to the outside world, one at a time, until their target has become theirs and theirs alone.
Of course, this slow descent into focusing entirely on their new friend will not exactly be conducive to the career which made the person in question famous, and over time people will stop caring about the singer who gave up on writing songs, the TV star who hasn't taken any roles, the superhero who just stopped caring about crime. Their focus in the media spotlight will decline, and they won't notice or care. And if they do care, You will not let them worry about it, or do anything to change it. They only need You really, letting go of all that stressful things is just right. Their fame will slowly ebb as the universe, fickle in its attention, begins to forget about them. The famous person will eventually, stop being very famous at all.
And then You will ditch them without warning.
Abandon them to their own devices, wordlessly and callously. Uninteresting, the un-famous person who is no longer of any worth to them is ditched in search of a new host. This is why you should not be involved with this being, no matter how great it seems or how cool they are. They will suffocate your career, estrange you from your friends and leave you empty and bitter on the streets.
Because this is the reality of You's attitude to people they do not deem “famous” or “worthy”. People who aren't special are irrelevant to the story of their life, and are at best worth a brief conversation. They are never interested in a ‘nobody’ for long, and when they seem to be, they will always find a way to turn the conversation into a reflection of themself and their traits, as if a filler between conquests of champions. They are always seeking a new star to attach themself to, a new light with which to fan their own flame, and they are toxic. They are a parasite.
You does not, in the course of their shapeshifting ways, attempt to adapt their personality in any way to fit that of the people they are using the body of, simply acting as they always do. This may give an alien or ill-fitting air to it when it has mimicked species with notable habits and common personalities, but ignores them because the story of their life isn’t about them being a tweep, or a notail, the story is about them interacting with the high and mighty, the trendy and the beloved. This also includes names - You will without fail introduce itself by its real name if addressed as if they were actually the person they are using the shape of, a fact they claim to do to avoid any confusion. Many people have remarked that it is extremely disturbing to see someone who looks exactly like them, walking and talking in a totally alien way, or committing actions that the original person may strongly disapprove of.
When people ask You why they don’t even try, they always respond with a statement along the lines of “if you don’t like what I have to say, don’t bother listening”, refusing to discuss the issue any further.
As You becomes more and more emotional or stressed, they begin to lose control of their forms, and may flicker or switch between previously used shapes. This only grows progressively more severe as they get more and more upset, until they are incapable of maintaining a single form for more than a few seconds at a time, resulting in total incoherence and making interaction with them difficult at best until they have calmed down. As it is incapable of meaningful speech at this time, this is your best opportunity to rescue someone who has fallen too far under their influence to break away by themself - they’ll always be lurking nearby otherwise.
History
You has been around for a very long time indeed, although its actual origins are shrouded in obscurity. It is not clear exactly how long that is, as they are first known to have started out hunting (For that is the only word we can think of to describe it) lesser-known celebrities and only later moved onto their current wider scope. The fall from grace of interstellar rock star “Power-Lime Musicney” was the first time You was brought to public attention, and it has not stopped trying in the thousands of years since.
Every high profile case is a tragedy, and every time people swear that it will never happen again, that they will remember this time and heed the warnings. And every time the public memory fades, the issues of the new day dull the perception of risk and the warnings, and somewhere out there a promising rock artist thinks they’re too cool to fall. And the cycle begins all over again, with the words “Hi there. My name is You!”
Special
Shapeshifter: You is the archetypical shapeshifter. They can perfectly change their shape into that of any other being, without any known restrictions.
Image Gallery
No art currently, maybe you can help.
