Character Rant - Attraction: Waltic Onsur

Post Index

-Rant Introduction- A brief Summary of Attraction -Character Introduction- Secret Identity Walter’s role in the story

-Plot holes and Issues- -Walter's Second Outing- -Third Time's the Charm- A little side tangent

Walter’s Backstory

-Closing thoughts-

-Rant Introduction-

If there is one thing that I have grown to appreciate about saving concept drafts and plot ideas rather than discarding them - like I had done before and deeply regret it now; it's just the option to look back into the process of how I came up with and, eventually developed the stories, characters, and worlds I have now.

- Case in point, the topic of this post - Waltic Onsur.

 One of the early characters I created during the infancy of Attraction - a story taking place in a world where you are attracted to the things you desire, just as that desire is drawn to you.

A brief Summary of Attraction

 Following a spunky, excitable girl, and the tired store keep she suspects is a vampire, hijacking him in her shenanigans. The two work together in the 'Any things can do' Mission's Agency - A business they shared ownership in, and work as its primary employees. Accepting any odd jobs, random requests, and missions that comes their way.

 Attraction is a light-hearted, episodic series with the gimmick of its characters coming from different genres and stories put in one world; showing how they interact and influence each other, and how it disrupts their own narrative than if they were left uninterrupted in their stories. Its a character driven story in design and so a character-based story like Attraction inevitably depends on its characters for the story to happen and progress.

 And Waltic is one of the many characters that make up the populace of Attraction’s world.

  Made to fill up the main roster of focus characters. Interestingly, Waltic stands out from the dozens of characters, and his main cast members as the one that has gone through the most changes.

  Take Toki for example, who remains the hyper, adrenaline-seeking, excitement junkie from her initial conception, aside from some visual and backstory changes. And Onri, who instead of having his character changed, has his original concept built on with new elements that recontextualize his existing character traits.   Meanwhile Waltic himself has been through several iterations before settling into the character he is now – The process of which I will go through in this badly articulated, and long-winded rant.

 *Don't worry though, I have broken this up into several sections to make it easier for anyone willing to read through this post.

-Character Introduction-

From the very beginning of his character - Waltic is a serial killer.

Alright. So, there is more to his character than just a serial killer. Waltic is a composite of several ideas I had put into one character. Like the idea of a serial killer main ensemble character, who is harmless to the main casts (that just so happen to be his friends), and who just so happen to not notice his ‘hobby’.   As well as this little condition that some people have, where they lack the mental inhibitors that keeps them from unintentionally, or intentionally hurting themselves. These two concepts I am mentioning now (and another much later), makes up the bulk of Waltic's initial character, where they are used as reference points for any traits that are added to him; like his bandaged thumb - a result of Waltic's unhealthy thumb sucking habit and the occasional nibbles he tends to take in his sleep.

 But Waltic’s character is first and foremost, based on the subcategory of a serial killer character. Even if Waltic's MO. technically categorize him as a spree killer than a serial killer, a fact I will try to rectify poorly in the first draft, you’ll see why. Pedantic aside, Waltic is a murderer and killer of human people.

Secret Identity

Dubbed as The Appraisal, or Appraisal by the public. A name used to reference his method of emptying his victims' insides through either openings of their body, and depending on their victims- Either propping their bodies in a position that shows them cradling their organs in a macabre display... or have those organs put back in their body through the other, um... unused end.

 Only appearing in accidents with high fatality rates, targeting people who are badly if not fatally injured. Appraisal's methods are speculated to be them judging the final moments of their victims. Giving them a fitting 'reward' or 'punishment' of sort in their own ways of remembrance and 'honouring' them in their last moments of life. Like an appraiser judging the value of an artwork, if an unhinged one that possesses a God complex, whose twisted logic felt sound and 'proper' in their acts of ‘due diligence’ for the people they killed. Hence the name.

 What the public is unaware of, however, it’s that Walter - the name he goes by before his employment to the Mission's Agency (and the name I shall refer to him as of now) - is a reoccurring survivor or associated figure in the accidents where The Appraisal had appeared. One of these accidents and the murders that happened there broadcasted to the world, with Walter, the identity of Appraisal, shown on national TV; covered in blood, but somehow managed to evade suspicions of his own murders. Instead passed off as an unfortunate survivor of the accident and the murders.

So blatantly careless. Walter's unintentional reliance of that absurdity. Seeing that it would cause mass outcry from the public, and the authorities investigating his murders, by the time of the reveal that this deranged, almost supernatural spree killer, is a normal guy that doesn't even bother to clean his victim's blood off him.

- And this event here is a fixed point in Walter's story, regardless of the changes made after. 

Walter’s role in the story

Continuing on. When Walter crossed paths, and eventually end up as the caretaker and secretary of the 'Any things can do' Mission's Agency - His reasons to settle down and work for this unorthodox venture, was for a way to find new victims. Which is a dumb reason.

 Working for the Agency, where his name is changed from Walter to 'Waltic’ by Toki, his employer. Who felt his name was too normal, and changed it accordingly to fit in more. Another fixed point.

Walter uses this opportunity where he is housed and fed, with a normal job, and a normal identity should suspicions fall on him, and no longer wondering place to place as a drifter.   Using the window of time where the other members are off to their shenanigans, leaving Walter alone as the only defence against any intruders, whose intrusion gives amply reasons for Walter to have a 'reliable' source of victims. The circumstances used excuses his murders. Although customers who seek the Agency's services are not safe from Walter either.

-This is another detail added to the list of plot holes.

 But now that Walter is working in close proximity to other people. It forces him to be careful and take precautions in his 'hobby' to avoid suspicions from Toki and Onri. And here. Right here, is where the issues I've pointed out earlier, with yet another one added – to all come crash on me without the option to ignore them anymore.

-Plot holes and Issues-

Let's address the chief problem that made me reevaluate Walter's entire character, whose wrinkles I have brushed aside up to this point - How can Walter hide his killings, especially after he gained employment at the Agency, from the others?

This problem came about with the clashing of two characters. Of whom in their own stories, would be justifiably ‘invincible’ (in a lack of a better term) by the archetype they are based on, and what they are already capable of besides the plot armour they have as main characters in the story they are in, and the story they belonged to.  Except they aren't in their own separate stories, they are placed together and forced to share a space with the other. Made to interact with each other in one place, one closely shared space at that! While somehow still retain that sense of 'invincibility' as they would in their own narrative.

The two characters I am talking about are Walter, of course, and Onri.

Some contexts to better explain my woes; Onri is a vigilant, cautious-to-the-point-of-paranoia character that can 'sense' evil-intent due to his past experiences before the story of Attraction. Befitting of a lance/anti-hero character from a supernatural themed young adult novel/story.

 Whereas Walter is a Serial/Spree killer who just gets away with sloppy murders since no one can expect that of him, and because he IS supposed to get away with it. He is that sort of serial killer character in a villain protagonist, power-fantasy story, or in a better fitting genre for the type of character I based Walter on; a joke character of sorts whose 'unusual antics' in the background brings a morbid tone to an otherwise light-hearted story - A story like Attraction.

 Putting these two together does not make sense, and its the first major roadblock I have to actually deal with, since it's almost an act of character assassination of either one or both of them if I chose to ignore it anymore.

 There is the other issue I have already outlined, and will bring up here as well;  - There is the change in Walter’s ‘stomping ground’, from major accident sites to a single building – which does technically make Walter closer to a serial killer than a spree killer, if badly shoehorned in.  - That and the inconsistency in Walter’s methodology, changing from targeting injured people to anyone whose unfortunate to meet him alone. -And why Walter would put himself in a situation where he has to be careful and cautious, when he has been reckless and careless before he gain employment in the story proper. 

  Then there is the issue of Walter’s character - What is his motivation in all of this, and why is he doing any of the things he did. What is Walter besides the actions and choices he committed? Is he just a reckless, self-absorbed sociopath who just happens to get away with his killings due to the recklessness of others? Or are there actual reasons that pushed him into the things he did? All the focus on his character has been placed on his actions and there was barely any internal thought or agency in the shell of the character he is.

I couldn't ignore these existing problems. And felt unsatisfied with Walter’s character, but also not wanting to scrap him altogether since his concept is one that I wanted to implement and explore in Attraction. So, I ended up putting Walter back to the drafting table to smooth out these issues and try to make sense of his character as a whole.

-Walter's Second Outing-

And so. The second iteration of Walter came about. Who is much closer to his original iteration, but details of the first version more fleshed out and eventually expands to his final character.

 Walter is still a serial/spree killer, this time leaning to the latter, not that it makes what he did any better. He still ended up in accidents where the public witness Appraisal (aka, Walter’s) murders, one of which - a train derailment, was the debut of his killings to public attention, using the same methods mentioned already.

This little detail, coupled with two other details added and emphasized in this second attempt, *kind of changes the context of events in the first version.

 -  One. It’s revealed that Appraisal’s victims would die regardless if Walter had decided to kill them, let alone survive long enough for rescue.

 - Two. Walter was seen by survivors who are spared from his spree, trying to resuscitate a dying man. But in his panic and the situation they are in, Walter exerted too much force and ended up caving his hand into their chest.

 These two details the seemed unrelating to the issues I’m trying to fix, ended up helping me form a proper impression of Walter's character- From a morally dubious, and reckless spree/serial killer with no insight to their actions, to a more morally dubious, reckless, but now an internally still morally and ethically wrong individual where some traits of Walter’s personality can be inferred.

 The plot holes in the first version still exist, as well as other questions from this new draft;  - For one, I have not tackled the origin of Walter’s methodology. Not that he needs it, just for my own satisfaction and having an explanation handy when asked.  - And if I am going to explain the way he kills people. (Christ, this is grim...) I also want a reason for how he chooses his victims.

- From the added details; Why did Walter help someone when he began his spree? The man he tried to save still died, but it seemed accidental. And how it spurred into a string of murders. - How can Walter tell the people he chose as victims will die regardless? If my intention for his character is to be a mundane but still dangerous murderer in a story with supernatural and fantastical elements. It’s odd how Walter can ‘just tell’.

 These are trivial questions I could leave blank, adding a little mystique to Walter. But those questions achieved the effects that I wanted for others... to me. I also want to know why, and it feels inconclusive to not answer them.  

 So, I answered them. In doing so, it pushed me to give more thoughts into Walter's character and see him more... personable, helping me with his third, and final character iteration. *Final, as aside from some tweaking of his original concept, there are less changes as they are details meant to provide context to his existing character than change him anymore.

  So, here is the final, and approved version of Walter, or Waltic Onsur.

-Third Time's the Charm-

A little side tangent

First, let me talk about something else, a concept -

We are born in a big world, no secrets in that. And of course we are surrounded by people, be they family, caretakers or just people who come and go in our lives.   Naturally as we grow, we end up picking up stuff from the people around us. Like languages, and the ways we communicate with other people through speech or gestures and actions that are near-universal or just so slightly different. We learn to speak, to write, to read, all things taught to help better communicate with others, and form a sense of community.   Not the very least, it also helps us understand the world around us by associating certain things; objects, ideals and beliefs, concepts and emotions, identity of people and ourselves through labels and names, that may differ from one another but still meant to help identify some 'thing'. and to easily exposite it to others. Things like these that are ingrained into our society that its odd to think of one which does not adhere to this system. So what happens if that is the case? What if someone is born without the aid and influence of our societal systems?  It is not an unheard question; after all, there are different languages developed with different labels for the same thing. But this is a result of people distilling centuries of efforts to achieve, and a result of community and cooperations.   But what if it’s just one person?  Someone who can think and breath, but does not know what thinking or breathing is? Someone that forms their own systems to make sense of their surroundings - how different would it be from our own?  I have explored this concept before, and I am reusing this concept for Walter, this time focusing on a different aspect, the morality. What happens when someone's moral standards do not align with those of society’s? And in Walter's case, having his morals and ethical standards distorted from what is expected of a normal person. This is all a prelude to Walter’s character in the story, which will be reveal after I exposition dump his backstory first. That's right, he has a backstory now! But don’t worry, I’ll keep it as brief as I can,

-Walter’s Backstory-

Walter was raised in a cabin in a clearing within a dense forest. With only one other person, a woman who Walter realized was mute long after he integrated into society. After he left the cabin, and the woman.  Alone with nothing to do. The woman made no more effort than the bare minimum to keep herself and Walter alive; that is except for one task which she shows a level of competence - keep Walter away from the forest, the only thing keeping Walter isolated in the space around the cabin and from anything outside of it. Almost as if she materialized right behind Walter to drag him back to the cabin for so much as grazing the shade casted by the foliage above.

 There was nothing in the cabin but a few pieces of bolted in furniture; no books, toys, even the clothes they wore are constantly mended and repurposed to suit the elements. The woman herself is preoccupied with a strange task; sitting in the dinning room and staring out the window, leaving the very neglected child with no form of stimulants.  This, and Walter’s lack of understanding of his situation, his bliss for things that should be taught and introduced to him much younger ago,  leaves Walter much more isolated... if he knows that was a feeling he felt, that and the perpetual sense of dullness, and emptiness.  So it would not have been a stretch for Walter to latch onto the first physical stimuli that came his way. Developing a ‘fascination’ towards the one thing that broke the monotony of his life so far. If only it was something innocuous – It all began when Walter found the body of an animal near the cabin.  Not knowing the horridness Walter would learn long after the act was committed; manhandling the body like a puppet before Walter is intrigued how the weight of the body moves. Prompting him to mess with the bloated torso until it... burst.  And rather than be bothered by the putrid viscera that covered him, Walter marvelled at the sudden shift of weight in the body, its remains still held standing by his hand, as he stood fascinated of the immediate change and the sudden ‘lightness’ of the body. Never mind the awful smell and the gore he released.

 It took a hold of Walter’s mind as the only thing that kept him from resigning to his dull life, lingering long after the woman found and dragged Walter back into the cabin. Long after Walter grew well into his adulthood still living in the cabin; long after the woman grew sick, needing Walter to care for her.  But by then, nothing is stopping Walter beyond the conditioning from years of voiceless discipline. Growing bolder and bolder to take further distance pass the boundaries set. The woman unable to restrain him not long after her sickness took a hold of her, allowing Walter a sense of freedom as she laid bedridden.  It’s only when she broke apart – in the midst of being carried by Walter. Who stood befuddled as his mind can only grasp the familiar feeling from what had happened, still holding to the woman that felt so ‘light’, consumed by that feeling of intrigue for his ‘fascination’ as it stirs awake. And after indulging in his revitalized interest,

 Walter left the cabin.  Finally able to go into the forest and wondered, and wondered, and wondered. Until he stumbled onto a hard path, where he wonders on aimlessly along while large ‘things’ zipped pass him... where he was found by a stranger who took the disoriented young man under his care, and out of the sympathy for the young man, helped him integrate to society and introduced things he was undeservedly denied, for reasons he will never know. Not that he cared. 

It was a chance for a normal life he was kept unaware of, and he is forever grateful of the stranger. Taking their name - Walter, as his own in gratitude and appreciation for their kindness to take him in, helping him into a world larger than the clearing in the forest Walter would’ve been trapped in forever; and who, privy to Walter’s ‘fascination’, tried to offer a healthy outlet for his obsession.   A mortician by trade, the man offered Walter an job as his assistant, by extention, a respectable way for Walter to indulge his obsession in a controlled environment. Going as far as to put Walter through the necessary courses, and much more when Walter’s interest branched to medicine and biology. Becoming an Emergency Responder, wanting to help others just like how he helped Walter.

  It’s a shame that the accident happened then.   Trapped inside a train compartment with people badly injured from the initial crash and subsequent tumble, with oxygen cut off in the crumbled cabin. In the stress of the situation, Walter tried to help anyone he can. It is his job; it is what normal people do.  Why did it had to go so wrong?   Shellshocked and dazed, his hand wafting in the open cavity of a man, who for a moment ago was convulsing erratically as Walter tried to perform CPR. In the midst of screams and wail, the snapping wires and the horrid groans of the train, Walter props the man up, the immediate ‘lightness’ he felt as the man’s body spilt out of the cavity he created...  

  Walter moved onto other people, needing to help those that may need his help, even if it is small comfort when Walter finds them too far gone to be helped, a number only growing as time and air depletes.  Walter can only sit the people in a comfortable position, hoping they can be found easier by rescue. All the while his mind retreats into itself, buckling under the situation while the sensation of the man he tried to save earlier anchored him to reality – just enough for Walter to hear the insult and curses of those unaccepting of Walter’s helplessness.  Just enough to feel his arm digging into a wet chasm as the insults ceased, feeling a calmness as he felt the lightness of their bodies in his arms, so, so soothing... But no... some do not deserve to feel that ‘lightness’. And pettily, in his most disconnected mind, he goes through the process again to remove their ‘lightness’, almost giddily so as Walter’s careful precision grew into a childish frenzy, having never felt so close to his ‘fascination’ to feel this new stimulation on his arm and body...

 Only a few people survived the train derailment, and fewer who survived the massacre that took place. Recalling only one thing in the delirium and anxiety of the event, A pinprick shine of an eye amidst an upward splatter of blood. And when the uproar of the event subsided into debates of the event, they named the perpetrator – Appraisal.

 This is a complicated origin for a character who would remain in the background for some time, and won't be explored until much later on in brief glimpses and hearsay. But I am rather happy that it is.  Walter is meant to be an uncomfortably normal character who is more unusual/unsettling that the other characters that stand beside him. Juxtaposing his character of an unassuming character who can easily blend in a crowd, who is more defined in character than his appearance suggested. Like real people you wouldn’t separate from the background, who still has a life that they lead up to this point, a life that can’t be judge from just one impression and can’t be put to one extreme on a scale.

 As unnecessarily messed up as some of the details are, I rather like how far I can come up in the fiction I create. And Walter did have some good moments here and there... When he did cut ties with the mortician, to avoid associating them with his reckless actions. When Walter knew that what he did was deplorable and reprehensive, but he chose not to report himself – fearing the feeling of being restrained and trapped experienced in his lost youth, and by actions Walter performed in an emotionally blind state in a stressful situation, one in the many that followed. All punctuated by the same gruesome end when Walter surrenders to his ‘fascination’, the one reliable thing that kept him through everything, after losing everything because of it...  This is a main motif with my characters, and Walter just fits snug there alongside his main cast members, all of whom exploring the different responses to the realization of their flaw. Like Toki who tries to rein in her dismissal of others but her pursuit of excitement; Onri who awaredly denies his past and all things associated with them even if he can never seperate from them, and Walter, who lives with it -  indulging when the opportunity presents itself, otherwise, he is as normal as someone can be.  There is guilt in Walter and some desire for punishment as he was taught when someone does a bad thing. He wouldn’t announce his crimes unprompted, but he will confess when asked; as he did when Onri asked Walter in his own investigation of the Appraisal killings, when it was assumed that Appraisal is a supernatural entity.  And that is a fun addition to Walter’s character, not only tying him to a character before their in-story meeting, but offers a fun dynamic, and an interesting question – If Onri knew that Walter is Appraisal, why did Onri not report Walter, and later on hired him as an employee?

 It asks questions about Onri who is already shrouded in mystery, and brings an interesting premise between them, with Walter aware of, at least some of Onri’s past while Onri is aware of Walter’s deeds. And in general, I just like Walter and the moral dilemma he is. He is by no means a good person; he is a monster as his last name alludes to, someone who excuses their killings on a technicality that the people they target will die anyways, and scathes by incarceration and justice through luck.  But after all the shat Walter’s been through and the circumstances that created him, there is some pity earned for him... And maybe, in a better environment with people just as terrible and eccentric as him, maybe Walter can find a compromise with his ‘fascination’.

 If this long rant hasn’t made it obvious enough, Walter is a comfort character of mine. For how fun it was to finally conclude on what kind of a person he is, and for how fascinating Walter has become from a caricature that lacked an internal agency.

 It’s fun to make sense of him, and it’s fun in the many ways that can be read about him, conveniently so; his inability to not physically hurt himself ironically contrasting the inhuman effort he takes to keep his sanity, his unassuming design that reflects the complexity of a real person while hiding his extremes... it’s all so fascinating the more thoughts I give to Walter’s character.

  And having a record of these changes to look back on, its nice to see Walter's evolution from his initial conceptualization. 

-Closing thoughts-

This has been an exhaustingly long tangent about a character who has yet to appear in a story, yet to be made. Trying to move from the stagnation and the perfectionist attitude to want to do better, if the story of Attraction had not been a (endearing) concept dump for different characters ideas and story plots, I doubt I would have stuck to it as long as I had with any other stories I came up with, let alone still having that passion and motivation to keep working on the different elements that made it so.  Hopefully, and I do mean this, I can showcase the story of Attraction, its story and characters (Walter included) in a better medium than long diatribes.  And thank you, for making it to the end,

Walter Onsur - Reference Sheet