How Zushakon Go Wrong

 

"Air" by art-vander (resized) is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 3.0

Varied Echoes

Zushakon can be many fine things: fun and free, insightful and thoughtful, experimental and daring, communal and friendly. But outside of their original aeon, they can become very different than they were among their kin. Some live as mysterious wanderers, oracles, and spies while others twist into dangerous foes, mad spectres, and whispering tormentors.

Common Complications

Encountering Society

Their troubles typically begin when they struggle to connect. Unfamiliar cultures can stymie them, at least at first. Their intangible natural forms are easily misinterpreted or missed, which often makes matters worse. Going unseen may allow them to learn their way around, but the longer they're on the outside, the more difficult it can be to find a way in or a good place to fit.

Finding Flesh

To ease the process, the Zushakon have found new ways to take on bodies. They aren't born into them like they were before, however. Those who joined the Carcosans can have new bodies engineered and aged up for them. Known colloquially as Masks, these physical vessels are made into a wide variety of species and have no native souls of their own. This is a welcome benefit.

Others aren't so fortunate. They can inhabit the bodies of the recently deceased, but those forms rot away and don't make for good first impressions. They can also possess living bodies that don't have souls anymore. Various circumstances can damage the soul/body connection: comas, magic, psychic assaults. If all else fails, desperate Zushakon might learn to chip away at a soul until they can move in - and the worst of them come to enjoy their victims' slow, agonizing exits.

The Burden of Memory

The Zushakon no longer lose their memories when they take on flesh; they know who they are the whole time. This can be as much a boon as a curse. They can move far away and try to avoid being recognized in stolen bodies. They're good at escaping and starting over, and few can relish a new life as much as they do. Exploring new aeons with ancient eyes can be exhilarating.

But they have no break from the weight of the ages, and they bear more ages than most. Bodies inevitably fail, but their souls survive most things, and that can become too much. Boredom is a terrible bane, as is life without meaning. A Zushakon needs a purpose that will last a while - not just a job or a relationship, but a deeper reason for being on a longer scale.

Deeply Discordant Notes

Unfulfilled Social Needs

Another vital element of Zushakon's existence is community. In their original aeon, they were rarely alone - even at the end - and never for long. The Survivors may have escaped solo but they didn't want to stay that way. They need to experience many faces and voices, and often. Connecting to too few puts too much on their new loved ones, who offer too little in return. For this reason, they seek larger groups and population centers and do better near them.

Prolonged isolation is bad for most creatures in most aeons but is particularly poisonous to Zushakon. Loneliness intensifies boredom and aimlessness a thousandfold. Whether they struggle to find populations or are shunned within them doesn't make much difference. Isolation keeps them from understanding and embracing new places and people. Their empathetic and moral awareness begin to curdle, making them more bizarre and frightening when others finally do appear. The downward spiral that can result may drag everyone nearby into the void with them.

In despair and desperation for companionship, Zushakon are also vulnerable to whomever they encounter. As thirsty wanderers in the desert of eternity, the first people who don't shun them can feel like an oasis. If new companions embrace them, Zushakon are likely to forgive their flaws and schemes. This can leave them in the thrall of those they would have avoided otherwise. Their saviors may be able to ask them to do anything to anyone else, and a Zushakon with no other connections may see no reason to refuse. They will put up with a lot of poor treatment to avoid being forlorn again. They may go out of their way to protect new friends, whether or not they ask and even if they're horrified by the results.

A Loathing for Life

By this point, it should be easy to see how some Zushakon develop a disturbing disregard for life. This can come from a lack of understanding rather than malice. Since other beings have souls, why should it matter if - or how - their bodies suffer and die? Some expect other beings to reincarnate like they did; others view souls as the only worthwhile parts of a person. One Zushakon may decimate the living because they're inconvenient and worthless; another may believe they're liberating others from the miseries and illusions of life.

Zushakon who loathe life and the living are the most callous and cruel, and their crimes can become monumental. It's easy for an unlucky, lonely Zushakon to hate an alien aeon and everything in it. Some act as judges and executioners carrying out sentences on unworthy aeons or species. Others develop twisted games for their own amusement. It isn't easy to pass the time when you last for aeons, after all. A few may be trying to end their own existences, heedless of who else they take with them.

Those who follow someone else's orders can at least trick themselves into believing they aren't responsible for the terrible things they do, or that the atrocities they carry out are nothing compared to what they gain. As chilling as that can be, woe to those who encounter the machinations of Zushakon who no longer care about anything! For they may seek to extinguish galaxies, gods, and even the cycle of aeons itself in a bid to end their existence. And with what they know, they may have a chance to succeed.

The fact that few Zushakon have ever embraced nihilism for very long is a mercy and a testament to their strengths.

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