I frickin love Steve. He is the absolute best. And I love that he and Mattholomule are brothers, too! Steve deserves the world, he deserves happiness, I feel so bad for his therapist...
...Anyway, enjoy!
Steve Norman Redshirt was born on the 43rd of Scabruary, 39 A.B. (Anno Belosi), to parents Don and Ramela Redshirt. By all accounts, his was a happy childhood, with good parents, a stable home (despite his mom's untimely death by Uncommon Mold), and a sweet little half-brother, Mattholomule, born nine years after him. His first memory is of himself bouncing up and down in his crabcrib, then jumping so high he went over the retaining bar and fell on the floor. Needless to say, he did not remember much after that.
From a very young age, Steve's dream was to join the Emperor's Coven and become a Coven Scout. He loved their groovy outfits, flashy magic, and single-minded devotion to the Emperor. He liked the Emperor. The Emperor seemed like a chill dude. He wanted to become friends with him. That was probably a pipe dream, but hey, a witch can dream if he wants.
Steve was also enthralled by magitek, like the stuff Blight Industries produced. He found it fascinating the way spells could interface with seemingly-normal items to produce abnormal ones, and the way some objects could channel magic in odd ways to produce even more complicated effects. He liked making at-home smoke bombs and stuff like that. Steve used them once while playing Covens and Wilds with his neighbor friend Yougene and got in trouble for triggering a traumatic war flashback.
He was enrolled in the Glandus Primary Construction track starting at age seven. Steve was generally a good student, although he did like to goof off and treat other students nicely from time to time. He made a couple of frenemies, namely Derek and Nymian. He started dating the latter when he was thirteen but had to break it off once he entered the Emperor's Coven.
Steve liked Glandus. Sure, the environment was hostile and not conducive to learning, but wasn't that what school was all about? … Yeah, yeah, now Steve's aware that he might have learned more and done better in school if he enjoyed it, but what's done is done.
One thing he regrets is that he wasn't able to multi-track. Steve had tried to ask his parents if he could at least try out the Oracle track for a little while, but they'd said no. His dad had told him, "If the Construction coven is generic enough for us Redshirts, it's generic enough for you, too." So alas, all he ever learned how to do was make stuff. Which was exactly what he wanted to do in the first place, but oh well.
Steve had gotten a letter from his brother about three days ago. Since Hexside had started its new multi-track policy, Mattholomule had decided to dual-track in Construction and Illusion. Steve was definitely happy for him and not the least bit upset that his brother had gotten an opportunity that he hadn't. No siree. That is not like Steve in the least.
Despite his apathy for the education system, he did well in school, well enough to be scouted for the Emperor's Coven. After passing the tryouts at age 14, Steve and his sort-of-friend Rieman were admitted to Coven Boot Camp as recruits.
It wasn't much fun, although he loved it at the time. It was days of hard labor, weaponized magic training, crash courses in all the main covens's magic systems, and threatening spiky obstacle courses. He made a few new frenemies: Severine, Ellison, Mikeiplier. He got a couple nasty scars. His favorite is the one on his right shoulder that he got during the Mountain Ordeal. Some demon had tried to bite his juicy deltoid meat and gotten a hex to the face for its trouble.
Upon graduating basic training and his full admission into the Coven, Steve had to give up his palisman. He had carved it himself when he was thirteen. His stepmom, Peggy, paid for the palistrom wood out of her own pocket, as part of a needless ploy to gain his affection. (He loved her anyway; what was the need?) His palisman's name was Kevin, and he took the form of a zebra. He was sad that he had to give Kevin up to the Emperor, but, as he was told, it was for the good of the Isles that he shun the wild magic of the palismen. Ah well.
Despite all the physical and mental trauma (he started seeing the Boiling Isles's only and very overworked therapist some four years ago), Steve enjoyed his job. In part, it was because of the fun (and constantly rotating) cast of characters that composed his coworkers. In part, it was the relative freedom that being in the Emperor's Coven provided. He could do whatever experimentation with magic he wanted, so long as it was permissible. Plus, he got plenty of scrip, was legally constituted as an adult, and could therefore buy whatever he wanted. He bought and souped up the moterrorbike as a one-year-closer-to-death-day present for himself, and his parents didn't even complain that much!
Mostly, though, Steve enjoyed his commanding officer, Lilith Clawthorne. He had a huge crush on her, he admits. One time two years back, he was raiding an illegal library which had a seemingly infinite number of shelves and was only accessible by walking backwards into a certain section of scrub brush. (This mission was headed by the captain, not Lilith. Lilith will come into the story in a little while.) While there, Steve found a thin hardcover book from the human realm entitled "Our First Year: A Scrapbook for Your Precious Journey into Married Life". The title intrigued him - he suspected that married life was some manner of deep-cover espionage - so he smuggled it home.
As it turns out, married life is much more pleasant than is espionage (although Steve's still not convinced marriage isn't a form of espionage). Several attempts at reverse psychology later, Steve had successfully tricked Lilith into having said wedding vows with him. The marriage certificate was a little harder to figure out. Steve photocopied the one taped into the book, whited out the signatures and names, and slipped it into Kikimora's pile of paperwork when she wasn't looking.
Needless to say, the wedding night did not go well.
As many positives as there were to Coven Scout life, there were many negatives. Steve disliked the long hours, separation from his family (he and everybody else got one day off a year), and unkind superiors. He loved fighting for the good of his community, but at times, he wondered if the community was one worth fighting for.
Severine was the first in his graduating class to imply treason. She kept complaining about the conditions and how much better the Tiny Cat Coven was, although Steve thinks she was biased. One day, during her weekly rant, she said, "Nine covens and no magic? Why not no covens and nine magic?" Ellison pointed out how close the statement was to wild witch propaganda. That shut Severine right up.
Still, Steve couldn't get the idea of no covens and nine magic out of his head. And the rumors of multi-track students at Hexside only inflamed the itch that hadn't been scratched since his school days. He wanted more magic to mess with, dangit! Plus, he missed Kevin. He still wonders whatever happened to his little zebra fella.
On turning twenty-one a few days ago, Steve went out drinking for the… well, he hesitates to say the first time? Being a Coven Scout effectively means you can have alcohol even if you're under twenty-one for witches and bipedal demons or fifteen for other demons. After all, donning the mask makes you an adult, so they say. Steve sometimes wishes he had more time to be a kid.
Anyway, Steve legally went out drinking with his friends for the first time. That's another perk of wearing the white-and-gold: you're the upholders of the law, so what you do is pretty much always legal. Ramussen was talking about that that night. They said, "Isn't it great that we won't get in trouble for any laws we break, not counting treason?" And Steve wondered why treason was the sole exception to the law that must always be upheld, and why the personifications of the law were allowed to do things contrary to its nature, but because he was drunk off his behind, what he said was something more like "yeahuh" and then the sound of somebody hitting the floor with his face.
Not long after, he had a brief run-in with the Golden Guard (who's surprisingly scrawny without the cloak!) which set him to wondering if the Emperor's Coven had been good for him, and for Steve himself by extension.
You know the rest. Steve accompanied King on his vision quest, defected to the rebels, and is now ready to save the Isles in two days time! His story, the story of a lone young Redshirt who dared to do the right thing, will undoubtedly go down in history!
Luz clapped politely. King couldn't clap on account of having fallen asleep snuggled in Luz's lap. "That was a wonderful life story!" she told Steve. "Amusing, with plenty of catharsis at the end to seal your character arc! Just one question, though."
"Ask away," Steve said.
"Why'd you narrate it in third person?"
He shrugged. "Steve works in mysterious ways."