Taz
birthday: 10/23/2020
Appearance
Standing at 4 feet tall, Taz is tall for a skykid. Their long, flowing hair constantly covers the large crystal scar on the left side of their face. Though it's not visible at a glance, their mask is broken, stopping right where their scar begins. Their remaining eye, as well as their core, shine orange. Their broken hermit horn appears on their left side instead of their right.
Taz carries a fireworks staff, with their Season of Prophecy necklace wound around the top.
Abilities
Taz has combined their inner light with orange elemental light, making any light they give off appear orange in color. This also gives them the ability to summon and manipulate flame with far more skill than any skykid. This doesn't do them much good against other skykids, but it makes them particularly adept at healing. They can also hold their own against various dark creatures.
By making use of their orange light abilities, Taz has improved upon an old clay-based healing technique. When light isn't enough to close a wound, they can patch it with clay and harden it by adding heat. The clay won't change to match the skykid's skintone, so Taz tries to match it as best they can. If the situation is dire, though, they'll just have to live with the scars.
Using orange light, Taz can connect two inner flames to each other, creating what's known as an orange light link. During the ancestor war, these links were forged between the Wasteland Elder and their soldiers to improve battlefield communication and to give soldiers an added layer of protection.
Taz also uses orange light to dance with fire like a ribbon, and to make bombs.
Personality
Taz's personality changes as the story goes, as many of their actions are a result of trauma.
Relationships
Acheron: the besties. the evers. Taz and Acheron are so so close. They love each other and they trust each other and they hold each other when their wounds ache too much to bear alone.
Celadon: Also very close. Taz took care of Celadon when they were younger, and now Cel helps Taz out when they need it. They’re very gentle, they never scold Taz when they get into trouble, they only quietly carry them to safety. When not in serious situations, these two have a snappy back-and-forth. They’re siblings, your honor.
Suvoko: Taz got a lot from Suvoko. They were kind and laid back, and they looked after their moths. Taz misses them a lot.
Saga: Oh Saga. Taz doesn’t know how to feel about Saga. The two were inseparable for a while. Saga was there through their darkness sickness. But they had become overbearing, so focused on helping that they wouldn’t listen. Both parties were somewhat at fault for this relationship falling apart. It would hurt so much to see Saga again, but Taz can’t bring themselves to hate them.
Eridor: Deep, unbridled terror.
Trick: Saved Taz's life once. For a long time they were one of the few people Taz trusted, even if it was only a little. They don't see each other much, but Taz is happier each time they do. Trick belongs to @csabyssallight.
Alisi: Taz's mentor. The two of them met during the Season of Revival, when Alisi saw Taz struggling with light poisoning and immediately jumped in to try and help them. They specialize in turning colored light into shapes (mostly rings, but they can do other shapes). It's under Alisi's wing that Taz gets to act like a kid again. Alisi completes Taz's broken horn with light crystal to lessen their symptoms, and eventually builds them a prosthetic hand after they lost it defending Acheron. Alisi belongs to @csabyssallight.
History
note: Taz goes by many names over the course of their life. They are only referred to as Taz in this section to avoid confusion.
Taz was born October 23rd, 2020, during the Season of Prophecy, alongside their twin Celadon. Taz hit the ground right before midnight, which is why the two have different birthdays. Once they reached Dawn's temple, they were given the name Oleniz. They met their mentor, Suvoko, not long after.
Taz spent most of the Season of Prophecy in the cave itself, taking care of their sibling (see Celadon's page for details). They looked up to all the prophets, but were especially enamoured by the Prophet of Fire and the element they wielded. They started training under the prophet.
By the time the Season of Dreams was underway, Celadon was (mostly) back on their feet. Taz, Celadon, and Suvoko threw themselves into the season. At this point Taz was already skilled with fire manipulation, and they would perform in the Village of Dreams under the name Torchlight, dancing with ribbons of flame.
About midway through the Season of Dreams, Suvoko disappeared. Coping with the loss of their mentor, Taz threw themselves into performing, trying to mold themselves into someone else, someone who wasn't hurt. They changed their name to Aza. Though they'd only had minimal contact with Suvoko's siblings, they took care to avoid them.
It was during this time of instability that they met Saga. Saga was looking for a healer to accompany them in Eden, and they had been impressed by Taz's control over fire. Taz only went to Eden occasionally, but they were intrigued by Saga. The skykid could see traces of light, and they were trying to find light on the mountain. What kind of light didn't matter, it could be murals, or trapped light creatures, or maybe even spirits. It didn't matter, so long as there was something still up there, Saga wanted to find it. They needed Taz to be able to help any lost skykids, who they frequently found while conducting their search. The two quickly become close.
A few weeks into the Season of Assembly, there’s an incident in Eden. While exploring a high-wind area, Taz slips and falls, hitting a large patch of corrupted crystal on the way down. They lose their left eye and sustain significant damage to their face and shoulder. While Saga is trying to get them both off the mountain, Taz begins to develop darkness sickness.
Their injuries scar over with crystal (similar to Wounded Warrior). Taz starts wearing a bandana over their scar, as they can’t manifest light projections over the damaged area. But darkness sickness is the larger problem: Taz’s wounded light couldn’t keep dark plants from growing. Even spending time in prairie couldn’t prevent flareups, which rendered them immobile and temporarily blinded them. Taz gets more and more frustrated and ashamed with how they’re living. A rift starts to grow between them and Saga.
Eventually, Taz decides they’ve had enough. They flood their core with orange light until it changes, hoping that the fire will be able to keep the dark plants at bay. This plan works, and with their newfound freedom, Taz runs away to the outer wasteland, where they live alone until the Season of Performance. With this change comes a new name: Zil.
As Zil, Taz roams the wasteland, helping fellow skykids wherever they can. During this time they encounter a skykid claiming to be a healer named Eridor. At this point Taz had given up on most healers, but Eridor was very convincing, and Taz agreed to let them try to help. Taz did not realize that Eridor's version of helping was drugging them with red light and cutting them open, and by the time they did it was too late to stop anything. However, due to Taz's unique light, their body rejected the red light faster than the average skykid and they were able to escape. A mysterious figure (Trick, mentioned in relationships) found them stumbling through the desert and brought them to a safe place to recover.
It is in Taz's nature to run, and run they did. They buried themselves deep in the wasteland, where hardly any skykids flew. They changed their name yet again to Taz. The trust that Eridor had taken advantage of was gone, replaced by paranoia and hostility. Taz started carrying darkstone knives, which they would use to threaten anyone who got too close.
Midway through the Season of Performance, Taz meets a wild skykid. Their eyes are like a krills, and they don’t respond to anything Taz says, but Taz keeps trying to help them. Eventually, the skykid comes back to themselves. They give their name as Acheron. They were hit by a shard falling from the sky, and the shard gave them the memories of a krill. They needed help. Taz was determined to help them. At first, they didn’t notice themselves starting to care again, but once they did they found that they didn’t want to stop.
Gallery
Timeline
note: the hermit horns are incorrect in most of these images. canonically their intact horn is on the right side
Art
by @csabyssallight on tumblr
by @csabyssallight on tumblr
by @csabyssallight on tumblr
by @dreamybottles on tumblr