Character

came to a bit of a realization today.

last month i mentioned how i was going to make a female main character who wasn't just a damsel in distress? yes? well, over the past 20+ days I've been thinking, and thinking, and thinking about this story to the point where it has kind of almost taken over my life! (not to be dramatic or anything O.o)

No, but seriously, this thing has become about so much more than just one girl. for starters, there's a power-hungry supercomputer, a soulful Head of Security (aka torture), a handful of corrupt military men (and women), a newly recruited young man in way over his head, a notorious assassin in a ginger cat suit, a society caught in a struggle to survive in a slow threat to collapse, a young woman who wants to save it, and a young man who just wants to play the piano....

but anyway. my realization. i was sitting in my college's campus center, looking out the window, half-watching the snow fall and blow around, and half-spacing out, and this idea just kind of crept up on me.... first i was telling myself (again) how i wanted to make this story seem real (even if it does take place 100 yrs or so in the future and under a slightly different society), i wanted the characters to seem real, ya know? like, memorable. but then this time i thought: what makes a good character memorable? what is it about those guys that, even if you've seen the movie/read the book a MILLION times you still cry and cry and cry? what is it about them that breaks your heart?

and then i got it: they're human. imperfect. emotional. irrational. in other words, they are us. they're like us. we cry because we empathize with them. our hearts break with theirs. so, to make my story crazy awesome amazing i don't just need to think up characters--pawns that i can shuffle and ideas i can rearrange--but i need to create humans. i have to think up legitimate people with legitimate flaws!

(laugh if you will if this seems obvious to you, but i thought it twas a fantabulous epiphany. so there! XP)