Mother (The Story So Far...)

Mother
Species:	Houseworlder
Job:	Spirekeeper
Affiliated with:	Faction Paradox, Family of the Shadow Spire
Place of origin:	The Homeworld
First appearance:	The Story So Far...
Appearances:	PROSE: Going Once, Going Twice

Mother was one of the two the Spirekeepers of the Shadow Spire, the other being Father. The two were members of Faction Paradox.

Biography

Early exploits

Because her biodata had been corrupted by the Shadow Spire itself, Mother could only dimly remember her initiation into Faction Paradox and the time she had spent in the Eleven-Day Empire, let alone her identity from prior to joining the Faction. As her ceremonial mask, Mother adopted the "weather-beaten" skull of a Haast's eagle. (PROSE: Going Once, Going Twice)

Guardians of Auteur

Mother and Father were assigned to the Shadow Spire to watch over Godfather Auteur, an insane, heretical member of the Faction whom the higher-ups had decided to imprison in the Spire. However, the Spire itself "leaked into their ears and rotted the wet and pink inside them", dissolving their bodies and histories until they were nearly non-physical and had all but lost their sense of self. The two became incarnations of the orthodox Faction Paradox ideal, unyieldingly loyal to the Grandfather's dictates without any deeper thought. (PROSE: Going Once, Going Twice)

The Family of the Shadow Spire

Mother and Father once called upon a loa to show them Faction Paradox survivors following Lolita's attack on the Eleven-Day Empire. They were shown Mathara's invasion of the corrupted War Queen's sheath echo of the Homeworld and survivors huddling around campfires on long-dead Homeworlds including Ardethe, New Alexandria, and an ancient Wonderland. When they asked to see survivors of other Homeworld deaths they were shown some Homeworlder survivors falling from a Warring Heaven, an Emperor in an "exile's century" and his Magistrate toying with his rosette. Finally they were shown one more Faction survivor, the new Grandfather.

Mother and Father then decided to open the Spire to all the living Faction members they had been shown. They then asked the loa to show the location of a weapon, to which it gave a flash of a green snake writhing through history before vanishing. (PROSE: The Story So Far...) This weapon was Apep, an insane creation of the Great Houses corrupted by the Osirians. With Auteur's help, they united the survivors into a structured Faction cell, the Family of the Shadow Spire. They sent a battalion of skulltroopers, including Cousin Intrepid, to the Fields of Cratosi, to recover the Sarcophagus in which Apep was imprisoned, only for the Houses to get involved and all the soldiers to be frozen in Time. Deeming them "failures", Mother and Father had no interest in rescuing the frozen skulltroopers, and made new arrangements to acquire Apep. (PROSE: Going Once, Going Twice)

Death

After the sarcophagus was brought back to the Shadow Spire, Auteur betrayed Mother and Father, ordering the loas to attack them. As the two were mauled to death by the temporal beings, Auteur used his own shadow-skin to absorb their biodata to strengthen himself. In his last few moments, Father told Mother that he loved her. She only had the time to say "Shut up" before ceasing to exist completely. (PROSE: Going Once, Going Twice)

Behind the scenes

Mother and Father were additionally mentioned in the short story Birthdays are Made for Memories which is not considered valid by this wikia.