- For the post-scratch version of this character, see the Handmaid.
Damara Megido is the Witch of Time and Aradia's dancestor.
Conflicts within the team provoked by Meenah Peixes ultimately embittered her and turned her against the entire team. She was responsible for initiating the scratch on the Cardinal Movement, rebooting the session.
Etymology
Damara is named after the Damara, a breed of domestic sheep. The name was originally suggested by Beelzebibble for Aradia.
While Damara is the name of a Celtic fertility goddess, the name could also be a play on the Japanese profanity word "だまれ", or "damare", which translates to "shut up", or any rude way of commanding someone to keep their mouth shut. It also alludes to her speaking often rude language, albeit in Japanese.
Biography
Before their Sgrub session, Damara was a member of the Lost Weeaboos, a guild of tree-dwelling troll otakus living in secrecy in the forest. It was here which she met Rufioh Nitram, and the two eventually entered a flushed relationship, one which ended bitterly for Damara when Rufioh ended up cheating on her with Horuss Zahhak. Despite being deeply wounded by this, it wasn't until Sgrub that she performed an acrobatic fucking pirouette off the deep end.
Damara was the Time player of the A1 session, and so her planet in the Medium (which bears a strong resemblance to Aradia's Land of Quartz and Melody) housed the session's scratch construct, the Cardinal Movement. In her efforts to rile up the team, Meenah Peixes took to harassing Damara, particularly on the subject of her former relationship with Rufioh, which ultimately caused Damara to snap. Now feeling thoroughly vengeful, she paralyzed Rufioh from the neck down, causing Horuss to build Rufioh a robotic horse body to compensate; it is also implied by her that she may have killed Horuss at some point. Eventually, she engaged Meenah in a brutal duel, in which she ultimately won and killed Meenah in revenge, this being the cause for Meenah's god tier ascension; it does not appear that Damara was also killed and ascended during this fight, or at least Damara herself would not say if she did.
From here, it is implied she began using her time powers to wreak havoc on the session, appearing at various points to sabotage everyone's efforts. The only time she cooperated with the team was when they needed to initiate the scratch, which she performed gleefully. Before the scratch could take effect, Damara was killed along with the rest of the team by Meenah's bomb, ensuring their survival as ghosts in the Furthest Ring.
In Openbound Part 3, Aranea Serket gives Meenah a biography of Damara's life and role in their session:
- “The Witch of Time was not always the party's 8iggest trou8lemaker. [...] Once she was as meek as can 8e. Hailing from the eastern provinces, she migrated across the seas and settled near the forest concealing Rufioh's guild. The two of them 8ecame quite fond of each other, and shared many interests! He secretly 8egan seeing someone else, 8elieving she knew nothing. 8ut she always suspected his infidelity, and over time grew quite distraught. 8ut her sadness never quite turned to rage and malevolence. Not until you... involved yourself. [...] After we 8egan our game, you quickly determined that winning was going to 8e an uphill 8attle with our team. Everyone was so preoccupied with their interpersonal issues, and no one seemed in any shape to 8e fighting major 8attles. [...] So you did your 8est to rile up the crew any way you could. Appealing to peoples insecurities, 8uried hostilities, 8rewing rivalries... needling anyone you could into confrontation with others. Your theory was that increasing everyone's state of aggression would make them 8etter equipped to play the game. And you were sort of right a8out that! 8ut the Alternians would prove it. Not our group, sadly. The poor girl who took the 8runt of your 8ullying tactics was Damara Megido. You talked up her matesprit's 8etrayal making her feel even more dreadful, while pushing him further into the arms of her rival, until she simply snapped. She attacked him, paralyzing him from the neck down. You finally got the aggressive confrontation you were looking for. Unfortunately, you unleashed something even you weren't prepared for, and you had to deal with her yourself. After a long 8loody duel, she killed you. [...]
Damara has 8een unhinged ever since. 8y increasing her violent tendencies, instead of 8eing an asset in the game, she 8ecame a loose cannon, ar8itrarily showing up at key moments throughout the timeline to sa8otage us. So radical was her shift in personality, I've had a hard time 8elieving your incitement was solely to 8lame. It always seemed like other forces were in play, as if her acts, though apparently haphazard, were in keeping with some inscruta8le agenda. Of course it doesn't help that it's so hard to understand her even on a good day. Strangely, the only time she was eager to help us was when we were preparing to initiate the Scratch. And it's a good thing she was, since I'm not sure anyone else would have had the a8ility to do that kind of damage to the Cardinal Movement and release its energy. It was almost a little eerie how happily she complied with our plan. What did Rufioh say she said? Something a8out how we would all finally get what we deserved... Which at the time, I thought sounded chilling. 8ut there's really two ways of looking at it. One is how the Scratch re8ooted our world into a state of pure chaos, culminating in the annihilation of our universe. 8ut on the other hand, we all got the chance to live out our wildest fantasies as adults on Alternia! At least you and I sure did. And I wouldn't dou8t she feels the same way.”
Damara after initiating the scratch
Ironically, of course, all Damara's Alternian self got out of the reboot was a lifetime of bitter servitude to Doc Scratch and Lord English as the Handmaid, though it is possible that at that point, utterly corrupting troll society would have been something she wanted her future self to do, therefore fitting the description of her "wildest fantasies."
When Meenah was rallying up the ghost army, it was clear that Damara (along with Kurloz, Aranea and other Vriskas besides the main one) were not present. It can be inferred that she chose not to, due to her turmoil with Meenah as well as her dedication to Lord English. Because of her lack of plot relevance, it isn't shown what she's doing during the time of the battle.
Personality and Traits
Damara bears a very strong resemblance to her post-scratch self during her time imprisoned by Doc Scratch - she wears similar if differently colored clothing, has the same bun hairstyle, and uses the same Strife Specibus (either Wand or Needlekind); this is acknowledged in-comic by Andrew Hussie, who remarks that he should never have freed her from Doc Scratch's care and that her teen delinquent behaviour is a product of being raised by “a four foot tall asshole in suspenders, who's kind of like a creepy puppet uncle”, though this was very likely a joke.
Damara peppers her speech with crude, aggressively lascivious remarks at any opportunity, even with Meenah (whom she hates). It is uncertain whether she actually means her remarks as an honest invitation, or if she is simply taking advantage of the language barrier to mess with others without response. Between her ribald remarks, however, lies much fatalism and frustration. According to Aranea, Damara's personality took this drastic shift after repeated bullying from Meenah regarding Rufioh's betrayal, coaxing her from despair to a quiet, unyielding anger. When speaking with the kids, she seemed very kind and spoke in broken english with them. It is unknown whether or not she was just playing them to make them think of her as harmless, though. Damara is shown to have no qualms about locking her former matesprit's lusus in a chest, and it is heavily implied that she used her time abilities to meddle with her teammates in revenge.
Relationships
Rufioh Nitram
Damara was in a relationship with Rufioh until their relationship ended because Rufioh started cheating on her with Horuss without breaking up with Damara. As previously mentioned this event was the target of Meenah's harrasment, which triggered a big change in Damara and she started to distance herself from her former friends. Rufioh does still confide in Damara things about his current relationship that he wouldn't tell others, and she seems to offer advice (albeit biased advice), though she still seems to play cruel pranks on him from time to time.
Meenah Peixes
Meenah, under the flimsy guise of being a "good leader" and "helping her team", heavily bullied and harassed Damara. She specifically targeted Damara's failed relationship with Rufioh, bringing the poor girl even more anger and pain from the almost healing wound. At the same time Meenah was harrassing Damara, "other forces" were said to be at play. We can only assume it is talking about Lord English's influence. After Damara snaps and kills Meenah and cripples Rufioh, she goes on to be generally distant from her friend group. Kurloz is a potential exception to this since he and Damara both serve Lord English. However, no interactions between Kurloz and Damara have been shown so far.
Porrim Maryam
Unlike some of the A1 trolls, Porrim seems to hold some affection for Damara. She treats Damara as one might treat a friend in need, saying to her "We'll talk later," when the player approaches her and Kanaya as Damara in the third part of Openbound. Although seeming somewhat annoyed by Damara's intrusion, Porrim's comment implies that she cares enough about Damara to maintain some semblance of a friendship or at least an amicable relationship with her, which is more than can be said for some of her fellow A1 trolls.
Horuss Zahhak
The connection between Damara and Horuss is largely obscured, but Damara is said to constantly warn Rufioh of the weakness of his matespritship. Horuss is unable to have meaningful conversations with her, since he cannot understand her lowblood speak.
Aradia Megido
At some point in the afterlife, Damara seems to have met Aradia in some capacity, as Aradia appears to be familiar enough with Damara's behaviour to express relief at Meenah not seeing any resemblance between the two.
Terezi and Latula Pyrope
Latula is well aware of Damara and her destructive tendencies, as she saw the need to threaten Damara to protect Mituna's sleeping body from her.
Terezi is apparently also aware of Damara, as she similarly threatens her away from a sleeping Karkat.
Trivia
- Damara's Japanese speech is intentionally shitty and intended to be clearly evident as such to those who speak the language; it was generated by writing her dialogue in English, then running it through Google Translate. As Hussie puts it, “So you aren't really authentic troll Japanese, you're fake troll Japanese.” During the game, a link is provided to a separate page providing a transcript of Damara's dialogue
, intended to allow people to run it through Google Translate to see what she is saying. - Her title, as the Witch of Time, is part of a progression concerning pre- and post-scratch Class changes between Dancestors. The pre-scratch trolls included the titles “Witch of Time”, Maid of Space, Sylph of Light, and Thief of Life, while the post-scratch session included the Maid of Time, Sylph of Space, Thief of Light, and Witch of Life.
- Damara killing Meenah draws a parallel to Aradia killing Vriska. In both cases, each was bullied in some way by the other person and became violent after starting the game. Both murders allowed the killed person to ascend to god tier.
- In Ministrife, Damara and Rufioh are seen dressed up as a couple from the anime/manga Sailor Moon. This references that they were part of the "lost weeaboos" and their past relationship.
- Just like Aradia's, her talksprite doesn't display pointed teeth.
- During Openbound, Damara is seen smoking a joint of something. While the contents could have been something different than the traditional human soporific, like perhaps Sopor Slime or catnip (which Meulin and Kurloz are implied to smoke in part 3 of Openbound), or she may have been smoking it just for the offensive appearance similar to her crude sexual advances, this could also potentially mean that trolls are affected by marijuana in much the same way humans are. It is, however, quite certain that she was influenced by human culture, since the other trolls are confused about Cronus's cigarettes, and even he himself doesn't seem to fully grasp the concept as he says lighting it would be a waste.
- Both Damara and Aradia's full names can both be accurately spelt in Japanese. (メギド・ダマラ、アラドィア・ダマラ)
See also
- ↑ Andrew Hussie. "clues in text suggest they were about 19" Twitter. February 26, 2013. Archived from the original on November 4, 2015.