Space and Environment Secret Lairs

The Secret Lair of a... Cyborg Witch

The description I have for my secret lairs project is a cyborg witch. Witchcraft has been expressed in many different ways; the way I have chosen to portray them is a more ritualistic and religious rather than satanic and with apparent mirth. Most commonly in current media, witches have been characterized as evil and demonic, whereas they are actually more connected with nature. Witches practice the religion of Wicca and put heavy faith into the afterlife and magic. The pentagram is their religious sign with each point having a different meaning; Top Spirit, Right Water Bottom Right Fire Bottom Left Earth Left Air. Figure 01 They use their rituals to connect with spirits so that they can learn the meaning of life; however, witches are skeptical about a God. During their rituals they use a variation of different tools including: Patens Swords or Athames Wands Chalices Bolines (Crescent curved knife) Incense Cauldrons And spears. They have strict laws that say that if any of the tools come in contact with human blood it loses all of its magical powers and must be destroyed. Wicca has their own language and they use it within their rituals as a way of communicating with the spirits and also to keep unaware people away and keep privacy. It is called the The Theban Alphabet and was originated by the Greeks in Thebe by The Honorius of Thebes Figure 02

I recently heard of a cave in Wookey Hole that was rumored to be haunted by a witch. The story is that "A man from Glastonbury is betrothed to a girl from Wookey. A witch living in Wookey Hole Caves curses the romance so that it fails. The man, now a monk, seeks revenge on this witch who having been jilted herselffrequently spoils budding relationships. The monk stalks the witch into the cave and she hides in dark corner near one of the underground rivers. The monk blesses the water and splashes some of it at the dark parts of the cave. Catching the witch off guard, the monk splashes the water at the dark corner she is hiding in. The blessed water immediately petrifies the witch, and she remains in the cave to this day." (Wikipedia, 2008)

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The cave is a perfect lair for a witch, plenty of space, dark, hidden and close to nature. This is an important factor, as the essence of Wicca, is not the spells or hypnotism, it is to connect with nature and the spirits from out of the physical plain. As well as a cave, I am thinking of using a forest where the spirits emit most of their energy.

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A Cyborg is a human who has mechanical parts. The best examples of this are: Inspector Gadget The Terminator General Grievous (Star Wars) Robocop And Deus Ex Typically Cyborgs dont tend to die, as most of their body is machine with the heart and brain being human and regenerative. However, I think this is too sci-fi for my story, and the way I am going to portray my cyborg witch is to have it as a necessity to live, not to make her invincible. I want to do this in the style of Star Wars, when Luke Figure 07 has his hand severed in Episode 5 and is fitted with prosthetic one.

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The trouble with a cyborg, is that because it is DNA based, it can start thinking by itself and corrupt the person, turning them evil, Terminator for example, made terminators for human ease of use, until they became selfaware. The films portray areas where the terminators stay. Long halls with machines to charge, re-program, and update them. I want to incorporate this kind of technology into my secret lair, I want to have a single docking station with other machines for repair, disguise and removal and/or addition of other body parts.

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The Cylons from Battlestar Galactica are a really good concept of cyborgs; they are human tissue fused with a metal exoskeleton. This is a way for them to control all of the features of the robotics, with their mind and muscles rather than hand movements, and this is an example of ease of use.

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To proceed with a cave (which is a must for the witch element), I need to involve all of these other elements, just as bright lights, dark shadows and metallic surfaces. The robots generally reside in these heavily machined areas that dont have any humans working in them. The way I am going to portray the cyborg part, is to have a good witch, that has had a traumatic event and the cyborg part has gone wrong and turned her evil, but not for an evil cause, in the current media, the robots have turned evil for evil causes, for example, I, Robot turned evil for the safety of mankind by trying to kill the humans, and the terminators who wanted to eradicate the human race. I feel that this has been done many times and is starting to become a stereotype, which is why I want the cause that she has become evil for, is justified.

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Illustrations:
Figure 01 http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/e0/The_Spiral_Pentacle_by_SingingGandalf.jpg Figure 02 - http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/c6/Theban.jpg Figure 03 - http://www.wookeyhole.org/images/cave/wookey_hole_caves.jpg Figure 04 http://www.megalithic.co.uk/a558/a312/gallery/England/Somerset/wookey_hole_caves_01.JPG Figure 05 - http://giggsey.com/videos/images/ede64b3b713093e3db2a43c3c4e5f9a3.png Figure 06 - http://wallpaperstock.net/hidden-forest-temple_wallpapers_22304_1600x1200_1.html Figure 07 - http://www.danielletunstall.com/wpcontent/uploads/2010/10/IMG_9033nggggggggg1.jpg Figure 08 - http://babelwright.files.wordpress.com/2012/06/skywalker-hand.jpg?w=594 Figure 09 - http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3131/3248033221_0f6c59968d_o.jpg Figure 10 - http://photos.imageevent.com/afap/bsg/characters//cylon_c2.jpg Figure 11 - http://cghub.com/files/Image/090001-091000/90874/274_realsize.jpg Figure 12 - http://fc08.deviantart.net/fs71/i/2011/061/8/a/sci_fi_concept_wasteland_by_mlappasd3arani.jpg

Bibliography
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Witchcraft http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wicca http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cyborg