Hello, One Sees In Us People Who Just By Seeing Their Faces Know They Are Kind And Have Big Hearts Peace

i'm so curious about your character gender reads now tho 👀👀

(You enter the kitchen and see me, eating shredded cheese out of the fridge by the handful)

(I turn around to face you.)

Hi. Do you want me to sell you on amab NB Siffrin? I'm going to try and sell you on amab NB Siffrin. And maybe even a little bit of tranfem siffrin and/or loop. as a treat. just for you.

So, (I put the cheese back in the fridge.)

This read of mine comes from a number of things, a lot of them to do with the game's themes, and to do with Siffrin being a narrative foil to the other characters. And Vaugarde as a whole.

(READMORE WARNING: THIS IS LIKE 6K WORDS LONG. YOU ALL SHOULD KNOW BY NOW I DON'T MAKE POSTS WITHOUT UNCONSCIOUNABLE AMOUNTS OF EVIDENCE AND EXPLANATION. IF ANYTHING I'M BEING RESTRAINED HERE. THUMBS UP.)

(Pre-readmore note: this is in response to me having given an analysis of how I personally percieve Sifloop in relation to asexuality and shipping. Which you can look at here. (x))

It is however, not what my like, no-holds-barred no-rules just-for-me headcanon for Siffrin would be. (which is intersex 'head empty no thoughts' siffrin, for the record). This is instead my close-reading-of-the-text-and-themes interpretation of Siffrin. This is why I'm gonna be saying Read and not Headcanon, to distinguish the two. (Anything I consider a little bit too much of a stretch vis a vis interpretive hard reads I will call a headcanon. But those are for the last bit of this post.)

Unlike *gestures at mass media* All That… ISAT is already packed to the gills with queer rep, to the point where I feel no need to grasp at straws and make overextended reaches into obviously unintended subtext. Like with, y'know, most media. Since here, the subtext isn't unintended. Like this isn't a Transfem Metal Sonic or Aroace Ash Ketchum situation where I know none of the evidence is on purpose and I'm just having fun making a conspiracy theory pinboard out of it. This is like… There's intentionality there. And I want to engage with it on its level, see what the text itself suggests. It's my personal preferred method of expressing deep respect to a text. (Not that it has to be anyone else's, obviously. This is just my way of showing I love a work.)

So yeah, I am, in general, very interested in hearing hard-fought arguments when it comes to interpreting texts. I'm glad ISAT has a lot to pick at here, and so, I will. (and since not a lot of texts ever have anywhere near this kind of depth in this arena, i don't wanna squander it… i'll try and keep my own biases as in check as i can, and already have done by hashing quite a bit of this interpretation out with two people of very different gender identities to mine. To put it mildly, binary-aligned or transfem I am very squarely Not.)

(Now that the cheese bag has been removed from the equation, I drop this framing device, sit you down at the table and begin to dredge up evidence from below it.)

Okay, so. What are my like… Core reasonings here? I think I can split it into three categories. Broadly, with an amount of overlap, so bear with me…

SIFFRIN AS A FOIL AND CONTRAST TO MIRABELLE, ISABEAU AND THE CHANGE RELIGION AS A WHOLE.

SIFFRIN'S HABITS OF CLINGING TO 'KNOWN QUANTITIES', SCAPEGOATS, AND THEMES OF RACIAL IDENTITY INTERSECTING WITH GENDER IDENTITY.

SIFFRIN, LOOP, DE-PERSONING, DEHUMANISING, APATHY AND SURVIVAL.

Okay so up top I'm going to split my argument for Siffrin's gender identity Present and Future here. This means, for now, I'm arguing for AMAB NB Siffrin alone. The transfem stuff is for later (and more for loop, in my mind, too).

I have a few direct observations of the text here that set things up. Here are the things in-game that make me assume that Siffrin, as of the start of the game, has not yet undergone any radical change to their identity in their life. Not on purpose, at least. These are ordered in a messy but logical flow, so uh, try and keep up. I'll synthesise at the end. I Prommy.

SIFFRIN AS A FOIL AND CONTRAST TO MIRABELLE, ISABEAU AND THE CHANGE RELIGION AS A WHOLE.

CHANGE & THE UNIVERSE: PERCEIVED OPPOSITES

When interacting with most objects in the Changing Room in the house, they express a genuine curiosity toward body craft. It seems they are legitimately unfamiliar with it on a deeper level than having simply heard of it.

Despite this curiosity (explicitly stating they've previously wondered about it), they dismiss it as too much work early on in the game. These points combined seem to suggest to me that they have never previously sought out any kind of real change to their appearance or identity. Either for gender reasons, or other body dysmorphia reasons. (Which, despite the dismissal, they do refer to their body as a 'meat prison', which is not particularly positive) However...

This changes in Act 3. In acts 3 and 4 they flatly state: "You're thinking about crafting your body. You seem to have all the time in the world now." While still never spoken aloud, their declining mental state corrosponds with a worn-down, almost nihilistic reckoning with the feelings they masked with the 'meat prison' joke in act 2.

[Image: Interactions with the change craft textbook in acts 2 and 3/4.]

In talking to Mirabelle, they are very self assured that one can stay the same/be comfortable with their born identity. They also seem a little unsettled by the change religion's flippancy in general, which makes sense, as they have been clinging to the famliar (even when painful) to cope with other traumas. (More on this later, section 2)

The Universe Faith appears to heavily disincentivise Wanting for oneself and other expressions of Free Will due to safeguarding against Wish craft. This seems to have impacted Siffrin's mental state majorly, even if they do not recognise it. The followers of the faith are (if Siffrin is to be believed) incentivised to 'go with the flow' and take paths of least resistance, and those that DO make big decisions will tend to justify things as being The Universe's Will. (See: The King's entire Modus Operandi, and the way Loop (and Siffrin) do the same rote actions, constructing worldviews (the play analogy, the Universe's Will) and justify that as what the Universe Would Want (despite a total lack of evidence to prove as such)) As such, it seems as if a follower of this faith as neurotic as Siffrin would be unlikely to act upon any Wants to Change Themselves without a lot of turmoil and backwards-justification. (Of note, Loop's forcible change coinciding with a dropping of pronoun. But that is again for later, section 3) As of the start of the game, they do not appear to have broached this kind of turmoil directly.

[Image: Act 5 interaction with the star journal, emphasis on it being a cautionary tale against reckless usage of wish craft, instilled so deeply to be a children's bedtime story]

Siffrin, in act 5, grows frustrated with both The Universe and The Change God, feeling abandoned by the former. They struggle with simultaneously anthropomorphising the Universe as a cruel onlooker, while also seemingly acknowledging them as a cold, almost scientific fact of nature. This would heavily imply that the 'blame' put upon the Universe by Siffrin in these moments is known to them, at least a little, to be potentially meaningless. It seems that somewhere in Siffrin's belief system is something, be it the core or merely a creeping worry, that the Universe is not a thinking, feeling, thing. And thus that their invocations of "The Universe's Will" are merely rationalisations of random chance and consequence. This is in DIRECT contrast to the Change God, proven to be an emotive sapient entity, who merely refuses to offer a helping hand. (Similar sentiments are, too, spoken by the Change God itself.)

[Images: Interacting with the window in the observatory in act 5, text from the change god meeting]

So. These are the bulk of my observations when it comes to how Siffrin is positioned in contrast to the Change Belief. It would seem to be that Siffrin, inkeeping with their role as an outsider, is a complete fish out of water in Vaugarde's change-centric world. This makes sense! It makes them a compelling foil to the Vaugardians in our cast, and allows the Vaugardians to challenge Siffrin's worldviews merely by existing. It also, more importantly, makes Siffrin an interesting lens through which to inspect our two most Change-driven characters. Mirabelle and Isabeau.

MIRABELLE.

Mirabelle and Siffrin's differing faiths are put on display the most frequently. Interactions like the circle key and the party's disbelief of Siffrin's facts about the stars make this clear. These interactions other Siffrin from the group further, and are another avenue through which Siffrin can ignore their own needs, not communicating with the party and allowing them to dismiss things he deems important.

Obviously, the friendquest is primarily about Mirabelle's struggle with her aromanticism and asexuality. But there's an implicit undercurrent of gender there too. Mirabelle has never made a big change, not like Isabeau. She has never 'changed completely', by her words. And Siffrin distinctly finds this an odd thing to be worried by. Whatever culture he carries has no pressure to explore these avenues, it seems. Siffrin is able to help her by sharing their honest opinions, that he's never felt the need to change these things, and he's happy (allegedly). Why should she?

[Image: Mirabelle's friendquest text] Siffrin is not thinking particularly hard when he first does the friendquests, they are just being themselves. By positioning Siffrin as this unchanged yet confident object, they are in the perfect position to help Mirabelle by being in her almost exact position, both sexuality and transgender status (albeit, with the caveats of potential alloromanticism, and a they pronoun), that they become her ideal foil. (And in fact, the subtle differences between their positions in canon add to this, showing a display of Perceived Genuine Truth, rather than simple in-group camaraderie)

Whereas…

ISABEAU.

When Mal du pays speaks as Isabeau, it says the following;

"I don't want to know someone who won't even try to change, who luxuriates in things staying the exact same like you do."

I don't want to know someone - Shame of being known, that's Isabeau's insecurity. Reflected back at Siffrin, who has become the worst thing imaginable to each of their friends, in Siffrin's own mind. He absorbs their insecurities like a sponge and incorporates them into himself. Empathy turned ill.

Who luxuriates in things staying the exact same - Now THAT'S interesting. This is not Isabeau's insecurity, it's Siffrin's own. But also, it appears as if, Siffrin, whom to Mirabelle was unflappable in that not changing was alright, has internalised some of her worry. That it is MDP's Isabeau saying this, though, shows this is about Personal Change, perhaps even Specifically Gender and Self Image, rather than Mirabelle's spiritual side.

Isabeau and his distinct change in personality and gender, to become someone who he actually likes… Diametric to Siffrin, who has been stagnant for a long time, presumably as far as they can remember. It would seem to imply they have no recourse against this argument. Siffin becomes, in his mind, the opposite to Isabeau, a man he deeply admires the bravery of when told the story of his Change. These are Siffrin's words against themselves, that they consider themselves to have never even 'tried' whatever it is they think Change to be.

So. These are my main points vis a vis: Siffrin as a foil. This reading would posit that Siffrin's He/They status is, well, almost accidental? Which I would imagine befitting of them. They are, at the start of the game, still the mysterious rogue who never elaborates upon anything. They aren't going to be correcting a they/them from a teammate who is likely far more cautious about assumptions.

Notably, Mirabelle excludes Siffrin from the label "man" in the bathroom monologues… But as does Siffrin when in the prologue poem room. Though one needs remember, Siffrin only expresses these thoughts internally.

[Image: Bathroom conversation featuring Isabeau identified as the party's singular man]

[Image: Prologue!Siffrin expressing that they are not a man in very certain terms.]

While I do wonder what Mirabelle's knowledge (or lack thereof, potentially! Did Siffrin actually divulge this to her, once? Or is she making assumptions again?) is here, this is pretty clear evidence that Siffrin doesn't see themselves As A Man. (that, and Adrienne's word of god "fella" comments). I'm sure you can see where I'm going with this… but.

The thesis here is, that Siffrin may want to explore their gender further; doesn't feel connected to Masculinity, and yet, keeps that He pronoun around? Well, the Universe does not, in Siffrin's mind, really allow for personal wants and desires. If their friends start they/themming them, then cool. They like it, but never requested it, so it's the Universe's will. But, asking? Making decisions and requests and rocking the boat? That seems to scare Siffrin a lot. It seems to scare them so much it causes a lot of, if not all of, the conflict in the game. I feel like it's a fair deduction that this aversion to humour their own desires pervades a lot of their existence.

Plus, I think there's meat there. By only allowing Siffrin to reckon with any potential desires to change only after growing closer with the family, you get to explore things like "How does Mirabelle feel that even the person who said she didn't have to change is changing." and the slightly less potentially harrowing (OR MORE, IF YOU WANT IT TO BE? IDK. I'M NOT YOUR BOSS.) "Isa's continued changing allows Siffrin a space to explore it, maybe even just by proxy, or maybe by joining them."

But mostly, this section is about how Siffrin not having Changed Yet makes them delightfully strong narratively; allowing them to relate to Mirabelle, and get cold feet when comparing themselves to Isabeau. I love this as a narrative strengthener. It's very rare in media that we get to explore a nonbinary character's thoughts and insecurities on whether or not they're "doing enough" to be nonbinary. Even less so Aligned nonbinary people. And reading that alignment and insecurity through the lens of a nonbinary person not fully disconnected from their assigned gender at birth? It's a very compelling exploration of a very common and raw and yet underdiscussed feeling, much like the rest of ISAT. I think this is an extremely potent element should it be read this way, and is only strengthened when taking Siffrin's other themes into account.

Speaking of which.

2. SIFFRIN'S HABITS OF CLINGING TO 'KNOWN QUANTITIES', SCAPEGOATS, AND THEMES OF RACIAL IDENTITY INTERSECTING WITH GENDER IDENTITY.

HOLDING ON TO WHAT YOU KNOW. (OR KNOW THAT YOU DO NOT.)

I explained above many of my thoughts on the Universe Faith, and trying to keep these two sections separate was difficult, but needed to be done for the sake of clarity. But this section and the above are deeply intertwined.

Siffrin… Holds on to the things they know. They do not know much. But man do they fucking hold. And yet, paradoxically, they are also avoidant about it.

It is made clear in the text, to the point where I really don't feel the need to rehash it here, that Siffrin's disconnection from their homeland is incredibly painful, but that they consider that culture utterly and irreplaceably important to them. They cannot face it, it is too painful. They cannot let it go, it is too important.

Knowing what we know of the Island's irl inspirations (though, word of god, the exact location is not supposed to matter, one can infer it from the text (and I did! within reasonable proximity!)), Siffrin is of an indigenous peoples of some description, more than likely. And at the very least, Siffrin carries with them inherent biases and ignorances that show that Vaugarde's conceptions of things don't quite mesh with their own. Bowing to the Vaugardian way of things could very easily be seen as assimilation, in this way.*

And identity? Gender? Presentation? Role? All of that has a cultural element. There's no telling what specifics Siffrin has lost in that arena, and that's the problem. Neither do they. How paralysing, the feeling, to know that should you change yourself you risk unknowingly erasing another piece of home? I wouldn't blame them for locking it off. Keeping their old clothes, keeping what little they can remember of themselves… It doesn't seem to me a conducive or safe mental space to get experimental.

And the Universe makes for a perfect scapegoat. As referenced in the section above, a lot can be justified should you call it "The Universe's Will", because who's there to call you on it? Hardly anyone. Your divine right to Freeze A Place In Time; Your Deserved Punishment for Wanting to be Loved: All of it the Universe-- If you want it to be. And thusly, if the Universe wanted you to be a certain way, wouldn't you already be? Wouldn't it make you so? (Wouldn't it take away your body, that which makes you human? If that is what it thought of you?) So best to put it out of your mind. Wouldn't want to accidentally wish anything.

But as the game itself puts it, personified by The King, you cannot stay mired like this forever. As Loop themselves puts it, they can "get so fixated, sometimes." At some point they need to allow themselves to grow in whatever direction they need, because in the end, they need to live their life. They don't need to abandon their country, their culture, but they can't let it restrain them either.

(* MASSIVE CAVEAT: im white as fuck boyyy. i cant say shit. im like technically Of The Land im like 90% pictish or something ridiculous like that so my particular line has never moved anywhere but. this is notttt something i have input or insight on. this is all gleaned from reading and listening to indiginous perspectives from wherever they may be. i am simply trying to infer from what the game gives us without inserting my own feelings on the matter.)

3. SIFFRIN, LOOP, DE-PERSONING, DEHUMANISING, APATHY AND SURVIVAL.

Alright, here's some less heady and purely-thematic points to round things out. And where we'll also address the fucked up star being in the room; Loop.

My last couple of reading points are the most potentially-transfem to me. Or at least the ones that really hammer home, to me, a seeming lack of want to be masculine-aligned.

ANOTHER NOTE ON THE 'NOT A GUY' THING.

Obviously, there is the aforementioned "Not a man/not that you're a boy" thing. This is rather straightforward, but also still pretty ambiguous. You can be masc-aligned and still Not A Guy. But it does seem to be of note that being a guy very much does not seem to be a goal of Siffrin's. I would posit this in direct contrast to… Isabeau.

But not Isabeau's masculinity. I would instead hold it up against Isa's femininity.

ISAT, as a text, has its characters have genuinely different levels of security in their gender identity, and Isabeau, despite still having insecurities, seems super chill on the gender angle specifically! Their internal strife comes not from their 'not feeling like a man enough' or 'hating being a woman', but instead from their self perception as a friendless nerd! Something that seems to be only tangentially related to Isa's gender, really?

The big dumb bruiser thing is certainly aided by being a dude, but Isa still seems completely comfortable referring to themselves with feminine language, calling himself a "mother hen" (prologue) and having "the heart of a fair maiden" (cookie snack time). (However, they also take being excluded from Mira's girly book club as a surprised compliment, implying they weren't expected to be excluded, and find it affirming.) And even further so, Isa states they want to continue changing further and exploring their identity more, being rather blatant that they might lean back into femininity (and more importantly, let themselves be outwardly smart again), since they're starting to feel hurt by everyone assuming they ARE genuinely stupid.

[Image: Prologue Isa calling himself a mother hen]

And man, this is such a breath of fresh air vis a vis representation. I don't think I really need to explain that. A character who's gender identity is driven by chasing euphoria, even if it started out by trying to drive out misery. Isabeau's character is so damn good. But this essay isn't about him, so get back in the crate, boy.

... So here we have Isa, who is genuinely comfortable reclaiming things about their birth gender, and Mirabelle who loves her traditionally feminine traits to the point where she feels a little guilty that she isn't rejecting them to foster change. And then we have Siffrin… who seems to reject masculine language…? Hrm… (… And then we have The King. A Masculine Title. Someone who Siffrin increasingly sees themselves in and deeply, deeply dislikes this.)

APATHY AND SURVIVAL

It should be clear by now that I see Siffrin's core character as being driven by avoidance and survival. This seems to lead to a lot of apathy, brushing off emotions that are too intense or events and occurences that are too painful. (See: just absolutely everything with Bonnie)

It's all Siffrin really seems to be able to do to Survive. They've travelled, seemingly alone, for what would be around a decade by what the game says about the island's disappearance. They've lived alone on the road as a traveller in a country that so openly welcomes strangers that THE KING and his whole motives can happen. Siffrin is avoidant and refuses to acknowledge problems or strive for help and comfort.

So. That line about the dress. Let's unpack the line(s) about the dress.

THE DRESS LINE, AND THE WAY IT CHANGES BETWEEN PROLOGUE, ACT 2, AND ACT 3.

Good god where to start with this. Full disclosure, the first draft here was way more vague in how I approached this line because I remembered it (and another line, I'll get to it.) way more tame, but going and getting the screenshots..... Siffrin. Buddy. We gotta unpack this.

In act 2, we have "You haven't worn a dress in forever!". This is a neutral, if seemingly a little joyous statement. All we really glean from this is the information that Siffrin at some point, wore 'a' dress. No real inferences there. (Maybe you could say that the singular as opposed to plural makes it more likely that they borrowed/only owned One Dress rather than owned several? But that's a massive stretch...)

Then, act 3/4 shuffles this off into a more general "You wonder if you'll ever wear different clothes again." Which is a more despairing and distant statement. Considering Siffrin seems to travel with only the items they can carry, and owns sleep clothes... It's unclear how many changes of clothing they have. The party seems to consider the cloak a pretty permanent fixture, anyhow. But this line doesn't really say much aside from 'oh god i'm losing myself to the time loop malaise'

NOW THE PROLOGUE. Prologue Sif, buddy, pal, Loop, if I'm allowed to call you that....

Thousands of loops in. We are wistful for specifically dresses. You've forgotten almost everything. You dream about someday seeing the sun again. To be anywhere but here. You want to wear a dress again.

I. Kind of do not know what to do here but point at it. Like I said, my first draft had me half-remembering the progression of this line and as such I was far more vague on what I thought it could imply. Instead this is just straight up yearning.

To, try and segue back to what I had initially written, we'll pick up here...

Siffrin expresses a want to wear other clothes, explore changing their body... But instead, they wear a ratty old form-covering cloak that keeps them warm and safe and is a last reminder of home. They are shapeless, formless, hiding their face under the brim of a wide hat. They do not voice their desire to wear a dress aloud. They once again, keep a desire to themselves, because they do not allow themselves to want publicly. Apathy is safer. Apathy and quiet means you do not risk retribution or hurt.

While I do not think the above is exclusively a transfeminine feeling, it really, really reads like one when taken part and parcel with assuming Siffrin has denied themselves prior exploration.

... And here I have to break my first draft again. I was being, once again, restrained in my reading when writing this. Because I had convinced myself I had maybe straight up imagined one of the lines I was basing my reads on, because I couldn't find it. Because it was a line that read so strikingly desolate to me that my brain had slotted it in during Act Five, meaning when I went looking for it neither me nor my friends could find it.

It's in acts 3 and 4. It's a line I already brought up.

"You're thinking about crafting your body. You seem to have all the time in the world now."

good fucking christ. sorry to break the academic tone but Jimminy Fucking Willikers, Siffrin. What's with that bit. The resignation and despair and guilty comfort we know the timeloop brings them, bleeding into the gender.

This. *taps my finger harshly on my desk* THIS, this feels transfem. this feels so wildly transfem to me. The knowledge that they've never changed before this line lends. The admission that they've been holding back because it's 'too much work'. I spent a lot of time during the game relating Siffrin not to myself but to my friends.

If I'm honest, really, truly, I'm not all too often in Siffrin's shoes. I'm the stable one, of my group. I'm the rock people ground themselves on. And I see so much hesitance, all the time. Denial of joy because what if it's taken away, again? Or futilely out of reach? It hurts more to try, and to fail, than to never try at all.

I wanted to shake Siffrin by the shoulders this whole game. Grit teeth beg them to accept help because for fuck's sake people are clearly offering it get it through your skull--

*coughs* Ah. Ahem. Right. The uh, academic tone.

Right. What I mean to say is, this read as transfem to me because of the way it relates to real-world experiences of denial. And this combo of the Dress line, and the progression of the Meat Prison line, the constant evidence of never having strived for what they want, and that insistance that you're not a man, seem to dislike being percieved as a man, but not being able to shed the outward signifiers?

Individually, yes, these points can be read in different ways. The total opposite ways, even, I'm sure! But as a gestalt it feels really, really transfem. Even if yeah, sure Vaugarde is a magical setting where being transgender is accepted, and this hesitance, specifically, around gender, might not 'make sense' in 'the lore'...

Diegesis isn't everything. Sometimes something that reflects a real-world feeling is important, even if it doesn't 'mesh' with 'the lore' of the world.

TANGENT: DIEGESIS AND READING INTO NON-REAL-WORLD-SETTINGS.

This is a Watsonian vs Doylist spectre that's been haunting this whole argument. In-universe (Watsonian), Vaugarde has seemingly no discrimination between genders, sexualities, and a lackadaisical approach to most things in the arena. Reading our own patriarchal/heterosexual/amanonormative/perisexist society unto it does not make sense, not in this context.

In the real world, however (Doylist), ISAT is a text made in our prejudiced society. A text that is distinctly flavoured by those bigotries which it is kicking back against. Because of this, it is not the whole story to simply read the text while discarding our real-world-informed inferences. Isabeau is a big example of this. While perfectly accepted in Vaugarde, he is very obviously a revolutionary character in our real-world space! He has so much to say, specifically BECAUSE things about him that are not readily accepted here, are accepted there! Same with Mira's struggles, and yes, Siffrin's too.

ISAT was written with the knowledge of how it would play against our real world in mind, we know this, clearly, from many an interview. This is most present in how it engages with asexuality and aromanticism (and immigrant identity), but make no mistake, it influences the Whole Text.

Ergo, just because I view certain writing choices here in the context of Our Real World Perspectives On Gender and not Vaugarde's In-Universe Perspectives, it does not make them an invalid read. They are simply a Doylist read.

There's been an admittedly loosey-goosey lack of delineation here between things I'm reading with either lens, because for the most part all of these points have been a vague synthesis of both that I can't quite decouple. Unprofessional, I know, but I'll admit to not having written my thoughts down like this in a good long while. Usually I just hash this out verbally over discord voice to a small number of weirdo literature and classics student friends who are willing to humour me. I'm an arts student too, but animation hardly required I actually write an essay to a literature degree's standard. Lol.

DE-PERSONING. AND LOOP. OH JESUS . LOOP .

Siffrin de-persons themselves a lot. I say de-person rather than dehumanise because, well, there's a subtle difference there. Siffrin doesn't see themselves as vermin or an animal or an object, but they do seem to see themselves as lesser, not requiring the respect they grant others. They aren't, you know, a 'real person'.

People get to have things like thoughts and wants and identities. Siffrin is, at best, Just Siffrin. They have what they have and they don't ask for more and they don't (CAN'T) feel too strongly on what they do have!

When Loop at first offers their pronouns they offer the Royal 'We'. This is at least a little bit, a joke. A nudge toward their true identity, a potential dig at themselves for becoming so understanding of The King. Mostly though, a joke on the first thing…. and a sign that they do not see themselves as a separate entity to the Siffrin stood before them.

When Siffrin rejects this, they settle for they/them. Loop drops the he/him, presumably partially to cover their tracks, but… They just showed their hand with the 'Royal We', and if you wanted to go even further with this, there's no way for us to know whether Loop is treating this pronoun as singular or not. They presumably are, but it is still a potentially plural pronoun.

Loop… Clearly does not see themselves as a person. It's, I would say, a completely reasonable assumption that the form they have taken reflects implicit feelings toward themselves as less than a person, an actor, a monster, a tool, a means to an end. They are rendered inhuman by The Universe, frivolous distractions removed. No mouth, inventory and clothes confiscated, nothing between the legs. Formed roughly in the shape of a person to allow them to do their only job: Help.

Loop's body does not make logical sense, given their continued ability to sleep, dream and their continued habit of deep breaths to self-soothe. It would seem to me, it was made in the image it was, with only the tools it needed to Help Siffrin. Why obfuscate their identity? Because giving the game away too early would likely make them lose hope. Why so deeply, thoroughly star themed? An instant signal, that even if a stranger, they are an ally. They are home.

[Image: Loop saying that they take naps and dream, and evidence of Loop habitually attempting to breathe in the twohats lose-to-loop ending]

And they… Degender themselves. No longer with any bodily signifiers of masculinity, and cruelly disallowed the ability to hide themselves beneath fabric, they are null. The spoiler Q&A (paratext, as it were) states that:

Q. Is Loop: 1. Actually comfortable with both he and they, but only gave the one pronoun to emphasize the distance? 2. Only using they/them because a large life event led to a shift in identity/ how they’d like to be perceived? or 3. time lops stole he from they they :( A. Mostly that first one. But all three of those reasons have a bit of truth to them.

While the 'mostly the first one' comment does imply that Loop would not baulk at being he/him'd (similar to how Siffrin does not), the other reasons, especially the second, having 'a bit of truth' does lend credence to this reading. That Loop's self-perception has shifted, and what I posit, is that this shift is in tandem with a disconnection with humanity. Due, presumably, to the dehumanising experience of the timeloop.

Loop has no biology to speak of, and yet they remain blind in one eye. I take this as an implication that they considered this so core to themselves, to who they could remember being, that it stayed. Even if they had forgotten their own face, trapped in a part of the house with no mirrors, they knew they couldn't see. They kept this, and yet seemingly they, or The Universe, or both of them in tandem, discarded all else.

This isn't like…. Healthy behaviour. That is for certain. But it is interesting that Siffrin and Loop seem to hold on to their masculinity by a thread, and that Loop, when actually given the excuse to make a choice, chooses the Neutral Option. Siffrin might de-person themselves, but Loop, Loop is absolutely dehumanising themselves. From Loop's own mouth (or lack thereof) do they call themselves a Corpse. That's… pretty damn bad.

TANGENT 2: POTENTIAL IMPLICATIONS OF THE JAPANESE TRANSLATION.

Did somebody say 'distance'? Yeah turns out that has some more potential evidence. In the form of First Person Pronouns. See, English, with its third person only pronouns relies on others to gender you. Japanese, you get to gender yourself. And Siffrin specifically has an interesting discrepancy in the way he refers to himself.

(DISCLAIMER: I . DO NOT KNOW MUCH ABOUT JAPANESE. THIS IS SECOND-HAND KNOWLEDGE. SOURCED FROM THIS TUMBLR POST AND OTHER QUICK SKIMS OF WIKIPEDIA)

Loop and Siffrin use the same, very neutral "mostly male but could go either way" pronoun of 僕 boku. Safe, soft friendly pronoun. Used by people on the younger side of adulthood, not so impolite that you can't use it in a formal setting. Such a neutral all-rounder that female singers in japan tend to use boku in their songs to relate to the audience with quiet confidence.

And in their internal monologue? Siffrin uses a completely different pronoun. In his head, for himself, he uses 自分 jibun. Now, this may be an artefact of the monologue's english second-person "You", since jibun can also be used to mean a very neutral "self". A "myself/herself/himself" type 'self'. But when used as a first person pronoun, it has a connotation of being… distant, introspective. Which is… a fascinating implication, if that was the intent.

But I don't know anything about japanese so ! If I'm off the mark, discard this!

LOOP, PART 2: MAYBE NOT A GREAT STATE TO BE IN.

While Siffrin I can comfortably argue that they can like, keep their current gender presentation, whatever you may perceive it to be, once the game is over, Loop, I cannot.

Siffrin's potential issues with their identity are ones that honestly feel like they would best be explored with gentle refinement and searching. They don't need to violently seperate themselves from what they are now, far from it, in fact. They need to learn to grow comfortable in their own skin, and with the people they love. To become open and trusting, with an open mind to where it may lead.

Loop has already lost this battle. They don't get to refine anymore, just pick up the pieces. While I don't necessarily think radical change is Good for Loop, I think they may Need It. For them, resting will probably become stagnation (see: napping all day under the tree, resigned, really, to the idea they're stuck there forever.), they need a shake-up in order to re-find their feet. Even if they end up right back where they started, they still need to do the actual painful process of soul-searching first.

Problem is, they're still rather avoidant. So it basically becomes a question of getting them into a situation where this exploration is forced upon them. At which point, that's a whole new plotline. This becomes fanfiction. Hence, why while I think Transfem-Egg Loop is a Valid Read when extrapolated from Siffrin… I must concede any actual adventures into them acting upon that as headcanon territory. I just do not know how you would get them there without making a whole new Thing, at which point it stops being Just A Read of the text haha. It doesn't help that Loop and Siffrin (grudgekeepers supreme) both have reason to spite the Change God after who was phone.

As for whether this egg-read reflects directly back on to Siffrin? Maybe! They are the same person. But I think that, especially with Vaugarde's lax views, and their actual differences (Loop's general worse mania // Siffrin's incentive to stay a reminder to themselves and Loop of their country) means they could easily go two different routes, along the road to becoming their own distinct individuals. (And in all honesty, growing into their differences is probably the more healthy option in the long run if you're keeping Loop around? But again, we are going so far into the future here this is no longer a read. And I am not here to dispense baseless headcanons without massive disclaimer, so…)

Tl;Dr:

Siffrin's Survival-Apathy and hesitance to change feels really thematic to their being 'what's left' of their homeland

They seem unsettled by the flippancy of the Change Religion at times, clinging to the familiar to cope with the trauma of displacement.

Mal du pays speaks of them that they have not 'tried' to change, showing an insecurity there, even outside of the literal stagnance of the loops.

They are self assured to Mira that one does not have to change, in a very genuinely personal impulsive statement.

They and others exclude themselves from being "A Man", but Siffrin keeps desires to explore their expression to themselves.

The Universe belief, seemingly in Siffrin's view of it, disincentivises Free Will and Wants very heavily. It is not hard to assume they extend this to all elements of their life.

They have self-admittedly never pursued tangible change, likely due to this aversion to choice. Despite this, they express interest in changing, seeming nonplussed with their body, and house at least some desire for more traditionally feminine expression.

Oh Good God. Loop Sure Does Not Treat Themselves Like A Person. Why Does That Come With A Pronoun Change? What Does That Mean?

But most of all:

It makes them such a fascinating foil and lens to Change and characters who believe in it! It makes them eerily similar to The King! It opens up such fascinating debate between characters like themselves and Mirabelle, Isabeau and Loop, on whether or not they want to change in future, or if it truly is okay to never radically change yourself! What genuinely fertile ground for dialogues. And man if I'm not heavily drawn towards dialogues.

(End of essay! Congratulations for making it the whole way! 🎉 I hope this nightmarish deep dive helps with understanding some of the ways I've been writing Siffrin and Loop too. Since while I've not ever focused on the gender side of it (and probably won't in comic form) this does pervade my view of the two, since it would be impossible for it to Not. As you can see, I do think it is pretty relevant to both their themes.)

(Now for some bonus material)

ADDENDUMS:

PERSONAL BIAS NOTE:

Not included in this analysis since this is more a Pet Theme of my own (usually kept quarantined to the realms of my OCs), but something else I see in Siffrin is a reflection of the Dude Issue(tm) of patriarchal irl society disincentivisng Dudes(tm) from ever fucking introspecting ever.

I'm curious about nonbinary/trans characters who have no idea they’re nonbinary/trans because they’ve been disincentivised from thinking/doubting their identity due to societal power structures or simply tradition. I dig around the themes of “a lot of guys are trapped in a societal prison without ever knowing and it makes them miserable but they can’t escape because they don’t even see the cage” like, a lot, in my personal work. It intrigues me. So bleh, cards on the table there. That mode of interacting with nb/trans characters is one I'm inclined to.

This kinda goes hand in hand with the watsonian vs doylist situation i took an aside to mention. But it is so far along the doylist side that I didn't want to include it, since it is a little too assumptive of the text for my comfort. I don't think the game necessarily has much commentary on this specific Societal Bind. But if it does, then hey, there's my thoughts on it.

STRAY SIDE NOTES AND HEADCANONS ABOUT OTHER CHARACTERS (AS A TREAT FOR GETTING THIS FAR):

MID-GAME OBSERVATION ABOUT BONNIE AND ODILE THAT I NEVER WENT BACK TO VERIFY:

I got the impression that Bonnie heavily favours they/them pronouns for Siffrin, and Odile he/him, as a bit of presumed character voice. I don't know that I am right, literally at all, in that observation, because it very well could've been confirmation bias.

BUT! It did give me the impression that one of the things Bonnie was idolising about Siffrin was a degree of "wow!! older person with my gender!! wow!!", which is just like, cute. I like it even if I don't have any solid evidence.

ODILE, WHAT'S HER DEAL?:

Oh she stays just as mysterious as she intends to be, huh? Even with her comments in the Changing Room alluding to knowing things about underground changing operations, you can't draw much of a conclusion about her. I appreciate verily that she's word-of-god unlabelled and also poly. That shit's great. Woman who has stopped drawing lines or caring what she's up against. Nice characterisation flavour I think.

Anyway, I do think that transfem Odile is a really, really nice take. I have no evidence in either direction for her in either direction, and her being a woman of any description makes her relationship with her absent mother something interesting to chew on, but the idea that she pursued womanhood intentionally lends an interesting texture. I've not much to say, but it's a thread to pull on. Makes you wonder what other female role models she had in her life instead. Anyway she's mysterious as fuck I can't extrapolate Jack nor Squat. Shrug! I'm also made curious by the idea of her potentially moving away from womanhood as she feels the weight of her history lifted. This goes either way, really. Diagnosis: mysterious.

HEADCANON NOTE: INTERSEX SIFFRIN

I don't have any in-text support for this so this entire thing is an unbased headcanon to me. but i DO like it because 1. fun and 2. potential for more thematic exploration

haha gotcha its fuckin themes again. its always themes with me.

But yeah. Not much to say here besides drawing a parallel (that I believe I've seen drawn elsewhere in the fandom already?) between ISAT's comments on how a society that values change would view Aroace identities, and how Mira feels about not wanting to change with the real world experiences of Intersex people having alteration and conformity forced upon them, saying the Change Belief would likely be just as bad for them as it is for aroace people.

So, adding it to Siffrin's situation further drags them into the opposition-to-change foil role. Which like I said, think has a lot to explore.

HEADCANON NOTE: A POTENTIAL METHOD FOR GETTING LOOP OUT OF THEIR GOD DAMNED COMFORT ZONE

I think utilising Loop's contrarianism is an effective and funny way to get them to explore their gender. I personally think running with them trying to hide their identity from the party is a hilarious way to do it. Having them try to position themselves in direct opposition to Siffrin to "throw the party off their trail" (not that i think they really need to?), going full feminine-revealing-clothing because it's NOT what a Siffrin would do and accidentally growing accustomed to it. Funny to me. Especially when the party eventually do find out who they are and go . "????? what was the girl stuff about ??? is that something you wanna do now ???".

[Isabeau] "Ohhhh it was a bit! Haha you really are Sif, still a jokester!" [Loop] "HAHA YEAH . JOKES. LOVE THOSE. LOVE TO MAKE JOKES!" [Isabeau] "Yep! Anyway. Tell me if you need anything!"

Bonus bonus:

[Siffrin] "Okay, so, if you're a girl. Does this reflect on like… me?" [Loop] "No doubles. Get your own gender, parasite~!"

Chat we know that after Rachel usually gives out a prophecy she sorta collapses and is exhuasted. Fatigued even. I wanna add to that.

So like if she gets visions she should get a headache. Because information about the future is sorta rushing to her head. Also there should be a time that in TOA, when she gives out a prophecy, She gets a seizure after. Basically I think she should have a TAD bit more side effects but Idk

Will solace is the kind of guy to tell you to get 8 hours of sleep, say that mental health is important, and how you should eat 3 meals a day and then pull all nighters, neglect his mental being, and forget to eat because he uses all his time to take care of other people

YO???? THIS IS SO GOOD

The Battle of Manhattan didn’t go the way the Fandom thinks it did; we need to address the “massacre” of the Titan Army!

The Battle of Manhattan is the most pivotal event of the first series. And we see the entire thing exclusively from Percy’s point of view. He takes us through the thickest of the fight from one end of Manhattan Island to the next, and shows us a desperate fight of good against evil.

But we have another point of view for the battle, one that comes from the demigods of the Titan army, and one that informs us of a far different, darker side to the conflict. One where an entire army of children is massacred by the victorious Olympians, without a thought or even a care. It’s a shocking, confronting side of the struggle that most fans don’t seem to be aware of. 

But it’s also completely inaccurate. 

Now I love Alabaster; he’s one of my favorite characters, and I want nothing but the best for him. But he’s a demonstrably unreliable narrator. I don’t even mean that he’s intentionally dishonest; but he’s very badly misinformed about what actually happened. And that gives the fandom three major misconceptions that need to be cleared up. 

Alabaster gets the casualty ratio for the battle wrong (the Olympians had more than he thinks).

The Titan army has far fewer demigods than most fans think (not much more than 50 at the most).

Alabaster does say that there was a “massacre” at the end of the battle, but most of the TA demigods had deserted before that!

Part 1) The Olympians Have High Casualties

“It was a massacre. If I remember right, my mother told me that Camp Half-Blood and its allies had sixteen casualties total. We had hundreds.” (pg 219)

This is the only time we get a specific number for Olympian casualties, but it just doesn’t match up with what actually happens in the books. Looking back at all the deaths we do see:

Charlie Beckendorf -1

one [Hellhound] got hold of an Apollo camper and dragged him away. I didn’t see what happened to him next. I didn’t want to know. (pg 182) -1

Michael Yew -1

A young dragon had appeared in Harlem, and a dozen wood nymphs died before the monster was finally defeated. (pg 203) -12

“We lost twenty satyrs against some giants at Fort Washington,” [Grover] said, his voice trembling. (pg 203) -20 Giants smashed through trees, and naiads faded as their life sources were destroyed. (pg 243) -1< Enemy archers returned fire, and a Hunter fell from a high branch. (pg 244) -1  Too many of our friends lay wounded in the streets. Too many were missing. (pg 257) -1< The flagpoles were hung with horrible trophies –helmets and armor pieces from defeated campers. (pg 282) -1< The Drakon lashed out, swallowing three californian centaurs in one gulp before I could even get close. (pg 288) -3 Poison spewed everywhere, melting centaurs into dust along with quite a few monsters, (pg 288) -1< The Drakon snapped up one Ares camper in a gulp. (pg 291) -1

Silena Beauregard -1

Leneus -1

a body covered in the golden burial shroud of Apollo’s cabin. I didn’t know who was underneath. I don't want to find out. (pg 303) -1

Oddly enough, we actually miss the moment that was probably the worst for the Olympians, the final push by Kronos that breaks through their line. After Clarisse slays the drakon and the monsters are driven back again, Percy and co. take the opportunity to go up to Olympus. Percy gives Pandora’s Pithos to Hestia, and then contacts Poseidon via his throne. It’s just as he finishes that Thalia comes up and tells them that Kronos is coming again, but they miss the fighting.

By the time we got to the street, it was too late. Campers and Hunters lay wounded on the ground. Clarisse must have lost a fight with a Hyperborean giant, because she and her chariot were frozen in a block of ice. The centaurs were nowhere to be seen. Either they’d panicked and ran, or they’d been disintegrated. (pg 312) -<500

And finally, Kronos does kill some people on Olympus itself.

A few minor gods and nature spirits had tried to stop Kronos. What remained of them was strewn about the road: shattered armor, ripped clothing, swords and spears broken in half. (pg 322) -1<

The specific deaths we have mentioned during the battle amount to 48 at the very least; and that is an extremely conservative estimate that only includes the deaths Percy has the time and presence of mind to witness in all the carnage. Considering how many others must have happened, factoring the sudden disappearance of the 500 centaurs in particular, it was likely in the hundreds. And most of the centaurs probably ran at the end, but even that would have involved heavy casualties.

It’s true that actual demigods were a smaller fraction of Olympian forces, and so would have made up just a fraction of losses. The number 16 might actually make sense if it were just the number of campers lost, but that’s not what Hecate said, she said total.

It might be significant that Hecate is the actual source of this misinformation. Would she have reason to lie to her own son, or might she herself be out of the loop. Right now, we just can’t know. 

And she might be underestimating Titan Army losses too. Considering how many times a wave of several hundred monsters tear into Manhattan, and get thrown back by the Olympians only to return later with no discernable drop in numbers, until the army is finally routed entirely, it wouldn’t surprise me if the TA actually took a thousand or more casualties. But those would be overwhelmingly monsters, because:

Part 2) Less Than Fifty Demigods Were Even In The Titan Army

To prove that there could not possibly have been hundreds of TA demigods killed at Manhattan, we need look no farther than Alabaster's own account.

“There was a war between the gods and titans last summer and most half-bloods–demigods like me–fought for the Olympians.” (pg 218)

So the TA could not have had more demigods than the Olympians; and they had about a hundred. There are forty campers to start with, who are quickly joined by the Hunters, who now have thirty members. Then, in the last hours of the fight, they are finally joined by the Ares cabin, which brings another thirty (jeez Ares, you animal!). So Olympus has an even hundred demigods. (The Hunters aren’t necessarily all demigods by birth, but I don’t think Alabaster would make a distinction based on that.)

So the TA has less than a hundred demigods, significantly less. I would argue they probably had no more than fifty because that lines up with the only solid numbers we ever get for them. And every time the TA is described, demigods are a clear minority. First, look at the foes Percy encounters when he infiltrates the Princess Andromeda:

I saw monsters patrolling the upper decks of the ship–dracaenae snake-women, hellhounds, giants, and the humanoid seal-demons known as telkhines . . . . . “I don’t care what your nose says!” snarled a half-human half-dog voice—a telkhine. “The last time you smelled half-blood, it turned out to be a meatloaf sandwich!” “Meatloaf sandwiches are good!” a second voice snarled . . . . . a telkhine was hunched over a console . . . . . a half dozen telkhines were tromping down the stairs . . . . . past another telkhine . . . . . And in the fountain squatted a giant crab . . . . . a couple of dracaenae slithered across my path . . . . . As I was running up the stairwell, a kid charged down . . . . . Laistrygonian giants filed in on either side of the swimming pool . . . . . demigod archers appeared on the roof . . . . . two hellhounds leapt down . . . . . The crowed of monsters parted . . . . . Giants jeered. Dracaenae hissed with laughter . . . . . throwing monsters off their feet . . . . .I knew him, of course: Ethan Nakamura . . . . . two giants lumbered forward . . . . . Panicked monsters surged backward . . . . . one of the dracaenae hissed . . . . . I pushed through a crowd of monsters . . . . . Monsters yelled at me from  above.

That was a quick summary of all the enemies Percy and Charlie encounter on the Princess Andromeda, I’m not crazy enough to try and write the whole chapter. But it’s pretty clear there are only a few demigods amid dozens of monsters. We hear the same thing from Poseidon later, that “there were only a few demigod warriors aboard that ship”; we might question whether or not Poseidon is a trustworthy source, but the evidence does back him up.

When we finally get to the battle, the disparity of demigod numbers in the TA is again evident:

The bronze image showed Long Island Sound near La Guardia. A fleet of a dozen speed boats raced through the dark water toward Manhattan. Each boat was packed with demigods in full Greek armor. At the back of the lead boat, a purple banner emblazoned with a black scythe flapped in the night wind. I’d never seen that design before, but it wasn’t hard to figure out: the battle flag of Kronos. “Scan the perimeter of the island,” I said. “Quick.” Annabeth shifted the scene south to the harbor. A Staten Island Ferry was plowing through the waves near Ellis Island. The deck was crowded with dracaenae and a whole pack of hellhounds. Swimming in front of the ship was a pod of marine mammals. At first I thought they were dolphins. Then I saw their doglike faces and swords strapped to their waists, and I realized they were telkhines—sea demons. The scene shifted again: the Jersey shore, right at the entrance of the Lincoln Tunnel. A hundred assorted monsters were marching past the lanes of stopped traffic: giants with clubs, rogue Cyclopes, a few fire-spitting dragons, and just to rub it in, a World War II-era Sherman tank, pushing cars out of the way as it rumbled into the tunnel. (pg 167)

Here we see the first wave of the Titan Army as a three pronged attack (which Percy says on the next page collectively numbered at least 300) and only one of the units has demigods. It’s the one that Kronos leads, so it’s probably meant to be a more elite unit, at least at first. 

We don’t know for sure how many there are. Speedboats are usually made to carry 4-6 people so a dozen would be possible 48 to 72. Considering Alabaster says there were significantly less demigods in the TA than the Olympians, I would guess it’s on the lower end; and that does match another number we see in a moment.

This fleet never reaches Manhattan, since Percy bribes the East River to swamp their boats. Those who say many TA demigods were killed in the battle might point to this as Percy causing a bunch of kids to drown; but Alabaster never mentions a mass drowning in his narrative of the battle, and he would have been on one of those boats, so it’s safe to say they just went for a swim.

(And Kronos was with them, which means that a very angry titan lord was suddenly pitched into the river and had to swim with the rest of them. That’s not really relevant, I just want everyone to know that.)

Percy is then immediately told that “Another army is marching over the Williamsburg bridge.” This fourth prong of the attack, led by the Minotaur, also has no demigods in it.

An entire phalanx of dracaenae marched in the lead . . . About a hundred more monsters marched behind them. (pg 182) More monsters surged forward —snakes and giants and telkines—but the Minotaur roared at them, and they backed off. (pg 186)

But more monsters keep advancing because by the time Percy kills the minotaur and the demigods charge and rout the whole group, it had grown to 200

Finally, the monsters turned and fled—about twenty left alive out of two hundred. (pg 188)

So the grand total for the first TA attack was 500 soldiers or more, with only 40-70 of them demigods. And after the monsters on the Williamsburg bridge retreat, those demigods show back up.

Then I saw the crowd at the base of the bridge. The retreating monsters were running straight toward their reinforcements. It was a small group, maybe thirty or forty demigods in battle armor, mounted on skeletal horses. One of them held a purple banner with the black scythe design.  The lead horseman trotted forward. He took off his helm, and I recognized Kronos himself, his eyes like molten gold. (pg1 188)

This is the only time we get anywhere close to a specific number when TA demigods are concerned. It would have been the same group that was sunk in the East River, who then had to swim for Brooklynn; which is where they are now trying to take the Williamsburg bridge. This reinforces the idea that the number of demigods in the boats was only a little more than forty, since they would not have suffered more than a few injuries in the sinkings.

I’m going to come back to this moment later to demonstrate how Percy refrains from killing other demigods, even in his Achilles state, but the other important thing to note is that this is the last time Kronos organizes his demigods into a unit that he leads personally. After they fail to break through here, Kronos just has them take on a secondary role, and puts his faith in bigger and bigger monsters to lead the charge instead.

The Titan Army units on Long Island then spend the evening marching the long way around Manhattan (for some reason) because they make camp for the night in New Jersey, at Medusa’s old lair. Percy again describes demigods as the small minority.

Hundreds of tents and fires surrounded the property. Mostly I saw monsters, but there were some human mercenaries in combat fatigues and demigods in armor too. A purple-and-black banner hung outside the emporium, guarded by two huge blue Hyperboreans.

And this is only part of the Titan army, because there are more troops north of Manhattan. 

“Tell my brother Hyperion to move our main force south into Central Park. The halfbloods will be in such disarray they will not be able to defend themselves.” (pg 237)

The army that marches into central park is bigger than the one camped in New Jersey. And it is made up exclusively of monsters. 

At the north end of the reservoir, the enemy vanguard broke through the woods—a warrior in golden armor leading a battalion of Laistrygonian giants with huge bronze axes. Hundreds of other monsters poured out behind them. (pg 243)

There is not a single mention of a demigod. However they’re already joining the fight in other places. 

When it flew above the rooftops, I could see fires here and there around the city. It looked like my friends were having a rough time. Kronos was attacking on several fronts. (pg 251)  

After Percy kills the Clazmonian Sow, the momentum of the battle shifts. With his main force failing to deliver a knockout punch, Kronos has his remaining armies spread out to put equal pressure on the entire defensive line, and catch it in a massive envelopment.

Midtown was a war zone. We flew over little skirmishes everywhere. A giant was ripping up trees in Bryant Park while dryads pelted him with nuts. Outside the Waldorf Astoria, a bronze statue of Benjamin Franklin was whacking a hellhound with a rolled-up newspaper. A trio of Hephaestus campers fought a squad of dracaenae in the middle of Rockefeller Center . . . . . The hunters had set up a defensive line on 37th, just three blocks north of Olympus. To the east on Park Avenue, Jake Mason and some other Hephaestus campers were leading an army of statues against the enemy. To the west, the Demeter cabin and Grover’s nature spirits had turned Sixth Avenue into a jungle that was hampering a  squadron of Kronos’s demigods . . . . . I spotted a familiar silver owl banner in the southeast corner of the fight, 33rd at the Park Avenue tunnel. Annabeth and two of her siblings were holding back a Hyperborean giant . . . . . The next hour was a blur. I fought like I’d never fought before—wading into legions of dracaenae, taking out dozens of telkines with every strike, destroying empousai and knocking out enemy demigods . . . . . At one point Grover was next to me, bonking snake women over the head with his cudgel. Then he disappeared in the crowd, and it was Thalia at my side, driving monsters back with the power of her magic shield. Mrs. O’Leary bounded out of nowhere, picked up a Laistrygonian giant in her mouth and flung him like a Frisbee. Annabeth used her invisibility cap to sneak behind enemy lines. Whenever a monster disintegrated for no apparent reason with a surprised look on his face, I knew Annabeth had been there . . . . . Kronos was riding towards us on a golden chariot. A dozen Laistrygonian giants bore torches before him. Two Hyperboreans carried his black-and-purple banners . . .

“THEN THE WINGED HUSSAARSSS AARRRIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIVVVVVVED” SABATON BLASTS ON ELECTRIC GUITAR

 Sorry, sorry, I mean then Chiron and the 500 centaurs arrived!

Kronos’s forces looked as confused as we were. Giants lowered their clubs. Dracaenae hissed. Even Kronos’s honor guard looked uneasy. Then, to our left, a hundred monsters cried out at once. Kronos’s entire northern flank surged forward. I thought we were doomed, but they didn’t attack. They ran straight past us and crashed into their southern allies . . . a shower of arrows arced over our heads and slammed into the enemy, vaporizing hundreds of demons. (pg 258)

This is how the second phase of the battle ends. And during the entire night, out of a sea of monsters (hehe) we only see one unit of TA demigods. And it’s the last time we get any reference to them participating in the battle.

After being driven south, the TA apparently did another long march, because they make camp northeast of Manhattan.

The Titan army had set up camp all around the U.N. complex. The flagpoles were hung with horrible trophies—helmets and armor from defeated campers. All along First Avenue, giants sharpened their axes. Telkines repaired armor at makeshift forges. (pg 282)

Ethan is the only demigod mentioned this time. And he doesn’t appear to take part in the next attack, aside from releasing the drakon. We get less of a description of the enemy army this time, but it’s all monsters.

The rest of the battle wasn’t going well. The centaurs had panicked under the onslaught of giants and demons. An occasional orange camp T-shirt appeared in the sea of fighting, but quickly disappeared.  (pg 289)

Of course the Ares cabin arrives, the drakon kills Silena, and Clarisse kills it. It’s another rout for the TA.

The monsters retreated toward 35th Street. (pg 298) There was no answer from the enemy. Slowly, they began to fall back behind a dracaenae shield wall, while Clarisse drove in circles around Fifth Avenue, daring anyone to cross her path. (pg 299)

After that we have the final phase of the battle, when the Titan Army finally breaks through the Olympian lines. But once again, we have no reference to demigods other than Ethan.

The Titan Army ringed the building, standing maybe twenty feet from the doors. Kronos’s vanguard was in the lead: Ethan Nakamura, the dracaenae queen in her green armor, and two Hyperboreans. I didn’t see Prometheus. (pg 312) “ROWWF!” Mrs. O’Leary bounded toward me, ignoring the growling monsters on either side. (pg 315) There were thousands of [skeletan soldiers], and as they emerged, the titan’s monsters got jumpy and started to back up. (pg 315)     The armies of the dead clashed with the Titan’s monsters. Fifth Avenue exploded into absolute chaos. Mortals screamed and ran for cover. Demeter waved her hand and an entire column of giants turned into a wheat field. Persephone changed the dracaenae spears into sunflowers. Nico slashed and hacked his way through the enemy, trying to protect pedestrians as best as he could. My parents ran toward me , dodging monsters and zombies, but there was nothing I could do to help them. (pg 318).

The fight continues like this, until Typhon is destroyed, and the defenders are joined by the gods, and Poseidon’s army of cyclopes. It’s then that the Titan army is “massacred.” Most of the fandom thinks that the demigods were killed too, but that’s not the case.

PART 3: The TA Demigods Deserted Before The Final Battle

As Alabaster remembers it:

the war didn’t go our way. I fought on the battlefield against the enemy, but most of our allies ran. Kronos himself marched on Olympus, only to be killed by a son of Poseidon. After Kronos’s death, the Olympian gods smashed any remaining resistance. It was a massacre. “We weren’t all destroyed,” Alabaster said. “Most of the remaining half-bloods fled or were captured. They were so demoralized they joined the enemy. (pg 219)

When you look at this narrative, and compare it to The Last Olympian, it’s actually more complicated than the TA demigods simply getting massacred.

Al says that while he was fighting, most of his allies ran. That’s odd, because we don’t see the relative numbers of monsters go down at any point. What we do see, is the number of demigods go down.

As I illustrated in Part 2, the Battle of Manhattan has four distinct phases. Phase one, that ends when the Williamsburg Bridge is destroyed. The second phase, that starts when Hyperion attacks Central Park, and ends when the Party Ponies arrive. The third phase, which is all about the attack of the drakon. And the final phase, when Kronos breaks through.

We only see TA demigods in the first two phases; they attack the Williamsburg Bridge in the first phase as part of the Kronos’s main force, then in the second phase they’re relegated to a supporting role by hitting the defenders western flank. And that’s the last we see of them. After that, Etahn is the only demigod left standing in the TA. Alabaster must be somewhere in the background, as a retcon, but there’s no one beyond the two of them.

You might think that they’ve just already been killed by this point. After all, Percy blows up the Princess Andromeda, then goes into an Achilles Curse fueled berserker mode several times in the first two phases of the battle. Surely he must have killed hundreds of kids, right?

No, not even close.

Maybe not any at all.

On the Princess Andromeda Percy finds lots of monsters, but the number of demigods he finds could be counted on one hand. And the first one he meets; Percy spares him and tells him to get his friends and evacuate. We can’t prove whether or not any demigods were killed in the blast; we just know that the two we can confirm were still on board, Ethan and Alabaster, both survived. And when Alabaster recounts it, he doesn’t mention any bad losses at this point.

As for the Curse of Achilles, it doesn’t send Percy into anything like the berserker state some people think of it as. It might seem like that when Percy lets loose on the Williamsburg Bridge:

You’re going to ask how the whole “invincible” thing worked: if I magically dodged every weapon, or if the weapon hit me and just didn’t harm me. Honestly, I don’t remember. All I knew was that I wasn’t going to let these monsters invade my hometown. I sliced through armor like it was made of paper. Snake women exploded. Hellhounds melted to shadow. I slashed and stabbed and whirled, and I might have even laughed once or twice—a crazy laugh that scared me as much as it did my enemies. (pg 188)

But when push comes to shove, Percy can control the Curse, and what he does during it. That last moment was when he was fighting nothing but monsters. But when the TA demigods arrived, Percy pulled his punches like he always does.

I tried to wound his men, not kill. That slowed me down, but these weren’t monsters. They were demigods who’d fallen under Kronos’s spell. I couldn’t see faces under their helmets, but some of them had probably been my friends. I slashed the legs off their horses and made the skeletal mounts disintegrate. After the first few demigods took a spill, the rest figured out they’d better dismount and fight me on foot. (pg 189)

Percy is still in complete control of what he’s doing; even when the worst happens.

“Annabeth!” I turned in time to see her fall, clutching her arm. A demigod with a bloody knife stood over her . . . . . I locked eyes with the enemy demigod. He wore an eye patch under his helmet: Ethan Nakamura, the son of Nemesis. Somehow he’d survived the explosion on the Princess Andromeda. I slammed him in the face with my sword hilt so hard I dented his helm. (pg 190)

Percy really has all the reason to hate Ethan at this point; after Percy spared his life in Antaeus’ arena, Ethan still joined the side that had been ready to write off his death, and deliberately helped Kronos achieve his physical resurrection. Because of that Percy’s friends and even-Riordan-doesn’t-know how many mortals are going to die in the next few days; and on top of all that, Ethan just stabbed the love of his life.

And all Percy does is knock him out, maybe a little harder than necessary. He makes no effort to kill him. Those aren’t the actions of a berserker with no control.

In fact, the knife turns out to be poisonsed. And Ethan now has an idea where Percy’s Achilles Spot is, and might tell Kronos. And even after all of that, Percy doesn’t seriously think about killing him as an option.

“I’ll bonk him on the head harder next time.” (pg 241)

But more on topic, there is no reason to think the TA demigods have particularly high casualties in this phase of the battle, though they have a few:

Our archers shot a volley, bringing down several of the enemy, but they just kept riding. (pg 189)

Though it’s vague if they are hitting the riders or the horses. In fact, it might actually be Kronos who’s responsible for more of their losses.

[Kronos] struck the bridge with the butt of his scythe, and a wave of pure force blasted me backward. Cars went careening. Demigods—even Luke’s own men—were blown off the edge of the bridge. (pg 192)

I will die on the hill that between this, Ethan, and other implied moments, Kronos killed more of his own demigods than Percy did.

In the second phase of the battle, when we see the TA demigods attack again, they’re in a very different situation.

To the west, the Demeter cabin and Grover’s nature spirits had turned Sixth Avenue into a jungle that was hampering a  squadron of Kronos’s demigods. (pg 255)

This is the only thing we see the TA demigods do as a group in this phase; and they’re fighting people who are using very defensive tactics, more hampering than harmful. They’re not likely to lose many fighters. A few of them do cross Percy’s path in the chaos, but even at his most Achilles fueled chaos he never loses control.

The next hour was a blur. I fought like I’d never fought before—wading into legions of dracaenae, taking out dozens of telkines with every strike, destroying empousai and knocking out enemy demigods. (pg 257)

He talks about killing monsters, but always “knocking out” demigods. Finally, that phase of the battle ends when the centaurs show up. Did the centaurs kill any demigods? After all, Percy said they “trampled everything in their path.”

Well the only report we get on the TA demigods puts them to the west. When the centaurs attack, they come out of the north east and drive the enemy south, and start off a wave of panic that ripples down the enemy lines ahead of them. The demigods were probably running before any centaur reached them, and might have had better chances of being trampled by their own monsters.

So if the TA demigods aren’t taking many losses, where do they all go in the third and fourth phases, when we don’t see any except Ethan?

They desert. 

Alabaster: “I fought on the battlefield against the enemy, but most of our allies ran.”

I think the demigods of the TA signed up with no real idea of what would happen when they fought the Olympians. They thought they were going to have a sure victory. 

Chris Rodriguez said it in SOM:

“I hear they got two more [drakon] coming,” [Chris] said. “They keep arriving at this rate, oh, man—no contest!” (pg 122)

Alabaster C. Torrington said it in SOM:

“Kronos wasn’t supposed to lose! You said the odds of winning were in the Titan’s favor! You told me Camp Half-Blood would be destroyed!” (pg 196)

And they probably weren’t well prepared for the war either. At one point Luke says they will fight well because he has been training the army. But most of them join because they are the children of minor gods who swear for Kronos, and that doesn’t happen until the end of BOTL, after Luke has been possessed. Most of the TA demigods never got training from him; including their two highest ranking members, Ethan and Alabaster. It’s no wonder most of them weren’t prepared.

As I was running up the stairwell, a kid charged down. He looked like he had just woken up from a nap. His armor was half on. He drew his sword and yelled, “Kronos!” but he sounded more scared than angry . . . . No way was I going to hurt him. I didn’t need a weapon for this. I stepped inside his strike and grabbed his wrist, slamming it against the wall. His sword clattered out of his hand. (pg 18)

And the demigods might not hold much loyalty to Kronos, a violent and temperamental eldritch horror!

Ethan moistened his lips. “He’s still fighting you, isn’t he? Luke—” “Nonesense,” Kronos spat. “Repeat that lie, and I will cut out your tongue. The boy’s soul has been crushed.” (pg 236) “But, my lord,” Ethan said. “Your regeneration.” Kronos pointed at Ethan, and the demigod froze. “Does it seem,” Kronos hissed. “that I need to regenerate?” Ethan didn’t respond. Kind of hard to do when you’re immobilized in time. Kronos snapped his fingers and Ethan collapsed. (pg 284)

And the demigods might have witnessed a darker side to his army that we didn’t.

Back on my first visit to the Princess Andromeda, my old enemy Luke had kept dazed tourists on board for show, shrouded in Mist so they didn’t realize they were on a monster infested ship. Now i didn’t see any sign of tourists. I hated to think what had happened to them, but I kind of doubted they’d been allowed to go home with their bingo winnings. (pg 15)

So, the demigods deserted. After the second phase of the battle we don’t see any at the Titan camp at the U.N., or taking any part in the last phases of the battle. They had been fed false promises, were treated badly, and were being sent against enemies out of their league.

“Most of the remaining half-bloods fled or were captured. They were so demoralized they joined the enemy.”

All except two, Alabaster and Ethan. The son of Nemesis, who has already given so much and is so desperate to see something good and fair come out of it; and the son of Hecate, who was promised victory, and is desperate to avenge the death of his siblings. Ironically, the two demigods who stayed loyal to Kronos the longest, did so because they had faith in their godly parents.

So if there was no “massacre” of TA demigods at the end of the Battle of Manhattan, why is Alabaster so insistent that there was one? 

“Yes,” Alabaster said bitterly. “Camp Half-Blood decided that they would accept any children of the minor gods. They would build us cabins at camp and pretend that they didn’t just blindly massacre us for resisting. (pg 220) “But I’ll never bow to the Olympian gods after the atrocities they committed. Their followers are blind. I’d never set foot in their camp, and if I did, it would only be to give that son of Poseidon what he deserves.” (pg 221)

Well, it’s because the children of Hecate suffered the most in the war. She didn’t have as many children as other gods, and Alabaster was the only one to fight in it and survive. He claims he convinced “most” of his siblings to join; but if Hecate does not have many children, and he is the only survivor of the battle, how are there still enough of his siblings to decently fill a cabin, it’s likely “most” was only slightly more than half. The sad irony is that the fact that the smaller group of demigods had more casualties than the larger ones (and it sounds like not just more proportionately, but more in actual numbers), also kind of disproves that there could have been a large massacre that affected them all.

Alabaster was a scared, frustrated, exhausted kid; who convinced his siblings to fight in a destructive war, and was the only one of them to survive. To him, that is probably always going to feel like a brutal massacre.

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