Zelda!!

Zelda Donovan was a character first introduced in the Dimension 20 campaign 'Fantasy High' as a side character, and was brought back as a main character in the spin-off campaign 'The Seven'.

Funnily enough, The Seven captured my interest in a way that Fantasy High didn't do at first, and so I watched the spin-off campaign long before I watched the bulk of the story. I actually went back to watch Fantasy High for the sole reason of learning more about the Seven Maiden's origins, although I did wind up liking the campaign for its own merit as the story and characters progressed. BUT Zelda had already captured my heart, and there's so much about her that I absolutely love.

Honestly, what really caught my heart right away was the way the other members of The Seven interact with and care for Zelda. The group as a whole is supremely open with their affection and love for each other, and they look out for one another both on and off the battlefield, but I feel like their fondness towards Zelda tends to be even more overt. I love the way they accept and accommodate her momentary rages, and the way they check in with her to make sure she isn't feeling too overwhelmed by their interactions or surroundings. Moments like Sam sacrificing the impact of her enterance to the Masquerade Party in order to help cover Zelda's fumble, and Penny and Ostentatia encouraging her to be more open about her irritation, like in the clip below:

Feels like if you've spent any time on this site, it goes without saying that I headcanon Zelda as autistic. Her anger/rage is actually a very important part of that headcanon to me; I struggle a lot with self-recrimination surrounding my own anger - it's always the emotion that surges to the front when I'm experiencing sensory or cognitive overload, and even when I'm able to control the urge to lash out, I still always feel guilty about it afterwards. I appreciate so much how Zelda is allowed to have these outbursts, that the other characters accept her snarling and growling as a form of communication in its own right - not something that needs to be admonished or corrected. When Zelda rages, her friends listen to what she's saying without ever getting defensive, which is actually a running theme surrounding a lot of Dimension 20 characters, which is awesome!

Similarly, I also love the way the others respond to Zelda's speech patterns. She is a very anxious and withdrawn person, and her speech tends to be very cluttered and disorganized - she takes a lot of pauses in between words to pick what the next one will be, and her sentences are littered with "Um's" and "Like's". When Zelda realizes the amount of time it's taking her to complete a sentence, she'll often interrupt herself to apologize, and the others will immediately reassure her that she can take her time, and that they care about what she has to say (and usually take the space to compliment her in a variety of other ways as well lol). Like it's just really nice to see a character not only accommodated for her differences, but embraced because of them!! I love it a lot <3

There are, of course, plenty of individual character details about her that I love. I love the way she's described as 'moshing by herself' when she puts in earbuds to listen to her favorite metal music while feeling overstimulated at a party. The fact that she has a tendency to eat/chew on non-food objects when she's nervous or bored (since she's a satyr). The way she also makes space for her friends to open up and express themselves - and the fact that she's not actually very good at following through in the aftermath! I love the fact that she's allowed to try, even though it's clear that the initial outreach was all she had an actual script for. I love that - even though she has been shown to have some varying levels of discomfort with her rages - she will hold anger on her friends' behalfs, until they're willing/able to express their own anger that they had been surpressing. She's awkward and uncertain, but such a good friend - I love how often she's the one being overtly physically affectionate with the others. ALSO!!! Love how often she snorts and snarls and growls - I used to stim with 'animal noises' a lot as a kid and they're still so much fun when I'm able to let myself do them, every time I hear Zelda snort I want to squeal in delight