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So, my main alterhuman identity, at least currently, is Parado from Kamen Rider Ex-Aid, or Kamen Rider Para-DX. The former leader of the bugsters, who went through a journey to find his heart, and fought through anxiety and guilt to go from an immature being who didn't care about the consequences of his actions to a man with a true heart. However, he's not the only one. I've talked a bit in my longform writing about my other identities, such as my long-term identification with (and occasionally as, maybe) Takumi Inui from Kamen Rider Faiz, and how his journey to overcome his isolationist habits and find his dream in life mirrored my early life to a nearly uncanny degree. Here I'm gonna talk about a couple of my flicktypes, cameotypes and similar, my more temporary identities that fluctuate a lot more compared to my main fictotype, for example, and how they've arrived, changed, and faded over time.
I've had quite a few of these sorts of identities, and I want to start with the one that made me realise that I had them: Takatora Kureshima, or Kamen Rider Zangetsu (Shin), from Kamen Rider Gaim. I started watching Gaim after I finished re-watching Ex-Aid in May 2022, and I finished it in August while on holiday in Italy, of all things. Anyway, I connected to him originally because I saw my dad in his serious demeanor, and his realistic, near Stoic outlook on life, and his father figure relationship to his brother, Mitsuzane/Mitchy. I won't talk about the whole plot of Gaim here, but basically in the show, he starts as a main antagonist, working as the head of R&D for the Yggdrasil corporation, convinced that the only way to save humanity is to follow through with 'Project Ark', a plan to eliminate 6/7ths of humanity to allow the surviving 1 billion people to live in an alternate alien forest dimension that's invading the world. However, he ultimately finds another way in potentially negotiating with the dimension's leaders, before being saved from death by their king, however his plan failed, and he could not stop the invasion, and in the end, he was nearly killed by his brother before being saved from death again by the protagonist, Kouta, who had since became a god of sorts... It's confusing, I know. Takatora was my favourite while watching Gaim, and I got a few very odd shifts for him throughout my watch and for a bit afterwards, I think due to how similar me and my dad are, and due to as stated before, seeing my dad in him. Nowadays, several months on, he exists as a hearttype, or maybe a synpath. I still have alterhuman feelings for him, but it's a semi-familial connection, rather then a shift, or an identify as connection... It's interesting how much my connection to him has changed in a relatively short time. I never got much noemata for him, I guess due to how it was more of an identify with identity compared to some of my other identities, and how short my shifts for him were.
My next identity was for Souji Kusakabe, or Kamen Rider Dark Kabuto, from the 2006 season of Kamen Rider, Kabuto. He was some sort of cameotype, or short-term fictionflicker. In the show, he was a human boy, who was kidnapped by an organisation called ZECT, created by aliens called the Native Worms, who experimented on him to basically create time travel technology, slowly stripping him of his humanity and turning him into a Worm himself. After he is freed from the cut off Area X by the ZECT higher ups, he mimics the protagonist of Kabuto, Souji Tendou, and takes on his old identity as Kusakabe and becomes a Rider, wanting to, in his eyes, protect his younger sister, Hiyori Kusakabe, by taking her to the edge of the universe to live with her. In the end however, Tendou stops him, and he sacrifices his life in the final battle to stop the ZECT higher ups from turning all of humanity into Worms like he was, and does die a hero. Souji is an interesting case, because I think I might've had a weak connection to him all the way back in 2016, as he was always my favourite from Kabuto, even though I was very unfamiliar with the season until I started watching it a few months ago, and got about halfway through before school restarting forced me to put it to one side for now. I have a very small figure of him I remember getting... he's very cute. Anyway, my Souji identity first appeared while I was watching Kabuto, when I got sudden flashes of noemata for him, mainly him being freed from Area X, before the man in Area X was actually revealed to be him, and I think some stuff about him getting his powers. This sudden flood of noemata gave me a short identity crisis, as I started to wonder if I had a second fictotype in him, however, the identity soon faded away just as fast as it appeared, as I stopped watching Kabuto. I still feel some connection to him, and some of the noemata still exists, but the identity as component has completely gone, and the strength of the connection has diminished a lot, unless I think about him a lot, with even Kabuto edits not really bringing it back. Dark Kabuto has since become some kind of synpath, I suppose, even though the fact I got strong noemata for him, and he became a flicker rather than just a cameotype, is a pretty interesting distinction. I don't know, my brain acts in weird ways sometimes, especially when it comes to Kamen Rider and alterhumanity.
For some reason, something tangentially related to this is that often my brain likes to latch onto 1 character specifically for each season of Kamen Rider I watch. It doesn't happen in every case, but it's where a lot of my alterhuman identities start. My latest experience with this was another very brief cameotype for Keiwa Sakurai, or Kamen Rider Tycoon, from Kamen Rider Geats, the latest season, a job-hunting uni student taking part in a battle royale for first a wish of world peace, and then to revive all those lost in previous rounds of the game. I'm still not sure why I connected to him briefly, I guess it's because his story at the end of Arc 1 really scratched my brain when I was watching and daydreaming about it on the bus to school to my specific playlist for Geats, but it was the briefest identity I have. I don't really feel any connection to him anymore, apart from the usual favourite character kind of feeling. My alterhuman identities feel... different. There's more of a connection, a more personal element to them, usually because I draw a connection between my own life and theirs. I may not identify as them, but maybe for a short period, or maybe for a while, they're an important part of my alterhumanity and my identity as a whole, and I can confide quite a lot in these connections and identities.
I'm most well known as Parado, but I'm also lots of other Riders, too. I was, and still carry bits of, Takumi Inui, now as a hearttype, and somewhat as a representation of past me, and I've had bits and connections and parallels to many others, such as Takatora, Keiwa and Souji. In the end, I'm Kamen Rider fictionkind, but not just for Paradox. I've got lots of other, if less all encompassing and permament, identify withs, and sometimes as, which deserve some love too. This topic often isn't talked about a lot as well, so I hope you can maybe see yourself in my experiences, and finally have some words for what you experience, or at least, understand the concepts of cameotypes and fictionflickers a little more. This is just one take on more temporary identities, but in the end, there isn't just one way to be alterhuman, but many, whether they exist for your whole life, or just a couple of days.
Clumpy
I've had quite a few of these sorts of identities, and I want to start with the one that made me realise that I had them: Takatora Kureshima, or Kamen Rider Zangetsu (Shin), from Kamen Rider Gaim. I started watching Gaim after I finished re-watching Ex-Aid in May 2022, and I finished it in August while on holiday in Italy, of all things. Anyway, I connected to him originally because I saw my dad in his serious demeanor, and his realistic, near Stoic outlook on life, and his father figure relationship to his brother, Mitsuzane/Mitchy. I won't talk about the whole plot of Gaim here, but basically in the show, he starts as a main antagonist, working as the head of R&D for the Yggdrasil corporation, convinced that the only way to save humanity is to follow through with 'Project Ark', a plan to eliminate 6/7ths of humanity to allow the surviving 1 billion people to live in an alternate alien forest dimension that's invading the world. However, he ultimately finds another way in potentially negotiating with the dimension's leaders, before being saved from death by their king, however his plan failed, and he could not stop the invasion, and in the end, he was nearly killed by his brother before being saved from death again by the protagonist, Kouta, who had since became a god of sorts... It's confusing, I know. Takatora was my favourite while watching Gaim, and I got a few very odd shifts for him throughout my watch and for a bit afterwards, I think due to how similar me and my dad are, and due to as stated before, seeing my dad in him. Nowadays, several months on, he exists as a hearttype, or maybe a synpath. I still have alterhuman feelings for him, but it's a semi-familial connection, rather then a shift, or an identify as connection... It's interesting how much my connection to him has changed in a relatively short time. I never got much noemata for him, I guess due to how it was more of an identify with identity compared to some of my other identities, and how short my shifts for him were.
My next identity was for Souji Kusakabe, or Kamen Rider Dark Kabuto, from the 2006 season of Kamen Rider, Kabuto. He was some sort of cameotype, or short-term fictionflicker. In the show, he was a human boy, who was kidnapped by an organisation called ZECT, created by aliens called the Native Worms, who experimented on him to basically create time travel technology, slowly stripping him of his humanity and turning him into a Worm himself. After he is freed from the cut off Area X by the ZECT higher ups, he mimics the protagonist of Kabuto, Souji Tendou, and takes on his old identity as Kusakabe and becomes a Rider, wanting to, in his eyes, protect his younger sister, Hiyori Kusakabe, by taking her to the edge of the universe to live with her. In the end however, Tendou stops him, and he sacrifices his life in the final battle to stop the ZECT higher ups from turning all of humanity into Worms like he was, and does die a hero. Souji is an interesting case, because I think I might've had a weak connection to him all the way back in 2016, as he was always my favourite from Kabuto, even though I was very unfamiliar with the season until I started watching it a few months ago, and got about halfway through before school restarting forced me to put it to one side for now. I have a very small figure of him I remember getting... he's very cute. Anyway, my Souji identity first appeared while I was watching Kabuto, when I got sudden flashes of noemata for him, mainly him being freed from Area X, before the man in Area X was actually revealed to be him, and I think some stuff about him getting his powers. This sudden flood of noemata gave me a short identity crisis, as I started to wonder if I had a second fictotype in him, however, the identity soon faded away just as fast as it appeared, as I stopped watching Kabuto. I still feel some connection to him, and some of the noemata still exists, but the identity as component has completely gone, and the strength of the connection has diminished a lot, unless I think about him a lot, with even Kabuto edits not really bringing it back. Dark Kabuto has since become some kind of synpath, I suppose, even though the fact I got strong noemata for him, and he became a flicker rather than just a cameotype, is a pretty interesting distinction. I don't know, my brain acts in weird ways sometimes, especially when it comes to Kamen Rider and alterhumanity.
For some reason, something tangentially related to this is that often my brain likes to latch onto 1 character specifically for each season of Kamen Rider I watch. It doesn't happen in every case, but it's where a lot of my alterhuman identities start. My latest experience with this was another very brief cameotype for Keiwa Sakurai, or Kamen Rider Tycoon, from Kamen Rider Geats, the latest season, a job-hunting uni student taking part in a battle royale for first a wish of world peace, and then to revive all those lost in previous rounds of the game. I'm still not sure why I connected to him briefly, I guess it's because his story at the end of Arc 1 really scratched my brain when I was watching and daydreaming about it on the bus to school to my specific playlist for Geats, but it was the briefest identity I have. I don't really feel any connection to him anymore, apart from the usual favourite character kind of feeling. My alterhuman identities feel... different. There's more of a connection, a more personal element to them, usually because I draw a connection between my own life and theirs. I may not identify as them, but maybe for a short period, or maybe for a while, they're an important part of my alterhumanity and my identity as a whole, and I can confide quite a lot in these connections and identities.
I'm most well known as Parado, but I'm also lots of other Riders, too. I was, and still carry bits of, Takumi Inui, now as a hearttype, and somewhat as a representation of past me, and I've had bits and connections and parallels to many others, such as Takatora, Keiwa and Souji. In the end, I'm Kamen Rider fictionkind, but not just for Paradox. I've got lots of other, if less all encompassing and permament, identify withs, and sometimes as, which deserve some love too. This topic often isn't talked about a lot as well, so I hope you can maybe see yourself in my experiences, and finally have some words for what you experience, or at least, understand the concepts of cameotypes and fictionflickers a little more. This is just one take on more temporary identities, but in the end, there isn't just one way to be alterhuman, but many, whether they exist for your whole life, or just a couple of days.
Clumpy