So...about those factionless affiliations. Why not? Just because people weren't inspired to create them back then is no reason not to add them to the roster now. Every faction has to begin somewhere—and inspiration can strike any time.

For example: all I did was make a post here on my blog, and immediately hearts_blood came back with the name that she's always felt to be the right one for a faction for Daniel, the Cockney boy from the flashback to "Father Figure". The FORKNI-L post I made also got an immediate reaction from Brenda B., who had the name for the Nick & Schanke faction. How can one argue against such promptitude? Clearly, they must be right.

Add in a couple of factions that were equally obvious to me, and...here's the first installment.



Feliksities:

I've mentioned the Feliksities more than once (though I must admit that I also toyed with the name "Happy Twisters" for the affiliation). Although my main faction is the Die-Hards, with whom I played in the last war, I have a soft spot for Feliks. Not so much because of his financial skills, you understand, useful though they may be to the Die-Hards. Rather, I love gardening, as does he. Mind you, I do mine out of doors.

The Feliksities are, in a way, almost where this project started. You see, after War 13, I made webpages for all my posts. To give them a common theme, I created a Die-Hard symbol—the same one seen on their icon—and used it to create a border background that I used on all the story pages. I did think of making a Die-Hard website and putting up all our posts; and then I thought that, since, for all that she was playing with the Die-Hards, Chanda's posts were really Ravenette ones, I should make a Ravenette background to decorate them. So I did that—but then didn't use it after all. I did, however, go on to make a Feliksity background; and then I made a few for other factions; and then I wondered what the point was, since no one would ever use them, personal websites being a bit out of fashion. So, in the end, I decided to make icons.

Which brings me back to Feliks. The Feliksity background that I made had a paisley border; and, although that particular pattern didn't work well at icon size, I did fancy paisley. A bit of googling turned up a lovely rosy one which I cropped to a suitable size.

I then needed a flower—either a single blossom or a bunch. My usual garden flowers wouldn't do, of course, since Feliks has to tend his plants indoors. So I picked something rather tropical, and only had to modify the colour very slightly to match the background.

For the logo, I hunted floral and leafy fonts, and found Leafy Glade at dafont.com.




Artful Dodgers:

The Artful Dodger is, of course, the young thief from Oliver Twist. So it's easy to see why hearts_blood suggested that Daniel's faction ought to be called the Dodgers, or Artful Dodgers: after all, we first see him trying to steal Janette's purse.

The flashback to "Father Figure" is set in London during the Blitz, so I looked for colour pictures of this to serve as the background. Failing something suitable, I looked for modern pictures with this subject. The first one I picked almost worked; but this one proved to be more successful.

Both hearts_blood and I felt that the best symbol for Daniel would be the toy fire engine that Nick and Janette give him. A bit of googling turned up this picture, which I think comes from the cover of a box that once held such a toy. With the colour slightly intensified (to compensate, I suspect, for fading over the years), it tones in very nicely with the faint pink in the background graphic—and, of course, gave me the colour for the logo.






PotM (or Partners of the Month):

When I posted about non-existent factions to FORKNI-L, I pointed out that, if couple factions need not be romantic (and the CotK certainly isn't) then there was an obvious missing faction—that for Nick and Schanke. By return post, so to speak, Brenda suggested the "PotM" or "Partners of the Month" faction. From now on, anyone who writes a buddy story about the two cops chatting in the squad room or on stake-out can describe it as "a PotM story"; and we'll all understand exactly what is meant, right?

So here's their icon.

Dominating the background is, of course, the Partners of the Month plaque that so thrilled Schanke when he and Nick were awarded it. In the foreground is a nice friendly pic of the two of them in a convivial moment. So far, so obvious.

To round it out, I added two more elements: a bottle of unlabelled "wine" and a head of garlic. The former represents all the bottles that Schanke so fretted over in Nick's fridge, not to mention those found there by I.A. when Nick was framed for murder. The latter is, of course, Nick's big bugaboo—especially when Schanke's just been eating a garlic-laden pizza.

The icon has been made in two versions, with the name either abbreviated or written in full. In both cases, the blue-grey tones have been picked up from Nick's clothes, tying the icon together visually. However, it was necessary to use a darker shade in the "PotM" version so the letters would show up well.




Brabantines:

The Brabantines are obviously fans intrigued by Nick's life before he was brought over—especially his childhood and youth, and his relationship with his family.

The icon is a simple one, consisting just of the Brabant coat of arms with the name of the faction. The Brabant lion, by the way, is properly depicted rearing upright, in gold with red tongue and claws (a lion rampant or, armed and langued gules, in heraldic terms), and is displayed on a black (or sable) ground.

The logo, in Gothic-style lettering, echoes the red and gold of the lion.