Cagegirl

Cagegirl and Her Limited-Area Adventures (short title Cagegirl, often stylized as CAGEGIRL ) is an ongoing comic series told in page / graphic novel / strip format, being released by Hungarian artist Adam-00 of ComicFury and DeviantArt fame. While primarily hosted on ComicFury, the comic is also in syndication on its Facebook page and on DeviantArt, with some release delays for its syndication.

Dozerfleet Comics began promoting Adam-00's series on the Dozerfleet Database as of April 11th of 2016.

Synopsis
Young Xirzara sets out on her own into the world in an effort to learn what it means to be a hero. However, she soon learns that it is not at all what she expected it to be, in a world where nobody can be entirely trusted. Simply escaping with her life will prove difficult enough.

Plot
Note: ''The following story is still in progress. More details may follow''.

The world has been torn apart by the arrival of a new power that manifests in different ways by those enhanced with it. As such, the entire planet's political structure has been dramatically altered. In this future, the world is now divided into a "civilized" nation (presumably Hungary) and another "uncivilized" territory (possibly Britain or the United States, yet never specified.)

Bored with her do-nothing life, the enhanced Xirzara (also going by "Xira" for short) heads to the nation and attempts to strike it out on her own as a traditional superhero. However, federation forces attempt to apprehend / murder her within seconds of spotting her minding her own business. When they confirm that she is on the soil illegally, they especially make capturing her a priority. Confused, Xira fights back. This ends disastrously when she is unable to keep her powers under control. She kills one of the men that went after her. Acting impulsively and ashamed of her actions, Xira turns herself in.

She is sentenced to 11 years at the Nasraaden Prison for the Enhanced&dagger;, where she befriends a telepath named Karla. Karla is revealed to have been hard at work exposing a corrupt cartel that has infiltrated the highest offices of the government. The prisoners discover that the cartel is operating through the military, and that they have been abducting women for a slavery ring. The cartel is discovered to be using this slavery ring as a way to finance their own Social Darwinist agenda, believing it will lead to them being able to one day create a "better world" with all the enhanced they are gathering. One of the guards jokes about the use of this slavery ring to make sex slaves out of prisoners. This leads to Karla believing that all the abducted women were being used for sex; enraging Xira and Karla both.

Other prisoners have started becoming targets of this operation. The cartel discovers through their most notorious hitman, Invernay, that the prisoners have grown wise to the cartel's agenda. They attempt a preemptive strike to assassinate the prisoners, before they can save the public from the cartel's continued schemes. Invernay adopts the moniker of "the Holy Diver," and serves doubly as a propaganda minister to keep the federation's suspicions to a minimum. A doctor at Nasraaden, Maria Kralitz, is revealed to to also be a prisoner there. She helps Xira better understand the enigmatic nature of her abilities; which are "not completely formed." Maria also reveals that she was imprisoned for inventing a formula which can tap into the meta origins of abilities, and enhance almost anyone.

Karla convinces Xira to help her fight back against all the corruption around them shortly after the two rescue a woman who is being raped by some of the prison guards. On top of this, Karla's friends embark on a quest to leak information to the public about the cartel. To buy the campaign some time, Karla initiates a prison riot. The cartel descend with full military might upon the prison, and attempt to bury the prisoners alive. Invernay infiltrates the prison and assassinates Maria, convinced that her knowledge is too dangerous. Xira and Karla find a way to neutralize the prison's dampeners, enabling prisoners to use their abilities to fight back. Xira uses her abilities to save the prisoners from a death trap, only for a violent bloodbath to ensue once they make it to the surface. As many as possible escape and warn the public about the cartel's illicit activities. However, most of the prisoners are slaughtered brutally and immediately. Xira buys them as much time as possible; but she is ultimately exhausted and recaptured. Invernay makes certain that Karla is among those viciously slaughtered, especially since he has learned that she used her telepathy to memorize Maria's formula.

A military-based enhanced going by the alias "Artillery" is sent in to finish off the prisoners that hadn't yet fed or been killed. However, she is distracted when the disillusioned prison captain, Jari Hallanen, rebels and tries to prevent further slaughter. The cartel members try in vain to minimize their bad press after witnessing Artillery's ultra-violence, by betraying Artillery and having her arrested along with Jari. The two are held in secret, with plans to execute them without trial or public awareness. However, Artillery intercepts the plan and helps herself and Jari escape, further planning to expose the cartel for their betrayals.

Xira's mother Xemzara, also intercepts the news. She begins to suspect that her daughter has been taken hostage, and heads to the "civilized" nation in order to learn the terms of Xira's release. Xema blames herself for Xira's predicament, claiming that neglecting Xira so often "pushed her to this." Members of the cartel plot to assassinate Xema; but that ends badly when not even Invernay can get close enough to her to do any damage. They scheme a way to lure "Suncore" into another, smarter-built trap.

Meanwhile, it's revealed that Minister of Defense Michael Harrington is the cartel's secretive leader. One of the surviving prisoners goes to the media, exposing Harrington and his cartel in graphic detail. The public is outraged by the cartel in ideology most of all; yet it is made very clear that they find the excessive violence with which the prisoners were slaughtered to be barbaric. They also find the slavery ring repulsive. Prime Minister Martha Neibel calls Harrington into her office; and demands he resign for causing the regime such total disgrace. He instead uses Invernay to abduct Martha, thus staging a mini-coup to assume direct control of the whole nation.

Xira awakes on a moon base next to some other prisoners, and quickly sets to work with the others in converting the base into a spaceship to aid their return to Earth. She learns from one of the older prisoners, a man named Tomas, about how Invernay became the Diver. She promises to go easy on all of Tomas' creations, except for Invernay - whom she vows to make suffer in order to avenge Karla and Maria. Meanwhile, Xema attempts to negotiate for Xira's freedom a second time, and discovers it to be yet another trap. Xira flies in to her rescue.

Characters
There are a huge number of characters in the series, many of which are not named outright in the novel itself. The following is a partial list of some of the most prominent cast members:


 * Xirzara "Xira" Kevendsdotter: The daughter of a legendary man named Kevend, Xira believes she is destined to do great things to ensure the sort of "better world" that she once saw advertised, leading to her visiting the Civilized Nation in order to contribute the old-fashioned way. Her powers are highly unstable, yet she is too ideology-driven to let it stop her.  Her abilities seem to mostly revolve around dissolution of matter, though this can be repurposed to re-arrange matter or to heal injuries.  This leads to Maria claiming that Xira's powers are "not fully-formed," granting her multiple applications whereas most others have only one or two practical applications for theirs.  Xira is mostly-good-natured yet quick-tempered, and is highly impulsive - even to her own peril.  This leads to her frequently making snap judgments that come back to haunt her often.  Her patronymic surname on this database is for organizational purposes only: individuals outside the "Civilized" Nation are seldom granted the luxury of true surnames.  In the territories, she was often described as merely "the daughter of Kevend."  Xira tends to be a polarizing figure, making strong friends and enemies very quickly everywhere she goes.  Her formal first name, according to Adam-00, is derived from the Kazakh language word зілзала (zilzala), meaning "earthquake."  Not surprisingly, she has many parallels to Daisy "Quake" Johnson from Marvel's Agents of SHIELD.


 * Xemzera "Xemza" Kevendswif / Suncore: Xira's mother, who blames herself for Xira's wandering off and getting into trouble. She attempts to get her daughter back; but learns just how corrupt and dangerous Harrington's men are very quickly.  Not as impulsive as Xira, she is every bit as dangerous - and arguably a lot harder to subdue.  She can make herself almost as hot as the sun's core, leading to her enemies being genuinely terrified of her.


 * Karla Rentzdon: A telepathic prisoner at Nasraaden, who befriends Xira rather quickly. She is a hot-blooded political activist who believes the entire regime in charge of the Civilized Nation is a scam, and will not hesitate to instigate riots if need be to expose them as such.  She claims to Xira upon her capture that she's in for "not being able to keep quiet," claiming "it's the worst crime there is."  Upon trying to copy Maria's formula, Karla essentially seals her own fate.


 * Artillery:


 * Jari Hallanen:


 * Martha Niebel: Prime minister of the Civilized Nation. She wants to maintain a peaceful society and find a way for enhanced and non-enhanced to live in peace.  She initially has Maria imprisoned upon belief that Maria's knowledge of how to enhanced the not-already-enhanced is too dangerous.  However, she also discovers that her minister of defense is corrupt.


 * minister of defense-Michael Harrington


 * Diver Invernay


 * Ultimate-János


 * (additional info pending)


 * Old man on moon-Tomas

Development
(This section pending review.)

Visual style
Most visual panels appear to be drawn in a by-hand style that, while not true anime / manga, shows definite leanings of being manga-inspired. Colors are an improved version of the final ending panel of Daredoers, another English-written comic strip by the same author. While Daredoers is mostly black-and-white, Cagegirl is done from the get-go in full color.

Characters and placement also take a lot of cues from other works by Adam-00's other work, though much of the nudity is toned down or implied in Cagegirl in situations where it'd be more explicit in other works. Unlike true manga, where mouths tend to be highly expressive, Cagegirl suppresses manga's mouth emphasis in favor of using eye placement and eyebrows to be the main communicators of expression. While most themes of sex and nudity are muffled, violence is seldom given the same treatment. Blood is common, although actual gore is seldom. However, little was held back during the prison riot outcome scenes, where it was shown the Karla had very much been torn in two during the fighting.

Manga emphasis on fancy hair is also subdued considerably for most characters, with Xira herself being an exception.

Themes
(This section pending review.)

Cagegiggles
As a way to both promote interest in Adam-00's comic and take advantage of it, Camelorum Adventures features a fanfic crossover dubbed "Cagegiggles," in which the Percolation sends Candace, Carly, and Emily to a world resembling that of Adam's comic. The three future Camelry members quickly and unwittingly draw attention to themselves from Xira and Karla, who are friendlier than anticipated. The Percolation also sends a xerox of Inigo Montoya to irritate the girls, but Candace turns him into a piece of broccoli.

The blue-skinned guard that rebels later on in the comic spots the three of them, and Candace negotiates for them to see the doctor after confessing they were involuntarily dumped in Nadasreen from another world. The guard gets security to agree to hold the three Camelorum girls in the doctor's office until they can learn more about the Percolation and how it works - and how much a threat to their own world it may pose.

The doctor at Nadasareen examines the Camelorum girls, and discovers that their energy signatures are all very similar - however, Carly has a "double dose" of it powering her. Candace concludes that the XomiaFaeCore is powering all three of them, and that the lair Emily found was Xiboruty's. Carly wonders if she weren't also abducted by Xiboruty, who then simply erased her memories. This would mean she's not a "glitch in the universe," as was thought by the Camelorum staff. The doctor warns Carly that Xiboruty was probably not her only donor, and that the mixture of donations could make her extremely unstable.

Just then, the military guys attempt to abduct Emily. Carly and Candace sneak out of Nadasareen and follow a suspicious truck that delivers Emily to a private residence. The men inside attempt to rape Emily after the military leaves; but Carly and Candace intercept. The men are able to resist Candace's powers with their own; yet they irritate Carly. This leads to the house blowing up, and to Emily's slaveowners being transformed into near-look-alikes of Beavis and Butt-Head - with fly eyes. The three Camelorum girls remove their prison uniforms and flee into the streets to find a place to lay low until they can be Percolated home. They infiltrate a log cabin and use it to blog to the world about the slavery ring they've uncovered. They confess to being extradimensional aliens who've made a mess of things, and also warn the public that the Percolation may not yet be done messing with their worlds.

A security notice goes up to the cabin owners that their cabin internet access has been tapped into without permission, and helicopters are sent to the area. The girls escape when a man in a nearby cabin who is attracted to Emily assists them in hiding in his cabin. Emily's hair changes to brunette on its own, allowing her to hide her identity while the other two hide beneath the floorboards. Police discover Freddy and his "girlfriend" "Anya" making out; but are fooled by the ruse. They attempt to do a scan for enhanced individuals; but it is to no avail, since their scanners are not sensitive to the XomiaFaeCore. The officers order Fred and "Anya" to prove that they are a couple by going to the bedroom. Emily agrees with Fred's gesture to play along, though she makes it clear she is unhappy about the police inviting themselves in to watch. Beneath the floorboards, Carly and Candace share their disgust that their efforts to protect Emily were in vain.

After police leave, Fred lets Carly and Candace out from beneath the floorboards. He apologizes to the two girls for not finding a smarter way to protect them without having to use Emily. He also makes Emily promise that when she returns to her own dimension, she will find a boyfriend worthy of being his replacement. She assures him she will try. He gives the three girls housing for the night, and promises to help them in the morning if they're still around. However, they Percolate back to Camelorum shortly before falling asleep. Police return to the cabin to harass Fred a second time, and he claims that Anya left because she was angry over the invasion of privacy. Fred is shot dead out of suspicion that he is lying.

The girls arrive in Camelorum, and debrief Stan about their adventure. Emily expresses hope that Fred will be xeroxed to their world, and Pat Pitterson attempts to help Emily cope with her broken heart. The Jens show the other girls footage they've recovered on their equipment of the fallout of that little excursion into the Cagegirl universe, and the girls are horrified to learn that their impact on that world's social climate could have been disastrous. Emily vows to interfere less in the affairs of other universes the next time she Percolates, whereas Candace and Carly see it as an opportunity to improve their skills.

Other
Cagegirl was first discovered on DeviantArt by the Dozerfleet founder while research was being done for both Camelorum Adventures and Sodality: Vindication. It was hoped that the work could be useful research for how to write both of these, though it proved more useful for the former than the latter.

Writing Cagegiggles as a fanfic inspired other fanfic crossovers, such as Confusion of the Oranges (with Orange is the New Black) and 17 and Amphibious (with Jailbait.)


 * In Confusion of the Oranges, Daya finds herself trapped in Camelorum due to the Percolation, and it's up to the Camelorum crew to keep her from panicking even while the Cheshire Pig pesters her. Upon returning to her own dimension, however, Daya finds herself next to Gwen Indot, who confuses everyone at Litchfield with her story about being bad luck to ferrets.  Later, Carly and Jenny Jane get sent to Litchfield by the Percolation.  They attempt to save Tricia, but only succeed in turning George Menendez into a Sith lord; while they also cause bicycle training wheels to rain from the sky.  The girls are then sent to a 1980s dimension, where they meet Belf.  They dig for clues about Carly's past based on analogs and a Fretter store.  However, they get sent back to Camelorum before they can completely solve the mystery.  A Belf clone arrives in Camelorum with them.


 * In 17 & Amphibious, Rita Rigatoni steals a wand the Jens invented and invades a world based on Jared Cohn's 17 & Life / Jailbait, as featured by The Asylum. Candace is sent to stop Rita right as she terrorizes the highway.  Candace commandeers the Rendleton Youth prison van and gives a rousing speech to get the girls on her side.  The girls begin acting as a makeshift Camelry, since Stan was reluctant to let the others go in along with Candace.  (Particularly Carly, given how powerful and unstable she is by this point.)  Rita is sent back to Camelorum, but Candace remains trapped for an extra week in the Cohnverse.  Candace is initially detained along with Anna at Rendleton.  However, she is eventually ruled to be an adult; and is transferred to an adult facility.  She uses her brief time at Rendleton to teach Anna self-defense.  After a week, the Percolation lets Candace go home...but with one small complication:  Anna is sent to Camelorum with her - and gets somehow turned into a frog.  The Jens work on finding a cure.  Anna states she'd rather be a frog in Camelorum, than be another day in Rendleton.  She and Candace then joke about passing the time playing Polar Battleship.  (Which Candi Flippo also uses to pass the time in Ciem: Inferno, which also makes fun of the plot of Jailbait.)

As the Cagegirl series itself improved, it was seen as an opportunity along with the retooling of DozerfleetWiki as the Dozerfleet Database to benefit from co-branding, leading to Cagegirl being promoted on the Database alongside Prodigal-Gamer's original The Tale of Emily Barnes and the Two Jens as part of the "Dozerfleet Gigaverse." This both justifies the fanfic Cagegiggles (while also keeping the majority of Cagegirl continuity intact) and allows for Adam-00 to use the Dozerfleet brand name if-and-when convenient for self-promotion.

Gigaverse compatibility
The Cagegirl universe may interact with the Dromedeverse, though both take pains not to disrupt each other's main continuity too greatly. Only if a visitor from the Cagegirl universe should arrive inside of the Dromedeverse, they may interact with Percolations from the Gerosha Crossover Gaming Universe as well. Xeroxes of characters from the Volkonir universe may also interact, but only to a very limited degree. Which means that Earth-G7.2.1 Ciem may team up with Xira and Lemon Witch on a mission. However, Earth-G7.0 Ciem would not be able to appear. Mainstream Cataclysmic Gerosha is not aware of other universes within the Dozerfleet Megaverse, being confined to itself. Being defunct, all earlier versions of Gerosha mythos are also unable to interact.

Cagegirl typically does not interact with any other universes within the Gigaverse nor the Megaverse outside of the Dromedeverse, being relatively self-contained in order to preserve as much of Adam-00's vision as possible. However, his other works such as Daredoers are considered fictional inside of the world of Cagegirl, allowing for some interaction within the greater Adam-00 Megaverse, should his megaverse adopt its own Percolation mechanics.

Schedule
New content is added to the story at a rate of usually about five pages per week, or one new page every workday on average. These are usually published every Monday, Tuesday, or Wednesday to Adam-00's DeviantArt gallery, though updated posts to the Facebook page are fairly regular as well.

Due to various issues with production vs. distribution times, most issues arrive on ComicFury a lot faster than their DeviantArt counterparts, leading to DeviantArt being several pages behind. The Facebook page has even more delays in upload times. Viewers insisting on seeing the newest of everything are encouraged to read on ComicFury rather than DeviantArt, due to these delays.

Reception
Most reception of the comic appears to be positive from most who have read it, with the comic receiving a 5/5-star rating from ComicFury viewers. Since releasing the comic, Adam-00's devoted watchers on DeviantArt have climbed to over 100 and rising.