The Gaiaphage, later known as Gaia Soren-Ladris, is the overarching antagonist of the young adult book collection the Gone series, becoming the main antagonist of its final book Light.
It spawned from a virus produced by an alien species millions of years ago as a means to create life which caused a moon to explode and floated through space for many millennia. Eventually, a fragment of the virus broke off and crashed into a power plant in the town Perdido Beach, killing a man called Taegan Smith, the father of Sam Temple and Caine Soren, fusing with a mix of his DNA and the toxic waste in the power plant to create the supernatural entity known as the Gaiaphage.
The Gaiaphage would then go on to directly or indirectly cause many of the strange occurrences that took place in Perdido Beach after that point, including the creation of the FAYZ (something a boy called Little Pete made in response to its actions), which surrounded the entire town with an unbreakable dome, mutated the populace inside, and caused all humans over the age of 15 to vanish from Perdido Beach, reappearing on the other side of the dome. Eventually the Gaiaphage gets a body that ages significantly faster than average, becoming a young girl called Gaia Soren-Ladris, the daughter of Caine Soren and Diana Ladris.
What Makes It Pure Evil?[]
In General[]
- All of the horrors that occurred in the Gone series can be traced back to it, directly or indirectly, as it was the execution of its own plans for world domination that led to the creation of the FAYZ along with much more.
- While one could argue it suffers from moral agency issues due to its birth being the result of an artificially created virus, this idea doesn't hold much weight given what is known about the Gaiaphage.
- The virus that the Gaiaphage spawned from was produced to create life, not to kill or take over existing lifeforms. That would likely be considered the exact opposite of the experiment's goal, yet the Gaiaphage does it on countless occasions. This supports the idea of it acting on its own agenda.
- There are many times when the Gaiaphage appears to express sadism in its crimes, both before and after becoming human. This insinuates that it knows the difference between right and wrong but doesn't care.
- During Light, Diana told the Gaiaphage (now Gaia at that point in the story) that her plan of taking over all living creatures on Earth was flawed as living a life where everyone is the same as you would be boring. Gaia actually agreed with her on this and decided to change her end goal from turning all life on Earth into her to keeping some people the same. This proves that the Gaiaphage can change if it wants to, but it simply chooses to remain evil.
- It shows no care for any of its allies including the intelligent coyote army it controls and the children that serve it like Drake Merwin and Penny, being completely unbothered about their safety and (with the exception of Penny) brainwashing them into subservience against their will.
- Despite having some minor comedic moments as a human such as getting more offended at being called "nearsighted" than a demon child, becoming a fan of rock music when introduced to it, and using childish insults when addressing Diana, the Gaiaphage is generally still taken seriously as a villain with such moments only existing to highlight the irony of such an evil character having the body of a little girl.
- While Tom Peaks killed more people in Villain, these kills were unintentional meaning the Gaiaphage is still more heinous than him.
- Even if the kills were intentional, it's unlikely that the Gaiaphage would fail the standards given both characters have similar resources and Tom Peaks doesn't have any particularly unique crimes outside of his one case of mass murder while the Gaiaphage commits some of the most deplorable acts in all the books.
Background[]
- Although it would be unfair to say the death of Taegan Smith was its fault given it wasn't technically alive when it happened, it showed no empathy over the situation, instead focusing on the pride it felt for its own birth.
- It set out to turn every living thing in existence (to its knowledge) into extensions of itself.
- It gave certain children in Perdido Beach powers as a means to strengthen its own abilities. This makes it indirectly responsible for all the chaos that happened as a result of the children developing the powers before the FAYZ started, including Sam accidentally burning off his stepfather's hand, Caine hospitalizing his teacher, Darla getting killed by the Evanstan Natioinal Base guards, and Toto going insane from isolation in the Evanstan Natioinal Base bunker.
- It attempted to cause a nuclear meltdown in Perdido Beach minutes before the books began and would have succeeded if Little Pete hadn't intervened, unknowingly saving the town by creating the FAYZ.
Gone[]
- It had its coyote army kidnap Lana Lazer and temporarily brainwash her into becoming their leader to "teach them how to kill humans".
- It forced Lana to heal Drake's recently amputated arm, deciding to brainwash him as a superior replacement to Lana in leading the coyotes.
- It gave Drake free rein to use the coyotes in the Thanksgiving Battle which were used to take a daycare hostage and kill 16 children in the conflict.
- It is revealed that when a child turns 15 and has the choice to "poof", it is the Gaiaphage who attempts to manipulate them into leaving the FAYZ by taking the form of someone they love. While this isn't particularly heinous in the first book as they just appear outside of the barrier, later on leaving the FAYZ causes horrifying consequences for those who choose it.
Hunger[]
- It mentally tortured Caine for several weeks as a way of manipulating him into doing its bidding, leading to him becoming mentally delirious for a substantial amount of time, causing him to accidentally kill his ally, Chunk.
- It used its mental control over Caine to have him, Drake, and the Coates kids steal uranium to offer itself sustenance and increase its strength. This led to the deaths of multiple soldiers working for Edilio Escobar, the power being shut down in Perdido Beach, Drake almost causing a nuclear meltdown, and Sam getting tortured nearly to death.
- It took control of Lana and had her shoot Edilio, nearly killing him.
- It nearly caused the deaths of everyone in Sam and Caine's groups via radiation poisoning through its attempt at creating a new, near-indestructible body for itself, only failing through the sacrifice of Duck Zhang.
Lies[]
- It fused Drake with the immortal Brittney Donegal and manipulated her into serving it by pretending to be the ghost of her dead brother.
- It disguised itself as a girl called Nerezza and started a cult to not only encourage children to "poof" when they turn 15 (something that now causes severe mutations to occur with anyone who does it) but also have them believe that death is an escape from the FAYZ.
- Its actions led to Mary Terrafino's sanity breaking and it convinced her to drag all the infants and younger children off a cliff during her "poof", under the guise of saving them. They would have died if not for a last-minute save from Dekka Talent and Brianna Berenson.
- It gave Zil Sperry's Human Crew the idea to attack a group of children running away during the chaos, with it being confirmed one child was killed during the carnage.
- It strangled the second in command of its cult, Orsay, to death when she even slightly questioned its authority.
Plague[]
- After reuniting with Drake, it had a newly acquired army of bugs eat his hostage, Jamal.
- It unleashed its army on Perdido Beach to cause chaos, with them eating several characters from the inside out including Hunter Leftkowitz, a boy called Roscoe, and even one of its own coyote servants.
- It finally got Brittney on its side by destroying her spirit and pretending to be God.
- It had Drake/Brittney take the bug army to kidnap Little Pete, giving his sister Astrid Elison no choice but to kill him herself.
Fear[]
- It had Drake/Brittney and the coyotes go to kidnap the now-pregnant Diana, letting them take hostages, where they leave a trail of blood as they does so.
- With Penny's assistance, it possessed Diana's newborn baby, pretty much killing her the moment she drew her first breath.
- Now Gaia, she attempted to murder Sam Temple's group causing Sam to act in self-defense, giving the adults outside the barrier an image of Sam nearly killing a little girl without the full context behind it.
Light[]
- Although she kept her biological mother Diana alive and was willing to feed her despite Diana no longer being useful for breast milk, it’s likely Gaia only did this so Diana would fill any gaps in Gaia’s knowledge about the Earth.
- If Gaia actually did appreciate Diana’s company, this still isn’t preventing as it’s made clear she only saw her as a possession, regardless of whether it was out of pragmatism or twisted affinity.
- When hearing Diana's opinion that being the only sentient person on the planet would be boring, she amends her plan to keep a few people the same to torture for her own amusement.
- She physically attacked the soul of Little Pete to weaken him enough to remove part of the barrier for a few seconds, dropping an adult called Alex Mayle inside.
- She cannibalized Alex but kept him alive through her healing abilities so he would remain a food source until she encountered Drake's disembodied head, which gave her the idea to decapitate Alex and attach his body to Drake's head.
- She mutilated Sam to a point where his spine stuck out of his body and mind-raped Caine when the two attempted to defeat her.
- She murdered Brianna alongside several gunmen in a gruesome battle between herself and the 3-bars teamed up with Edilio's army.
- She killed almost everybody in Lake Tramonto, amounting to around 79 children including major characters like Dahra Baidoo and Justin.
- She opened the barrier and nearly escaped, killing several people on the outside.
- After an unsuccessful attempt from Caine to kill her with missiles (leading to Orc's death), he allows Little Pete to take his body and she manages to kill him in a blaze of glory before getting burned to death herself.
Trivia[]
- The Gaiaphage, alongside Drake Merwin, is one of the two characters from the Gone series to qualify as Pure Evil.
- It’s possible that the Gone series shares a universe with the Animorph books, another series Michael Grant had involvement with as it has several Easter Eggs the connect the works such as Drake Merwin being mentioned by name. If this connection was reinforced and didn’t introduce so many continuity errors, the Gaiaphage’s Pure Evil status may be affected considering Animorph has villains like Esplin 9466 who committed similar crimes, except on a galactic scale.
- However, considering the onscreen crimes the Gaiaphage commits are significantly more brutal than anything seen from a villain in Animorph due to the series being catered towards a younger age demographic, it could still stand out even with the higher heinous standards.