Theory: Before Legion was Legion, Legion was Legion

[Newan he/him]

I think we all know where Legion gets his nickname.  In the Bible, Jesus encounters a man who is possessed by a large number of evil spirits.  They say to him, my name is Legion, for we are many.

 

Before modern medicine and political correctness, some cultures believed that mental illnesses were caused by evil spirits.  

 

Here's the theory:

Before Sandra found him, Leeds was the smartest person in the world, but he also couldn't function.  He had practically every mental illness known to man.  

 

Somehow, Leeds was able to give away his afflictions to his aspects, but it also required giving away his intelligence.  Now he isn't skilled at anything, but he also isn't insane.  

 

If he tries to make an aspect that is too smart or has too many skills, it will also have more trouble functioning.  When Audrey was just a handwriting specialist, she had an interesting psychosis, but she got along fine.  Now that she is also skilled in cryptology, she clashes with the other aspects and thinks that nothing will happen if JC shoots her.  

 

If Leeds tried to create one aspect with all the skills, it would also have all the disorders.  It might have to come up with its own aspects to help it get by.  

[Surgebound Rainspren he/him]

So your saying that that the one mental illness in each aspect is because of the one area they specialize in, and if one were to be a expert in more than one field they would have more than one mental illness.  

[Silus - Shard of Flame he/him]

I disagree, I think Audrey's condition is something that was always present, but she had simply never been around enough for Stephen to really make any diagnosis.  I think that the illnesses present in each of the aspects are about Stephen's subconscious projecting onto them, creating reflections of himself and his own condition.  He is a genius at anything he even sort of tries to do and his aspects reflect that capability, but he and others around him see him as unstable.  So in creating sort of "alternatives" to himself, personalities that are not him but at the same time represent him, he creates each of them with one (or now possibly more) specialty and a psychosis as a more mundane reflection of himself.

 

Also, if this were the case, wouldn't Stephen himself have that psychosis up until the moment that that aspect manifests and he can siphon it off?  For instance, wouldn't he have been a schizophrenic up until when Tobias manifested?  And wouldn't he know exactly what their issues were from the start?  He wouldn't have to figure out what Audrey's issues were if he'd dealt with the same thing before manifesting her.