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modmachine) wrote2015-07-29 12:42 am
modmachine) wrote2015-07-29 12:42 am
APPLICATIONS
In order to keep the number of players from getting overwhelming for the mods, all applications are processed in a queue in the order submitted and characters are accepted as space becomes available (either as space in the game is increased or other characters are removed from the game). Acceptance into the queue does not guarantee entrance to the game; unless there are glaring errors in the application (such as a missing section) or moderator concerns, all applications go into the queue based on the time of reserve (if applicable) or submission. There are two queues, one for newly arrived characters and one for those who are already residents of Hex. At the time of game opening, there will be twelve slots for new arrivals and twelve for current residents, discounting moderator characters. (Moderator characters apped in after game start will be a part of the queue.) The remaining four slots in the game will go to whichever fills up first. Post your applications to this entry in the following format: First comment should contain the OOC information section only. Successive comments should be posted in reply to that comment, as many as you need. Moderator responses will be appended to the last comment of the application. Last updated: Dec 5 11:pm EST
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Corwin Gardener | OC
Player name: Gail
Player age and gender: 35, she
Any other characters in game? None
no subject
Character name: Corwin Gardener
Character canon: OC
Canon point: NA
Character history:
Corwin had a childhood spent largely at home, going out only for school and coming straight home afterwards. His mother was alcoholic, extremely controlling, and emotionally abusive. Corwin is always quick to say she never actually hurt him, though he's privately sure she might have wanted to and just held herself back for his sake. If anything, however, it was because she lacked the courage. Even as a child, he grew up like a weed, and towered over her already by twelve.
Between moving about once a year due to evictions, his mother's controlling nature, and his own quieter nature, he never really had friends. The only real friends he ever managed to make were neighbors' pets and stray animals, and that only with a lot of time and patience. Because it was all he had, Corwin did well in school, working hard and generally not having trouble understanding the material. His grades got him into college, just barely, for a computer programming degree, and after that he never went back to his mother, moving as far from her as he could without actually leaving the country.
Corwin's sire, an older vampire named Jared, discovered him when Corwin was twenty-nine. It took the vampire three years to turn him. He watched him for a long time before beginning a correspondence and finally turning him on their first face-to-face meeting. Once Corwin got over the fear of the "attack" and being dead, actually understood what had happened, and realized that Jared was not lying about being "family" now-- it helped when Jared introduced him to a couple other Strigoi vampires who lived nearby, and they were unreservedly accepting-- he was overjoyed.
Jared took his new progeny to New York, so Corwin could meet as much of the "family" as he wanted. They stayed there for two years, Corwin eating up everything he could about the Strigoi line, way of life, and abilities and making friends for the first time in his life. When they returned to home to Detroit Corwin decided, with his sire's fondly amused support, to try and share the gift of family immediately, and purposefully set out to find the unhappy, downtrodden, and outcaste and see if he could help them.
His first choice, a teenage boy named Eric, seemed painfully familiar: bullied, clever but friendless and lonely, with a difficult home life. Taking a cue from his own sire, Corwin watched-- perhaps "stalked" might be a better word-- for a whole year, then spent another sharing emails and internet conversations with his chosen. Rather than surprising him with teeth and blood and death immediately, however, he actually met Eric in person before he turned him. He liked the idea of letting the boy know what he was in for, first, rather than putting him through the fear Corwin had dealt with, and having someone willing to cooperate with the procedure made things easier. After a few awkward moments while Corwin convinced him he wasn't a demon and he was still his friend, Eric actually took it surprisingly well, and after Corwin's rather passionate testimonial, accepted the invitation.
Except it didn't work. Instead of a vampire, a son and a brother, what Corwin got was a ghost. Eric had trusted him so much that he wasn't going to pass on when he died that he didn't, but his new unlife was not at all what he'd expected. Corwin was horrified, Eric confused, and no one happy.
Eric forgave him, but Corwin wasn't about to forgive himself. Panicked, afraid that he'd done something wrong, Corwin tried again, this time with Theresa, a battered wife with a stubborn streak that applied to everyone except her husband, a bitter outlook on life, and a loner's nature. He was much hastier this time, and didn't reveal himself, afraid of giving her false hope-- and what if the fear was necessary, and that was what he did wrong with Eric? Except that didn't work, either. All that happened was that the terror she felt when he killed her, and her fury at being killed, led to her staying behind as a ghost, as well-- only she, unlike Eric, did not forgive her assailant when he penitently explained what he'd done.
Now unable to deny that something was wrong, he finally dared to face his sire with his "terrible mistakes", as he saw them. Jared explained sympathetically that some vampires simply were infertile and couldn't turn others. The "defect" was devastating to Corwin, despite the assurance that it wasn't his fault and he'd still be accepted among the family no matter what, and he now feels that he has to do something else to make up for his lack. It feeds into his subservience to older Strigoi vampires, increases his protectiveness towards those he would otherwise take into the fold, adds to his unwillingness to turn away stray animals, and often leads him taking on strange missions or crusades in the hopes of helping the helpless. He doesn’t stay in one place much, these days, instead moving around with a couple of stray cats, the pair of unquiet spirits, his laptop and cell phone for freelance programming work when he needed cash, and the hope that he can maybe make a difference in the world.
Character world:
Corwin’s original world, a now-closed original-character role-playing game called Praelitis, is actually probably a lot like the World of Darkness world: there are vampires, there are werecreatures, there are mages, there are spirits and demons, there are even angels, though they’re not much like the angels of the Machine. The supernatural stays underground there as well, with those few too sensitive, too unlucky, or too curious for their own good stumbling onto it now and then, for good or for ill.
The time is modern, early 2000s, and the setting is mostly like the USA of our world, only with the addition of those hiding supernaturals. Vampires in particular come in several varieties, and though they all share certain traits-- weakness to sunlight and fire; supernatural strength, speed, and healing; conditional immortality and the need for blood-- they are different enough to have their own specific species traits. Corwin’s type, the Strigoi, are the ones with the ugliest outsides but the kindest hearts. They take in outcastes and the abused, try to give them a family in undeath, somewhere to belong and someone to look out for them, but the turning warps them physically into something hideous and frightening, a truly inhuman monster in appearance. Their special abilities include the summoning of one specific type of animal (in Corwin’s case, cats); a painless or even pleasant bite, if he’s careful about it; an unerring sense of direction and ability to navigate; and a tendency to kill plant life in the vicinity of anywhere they take up residence, though that’s more like a curse than an ability. The Strigoi’s oldest and most powerful vampires in the States live in New York City, in the subway tunnels beneath the streets, where they keep watch on the homeless there and protect their own, and keep records of their kind. Their culture is one of protection, watchfulness, and acceptance, with little of the vying for power that other vampire lines tend to engage in.
The game setting itself is a small town in Michigan, where the supernatural tends to congregate, it being out of the way from any major cities and unusually magical in nature. One of your typical settings for a modern supernatural game, really. Corwin’s friends there included a pair of demons, a wereraven, and a blind dreamwalker-- which is pretty much exactly what it sounds like.
no subject
Character personality:
What Corwin is like depends quite a bit on who you are. To animals or someone who he's comfortable with he is awkwardly kind and extremely gentle, if a bit likely to stammer and put his foot in his mouth. His patience with people who seem willing to give him the time of day (or night, in his case) is endless, and when his loyalty is won, it is hard to shake, to the point of carefully ignoring a person’s more negative traits. He sees others as far more important than himself, and if he can do anything to give them a chance at a happier life than he had, he'll do it.
To someone who he sees as cruel, bullying, or mocking, however, he's cold, defensive, and very, very nervous. He'll glare, growl, and threaten, but he's more than a little afraid of mockery and cruelty, and the easiest way to get him to back off is to confidently insult or belittle him. If there's immediate danger to someone other than himself, however, and he doesn't have time to think about it, he'll just dive in to try and help. If he doesn't know what kind of person someone is yet, he's quiet, shy, and more than a little jumpy, half-expecting to be made fun of. He tends to err on the side of suspicion with new people, unless they are obviously and carefully non-threatening-- not particularly common given the first impression one usually gets of him is looming, ugly, and tattered.
Corwin does have a lot of trouble fitting in, and not just because of his fearsome appearance and massive height. He never had a whole lot of social interaction growing up-- he was awkward and unattractive even before he was turned, and with his controlling mother, he didn’t have much in the way of friends-- so most of what he’s learned has come from other Strigoi vampires. And as their way of life is hardly typical, either… well, that means neither is he. He’s one of those who tends to think stalking is acceptable behavior, taking the Strigoi tendency to watch humanity to the extreme. When he finds someone of interest, he sees nothing wrong with following them, learning everything about them, watching them sleep, listening in on their conversations, or having one of his cats follow them around. How else can he find out whether they're happy or need help? He is more likely to come to your window than your door if he wants to see you, and petting someone’s hair or shoulder doesn’t seem any different to him than petting a cat: you do it gently, and you back off when the cat hisses at you, but otherwise you do it liberally. He’s bad at reading body language and expression, though excellent at reading tone of voice, which can make things interesting when they’re at odds.
On the whole, Corwin acts younger than he is, particularly when one considers the decade or two of living as a vampire on top of his age when he was turned. Part of that is how he never really had a childhood, and his turning gave him the chance to go back and be a “child”, in a sense, all over again, and part of it is his incomplete socialization as a child to begin with. Because of the latter and because of his setbacks since turning, however, he is very mature in some things, and understands a lot about loneliness, depression, grief, and emotional abuse. Whether he can apply that understanding properly to actually help someone is another issue entirely.
Character abilities:
Vampire Traits: Conditionally immortal, subsisting on blood, quick healing, stronger and faster than your average human-- albeit more towards the strong side than the fast side, given his six and a half feet of height and tendency towards clumsiness-- immobilized by a stake to the heart, and likely to go up in flame if touched by the sun… typical vampire stuff.
Strigoi Bloodline Traits: A painless or pleasant bite, the ability to summon members of a family of animal-- small cats, in Corwin’s case, mostly housecats but with the rare chance to call a bobcat or cougar-- an unerring sense of direction and impeccable memory for navigation, and an aura of plant-killing.
Miscellaneous Supernatural Abilities: Whether as a result of being haunted for so long, or due to some quirk of mind from when he was turned himself, Corwin can see spirits unless they are actively trying to hide from him. He cannot affect them in any way, just see them and communicate with them.
Mundane abilities: Rudimentary first aid for animals of many kinds, programming in several computer languages and the ability to build a computer from parts, and familiarity with a lot of video games.
Samples:
Sample 1, from the test drive
When the third cat came home limping in as many days-- and this time it was Patches, who was the least scrappy animal he knew-- Corwin decided, probably belatedly, that this wasn't a random fluke, accident, or presence of a new and feisty cat in the area. Someone had been hurting his animals, possibly on purpose. Probably on purpose.
So he did what he did best: he watched, and he waited, until he could catch whoever it was. It gave him something to do. He followed the cats out for three nights, picking a different one until he stumbled upon the right one. Horus had wound up injured, too, while he was creeping through the shadows and along rooftops following Davey. So had Corwin himself, falling off one of those roofs, but that wasn't really pertinent to the chase.
When he finally did find the right one, it was Patches again, following a route through one of the parks in the nearest suburb, the one he had a feeling Horus had been on the night before. The cats had territories around his house, but they frequently wandered through others on almost regular circuits, sometimes looking for better hunting or sometimes, he thought, just out of boredom. Corwin knew his older cats' routes by heart.
The little tortoiseshell cat was trotting along through the park, tail waving jauntily enough that she didn't seem nervous, when the first stone came flying out of the trees-- right past Corwin's unsuspecting nose-- and hit the tree right behind her, narrowly missing her hind end. Patches whirled and hissed, and another small rock sailed just over her head. Not being a particularly brave cat, Patches bolted.
"Missed!" a young man's voice complained, and footsteps came closer down the hard-packed dirt path this park boasted.
"Damn," chuckled another one. "Now what'll you practice aiming at?"
Corwin shrank back into the shadows off the path, scowling at the approaching small group of teenagers. Throwing rocks at cats? To practice their aim?
"Trees don't move, John," another boy snorted. "Maybe you'll have better luck with them!"
"Cats are more fun," the first retorted. "When they get all puffed up and mean-looking and shit. Trees don't do anything."
That was more than enough to get Corwin angry. Even if they hadn't been attacking his cats, he would have been angry. And he hadn't had a decent meal in a couple days. This, then, would be perfect. A good scare might teach these kids a lesson, and he could tide himself over for another couple days.
"Maybe," he spoke up roughly, coming out onto the path behind the kids and trying to be as clear as possible, "you should try practicing on something that can fight back."
All of them turned in surprise and confusion, and froze at the sight of the tall, clothes-muffled stranger. Not a one of them came anywhere near his height.
"Hey, man," one of them said nervously but with an attempt at bravado. "Mind your own fucking business."
Corwin barely resisted the urge to flinch-- it was automatic, even now-- and instead yanked down his hood and scarf and bared his massive, uneven fangs at the bullying boys. Almost as one, they let out frightened yells and bolted. Corwin pounced at the one who'd actually thrown the stone-- the one who'd complained about missing-- and ploughed his face into the dirt with his heavy landing.
"You," he growled thickly into the young man's ear, "are a cruel, vicious person, and you deserve this."
"You're a freak!" the kid cried, struggling under the heavy weight of angry vampire, and this time he did flinch.
Freak, Theresa's insubstantial form echoed behind him. He hadn't noticed her reappearing, and he flinched again.
Leave Corwin alone! Eric spoke up in protest.
"Let me go!"
You think you're going to prove anything? Theresa sneered, ignoring the other ghost and the wriggling adolescent. Teach him anything? Ha! You're not going to make a difference in how a kid behaves!
She was right. Of course she was right. Corwin had never made a difference, how would that start now? He might even make this boy, this young man, worse towards others by frightening him. He'd seen it happen. He should've thought of that. Why did he never think these things through before he did them?
The bullying boy managed to wriggle himself free while Corwin was distractedly berating himself, gave his captor a sharp shove to get him the rest of the way off, and scrambled to his feet before taking off after his gang. Corwin sank back on his heels and braced his face in his hands in frustration. He was a vampire who couldn't even get dinner properly.
You're pathetic, Theresa said smugly.
At least that night no cats came home limping.
AU nature: Ulgan Promethean, the Riven
AU history:
The first thing one of the Riven remembers is his spiritual death, in pain, at the spectral hands of hungry spirits, and Corwin is no different. His next memory is of his awareness being dumped back into a tall and gawky body, the one he’d left though he doesn’t remember leaving it, only now it’s not quite alive anymore, and it keeps leaking darkness everywhere. It doesn’t feel quite right, either, because now it’s lacking the soul, the Kut, that was torn away from it. His creator, another Promethean, explained to him what he now was and what he must do to regain a soul.
What he doesn’t remember anymore is that his life up until that point was much like the life his original self experienced: the life of a withdrawn, socially inept programmer with a great love of cats and video games. His recreation into a Promethean mirrors his turning into a vampire, only rather than the acceptance of a new family and the protection of the outcastes, his new goal now is transcendence and a return to mortality. He’s still a fairly new Promethean, and has only hit his first milestone, and that recently: when his creator turned him out on his own and he got a job to pay rent on a tiny apartment-- he works as a garbage collector, which he actually enjoys since he can learn a lot about people through what they leave behind-- making him feel independent for the first time. That happened within a year of his creation, and he’s only been alone in the city of Hex for a few weeks, at best.
Most aspects of his original personality before Hex remain the same. For example, he can’t quite understand why it hurts when the local alley cats, stray dogs, and even pigeons flee from him, but it definitely does hurt-- particularly the cats. He has no trouble whatsoever falling into the pattern of watching humans and trying to learn from them what it means to be mortal, again to the point of stalking those he approves of or is curious about, and sees nothing wrong with it since obviously he means no harm. He has a fierce protectiveness over the creatures he would like to rejoin someday, ready to leap to their defense at a moment’s notice, and an endless curiosity about them.
Corwin’s bestowment is ethereal flesh, the ability to communicate with and interact with spirits, and his only transmutation at present is vitality, supernatural strength, which he achieved at his first milestone. It is not very strongly refined as of yet, so he can’t use his strength for more than a minute or two. I hope over the course of the game to teach him luciferus, the manipulation of light... largely for the irony factor.
Justification:
I liked the juxtaposition of Corwin’s oddness with the desire to “fix themselves” that the Promethean class has, it might make him actually think about his neuroses and grow a little to compare the two once he starts getting memories back. Plus it gives him an innocence I think will be fun to play with, and the curiosity is a good reason to interact with others in the game, both in a positive and negative way. The idea of playing with “what does it mean to be human” is very appealing to me, and I think fits his themes of belonging and acceptance well. Both his vampire self and his Promethean self are very disturbing to look at, too, which I love, as I like weird-looking characters in general, and they share a number of abilities, which is handy for their integration.
Plus, Prometheans are just so damn cool, and I wanted one :)
ACCEPTED
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