Post by Minyahil on Jul 29, 2009 21:28:48 GMT -5
Full Name: Calvin Durst
Status: Protected. If you understand him, I’ve got no problem with you playing him, though I reserve the right to change anything I feel is grossly out of character.
Gender: Male
Age: 46, birthday December 28
Occupation: Historically, researcher and literature professor. Nowadays, Calvin spends more of his time writing, inventing things, and studying the occult like a starving artist studies Picasso.
Angelspoken: No.
Appearance: Calvin is a stocky 5’11” or so, with coarse, shoulder-length black ringlets framing his face. He used to be handsome, except possibly for his slightly large nose, but he has not aged gracefully—deep lines run from the corners of mouth and from his eyes, which are such a dark brown that they almost match his hair. Calvin’s clothes are generally of good quality, though they tend to be rather shabby and/or smell of stale alcohol. His favorite is a red velvet waistcoat which, like him, is beginning to fray around the edges. Calvin weighs about 195 pounds.
Personality: Calvin does not suffer fools, gladly or otherwise, and usually takes a pretty dim view of the world. He's an irate, drunken genius who doesn’t believe the world is out to get him, mostly because that would be giving the world too much credit. Born to be an anarchist, Calvin almost immediately distrusts any form of authority and respects those who stand up to them (when he taught, his favorite students were always the ones with whom he had the loudest arguments). He’s ill-tempered, nearly impossible to get to work as part of a team, and stubbornly contrary. At the same time, though, he possesses a knack for analyzing people and machines alike, and years of making his own way in life usually help him keep a cool head when he really needs to.
Likes: Books, machines, conspiracy theories, playing the rebel, conflict.
Dislikes: The church, vacillation, melodrama.
History: Calvin was born in Task, a modest city on the northwestern plains of Iden. His father, a quiet man made tallow candles for the local temple of Belief and made the rest of his living as a woodcutter, was shot to death in a fluke hunting accident. Calvin was eleven then; his mother remarried a week after his twelfth birthday. He always hated his stepfather, and it was partially this home situation which led Calvin to study so single-mindedly as a teenager, often studying during evening at the local jail after being pulled out of one fight or another. He was accepted to Iden’s best university in Pallas when he was 20, and proceeded to carry out two brilliant parallel careers in engineering and writing. Literature professors were more willing to indulge him with protracted arguments about there field, however, and eventually Calvin formally specialized in literature. He taught at his alma mater for a while in between books, but was politely fired after he began to develop a frightening interest in the occult—as a result, he’s seen as a bit of a fallen star as an author.
Since then, Calvin has veered wildly from success to failure and back again. His typical pattern has been to drink himself into a stupor for a few years, hit rock bottom, become inspired to write something brilliant or invent something useful, ride high on the success, and start all over again. He still keeps in touch with his few friends from the University, but mostly spends his days in seclusion, scribbling down a short story or a blueprint.
Character RP sample:
The alehouse was dimly lit and stank, which suited Calvin’s mood just fine. He was nursing his second brandy and his temper when someone spoke behind him.
“I do wish I didn’t always have to find you in a place like this, professor.”
“You didn’t have to come, and your unfortunate addiction to sobriety is your own problem. And don’t call me ‘professor,’ boy; you’re one too.” Calvin grunted as he turned away from the bar.
The owner of the voice, as he’d expected, was Henri Lionel, who Calvin saw had prepared for his foray into the seedy part of town by adding an ornate walking-cane to his typical blue velvet waistcoat and fashionable laced ruff. The Lionels were a moneyed family—they’d have had to be in order to send Henri to the University if the Caryatids in Pallas—a fact that showed in his clothes, his posture, even his irritating habit of speaking with the kind of accent that pronounced “Henri” as “HEN-rae”. When the older man had had him as a student, Calvin had always marveled that Henri could not only look like a pansy, his manner seemed to imply that pansyism was an exclusive club, to which one gained admittance only through years of exacting toil. That said, Henri’s current position as the head of the University library put him in charge of the finest array of dangerous occult books in Iden. When some of them had mysteriously disappeared over the years since Calvin had left the University, the librarian had nonchalantly spread rumors among the students that the books might have been cursed. Or something.
Henri was still frowning. “My wife’s in the temperance movement, she’d kill me if she knew where I was. And you, you shouldn’t drink as much as you do. You're ruining what’s left of your career.”
“Hells, Henri, just take a seat. I won’t argue with you about which is a more dangerous addiction, alcohol or marriage.” He gestured to the thin gold ring on Henri’s finger. “And I did not lose my job to alcohol, if you recall.”
“No, you didn’t.” Henri spoke slowly. “You were fired for yelling at a student in the ancient destruction-ritual language of Aeij-Kellezera’att.”
“And completely unfairly, too! His term paper on rituals of the southern countries was terrible… I was teaching him.” Calvin said, signaling the barkeep for another brandy.
“Calvin, his hair caught fire the next day.”
"Coincidence!”
“Then it turned into snakes.”
“That wasn’t my fault,” Calvin retorted. “I wasn’t even positive that was the word for snakes.” Henri opened his mouth, then closed it again.
“But nostalgia isn’t the reason I called you here, Lionel. You know that old demonology book you lent me on gatekeeper summoning rituals?”
Henri frowned again, this time in concentration. “The one that proposed that absurd summoning circle theory, with the human sacrifices to bind whatever spirit was supposed to be called?”
Durst nodded. “Tried it last night.”
“Hmm… clearly there’s no empirical evidence of demo—hold on, you tried what?!?”
“Well, it looked like it might be interesting, even without the human sacrifices. I just lit candles there instead,” Calvin said as Henri visibly relaxed. “Now—speaking theoretically—what would you expect to happen if the ritual actually worked?”
Henri fidgeted with his handkerchief. “Theoretically? The candles would serve as the summoning barrier, so the circle would still work. The presence would probably overwhelm the candles, so they’d blow out, and the rest of the energy would create a blowback, a recoil of some sort. So, er, what did happen?”
“The candles blew out simultaneously. And did you hear about all those naturalists trying to figure out how Pallas had its first earthquake in a hundred and fifty years?”
The color drained from Henri’s face. “You’re joking.”
Calvin grinned at the barkeeper. “Nelson, get my friend here a brandy, please.”
“A double,” Henri amended faintly.
Writing RP sample:Waived (no other characters yet, plus I've written up Death)
Status: Protected. If you understand him, I’ve got no problem with you playing him, though I reserve the right to change anything I feel is grossly out of character.
Gender: Male
Age: 46, birthday December 28
Occupation: Historically, researcher and literature professor. Nowadays, Calvin spends more of his time writing, inventing things, and studying the occult like a starving artist studies Picasso.
Angelspoken: No.
Appearance: Calvin is a stocky 5’11” or so, with coarse, shoulder-length black ringlets framing his face. He used to be handsome, except possibly for his slightly large nose, but he has not aged gracefully—deep lines run from the corners of mouth and from his eyes, which are such a dark brown that they almost match his hair. Calvin’s clothes are generally of good quality, though they tend to be rather shabby and/or smell of stale alcohol. His favorite is a red velvet waistcoat which, like him, is beginning to fray around the edges. Calvin weighs about 195 pounds.
Personality: Calvin does not suffer fools, gladly or otherwise, and usually takes a pretty dim view of the world. He's an irate, drunken genius who doesn’t believe the world is out to get him, mostly because that would be giving the world too much credit. Born to be an anarchist, Calvin almost immediately distrusts any form of authority and respects those who stand up to them (when he taught, his favorite students were always the ones with whom he had the loudest arguments). He’s ill-tempered, nearly impossible to get to work as part of a team, and stubbornly contrary. At the same time, though, he possesses a knack for analyzing people and machines alike, and years of making his own way in life usually help him keep a cool head when he really needs to.
Likes: Books, machines, conspiracy theories, playing the rebel, conflict.
Dislikes: The church, vacillation, melodrama.
History: Calvin was born in Task, a modest city on the northwestern plains of Iden. His father, a quiet man made tallow candles for the local temple of Belief and made the rest of his living as a woodcutter, was shot to death in a fluke hunting accident. Calvin was eleven then; his mother remarried a week after his twelfth birthday. He always hated his stepfather, and it was partially this home situation which led Calvin to study so single-mindedly as a teenager, often studying during evening at the local jail after being pulled out of one fight or another. He was accepted to Iden’s best university in Pallas when he was 20, and proceeded to carry out two brilliant parallel careers in engineering and writing. Literature professors were more willing to indulge him with protracted arguments about there field, however, and eventually Calvin formally specialized in literature. He taught at his alma mater for a while in between books, but was politely fired after he began to develop a frightening interest in the occult—as a result, he’s seen as a bit of a fallen star as an author.
Since then, Calvin has veered wildly from success to failure and back again. His typical pattern has been to drink himself into a stupor for a few years, hit rock bottom, become inspired to write something brilliant or invent something useful, ride high on the success, and start all over again. He still keeps in touch with his few friends from the University, but mostly spends his days in seclusion, scribbling down a short story or a blueprint.
Character RP sample:
The alehouse was dimly lit and stank, which suited Calvin’s mood just fine. He was nursing his second brandy and his temper when someone spoke behind him.
“I do wish I didn’t always have to find you in a place like this, professor.”
“You didn’t have to come, and your unfortunate addiction to sobriety is your own problem. And don’t call me ‘professor,’ boy; you’re one too.” Calvin grunted as he turned away from the bar.
The owner of the voice, as he’d expected, was Henri Lionel, who Calvin saw had prepared for his foray into the seedy part of town by adding an ornate walking-cane to his typical blue velvet waistcoat and fashionable laced ruff. The Lionels were a moneyed family—they’d have had to be in order to send Henri to the University if the Caryatids in Pallas—a fact that showed in his clothes, his posture, even his irritating habit of speaking with the kind of accent that pronounced “Henri” as “HEN-rae”. When the older man had had him as a student, Calvin had always marveled that Henri could not only look like a pansy, his manner seemed to imply that pansyism was an exclusive club, to which one gained admittance only through years of exacting toil. That said, Henri’s current position as the head of the University library put him in charge of the finest array of dangerous occult books in Iden. When some of them had mysteriously disappeared over the years since Calvin had left the University, the librarian had nonchalantly spread rumors among the students that the books might have been cursed. Or something.
Henri was still frowning. “My wife’s in the temperance movement, she’d kill me if she knew where I was. And you, you shouldn’t drink as much as you do. You're ruining what’s left of your career.”
“Hells, Henri, just take a seat. I won’t argue with you about which is a more dangerous addiction, alcohol or marriage.” He gestured to the thin gold ring on Henri’s finger. “And I did not lose my job to alcohol, if you recall.”
“No, you didn’t.” Henri spoke slowly. “You were fired for yelling at a student in the ancient destruction-ritual language of Aeij-Kellezera’att.”
“And completely unfairly, too! His term paper on rituals of the southern countries was terrible… I was teaching him.” Calvin said, signaling the barkeep for another brandy.
“Calvin, his hair caught fire the next day.”
"Coincidence!”
“Then it turned into snakes.”
“That wasn’t my fault,” Calvin retorted. “I wasn’t even positive that was the word for snakes.” Henri opened his mouth, then closed it again.
“But nostalgia isn’t the reason I called you here, Lionel. You know that old demonology book you lent me on gatekeeper summoning rituals?”
Henri frowned again, this time in concentration. “The one that proposed that absurd summoning circle theory, with the human sacrifices to bind whatever spirit was supposed to be called?”
Durst nodded. “Tried it last night.”
“Hmm… clearly there’s no empirical evidence of demo—hold on, you tried what?!?”
“Well, it looked like it might be interesting, even without the human sacrifices. I just lit candles there instead,” Calvin said as Henri visibly relaxed. “Now—speaking theoretically—what would you expect to happen if the ritual actually worked?”
Henri fidgeted with his handkerchief. “Theoretically? The candles would serve as the summoning barrier, so the circle would still work. The presence would probably overwhelm the candles, so they’d blow out, and the rest of the energy would create a blowback, a recoil of some sort. So, er, what did happen?”
“The candles blew out simultaneously. And did you hear about all those naturalists trying to figure out how Pallas had its first earthquake in a hundred and fifty years?”
The color drained from Henri’s face. “You’re joking.”
Calvin grinned at the barkeeper. “Nelson, get my friend here a brandy, please.”
“A double,” Henri amended faintly.
Writing RP sample:Waived (no other characters yet, plus I've written up Death)
