player.
NAME/HANDLE: aida
PERSONAL JOURNAL: ![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png) boys
ARE YOU 16 OR OVER?: yep
CONTACT: hyraxed @ gmail | latrodectus @ plurk
OTHER CHARACTERS: natasha romanoff debts
character.
CHARACTER NAME: Reese Morelli
AGE: 23
APPEARANCE: Jacquelyn Jablonski, as pictured, along with a row of small stone-like protrusions spaced apart down her spine.
BRIEF WORLD INFO:Reese stems from an original character universe named CABALS. Based loosely on another, similar verse named AMYRANTH, both verses exist in a world where magic is real. Almost everybody is able to use magic, and in 99.9% of cases magic is used in synergy with the planet, drawing off the "naturalness" of the magic in nature to do things like start fires or cast spells or, you know, other magical stuff. The one guideline of magic in general is you should never upset the balance of this nature-magic around you — manipulating it into things that are unnatural (including curses, generally doing harm) taps part of the planet's 'well' for magic 'dry', and is discouraged by almost everybody with two eyes and a brain. People who upset this natural balance are often shunned and looked upon as pariahs in society (similar in theme to murderers, rapists and child molesters who try and reintegrate themselves back into a community).
In CABALS, this is taken an extra step further. Most (if not all) cities are ruled by Cabals, a small group of magic-users (witch, wizard, warlock; terms are interchangeable). Depending by location whether they operate more like street-gang or democracy, one rule is absolute: magic is wild, and to be able to channel that magic is seen as taming the beast, in doing your part for nature. Those who are lesser than magic users — beings such as shifters, the undead, those not-quite human, even if they were all born that way — are seen as filth and unclean, perversions of the precious "naturalness" inherent in the world around them. While some cabals are more lenient than others, most operate by one rule. Coral these abominations under a yoke, give them slums to live in; if they disobey, execute them like livestock.
The Vegas cabal, House Moroi, is ruled by the Moroi family of witches and illusionists. Because the 'nature' around them consists largely of people, luck, entropy and the cityscape, spells and other magic that is called into being while on the Strip is the strongest. The city is infamous for its entertainment industry, in particular the sex trade and various "magical highs" that are seen as artificial and damaging to the body (as it is seen as letting the "unnaturalness" inherent in that kind of magic within them).
BRIEF CHARACTER HISTORY:The daughter of a maid and a blackjack dealer, Reese had the typical upbringing of a child who was born with parents who consistently made trips to the Strip. Her parents’ marriage was tenuous at best, a series of ugly and vicious arguments that eventually escalated until her father was caught using a charm from a cabal in New Mexico to manipulate the games in his favor. House Moroi, the cabal of Las Vegas, had strict rules about not only using outside sources of magic without proper permission, but explicitly disallowed any magic on the gambling stage. Their retribution for this was his death. As it grew increasingly difficult to raise a child on a single parents salary, Reese’s mother turned to the Morois and was accepted under their ‘rule’ -- this made her not unlike a gang member, required to mete out occasional acts of physical and mental violence using magic that drew on the city as well as her body and sex, to further the cabal’s pursuits. Reese was raised by this cabal in exchange for this servitude, and given a standard education, until the age of sixteen. A reckless teenager, sneaking out at night meant meeting up with the ‘unfavorable’ kids; Declan Travers was one of them.
Declan became, in quick succession: Reese’s best friend, her first serious boyfriend, first person she slept with and first (and, so far, only) love. Finding out that he was a werewolf only elevated Reese’s romanticized view on their relationship, and when Reese’s mother found out and subsequently disapproved (equal parts in plain disapproval and disapproval on behalf of the cabal’s staunch rules about ‘unnaturals’), she ran off with him into the Vegas desert. Dropping out of high-school, she begged him for three months to bite her, and she spent the resulting week in complete agony. When she emerged on the other side of it, she was part-wolf and part-monster, just like Declan. His ‘pack’, consisting primarily of family members (both close and extended) as well as several friends of the family, took her under her wing. Reese cut all ties with her mother and lived with them until the age of nineteen. There she was taught a different kind of magic -- one that believed that lycanthropy was only an extension of nature, not a perversion of it.
Things were fine until she turned nineteen, when the cabal was sent to clean out the pack. In short, House Moroi’s attitude to the pack -- that is to say, unnaturals that lived outside of their designated slums -- were seen as something akin to runaways or illegal immigrants. Having a more cutthroat attitude to unnaturals, the Queen of House Moroi decided to order the pack killed. Each and every member was slaughtered, including Declan and his father. Reese was only spared through luck, not skill, and surviving was a fate worse than death -- a wolf without a pack was destined to be an omega. She was placed in the slums of Moroi, although a more accurate term would be uprooted and made homeless. In order to survive not just as someone with no money or food, shelter and clothing but also as an omega, Reese turned to more desperate actions. She spent the next two years selling her body, and after that turned to unnatural vs. unnatural cagefighting, both technically illegal (though seen as jobs befitting the ‘filth’ that was an unnatural), and Reese found she was much better at violence than she was at sex.
Not that she was very good at it, but her wolfish nature (coupled with stubbornness, determination and a certain amount of self-pitying rage at the way her life had turned out) spurred her on. After two years of this -- of trying to make ends meet, of selling herself (fists or otherwise) for money, exchanging favors for food and bartering with graverobbers for clothing, Reese almost died in a confrontation with another wolf. Sucking up her pride (a once in a lifetime event), she crawled back to House Moroi with her tail between her legs, expecting death. Instead, the Queen caged her and treated her for the following two years like a slave, or worse than: a dog. Her ‘unnaturalness’ meant that she was used more like a battering ram than a covert assassin, tasked to killing enemy members of the cabal who would enter Vegas territory, sometimes other rabble-rousers in the slums. While she was loathe to do this, it was the only way she could ensure her own survival. Kept in a literal cage and given clothes enough to make her ‘presentable’’, she was made to be the Moroi’s plaything; an animal to sic on those that offended them, to rape and sexualize however they wanted, and no-one would be able to tie it back to the cabal. If news got out outside of the cabal’s state lines, they would say it was an unnatural and that the outlier had been disposed of-- nobody inside state lines would say anything, because they would be the next name reported dead.
Reese tried once and only once to escape, six months into her indentured servitude. As punishment for this she was magically collared through a series of crystals that were fused to her spine, allowing high-ranking members of the cabal and in particular, the Queen herself, to plant suggestions into her mind, give her orders that she was compelled to follow, and inflict pain from whatever distance (as long as they were in cabal territory).
Reese arrives in ExitVoid after having been tasked to (and subsequently completed) kill a small group of unnaturals living in the slums.
PERSONALITY: Reese is a person who has been shaped by their experiences. She is not, as some other people would be, a survivor who maintains steadfast and unchanging through the mistreatment in her life. To understand her it is important to understand the degree of dehumanization, degradation, humiliation and abuse she suffered not just within the social climate of her environment, but direct maltreatment by the upper echelon of House Moroi. She was kept in a literal cage, fed only raw foodstuffs even through periods of obvious malnourishment (before magic was employed), denied access to water to bathe herself and was treated, in essence, like a dog -- the latter being the colloquial term for lycanthropes -- and only allowed freedom when she was sent to kill. This warped her from a character who was hopeful, if tempestuous, a romantic who was fiercely loyal and would endure great agony on behalf of the people she loved, into a self-pitying, aggressive, combatant creature.
The first thing to note is that Reese is easy to anger and easy to rile up. Having spent two years of maltreatment in conjunction with being called a ‘filthy dog’, she has unconsciously adopted a more animalistic approach to human behavior, especially in social situations. She is prone to snarling and growling to voice her displeasure, treating the barest slight or misstep as a personal affront that she will solve not through communication but through fighting (sometimes to the death). She is equal parts wrathful and vengeful, and is a misogynist; her abusers were primarily women, and so she treats them with an element of fear, distrust and aggression that lessens (slightly) around men, though that is not to say that Reese by any means is an easily trusting person. Or, in fact, easy to get along with at all. She uses slurs relentlessly and will not apologize for them.
She is intensely hypocritical, and will often display paradoxical behavior -- and, when questioned about it, will lash out in physical violence and taunting. Having a strong hatred for magic and slavery of any kind, she will rally and lash out against any perceived threat to her personal autonomy, while at the same time advise non-action from others in similar situations. This behavior is directly linked to her desperation for freedom versus the sense of overwhelming inevitability that stems from her (re)capture, as well as a certain Pavlovian-esque response; her aggression is what was most prized within the cabal so that is her ‘go-to’ tool, but it is something she subconsciously avoids doing if the situation presents any potential negative consequences according to what the cabal would have wanted (disobedience).
She also suffers from a degree of emotional instability. Prone to feeling intensity of emotions and no mindful in-between, Reese is a fundamentally insecure human being who believes she has little to no self worth. This leads her not to be self-sacrificing but reckless, uncaring about her emotional/social health and self-pitying. Being a misogynist, as well as being filled to the brim with self-hate, also lends itself to some identity issues -- an “us” versus “them” mentality, despite the fact that there is very little that separates her from the perceived “others”, and Reese will be the first to get incredibly defensive and resort to violence if questioned. The nature of her history and worldbuild means that Reese has not had very many chances to display her good qualities, but she does have them. She is fiercely loyal, will put those that are weaker than her before her (that is to say: children), and is capable of enduring a virtual shitstorm of just about anything if she considers the ‘cause’ worth it. It’s the hope that with her extended time in ExitVoid, she can grow on some of these attributes.
ABILITIES: Reese is a werewolf. While most werewolves from her worldbuild are the type that shift from man to wolf and then back again, Reese is not. Time spent under the thumb of House Moroi, as well as the magical leash around her spine, has turned her into a hybrid rather than strictly one or the other, and so is incapable of fully using the extent of her abilities. She is capable of great violence -- increased strength, speed, reflexes, healing factor -- but is not a strategic fighter, preferring brute force and has been ‘conditioned’ by her experiences to remain human while doing so, making her slower than she would if she were truly an animal. While most lycanthropes are capable of tracking by scent and low-light vision, Reese is capable of the latter but not the former. She has a heightened durability and endurance, as well as a more animalistic ‘brawler’ type fighting style.
Having spent time in her world-equivalent of a slum and in dire poverty, Reese has a strong survival instinct. She has fast reflexes (better than the average human, not as good as someone from another genre other than slice of life), mostly attributed to her lycanthropy, and is adept at basic sleight of hand (stealing wallets and the like). Werewolves from her world are capable of having normal diets like humans, but due to her mistreatment Reese’s body will violently reject any food that is cooked.
The previously mentioned “collar” will be null and void in-game, but she won’t realize it, and the magic inherent there will clash with other types of magic that I hope to use as a player-plot tool later on.
POSSESSIONS: The clothes on her back (white tanktop, jeans, black jacket), boots, a balisong, a zippo lighter (worn, 2/3's lighter fluid) and half a pack of Parliament cigarettes. |
