Atrophy

House Wars and Blood Feuds In Old Venara

Name: Juniper Delorano

_{"Junie, mom would call me, or Junebug. I never really liked the nicknames, but what I would give to hear them again."}

Age: 15

_{"Old enough to know better but young enough to be ignored."}

Sex: Female

_{"If things hadn't changed in Old Venara I probably would've been shipped off to marry some third son of some rival house that I had never met before."}

Race: Human

_{"Doesn't change the fact the people look at me as if I were an Umbrakin."}

Appearance:

Juniper

While Juniper has some of the traits of her family, she feels as if she got the ones that were meant to be left behind on the cutting floor. Her body has seemingly only grown upwards, and with her narrow hips and gangly arms she looks more like a child that has been stretched on a rack rather than a young woman. Her brown, dry hair is chopped just beneath her chin, and it seemingly cannot decide if it would rather lay straight or curl up. Her brown eyes are bloodshot and baggy, and almost always looks as if she had just finished up having a nice, long cry. Her skin is pale but, unlike her aunt or her sister, her fair complexion has been fighting a long, tiresome war of attrition with the dark forces of puberty, and while the acne outbreaks have finally seemed to retreat in force evidence of lost battles can still be seen dotting her cheeks and forehead. For someone who claims that she doesn’t give a damn about how she looks, Juniper spends quite a lot of time preening herself in mirrors and tends to wear clothes that are less revealing (because she fears that then people would see the already obvious fact that she has nothing to reveal).

_{“I’m glad I’m not pretty. Unlike my sister, I don’t have to worry that the men who try and spill my family’s blood in the streets will also try to get me to spread my legs underneath their sheets.”}

Personality: According to Juniper’s tutor, a noble lady should be polite, caring, and patient. How he came to this horseshit conclusion Juniper cannot say, but it only serves as the ammo she needs to convince herself that it is much more wise to act the way she does. Although young, Juniper has mastered the fine art of being discourteous and disrespectful, knows more foul words than even the saltiest of sailors, and can easily hold a grudge that, if she were an elf, could imaginably outlast even the longest of Blood Feuds. She’s rather sick of how everyone in Old Venara loves putting on airs and refuses to play her part in their pageantry, and has grown even more distant and moody after the death of her parents. In other words, although she shies away from being a model young lady, she’s quite happy with falling into the typical trappings of being a shitty, envious, self-centered teenager.

_{“I might be the only good person that I know, but that’s like saying I’m the only good singer in a room full of deaf-mutes.”}

Biography: Juniper will forever be the baby of the family, even if she has begun to spoil like forgotten milk as she has aged. She did not get to spend much time with her siblings thanks to the gap in their age, although she had certainly tried to tag-along when she could. Still, even in her happiest childhood memories of her siblings, which are few and far between, she can only remember herself as being an outside observer, a tiny pair of eyes peeking out from behind a closed window or as a stumbling pair of small feet unable to keep up with them as they ran ahead to the pier. Yet, despite not being part of their clique, Juniper felt that she was the one who got punished for the mistakes of her siblings. Nalia may have been the one wounded by the blade of an enemy or Lucien may have been the one to stow away on a ship, but it was Juniper who was kept under lock in their manor lest she tried to imitate her brother or sister.

During these times the only person in her family that she was really close with was her mother. Her father was there, yes, and he saw to it that she was educated and sheltered, but he was busy a man. It was her mother that nurtured her, that told her that she was sweet, that she was smart, that she was special, and in a way she was, spending most of her time cooped up in her home with plenty of time to toy with her hobbies when she wasn’t throwing a fit or being moody. Yet while Juniper was kept sheltered from the plague, her mother was not. Her father, fearful that his daughter might catch the disease that ate away at his wife, kept her barred from visiting her mother as she faded away and, inevitably, succumbed to the sickness.

It strained their already tepid relationship. She needed someone to blame for her mother’s death, and she couldn’t blame the plague—you don’t curse the axle of a wagon when it breaks and makes you late to a soiree, you curse the driver. During the years after her mother’s death, she and her father often butted heads over even the smallest of things. Servants could determine the location of Juniper at all times by following the slamming of doors and the rattling of china, and the prolonged absence of these noises often would put the house on alert, because it meant that the youngest daughter of their lord had yet again snuck out while under their watch. Still, she did not truly hate her father; it’s a shame she had to become an orphan to realize that.

Now, Juniper finds herself without the mother who cared for her or the father that sheltered her, her life hung in an uncertain balance that is to be determined by relatives that are more strangers to her than anything else.

_{“I’m trying to look on the brighter side of things since Father’s death. For starters, the odds of me seeing Mother sooner rather than later has jumped greatly.”}

Position In House Delorano: 4th child and youngest daughter of Leon Delorano.

_{"Although I think they tend to treat me more like a door mat in the way that they otherwise ignore me except for the times that they need something on which to wipe off the shit on their boots."}

Equipment: Juniper is never seen without her mother's hand-me-down hair clip except for when she sleeps. Even when she's home the girl keeps a set of lock picks and a small letter opener tucked safely away in her garter, and she has three pistols and the key to her father's gun case stashed away in a lock box beneath her bed in case she ever needs to go out.

_{"Father wanted me to never need to carry a weapon because he wished I would live a life that had no need for such things. The others want me to never carry a weapon because they think that I'll end up shooting my eye out.”}

Skills:
Racial: Human, +1 to chosen field (Gunnery)

_{"Thankfully, there's enough ambient gunfire echoing through the city these days that nobody pays mind when a shot rings out, even in their backyard."}

Gifted: Gunnery +4, Athleticism +4

_{"I can run further and faster than my siblings or my cousin, yet I am the one who's a slugabed according to my beloved aunt."}

Above Average: Brawling +3, Skulduggery +3, Reputation +3

_{"I may not be anywhere near as good with a blade as my brother or sister, but who needs to be when I can just mention their names to get my way? And if that doesn't do the job, well, I'm not above a using a few dirty tricks."}

Deficient: Acumen -2, Grace -2

_{"I don't need others to help me, and I'm so sick of this little masquerade our houses all play with each other. I rather we all just be honest with each other instead of acting nice—and no, this isn't all because I embarrassed myself at the last dance, fuck!}

Unlisted: Soldiery, Archery, Dueling

_{"I get it. Some people are tied to the old ways. I'm sure there's some value in knowing how to swing around a hunk of wood and metal but, well, us smart people have guns. Okay, I guess I don't get it.}

House Wars and Blood Feuds In Old Venara

@Big DreadWord! Thanks boss. Should have one up later tonight.

@Sypherkhode822I figured Papa Leon would have enough guns around the house that a child with enough determination could get there hands on like in one of those old PSA videos where they always end up shooting themselves in the face. As for lock picking, well, hmm...maybe we should talk about her past with Pieter.

House Wars and Blood Feuds In Old Venara

@Big DreadOh, well, since you asked, I just happen to have this character sheet that I certainly wasn't plucking away at for sometime now.

The Fourth Child

Name: Juniper Delorano

_{"Junie, mom would call me, or Junebug. I never really liked the nicknames, but what I would give to hear them again."}

Age: 15

_{"Old enough to know better but young enough to be ignored."}

Sex: Female

_{"If things hadn't changed in Old Venara I probably would've been shipped off to marry some third son of some rival house that I had never met before."}

Race: Human

_{"Doesn't change the fact the people look at me as if I were an Umbrakin."}

Appearance:

Juniper

While Juniper has some of the traits of her family, she feels as if she got the ones that were meant to be left behind on the cutting floor. Her body has seemingly only grown upwards, and with her narrow hips and gangly arms she looks more like a child that has been stretched on a rack rather than a young woman. Her brown, dry hair is chopped just beneath her chin, and it seemingly cannot decide if it would rather lay straight or curl up. Her brown eyes are bloodshot and baggy, and almost always looks as if she had just finished up having a nice, long cry. Her skin is pale but, unlike her aunt or her sister, her fair complexion has been fighting a long, tiresome war of attrition with the dark forces of puberty, and while the acne outbreaks have finally seemed to retreat in force evidence of lost battles can still be seen dotting her cheeks and forehead. For someone who claims that she doesn’t give a damn about how she looks, Juniper spends quite a lot of time preening herself in mirrors and tends to wear clothes that are less revealing (because she fears that then people would see the already obvious fact that she has nothing to reveal).

_{“I’m glad I’m not pretty. Unlike my sister, I don’t have to worry that the men who try and spill my family’s blood in the streets will also try to get me to spread my legs underneath their sheets.”}

Personality: According to Juniper’s tutor, a noble lady should be polite, caring, and patient. How he came to this horseshit conclusion Juniper cannot say, but it only serves as the ammo she needs to convince herself that it is much more wise to act the way she does. Although young, Juniper has mastered the fine art of being discourteous and disrespectful, knows more foul words than even the saltiest of sailors, and can easily hold a grudge that, if she were an elf, could imaginably outlast even the longest of Blood Feuds. She’s rather sick of how everyone in Old Venara loves putting on airs and refuses to play her part in their pageantry, and has grown even more distant and moody after the death of her parents. In other words, although she shies away from being a model young lady, she’s quite happy with falling into the typical trappings of being a shitty, envious, self-centered teenager.

_{“I might be the only good person that I know, but that’s like saying I’m the only good singer in a room full of deaf-mutes.”}

Biography: Juniper will forever be the baby of the family, even if she has begun to spoil like forgotten milk as she has aged. She did not get to spend much time with her siblings thanks to the gap in their age, although she had certainly tried to tag-along when she could. Still, even in her happiest childhood memories of her siblings, which are few and far between, she can only remember herself as being an outside observer, a tiny pair of eyes peeking out from behind a closed window or as a stumbling pair of small feet unable to keep up with them as they ran ahead to the pier. Yet, despite not being part of their clique, Juniper felt that she was the one who got punished for the mistakes of her siblings. Nalia may have been the one wounded by the blade of an enemy or Lucien may have been the one to stow away on a ship, but it was Juniper who was kept under lock in their manor lest she tried to imitate her brother or sister.

During these times the only person in her family that she was really close with was her mother. Her father was there, yes, and he saw to it that she was educated and sheltered, but he was busy a man. It was her mother that nurtured her, that told her that she was sweet, that she was smart, that she was special, and in a way she was, spending most of her time cooped up in her home with plenty of time to toy with her hobbies when she wasn’t throwing a fit or being moody. Yet while Juniper was kept sheltered from the plague, her mother was not. Her father, fearful that his daughter might catch the disease that ate away at his wife, kept her barred from visiting her mother as she faded away and, inevitably, succumbed to the sickness.

It strained their already tepid relationship. She needed someone to blame for her mother’s death, and she couldn’t blame the plague—you don’t curse the axle of a wagon when it breaks and makes you late to a soiree, you curse the driver. During the years after her mother’s death, she and her father often butted heads over even the smallest of things. Servants could determine the location of Juniper at all times by following the slamming of doors and the rattling of china, and the prolonged absence of these noises often would put the house on alert, because it meant that the youngest daughter of their lord had yet again snuck out while under their watch. Still, she did not truly hate her father; it’s a shame she had to become an orphan to realize that.

Now, Juniper finds herself without the mother who cared for her or the father that sheltered her, her life hung in an uncertain balance that is to be determined by relatives that are more strangers to her than anything else.

_{“I’m trying to look on the brighter side of things since Father’s death. For starters, the odds of me seeing Mother sooner rather than later has jumped greatly.”}

Position In House Delorano: 4th child and youngest daughter of Leon Delorano.

_{"Although I think they tend to treat me more like a door mat in the way that they otherwise ignore me except for the times that they need something on which to wipe off the shit on their boots."}

Equipment: Juniper is never seen without her mother's hand-me-down hair clip except for when she sleeps. Even when she's home the girl keeps a set of lock picks and a small letter opener tucked safely away in her garter, and she has three pistols and the key to her father's gun case stashed away in a lock box beneath her bed in case she ever needs to go out.

_{"Father wanted me to never need to carry a weapon because he wished I would live a life that had no need for such things. The others want me to never carry a weapon because they think that I'll end up shooting my eye out.”}

Skills:
Racial: Human, +1 to chosen field (Gunnery)

_{"Thankfully, there's enough ambient gunfire echoing through the city these days that nobody pays mind when a shot rings out, even in their backyard."}

Gifted: Gunnery +4, Athleticism +4

_{"I can run further and faster than my siblings or my cousin, yet I am the one who's a slugabed according to my beloved aunt."}

Above Average: Brawling +3, Skulduggery +3, Reputation +3

_{"I may not be anywhere near as good with a blade as my brother or sister, but who needs to be when I can just mention their names to get my way? And if that doesn't do the job, well, I'm not above a using a few dirty tricks."}

Deficient: Acumen -2, Grace -2

_{"I don't need others to help me, and I'm so sick of this little masquerade our houses all play with each other. I rather we all just be honest with each other instead of acting nice—and no, this isn't all because I embarrassed myself at the last dance, fuck!}

Unlisted: Soldiery, Archery, Dueling

_{"I get it. Some people are tied to the old ways. I'm sure there's some value in knowing how to swing around a hunk of wood and metal but, well, us smart people have guns. Okay, I guess I don't get it.}

Lemme know if anything I put in there conflicts with already established facts; I think I double-checked the other character sheets to make sure I didn't bone anything up, but it's not completely impossible.

House Wars and Blood Feuds In Old Venara

@Big DreadOkay, I've been creeping on this RP for far too long to not say anything. Would ya'll be cool with adding another member to your big happy family?

Beyond the Storms

[Yells] LET'S START STIRRING UP SHIT!

Beyond the Storms

A happy story. While the practiced, mildly amused look, as if someone had just whispered an unpleasant joke about a person within her vicinity and now she was trying not to laugh, stayed on Constance’s face, there was hints of strain around the corners of her eyes and the edge of her lips. It had been a bluff, really. She had assumed Edward would’ve been like most other reporters and chased after something harrowing or exciting or scandalous instead of falling into the trap of publishing feel-good interest pieces that generally led to a decline in readership. Now she was stuck; she didn’t really have any happy stories, at least none that ended well for all parties involved. She cleared her throat and strung together a few words that sounded as if she was about to start something despite having no clue what to say, a thankful interruption from the intercom buying her another few precious moments to rack her brain for something from her life that she could spin positively.

“Okay, I got you one,” she said with a snap of her fingers and a gesture towards Edward. “A sort of rags-to-riches story. People love those ones, don’t they?” If she attended for the question to be answered, she didn’t give them a chance. “I maybe the great granddaughter of the Devil Diver James Holloway, but even when he was alive his family never had much wealth and, well, disappearing is a good way to let your loved ones be torn apart by the teeth of loansharks.” It was a tactic she had been accused of using before. She laughed lightly, although there was a hint of bitterness in her voice, and shook the thought from her head. “By the time I was born our family wasn’t just destitute, they were practically revelling in their poverty. I could never understand as a girl how my parents could never scrape together enough coins to properly feed us yet how my mother always seemed to find herself a bottle and my father always seemed to find a buy-in for a card game.”

“In the Bottoms—my hometown, Edgenook, sorry—there was only one way a child could really survive, and that was by working. Mostly in factories, even if they paid you rubbish and treated you as if rubbish was what you were. They’d deduce wages at the slightest offense; for slacking off, for talking, for breaking a product, for getting caught in the machines.” Constance looked out towards the horizon, as if she was trying to forget factory life, and then continued, “Another way to survive was to band together with other children and do whatever was necessary. Beg. Steal. Threaten. Most of them acted out of desperation, but I saw enough of them that actually enjoyed it that to this day I’m certain I’ll never have a child.”

“I just worked in the factories, but I had plenty of friends who went the other route. They were forced to do it, actually, because they weren’t allowed to work in the factories. Mostly for their fault, I guess—got caught stealing food from the foreman’s office, talked back to their supervisors, that sort of thing—although I remember there was one who had lost an arm to a set of gears at work and they fired him because he could no longer properly do his job. However, I must’ve felt bad for them; I practically begged Paxton to let me give them a hand.”

She paused abruptly and turned her head. That was a name she hadn’t spoken aloud in a long time, and for good reason. Any story involving Paxton was, by definition, an unhappy one. Reflexively, her teeth peeled back her lower lip and her eyes narrowed, only for her to quickly correct herself with a few blinks and a polite laugh.

“Anyway,” she said, sucking in air and then rushing through the next words, “it turns out that the real way someone survives in the Bottoms is to get out of it, and that’s what I did once I had saved up enough money through hard work and dedication. I was fortunate enough to meet a businessman who saw my potential, yadda yadda yadda, and now I can buy up all the factories in the Bottoms if I wanted to—except they aren’t really profitable, so, well, you know.”

She smiled, and then quickly moved to change the subject before anybody could point out how phony the rushed ending of her “happy” story felt. “Luna, I must say that you did an absolutely fantastic job of patching me up; Officer Raoul hardly did anything at all except talk my ear off. I swear, it was ready to jump overboard. Most girls I know just become nurses with hopes of finding a way to worm themselves into a doctor’s heart and, well, his pocketbook, but I can tell that isn’t your case. But still, it seems like an awful amount of work for almost no recognition—Raoul pretty much broke his hand patting himself on his back for the job you had done. I must say, I was rather bothered by it. I don’t know if I could stand someone taking credit for my hard work.”

“I have to ask,” said Constance with a mischievous glint in her eyes, “does that sort of thing happen often in your line of work? I’m sure Eddy’s curious, too, aren’t you, Eddy?”

Carvings of the Galaxy

@beyond visionsWe're wrapping it up. Should be fairly soon, but I can't say for sure.

Carvings of the Galaxy

Note to self, don't drink the water.

@Eru IluvatarTake care, brother.

Muskets & Magic - Dark Fantasy RP

For six long weeks Vashti had found herself drawn to the bow of the The Hallspeed, her blue eyes scanning the horizon for the darkness that laid beyond it in an almost eerily obsessive way. It was her way to keep herself from losing focus on her divine mission, for there were plenty of distractions crammed into that transport ship. She had expected as much considering the sort of people who often found themselves being volunteered for the expedition, a relief force comprised almost entirely of murderers and thieves and fools, but it was damn well laughable the amount of malice she felt radiating from the conscripts and the men who had been charged with keeping them from turning the ship back towards Ilya. Vashti could feel the gods testing her with each passing day as she overheard the quiet conversations of her compatriots, but she knew that now was the time to stay her hand and be patient. Those kind of men were a necessary evil needed to supply the expedition with plenty of cannon fodder, and she doubted that any of them had a chance of escaping divine punishment in the New World, even if it came in the form of an ungodly beast.

Yet there was no sense of relief when the boat docked in New Stratton. Her hand shot up to her nose almost the instant the gangplank had been lowered, a motion followed by a few others as they made their way from the landing zone. Vashti made a sort of noise, a mix between clearing her throat and forcing back vomit, as they pressed forward, her eyes stinging from the fumes. The elf had always hated human cities because of the stench, and even during her cloistered days she never truly got used to the foul odors that seemingly oozed out of every possible pore that man had, nor did she fall for the overwhelming colognes and perfumes they used to obscure the fact that they were, simply, a disgusting lot of people.

The putrid stench was even present, possibly stronger, in their bunkroom. Vashti was mildly alarmed that they did not have individual rooms, and deeply irked that she would be sharing space with convicted criminals. Even if she was no longer a true member of the clergy, she still had a spotless record—the fact that she got the same shitty bed as people who should’ve been hanging from the gallows filled her with venom. She sat in silence on the bunk that she claimed as her own, her head lowered as her lips moved in silence, her fingers fidgeting with the leaf pendant that hung around her neck. She prayed that the people who she would be sleeping next to would be smart enough to not bother her, or at least smart enough to realize that the claymore that had not left her arm’s reach for the past month and a half was neither ornamental nor exclusively for monster slaying.

If the gods heard her prayers she did not get a chance to interpret a response from them, as a cacophony rose throughout the already noisy barracks when the sergeants began to drive the new recruits like cattle out of the barracks and into the muddy field. It was another thing Vashti loathed about humans as she felt herself pushed and shoved towards the door; they were always in such a damn hurry. She could rationalize it back in the Old World, perhaps. Humans had such short lives and such large delusions that they were bound to accomplish some kind of greatness instead of not even living a life that was worthy of even being a footnote. In a sad way, it was almost adorable. However, here, where the average life expectancy was said to be none, it just seemed stupid to be in such a rush. Death wasn’t going anywhere and, apparently, neither was she, as she found herself standing in some sort of lineup while facing a podium.

Vashti forced a frown off of her face as a man, clearly in charge due to the lack of filth on his clothing, gave a less than warm welcome. He didn’t even introduce himself, either because he was humble enough to believe that nobody cared or realistic enough to believe that none of them would be living long enough to have a need for it, and she couldn’t help but stare at the empty space where his arm should’ve been. She always found wounds interesting for how they would tell of a person’s mistakes even if they themselves were unwilling, and she shook her head as the man talked. An armless man to lead an army; Vashti was no longer lost on how the expedition had made nearly no progress.

Still, while she could appreciate his simple orders the vices that he used as incentives to drive them to slay evil made her nose wrinkle. In fact, she had failed to see anything but dens of vices and signs of sin around the camp during her walk from the docks to the barrack. Was there even a chapel to be found in the camp, or even just some quiet room where one could momentarily take sanctuary? It wouldn’t hurt to ask; apparently everything in the camp cost kills, and if she was going to be charged for a place to meditate then she would like to know now—the barracks were hardly the sort of place that would allow someone to be at peace. At the tell that the man was beginning to wrap up his speech Vashti rose her hand up; when the word “questions” left his mouth she stretched it even higher, making direct eye contact with the man as he pretended to ignore her question and stepped down from the podium. She no longer tried to hide her frown.

“Asshole,” she muttered, brushing a loose bit of brown hair behind her ear before she dropped her hand to her side and waited for her assignment to a one-eyed man named Hoff. Again, she found herself studying the wound and wondering what kind of shit a person must go through before they decide to stop wearing an eyepatch for the sake of others. She pulled her eyes away from the man to look around at the group that she was stuck with, certain that every single one of them except her were here against their will.

Well, all of them except her and the Firehawk. She gave the other woman a glance that wasn’t wholly unfriendly. She had overheard whispers about the woman on the ship saying that she was some kind of hotshot bounty hunter, but it struck Vashti as odd that a bounty hunter would sign up for the expedition. The payday certainly wasn’t worth it, but maybe the Firehawk had heard otherwise. If that was the case then Vashti couldn’t help but to pity the woman, although perhaps it was what she deserved for pursuing a career that was more driven by greed than by righteousness.

She studied the Akvir that spoke up next, her eyes not failing to notice the tattoos on his wrist that marked him as some merchant’s property. Had the poor thing gotten on the wrong ship, or had his master sent him here in some desperate attempt at saving his investments in the New World? That hardly seemed like smart business, but Vashti admittedly knew very little about economics. Still, she couldn’t help but judge the man. She had heard that marking themselves for a life of servitude was something the Akvir sometimes did to show their loyalty to their benefactor, but why one would serve a man when the gods were an option completely puzzled her—it was like being offered gold but taking silver instead. Absolutely foolish.

“Just one thing. What the hell are shamblers? Folk have been tight lipped on just what we’d be facing out here, and I don't fancy running into these things unprepared.”

Vashti turned her gaze to Roland. Oh yes, she knew this one by name. They had talked about him on the boat too, much like how they had talked about her when they thought she was out of earshot. The man was vile; a patricide. Of all the people on the boat that had radiated a darkness, he was without a doubt the one with the strongest presence. Vashti was certain that there was no excuse for the man that made him deserve to live, and there was little doubt in her mind that he would do anything to buy his freedom. As far as she was concerned, she was responsible to see that he did not set foot back on the boat. But until that day they needed as many blades as they could muster, and it wouldn’t do to send a sword out without sharpening it up first.

“Not all folks,” said Vashti, giving Roland a half-smile. “Although I must say that I’m surprised Brother Danidus was actually telling the truth for once; he always did like a good yarn. Shamblers are the undead, reanimated corpses hellbent on destroying the living. They actually were a bit of problem in Yggdrasil before the church and its inquisitors put an end to most of them a few centuries ago. Nowadays those who would see to raise an army of the dead are tossed on a burning pyre before they can even get a single one moving right.” She sighed and covered her nose again. “I guess that explains why this place smells so familiar. Learned the hard way that we had to burn the bodies to prevent them from coming back to fight for the other side, I’d imagine.”

She shuddered, although the light in her eyes betrayed some kind of anticipation. “They’re ungodly creatures. The sooner we get out there, the sooner we can put them down.”

Beyond the Storms

Well hell, if you two are up for it then I'm up for it. Who's posting next?