Post by Desert on Nov 18, 2008 17:39:57 GMT -5
faceclaim
Kadran
Sound of Madness
i created the sound of madness
wrote the book on pain
somehow i'm still here to explain
that the darkest hour never comes in the night
you can sleep with a gun
when you're gonna wake up and fight
Weyr:
Name: Kadran
Gender: male
Sexuality: K'dran never figured out his sexuality -- he always assumed he's straight, given he Impressed a king; actually, he's bisexual more than anything
Rank: ex-blackrider
Age: 35
Appearance:
Kadran is fairly tall, being a good half-head taller than the norm, with a lean build. He is quite thin and, as a boy, had a fast enough metabolism that he could eat a lot and not gain an ounce. His appetite has become more normal since he matured into adulthood, which has probably kept him from packing on extra weight. He is lanky, with long limbs and broad, clever hands, as if he never grew out of the clumsy stage of adolescence. Still, he is quite graceful and lithe, and could even pull off a rather dignified air if he tried.
But he never tries. Kadran's lazy, slouching posture, his often indifferent attitude toward clothing, and generally unkempt look fit very well with his rather apathetic outlook.
His hair is deep, inky black, with a hint of a deep navy undertone when struck just right with direct, strong light. It usually has a slightly oily look and hangs in limp, haphazard clumps in every direction over his head: a testament to his laziness. Most of it is cropped fairly short to make it easier to deal with, though he always leaves one section of bangs longer so that it falls over his left eye.
Kadran has a heavy brow and jaw, with hooded, deep-set eyes. The rare times he bothers to smile, the ex-blackrider could actually look fairly attractive, though his typical apathetic expression or a scowl is enough to irritate or intimidate people so they stay away. His skin has a rather pale complexion, and doesn't hold a tan well. The skin under and around his eyes is usually stained with dark bruises, considering his sleep schedule tends to be a bit erratic.
Kadran's eyes are his most striking feature: simple blue, but so watery and pale that it seems almost as though rings of clear ice surround his pupils. Only up close is the color visible: from any distance away, his eyes give the disconcerting impression that he has no iris at all. On closer inspection, it is apparent that around the rim of his pupil, the blue is very slightly darker and more intense, and it fades to a shade of the same color that might as well be white. Sprinkled throughout the iris are flecks of a bluey-gray faintly more noticeable than the blue near his pupil, but still hard to see from a distance.
His lanky body, for all the wiry, lean muscle on him from Turns of being a rider and under the thumb of Dharth who insists that his rider stay in good physical condition, is not much to look at derobed. In fact, most people would probably blanch in horror if they saw under Kadran's clothes. The only parts of him that have escaped extensive abuse by Dharth are his face and hands: he needs his hands to function normally, and not only does he need all the sensitive sensory organs on his head to work properly, but Dharth wouldn't have been able to stand it if people always stared at his rider's face just for the scars. Neither would Kadran, but Kadran really doesn't have much of a say in the matter. But his chest, abdomen, legs, and arms are all laced with scars -- several layers of scar tissue, in some places. Long, thin lacerations from slashing claws, ragged patches from biting teeth; the newest are pocked burn scars that cover most of his torso and arms. His hands haven't escaped unharmed, having been raised to protect his face from searing flame. The one scar on his right hand from before he'd even Impressed makes clenching and flexing that hand difficult, considering the damage to the tendons, but since Kadran is actually left-handed that old injury hasn't held him up very much.
oh my, here we go!
another loose cannon gone bipolar
slipped down, couldn't get much lower
quicksand's got no sense of humor
i'm still laughing like hell
Personality:[/b]
A few words can sum Kadran up quite effectively: lazy, selfish, socially inept, and apathetic. His general attitude has improved in the Turns since Adria and Kali came into his life, making him behave more like a proper human being. Not that it changed his personality at all, it's just that he's begun to put forth the effort to care and to go through daily life.
Kadran likes nothing better than to spend the day dozing or contemplating the mysteries of the universe. Not that he gets his wish that much, but it doesn't stop him from wishing. As a candidate he would regularly exasperate the adults in his life by constantly slipping away when chores were assigned, always found in some isolated niche staring into space. He almost made an art of exerting more energy trying to get out of doing work than the assigned task would have taken. Of course, when Dharth came into his life, slacking ceased to be an option. He still tried his utmost to get out of doing things that weren't strictly necessary, but his dragon has an eye for semantics and a low tolerance for Kadran's shenanigans.
He is also quite selfish and self-centered. An extension of this is that he can be a bit of a coward -- Dharth could bully him into going along with some of his little intrigues merely by threatening to make his life hell. Or at least, more than it already was. If his hide is in jeopardy, Kadran will keep his mouth closed when Dharth does something amoral; and to some extent, might be coerced into joining in, depending on what Dharth asks him to do. While Kadran's self-centeredness isn't the arrogant sort that makes him a pain to be around, combined with his lazy apathy it is irritating enough.
Kadran, when in his preferred state of apathy, is hopeless at reading people, and for the most part is oblivious of a lot of subtle nuances that most people pick up on pretty easily. He's not a people-person at all, much preferring his own company. His patience is very thin when another person is involved, even if that other person is just as unassuming and easy to get along with as they can be. He can be positively misanthropic in a foul mood, which is the sort of mood he's in frequently. When he wants to, when he cares, Kadran can be just as observant as the next person.
A lot of what makes other people dislike him is his general outlook on life: it goes something like "I don't give a shit." Kadran really can't bring himself to care very much about a lot of things. He's not sure why, he just doesn't care, so long as it happens to someone else. Very few things or people are on his list of things he actually gives a flying rodent's nether regions for; most people who are familiar with him have a hard time believing that there's anything on that list besides himself.
The things on this list are Juno, Accalia, Adria and Kaliara, in no particular order. These four were the ones to pull him out of his indolent apathy and knock some backbone into him, and his newly awakened sense of responsibility took over from there.
Still, Kadran hard to goad into anger unless you know his buttons -- which Dharth did. Kadran had an odd, antagonistic relationship with his dragon. They made a game of irritating each other, though not usually to the point of snapping tempers. Dharth was the one who does most of the pestering, since Dharth had the upper hand in most things above his rider.
Kadran has a very sarcastic sense of humor. His favorite weapons when dealing with anyone else, especially now that Dharth is gone, are cynicism and bitter sarcasm. He can have a very sharp tongue and foul language, but for the most part his bark is worse than his bite. He is no sadist: that role is given completely over to Dharth. He can be vengeful when crossed, certainly, but for the most part he doesn't taken the same joy from watching another's suffering.
But he's not that shallow through and through. Kadran does have emotions, it's just that he keeps them locked away, protected by his apathetic mask. He can have his moments of compassion, and if you manage to get past his irritating facade, he's actually a decent guy to be around. Behind that misanthropic face he actually doesn't mind having one or two people to just hang out with and chat, but long Turns of being a loner has folded up his feelings behind a wall that few people bother trying to get past.
Though he may seem like an idiot -- he usually acts quite dense -- one thing Kadran is not is dull-witted. He's actually fairly clever, and on the intelligence scale he could be deemed smarter than the average bear. He seems to live by the saying "genius by birth, slacker by choice."
As a result of his Turns bonded to Dharth, Kadran developed a very high tolerance for pain. It could be said that his pain threshold borders on masochistic. He refused to give Dharth the satisfaction of hearing him cry out in pain; it was mostly sheer perversity that helped him build up such a tolerance for abuse.
Kadran doesn't fear much. By now, with Dharth gone, he doesn't need to worry about the sadistic black harming his loved ones. He certainly doesn't fear death: he's faced it too many times. He isn't going to actively go to his death, but when it comes he certainly will meet it composed, even slightly relieved.
The situation that had him so paranoid about his loved ones is one of the main reasons Kadran is so antisocial and standoffish: in a situation like his, any bond is just a point of weakness that can be used to hurt him. For his own sake, he has mostly avoided getting close to anyone. Or, for the other person's sake, since being close to Kadran would have made them easy targets for Dharth's sadistic whims. For all his supposed apathy, he has tried not to visit his own problems on others any more than he possibly can.
The general opinion the Weyr has for him has taken an upturn over the past few Turns. Since he began shrugging off his uncaring coldness, the blackrider has become a much easier person to be around; to most people he's still quite distant and standoffish, but not to the extent it was, and toward the handful of people he cares about Kadran has shown the side of him that is almost the reverse of his former attitude.
Now, of course, that Dharth is dead, he is constantly teetering on the edge of insanity. In the moments of his death, Dharth latched onto his rider's mind and pulled it close, resulting in deeper psychological damage than is usual, even for dragonless. Coupled with the loss of his daughters, and Accalia's subsequent disappearance, he has only Juno to keep him tethered.
History:
Kadran, like many weyrbred, was the product of a Flight. His mother Kalie thoroughly enjoyed this aspect of being bonded to her jade -- so much so that she would often warm a man's bed even when Frierth wasn't in season. But once the afterglow wore off, Kalie would always slip away and never be seen with the same man ever again, if she had anything to say about it.
She was injured in an accident during drills shortly after one of Frierth's Flights, restricting her mobility for several months -- long enough that when she was confirmed pregnant, she could be fairly certain of the father: D'rren, whose roan Garrth had caught Frierth. By the time her injuries had healed enough that the Healers were willing to let her fly and go between on her jade again, the pregnancy was too far along to abort. When the boychild was born, gentle D'rren showed some paternal interest, but Kalie was hardly mother material, and she dumped the infant onto a fosterer in the weyrhold.
Almost a Turn later, Kadran's foster mother took on Kalie's second son: Kaital, whose father was (likely) an unbearably snobbish Wingsecond whose tempest lost a queenFlight. The two half-brothers were raised together in the weyrhold, though from the start they weren't as close as other siblings. Kadran regarded his younger brother as a minor annoyance for sticking so close all the time, but since their personalities were similar enough, neither got on the other's nerves too much. Since both boys were fairly misanthropic, they were each the only friend the other really had, and the relationship was still quite loose.
They led fairly average early lives for weyrbrats in Eden, and were pressed into candidacy with most of the rest of their peer group. Neither reacted to the post with particular enthusiasm nor revulsion, though Kadran quickly became a nuisance for playing hooky on chores so frequently. Every time they were dressed in white and placed on the burning Hatching sand, both came out empty-handed; a revelation Kadran for one greeted with faint relief, since it meant that he didn't have to put in all the effort it took to raise a dragonet.
Through the five Turns of candidacy, Kadran's career was fairly uneventful: for the most part, the only noteworthy event was when an overexcited violet charged through the mob. Kadran earned a nasty gash on his right hand, which slashed partway through one of the tendons and limits his use of that hand.
All that changed when he was nineteen. It was one of the last clutches from the old senior queen, but since Lyrmith was a raven even the smaller clutches she threw in the twilight of her life were always stellar. It was thought by some that the positively massive egg looming above the others would be another raven to take her clutchmother's place as senior queen when Lyrmith passed on, though others were less sure. Lyrmith had not singled the egg out like she always did queen eggs, and ravens were always born smaller than golds.
When that gargantuan egg finally shattered to pieces, there was a ripple of gasps from the audience. A hide black as night -- a raven after all? But no, red was flecked across that dark hide like splatters of blood, and underneath the layer of slick amniotic fluid covering the hatchling, its body lacked the iridescent sheen trademark of ravens. Once it sank in that this huge dragonet was one of the fearsome black kings, the onlookers muttered uneasily to each other. They had a black again, the first in over a generation. Not only that, but a tiny egg deep within the clutch that many had thought to be a dud had actually begun rocking -- and the only dragon small enough to fit into an egg that size was Eden's own talisman of ill-omen, a cyan. The two most notorious of Eden's native mutants in one Hatching -- to the older riders, it seemed a very bad sign indeed.
To everyone's surprise, the black did not immediately set about mauling the nearest living thing, as most blacks were wont to do. Instead he stood quite still with wings held half-open to dry them, surveying the candidates and the stands with all the detachment of a venomous serpent watching a mouse wander unsuspectingly closer. It wasn't until a dainty little green fresh from her egg tripped clumsily on her dragging wings and fell against his leg that the black exhibited any violence, and even then it was with a cold-hearted nonchalance that he clamped his jaws around the green's neck and snapped it with a deft flick of his head. The black then strolled away from the green's limp body without a second glance at it, toward where his clutchmates and the candidates were gathered. The faster thinkers managed to scramble out of the way of the black's path, though some still fell prey to his slashing claws and seeking teeth. He didn't do much damage to any of these victims -- all the wounds would be easy to recover from. His victims seemed randomly selected from the ones within reach, though who knew but he deliberately chose who to maul.
Then, the tiny egg shattered violently open, and the predictions were proved true as a bright blue scaled body tumbled free with an angry squall. Everyone backed away rapidly from the runty terror, but the huge black seemed unaware of his bloodthirsty clutchsib's rampage. That was, until the cyan fixed its fiery red glare on him. It charged up behind the big king and launched itself, landing squarely on the black's red-flecked haunch, and clung on with all claws. The black whirled in a circle as a deep bellow of surprise and pain tore from his throat, then whipped his dark head around to snap at the neon blue tick.
The cyan was pried off, and before it could make any more moved, the big black retaliated by flopping heavily onto it. The cyan was crushed by the black's far superior weight, trapped between its adversary and an unfortunate candidate. The cyan's wild thrashing ripped the human boy to bloody shreds and scored a deep, ragged laceration across the black's chest before the big king deigned to release his opponent; having apparently learned the lesson, the cyan darted away to carve a bloody path away from the black with a baleful hiss.
Now irritated by the brawl and bleeding copiously from his chest wound, the black continued on his seemingly aimless amble through the candidates, though the few he attacked this time were lucky to come away with non-fatal wounds. One of these victims was Kadran, who as per his habits had actually dozed off while standing at the back. He was rudely awakened when the black threw his weight into him and tackled him to the ground. Under the hatchling's weight, Kadran's collarbone and even a rib or two cracked. He stared incredulously into the black's red eyes as the dragonet glared for a few moments, before dipping his wedge-shaped head to Kadran's abdomen. The dagger-like teeth shredded through the lad's left side, pulling away a mouthful of muscle that the black tossed his head back and swallowed. The first bite had Kadran blacking out -- the pain of the broken bones and the burning sand added onto the hot agony of being devoured alive was too much for the young man.
It looked like, after a moment, the black lost interest in the unmoving and unconscious human, and moved on to bring down several more victims -- dragonet and human -- with the same cold-blooded savagery. A Healer had rushed to Kadran's side and was frantically trying to arrest the flow of blood from the huge injury, when to everyone's alarm the black sauntered back up to Kadran. The huge dragonet eyed the Healer coldly until the woman backed warily away from her patient. He went to Kadran's side and lifted a paw, then raked his wicked talons from scalp to chin and rumbled a growl. Up, Own, get up![/b][/color] Dharth ordered. You will get up and you will take me away from here. Your injuries will be tended, but they will always leave scars. That way everyone knows that you are Mine. After you are tended to, you will feed and bathe me. Come, my Own.[/b][/color] The big black watched, tail flicking pensively, as the Healer helped K'dran to his feet and helped the new blackrider limp away.
Over the next three Turns, the pair settled into their life. It was a fairly predictable pattern: Dharth would use every opportunity to control and torment K'dran, and for the most part K'dran would take it in stoic silence. Sometimes K'dran would do something Dharth disapproved of, and the big black would punish him for it. Dharth was the one to orchestrate their promotion to Wingleader, and it was Dharth to make sure the wing ran smoothly. K'dran just went along with it, unwilling to provoke his dragon into inflicting more pain on him by resisting.
There were several points where K'dran was pushed very close to snapping. There is only so much torment one person's mind can handle, and Dharth has almost crossed that line more than once. In every one of those episodes, K'dran gave serious consideration to a suicide attempt. The long-suffering blackrider knows that the only way to make Dharth stop is to kill him, and practically the only way to do that is to kill his rider. Though a blackpair's bond is relatively loose, it is still tight enough that unlike cyans, a black relies on his rider as much as any other dragon. If K'dran had ever given into those moments of temptation, he could have been rid of Dharth for good. The notion remains there to this day, and always crops up whenever he gets too fed up with his lot in life.
That was how he first got involved with the Rising Tide jaderider Accalia. Dharth had played his psychological games with Accalia's Rownith, and won the jade's Flight easily. He had known that Accalia harbored an infatuation for his rider, and watched the aftermath of the Flight with sadistic glee. And when it turned out that Accalia conceived a child during that Flight and decided to keep it, Dharth forced K'dran to become involved. What neither of the blackpair expected was that K'dran, instead of going along with it resentfully as usual, warmed to Accalia. He befriended the jaderider, and surprised Dharth by being unusually attentive whenever his assistance was needed.
This news was greeted with mixed feelings by Dharth -- he is used to being the one in control, and thus doesn't take kindly to surprises. Even more so when K'dran actually outright defied him -- dared to attack him, even -- in order to spend time with Accalia and their twin daughters, Adria and Kaliara. That event seemed to mark a change: K'dran has started to grow a spine and stand up to his bullying, sadistic dragon.
Over the past thirteen Turns since Kali and Adria came into his life, life for the blackrider has changed. After growing a spine and a sense of responsibility, he's begun standing up to Dharth and drew a line that the black can't cross. He's taking his duties as a Wingleader (practically Weyrleader, since the other riders supposed to co-rule the Weyr until a Weyrwoman and Weyrleader take over are unfit for authority in one way or another) more seriously, along with his new role as a father. K'dran has found that life is actually better now, though some things might never change, and Dharth continued to be a painful thorn in his side.
Then, in an ill-fated trip to the beach with his loved ones, everything went wrong. A pair of Atlanopolis' marine dragons appeared and Searched both Adria and Kaliara; once he realized their presence, Dharth winged out to attack and drive off the aquatic intruders. In the process of this he badly injured Rownith, who had swum out at the behest of her bonded to look after her daughters, and the Atlanopolis male Poseidonth landed a few hefty blows on the big black. The siryn Skailaranth looked on from nearby with the two girls on her back as Rownith betweened, and Dharth limped through the sky to shore. K'dran went to Accalia, but in her grief the jaderider rejected him and stalked off into the scrub forest behind the dunes.
Dharth, reaching shore, commanded his rider to send for a Healer. But, after having lost his offspring and his best friend, K'dran had nothing else to lose. Dharth was battered from his encounter with Poseidonth, unable to fly and limping heavily. The blackrider threw his beltknife into Dharth's eye and, after a brief scuffle, slit the black behemoth's throat. He lay where Dharth's death throes had thrown him, waiting for his world to turn upside down, determined to endure it.
Dharth's last words to his rider were full of bitter hatred. Fool. May you live on, My Own, and may it be a hollow existence you lead. You have only one other being who calls you friend; all else is lost to you. I hope you beg for death long and loud before it grants you release.[/b][/color]
Father: D'rren of roan Garrth
Mother: Kalie of jade Frierth
Siblings: half-brother K'tal of bronze Zhekalenearth
Offspring: daughters[twins] Adria, Kaliara
Pets: spring flit Juno
Juno is a delicate little thing, slim and lithe, with a daintily feminine build that is only emphasized by her diminuitive size in comparison to Dharth. The base shade of her tiny body is a bright, new-leaf green, that in a twist of fate closely resembles the seafoam-y color Dharth's eyes take on when amused. Her paws are dipped in coffee brown that fades into the green in a grainy fashion, as if the color is loamy soil smeared over her hide. Juno's head is a rich evergreen, darker than the pure emerald shade and tinged with the barest hint of blue; the hue extends the width of two or three dorsal ridges down her slender neck, giving way to the base shade with feathery patterns that resembles the needles of Terran conifers. Her wings, too, possess this deeper green, though the filmy sail is dappled with a faint design uncannily like the leaves of a Terran maple tree in a rusty brown similar to the russets of autumn.
In temperament, few are so different from K'dran's black than his fire lizard. Many wondered at the fact that a creature like Juno would have bonded to a man as apathetic as K'dran, and even more that she has stayed so faithfully with him despite the risks associated with being around a blackrider. Juno, like all springs -- flit and dragon alike -- is, in a word, loving. Everyone this tiny creature meets is automatically her friend, and she just doesn't have it in her little body to feel anything more than a mild dislike toward anyone. Fear, certainly: she has a healthy wariness and respect for Dharth, but hatred is a concept utterly alien to her. She doesn't have a mean bone in her body, and loves nothing better than to give and receive affection.
Juno also seems quite clever for such a little thing, easily trained and much more sensible than some of her clutchsisters. Still young yet, Juno is inclined to having an occasional fit of adolescent petulance, and can react indignantly to some of K'dran's teasing. But, just as no one can honestly stay mad at the lovable little spring, Juno always quickly reverts to her normal, bubbly self and comes back begging for a caress.
Truly, sometimes, she is the only link K'dran has to sanity. She understands this well, and is quite lovingly protective of her human friend, always staying nearby and fetching anything he needs when Dharth is mean to him. Lately, she has extended this attitude and a level of adoration usually reserved for K'dran alone to Accalia and the twins, as if picking up on her human's attachment. To the twins it makes sense, since being a spring Juno is intensely maternal and drawn to anything young. Often enough, and as much of her own choice as due to K'dran's request, she is found in Accalia's weyr perched close to the twins; she remains immensely fond of them, though by now they are babies no longer.
Other: i have to say, these two are my favorite characters. i've used them enough that they've developed more complex, quirky personalities that make them fun to RP with. Dharth is probably one of my more evil characters -- more so than Dea or Necro. they're a well-matched pair, both with personality disorders: Dharth antisocial, K'dran schizoid. -pets both ruefully- and if K'dran lived on the same plane of existence as me, he'd likely murder me in the most gruesome and sadistic manner that's physically possible. i've tormented and tortured that poor guy so much, and i never get tired of it. i'm just kinda sad that this profile can't do either of them full justice; you have to play around with them IC to get a real glimpse of what makes them my favorites.
i dunno whether to be sad or relieved that Dharth died... maybe a little of both.
K'dran: black
Dharth: 330000
Juno: 006B00
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