This was my entry for the lost child contest!
Name: Bridget Marie Tulip
Gender: Female
Mythbase: Irish Folk Tale- Leprechaun
Link to a source on the mythbase:
Leprechauns on WikipediaLink to Fa'e quest thread: My Quest ThreadAppearance: Very short (four feet tall), A great big mess of red hair, always wears a gold coin around her neck.
Powers: oCoin Attachment: She is psychically bonded to her coins and they call to her when they are near, which is how she finds the coins that are not currently in her possession
oLimited Telekinesis: She is telekinetic but can only manipulate her coins. As she grows up her power doesn’t become stronger, but it becomes more useful as she gets more and more coins.
oBlinking: Because of the part of the Leprechaun myth that says that the moment some one takes their eyes off of a leprechaun they are gone, with this power she will be able to disappear and reappear in another location. It’s not as extensive as teleportation would be, for example, she can only go from the inside of a building to the outside. She also can only use this power under moments of extreme emotion. (she doesn’t have it yet when she comes to Gaia, she’d start to develop it shortly after arriving. Maybe once she reaches adulthood she will be able to master this power.)
Personality: oBridget has always been a bit strange. For starters her "mom" isn't her real mom, she found her in the snow when she was a baby. She has no father. In the very family oriented Irish-Catholic neighborhood that she grew up in this was a huge scandal. This has made her a rather mild mannered girl, usually. Most of the time she's fairly meek, your usual misfit dorky type. She's intelligent but not super smart, she's cute but not super pretty. She's shy but she has a few friends. However, every now and again her inner leprechaun comes out and she just can't contain herself. She has to cause some mischief or wreak some havoc. Her mischief is always benign in nature, she never means to actually hurt anyone.
oBridget doesn’t want to admit to it, but she is very greedy by nature. Leprechauns are consumed with their love and attachment to their gold, and that has permeated through to Bridget's new life. Being raised a catholic and taught that greed is bad, she's tried to control it, but deep inside, she has to have everything.
oBridget isn’t often in large groups, because of this, she craves the attention of large groups of people. However, if she were ever in a large group of people, especially in a confined space, she would get very nervous. She would keep her eyes fixed on the exits and plan the quickest way out. The few instances where this has been the case have been at church on major holidays (Christmas and Easter mass) and sometimes at Pep Rallies at her high school. Now, however, she avoids these instances like the plague.
How does the characters personality, appearance and powers and your character relate back to your chosen mythos? Personality:The first part of her personality, her meekness and dorkiness are caused by her up bringing as an outcast, because she was so different from other kids.
Her conflict between her desire to be good and her mischievous side stems from the conflict of her past life versus her current life. Leprechauns are known to be mischievous, because of her past life she has an innate compulsion to cause trouble. But because of her conservative upbringing and the morality from her mother and grand father, she has been taught that she needs to be a good girl. She wants to make her mother and grandfather happy, therefore she represses her true nature and plays the part.
Her dislike from large groups comes from my adaptation of the leprechaun myth when she (he in her past life) is uncomfortable at the yearly leprechaun meeting (see quest thread for more).
Appearance:Her appearance was chosen for very simple reasons. Bridget looks like a leprechaun. She’s short, she has red hair, (I have other ideas for her appearance but those are two of my chosen 3) these seem to be mostly obvious characteristics for a leprechaun to have. My third chosen characteristic is her coin. This is the first coin, the one that she was found with. She always keeps her coins nearby, but she must always have this one coin on her person or else she feels some how lessened, as though a piece of her soul is missing.
Powers: Telepathy and coin attachment: because of her deep blood bond with her coins she can control them in this life. Because she had sworn to return them all to her she can feel them calling to her when they are near.
Blinking comes from the part of the Leprechaun myth that says that a leprechaun will vanish the moment that some one takes their eyes off of them. Because this is a defense tactic of leprechauns Bridget can only do it as a defense, when she is feeling a particularly great emotion that she can’t control. (Eventually she’ll learn to control it consciously and maybe even learn to blink over larger distances but that wouldn’t happen until she is much older)
History: (Full version in quest thread) In her past life, Bridget was a leprechaun, a fairy common in Irish folk legend. In my adaptation of this myth the leprechauns are bonded to their gold by blood, and the gold is what gives them their power. This particular leprechaun had their gold stolen from them, and in the final moments of his life swore to retrieve what was rightfully his and to seek revenge on the young man who stole the coins from him.
Bridget had always been a little bit odd. Her mother encouraged her to meet other children her age. Other children called her names and teased because she didn’t have a father and because she was an adopted child. The father figure in her life had been her grandfather. Bridget excelled at traditional Irish dance and the flute from a young age and found a place into an elite dance troupe by the time she was 14 (although she was the shortest girl on the squad by far).
She always carries a bag around with her, in it she keeps her flute, her coins, a ball of yarn and crochet needle (she crochets as a nervous habit) and what ever book she’s reading at the time. The bag is with her at all times day and night and never leaves her sight, if for no reason than to be parted from her coins is so terribly disheartening that it is almost painful for her. Her mother made sure that Bridget understood that her greed and covetousness towards these coins was a sin and because of this Bridget does everything she can to be a “good” girl. She feels incredible guilt for feeling so attached to her coins and even worse about her ability to manipulate them. Sometimes she wonders if she is doing some sort of evil work, she can not be alleviated from this guilt because she is too afraid to confess what she does to her priest for fear that he will tell her that what she is doing is evil. All of this pressure to be “good” and all of her guilt over not being “good” tends to make what were usually tiny cracks in her good girl façade turn into gapping holes, from which her inner leprechaun can spring forth and wreak havoc. She rarely does any serious harm, although once a smoke bomb caused a boy to have an awful asthma attack, he was okay in the end but Bridget felt terrible about it. From then on she tried much harder to control her inner leprechaun.
Guardian: Mary Tulip was only 25 years old when a tiny red haired baby came into her possession. She’d lived a very simple life, she worked hard, drank heavily, and attended church every Sunday morning. She had never had but one serious relationship and had little need for men in general. Even though she acted very tough and independent, Mary was terribly lonely. Bridget brought love and companionship into Mary’s life. Bridget is Mary’s daughter. They have an almost “Gilmore Girls” dynamic going for them because Mary was rather young, not so much in years as maturity level, when Bridget came into her life. Mary is still a very staunch Catholic and has trouble accepting Bridget’s special abilities, she is in large part responsible for Bridget’s incredible drive and desire to be “normal” and “good”.
World: Bridget was born into a world very similar to our “real” world. She grew up in the middle of “Podunk-nowhere”. A small Appalachian town a few hours outside Pittsburgh PA with an almost completely Irish population. Most of the inhabitants are strict Irish Catholics, and the fact that Mary raised Bridget with out a father was a great scandal. In her town the church still rules daily life and anyone who exists outside of the church is considered to be less of a person.
Writing sample:Mary had spent her evening on the worn brown and tangerine couch, staring at the TV and watching the clock. She knew that this was a mistake. Letting Bridget out was a mistake. Letting her go, unescorted, to her first boy/girl party was a mistake. Letting her take that damned bag along was a mistake. Mary was plastered into the couch, a rerun of a sitcom she’d never been particularly interested in flickered across the screen. It was those damned coins. That’s what made her so nervous. Such greed in her young daughter, such a covetous nature. It seemed like Bridget cared more about those coins than her own family. Mary shook her head. No, she’d raised Bridget to be a good girl. She taught her about the 7 deadly sins, taking extra care to expound upon the meaning of greed and pride most of all. Bridget knew better. The rerun ended and Mary changed the channel, not paying attention to what was on. It wasn’t natural for a young girl to spend that much time locked up in her room. Mary could’ve accepted it and even encouraged it if she spent her time on the phone with a boy, or one of her friends. She would’ve been okay with it if Bridget was always on the computer, clicking away talking to her friends in some chat room. At least then she’d be being social. At least then she’d be gaining some sort of human contact. But as it was, Bridget was not only a misfit in school and church but she spent all of her time up in her room doing MAGIC!! The devil’s own work, those cursed coins, like the one that Bridget wore around her neck instead of the little golden cross her grandfather had given her.
No, Mary reminded herself, no it wasn’t the devil that had given Bridget her special talents. Her abilities were a gift from God, just like she was. She was a beautiful gift from God. And she was no different from any other 16 year old girl, all she wanted was to be accepted by the rest of the kids her age. She wanted to be popular and liked.
What worried Mary, was what Bridget might do to get people to like her. If she was at a party and it had started to lull, would she pull out her coins and start doing parlor tricks? After all the time that Mary had spent telling her to keep her special gifts a secret would she really blow it all? She wanted to believe that her daughter was too smart for that, but truthfully, she didn’t think so. Bridget was only 16 after all and it hadn’t been that long ago that Mary was 16 herself, 16 and stupid and willing to do anything to become popular. How would the other kids react to her tricks? Would they be open minded enough to see her abilities for what they really were, a special gift? Or would they believe that Bridget was an agent of the devil and burn her at the stake. Mary almost saw a march of torches outside her window. An angry mob ready to…
Wait, no one was ever burned at the stake anymore. That was a stupid thing to be worried about. No, the kids would only continue to ridicule her. They’d forget to call her “short” and “weird” and what ever else their expansive vocabularies will allow for, and start calling her “Witch”. They will tell their parents, and life will become even more difficult for Mary. It was bad enough when everyone assumed that she’d had a child out of wedlock, it would be worse if they thought her daughter was the spawn of Satan. Of course, she wasn’t Satan’s own child. She was a gift from God. But these Zealots would never see that. They’d never be able to accept that anything outside of their own narrow opinions was anything but pure concentrated evil.
Mary had been alerted to her daughter’s arrival by the swinging beams of the head lights of whoever drove her home. She had been comforted by the fact that this was neither preceded nor followed by an angry torch bearing mob and that her escort home had not been the local police. Mary hid just out of sight in the darkest corner of the living room, listening as Bridget fumbled with her keys, trying to find the right one to fit in the lock. Mary glanced at the red glowing clock over the TV, it was a few minutes past midnight, a full hour after Bridget’s agreed curfew. Bridget wasn’t a very stealthy girl and swung the door wide open as she entered, she had never had an opportunity to sneak into the house before and so didn’t know the proper way to do things, she didn’t stop to think that it might be wiser to sneak in the back door, which lead to the kitchen the stairs rather than cross the living room where her mother could be hiding. Mary smiled, her daughter’s naivety was comforting. By the time she was 16 Mary was well accustomed to sneaking both in and out of her house, and she even had a fire escape ladder rigged up outside her bedroom window to make her task easier. In large swooping steps, like those of a cartoon character, Bridget inched in the door and closed it slowly. She gingerly minced into the living room. Mary let her creep almost to the door way to the kitchen before clicking on the light.
“Hello” she said, in her most sinister voice, which as it turned out was not particularly sinister at all. Bridget froze, mid creep and turned her head slowly, her green eyes widening and almost bulging out.
“Uh…I’m…uh…” she stuttered and pulled her arms close to her, looking nervous.
“You’re late” Mary stated coldly, trying not to feel absurd for so clearly stating the obvious.
“Mom, I’m so sorry” Bridget paused and looked around nervously, trying to formulate an excuse. Mary thought that if it had been her in her daughter’s position she would’ve had one excuse fully worked out by the time she got out of the car. “I had trouble finding a ride home”
“Why didn’t you call me?” Mary asked, trying hard not to let Bridget see how worried she’d been.
“I thought you’d be angry…” she looked at her shoes, then back up at her mother. Her red hair was tousled off to the side and looked just a little more unkempt than usual. As she looked back up Mary saw that her daughter’s eyes were reddened with tears previously cried. Her mother stood up and rushed to her daughter’s side.
Bridget buried her face into Mary’s stomach and started crying again. “They hate me” Bridget sobbed “They only invited me so that they could make fun of me. They called me names and then no one would talk to me” she let out a great big sob “They said I was weird and short and ugly” she let out a long, deep wail “All I want is for them to like me! I only want to be a normal kid!” She lost all ability to talk and just wept. Mary led her over to the couch and set her down. She was worried that Bridget had resorted to extreme measures to earn approval.
“Bridget, love?” She asked. Her daughter looked up at her and sniffled. “What happened? Did you do anything? Anything to set them off at all?”
Her expression was incredulous. She gasped at her mother with a strange mix of hurt and anger “NO” she shouted in between sniffles “I showed up, and I saw this guy...that I like. So I went to talk to him. Then he said he didn’t want to talk to a little freak like me and laughed at me. Then his friends laughed at me and I left”. She let out a wail “He told me I was UGLY”.
“Did you do anything… with you coins?” Mary asked, worried about what the answer would be, if her daughter was desperate enough to impress this boy then maybe…
“No” Bridget whimpered. “I left right after they started laughing at me. Those girls…” She didn’t elaborate, she didn’t need too. There were two girls that had been harassing her for years, they were daughters of church deacons and their mother’s ruled the PTA. They were the golden girls of the community and they seemed to find Bridget’s existence offensive, and let her know it at every opportunity. They were the meanest of the teenage clique.
“You left just after you got there?” Mary asked, raising an eyebrow. Bridget nodded. “Then why are you just getting home now?” she asked. Bridget sniffled.
“Well, I started walking home, but I got lost, and then eventually I found a gas station and Father George was there getting gas for his car and a cup of coffee so he gave me a ride home”. The whole explanation was stated without taking a single breath, like one continuous word. Father George, the local priest, was just about the only person in this community that was kind to the Tulips. Mary told Bridget to go to her room and go to sleep. She decided that they could forgo any punishment, the girl had been punished enough tonight.
Bridget flopped onto her bed and spread out her arms. After a few seconds of reflection she dumped her coins out of her bag and stared at them. They rose into the air and she watched them begin to swirl around the bed. She laid back, resting her head against her pillows and making designs in the air with her most precious treasures. Her tears were drying on her cheeks but right now the events of the evening seemed far away, she was at peace and happy playing with her coins, watching the light bounce off their shiny gold surface in dancing beams of warm light. Bridget let all the hurt and pain of the day drift away, and a feeling of calm and completeness wash over her. It’d be okay, she told herself. It will really be okay, some day she’ll leave this little spit of a town and find her way to a place where people will like her. Where she will be loved for who she is. Slowly the coins settled onto the bed around her as she drifted off to sleep.
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