And a challenger steps up to contend for the much coveted position...
Name Icarus
Gender Mostly masculine, sometimes feminine, all fabulous, though some may beg to differ (Male, no matter what he or his occasional feminine tendency may say)
Age Thirty-one years old, but looks younger than he is.
Species Human
Occupation Ringmaster of Circo nelle Stelle
Appearance Icarus is what others may describe as 'a natural beauty'. With dark brown hair and hazel eyes, there is just some inexplicable quality about the man that makes him look, for lack of better vocabulary, quite pretty. With delicate, refined features and a thin and light body structure due to his previous occupation, he can actually be quite easily mistaken for a woman sometimes. His skin is clear and a bit paler than most, and for a circus performer, he uses surprisingly little makeup, usually only a bit of light eyeshadow or maybe a little face paint to draw a few decorations on his features. He enjoys wearing long flowing robes or capes for some reason. Other than this, he's honestly quite normal looking, and if you were to see him in a crowd, you'd probably look at him for a few seconds, trying to figure out if he was a man or woman, or perhaps think, "Oh, that person's quite pretty," before getting on with the rest of your life.
Picture (I will get around to drawing something, but please accept
this for reference in the meantime)
Personality Icarus is most certainly a diplomatic and perceptive individual who chooses every word and action with utmost delicacy, and with every intention of furthering his and the Circo's own interests. Courteous and gracious at the best of times, while slightly biting and sarcastic, if not ironic, at worst, the young ringmaster is a generally polite individual who rarely ever loses his cool or composure. Every decision or action he makes is carefully considered beforehand, all with the purpose of creating a tailor-made perception of himself in others' minds, which he manipulates and uses for his own benefit.
While lacking in charisma when compared to the likes of Monsieur Loyal or Madame Sil, Icarus is possibly the most mentally balanced of the three Ringmasters, though whether he whether the most sane of the three is up for discussion. Unlike the other two Ringmasters, however, Icarus is not very responsible or bold, painting himself as a coward or a procrastinator by shirking his workload and responsibilities and hiding behind his troupe members for protection when feeling threatened.
When he is acting his politest, there can be an underlying threat found hidden in his words. Most of the time though, he knows what people want to see or hear, and usually gives it to them, in order to win their favor. Tactless is probably one of the last words you would use to describe this man.
Despite his manipulative personality, Icarus has several very human traits to him. A complete romantic, he often gets quite emotional when watching 'chick flicks' or reading romance novels. He also genuinely cares for and enjoys being with his troupe, regardless of however they feel towards him. Icarus is relatively attention-hungry, and can get jealous easily. Needless to say, he is a bit vain, though not to the point of narcissism, seeing as he takes quite some pride in self-appearance. While he is calculating and diplomatic in his dealings, it does not necessarily mean he is cruel, and he's actually rather kind and compassionate to those close to him. Of course, then Icarus is kind, it's difficult to tell whether he has any ulterior motives or if the kindness is genuine if you are privy his true nature, so it's hard to know when you can trust him.
Due to his weak physical state, Icarus' Pstrength is his mind. Forever planning, Icarus is constantly evaluating and reevaluating those around him and those he sees. The way he acts makes him seem useless and far from a threat to either of the other circuses, but his true motives behind all this strategizing and manipulation are still unknown.
Abilities Due to his previous career as a tightrope walker, Icarus has extraordinary balance, though he never gets to utilize this skill due to his disability. However, his repertoire also consists of juggling, some ballet, and several acrobatic stunts, which lend him flexibility and hand-eye coordination. Due to his use of crutches, he also has surprising upper-body strength, but he does not put this to use nor boast about it much of the time. Besides these physical abilities, Icarus has the uncanny ability to quite accurately gauge and predict others' motions, thoughts and desires, through careful research and observation. He has a considerable amount of knowledge of psychology and human nature, so it isn't difficult for him to perform Freudian Dissections of people he meets, though he has certainly some ways to go before he reaches the level of, say, Sherlock Holmes. Needless to say, he is a splendid actor as well, but he is a human after all, and on certain occasions, he can make a mistake. As a final resort, he carries a tiny, and tiny as in 'no longer than a handspan', gun with him. Due to its size, it lacks a barrel and therefore only works at point-blank range, and it can also only carry one bullet.
Weaknesses Icarus' most noticeable weakness would be that his right leg is completely gone, as the result of an accident. During shows and performances, he uses a prosthetic metal leg and a walking stick to hide this disability, but at other times, he often uses a pair of crutches to walk. This means of course, that if you take away his walking stick or crutches, you can render him nearly immobile. He also never quite finished rehab and did most of his learning through trail and failure, so there's certain things that he never really learnt how to do with crutches and one leg. He's also quite inexperienced in the use of his prosthetic leg, and is still in the process of figuring out how to make it move. Besides this, Icarus is a huge romantic, and his emotions can sometimes cloud his judgement, or make him seem like a spoiled brat. This makes him seem over-dramatic and irritating at times. He is also a tad vain, and is a huge attention-seeker who gets envious quite easily, but his hugest emotional flaw is his overconfidence, the cause of his accident. It seems that he still hasn't learnt, and when he is too confident that a plan will work, to confident in his own skills, he refuses to listen to others' warnings and calls of contingency plans. This is a bad combination with his romanticism, because it means sometimes he places his ambitions too high, makes his goals too idealistic, then refuses to create back-up plans. A recipe for failure, and he often needs a good shove to push him back down to earth and rationality.
Backstory Once upon a time, there was a tightrope walker. He was the star of the show, and every night, he would perform stunts and dances up on the high wire, where everyone could see him and admire him, but never be able to reach. He loved his job, with the lights and colors, the audience and the cheering, the adoration and the attention. Walking up on that tightrope was like flying to him, the ultimate dream achieved, and it was all that he could ever want from life. Above everyone's heads, he would bounce on the wire, he would dance, he would juggle and flip and twirl. He lived off the amazed 'ooh's and the entranced 'ah's that the audience would gasp whenever he performed a trick. However, one day, he let all his confidence go to his head, and in the middle of the grand finale, a backflip followed by six consecutive pirouettes finished with the flick jette with the umbrella in hand, he just... Slipped.
The tightrope walker had never used a safety net for a performance.
That accident ultimately resulted in the tightrope walker losing a leg, and after some rehab, he would be able to walk again with the aid of crutches, but he'd never be able to dance, let alone tightrope walk, ever again. For the tightrope walker, this was a fate worse than death. His friends and fellow circus performers had all told him that his confidence and refusal to ever have any safety measures was going to be the death of him. Turns out they were right.
What circus has use for a one-legged man? He cannot be put in a freakshow, for disability does not equate to deformity. He cannot perform in the big top, because he was never trained to perform such feats on one leg. He cannot become a helper, because he can't quickly climb up and down the stairs to fetch the wares and tools needed. In any case, his rehab was to take nearly half of a whole year, and there was no way that the tiny traveling circus could afford the medical bill if they were to stay in place for so long. In the end, with their utmost regrets, the circus was forced to dismiss the tightrope walker from their ranks.
Born into the circus, the tightrope walker had been pretty much home-schooled all his life, and had never received a proper education, He could not take up those mediocre, minimal-pay, manual jobs that people do just to earn enough wages to stay alive either, for no-one would hire him with his disability. Janitors and Seven Eleven Clerks and street cleaners need both legs.
On the brink of despair and self-destruction, the tightrope walker, in a bout of emotion, made a rash decision to escape rehab and throw himself off a bridge and end his own existence. However, there is nothing more pathetic than a suicide attempt in which the victim cannot even climb up the rail to stand on the edge of the bridge. In the midst of his anguish, it seemed that Lady Fate decided to spite him even more, and the wind blew-well, more like slapped- a flier right in his face. Peeling it off, the tightrope walker took a look at the wet (well, it was raining of course, as it always is at this type of moment) piece of paper, it was an advertisement for a circus owned by a man named Fiancre Tristis.
And thus, the pitiful tightrope walker was reborn as the man known as Icarus.
Facts Sometimes, when no-one's watching, he attempts to tightrope walk again. But then, there's a reason that no-one's ever heard of a one-legged tightrope walker, so he fails every time.
Strangely enough, while he isn't afraid of heights or the high wire, he's now terrified of drops and falls. Roller Coasters and Drop rides are his worst enemies.
For some reason, he has no qualm with wearing skirts and women's wear once in a while, most likely because skirts hide his missing leg.
He has a very mild addiction to custard tarts. They're his comfort food. And his celebration food. And his hungry food.
Icarus is quite fond of children, and is very willing to play with them or babysit them. This tolerance for childish behavior is probably one of the ways he manages to stay relatively sane while being in charge of a circus in a place like Gaia.
Before his accident, in a world that he travelled to before Gaia, Icarus heard a story of a man named Pierre who illegally tightrope-walked between two of the tallest towers in the world. He fully intended to attempt that stunt as well, until he found out that the twin towers had been blown up a while ago.
Since his lack of education prevented him from getting a proper job after his accident, Icarus spends a lot of his 'free' (read 'slacking-off') time reading and learning. It seems that he's taken a special interest to not only psychology, but also Shakespeare, and can recite a verse or two if the situation calls for it.
He enjoys swimming and floating, because it reminds him of the feeling of suspension.
Icarus likes telling and listening to stories. Please tell him some. He promises to return the favor afterwards. Of course, there's no guarantee that he won't bend the facts a bit just to make it sound a little more interesting.
SampleThe music that's blaring from the speakers below is barely an echo up at the highwire, dozens of meters above the heads of the audience. Under the glare of the spotlights, the tightrope walker can feel the sweat bead up on his forehead, and the makeup clogging his pores does nothing to help. Playing his routine through his head, he stands, there completely still, waiting for his cue. The ringmaster below is still speaking, announcing his act, no doubt, and the tightrope walker can't help but swell with pride. It's about his time to perform.
All of a sudden, the volume of the music escalates. The sound of violins and the piano reach his ears, and he adjusts his internal tempo to fit.
One, two, one, two. Counting the beats in the rhythm, he takes a deep breath and bends his knees and the melody of the violin is climbing up the scale higher and higher until it reaches that high F and-
That's his cue. The performer jumps and frontflips onto the cable, bouncing as he lands, and emerging in a gymnasts' finishing pose, chin up, arms raised and apart. The crowd below cheers, and a smile inevitably creeps onto his face. Thus the show begins. Everything after that is rote muscle memory. The corkscrews, the spins, the balancing, the juggling. It's as if he's an airplane on autopilot, he's not truly thinking of his movements. He's too drunk, too high, to ecstatic from the crowd's cheers,this suspended feeling of flight. It's like this every performance, this euphoria.
This feeling is his anti-drug, his addiction. It's only at moments like this that he truly feels fulfilled, and this sensation, of stage lights burning him with their rays, the wind in his hair, the audience going wild belong, the butterflies in his stomach, the adrenaline pumping through his veins, is his heaven. As he flips and dances, as graceful as a bird in the air, there's nothing that he could want more from life. Everyone else in the world doesn't know what they're missing, doesn't know how amazing and brilliant it feels up here a hundred feet above the ground.
All is silent for a moment, and the tightrope walker realizes that it's time for his final trick. Grasping the white lace umbrella in his hand, he launches himself into a backflip, and as he lands, one, two, three, four, five, six pirouettes, his head turning and twirling and spotting and trying not to get dizzy. Finally, the flick jette and the tightrope walker gets ready to spin as he lands, turning to bow at the audience. But all of a sudden, as his foot makes contact with the cable, something feels off, and it throws off his entire balance. That mistake is all it takes, and his foot slips.
At that moment, the only thing running through his mind is utter shock.
How could I have made such a stupid mistake? His mind numbly registers that there isn't a safety net, because he never uses a safety net for performances, so he's probably going to die. He doesn't even hear the crowd's horrified gasps and screams. Everything around him seems to slow down. The wind in his hair, the attention of the crowd, the feeling of flight... Maybe this isn't so bad. Something white passes by the corner of his eye. It's the umbrella. The tightrope walker wonders why it's falling slower than he is. Isn't there something like terminal velocity that means one thing can't fall faster than another? Maybe it's air resistance. He can't help but watch the parasol as he falls, it really is quite pretty.
A white lace umbrella crashes to the ground and breaks.
Reply
