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 Posted: Fri Jun 18, 2010 2:12 pm
♫Welcome to Tor's Quarters♫
You enter a warm, welcoming little home not far from the central complex of the Weyr. The room you stand in is a large living area with a kettle over the fireplace, rugs on the floor, and many comfortable places to sit. A desk of good wood stands in one corner with hides scattered casually across it. The only other room is a bedchamber; it contains a hammock with a pillow and sheets, an alcove covered by a curtain for clothes, and a small table with a comb, hairbrush, and empty mug set upon it.
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Posted: Fri Jun 18, 2010 2:15 pm
♫Contents♫ Contents:
♪ Welcome
♪ Contents
♪ History
♪ Tor
♪ Flitts
♪ Acquaintances
♪ Encounters
♪ Journal
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Posted: Fri Jun 18, 2010 2:17 pm
♫History♫ Pre-game History:
Tor's grew up living with his parents and three elder sisters right on the coast just north of Iteos Hold. He was a normal enough boy if a bit on the dramatic side; he was always fond of being the center of attention. The Harper who was responsible for teaching the children of the small hold was quite impressed by his voice, and suggested to his parents that he become a Harper apprentice once he was old enough. His mother pounced on the idea right away, but initially his father was more skeptical; he had hoped that his son would follow him into fishercrafting. When it became clear how much Tor loved the idea however, he relented; given the lad's nature he was forced to admit that the tough life of fishercrafter wouldn't suit him anyway, and he wanted his son to be happy much more than he wanted to make him sail the high seas.
So it was that at the age of eleven that Tor left his family and set off to Harper Hall. It was not quite what he had expected. Suddenly he was surrounded by a whole crowd of people who were just as talented as he was, suddenly he was being corrected when he sang. He did as well as any apprentice, perhaps even a little better than average, but all Tor could see was that people didn't think he was stunningly perfectly wonderful anymore. When he thought back, he realised that while the Harper who had recommended he become an apprentice had liked his voice and had indeed said he had talent, he had never said he had exceptional talent. If he couldn't stand out because of his way with music, Tor decided that he would stand out in other ways. His penchant for the dramatic increased sharply over the turns, and he struggled to make people like him however he could.
At the age of twenty, Tor walked the tables to become a journeyman and chose to specialize in voice. As soon as the chance to leave the Hall came up, he took it and found himself on his way to Eron Hold. He spent four turns there, teaching, performing, and advancing in his craft. When he was almost twenty-five, however, a newly graduated journeywoman arrived at the Hold and somewhat stole the show. She was beautiful, witty, and had a large helping of natural talent. As a raw journeyman she didn't have the same skill as Tor but her presence on stage was incredible and he felt threatened by her. Whether or not she actually was becoming more popular than he was didn't matter; Tor took the next chance that came up to move on.
The deal was that Tor would travel over land to Trine Wyer with a route rider stopping at all the minor Holds along the way, and until they were almost there things were going fine. One day, however, on the road between one cothold and the next Tor and the elder journeyman were attacked by a gang of Holdless for everything from their runners to their cloaks. Tor and his companion tried to fight them off but were quickly overcome. Tor's companion was killed swiftly, but the younger Harper was kept alive so that the leader of the Holdless gang - whose nose Tor had broken with a lucky punch - could have his revenge. Payback started with a slash across the eyes from the leader's dagger.
Just as the Holdless were discussing what to do to him next, Tor's salvation appeared in the form of a sweep rider from Trine. Dragons might not be able to hurt people, but that didn't occur to the Holdless as a blue dragon swooped down towards them with a furious bellow. Before they could realise their error and turn around, the rider hauled Tor and the dead Harper onto her dragon's back and vanished between.
Tor awoke properly two sevendays later. The first thing he noticed was that he couldn't see, the next thing was that it felt as though there was a line of fire across his face. Once he had been calmed down enough to listen to sense, the Healer who had been primarily responsible for looking after him told the young Harper that they had been forced to remove what remained of his eyes. Devastated by the loss of his sight, and traumatized by the violence of the attack and the death of his fellow Harper, Tor sank into a deep depression for several sevendays. Without the will to recover, his injuries healed slowly and he was still in the healing wing when the young rider who had saved him sauntered into visit.
Her name, she said, was Xan and she apologised from not coming before but she'd wanted to get a couple of things before she visited. As she spoke, she pressed a pair of smooth oval objects into Tor's hands and told him to work out what they were. After some moments, he identified them as firelizard eggs. It was only a couple of days later when they hatched. The first one he named Eldest, because it was, and the second he named n** because the hatchling accidentally bit his finger while he was feeding it. The two young creatures quickly began to share images with him, and within a few days Tor was able to ask Eldest to show him what was happening around them right at that moment. n** picked it up more slowly, but over time both became really quite adept at it. Within a few months Eldest was giving him an almost constant running commentary of what was happening, allowing Tor to stop relying on other people to show him the way around.
Today, Tor's situation hasn't changed very much. He continues to advance in his craft, and to rely totally on his flits to get him through every day life; Eldest is his constant companion whilst n**, and recent addition Squeak, run errands and show him anything he wants to see further afield.
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Posted: Fri Jun 18, 2010 2:24 pm
♫Tor♫  Basics
Age: 27
Sex: Male
Orientation: Bi-sexual, leans heavily towards men
Rank: Journeyman Harper - vocal subcraft
Appearance
Height: 5'9"
Build: Slim
Hair: Mid chestnut brown, straight to shoulder blades
Eyes: N/A; his lack of eyes is covered by a silk scarf
Skin: Light tan
Face: Delicate for a man, but not especially handsome/lovely
Detailed appearance: The Harper is of average height, has a slim build with light tan skin, and arrow straight chestnut hair falling loose and smooth to his shoulder blades. Facially he is delicate for a man but, not striking or especially lovely. What is rather striking is the Harper blue silk scarf tied across his face, covering his eyes. The scarf never comes off; even if he's otherwise totally naked, while he's around other people the blindfold stays. This is because underneath there is a deep scar across the bridge of his nose, and a rather notable lack of eyes. An alert brown firelizard is always either perched on his shoulder or flying very close by, clearly guiding him. A blue flit and a green are often to be seen close by as well, but they swoop further afield and are often sent off on errands.
Personality
Five words: Dramatic, gregarious, musical, insecure, flitt-lover
Likes: Being liked, his flitts, flitts in general, performing, music, dragons, warm weather, fish, fruit
Dislikes: Not being liked, holdless ones, having blindness brought up, hitting a bum note, meat, canines
Detailed personality: Tor is a dramatic sort, a born theatric; he loves to be the center of attention, and will take any opportunity to give an impromptu performance. If there’s a normal way and a flashy way to do something, he’ll pick flashy every time even if it is more difficult than the normal way. In life he has three great loves, and in ascending order they are: singing, his firelizards, and being liked. He simply cannot stand to hear that somebody, anybody, dislikes him and when he does he will take great pains to track the person down and change their mind. If he fails to do this he will be convinced that they’re trying to make the rest of the world hate him too, and will try to find ways to make everyone else like him more so that nobody who currently likes him (or is at least indifferent) will change their mind. In the past he has gone so far as to buy a whole clutch of firelizard eggs, claim that his own flitts just found it, and then give the eggs out to people he feared might have been being turned against him. He is a fairly generous sort naturally, but extravagant gifts like that only crop up when he’s worried about what people might think of him.
Most of the time if Tor is insulted (intentionally or not) to his face he will try to either dismiss it or laugh it off, but if anyone brings up his blindness he will crudely cuss the offending party between before storming off. While having his loyal flitts allows him to function nearly normally it is a very sensitive subject with him, and he tends to assume that people either think less of him or pity him because of it. Even mentioning it casually with no cruel intentions, or starting to say something like ‘long time no see’ and then quickly stopping will set him off. He will eventually forgive somebody who brought it up by mistake, but anyone who intentionally uses it against him is despised for good and they join the rather short list of people whose opinion Tor doesn’t give a toss about.
Having blindness mentioned, however, is the only thing that will make him confrontational. Under all other circumstances he avoids it like the plague; no matter how much he might care about something he won’t keep arguing his point if things start to get nasty. If he can he will just walk away, but if he’s stopped he will quickly concede the point rather than face shouting, or worse a physical fight. He would quite like to be the dashing sort of man who when he hears somebody screaming for help will sprint to the rescue, but when actually put in such a situation he’ll slink away quietly in the opposite direction every time. He’ll go off and find somebody who is willing to rush in and be a hero as quickly as he can, but he doesn’t feel that this makes up for his cowardice and quietly hates himself for it.
Though he is flashy and apparently confident Tor is actually quite unhappy with who he is and has low self-esteem, hence his desperate need for the approval of others. At the end of many days he will spend candlemarks lying awake analyzing how he behaved, and will almost always find that he isn’t happy with himself. He could have done something nice for that person, firstly just to be nice and secondly to make them like him more. He missed that high note, and he’s sure he’ll never make master because of it. The only thing that can put him in a good enough mood to let himself be for a few days is a really good performance complete with all notes hit, all expression perfect, and plenty of applause at the end. Luckily he is very good at what he does so he gets his happy boost quite frequently, but people who know him well will notice that if he hasn’t had the chance to perform well for a while he will be more desperate to please than is normal even for him.
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Posted: Fri Jun 18, 2010 2:55 pm
♫Flitts♫ 
Eldest
Role: Chief flitt, chief guide
Commands:
♪ Show (direction) - Look in the commanded direction and share the image with Tor
♪ Stop - Stop whatever you're doing!
♪ Shoulder - Return to Tor's shoulder
♪ Fetch - Bring a desired object to Tor
♪ All done - Work is finished for the time being, the flitt is free to go and play
Offspring:
Personality: Eldest is a very calm, collected flitt. He takes his work extremely seriously, and wouldn't mess around while Tor needs him for all the treats, shinies, or females in the world. He holds an easy authority over the smaller two firelizards, and while he is very fond of them, he won't hesitate to reprimand them if they're messing about on duty.
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n**
Role: Chief messenger
Commands:
♪ Show (direction) - Look in the commanded direction and share the image with Tor
♪ Go show (image) - Go to a familiar place, or find a familiar person, and show Tor what is happening
♪ Stop - Stop whatever you're doing!
♪ Come - Come back to Tor and stay close
♪ Take to (image) - Take an object to the pictured person
♪ Fetch - Bring a desired object to Tor
♪ All done - Work is finished for the time being, the flitt is free to go and play
Offspring:
Personality: n** loves to fly, and to see, taste, and touch new things. He's loyal to Tor, and will do as he's told, but he's happiest when he's told to go and do something different from the norm, something a bit exciting. While he's usually very well behaved, something really exciting can distract him from working, prompting Eldest to pull the (very contrite) blue back into line.
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Squeak
Role: Messenger
Commands:
Studying under n**; unreliable on her own as yet
♪ Show (direction) - Look in the commanded direction and share the image with Tor
♪ Go show (image) - Go to a familiar place, or find a familiar person, and show Tor what is happening
♪ Stop - Stop whatever you're doing!
♪ Come - Come back to Tor and stay close
♪ Take to (image) - Take an object to the pictured person
♪ Fetch - Bring a desired object to Tor
♪ All done - Work is finished for the time being, the flitt is free to go and play
Offspring:
Personality: Squeak isn't as serious as the boys; she's a bit scatterbrained, but does well at her work so long as the others keep reminding her that she can't just flitter off to look at pretties, or sneak some food. Food really is Squeak's biggest weakness; she's a very large green (both in lenght and bulk) as it is; if she didn't get as much exercise as she does, she'd be positivly spherical.
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Posted: Sat Jun 19, 2010 2:55 am
♫Acquaintances♫
Coding: - Romantic love ♪ - Platonic love ♪ - Close friend ♪ - Like ♪ - Neutral/undecided ♪ - Dislike ♪ - Hate ♪ - Humans♪ Xan (wingrider of blue Opeth) ♪ - What can I say, she saved my life and gave me Eldest and n**. She's laid back and unflappable; a nice contrast to my dramatic tendencies. She can be a bit crass at times, but I love her all the same; she's wonderful fun to be around.
Fitts♪ Eldest (Brown, looks to Tor) ♪ - My calm consent companion. I couldn't manage without him.♪ n** (Blue, looks to Tor) ♪ - Always has the energy to take a message for me, or to show me something on the other side of Pern if he knows the way; another real gem.♪ Squeak (Green, looks to Tor) ♪ - She's young yet, and not very bright bless her. Still, she tries her best and sticks with n**, and I love her dearly.
Dragons
♪ Blue Opeth (looks to Xan) ♪ - I have never known a bigger grouch in all my days. Still, I'm fond of the beast even though he's never addressed me, never will, and ignores me at every opportunity. It's because he's Xan's, I suppose, and because he did save me.
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Posted: Fri Aug 06, 2010 4:29 am
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Posted: Fri Aug 06, 2010 4:31 am
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Posted: Fri Nov 12, 2010 6:37 am
I almost want to say we should use the technology, take the plunge, take the risk but... but it's too much risk. I'm no archivist but I know, everyone knows, enough about the history of our world to know what happened last time that thing was trusted. If we put our faith in it again and it fails... Well it doesn't bear thinking about, does it? I think we have to trust the farmcraft to bring back mystweed, to bring it back slowly, naturally. In the meantime, what about feeding northern queens on beasts from here and from Trine? It might take a bit of sorting out, but I think we could even arrange for all breeding dragons to eat southern animals while blues, greens, and atypes other than breeding crimsons eat northern animals.
It's a temporary solution, and would involve a lot of faffing around, but in times of trouble we have to come together and forget our differences... So that's all I suppose, I think we need to work together to ensure the fertility of queens, and crimsons, in the short term, and look to the farmcraft in the long term. Leave the ancientcraft out of it, that technology is better left buried.
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