Player's Name: Mina
Are you over 16? SO FAR OVER
Characters Played Here: None
Character: Charlotte Blaine
World Description: Charlotte was originally conceived of as being from 'now', the time that I started writing her, so I plan to bring her from the games 'now.' There's nothing in particular about her history that requires her to be from 1980 or 2080 or anything.
History: Charlotte is the only daughter of the patriarch of a large and wealthy New England family. In order to consolidate their power and wealth, they have been very careful over the last almost two centuries to control their family lines in very specific ways. Not only marrying and breeding for intelligence and appearance, which would help them be charismatic, but for other less obvious attributes. By current day all members of the family have some kind of psychic or extrasensory ability. This has aided them in building their status, of course, because it gives them an edge in business to be able to read the emotions or strong thoughts on an opponent across a negotiation table.
Charlotte was born when her father was already in his early forties to a much younger woman who he barely knew. She was selected for her bloodlines and little else. When she died as a result of complications of childbirth, he wasn't noticeably upset. She had served her purpose. He lavished attention and support on Charlotte, if not actual affection. For her entire childhood she was told how special she was, how she would serve the family, and how all her education and training would enable her to succeed.
Imagine her surprise at age sixteen, the pampered daughter of a wealthy and modern industrial ist, when she found out that her sole purpose would be to marry a distant cousin from Europe and bear him many children. Nothing more. She argued with him for two years until, on her eighteenth birthday, she was introduced to the man. Seeing that all her arguments were in vain and that the man was a brute only concerned with power, she did the only thing she could think of--she ran.
Taking few clothes, enough cash to get out of Maine and to a small town outside DC, and as much of the jewelry of her and her mother's collections as she thought she could sell, Charlotte left in the middle of a heavy storm. She hitchhiked as far as she could, then took busses. Once she had settled, she enrolled in a community college and then in a four year college studying history and the Classics. She found employment with an antiques appraiser who was startled by how accurate her appraisals were. Her ability came from all her schooling, but it also came from one of her two inherited skills: psychometry. Charlotte is able to 'see' episodes in an item's history presuming that it was handled enough. She's not 100% on being able to read an item, but when she does she's correct about what she sees. Because she doesn't always know the context, of course, she can't always understand what she sees.
Additionally, Charlotte is gifted with telekenisis. She can lift a similar amount to what she can naturally, but not for as long. Under extraordinary circumstances, much like a mother lifting a car, she can lift more but for even less time and it will wear her out. She hardly ever uses this power as it is one she shares with her father and she doesn't like the connection.
Having worked her way up to a senior appraiser by her mid-thirties, Charlotte was starting to make a name for herself and finally her father took notice. He'd been happy enough to let her have her freedom because he firmly believed he would be able to bring her back whenever he wanted. Now that she has some success, and some power of her own, he's begun to insinuate himself into her life and hint that her time is almost up. When the ad for a whole new life comes to her, Charlotte sees it as her only option. She's started over before, she can do it again.
Personality: Charlotte is by her nature as well as her experiences a deeply private person. Raised as a pampered and prefered child, she didn't have to share with anyone and didn't have to build a large circle of friends. Once she was on her own, she needed to protect herself and only formed as many relationships as she absolutely had to. Her mentor in the antiquities business knew her best, but even he didn't know about her gifts. Adult, sexual relationships were fleeting, never getting past the casual dating period and she rarely allowed her partners into her own space. That said, Charlotte enjoys people. She's fascinated by them, by how their lives go, and enjoys being around them. She just doesn't share about herself. She's often told she's an excellent listener for just that reason.
She's fiercely protective of people she feels are being misused, particularly those younger than her. While she might not make a hugely obvious statement about it at the moment, she will work to aid people who want to get free of their situations. On the other hand, she's not at all unwilling to work a scam on someone who deserves it. (No surprise, those people generally remind her of her family.) She worked hard to build up what she has and isn't at all afraid of hard work, either manual or mental. She's particularly impressed by the hard work of other people when they are craftsmen or artists, but overall she respects those who build for themselves in some way.
Having walked away from her life once, Charlotte is fairly open to new experiences and people from different backgrounds. She was so privileged and sheltered, in general, that she wants to learn about other people's experiences. Her love of history and antiques adds to that. She's not at all superstitious, mostly because the kinds of things so many people see as 'special' or 'other' are just part of her family. And she knows that people leave trace in their possessions, so that they might also leave them in an area doesn't surprise here. This leaves her with no great interest in religion for herself. She's also not fond of the kind of hold it can have over people, leaving them open to abuse. (See the early comment about being protective.) Still, she's respectful of people of genuine faith because there's no reason not to be. That faith has built great art and architecture and she is happy for that.
Charlotte knows she won't live as she did as a child when she arrives. And she won't even live the life of a seemingly simple academic the way she had been. She'd gotten to travel some, be wined and dined occasionally by wealthy clients. Instead she'll be much more back to what she did as a girl when she left home--taking any job she can, building up a reputation, and finally having something of her own. She anticipates having to work in some kind of retail or service job, which is fine. Looking at the available jobs, she might do well being a 'school marm' or in settler processing.. On the side, she intends to use her psychometry to do fortune telling which she will build into a business if she can. She figures she won't have to hide that if she's so far from home.
Why do you think your character would work in this setting? I think a lot of the answer is in the upper sections, but Charlotte is used to picking up and remaking her life, she's not afraid of hard work or new people, and she is seriously motivated to get far from home. Being part of an experiment that is based on living more simply, living on what you can do personally, really appeals to her after her family. Also, she is a grown adult on her own, not responsible to anyone else.
Inventory: - One nice outfit
- weeks worth of sturdy, varied clothing (some pants, some skirts, etc)
- Two decent art history books, resources for her old job and because she loves them. Well worn.
- A set of nice stationary/journaling book and pen set
- What's left of the jewelry she took when she left home. (There's not a ton and she will be reluctant to break it up and sell it, but she's been frugal and lucky in life, so she does have a good set. I'm thinking that if she HAD to sell it ALL it would last her maybe 6-8 months, but no longer. I leave that to you to adjust?)
Samples: Third-Person Sample: For the first day all week, work had been good. Charlotte wasn't likely to ever feel like she was fitting in with her co-workers, but she'd been comfortable enough to laugh with them and even talk about getting together for a quick drink on their off day. She hadn't begun to think if she would actually do it; enjoying the moment was enough for now. On the walk home, she had stopped to pick up a small pastry to have after her meal. She hadn't treated herself like that since arriving. Money was too scarce, too important, for that yet.
Charlotte thought, as she carefully balanced her treat and her bags that held the work she still needed to complete that night, that coming had been the right choice for more reasons than she'd ever assumed. Worst case, she'd thought that in six months she would go back to a totally different life, able to finally hide in a real way. Seeing the settlement and the kind of people who wanted to be there, she wondered if maybe making a go of it wasn't the better option. She might yet die horribly through some avenue she couldn't anticipate, but she was free. Her first thought in the morning wasn't
Will he come for me today?. Usually it was more on the lines of something mundane like how uncomfortable her bed was. Bad as her back ached for the first hour of the day, that as better.
When she got back to her room, she had her bags and the pastry all shifted around so she could get her key before she even realized her door was open. Ajar. Just open the tiniest bit as though someone had tried to close it quietly and the latch hadn't caught. She stood there without breathing until her chest ached. The deep breath she took to get started again only made her chest hurt more as the panic overwhelmed her. He had come. He was there, or some representative, and she was going to be taken away.
Just before she slammed the door open with her mind and reached for anyone who might be inside, one of her neighbors stepped out into the hall. Seeing her standing there, he frowned at her obvious distress. Then something clicked and he was quick to tell her that the building manager had been in all their rooms checking the environmental controls or the windows or some such. Nothing to worry about, they must not have closed the door correctly. They'd left all his lights on, too.
She thanked him, and even accepted his offer of help getting her bags inside, but her breathing and heart rate didn't come all the way back to normal until late in the night. Her treat sat uneaten on the little table by the window, silently mocking her, long after she finally managed to fall asleep.
(486 words)
First-Person Sample: Journal--Day 57What I miss most in living here is any sense of history. Everything is shopworn already, used to the limits of expedience, but that's not the same thing. You can use a thing to pieces in a day, that doesn't make it an antique. Nothing here tells a story yet. It makes me feel alone even though I can hear people in the next room and people go up and down the halls all night. At night I read and re-read my books, memorizing every line of the Faberge eggs cloisonne and the forcefulness of armored helms.
What I miss most, though are the caches of photos that I could go through when evaluating a client's collection. I loved early photos that showed candid moments. One small group posed on a street with a random dog wandering behind. Women laughing as they hang out laundry. Best of all, of course, are children playing. Moments stolen and trapped in the silver.
Digital images, which are so rarely printed, do not have the same appeal to me. The image on the screen will never fade or crack. It will never sit in a drawer or be tucked into a book to be discovered a generation later. There’s just no magic to it. When I left my father’s house, I took as little as possible, which didn’t include any photos. Pictures of me as a child, pictures of my mother and of the grounds around the house would be nice to have. Too late now, I guess.
(18 sentences)
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