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Jan. 2nd, 2018 06:33 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
OUT OF CHARACTER
Player Name: ten
Are you 16 or older: Yep.
Contact: PM is good! I have a plurk but be damned if I know how to link it.
Current Characters: N/A
Tag: Capella
IN CHARACTER
Name: Capella
Canon: Tron (OC!)
Canon Point: Just after Abraxis' first attack on the Grid.
Age: "Adult".
History: Like all ISOs, Capella was born fully formed from the Sea of Simulation, her origin being amongst the originals in 1984. Even from an early 'age', Capella understood pretty solidly why Basics were apprehensive and sometimes hostile to her kind, which was helped by the lengthy and detailed discussion with an energy maintenance worker willing to explain exactly what the differences were between her kind and Basics. She never forgot that lesson. As the cycles turned, she found herself often aiding in simple construction projects; Campanella wasn't designed for extreme intelligence, but she'd always been sturdy and strong and above all reliable, and there were plenty of buildings and highways and conduits that needed building.
She paid attention though. Noted the distant light that marked the Creator's portal home, his comings and goings. She observed the way gridbugs and destabilization followed wherever ISOs congregated for long, overheard the murmurs from Basics who suggested that ISOs were directly to blame. Not intentionally of course, but inherently. Although she avoided the occasional bombings, attacks and general terrorism and fear-mongering, Capella always paid attention. It wasn't their fault that they were breaking things by simply being there, but what could they really do about it?
Clu's decision to turn the Games lethal and prune those who do not win gave her an idea that would set her on her life's path of becoming stronger, tougher - a champion in her own right. Having long since moved with some six thousand others to Bostrum Colony, she returned to make her own challenges in the Games and did well enough, but never enough yet to draw notice. The death of the Sea of Simulation was agonizing and horrible but at least in her view put a solid stop to the emergence of more ISOs in an already overburdened system. She withdrew, to a constant crossing between Bostrum Colony and the distant Gallium City, to work on her skills and fighting ability a little more. Even there she overheard of the Creator's decision to install TWO ISO system administrators alongside the Basic Clu, and though she didn't speak of it, this seemed like a very bad idea to her. Every advancement ISOs made came at the cost of Basic rights, and now they were losing even more of a voice to the ISOs. Why was there only ONE Basic leader, but two ISOs?
Her sympathetic willingness to listen and commiserate with angry Basics over this and many other perceived affronts kept her neatly out of most attacks ... save the ones she very rarely chose to participate in to 'gently' try to convince her kin that they need not spread EVERYWHERE, and leave some spaces to the original kind.
But eventually she turned her attention back to the Games, determined to prove she was more than a resource hog and a waste of space draining energy and giving nothing back. She'd learned long since how to modify herself simply to match local appearances or live comfortably in Bostrum Colonoy's comparative harsh environment, tweaking her programming to be better at her chosen purpose was reasonable as far as she was concerned. As tensions rose to fever pitch more than once in Tron City, Capella honed her skills and worked on becoming the local Games champion of several smaller, outlying cities.
By the time she set to returning to Bostrum Colony, there were rumors of a virus in the system. Her determination to return home and defend it from this threat EVERYONE could unite against was rudely interrupted by Suddenly A Dreamdwidth Game.
Personality: At her most basic, Capella is good-natured and still innocent of the true realities of the Grid she calls home. This innocence might lead some to thinking she's simpleminded, having no head for most forms of math and little comprehension of tactics past how to win at her favored games, and maybe it's true - she's no genius and she knows it. Pure thinking power is left to others; Capella makes her decisions entirely by her heart. She tries to think logically, reasonably, using common sense and reason but more often than not impulse and emotion wins out. This often leaves her seeing things in terms of black and white, good and bad, awesome and horrible, and it's difficult to shake her out of that mindset once she's fixed something in one category or another. But she can connect dots as well as anyone else and certainly isn't stupid; even if she's somewhat naive in her views, she's not easy to trick. And it gets her through life just fine, allowing her to roll with whatever comes her way with an almost zen-like acceptance. Any and all problems are dealt with in a straightforward manner, and has plenty of confidence to go with it, certain she can deal with any crisis that could possibly arise in the same manner she deals with everything else. Lies are not part of her life as far as she is aware, she has no time for bothering with deception, and deals with people in a similarly frank, open way. She likes having friends, and spending time with them, often working on nudging them into friendly competition though she'll allow games meant for the mind just as easily and accept her inevitable losses with good humor.
In spite of being on the Grid and dealing with its variety of experiences for a long time now, Capella is still very easy to impress, and can be awed quite easily by new things - occasionally to her detriment, when an enemy's power or ships or strength is impressive, but she's got a healthy sense of self-preservation, and tends to not let her awe get her seriously injured. But it bears repeating: she's not stupid. She is all too aware that life is full of pain and suffering, death and misery ... but she loves it anyway, with the devotion of a true acolyte. She has nothing like religion, not even exceptional reverence for the Maker, but she does have faith in something, something she'd have a hard time putting into words for others, something that fills in all the gaps and holes of her life and gives her a sense of purpose. Without a programmed directive, without any other purpose, it soothes the need for meaning a little. Only a little. She lives surrounded by basic programs, who know exactly why they were made and what they are meant to do, something many might see as a flaw but Capella sees as a blessing; they don't have to find their purpose. Capella searched for cycles to find hers, but she did find it.
Survival of the fittest. Not for everyone .. just the ones who were a disruption, who had no built in purpose. Her own kind.
See, that cycles back to the 'not stupid' part. She'd noticed over the passage of time that ISOs seemed to be a disruption to the very home she loved, that there were so many of her kind, and nothing at all was replacing Basics. She watched as the Grid struggled with its new load of life and occasionally failed, watched Clu's forces do their best to maintain order, watched the Creator fail to appear for long, long cycles and never quite fix anything when he did appear. Too many ISOs and not enough ways of dealing with the problem, or any ways at all. It wasn't until the System Administrator turned the Games lethal did she finally understand her purpose, and that of other ISOs. There are a finite number of Basics, and the Games could kill them too. An ISO would have to fill that role, she decided ... and they better be as good at it as any Basic. If they were not, they did not deserve to continue to be a drain on system resources. Have something to offer, something that made them worthwhile - or be erased. With enough pruning of the excess population, ISOs and Basics COULD live in harmony, not straining the system, not degrading the very home they were born from. It was harsh, and she bore her own kind no ill-will at all, but it was also up to them to earn their place. Just as it's up to her to earn hers.
But as said, Capella's not a genius either. Being a great designer, or a skilled tactician, or handy with repairs or construction, simply aren't really things she is good at. What she is good at however, is sheer physical skill. And she loves it. She intends to one day offer herself as a guard or a professional gladiator in the Games or even one of the system monitors, and she hones her skills to this purpose. She has no issue at all with tweaking her own code within the range of her own skills, improving what she is capable of alongside learning how to fight better, few Bostrumites shy away from self-modification. Hers is just more goal-oriented than most. She loves the Games, and is an exceptionally skilled competitor, enjoying the exertion and test of skill and strength against others; that the Games are once more no longer lethal simply means if she fails this time she still has chances to improve. Sooner or later the terminal version will be back and she intends to become reigning champion above even the likes of the legendary and awe-inspiring Tron.
Knowing that if the Games go lethal again, being champion means eventually being dethroned and derezzed, somehow doesn't trouble her at all. She takes an easy view of that too: if she's not skilled enough to keep her position, she doesn't deserve the position. She isn't MADE for it, but it gives her a sense of purpose anyway. She's good at it, perhaps better than good in the circuits she fights in, and it fits comfortably with what she knows. She holds no malice at all for those she fights, they have something to prove as well and may the best program win; this attitude keeps her from forming enemies - at least enemies as SHE sees them though rivals are plentiful - and keeps her eager for the next match. It really is very personal to her, but not by way of crushing a specific individual. She wants to improve, needs to be better, faster, tougher, and it has nothing to do with the program across from her and everything to do with the bars she sets for herself and keeps moving.
Needless to say her perspective on things is a bit skewed from what others think. She is reasonably loyal to the System Administrators, comfortable with both Clu and Radia, Clu's bias against ISOs perfectly reasonable as far as she's concerned. After all, he's not exactly wrong, he just can't do anything about it. She doesn't hate other ISOs, far from it; it's not her place to drag them down or kill them or even harass them, but it's THEIR job to prove they're worth keeping on the Grid. She doesn't feel all life is inherently valuable and worth preserving, not in a closed System, where resources are finite and too much strain can ruin it for everyone, she simply doesn't feel the need to end that life when it's not in sanctioned competition. She would prefer all her kind find a purpose and excel in it, but she's also aware they simply won't be able to, too many content to just live and do their thing without supporting their System directly. Even with her great love of fighting and competition, she feels no urge to constantly prove it. She's a champion in the circuits she does fight in, and when it's time to move up a rung it'll be in a Game, not in some back alley or bar or street fight. Capella feels she has found her purpose and is earning her right to live, and has no need to prove it to anyone else. .. Well with two caveats: the System Administrators, and the Creator, Flynn. If they found her unworthy, then she too should be removed. She would not go eagerly, and in truth she fears deresolution, she simply accepts that it may one day be her fate.
Even now, with grid bugs and system instability and growing hostility between ISOs and Basics, Capella still believes her kind can earn their place. Maybe not EVERY ISO ... but enough of them, and how can she know if this one or that one has something truly valuable to offer? In turn she doesn't blame the hostility from Basics at all; after all they're MEANT to be there, ISOs just appeared. She sympathizes with them greatly, but there's only so much a lone fighter can do. For now anyway, as Capella fully intends to suggest to the System Administrators one day to bring back or instigate all forms of competition and have the ISOs prove their worth as a species..
Most of this should remain intact in contact with a non-digital world, she'll simply broaden her need to compete at new and even more strenuous levels, with unabashed eagerness.
Abilities/Skills: Capella's an ISO and a program. She doesn't NEED to eat, sleep or breathe (but can if she chooses to), is remarkably durable for a program, ferociously strong, reasonably fast and with incredibly quick reflexes; she is a competitor and has honed herself to that purpose for many, many cycles. She learns fast when it's physical, adapts just as fast and has a Bostrumite's knack for modifying her own programming to continue to improve. While she is not as agile as some programs, her coordination is top-notch, and while she prefers fighting with light swords and staffs, she's perfectly competitive with an identity disc. She has absolutely fantastic low-light vision and given she glows in the dark, that's pretty much any time there's supposed to be dark at all. Her only real noncombat skills revolve mostly around altering her own light patterns and colors, a really good but mostly irrelevant skill with painting landscapes, and a long-term familiarity with heavy construction equipment.
Strengths/Weaknesses:
* Strength. Yep. She's been working herself into being a combat monster and she is very, very good at it.
* Adaptability; generally this is something ISOs are good at as a group, in fairness.
* Durability; Capella's remarkably resilient even for a program.
* Determination to succeed, rarely allowing for failure and working to overcome it when it does happen.
* Amazing hand-eye coordination! She can and has knocked flying discs out of the air to prevent the ubiquitous rebound and return to their originator. If she had to she could probably snatch arrows out of the air.
* Not so dodgy. Some programs can do backflips and somersaults and so on while fighting, she is not one of them.
* Innocent worldviews on the Grid aren't necessarily a good thing. She still believes Clu in general is right about ISOs, and this has ... consequences.
* Complete and utter ignorance of User and organic worlds, and their sorts of technology and environments.
* No real belief in the inherent rights to life, liberty, etc.
* Not at all used to brightly lit spaces.
Items: Identity disc, game grid armor, 1 multipurpose baton (staff, unbearably fancy umbrella), 1 lightcycle rod.
SAMPLES
Network Sample: I'm sure anyone who reads these have gotten this sort of thing before, but I have Questions. I've already figured out this isn't exactly home and that I have no idea who any of you are.
So. WHERE is here, why is it so bright, and how do you make the lighting right instead of spotlight intensity?
[That covers the basics! She drums her fingers for a moment before continuing, chewing a bit on her lower lip.]
And where can I find someone who knows how to repair lightcycles? That last one's the most important one.
Prose/Action Sample: Capella's been to nearly every city and colony on the Grid. She liked to think of herself as reasonably well-traveled, able to deal with just about any threat or problem that could suddenly arise and ambush a lone ISO, but this..
This is nothing like anything she'd encountered before. She knew she was somewhere built, but it was so damn bright, and she had yet to see another Program at all. Or she assumed so anyway, there were plenty of other beings here coming to and fro, but none had identifying light markings, which meant ... what? Even the Creator was reasonably well lit up in the darkness, and here there was no darkness at all so --
So maybe that's why nobody wore their allegiances on their bodies. The thought keeps her busy down long hallways and through various rooms until she comes to the observation station and its wide empty expanse into .. into ...
She has no word for what is going on outside that forcefield. 'Stars' don't really exist, the cold vacuum of space is unknown, and the storms raging on the other side are so utterly different from the storms she knows that she can only make the dimmest, vaguest of associations. Capella liked to think she'd seen and done a lot, from the towering shining wonders of Arjia City to the shifting edges of the Sea of Simulation.
None of that has prepared her for this. This had no sense of purpose, no sense of design.
She sits, eventually, in one of the many available seats, deathly silent and still, gaze fixed on the expanse beyond the forcefield, struggling and failing to connect it to something she understands.