Post by Zaxal on Aug 9, 2012 19:38:32 GMT -5
[Nocta]
Age: 37
Gender: Female
Rank: Bluerider / Igen Councilmember (Dragonrider)
Appearance:
Nocta has a pretty average height and average weight, in shape while still having rounded edges. Her body is pear-shaped with a small upper-body and significant hips leading to her strong legs. She is good at running, but her upper-body strength tends to be on the weaker side.
Nocta's hair comes down to her chin. It's thick and black. She usually keeps it tied back, as it's long enough to be put up in a very short ponytail or, more often, she ties a strip of cloth over her head like a headband to keep it out of her eyes. Her eyes are dark brown, looking almost black in low light. Her nose is on the larger side, curved slightly up or else it would form a perfect triangle away from her round cheeks. Nocta has dark olive skin that tans if she spends too long in the sun.
Nocta tends to wear pants, tunics, and boots as opposed to dresses or skirts. She wears dull colors, usually finding whatever she has that's cleanest to wear except during Gathers. In the rare event that she does dress up, it's usually in one of very few dresses or nicer tunics she keeps specifically for the purpose of looking nice. She moves quite a bit when she talks, motions with her hands and occasionally moving her body towards something to make a point. Her movements tend to be fluid, confident. The quickest way to tell if she's uneasy is to see if she isn't gesturing as much as she usually does or if her movements become quick and jerky.
Personality: Nocta is an extremely passionate person in almost all aspects of her life. Anything she gets involved in, she puts as much of herself in as she can, whether that has been her work as a Councilmember or when learning something new. She is dedicated to being her best and giving her all to the point of running herself down if Ralelth or a friend can't get her to pull back. She hates letting others down, and if she gives a promise, she'll try her best to fulfill it no matter the circumstances.
Nocta's passion extends to her relationships with others. New people excite her – she wants to know everything about them. If there's a story to be had, she wants to hear it; she wants to laugh and cry and then do it all over again. Her friends will know her as someone known to stretch the truth from time-to-time to make a better story out of it, but it's easy to forgive. She rarely needs to be the absolute center of attention, preferring for others to take the limelight in groups and then, in one-on-one conversations, eagerly keeping up with whoever she's talking with. She's content to sit and listen, and she sees it as building relationships and therefore worth the downtime.
Nocta is extremely emotional, and she's bluntly honest about what she thinks and feels. She can rein it in when working in an official capacity, but anger, sorrow, excitement, and joy all come through easily once she's off the clock and allowed to be herself. She doesn't let things upset her for long, usually going to Ralelth who can help her sort out the important things from the smaller stuff she lets herself get worked up over. Nocta isn't shy about apologizing and admitting she was in the wrong. But sometimes it takes a fistfight or argument for her to really see what she's done badly.
However, Nocta has her fair share of problems. When it comes to making decisions that involve her personal life, she can take forever to make a decision. She gets caught up in the pros and cons and stops being able to see the forest for the trees. Her passion regularly gets her so involved with something that she can't help but let her personal life suffer while she works through whatever it is at the time.
And Nocta can be, at times, horribly selfish and self-involved, ignoring the needs of others to satisfy her own. This hasn't been a problem in her official capacity – she can keep the greater good separated from her personal life – but sometimes she can be so plain ignorant as to what other people need or want from her that it gets to be a problem. She favors friendships and relationships with people who will tell her exactly what they want, because she doesn't realize people need things without them asking for it.
She wants desperately to be useful to others, and she constantly struggles with ways to make Igen a better place. She's incredibly nervous about being useless once her term as a Councilmember is up, and has been desperately seeking her niche for the future. She can't be a Healer's assistant because the sight of blood makes her feel incredibly ill. She can't be a Harper's assistant because she never bothered to learn all of the songs and instruments. And she doesn't want to go back to being a cook because, honestly, she sees it as being a bit beneath her at this point. She figures that eventually she'll find her place. She's nervous about how long it'll be and where she'll end up by the time her soul-searching is over.
History: Nocta was born and raised in Igen Weyr. Her mother, Lanani, was a Harper and insisted on Nocta being well-educated. She had a fine ear for music even as a child, tending to pick up her mother's instruments and play a series of pleasing notes instead of the random chaos another child might have. Her father, Tonnac, was very involved in her life. A cook in the Kitchens, he used his free time to play with her and take her out on far-fetched adventures through the Weyr Bowl. He was more insistent on stories, and her mother on practicality, but they both agreed that Nocta should not be shielded from the unpleasant things in life either. They taught her, and she learned. Often excited to share her knowledge, she came off as snobby to the other Weyrbrats. In time, though, they learned that she was a fun girl with an active imagination, and she made quite a few friends.
Due to her early interest in her mother's music, Nocta was a prime candidate to become an apprentice Harper. But the idea of settling on one thing didn't suit her. She wanted to know more of everything practical, wanted to be useful in her home as opposed to going off to learn the Harper's trade. She, instead, began to work in the Kitchens alongside her father, and learned basic Healing techniques from a family friend. She strongly considered apprenticing as a Healer, but she became distracted.
A boy named Az'ar had caught Nocta's eye. As a weyrling, he was often busy with lessons and chores and caring for his new life partner, a bronze dragon named Erraneth, but he and Nocta became good friends after she accidentally spilled klah on him in the Kitchens when they ran into each other. He convinced her to ask about becoming a candidate, convinced that she would make a great dragonrider. She decided to try that rather than Healing as the months of visiting had revealed an unpleasant reaction to being around wounds too much. Still with an active imagination, she couldn't wipe the thoughts of those injuries being done to her, and it made her almost useless except to fetch things.
She was a candidate for three Turns. She continued to work part-time in the Kitchens and going with her mother to tell stories to the younger Weyrbrats. Nocta tried not to lose hope, given the increasing age at which people could Impress, but she knew that her own patience was wearing thin. She needed something to give her purpose, and what she was doing felt simply like waiting.
At a small Hatching with a green mother and only four eggs, out tumbled blue Ralelth. Impression gave Nocta a purpose at 18, but she was almost dismayed when Ralelth revealed that she wasn't meant to be a fighting dragon. Nocta yearned to join the Threadfighting wings, but she knew that she couldn't change what she couldn't change. Instead, after Ralelth hit adulthood, they offered to act as Searchriders and as transport when non-'riders needed the service.
Nocta was content. She had friends – her group of Weyrlings had been particularly close as there were only four of them, plus those she had made along the way – and she had a love-hate, on-again off-again relationship with a younger bluerider, a girl named B'riss. When B'riss was badly scarred in Threadfall, Nocta helped her get used to the new limitations of her injured arm. The next time Ralelth had her Flight, B'riss's Galenth caught her, and Nocta and B'riss had a constant relationship that lasted several Turns.
It ended on amicable terms once Nocta's political life began. When she was 32, an issue arose in several of the Weyrs about whether green and blue females ought to be forcibly neutered using firestone to keep the dragon population from rising too fast. Scare tactics and rumors spread life wildfire, and Nocta became immediately concerned. She addressed the Igen Council along with several others who rode clutching blues and greens. When this did nothing to stamp out the unrest, Nocta rose up with the green and blue 'riders to demand equality that was no longer being guaranteed to them. When the idea began to gain motion, Nocta and the others fled to the other Weyrs for a fortnight, refusing to return until the Council promised to put it to a Weyr-wide vote. Nocta began campaigning against the neutering of "lower" colors, and, in the next election, the motion was not only denied, but Nocta was elected into office as a Councilmember representing the dragonriders.
She has spent the last five Turns in this office, occasionally being called along with the other 'rider representatives to talk to the larger council as a whole on behalf of Igen's 'riders. She has learned a lot in her time as an official, and her impact, while not phenomenal, has been significant on behalf of the rights of smaller dragons, and particularly those than can have clutches of their own.
While nearing the five-Turn cap has been a time full of sadness and worry as to who her station will go to next, Nocta still has found herself ready to move on to something else, ready to serve Igen in a new way, though what that is, she's still not sure.
[Ralelth]
{Dragon}
Age: 19
Color: Blue (72928d)
Sex: Female
{Clutcher}
Appearance:
Ralelth is a medium-sized blue. Her angles are somewhat rounded, and she seems to be, in fact, a little bit on the pudgy side. Her wings and legs, though, are powerful enough for her to move quickly when she needs to. However, her preferred movements are lazy, almost sluggish. Like she has all the time in the world to get to whatever she's doing, and everyone else can wait. Some might say that she's saving it for when she needs to actually go. Surprising agility is her forte, and while she'll never match most of the fighters in a long-term contest, she can definitely hold her own.
Raleth's hide is a dusty blue, a gray-tinted teal that makes her almost look like she's faded over time. Her markings are a bit paler – a smatter of dots from her shoulders to her haunches and similar patches on her maw and throat. As she doesn't participate in Threadfall, she doesn't have many scars, but there is a notable one on her back right leg from an accident during one of her Flights. If she is forced to stand about for a significant amount of time, she'll eventually not put as much pressure on it, but she claims it's from the uncomfortable pulling of her hide and not actual pain.
Personality: Ralelth is calm, peaceful, and polite. She never seems to want to do anything except in her own time unless Nocta requests it of her. She's content to laze the day away, daydreaming and thinking inwardly instead of chatting with others. It can make her seem like a snob, unapproachable and unfriendly, but Ralelth is simply an introvert who needs quite a bit of time alone or with her 'rider and no one else. She can be friendly, and she does like the company of other dragons, but sometimes it gets to be too much, and she hides away in her weyr or somewhere else until she feels ready to be social again.
It takes quite a bit to disturb Ralelth's calm, but causing ripples in the still pond is not impossible, and once she's been angered, it can take a bit for her to calm down. Her anger is not the most outward display of emotions, but she will often stop talking to someone, give them the cold shoulder, or berate them with harsh, offhanded comments if they have wronged her or Nocta. It takes a lot for Ralelth to forgive someone, and not even Nocta can make her befriend someone she is absolutely set against liking.
Ralelth does have a desire, though, to be useful, much like her bonded. She has enjoyed helping Nocta during her term as a councilmember, and she will enjoy finding new ways to make her mark on her home Weyr. She may not be loud, but she can get a lot done once she sets her mind to it. Even if all she does is encourage Nocta and act as her personal cheer squad. This desire to be useful also somewhat carries over to her mothering abilities. Ralelth is very proud to be a clutcher, and though her clutches have tended to be on the small side, she has been extremely happy with her Hatchings. However, it isn't enough to lay eggs every now and again. She wants to find something she can do to be helpful and wanted, and if she can squeeze in a nap or two along the way, all the better.
