DE: Fire, fire, burning higher

[bjornwilde]

What five things must be present to properly summon your character? Or, conversely, what five things would banish or ward against them?

And I just realized I did this just three months ago, so...from genarti :
What does your character strive not to be? (And how assiduously? Is this a background "I don't want to be a bad person" thing, or something they've consciously built their life around, or what?)

Comments

[bjornwilde]

Jess: What HYDRA wants her to be. This is her burning goal and has been ever since she rebelled against them as a young adult.

Asajj: Weak. I think it started when she saw her first master was killed before her. But, she did grew up on a war-torn world, so who knows? I think it will never change, though how she goes about not being weak will.

Ahsoka: Sith. She is jedi through and through, even if the Council doubted her.

Tybalt: His father and other Fae nobles. He has had this goal ever since his first few decades and events in his life have only proven the worth of his goal.

[bjornwilde]

Adding on a few more...
Selina Kyle, if the hints are to be believed, is striving to not accept her mother is dead.

Quinlan is trying not to fall to the Dark Side again. He accepts its use but will not allow himself to let go of the Light Side. He desperately wants to keep his kids from being touched by it.

Hank is trying not to be a freak and has been ever since his feet started changing. It drives him enough that he makes a formula to hide his mutation. It goes poorly.

[athelstanthescribe]

Gavroche really, really wants not to be his father. Thus if he's ever faced with choices, he thinks of what Monsieur would do and does the exact opposite thing.

[aaaaaaaagh_sky]

Ellen has been striving not to be two things: her father, and the Scourge of God. She loves her father, and he was brilliant and a good man and the Wasteland is a better place for his having existed, but... well, everything she said here still applies. As for the other part, it's intensely disturbing to her that she's been able to bring about some of the massive destruction she has- Raven Rock, Adams AFB, what she threatened to do to the Pitt- and spends a good portion of her attention in rough situations on trying to keep them from getting to a point where 'wipe them all out, wipe everything out' becomes the only option.

[sunbaked_baker]

Continuing the theme, Rae strives always not to be her father. Or even her father's daughter, however much she is having to use what she inherited from him.

[neverbelievedintheend]

Stacker Pentecost has never had issues with his father except in that his father was murdered when he was a boy. What he strives not to be is visibly ill. He can not afford human weakness when the defense of Earth is on his shoulders.

Varric strives not to be either of his parents. There's a segment in Dragon Age: Inquisition where you find stones with all your potential party members' worst fears engraved on them. The stone for Varric reads "Becoming His Parents".

I could probably say Edward Kenway is trying not to be his father but in all honesty what he's really trying not to be is poor. Or low on the social ladder. But mostly not poor, because if you have enough money you can buy rank and station.

I'm not sure what Gordon's trying not to be, other than a failure of other people's hopes in him.

Shephard is striving to not be the last real Marine. Yeah, he's training up the people he's recruited and he's giving them the names and the uniforms, but until he sees them all in action and knows they're genuinely worthy of the title, he's the last one, and he does not want that to be the case forever. He's got orders from Captain America- well, it was Rojhaz, so it was General America by that point- not to die until he's successfully passed the Corps name and uniform and traditions on for real.

Fawkes is striving not to be the same kind of gleefully violent man-eating monster so many of the other supermutants are. He pursues education and Zen philosophy for part of that, and when his primal nature gets too strong, he directs it at deserving targets like his fellow meta-humans or people who would harm the children formerly of Little Lamplight. There's no point in denying that part of him is there, after all.

And Santo is striving not to be unmasked. He has to stay the best wrestler in Mexico until it's time to retire, so he keeps in practice at every opportunity.

[genarti]

Enjolras was the character on my mind when I wrote this, because of a conversation with Pilf about how both Enjolras and Bahorel make a lot of their life choices in an effort to not be the Dark Version Of Themselves, but they're very different dark versions. Enjolras is working very comprehensively to not be a Great Man, in the history sense of the word, or a tyrant on any scale. This is a constant enough thing that it's reflexive, but still, a lot of his life choices are built on that: to always look to the democratic opinion, to not ride on his money or charisma, to surround himself with strong personalities who will argue and hair-tousle and call each other on things.

Cosette's isn't anywhere near so conscious, but I think there's part of her that doesn't want to be cruel or vicious or selfishly dismissive, ever, to anyone. Part of that is of course generally not being a bad person, but there's also some subconscious specificity. But it's not in the kind of way where she's specifically worried that it would be easy for her to become that, or anything. Because no.

Thor strives to not be dishonorable. This is a general background thing, but it's cast into higher relief by the amount of power (both physical/magical and political) he has. More recently, he also strives to not be the unthinking immature temperamental guy he was a little while ago (i.e. at the start of the first Thor movie).

Clare strives to not be an Awakened One. Uh. Yeah! Part of being part-monster like all Claymores is that along with the superpowers you get a lurking evil side that will take over if you let it out enough, so that's definitely a constant awareness.

More later, probably, as work allows!

Edit: ha, I just looked at the number of people who are striving to not be their fathers. I'm actually kind of pleased that I don't have any of those! Even the ones with father issues of some sort (Thor, River, arguably Trowa) don't have the I Will Never Become My Dad thing. (Thor possibly should, but at this point does not.)

[street_sparrow]

...Cosette wants to not be Gavroche's father? Or mother, I guess, more specifically.

[genarti]

More mother and also everybody else in Montfermeil, yes. There was a whole lot of smugly looking the other way from bystanders.

[ceitfianna]

I'm not sure that Will has anyone he's striving not to be as he works more in trying to be someone worthy of Robin. I guess the closest equivalent might be any one of the Sheriff's men but never one person.

Charles is trying to not be like the men and women he grew up around who were blind to others' hurt and saw emotion as an extra or a sign of weakness.

Quentin is doing everything he can to not be like the nobles in the Queen in the Mists' court, tied to tradition, cruel and who see those around them as pawns. He's another where he tends to think more along the lines of being like Toby or Duke Torquill, or someone that the Luidaeg approves of.

Sameth is another that doesn't have anyone he's trying not to be like, he's trying not to be the worst version of himself, who didn't serve the Old Kingdom properly.

William doesn't want to be anything like Hollander, any of those men who don't respect what they have and see other people as tools. When he was younger, he didn't want to be like his father, but now he wants to be like him and hopes he doesn't have to go to that extreme to help his family.

Moist doesn't want to be like anyone from Uberwald; scared and not in control of what happens to them.

Jane doesn't want to be like her mother, trapped by what society expects.

Ivan doesn't want to be like either his father, dead due to politics or Miles or Gregor, who's lives are ruled by politics.

Demeter doesn't want to be like most of her family but especially Zeus and Poseidon who both take what they want and never think about what happens next.

Tumnus doesn't want to be like who he was before he met Lucy, scared to act and not really living.

[inlovewithwords]

Henry - background 'I don't want to be a bad person,' I think; mostly he's in the positive of what he wants to be rather than negative of what he doesn't. I think. By later in canon he's no longer trying not to be his parents' child, though for a while there are definite and major Regina issues.

Eriond - Honestly doesn't need to think about it.

Lois - Her dad. (Seriously, this trend.) I think with him, though, she both doesn't want to be him or do what he wants of her, but also not to disappoint him or fail to meet his expectations. Same with Lucy: she does not want to be her sister, but doesn't want to fail her. Other things: A tabloid reporter (which she used to be, she is so glad she's not anymore). Corrupt. A sell-out. Sometimes she tries not to be too insensitive. And I think she doesn't want to be a disappointment to Jonathan and Martha Kent--and eventually Perry White--who she has accidentally unconsciously adopted as surrogate mentor/parental figures.

[protect_and_survey]

Oswin: Anything the Predator assumed she was.

Jemma: Right now, a mad scientist. Once canon gets rolling? HYDRA.

Katya: ... dead? She can't actually become a Dark Other, so...

William: A coward.

Glorfindel: An oath breaker.

Bones: The person his ex-wife thinks he is.

Ace: Insane.

Sam: Fearful.

[i_am_your_host]

I'm having a bit of a hard time figuring out what the Master of Ceremonies doesn't want to be, because he is secretly already things that he shouldn't be (a liar, a manipulator, an addict). I think maybe he would never want to turn into the type of self-loathing person who would shun or reject anybody like himself.

[last_kallig]

Ibani wants to avoid becoming the kind of monster people tend to think of when the word 'Sith' is bandied about.

Some days that's more of a struggle than others, but it never really goes away. (And on the really bad days she just hopes she's not as much of a monster as she could be.)

[never_shall_yield]

Gene strives not to be what he really is. It's as background as it's possible to be, given that he only remembers his true self on very rare and exceptional occasions.

Javert strives not to be his parents. Raising himself above the criminal class he came from shaped his life from a young age, and is now so firmly a part of his character that it just is him. Or, was. He strove his whole life to be irreproachable, and ended up doing so much damage because of it. So now, he's consciously trying to unbuild it from his life, but doesn't really know where to start - still, nearly two years on - and is just trying to stay afloat.

Valjean continuously strives to not be what he was; angry, hurtful, a thief, (human). He doesn't want to be the man who stole from a bishop, and then a child, and was furious with the world. He wants light, not dark. There's nothing background about it, it's a constant, daily, aim of his life - to help others, to do better, to give everything he has so that he can know, in himself, that he's changed. He's not worried about what other people think of him, but he strives to quiet his own conscience, which is always beating him up horribly.

Courfeyrac strives not to be his father, too. Monsieur de Courfeyrac is far too respectable and bourgeois to be happy with a Republic, therefore he must not be emulated. I have the notion that Courfeyrac likes him well enough - sort of fondly calls him things like 'that old duffer' and whatnot, and only sometimes allows politics to cause a real row. But when it comes down to it, equality is more important than any family ties.

Bruce Banner strives not to be the Hulk. Is it a background thing? No, no it is not.

Bruce Wayne strives not to be afraid. Again, not a background thing. It's a constant test of himself, and a pushing of his physical and mental limits.

Pearly doesn't strive for or against anything. While he can short-term plan, when he tries, his character is not built towards any kind of long-term commitment. He reacts to things. What he strives not to be today could become tomorrow's primary aim, and he's crazy enough that being that changeable doesn't seem weird to him.

Moriarty strives not to be bored. It's not background, because if he doesn't constantly try, tedium eats him alive.

[student_of_impossibility]

And back, having napped!

Tavi -He consciously and categorically refuses to become the kind of military commander or politician who doesn't care about whose lives get hurt along the way, nor like some of the High Lords he's known. (Not being power-hungry beyond morals, a sadist, or a socio- or psychopath, that is not a problem.)

Mostly he has to consciously avoid every bad aspect of his father's whole family. The House of Gaius carries some unfortunate traits, particularly arrogance, occasional carelessness about other people's emotions, a nasty temper, a tendency to over-commit, occasional blindness and needing reminding of where their priorities or ethics lie, and an ability to be cold-blooded which--while frequently helpful when ruling an empire--can go too far.

Honestly, he's especially avoiding becoming his grandfather--a fairly incompetent father, lacking certain ethics and creativity, frankly unable to win people over from the heart, and killed himself over-working (and being poisoned)--or his father--who had a good heart but didn't always think things through and had a certain careless confidence in himself that contributed to getting murdered.

So he has the same Paternal Avoidance trend; it's just a little more generalized. He's seen the failure modes in them and himself, and tries to mitigate them. Luckily Kitai is always willing to smack him upside the head with reminders.

[hey35andholding]

Clementine: Her mother.

Dixie: Bly. Under different circumstances she could've given in to her lust for power and BEEN Bly, but her heart's too good.

Juliet: Frank. Her stepfather. Anyone who's terribly reckless (versus adventurous).

Eponine: Her father, natch.

Pinkie Pie: the kind of person she was when she was drained of joy thanks to Discord.