Heather Mason (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
foolishwren) wrote2010-05-21 11:00 pm
foolishwren) wrote2010-05-21 11:00 pm
Entry tags:
Abax application
player information.
name: Kit
are you over 18?: 21
personal dw:phantastus
email/msn/aim/plurk/etc:
E-Mail: kit.petitedra@verizon.net
AIM: Phantastus
Plurk: Phantastus
characters in abax: None
in character information.
series: Silent Hill (the video game series. The movie canon, comics, Silent Hill: Shattered Memories and other spinoffs/alternate universes are not part of her continuity).
name: Her alias is 'Heather Morris', but her legal birth name is Cheryl Mason. Before that, her name was Alessa Gillespie.
age: Her age is a little bit tricky due to crazy past life shenanigans (during her first life, she died at age 14 and was then reborn into her current one). Both lives together add up to 31, but for all sakes and purposes, she's 17 years old.
sex: F
race: Human, although due to creepy occult Silent Hill weirdness, she's sort of intertwined with that world's incarnation of 'God'.
weight: 124
height: 5'2"
[OPTIONAL] cause of death: Heather canonically dies multiple times and is revived each time to carry on, but the death I'm taking her from is during the Memory of Alessa fight. So cause of death would be... um.... "Doppelganger", I guess?
canon point: Mid-canon, during the carousel/Memory of Alessa boss fight in the Lakeside Themepark.
previous cr: Nope.
history: Heather's complete history is told pretty thoroughly between this Wiki article on Alessa focusing on her role in the events of Silent Hill(s) 0 and 1, and this article focusing on Heather's reincarnated life and the events of Silent Hill 3.
The Book of Lost Memories is another good resource for the history if the Wikis aren't sufficient.
If a written history would work better, let me know and I'll write one!
personality:
On the surface, Heather's a pretty good example of your average, attitude-laden modern teenager. Bright, but disdainful of school. Hard-working, but also prone to youthful irresponsibility and lack of foresight. She likes shopping, getting herself into trouble doing Dumb Teenage Things (tm), rolling her eyes a lot at her overprotective worrywart dad, delivering witty one-liners ... you know. Normal kid stuff. She's rowdy, sharp-tongued, fiercely independent, and has a short-tempered chip on her shoulder the size of a brick. But despite the fiery nature and... somewhat delinquent-esque tendencies, she's not unfriendly. For most part, Heather puts herself out there as outgoing, social, and more than a bit of a goofball. At age seventeen, she's straddling the fence between childhood and adulthood somewhat and doesn't seem to be ready to grow up in a lot of ways (unfortunately for her, considering she's more or less forced to over the course of her canon). She's as hotheaded as they come and tends to rush headlong into situations that could easily land her in hot water. Fortunately, she's usually quick-thinking enough to get herself back out of them again, and frequently displays a lot of creativity and resourcefulness when it comes to getting herself out of tight spots. To someone meeting her for the first time, it'd be fairly easy to write her off as a wild, slightly-airheaded tomboy. Although a childhood spent moving around a lot and being prevented from getting too close to others resulted in very few long-lasting friendships, the ones she does manage to make are hung onto fiercely. Her trust is difficult to earn, but she attaches herself readily to people who treat her with genuine kindness (and, you know, prove they're not just doing it to get something from her first), largely because there are so few genuinely-benevolent figures in her life that those who truly seem to mean well are cherished deeply. Her affection is characterized by playful aggression and tough love-- if you manage to worm your way into her heart, expect bearhugs, spontaneous wrestling matches and lots of noogies. She's full of energy and determined to enjoy life to its fullest, regardless of how many haters be hatin'.
Unsurprisingly for a survival-horror protagonist, this isn't quite the whole story. Underneath the peppy exterior, Heather has an inner hardness that accompanies a hotbed of suppressed trauma and issues built up on top of a lot of rough experiences and emotional scarring-- and she's got the wariness, trust issues, and street-smarts to prove it. Having been up and down the 'stupid rebel kid' route, Heather still carries a lot of unfortunate habits-- she frequently makes references to having been something of a troublemaker, with a history of underage drinking, smoking cigarettes, and even shoplifting on a regular basis. Due to an incident during her early childhood in which her father was treated as a murder suspect, she mistrusts authority and is likely to sneer at anything with a badge, whether it's a policeman or a private detective. The repressed memories of abuse and mistreatment from her previous life manifest in Heather largely as deep-rooted self-image issues (although she doesn't really understand where they came from until she fully regains those memories), and although she covers it up with her playful nature, she has a very justified wariness of strangers, both from those past-life experiences as well as a childhood mostly spent in hiding from the cult she came from. Although she'll happily pal around with folks, her father's paranoia rubbed off on her somewhat and she doesn't like letting people close enough to see her vulnerable moments.
That said, although she avoids showing weakness at all costs, she's fairly open when it comes to expressing her feelings, and can be fully expected to let people know when she's happy-- or angry. Actually, especially angry.
Which brings us to ... that little issue. Heather's a good kid even if she doesn't always act like one-- she inherited her father's heart of gold,even if it's gotten a little hidden under all that grunge over the years. But that said, she's also in possession of A. angry teenager syndrome (she's highly emotional and frequently moved to angry, frustrated outbursts when things don't go as planned or desired) and B. a sort of innate, bloodthirsty hunger for vengeance when wronged. She's not crazy (or at least not as much as one might expect from a Silent Hill protagonist), but she's been through a great many dark, hideous things and that changes a person. She is easily provoked to violence and, although she considers the harm of innocent human beings reprehensible and horrifying, she can and has killed before. Even before being dragged back into the horrors of Silent Hill, she carried a switchblade on her at all times (stating that she just "liked to for some reason") and was generally quick to snap. This is a kid who was sent to the principal's office a lot for trying to solve problems with punching instead of polite discussion. After her experiences in Silent Hill, her tendency to resort to violence is likely to be even more severe and easy to trigger.
Specific fears and triggers picked up from her terrifying Otherworld experiences aside, Heather also has quite a few unpleasant aversions that are carried over from the repressed memories of her past life, mostly phobias and inner sources of anxiety. Some direct carryovers are generalized fears of fire, dogs, mirrors, hospitals, infants/pregnancy, maternal figures, and rape/sexual assault. She has a past of being heavily manipulated by adult figures and as a result, is reluctant to the point of actually being slightly phobic of giving them control or sway over her (especially adult women). The cruel bullying she endured in her past life, both from her schoolmates and her biological mother, left her with some lingering self-confidence issues that she hides behind a clowny, often-cocky facade. She copes with trauma and upset primarily with humor, and tries her best to hide her troubles and fears behind a steady barrage of jokes and sarcasm. Thanks to the horrors she's been through, her sense of humor has wound up pretty twisted and to a certain extent, she's lost her sense of what's appropriate to laugh about and what isn't, which results in some very dark and questionable 'joke' decisions on her part (no, Heather. It's not okay to pretend that you're going to stab your only living friend. WHY WOULD YOU EVER THINK THAT'S OKAY). For most of her early (second) life, she was blessedly free of any overwhelming fears or mental issues outside of unpleasant deja-vu and frequent nightmares, but as she got older (and was, of course, eventually tracked down by all the nastiness she'd tried to leave in the past), traumatic flashbacks became a thing of increasing frequency. Particularly due to the immediacy of the events she's being pulled from, these memories and flashbacks will cripple her from time to time. But as tempting as it is to curl up in a corner in the fetal position when a major wave of past trauma hits, it's a good way to end up dead when you're in the Otherworld, so Heather does what it takes to stay alive. She's good at pushing terror and grief down long enough to do what has to be done, although the buildup wears her down eventually.
Particularly due to being whisked out of a point smack dab in the middle of her harrowing adventures, Heather's usual easygoing nature is likely to be walled-up behind a hefty wall of Oh My God I Could Die Horribly At Any Moment SURVIVE SURVIVE SURVIVE SURVIVE, which could take a lot of chipping-away-at before the regular kid underneath gets to see daylight again.
TL;DR: Heather is a decent kid just trying to make the best of her second chance at life, but unfortunately has a lot of heavy and horrible burdens on her shoulders from a dark, disturbing past. Being ripped from the middle of the loss of her father and from fighting for her life will leave her in a sort of unstable SURVIVAL-MODE, but underneath the rough and sometimes-caustic exterior, there's a good and caring (if slightly wild) person.
abilities/powers:
Bravery/Determination: Not so much an ability as it is a positive personality trait, but at her core, it's Heather's bravery that gets her through most of the considerable adversity she faces. She does not let fear stop her from doing what has to be done-- there's always time to break down and have yourself a nice cry later on when it won't be interfering with your ability to stay alive. Heather is a survivor in almost every sense of the word. She's been through bad shit. The fact that she made it through it all not only in one piece but also without winding up in a straightjacket is testament to her ability to persevere through hardship.
Athletic: Heather grew up falling out of trees, jack-knifing off of her bike, and running around like a wild child. This did not change as she got older. She can run like the wind and packs a hefty punch for a scrawny tomboy. She's also a good fighter and knows how to hold her own in a scrap.
Parkour: Between being a bit of a hoodlum and having to escape bloodthirsty monsters by any means possible, Heather is damn good at getting out of scrapes and dead ends in unconventional ways. When there's a freakin' monster with clubs for hands and a bendy-straw for a head, and it's coming at you like a hungry child comes at a plate of cake, you lean how to shimmy up a rain-pipe or haul ass over chain-link fences pretty quickly.
Good with Weapons: Whether it's a sort of power-trip or whether they just make her feel safer, Heather likes weapons. She spent most of her teen years carrying a knife on her person at all times, and she's comfortable enough with fire-arms to snatch them up in a second's notice and blast away if she has to.
Street-smart/smart in general: Heather's pretty bright. She's no prodigy, but she's got a lot of common sense-- not to mention a decent amount of book smarts and chemistry know-how. So, you know, if anyone needs to know how to make some gnarly compounds out of household cleaning agents, she's your gal.
Precognitive Abilities: An extremely watered-down version of the powers she once possessed as Alessa, Heather has minor precognitive abilities. She may occasionally receive glimpses of the immediate future in the form of dreams.
God: She... um... well, there's no delicate way to put this. She's got a baby god inside her. It kind of is her. Silent Hill is weird. She's had it her entire life, and although it's also a crippling weakness (it takes a physical and mental toll on her, and may even wrack her with pain from time to time, as god fetuses are wont to do), it represents her spiritual roots in the town and, as a forced/reluctant divine being herself, may cause her to exhibit disturbing behaviors or abilities from time to time. Not really a strength, per se, but going into a feral, monstery mindset in the middle of a fight could turn the tides in her favor. That said, because she's been physically removed from her own world, the sleeping god is likely to lie dormant in most situations.
Alessa: IN RELATED NEWS:
Heather is Alessa is the Mother of God is the Daughter of God is God? SILENT HILL Y U SO CONFUSING?
Being a direct reincarnation of Alessa Gillespie (referred to as a saint/the mother of God/GOD HERSELF in several cases), Heather has the potential to display the abilities that she had during Alessa's life. She's kind of like the Jesus-figure of the spooky religious cult she was born to. Being a somewhat Carrie-like figure power-wise, Alessa possessed frighteningly powerful psychic/telekinetic abilities-- even getting called a "witch" by her classmates at age seven for her eerie capabilities. She is/was particularly connected to fire and could, according to Heather's own recollections, "kill a person just by wishing for it".
I... personally do not plan to play Heather as regaining any of these abilities to their full extent, and don't think it would even happen outside of some seriously extreme circumstances, but I felt like I should mention it since it's, like, technically a possibility. In the event that such a thing would happen, I'd really want to discuss it with a mod first before deciding on a course of action-- and doubt I'll want to take it any further than like... I dunno, making lights or candles flicker when she's really mad or something. Maybe minor explosions. Or setting off smoke alarms when she gets really pissed, that'd be kinda funny. I'm happy to leave this up to the discretion of the mods, if that would be best!
first person sample:
Text post from Route 29. Loofah appreciation, declarations of manliness, and unnecessary mentions of wrinkly grandma hands.
third person sample:
Prose log from Route 29, in which Heather and an FBI agent eat stolen ice cream and talk about their feelings.
I wasn't sure if you guys check the actual threads, but if those are open for use as samples, the introspective/deep meat of the thread starts around here.
Trigger warning for later discussion of creepy serial killers/rapists though.
case no: 14-07-17
name: Kit
are you over 18?: 21
personal dw:
phantastusemail/msn/aim/plurk/etc:
E-Mail: kit.petitedra@verizon.net
AIM: Phantastus
Plurk: Phantastus
characters in abax: None
in character information.
series: Silent Hill (the video game series. The movie canon, comics, Silent Hill: Shattered Memories and other spinoffs/alternate universes are not part of her continuity).
name: Her alias is 'Heather Morris', but her legal birth name is Cheryl Mason. Before that, her name was Alessa Gillespie.
age: Her age is a little bit tricky due to crazy past life shenanigans (during her first life, she died at age 14 and was then reborn into her current one). Both lives together add up to 31, but for all sakes and purposes, she's 17 years old.
sex: F
race: Human, although due to creepy occult Silent Hill weirdness, she's sort of intertwined with that world's incarnation of 'God'.
weight: 124
height: 5'2"
[OPTIONAL] cause of death: Heather canonically dies multiple times and is revived each time to carry on, but the death I'm taking her from is during the Memory of Alessa fight. So cause of death would be... um.... "Doppelganger", I guess?
canon point: Mid-canon, during the carousel/Memory of Alessa boss fight in the Lakeside Themepark.
previous cr: Nope.
history: Heather's complete history is told pretty thoroughly between this Wiki article on Alessa focusing on her role in the events of Silent Hill(s) 0 and 1, and this article focusing on Heather's reincarnated life and the events of Silent Hill 3.
The Book of Lost Memories is another good resource for the history if the Wikis aren't sufficient.
If a written history would work better, let me know and I'll write one!
personality:
On the surface, Heather's a pretty good example of your average, attitude-laden modern teenager. Bright, but disdainful of school. Hard-working, but also prone to youthful irresponsibility and lack of foresight. She likes shopping, getting herself into trouble doing Dumb Teenage Things (tm), rolling her eyes a lot at her overprotective worrywart dad, delivering witty one-liners ... you know. Normal kid stuff. She's rowdy, sharp-tongued, fiercely independent, and has a short-tempered chip on her shoulder the size of a brick. But despite the fiery nature and... somewhat delinquent-esque tendencies, she's not unfriendly. For most part, Heather puts herself out there as outgoing, social, and more than a bit of a goofball. At age seventeen, she's straddling the fence between childhood and adulthood somewhat and doesn't seem to be ready to grow up in a lot of ways (unfortunately for her, considering she's more or less forced to over the course of her canon). She's as hotheaded as they come and tends to rush headlong into situations that could easily land her in hot water. Fortunately, she's usually quick-thinking enough to get herself back out of them again, and frequently displays a lot of creativity and resourcefulness when it comes to getting herself out of tight spots. To someone meeting her for the first time, it'd be fairly easy to write her off as a wild, slightly-airheaded tomboy. Although a childhood spent moving around a lot and being prevented from getting too close to others resulted in very few long-lasting friendships, the ones she does manage to make are hung onto fiercely. Her trust is difficult to earn, but she attaches herself readily to people who treat her with genuine kindness (and, you know, prove they're not just doing it to get something from her first), largely because there are so few genuinely-benevolent figures in her life that those who truly seem to mean well are cherished deeply. Her affection is characterized by playful aggression and tough love-- if you manage to worm your way into her heart, expect bearhugs, spontaneous wrestling matches and lots of noogies. She's full of energy and determined to enjoy life to its fullest, regardless of how many haters be hatin'.
Unsurprisingly for a survival-horror protagonist, this isn't quite the whole story. Underneath the peppy exterior, Heather has an inner hardness that accompanies a hotbed of suppressed trauma and issues built up on top of a lot of rough experiences and emotional scarring-- and she's got the wariness, trust issues, and street-smarts to prove it. Having been up and down the 'stupid rebel kid' route, Heather still carries a lot of unfortunate habits-- she frequently makes references to having been something of a troublemaker, with a history of underage drinking, smoking cigarettes, and even shoplifting on a regular basis. Due to an incident during her early childhood in which her father was treated as a murder suspect, she mistrusts authority and is likely to sneer at anything with a badge, whether it's a policeman or a private detective. The repressed memories of abuse and mistreatment from her previous life manifest in Heather largely as deep-rooted self-image issues (although she doesn't really understand where they came from until she fully regains those memories), and although she covers it up with her playful nature, she has a very justified wariness of strangers, both from those past-life experiences as well as a childhood mostly spent in hiding from the cult she came from. Although she'll happily pal around with folks, her father's paranoia rubbed off on her somewhat and she doesn't like letting people close enough to see her vulnerable moments.
That said, although she avoids showing weakness at all costs, she's fairly open when it comes to expressing her feelings, and can be fully expected to let people know when she's happy-- or angry. Actually, especially angry.
Which brings us to ... that little issue. Heather's a good kid even if she doesn't always act like one-- she inherited her father's heart of gold,even if it's gotten a little hidden under all that grunge over the years. But that said, she's also in possession of A. angry teenager syndrome (she's highly emotional and frequently moved to angry, frustrated outbursts when things don't go as planned or desired) and B. a sort of innate, bloodthirsty hunger for vengeance when wronged. She's not crazy (or at least not as much as one might expect from a Silent Hill protagonist), but she's been through a great many dark, hideous things and that changes a person. She is easily provoked to violence and, although she considers the harm of innocent human beings reprehensible and horrifying, she can and has killed before. Even before being dragged back into the horrors of Silent Hill, she carried a switchblade on her at all times (stating that she just "liked to for some reason") and was generally quick to snap. This is a kid who was sent to the principal's office a lot for trying to solve problems with punching instead of polite discussion. After her experiences in Silent Hill, her tendency to resort to violence is likely to be even more severe and easy to trigger.
Specific fears and triggers picked up from her terrifying Otherworld experiences aside, Heather also has quite a few unpleasant aversions that are carried over from the repressed memories of her past life, mostly phobias and inner sources of anxiety. Some direct carryovers are generalized fears of fire, dogs, mirrors, hospitals, infants/pregnancy, maternal figures, and rape/sexual assault. She has a past of being heavily manipulated by adult figures and as a result, is reluctant to the point of actually being slightly phobic of giving them control or sway over her (especially adult women). The cruel bullying she endured in her past life, both from her schoolmates and her biological mother, left her with some lingering self-confidence issues that she hides behind a clowny, often-cocky facade. She copes with trauma and upset primarily with humor, and tries her best to hide her troubles and fears behind a steady barrage of jokes and sarcasm. Thanks to the horrors she's been through, her sense of humor has wound up pretty twisted and to a certain extent, she's lost her sense of what's appropriate to laugh about and what isn't, which results in some very dark and questionable 'joke' decisions on her part (no, Heather. It's not okay to pretend that you're going to stab your only living friend. WHY WOULD YOU EVER THINK THAT'S OKAY). For most of her early (second) life, she was blessedly free of any overwhelming fears or mental issues outside of unpleasant deja-vu and frequent nightmares, but as she got older (and was, of course, eventually tracked down by all the nastiness she'd tried to leave in the past), traumatic flashbacks became a thing of increasing frequency. Particularly due to the immediacy of the events she's being pulled from, these memories and flashbacks will cripple her from time to time. But as tempting as it is to curl up in a corner in the fetal position when a major wave of past trauma hits, it's a good way to end up dead when you're in the Otherworld, so Heather does what it takes to stay alive. She's good at pushing terror and grief down long enough to do what has to be done, although the buildup wears her down eventually.
Particularly due to being whisked out of a point smack dab in the middle of her harrowing adventures, Heather's usual easygoing nature is likely to be walled-up behind a hefty wall of Oh My God I Could Die Horribly At Any Moment SURVIVE SURVIVE SURVIVE SURVIVE, which could take a lot of chipping-away-at before the regular kid underneath gets to see daylight again.
TL;DR: Heather is a decent kid just trying to make the best of her second chance at life, but unfortunately has a lot of heavy and horrible burdens on her shoulders from a dark, disturbing past. Being ripped from the middle of the loss of her father and from fighting for her life will leave her in a sort of unstable SURVIVAL-MODE, but underneath the rough and sometimes-caustic exterior, there's a good and caring (if slightly wild) person.
abilities/powers:
Bravery/Determination: Not so much an ability as it is a positive personality trait, but at her core, it's Heather's bravery that gets her through most of the considerable adversity she faces. She does not let fear stop her from doing what has to be done-- there's always time to break down and have yourself a nice cry later on when it won't be interfering with your ability to stay alive. Heather is a survivor in almost every sense of the word. She's been through bad shit. The fact that she made it through it all not only in one piece but also without winding up in a straightjacket is testament to her ability to persevere through hardship.
Athletic: Heather grew up falling out of trees, jack-knifing off of her bike, and running around like a wild child. This did not change as she got older. She can run like the wind and packs a hefty punch for a scrawny tomboy. She's also a good fighter and knows how to hold her own in a scrap.
Parkour: Between being a bit of a hoodlum and having to escape bloodthirsty monsters by any means possible, Heather is damn good at getting out of scrapes and dead ends in unconventional ways. When there's a freakin' monster with clubs for hands and a bendy-straw for a head, and it's coming at you like a hungry child comes at a plate of cake, you lean how to shimmy up a rain-pipe or haul ass over chain-link fences pretty quickly.
Good with Weapons: Whether it's a sort of power-trip or whether they just make her feel safer, Heather likes weapons. She spent most of her teen years carrying a knife on her person at all times, and she's comfortable enough with fire-arms to snatch them up in a second's notice and blast away if she has to.
Street-smart/smart in general: Heather's pretty bright. She's no prodigy, but she's got a lot of common sense-- not to mention a decent amount of book smarts and chemistry know-how. So, you know, if anyone needs to know how to make some gnarly compounds out of household cleaning agents, she's your gal.
Precognitive Abilities: An extremely watered-down version of the powers she once possessed as Alessa, Heather has minor precognitive abilities. She may occasionally receive glimpses of the immediate future in the form of dreams.
God: She... um... well, there's no delicate way to put this. She's got a baby god inside her. It kind of is her. Silent Hill is weird. She's had it her entire life, and although it's also a crippling weakness (it takes a physical and mental toll on her, and may even wrack her with pain from time to time, as god fetuses are wont to do), it represents her spiritual roots in the town and, as a forced/reluctant divine being herself, may cause her to exhibit disturbing behaviors or abilities from time to time. Not really a strength, per se, but going into a feral, monstery mindset in the middle of a fight could turn the tides in her favor. That said, because she's been physically removed from her own world, the sleeping god is likely to lie dormant in most situations.
Alessa: IN RELATED NEWS:
Heather is Alessa is the Mother of God is the Daughter of God is God? SILENT HILL Y U SO CONFUSING?
Being a direct reincarnation of Alessa Gillespie (referred to as a saint/the mother of God/GOD HERSELF in several cases), Heather has the potential to display the abilities that she had during Alessa's life. She's kind of like the Jesus-figure of the spooky religious cult she was born to. Being a somewhat Carrie-like figure power-wise, Alessa possessed frighteningly powerful psychic/telekinetic abilities-- even getting called a "witch" by her classmates at age seven for her eerie capabilities. She is/was particularly connected to fire and could, according to Heather's own recollections, "kill a person just by wishing for it".
I... personally do not plan to play Heather as regaining any of these abilities to their full extent, and don't think it would even happen outside of some seriously extreme circumstances, but I felt like I should mention it since it's, like, technically a possibility. In the event that such a thing would happen, I'd really want to discuss it with a mod first before deciding on a course of action-- and doubt I'll want to take it any further than like... I dunno, making lights or candles flicker when she's really mad or something. Maybe minor explosions. Or setting off smoke alarms when she gets really pissed, that'd be kinda funny. I'm happy to leave this up to the discretion of the mods, if that would be best!
first person sample:
Text post from Route 29. Loofah appreciation, declarations of manliness, and unnecessary mentions of wrinkly grandma hands.
third person sample:
Prose log from Route 29, in which Heather and an FBI agent eat stolen ice cream and talk about their feelings.
I wasn't sure if you guys check the actual threads, but if those are open for use as samples, the introspective/deep meat of the thread starts around here.
Trigger warning for later discussion of creepy serial killers/rapists though.
case no: 14-07-17