Application for Carnival of Rust
Player
Name - Dragon
AIM Name - dragondancer5150@yahoo.com (yes, the whole thing is the AIM ID...9,9 - PM me on LJ, though first to see if I'm around, I'm not available on AIM very often at all unless I'm expecting someone)
E-Mail - See above
Character
Name - Harlequin
Fandom - Pinocchio: The Adventures of a Marionette (the original book by Carlo Collodi, NOT the Disney bastardized sanitized version; well-translated copy available here; see chp’s 10 & 11 for Harlequin et al.)
Canon Point - Sometime after Pinocchio continued on from his brief visit to the Great Puppet Theater
Age - Physically only maybe two years old but, mentally/emotionally, the equivalent of a (naïve and sheltered) teenager
Gender - Technically non-gender, effectively male
Appearance - Harlequin is a two-foot-tall Living Marionette, a wooden “doll,” essentially. His facial features are carved and painted, and yet he can blink his eyes, open his mouth, and is capable of a full range of expressions just the same as a person made of flesh. A black, painted-on domino covers the upper half of his face from his cheekbones, and his “short,” black hair is also painted on. He’s well-constructed of solid oak, with dexterous joints that allow for a full range of motion - he is an actor and acrobat, after all. Even his hands and feet are jointed, with his feet in two pieces hinged across the ball for flexible “toes,” and his hands include a hinged thumb and an index finger separate from the wide piece that equates to the rest of his fingers. He wears pants and a long-sleeved tunic both covered in a “harlequinade” pattern of blue, green, red, and yellow, and a bicorn hat of mint green. A belt with a wooden sword and painted-on black shoes complete his attire. For what it’s worth, his eyes are brown. (based on the stock character costume as well as the character’s appearance in an Italian-made animated movie; screencaps available here )
Personality - Harlequin is generally a very happy and adventuresome Marionette, true to the stock dramatic persona from which he was modeled. He’s always ready to lend a hand, as service was also built into his nature. He can be a bit of a leader - well, he was among his siblings anyway. Under other circumstances, he likely might have turned out much as his brother Pinocchio had started out - unruly and miscreant - but his master, Fire-eater, saw to any such tendencies. Harlequin is terrified of his master and will generally obey him on reflex. This fear tends to manifest in the face of any authority figure, which he abhors in himself, but it’s a trait as deeply ingrained in him as the literal grain of the oak he’s carved from. Still, he tries not to think about that overmuch and to approach everyone with a smile and a good word.
He doesn’t anger easily - partly because he knows there’s almost no use to it. He’s two feet tall and looks like a child’s toy - what could he do? Even still, anger and the like really aren’t in his nature. He's an easy-going little fellow, quick and cunning.
History - Once upon a time, there was an ancient oak well outside of town. It was a magical oak tree. Or anyway, that was the theory of the great ogre of a man who found the tree full of laughing children’s voices coming from the very boughs of the oak itself. This man, one Fire-eater by name, cut a number of the limbs from the tree and was both startled and delighted when they called and laughed and bucked in his arms. It meant that his plan would work - to carve puppets of them that could move by themselves, Living Marionettes to work for him in the puppet theater he intended to build. As chance would have it, one of the logs got away from him. This one would eventually make its merry, ornery way into the hands of a poor carpenter by the name of Geppetto . . . but that is another story.
Harlequin and his brothers and sisters worked and lived in their master’s Great Marionette Theater, and they were a marvel of the town. Harlequin loved his work - the various parts that he played in many stories, the music and songs, the laughter and applause of the audience, and the fellowship with his siblings. Life was not without its price, however. The Marionettes lived in terror of their master’s fierce wrath and obeyed him without question, making sure to learn scripts or improv outlines flawlessly, keep up on chores, and do whatever else he demanded of them.
All was well until sometime their first winter. They were in the middle of a play, and it was Harlequin and his brother Punchinello on stage. Harlequin looked out across the audience during one of his lines and, lo and behold, who should he spy but his long-lost brother Pinocchio, the puppet carved from the very log they had lost so long ago! Harlequin was so overjoyed that he forgot the play entirely, calling to his brother to come up and join his siblings. The rest of the troupe, hearing Harlequin’s cries, rushed out on stage and joined the calling. Pinocchio leaped up to them and the whole crowd danced around in joy, carrying their brother backstage, completely oblivious of the audience’s outcry.
But while they could ignore their audience, they could not ignore their enraged master. Fire-eater demanded to know why the play had stopped, focusing on the new puppet. With the winter having been as harsh as it was, Harlequin and the others had not been able to keep enough stock of dry firewood, and now more than ever they feared the consequences of that failure as their master ordered Harlequin and Punchinello to seize hold of Pinocchio and throw him on the fire to finish roasting their master’s mutton for dinner. The last thing Harlequin wanted to do was put someone to death like that, and such a horrific one to boot! Let alone to do so to his newly-recovered brother! He gave one attempt to plead with his master for mercy - as did Punchinello - but a sharp command and a dreadful glower had him gripping Pinocchio’s arm before he knew what he was doing. Pinocchio wept and cried out so bitterly that Fire-eater was actually moved to . . . well, not tears. Sneezing, actually (it was the ogre in him). But be that as it may, Fire-eater pitied Pinocchio and pardoned him . . . only to turn his sights on Harlequin as the replacement sacrifice!
Harlequin’s knees went weak with terror as the two officer Marionettes flanked him, but he knew better than to try to plead for mercy from his cruel master. It was with astonishment that he heard Pinocchio renew his own cries for mercy, this time in defense of his “dear friend Harlequin,” and even more startled still when, finally, Fire-eater pardoned for the second time, contenting himself with a dinner only half-cooked, though woe to them the next time! Among themselves, they swore there would not be a next time, at least not that the firewood would be allowed to run too low! But in the meantime, the whole puppet company rejoiced the reunion and the pardons, dancing and making merry until the next dawn, wherein Fire-eater spoke to Pinocchio a little more before sending him on his way with a little money to take back to his “father,” Geppetto. Whether or not he ever actually made it, Harlequin could not tell.
Skills/Abilities/Powers - He's a consummate performer, as it's literally what he was created to do. He's an acrobat and actor, highly skilled in improvisation especially (since that was the stock of the Commedia dell'Arte on which he's based - the theater movement had no scripts for its plays, only outlines). He can also perform simple household chores like sweeping, fixing Master's meals, likely the puppets did repairs to their own costumes as needed so some sewing, things like that.
Power Restrictions - NA, the only supernatural power he has is the fact that he's living and sentient at all.
Job - He's too small to "hold his own" with other acts, being as he's a third of the height of his fellow performers, so either he'll be some kind of side show of his own, or he'll be a fool and general street entertainer, being an amusement for people waiting in lines for other attractions, something like that?
Mark Location - On his chest, under the shirt.
Samples
First Person Sample (Communicator) -
[The communicator seems to be transmitting from the ground, in that it's set on the ground and propped against something so that it's standing. After all, the device is only a little less than half the height of its owner, so it's too unwieldy to try to hold while he addresses it.]
Ah . . . hello? Goodness, I do hope this is working. Hi, yes, I . . . I've seen others use devices like this one, so I hope I'm doing this right. I, ah, I seem to be lost. I need to get back to the Great Puppet Theater on the other end of town. Master Fire-eater will be expecting me. Oh, I do hope he's not too upset with me, and that the others are okay.
Oh, by the firmament, where are my manners? I am Harlequin, at your humble service.
[He sweeps off his hat in an elegant bow, then gives the camera a sheepish grin as he straightens.]
I've tried to reach the lock on the front gate of this place, but . . . ah . . . I'm afraid I've been unable. And I can't seem to slip between the bars of the fence either. It's really very strange! But yes, if someone could offer some assistance, I would be ever so grateful. Thank you very much.
Third Person Sample (Log) -
Harlequin skittered around a corner, one hand gripping a shoulder strap of his makeshift backpack, the other keeping his precious hat jammed on his head. He prayed he would find some refuge, if not from the threatening storm than at least from the small pack of strays that had decided he might make entertaining sport.
Oh, what beautiful luck! A fire escape ladder, and it was extended. He scrambled up onto a trashcan and jumped the rest of the way to the bottom rung. The backpack weighted him awkwardly, not to mention slowing him down, but he was loathe to shed it even as the quickest of the dogs snapped at his heels when he leapt. Thankfully, not a one managed to catch his pant legs - or his feet! - before he could start climbing up, and he reached the first landing safely, continuing to the roof in the hopes of finding some meager shelter.
Fortune continued to smile on him this cool, dreary afternoon as he managed to stuff himself under some industrial debris that promised to be rainproof just as the clouds above unleashed their deluge. Settling in for the duration, he pulled a worn piece of paper - an old play poster - and began doodling on the back with the crayon he'd found yesterday.
Any Other Details We Should Know - His lack of height will prove quite a challenge sometimes out in the world away from his theater, where everything is built for people three times his size. He accommodates and makes do the best he can, though, having no fear of climbing up on things as needed. He has many of the same needs as a flesh person - he eats, drinks, and sleeps. Drugs, medications, and other toxins/chemicals have no effect on him, as anything that passes into him is merely converted into a sort of usable energy form by the magic that animates him. This is both a good and bad thing - a painkiller won’t help any more than a poison would harm. And he does feel pain. He can “heal” damage to himself about the same as a flesh person - scratches and scuffs fade, cracks and breaks will heal with time and support (binding the affected part about the same as one would do for first aid), and anything too badly damaged simply has to be removed, sparing the undamaged half of a joint if possible. His “doctor” is a carpenter who can carve him a replacement (though any new, foreign pieces will be stiff and painful while his body integrates and gets used to them) - so long as his head is largely intact, he’s repairable.
He’s been “raised” to fear authority, and can be intimidated into doing things he’d never on his own choose to do, and without much effort on the part of the intimidator sometimes (well, at least that was true of his master, Fire-eater). His greatest weakness - and fear - is fire . . . for obvious reasons. And he has been threatened with burning, both as punishment and by whim - his master liked his mutton well-roasted and woe to the Marionettes if the firewood ever got low! Water is also a bane of his, giving him a sort of arthritis. Wet wood swells, and swollen joints lock up - it’s rather painful, actually!
Name - Dragon
AIM Name - dragondancer5150@yahoo.com (yes, the whole thing is the AIM ID...9,9 - PM me on LJ, though first to see if I'm around, I'm not available on AIM very often at all unless I'm expecting someone)
E-Mail - See above
Character
Name - Harlequin
Fandom - Pinocchio: The Adventures of a Marionette (the original book by Carlo Collodi, NOT the Disney bastardized sanitized version; well-translated copy available here; see chp’s 10 & 11 for Harlequin et al.)
Canon Point - Sometime after Pinocchio continued on from his brief visit to the Great Puppet Theater
Age - Physically only maybe two years old but, mentally/emotionally, the equivalent of a (naïve and sheltered) teenager
Gender - Technically non-gender, effectively male
Appearance - Harlequin is a two-foot-tall Living Marionette, a wooden “doll,” essentially. His facial features are carved and painted, and yet he can blink his eyes, open his mouth, and is capable of a full range of expressions just the same as a person made of flesh. A black, painted-on domino covers the upper half of his face from his cheekbones, and his “short,” black hair is also painted on. He’s well-constructed of solid oak, with dexterous joints that allow for a full range of motion - he is an actor and acrobat, after all. Even his hands and feet are jointed, with his feet in two pieces hinged across the ball for flexible “toes,” and his hands include a hinged thumb and an index finger separate from the wide piece that equates to the rest of his fingers. He wears pants and a long-sleeved tunic both covered in a “harlequinade” pattern of blue, green, red, and yellow, and a bicorn hat of mint green. A belt with a wooden sword and painted-on black shoes complete his attire. For what it’s worth, his eyes are brown. (based on the stock character costume as well as the character’s appearance in an Italian-made animated movie; screencaps available here )
Personality - Harlequin is generally a very happy and adventuresome Marionette, true to the stock dramatic persona from which he was modeled. He’s always ready to lend a hand, as service was also built into his nature. He can be a bit of a leader - well, he was among his siblings anyway. Under other circumstances, he likely might have turned out much as his brother Pinocchio had started out - unruly and miscreant - but his master, Fire-eater, saw to any such tendencies. Harlequin is terrified of his master and will generally obey him on reflex. This fear tends to manifest in the face of any authority figure, which he abhors in himself, but it’s a trait as deeply ingrained in him as the literal grain of the oak he’s carved from. Still, he tries not to think about that overmuch and to approach everyone with a smile and a good word.
He doesn’t anger easily - partly because he knows there’s almost no use to it. He’s two feet tall and looks like a child’s toy - what could he do? Even still, anger and the like really aren’t in his nature. He's an easy-going little fellow, quick and cunning.
History - Once upon a time, there was an ancient oak well outside of town. It was a magical oak tree. Or anyway, that was the theory of the great ogre of a man who found the tree full of laughing children’s voices coming from the very boughs of the oak itself. This man, one Fire-eater by name, cut a number of the limbs from the tree and was both startled and delighted when they called and laughed and bucked in his arms. It meant that his plan would work - to carve puppets of them that could move by themselves, Living Marionettes to work for him in the puppet theater he intended to build. As chance would have it, one of the logs got away from him. This one would eventually make its merry, ornery way into the hands of a poor carpenter by the name of Geppetto . . . but that is another story.
Harlequin and his brothers and sisters worked and lived in their master’s Great Marionette Theater, and they were a marvel of the town. Harlequin loved his work - the various parts that he played in many stories, the music and songs, the laughter and applause of the audience, and the fellowship with his siblings. Life was not without its price, however. The Marionettes lived in terror of their master’s fierce wrath and obeyed him without question, making sure to learn scripts or improv outlines flawlessly, keep up on chores, and do whatever else he demanded of them.
All was well until sometime their first winter. They were in the middle of a play, and it was Harlequin and his brother Punchinello on stage. Harlequin looked out across the audience during one of his lines and, lo and behold, who should he spy but his long-lost brother Pinocchio, the puppet carved from the very log they had lost so long ago! Harlequin was so overjoyed that he forgot the play entirely, calling to his brother to come up and join his siblings. The rest of the troupe, hearing Harlequin’s cries, rushed out on stage and joined the calling. Pinocchio leaped up to them and the whole crowd danced around in joy, carrying their brother backstage, completely oblivious of the audience’s outcry.
But while they could ignore their audience, they could not ignore their enraged master. Fire-eater demanded to know why the play had stopped, focusing on the new puppet. With the winter having been as harsh as it was, Harlequin and the others had not been able to keep enough stock of dry firewood, and now more than ever they feared the consequences of that failure as their master ordered Harlequin and Punchinello to seize hold of Pinocchio and throw him on the fire to finish roasting their master’s mutton for dinner. The last thing Harlequin wanted to do was put someone to death like that, and such a horrific one to boot! Let alone to do so to his newly-recovered brother! He gave one attempt to plead with his master for mercy - as did Punchinello - but a sharp command and a dreadful glower had him gripping Pinocchio’s arm before he knew what he was doing. Pinocchio wept and cried out so bitterly that Fire-eater was actually moved to . . . well, not tears. Sneezing, actually (it was the ogre in him). But be that as it may, Fire-eater pitied Pinocchio and pardoned him . . . only to turn his sights on Harlequin as the replacement sacrifice!
Harlequin’s knees went weak with terror as the two officer Marionettes flanked him, but he knew better than to try to plead for mercy from his cruel master. It was with astonishment that he heard Pinocchio renew his own cries for mercy, this time in defense of his “dear friend Harlequin,” and even more startled still when, finally, Fire-eater pardoned for the second time, contenting himself with a dinner only half-cooked, though woe to them the next time! Among themselves, they swore there would not be a next time, at least not that the firewood would be allowed to run too low! But in the meantime, the whole puppet company rejoiced the reunion and the pardons, dancing and making merry until the next dawn, wherein Fire-eater spoke to Pinocchio a little more before sending him on his way with a little money to take back to his “father,” Geppetto. Whether or not he ever actually made it, Harlequin could not tell.
Skills/Abilities/Powers - He's a consummate performer, as it's literally what he was created to do. He's an acrobat and actor, highly skilled in improvisation especially (since that was the stock of the Commedia dell'Arte on which he's based - the theater movement had no scripts for its plays, only outlines). He can also perform simple household chores like sweeping, fixing Master's meals, likely the puppets did repairs to their own costumes as needed so some sewing, things like that.
Power Restrictions - NA, the only supernatural power he has is the fact that he's living and sentient at all.
Job - He's too small to "hold his own" with other acts, being as he's a third of the height of his fellow performers, so either he'll be some kind of side show of his own, or he'll be a fool and general street entertainer, being an amusement for people waiting in lines for other attractions, something like that?
Mark Location - On his chest, under the shirt.
Samples
First Person Sample (Communicator) -
[The communicator seems to be transmitting from the ground, in that it's set on the ground and propped against something so that it's standing. After all, the device is only a little less than half the height of its owner, so it's too unwieldy to try to hold while he addresses it.]
Ah . . . hello? Goodness, I do hope this is working. Hi, yes, I . . . I've seen others use devices like this one, so I hope I'm doing this right. I, ah, I seem to be lost. I need to get back to the Great Puppet Theater on the other end of town. Master Fire-eater will be expecting me. Oh, I do hope he's not too upset with me, and that the others are okay.
Oh, by the firmament, where are my manners? I am Harlequin, at your humble service.
[He sweeps off his hat in an elegant bow, then gives the camera a sheepish grin as he straightens.]
I've tried to reach the lock on the front gate of this place, but . . . ah . . . I'm afraid I've been unable. And I can't seem to slip between the bars of the fence either. It's really very strange! But yes, if someone could offer some assistance, I would be ever so grateful. Thank you very much.
Third Person Sample (Log) -
Harlequin skittered around a corner, one hand gripping a shoulder strap of his makeshift backpack, the other keeping his precious hat jammed on his head. He prayed he would find some refuge, if not from the threatening storm than at least from the small pack of strays that had decided he might make entertaining sport.
Oh, what beautiful luck! A fire escape ladder, and it was extended. He scrambled up onto a trashcan and jumped the rest of the way to the bottom rung. The backpack weighted him awkwardly, not to mention slowing him down, but he was loathe to shed it even as the quickest of the dogs snapped at his heels when he leapt. Thankfully, not a one managed to catch his pant legs - or his feet! - before he could start climbing up, and he reached the first landing safely, continuing to the roof in the hopes of finding some meager shelter.
Fortune continued to smile on him this cool, dreary afternoon as he managed to stuff himself under some industrial debris that promised to be rainproof just as the clouds above unleashed their deluge. Settling in for the duration, he pulled a worn piece of paper - an old play poster - and began doodling on the back with the crayon he'd found yesterday.
Any Other Details We Should Know - His lack of height will prove quite a challenge sometimes out in the world away from his theater, where everything is built for people three times his size. He accommodates and makes do the best he can, though, having no fear of climbing up on things as needed. He has many of the same needs as a flesh person - he eats, drinks, and sleeps. Drugs, medications, and other toxins/chemicals have no effect on him, as anything that passes into him is merely converted into a sort of usable energy form by the magic that animates him. This is both a good and bad thing - a painkiller won’t help any more than a poison would harm. And he does feel pain. He can “heal” damage to himself about the same as a flesh person - scratches and scuffs fade, cracks and breaks will heal with time and support (binding the affected part about the same as one would do for first aid), and anything too badly damaged simply has to be removed, sparing the undamaged half of a joint if possible. His “doctor” is a carpenter who can carve him a replacement (though any new, foreign pieces will be stiff and painful while his body integrates and gets used to them) - so long as his head is largely intact, he’s repairable.
He’s been “raised” to fear authority, and can be intimidated into doing things he’d never on his own choose to do, and without much effort on the part of the intimidator sometimes (well, at least that was true of his master, Fire-eater). His greatest weakness - and fear - is fire . . . for obvious reasons. And he has been threatened with burning, both as punishment and by whim - his master liked his mutton well-roasted and woe to the Marionettes if the firewood ever got low! Water is also a bane of his, giving him a sort of arthritis. Wet wood swells, and swollen joints lock up - it’s rather painful, actually!