[APP] paradisa
NAME: Fyre
JOURNAL: fyretoppaaa
EMAIL: hotaru.no.tamashii[at]gmail[dot]com
AIM: eighth helleluia
WIKI NAME: N/A
CHARACTERS: N/A
CHARACTER NAME: Eridan Ampora
FANDOM: Homestuck
CANON: When Rose blows up his computer
WHAT THEY LOST: His kickass royal purple blood! It used to be THIS COLOR. It is now THIS COLOR and he will not be pleased, because the color of his blood denotes his position on the social ladder and said position has now effectively been lowered. The About section provides more detail on this trait's role in his character.
ABOUT THE CHARACTER: There are three basic things about Eridan that one shouldn't forget; notably because he won't let you forget them. First: he's penultimate on the hemospectrum, the social caste system of his species, due to his purple blood -- right under the heiress apparent. Second: he's a sea troll (though he doesn't seem to have been underwater much -- a handful of days in his entire life, if his moirail's to be believed), the ruling class of the species -- a class which is also said to have a 'traditional' feud with their land-dwelling fellows. Third: he's the Prince of Hope, though at his current timepoint he hasn't fully come into the title (at least the way he eventually interprets it in canon).
As one might guess, his high social placement has made him incredibly arrogant, proud and self-centered... without doing much for his manners or grace: he swears like a sailor and for the most part doesn't seem to see any use for tact. It's his way or the highway, and he is a brat has notable difficulty accepting any kind of alternative view (see: below on magic).
This doesn't mean that he's completely unreasonable -- he'll listen to logic and face facts because he's a scientific sort, but anything of the more mystical or open-ended or romantic variety and you'll find it pretty ridiculously difficult to get him to bend his views, much less change them... unless there's something in it for him. As you might have guessed, he's about as stubborn as they come; to the point of self-delusion, in many respects (his own importance, the existence of magic, his relationships, etc.).
His impressive reserves of selfishness, however, also mean that he will accept almost anything he can use provided it's on his own terms -- it also means that his morality is pretty noodle-like fluid, or weak and hypocritical, depending on how you look at it. Morality is a bit of a relative concept for trolls, anyway, especially at the upper end of the hemospectrum (apparently, the aristocracy murdering, backstabbing and plotting against even friends is par for the course). His attitudes toward both land-dwellers and humans are a great example of this: though he's loud and proud about disdaining both, he ends up befriending and/or hitting on individuals in both categories.
An excellent illustration of all of the above traits is his later interpretation of his title as Prince of Hope, derived from his team's session of the apocalyptic game Sgrub. His take on it? He's the only one qualified to know when hope is lost, and therefore when to throw in the towel, cut losses, burn bridges, etc. He becomes the destroyer of hope rather than its champion -- using white magic passed on from murdered angels that he continues to call 'white science' -- and he thinks this is a perfectly reasonable conclusion.
A few other helpful footnotes: each troll has an 'ancestor' from some more or less removed time in the past from whom they derive most of their genes and whom they believe they're fated to follow in the footsteps of. The trolls are also a warrior race who, when fully-grown, waste no time going out and joining in the conquest and subjugation of their galaxy; as such, the current population of Alternia is mostly composed of younger trolls and their guardians.
Eridan's ancestor was called Orphaner Dualscar; so far he has based his FLARP character off of the man and recovered his legendary rifle -- Ahab's Crosshairs. There are some notable parallels in their lives, including the part where they both turned their back on people they cared for and their rivalries with Vriska Serket and Marquise Spinneret Mindfang (her ancestor). It has been hinted that Eridan was a fairly competent FLARPer, or at least enough to keep up a rivalry with Vriska that put an end to countless trolls and their guardian lusii. This also served the dual practical purpose of feeding Vriska's lusus as well as that of Eridan's former moirail. The latter was a fairly important duty, since the continued survival of the entire troll race depended upon it -- it's also worth noting that he refrained from conveniently cutting back on the feeding, which could have wiped out land-dwellers for him, because he was more interested in keeping his moirail happy. While he will always serve his own interests, it doesn't mean that he will always ignore those of others or that he doesn't know how to care about them; just that there will pretty much always be an ulterior motive. The fact that it was perfectly fine to perform massacre for gaming purposes... well, we've already touched on the ultimate goals of the troll race.
His relationship with his guardian lusus was, by all appearances, pretty harmonious -- especially compared to others who were forced to duel with theirs at every opportunity or to keep up with stressful feeding schedules (though he ended up doing that anyway). His lusus, a flying seahorse, was shown to act as a mount and companion on his adventures. It later died as a result of the events leading up to the apocalypse, was revived in an alternate form, and presumably died again.
Troll romance is an absurdly complicated exercise based on four quadrants and resulting in certain death if one of the halves isn't filled. As such, it plays a significant role in troll interactions and for Eridan in particular, since he seems to have a bit of an obsession with filling any and all quadrants (to put it lightly). As a matter of fact, at last count he has hit on 10/16 members of the core cast (humans and trolls), some in multiple quadrants and/or on multiple occasions. He seems to have had this habit even before his longtime moirail Feferi broke off their relationship -- which, though they were described as having been "hatched for each other", he revealed that he had only tolerated because he had been hoping to deepen it to one of the reproductive quadrants one day. Interestingly enough, his ancestor was said to have had feelings for the Empress; Feferi is the current heiress apparent. It's unclear just how much this influenced Eridan's professed feelings, if at all. The sincerity and/or depth of a vast majority of his romantic pursuits is also dubious considering how often and incessantly they occur.
Besides FLARPing and filling quadrants, his interests consist of military history and conquerors, genocidal plots against all land-dwellers, and a strictly classified fascination with magic -- in the sense that it's fake, he knows it's definitely completely and absolutely fake and only science is the truth!! -- but it's interesting anyway.
He lives by himself on a boat broken nearly in half on an island in the middle of the ocean; you'd think this and his lone-wolf behavior during Sgrub would mean he's used to solitude, but he turns out to be incredibly clingy, constantly demanding attention from whoever will indulge him, and seems to get lonely easily. He also keeps shitty wands in the fridge instead of food, but a confirmed bachelor the aristocracy is supposed to be a bit eccentric.
Part of his ambition and pretensions to power and importance can be ascribed to his interest in history and vice versa -- he tries clumsily to emulate his heroes with grandiose schemes, emotional theatrics, and possibly the romantic ridiculousness, too. He fails pretty spectacularly at all of the above -- to the point where most of his genocidal rage ended up being directed against the angels on his game planet because his plans weren't terribly effective, his moirail was against it and he was in cahoots with the land-dwellers anyway; his moirail left him citing emotional exhaustion with his theatrics, and he bowed out of life without a single quadrant filled.
In fact, he fails so uniformly that it's practically become a comfortable status quo before the events of Sgrub; it's when a series of upheavals continually upset the balance in his life -- the end of their world, Feferi breaking up with him, snatching defeat from the jaws of victory, waiting for almost certain doom on an asteroid, and finally, discovering new power with his heretofore dormant ability to wield white magic science -- that the real danger in his nature comes into play. Even before he turns his back and his wand on his friends to ensure his own survival, his ability to massacre other troll children and hordes of angels who just happened to be there without known hesitation or remorse is a pretty big testament to what he's always been capable of. Doc Scratch described him as "a vengeful boy on a path of nihilism"; it's likely that this downward spiral had already started even at the time point he's taken from, well before the discovery of his magic science gave him the push to act on it.
THIRD-PERSON WRITING SAMPLE: To say he was shellshocked was an understatement. He was algaepe, astonefished, counfloundered, bewhaledered, flippergasted! There was absoleutely no fucking way in hell that what had just happened could have happened to him.
He wasn't even being a little bit dramatic, either; it wasn't every day you provoked a witch in a neighboring universe and found yourself promptly computer-blasted so far off your shitty personal asteroid that you had clearly either begun dreaming the dreams you could no longer have -- or you had landed in a frilly fucking castle on a planet in a paradox space that didn't even have planets anymore. Not whole ones, anyhow.
(At least she'd observed the basic courtesy to fellow folk of royal blood and thrown him somewhere worthy of his station and awe, though really, it was more like thaw, what with the daylight drying the hell out of his husk before he could even take a breath of the putrid inland air.)
But never mind the general implausibility of the whole situation -- he could do implausible. He and implausibility (paradox, so to speak) had been fucking bosom buddies for what felt like sweeps by now. What was important was that the witch had seen fit to not only reach across the dimensions with a petty grubbing display of her powers but had actually completely surpassed his imagination with her retaliation. It really was a bit much for a round of witty repartee, but he was definitely not complaining.
The thing for Eridan to do was clearly to climb to his feet with all the grace of a deflated octopus, reach for his strife specibus, and start waving around Ahab's Crosshairs like it was coming into style. He even threw out an arm to give his cape that little extra bit of impetus it needed to start fluttering in the poor drafts circulating the meager halls of what was obviously a land-dweller's idea of a castle.
The leather-bound book caught under his stylishly posed heel went woefully unnoticed for the moment.
FIRST-PERSON WRITING SAMPLE: [Dearest denizens of Paradisa: the following appetizing image has just been splashed all over a page of your journal.]
[However, if you look closely, you will see words appear in the midst of the tread even as the journal records the next voice message; yep, say hi to the talking shoeprint.]
PINKSCARF MCWWITCH
yeah you knoww im talkin to you dont evven try and make out like you dont knoww your personal title that i wwas so kind to bestoww
see i evven added a mac as a courtesea to a likeblood in exchange a your consideration wwith this frilly fuckin landdwweller castle that im sure you didnt knoww any better
im pretty sure thats one a your human nobility titles or somethin that i happened to stumble upon in your fuckin mess of a timeline
anywway i knoww youre out up there ovver in the next galaxy laughin it up but i promise you
I PROMISE YOU
theres no wway youre gettin off scotfree in this most inksome a hostilities exchanges
specially not seein as youre the one wwho decided youd flaunt your fuckin interdimension fakey fakey fake topblowwin powwers in the first place
you dont just fishstick prince a hope eridan ampora a good one and expect to wwalk awway pure clean an wwhite you think youre the only one wwhos got dimensions for playthings
so consider this a official proper civvilized declaration a black intentions if you wwill
dont sink too easy you hear me
<3<
INTENT: I'm interested in exploring his reaction to the loss of his blood color, which is an integral part of his ego and the identity he's built for himself so far. Of course, it's not the entire loss of that identity -- he's still a seadweller, after all. But I'm wondering how it would affect his personality and actions if he had to actually try and hide something he's been used to flaunting his entire life (and he will try and hide it as best he can). I'd also like to explore how this and other factors in Paradisa would or would not affect the eventual direction his character takes in canon.
JOURNAL: fyretoppaaa
EMAIL: hotaru.no.tamashii[at]gmail[dot]com
AIM: eighth helleluia
WIKI NAME: N/A
CHARACTERS: N/A
CHARACTER NAME: Eridan Ampora
FANDOM: Homestuck
CANON: When Rose blows up his computer
WHAT THEY LOST: His kickass royal purple blood! It used to be THIS COLOR. It is now THIS COLOR and he will not be pleased, because the color of his blood denotes his position on the social ladder and said position has now effectively been lowered. The About section provides more detail on this trait's role in his character.
ABOUT THE CHARACTER: There are three basic things about Eridan that one shouldn't forget; notably because he won't let you forget them. First: he's penultimate on the hemospectrum, the social caste system of his species, due to his purple blood -- right under the heiress apparent. Second: he's a sea troll (though he doesn't seem to have been underwater much -- a handful of days in his entire life, if his moirail's to be believed), the ruling class of the species -- a class which is also said to have a 'traditional' feud with their land-dwelling fellows. Third: he's the Prince of Hope, though at his current timepoint he hasn't fully come into the title (at least the way he eventually interprets it in canon).
As one might guess, his high social placement has made him incredibly arrogant, proud and self-centered... without doing much for his manners or grace: he swears like a sailor and for the most part doesn't seem to see any use for tact. It's his way or the highway, and he is a brat has notable difficulty accepting any kind of alternative view (see: below on magic).
This doesn't mean that he's completely unreasonable -- he'll listen to logic and face facts because he's a scientific sort, but anything of the more mystical or open-ended or romantic variety and you'll find it pretty ridiculously difficult to get him to bend his views, much less change them... unless there's something in it for him. As you might have guessed, he's about as stubborn as they come; to the point of self-delusion, in many respects (his own importance, the existence of magic, his relationships, etc.).
His impressive reserves of selfishness, however, also mean that he will accept almost anything he can use provided it's on his own terms -- it also means that his morality is pretty noodle-like fluid, or weak and hypocritical, depending on how you look at it. Morality is a bit of a relative concept for trolls, anyway, especially at the upper end of the hemospectrum (apparently, the aristocracy murdering, backstabbing and plotting against even friends is par for the course). His attitudes toward both land-dwellers and humans are a great example of this: though he's loud and proud about disdaining both, he ends up befriending and/or hitting on individuals in both categories.
An excellent illustration of all of the above traits is his later interpretation of his title as Prince of Hope, derived from his team's session of the apocalyptic game Sgrub. His take on it? He's the only one qualified to know when hope is lost, and therefore when to throw in the towel, cut losses, burn bridges, etc. He becomes the destroyer of hope rather than its champion -- using white magic passed on from murdered angels that he continues to call 'white science' -- and he thinks this is a perfectly reasonable conclusion.
A few other helpful footnotes: each troll has an 'ancestor' from some more or less removed time in the past from whom they derive most of their genes and whom they believe they're fated to follow in the footsteps of. The trolls are also a warrior race who, when fully-grown, waste no time going out and joining in the conquest and subjugation of their galaxy; as such, the current population of Alternia is mostly composed of younger trolls and their guardians.
Eridan's ancestor was called Orphaner Dualscar; so far he has based his FLARP character off of the man and recovered his legendary rifle -- Ahab's Crosshairs. There are some notable parallels in their lives, including the part where they both turned their back on people they cared for and their rivalries with Vriska Serket and Marquise Spinneret Mindfang (her ancestor). It has been hinted that Eridan was a fairly competent FLARPer, or at least enough to keep up a rivalry with Vriska that put an end to countless trolls and their guardian lusii. This also served the dual practical purpose of feeding Vriska's lusus as well as that of Eridan's former moirail. The latter was a fairly important duty, since the continued survival of the entire troll race depended upon it -- it's also worth noting that he refrained from conveniently cutting back on the feeding, which could have wiped out land-dwellers for him, because he was more interested in keeping his moirail happy. While he will always serve his own interests, it doesn't mean that he will always ignore those of others or that he doesn't know how to care about them; just that there will pretty much always be an ulterior motive. The fact that it was perfectly fine to perform massacre for gaming purposes... well, we've already touched on the ultimate goals of the troll race.
His relationship with his guardian lusus was, by all appearances, pretty harmonious -- especially compared to others who were forced to duel with theirs at every opportunity or to keep up with stressful feeding schedules (though he ended up doing that anyway). His lusus, a flying seahorse, was shown to act as a mount and companion on his adventures. It later died as a result of the events leading up to the apocalypse, was revived in an alternate form, and presumably died again.
Troll romance is an absurdly complicated exercise based on four quadrants and resulting in certain death if one of the halves isn't filled. As such, it plays a significant role in troll interactions and for Eridan in particular, since he seems to have a bit of an obsession with filling any and all quadrants (to put it lightly). As a matter of fact, at last count he has hit on 10/16 members of the core cast (humans and trolls), some in multiple quadrants and/or on multiple occasions. He seems to have had this habit even before his longtime moirail Feferi broke off their relationship -- which, though they were described as having been "hatched for each other", he revealed that he had only tolerated because he had been hoping to deepen it to one of the reproductive quadrants one day. Interestingly enough, his ancestor was said to have had feelings for the Empress; Feferi is the current heiress apparent. It's unclear just how much this influenced Eridan's professed feelings, if at all. The sincerity and/or depth of a vast majority of his romantic pursuits is also dubious considering how often and incessantly they occur.
Besides FLARPing and filling quadrants, his interests consist of military history and conquerors, genocidal plots against all land-dwellers, and a strictly classified fascination with magic -- in the sense that it's fake, he knows it's definitely completely and absolutely fake and only science is the truth!! -- but it's interesting anyway.
He lives by himself on a boat broken nearly in half on an island in the middle of the ocean; you'd think this and his lone-wolf behavior during Sgrub would mean he's used to solitude, but he turns out to be incredibly clingy, constantly demanding attention from whoever will indulge him, and seems to get lonely easily. He also keeps shitty wands in the fridge instead of food, but a confirmed bachelor the aristocracy is supposed to be a bit eccentric.
Part of his ambition and pretensions to power and importance can be ascribed to his interest in history and vice versa -- he tries clumsily to emulate his heroes with grandiose schemes, emotional theatrics, and possibly the romantic ridiculousness, too. He fails pretty spectacularly at all of the above -- to the point where most of his genocidal rage ended up being directed against the angels on his game planet because his plans weren't terribly effective, his moirail was against it and he was in cahoots with the land-dwellers anyway; his moirail left him citing emotional exhaustion with his theatrics, and he bowed out of life without a single quadrant filled.
In fact, he fails so uniformly that it's practically become a comfortable status quo before the events of Sgrub; it's when a series of upheavals continually upset the balance in his life -- the end of their world, Feferi breaking up with him, snatching defeat from the jaws of victory, waiting for almost certain doom on an asteroid, and finally, discovering new power with his heretofore dormant ability to wield white magic science -- that the real danger in his nature comes into play. Even before he turns his back and his wand on his friends to ensure his own survival, his ability to massacre other troll children and hordes of angels who just happened to be there without known hesitation or remorse is a pretty big testament to what he's always been capable of. Doc Scratch described him as "a vengeful boy on a path of nihilism"; it's likely that this downward spiral had already started even at the time point he's taken from, well before the discovery of his magic science gave him the push to act on it.
THIRD-PERSON WRITING SAMPLE: To say he was shellshocked was an understatement. He was algaepe, astonefished, counfloundered, bewhaledered, flippergasted! There was absoleutely no fucking way in hell that what had just happened could have happened to him.
He wasn't even being a little bit dramatic, either; it wasn't every day you provoked a witch in a neighboring universe and found yourself promptly computer-blasted so far off your shitty personal asteroid that you had clearly either begun dreaming the dreams you could no longer have -- or you had landed in a frilly fucking castle on a planet in a paradox space that didn't even have planets anymore. Not whole ones, anyhow.
(At least she'd observed the basic courtesy to fellow folk of royal blood and thrown him somewhere worthy of his station and awe, though really, it was more like thaw, what with the daylight drying the hell out of his husk before he could even take a breath of the putrid inland air.)
But never mind the general implausibility of the whole situation -- he could do implausible. He and implausibility (paradox, so to speak) had been fucking bosom buddies for what felt like sweeps by now. What was important was that the witch had seen fit to not only reach across the dimensions with a petty grubbing display of her powers but had actually completely surpassed his imagination with her retaliation. It really was a bit much for a round of witty repartee, but he was definitely not complaining.
The thing for Eridan to do was clearly to climb to his feet with all the grace of a deflated octopus, reach for his strife specibus, and start waving around Ahab's Crosshairs like it was coming into style. He even threw out an arm to give his cape that little extra bit of impetus it needed to start fluttering in the poor drafts circulating the meager halls of what was obviously a land-dweller's idea of a castle.
The leather-bound book caught under his stylishly posed heel went woefully unnoticed for the moment.
FIRST-PERSON WRITING SAMPLE: [Dearest denizens of Paradisa: the following appetizing image has just been splashed all over a page of your journal.]
[However, if you look closely, you will see words appear in the midst of the tread even as the journal records the next voice message; yep, say hi to the talking shoeprint.]
PINKSCARF MCWWITCH
yeah you knoww im talkin to you dont evven try and make out like you dont knoww your personal title that i wwas so kind to bestoww
see i evven added a mac as a courtesea to a likeblood in exchange a your consideration wwith this frilly fuckin landdwweller castle that im sure you didnt knoww any better
im pretty sure thats one a your human nobility titles or somethin that i happened to stumble upon in your fuckin mess of a timeline
anywway i knoww youre out up there ovver in the next galaxy laughin it up but i promise you
I PROMISE YOU
theres no wway youre gettin off scotfree in this most inksome a hostilities exchanges
specially not seein as youre the one wwho decided youd flaunt your fuckin interdimension fakey fakey fake topblowwin powwers in the first place
you dont just fishstick prince a hope eridan ampora a good one and expect to wwalk awway pure clean an wwhite you think youre the only one wwhos got dimensions for playthings
so consider this a official proper civvilized declaration a black intentions if you wwill
dont sink too easy you hear me
<3<
INTENT: I'm interested in exploring his reaction to the loss of his blood color, which is an integral part of his ego and the identity he's built for himself so far. Of course, it's not the entire loss of that identity -- he's still a seadweller, after all. But I'm wondering how it would affect his personality and actions if he had to actually try and hide something he's been used to flaunting his entire life (and he will try and hide it as best he can). I'd also like to explore how this and other factors in Paradisa would or would not affect the eventual direction his character takes in canon.