application § paradisa
NAME: Taryn.
JOURNAL: buries
EMAIL: wheresthepillow@gmail.com
AIM: wheresthepillow
WIKI NAME: I don’t have one made.
CHARACTERS: N/A. First character I’m applying for.
CHARACTER NAME: Piper Halliwell
FANDOM: Charmed
CANON: 3x22 All Hell Breaks Loose. After the final moments of the episode; time has been rewound and Piper and Prue have been flung into the wall. Piper has been taken moments after that.
WHAT THEY LOST:
Piper will lose her memories of her relationship with Leo. She won’t remember ever being romantic with him, let alone marrying him. I chose this for her to lose as I think that her and Leo’s relationship is a big factor in her life. He’s been a constant presence since her first discovering she is a witch and has been her Big Love ever since. They went through many obstacles - breaking the rules (wherein a Whitelighter and a witch cannot be together in that sense), other loves (such as Dan), and, past her canon point, a separation due to the strain imposed by Leo’s upgrade to an Elder - and came out of it alright. Leo provides Piper the normal life she has been craving ever since she came into her powers.
I’ve included a summary to give a gist of their character journey to Piper’s canon point (only to emphasise how much she has grown and encountered with Leo): Her relationship with Leo Wyatt developed after their first meeting in her first year as a witch. He was posing as a handyman and Piper was quite smitten with him, as he with her. He was unable to stay due to the rule of Whitelighters and witches not being allowed to date. However, Leo stayed on as their Whitelighter, guiding the sisters as best he could while Piper fought her feelings for him. Eventually, in her second year of being a witch, she started to date Dan Gordon, a human living next door. Her relationship with Leo became strained as they were not allowed to be together due to the rules. Once Piper came down with Royal Fever, Leo broke the rules and healed her, saving her life and thus the Power of Three. However, her relationship with Dan suffered as a consequence. Leo’s wings were clipped and he became human. After finally admitting that she loved Leo, Piper and Leo started seeing each other again. Their journey to marriage would prove to be a tough one as the Elders (Leo’s bosses) were against their impending nuptials. After a failed attempt at marriage, Leo was taken away from Piper and the girls. Piper soon won him back after demonstrating selflessness, and the two were allowed to wed with the Elders’ blessing.
After Piper’s canon point, she became pregnant with Wyatt, a twice-blessed child who was prophesised to be incredibly powerful, and Chris, who would come to the past to save the future, preventing Wyatt from turning evil and Piper’s death. In the finale, it is suggested that Piper had her daughter, the one she saw in a future early on in her witch years. Piper and Leo, despite the strain on their marriage, overcame their separation and are happily married.
ABOUT THE CHARACTER:
Piper is a witch, more specifically, a Charmed One. In a nutshell, the Charmed Ones are the most powerful witches to ever exist. However, being a witch does not define Piper. After coming into her powers at the age of twenty-six, Piper found herself growing as a person. She, herself, defined who she was as a witch; being a witch did not define who she was.
Piper is the middle sister. Her older sister, Prue, took care of Piper and Phoebe while they were growing up after the death of their mother. Her younger sister, Phoebe, was the wild, irresponsible sister who regularly clashed with Prue. Piper found herself to be the mediator between Prue and Phoebe, and didn’t have much sense of who she was as she played Switzerland between the two. During her high school years, Piper wasn’t the most popular student in the year. She considered herself nerdy and geeky, and disliked high school very much. She was reluctant to attend her reunion as there had been no development in her life besides becoming a super powerful witch. She cared too much about what others thought of her.
After the death of Grams, the sisters split up. Piper was closer to Prue as Phoebe moved to New York and Piper and Prue into an apartment in North Beach. Being the middle sister seemed to play a large role in who Piper was as a person. When first introduced to Piper, she was meek and shy. She let people walk all over her, despite her own protestations to her sisters. She never had the courage to stand up for herself as she liked to please people. And if there was a problem, Prue was the one who would offer to stand up for Piper. Piper has an incredibly hard time saying “no”. An example is while working at Quake, her boss would ask her to do a list of things, even if she had worked a double-shift earlier that day. He only did this as he knew she wouldn’t say no. It took a lot of courage for Piper to stand up for herself and quit her job, finally admitting that working as a manager at the restaurant was not the same as fulfilling her dream of being a chef.
As Piper came into her powers, she started to grow confident - albeit slowly. It can be seen that after Piper gained her Charmed status, she started to realise what she wanted in life - and that was not to be a witch. Piper craved a normal life. Despite how she may be seen to accept the craft, Piper still longs for that normal life where magic is not involved. Even though the spell to relinquish their powers had been burned in their first year as witches, Piper still remembers the spell perfectly. In Piper’s dream world, she’d live a life without magic.
As she grew more confident, Piper slowly developed into a sarcastic and quick-witted woman. Prue's death played a significant part in the change in Piper's personality. She was angry, taking over the role Prue left behind as the leader of the trio as she hunted down demons instead of grieving for her loss. She took on a lot more responsibility and can be seen owning character traits similar to Prue's demon vanquishing oriented mind. Piper does calm down in this sense after she deals with Prue’s death. She still craves that normal life with Leo and dislikes the interference of magic, especially since it took away her big sister. Piper still grieves and misses Prue, even after coming to terms with her death.
She is uncomfortable around children, as expressed early in the series. However, a fear of hers is to have a child and leave them motherless, just like her mother did to her. Piper worries that the constant demonic attacks will end up harming her child. She does want children with Leo; however, the timing isn’t quite right during her third and early fourth years of being a witch.
Family is important to Piper. She cares deeply for them, as she was willing to stay with Grams during her early twenties and take care of her before her death. She was absolutely devastated when they lost Grams. Despite the bad blood existing between Prue and their father, Victor, Piper was always warm and affectionate whenever he came to visit. She soon repaired her strained relationship with her father and he developed a more active role in her life. After Prue's death, Piper is ready to give up her Charmed status due to her grief and anger over losing Prue.
Piper didn’t leave for college as she was insecure with leaving home. It’s a small regret of hers that arises when Phoebe returns to college. Piper is proud of her sister for returning to school to pursue her dreams. However, Piper’s own dreams are put on hold due to her Charmed life.
Her Charmed life has effected her friendships. Her friendships are strained and distant at best. This is another aspect of what Piper craves in a normal life. She wants to exist outside of her Charmed status and quit putting her life - family, children, relationships, work and friendships - on hold to vanquish demons. Piper struggles to maintain her friendships and make time for others. She’s determined to retain her friendships despite the interference of magic.
Piper’s dream is to be a chef. She is exceptionally good in the kitchen, thus making her an excellent potions master. This dream was put on hold after coming into her powers. However, she did attempt to gain it by taking a job at Quake. She had originally auditioned for a position as a chef but ended up with a manager’s job. Piper wasn’t happy about this, however, as it was an income, she kept with it. After being incredibly unhappy with it, as her boss pushed her around and she didn’t stand up for herself, she quit her job at Quake after realising that being the manager of the restaurant wasn’t fulfilling her dream of being a chef. Piper soon opened her own club, P3, which would fill the void of her dream for several years. She may not be a chef professionally, but she cooks at home for friends and her family. When she’s nervous, she cooks as she likes to do something with her hands.
*
The basic powers that come with being a witch include spell casting, potion making and scrying. The abilities that come with her Charmed status include the Power of Three (which can only be tapped into with her sisters), high resistance and agility.
Piper’s individual abilities include Molecular Immobilisation and Molecular Combustion.
Molecular Immobilisation is the ability to slow down molecules to the point where time is frozen. Piper gained this power in the pilot episode. This power was first triggered by fear. Over time, as Piper gained control over her power, she was able to use it at will. It has advanced to the point where she can use only one hand to freeze someone or something, and she can selectively freeze (such as, freeze someone's entire body but unfreeze their head). She cannot freeze good witches.
Molecular Combustion is the ability to speed up molecules to the point where an explosion occurs (usually, for example, a demon explodes or an object explodes). She gained this power in 3x20). This power is triggered by anger. Piper has little control over this power, as in canon, she has attempted to freeze a demon and instead blew him up. This power doesn't work on powerful demons as it is weak and new to her.
THIRD-PERSON WRITING SAMPLE:
Piper flipped the pages of the Book of Shadows slowly, glancing at each page before turning it. The Manor was asleep in darkness. She had slipped out of bed to walk through the chilled hallways before entering the dark attic.
She hadn’t come up here for a particular reason. Lately, she found herself unable to get a decent night’s sleep. Prue had drummed into their heads the need for constant vigilance. With the Triad gone, there was a bigger source of evil after them. There always was.
She didn’t know why she came up here whenever she couldn’t sleep. The kitchen was too vulnerable for attack, and the peace it once offered was tainted with the brewing of potion after potion. Piper’s unsure of the last time she cooked a decent meal that wasn’t interrupted by a demonic intrusion. The need to do something with her hands when nervous had shifted from cooking slime to flipping the pages of the book late at night. Knowing that her mother and grandmother had once touched these pages, using them to ward off evil, gave her solace; maybe they’d be okay when this was all over. They weren’t on their own, for even after death, they had left them with the tools to continue fighting this battle.
It wasn’t that she was looking for something in particular. The page she sought was long gone, burnt into ash in this very room. What she wanted was in her head, stored for a future purpose if there be one. Flipping through the pages, she held the page between her fingers as she looked to the middle of the ancient book. In the crease, there was the tiny strip of a page left in the binding. The page containing the relinquishing spell had been ripped out close to the centre; though, it still left its memory within the book.
Piper slipped her finger over the paper lightly. The relinquishing spell may be long gone, burnt into the air, but it remained a solid page with its calligraphy and beautiful colours in her mind. It was a secret that remained between her and the Book. The spell might not be there for future generations to look upon, but it could be transformed into a nursery rhyme similar to that of the Woogeyman. It could live on in oral storytelling if she chose that path.
With a lingering hand on the Book, Piper closed it. Now wasn’t the time to pave her own destiny. But she knew, even if by her hand, there would come a time where she would recite the relinquishing spell, bringing her life back into her full control. That was the one thing that she wouldn’t allow to slip between her fingers.
FIRST-PERSON WRITING SAMPLE:
The grandfather clock is broken once again.
Great. That’s just real great. Guess whose money that’ll be coming out from. It’s not as though it’s Prue’s turn or anything - but since I’m the only one employed, my pocket is the one that gets abused. And it’s not even like I flung the demon into it. Thanks Prue.
We might as well just not get it fixed. It gets broken every single freaking time a demon decides to just walk right in our house like he owns the place. You’d think, after living for a few hundred years, they’d have managed to learn some manners. They can blend in with humans but they can’t knock on a freaking door?
The clock is just like everything else in this house. Expendable. Our lives? Expendable. Put them on hold while we go out and battle some demons. It’s not as though we have jobs or social lives or dreams. I can’t even remember the last time I had dinner with a friend who wasn’t magical or a sister.
Are our lives like the clock? You can continue to break them and it’ll be easy to fix, just that you lose a few hundred dollars while you’re at it? It’s not even worth it. Might as well leave it broken. Everything in this house is.
INTENT:
I have loved Piper ever since I started watching the series back in 2000. She has remained as one of my favourite female characters over the years, despite my love/hate relationship for the show. She’s my favourite character because I was able to relate to her and her character journey - from meek, shy girl who wouldn’t stand up for herself to this confident, doesn’t-take-shit-from-anyone, sarcastic woman. Her character journey is one of my favourite character developments ever, and she’s the reason why I always return to watching Charmed, even after its finale.
For Paradisa, I’d like to build character relationships for Piper. As it’s something she’s struggled with and yearned for in canon (though, it’s been highlighted more in season four, past the canon point where I’m taking her from) I’d like to build that relationship base for her. I don’t have anything specific thought out for her, other than I just want to be able to play her more and address things that were dropped in canon (like her friendships). I’ve chosen Piper from this particular canon point because I want to explore how she develops into the Leader Witch organically, rather than immediately like the show portrayed. I want to explore how she can come to terms with her magic or come to terms with her craving for a normal life. I just want to explore different options for her and I think Paradisa will allow me to achieve that.
I included a summary of her relationship with Leo as I wanted to emphasise how important he is to her and how far she went just to be with him. As much as I love Leo/Piper as a ‘ship, I’d like to explore Piper without Leo’s influence.
And Piper has the best freaking hair ever. And awesome powers to boot. ;)