kid prator!
Personality:
An honest, diligent, and happy kid, Prator is the poster wiggler of a lowblood troll, a proud worker who dreams of growing up to having an utterly boring and unimportant job serving the Great Troll Society. He likes the quiet satisfaction of a job well done, and goes out of his way to be helpful for other trolls of all blood colours, although his lusus tends to scold him if he 'wastes' his time on other lowbloods. Friendly and a little naive, he tends to let others walk over him like a doormat, not really understanding how to deal with or express the negative emotions that stir in him when he's treated badly.
Thanks to his lusus, Ma, Prator is a bit of a hermit. Technically, he never leaves his hive during an average night, spending all his time in the tunnels dug by them both, with Ma, digging for food. The only times she sees it necessary for him to leave is when they have run out of shoring materials to keep the tunnels up, and then they usually take a tightly guided path to one of the garbage pits outside of Chittentown, where they scavenge for more materials before heading home.
As digging is dangerous work, especially for a little troll, Prator regularly gets into hazardous situations or suffers minor to medium injuries. However, he's become experienced enough to be able to take care of himself, and thanks to a rather unexpected gift dragged home by Ma, has a medical book of dubious origin, full of tips and instructions on how to treat and set various injuries. As Ma gets impatient if the tunnel system is not worked on for long enough, Prator has learned how to patch himself up and get back into shape in the shortest amount of time necessary. Ma encourages this, as she believes a lowblood who needs to rely on others is a dead lowblood.
Strengths:
Attentive
Prator has been taught by Ma to always make sure his Queen wants for nothing. Since Praetor doesn't think it's ever likely that he'll be serving his monarch directly, he transfers this to his friends around him. Always working hard to read their emotions, he is quick to jump on any subtle moods displayed and if they are negative, try his best to help soothe them. He just wants everyone to get along! Ma tends to twitter at him about this, his fellow lowbloods aren't really important in her eyes, he should only be tending to highbloods, but out in Chittentown these are usually in short supply. He's also got good general awareness of the world around him, as tunnelling requires you to be aware of where everything is around you, and navigating underground requires a keen memory and sharp eye.
Industrious
An active kid, Prator is always scrambling around with something, helping Ma in her never ending expansion of their home. He digs, he shores, he carries dirt, and he makes sure his tasks are done properly, because after being in one tunnel collapse makes you never want to be in one again. Ma has done a good job in raising him to work hard, do things properly, and see the inherent value in creating something with his own two hands. While he lacks the drive to come up with projects of his own, he will pick up the initiative on things he knows need to be done, and enjoys basking in the glow of someone looking at his work and giving him one of those pump-biscuit stopping compliments, like 'Eh, looks ok'.
Content
Raised to be a good little Royalist, Prator knows what he's going to do when he grows up. He'll be a construction drone! He'll build houses for other troll children on Alternia, and help society. Prator doesn't want to go fight evil aliens on starships, or build some amazing technological advancement, or go down in troll history for some famous (or infamous) deed. While this might be called unimaginative and lacking ambition in a highblood, for Prator it makes him perfectly equipped to handle his role in life. He likes what he does, is excited to help future trolls create comfortable places where they can live and grow, and is enthusiastic and exited about where he will end up in life. Everything will be ok!
Flaws:
Passive
If you kick sand in his face, Prator will probably just look at you uncomfortably then do his best to avoid or placate you in the future. Ma's never really taught him how to stand up for himself, or deal with conflict. Cooperate with others, work together for the betterment of society, and you will be accepted and useful. If he's getting grief from others, he tends to assume it was due to him not fulfilling his proper obligations, and will bend over for them, no matter what the reality of the situation is. This usually extends to other lowbloods, but here Ma will come into play, driving the other troll off before they cause trouble. Left alone however, he's easy pickings for a yellowblood or orangeblood who feels like stomping down on the only things below them.
Dependant
While Prator is an industrious and hard working troll under the direction of others or his lusus, on his own he's lost. Directionless and hesitant, he will most likely look around trying to find someone to tell him what to do. If no one steps up, he will most likely sit around listlessly, poking things with a stick. Ma has been so good with filling him with direction and purpose, but hasn't ever given him time on his own to develop interests or dreams of his own. While she does leave the hive occasionally, giving him time to think, he usually fills it with work that he knows she would approve of, and encourage were she there. Thankfully with her around, he'll never have time to dwell on this.
Naive
Prator struggles to understand the true self-serving and conniving nature that a lot of trolls harbour. Ego is a foreign concept to him as well, and doesn't match with the Alternian propaganda Ma regularly drags home and lines the walls with. Genuinely subscribing to the 'Trolls of all Colours Working Together to Crush Our Enemies' message that is generally broadcasted, he believes that everyone is, deep down, like him, wanting to work together for the greater good! He trusts other trolls with his safety, and remarks, and emotions, because he thinks they will take the same care of them that he would of theirs in return. He will even approach highbloods innocently, expecting them to if not see him as an equal, than at least as the useful, loyal and hard-working lowblood that he tries to be, and value him for it.
Home:
Praetor's hive is an unassuming enough semi-hovel, in a bad part of Chittentown, near one of the city's dumps. The inside is practically empty apart from all the piles of seeming junk and dirt everywhere. There's a small area cleared for living in the most spartan definition of it, and a few sketches of an extensive tunnel system tacked up on the wall, mostly for visitors rather than Prator or Ma. A rickety stairway to the basement shows where the real activity goes on. What starts out as a simple tunnel leading out of the wall gradually grows into a network of passages twisting and tunelling their way through the soil below Chittentown. A few passages are closed off, most due to accidentally burrowing into another troll's house or the sewer system and a hasty retreat being called. Some passages lead to Ma's stores of food, filled with tubers and other underground plants that are the great goal behind all the constant digging.
Lusus:
Ma is a huge mole rat, from nosetip to stubby tail slightly over the height of an adult troll. She is an industrious worker, almost furiously so, and gathers Prator and herself food by digging vast twisting tunnel networks in the desert. Leading out from the basement of their hive, she and Prator are usually found a good two hour walk away through their underground network, furiously digging and shoring and moving soil in their never-ending quest for food. She is a bit bossy to him, as she considers him her subordinate, and gives him the heavier jobs, but is always there working away herself, setting a good example through action. Ma tends to see other trolls, apart from highbloods, as unimportant unless they become his friend, and then fits them into her own idea of 'her colony'. She will treat them almost as an adopted second child (minus the emotional attachment), and demand the same kind of heavy labour from then that she does from Prator, which does not always go over well with their own lusii. Despite her gruff and bossy twittering, Ma is very attached to Prator and is, in her practical-minded way, giving him the best education she can for the position he will most likely end up in when he grows older. While other lusii push idealistic visions onto their charges and leave them woefully unprepared for the real world, Ma is determined that with her tutelage Prator will fit in, know his place, and feel comfortable there.