Name: Keionx Rutace[Keionx= anagram and mutation of Quixote, Rutace=genus of orange]
Blood colour: #cb3e20, Orange
Gender: Female
Symbol: Double Triangle
Personality:
Keionx considers herself a hero. She will go where the meek dare not tread, and fight what others would flee from. She will rescue fellow trolls and even animals in need and set out on heroic quests. She holds honor to be one of the highest virtues a troll can have, and has a very personal code of conduct that guides her through her life:
Be polite to all
Help those in need
Treat others with respect
Do the right thing
This code is the core of her being. It is what drives her and it is what she clings to when things go wrong. It is all she feels she really has, and it is what stands between her and maddening despair.
Keionx is a strange troll. Though she has been trained since wigglerhood to violence and usually uses some form of it to solve her problems, she is also extremely altruistic. Mad by troll standards, she does good deeds, expecting nothing in return, not even appreciation.
Though she is no longer the innocent delusional fantasy 'hero' she thought she was in her wigglerhood – her straightforward world was shattered completely by the truth that nearly every person she had ever trusted (including her own lusus) had lied to her and had been on the opposite side of the conflict all along – she is also no longer confused.
Ever since the battle in the caverns of the Pheonix Initiative, she has determined that that it's all right that the world is not be the beautiful, fun filled, adventure place where good and evil were easily determined and fought for. It's all right – Keionx now understands that this revelation does not truly change who she is.
Keionx is very resistant to having the opinions of others forced upon her. Despite having role models and close family and many friends amidst the Rebels, Keionx knows that her ideologies do not entirely match up with the Initiatives', nor does she agree with what they do. She also knows she doesn't have to. She makes her own decisions about what she believes in and what she chooses to do about it, and as long as she believes that what she is doing is the Right Thing (capitals intended), she doesn't care what it opposes.
As such, though she finds herself now on the side of the Initiative, Keionx is not fighting for it. What she is fighting for is the hope that it's members have for their nearly impossible cause. Hope, to her, is a beautiful and inspiring emotion, and their hope is worth devoting her will towards fighting for – or even dying for.
Not that she plans on dying anytime soon. Keionx is a hero, not a martyr... not by choice, anyway. Keionx will lay down her life, and would martyr herself if that was the only option and the right thing to do, but she is not suicidal – even at a young age, she was taught the value of retreating, and the wisdom of running when out of her league. However, if given a choice, she will stand and fight. Others may run, and she will protect them, but she will not be the first to flee, and she will not stand down when others need her... at least not without trying valiantly to aid them.
Keionx holds herself to a high standard of honor and valor. She will stand against even that which she knows she should run from, if it buys others time. She refuses to be cowardly and can be hard on herself in low moments. However, her standards apply only to herself. She does not judge others based on her morals. She knows what is right and wrong, and she is confident that others likely know the same. She has learned, through a turmultuous teenagehood, that right and wrong are very personal concepts, and that different people have different interpretations of it. If her right and their right conflict, so be it – she will oppose them, but at the same time she will respect that their beliefs are not hers.
She also does not judge by blood color, but not for reasons of equality. Although Keionx is fully cognizant of it as a thing that exists, and even approves of it as promoting order in their society, she barely registers it when talking to people. In addition, despite being aware of her distinctly orange shade of blood, she apparently does not completely comprehend that the hardships she sees around her are a direct result of the hemospectrum, nor does she seem to understand her own place in it. Although blood color can affect her interactions with other trolls, it is simply is not a quality at the forefront of her mind. Often, she is briefly surprised or taken aback when someone reminds her that she is a 'lowblood'. Fortunately, she is generally polite enough to everyone, regardless of blood rank, that her lack of appreciation for the hemospectrum goes unnoticed.
Although generally a tolerant troll, there are certain types of people whos's opinion of right and wrong she cannot accept; Keionx does not like thieves and swindlers - people who choose to live parasitically off of other people, either by their nimble fingers or their silver tongues. She also does not like those who are extremely selfish or unnecessarily vicious.
To all others, she is willing to open her mind and listen to what they have to say. However, quite stubbornly, Keionx's mind is a hard thing to change. Once its been made up, it's been made, and there is little that anyone can do about it. Keionx, in turn, does not actively try to turn others to her path – if others choose the same path as her, she will not hinder them, but she wants people to do as their own will directs them, and not otherwise.
[color=#cb3e20][/color]
Strengths:
- Brave
- Keionx knows what fear is, and she feels it as strong as any troll would. However, she chooses to face it head on. She is willing to walk ahead, right into the most dangerous and terrible places of Alternia, head held high and her sword at the ready. It is rare for Keionx to run from anything... or, at least, for her to be the first to leave.
- Stalwart
- Keionx is stubborn, but not to a fault. She stands up for her beliefs and for her friends, even when the tides of change or fate are against them and overwhelming. Her opinions about herself and the world are hard-won and consequently very solid, and it takes a lot to change her mind or break a trust.
- Cordial
- Keionx holds herself to too high a standard to be crass or rude. In fact, Keionx is very polite, even when others are rude in turn. She is not afraid to speak her mind, but she will do so carefully, politely, and logically. When stressed, she relies on this trait to support her, occasionally slipping into a very old-timey and overly proper accent.
Flaws:
- Kind of Dense
- Keionx is not the smart twin, and she knows it. Though she has mostly grown out of her “oblivious insanity” phase, where she was convinced she was a storybook hero, she still doesn't get things. She is creative enough to find solutions, and she isn't cripplingly stupid either. Some things just seem to go right over her pointy little horns.
- Altruistic
- Keionx was trained to be a hero since her trials, and she honestly can't help it. Like an addict needs a fix, she needs to help others – no troll in need will remain unaided on her watch. When she can't help someone, she feels awful, and she would never willingly leave a fellow troll behind, friend or foe. This need to do good, without necessarily getting any good in return, is her driving force. It is her motive for existing, the thing that keeps her going when all seems lost, and her only real hope for the darkened world she lives in. Obviously, it is easily exploitable, but Keionx does not care. In fact, she almost welcomes it...
- Egotistical
- Keionx has a big personality. She was trained to be THE hero, and has retained a sense that she is the protagonist of her story. Although she's not unpleasant about it, definitely not self-centered, and certainly won't wave her sense of a higher purpose in anybody's face, she still will not quite listen to others when they speak. She also considers herself to be, typically, in the right... which isn't always the “right” of rebels or royalists. It is, in the end, her right that matters.
History:
Keionx lived most of her life on Busthind Mountain, alone and completely unaware of her wiggling beginnings (aside from her trials). She made a few friends and a few foes, got into FLARPing at a young age, and gradually explored her mountain home with Beastdad.
She never even knew she had a twin.
On one of her frequent walks with Beastdad, the first that took her as far as the shoreline, she heard a scream and, being the sort of troll she was, she had to investigate and see if there was someone she could rescue.
She galloped over, her lance, (which was her weapon of choice before she switched to the sword) in her hand to find that she was too late. Only a puddle of disturbingly orange blood was left. Or so she thought. Disappointed at having nothing to fight heroically, she was about to move on when Beastdad snuffled at something in the bushes. An orphaned troll, and therefore an oppurtunity to play at being heroic.
Being slow on the uptake and not particularly observant, it took her a while to realize that the orphaned troll was her twin, especially considering the rarity of twins.
With Beastdad's encouragement, she offered to take her twin, Zariah, home with her.
Why not? It felt good, it felt heroic, and Beastdad wanted to bring him home anyway.
Such behavior was typical of young Keionx. Even during times of war, when she fought against the Rebels to take over Old Hemisect city, she was still the hero. The world was still divided into right and wrong, good and evil, heroes and villains.
Until Aendal.
During the battle in the cavern, reality came crashing down as her friends and role models, Odette Cygnet and then Mileiu Aojiro, put their lives on the line to protect Keionx in the absence of her lusus. The fight shook her up, and despite having helped to slay the villain and save the night, Keionx felt that something was wrong.
It fulminated when she learned the real reason why her Lusus was not with her – he had accompanied her brother with the Rebels, and both had been captured. She learned this after those very same role models, and the rest of their illuminated group, brought him back, showing themselves to be Rebels as well.
Keionx was heartbroken and stunned, and things were never the same after that. She went home with her lusus but hardly spoke to him, instead trying to focus on remodeling her hive. She knew she needed to talk to someone, and a certain name popped into her mind: Ephias Sagine, her friend from the war.
Only... when she went to visit him, her plans to talk to him and figure things out (or at least feel better) were thwarted when her arch nemesis, Etsali Azeban, showed up and revealed herself to be Ephias' friend.
This was too much for Keionx. Deprived of moirailship, she left on an adventure, refusing to talk to her Lusus or her friends for a very long time. What was there, she wondered, to say? She didn't know. She didn't know anything. Dully, she explored. Dully, she did heroics. Dully, she existed.
Bloodfest rolled around, and she joined in the festivities, performing as an athlete as best she could. She won some, she lost some, but she gained something more valuable: a return. She was able to reconcile with her friends and her lusus, and figure out a few things for herself.
Still, though her life was starting to settle, her teenagerhood was still confusing and difficult. Uncertain, she made the decision to visit the rebel hideout with her brother and see if she could figure out why the Scouts and her twin had chosen that cause. She went, in the hopes that she would discover her own path. And, in a sense, she did... but not before everything went to hell first.
Chaos reigned as the rebels fled from Kursha, the traitor. Keionx did not understand the history behind her neighbor's aggression, but she knew that her friends were being hurt, and she had to fight, even if she didn't know what she stood for.
Except, as things began to spiral into hopelessness, the leader of the rebels stood above the rest and urged them forward. Byakko's speech – and Stryke's assistance – rekindled the dwindling fire of Keionx's conviction, and restored her sense of self.
With renewed purpose, she fought with the rebels, and helped to protect the Mother Grub as she was carted through a mysterious and murky swamp. For several nights, she continued on, though she was badly injured. Finally, she fought against the daywalkers of the swamp and nearly fell in battle. It was through sheer willpower, and the help of Miache, that she made it to the abandoned village in the swamp and the salvation of Rebel companions.
Like the beast the initiative was named for, Keionx feels reborn, restored from the ashes of her innocence and resplendent in potential. She refuses to let herself be so shaken ever again.
Weapon:
Keionx's weapon is a one-handed sword, supplemented by the use of a shield in the other arm. She trained with this initially because it was a very heroic and knightly combination, and later found she could appreciate the balance between offense and defense it afforded.
Her first shield was lost underground against the undead plant-weilding troll Aendal, but she has since carved herself a new wooden shield, and has further reinforced it with metal.
Her sword was forged in her new smithy, adjoining the salle. It is a keen-edged steel blade that she hopes to upgrade to carbon steel, with her symbol inscribed at the base of the blade.
Hive:
When Keionx was a wiggler, her hive was a mess of training traps and weighted doors, as well as a cluttered trophy room – also her respiteblock – and a disorganized weight and training room. Her brother's area of the hive was small but sane, with few traps, weights, and mess, something that Keionx took to heart when she returned from the Chittentown drought.
Most of her collection of trophies have been sold or thrown away, and the entire hive has been cleaned and renovated. Gone are the heavy, weighted doors, falling floors, and the treadmill entry. Gone is the endless clutter and insane proportions.
Though still built out of the stone of Busthind and a part of the natural cave system in the mountains, it is now respectably furnished, with decent – if inexpensive – carpets in a warm umber color and evenly placed trophies and sconces on the walls.
Keionx still shares her respiteblock with her trophy room, and this is where she keeps things that are very personal to her, objects that remind her of her friends and, now, of who she is or, rather, is trying to be. She has sold off some of the trophies and so it is cramped, but not cluttered, and now completely ajoins a separate bath, sink, and shower area, without a stretch of hallway to separate them. She keeps some secret things in her room, including a chest containing private trophies, trinkets, small writings of her anguished thoughts, and small drawings to replace items or trinkets that were lost, but still hold a place in her memory.
The library is painstakingly organized and refurbished and, though modest, houses a variety of books from well read old fables and stories, to newer tales of adventure, to FLARP books, to some of Zariah's own writings. Of course, it is only a matter of time before the library becomes a chaotic mess, but for the time being order has held.
What dominates the hive, however, is its now well-appointed Salle, complete with fighting equipment, dummies, hologram training devices, and medical kits. Though cushioned with artificial leather, it is clear that Keionx takes her training even more seriously than before, and is willing to risk injury to do so.
There is a lot of new wood supporting her hive and a lot of thought put into the organization and clearing of it all. Keionx tried to make her hive suitable for her new friends, and as a base of operations to return to when she tires of her adventures. Still, she doesn't entirely feel at home here... Time will tell what she does about it.
Lusus: Beastdad
Beastdad – a rare, orange blooded variety of musclebeast, has a big job. With an unheard of two trolls to take care of, he has attempted to nobly rise to the occasion and give double parenting a damn good try. That he has not done the best job thus far is not a problem – he tries, and he learns, and he does the best he can. He at least has enough love – and bear hugs – for both of his charges, and he distributes them both freely.
Beastdad is adventurous, with the typical nobility and pride of his species. He holds these traits; Pride, nobility, and also the physical strength that musclebeasts are known for, very highly, as well as honor. If he was not parenting a troll, he would be out having grand adventures himself.
It was he has encouraged Keionx in her many heroic exploits and freely provided her with musclebeast milk. He cooked hearty meals (from things they scrounge on Busthind) to promote muscle growth and strength. Despite being a loving lusus, he was also very hard on Keionx. He gave her plentiful 'power food' and a great deal of personal attention, but he also kept her to a strict exercise regimen and constant rugged adventuring, which was both gruelling and exhausting. He pushed her hard with very little breaks- the world is harsh, and, on Alternia, a hero had to be able to weather the worst of it.
Formerly, he and Keionx were particularly close. But once she started adventuring on her own, his focus turned to Zariah. Beastdad is aware that Zariah is not as strong as his Keionx and he clearly isn't warrior hero material, so the lusus felt he needed extra encouragement. Thus, beastdad got involved in his Rebellious activities, and was willing to get captured for the cause.
When Keionx found out, this caused a rift between her, her lusus, and her brother, a rift that – though it has been amended somewhat, has not yet; and may not ever; fully heal. Keionx is still somewhat distant from her lusus emotionally, and Beastdad does not understand this, nor does he understand why. It is a source of great confusion for him, and when she is available, he treats her as if nothing has happened.
Note:
Beastdad raised his twins primarily on stories not of some mythical troll ancestor or hero, but of his (and Zariah's lusus') own ancestor, the musclebeast known as Chiron. This musclebeast trotted across Alternia, doing many great deeds and accomplishing many labors, protecting the world against countless threats and challenges. The legends and folktales about this musclebeast are many and varied and sometimes contradictory, but Beastdad has always stressed the importance of Chiron's heroic ways to his children and has himself tried to live by that example.
Power: None
