(Mobile Navigation) Follow us down to a Wonderland unknown, Where a brand new tyrant sits on the throne. It's been twenty-three years since Alice's last visit, And ten years now since her body's gone missing. This isn't the place you'd recall from her books, As horrors have flooded the Tulgey Woods. Hatter's in hiding and rumors have spread... Who will save Wonderland if Alice is dead?
So I apologize again for my lack of activity on the main. I just left a little OOC message in the group on a little bit of why but Iām not going to burden you guys with my mental poop. Since I have the day off today I will try to get the main back in order at some point. I do unfortunately have a lot of errands to run in between, though.Ā
I will be doing an activity check at the end of the night because the dash has been very halted. So if you havenāt done replies or posted a starter in the past 5 days, youāre on my list!
Congratulations, Ofir, Youāve been accepted for The Messenger! Please look over our Acceptance Guide and submit your character blog within the next 24 hours.
Desired Skeleton: The Messenger
Full Name: Arielle Thorne
Age: 20
Date of Birth: January 17
Gender: Nonbinary
Sexuality: Bisexual
Residence: Swampscott
Occupation: Messenger
Species: Weredove
Affiliation: Rebellion
Faceclaim: Amandla Stenberg
Biography
Before The Shift
Arielle could never make sense of the quickness with which their mother fell deeply in love, but it was not something they had initially questioned. By age seven, Arielle had lost track of the men they had been encouraged to call āfather.ā Still, most men were kind. It was her mother who proved to be too mercurial, her enthusiasm for each relationship phasing out as soon as the honeymoon phase had ended. Arielle couldnāt really figure out why until she was just a little bit older. What she learned was this: her mother craved a sense of adventure and newness, she loved the chase of it all, and she did not know what to do with stability once she had it. It would explain why she liked to move around often, why she got tired of each new trade she tried, why she insisted on seeing the world through rose-colored glasses and resisted everything that threatened to shatter them. In short, her mother liked to free-fall, never thinking about what would happen once she landed.
Arielle adapted by bringing stability to their life whatever way they could. They tried to shut their emotions down in approaching a relationship, not wanting to adapt their motherās foolhardiness. They tried to keep at hobbies longer after they grew bored. They tried to remember facts and situations exactly as they were. They kept journals of their life, writing down each detail exactly as they remembered it the first time, refusing to note a change in their thought without careful tracking of how they got there. They taught themself a steady determination that their mother couldnāt.
The dullness they invited into their life often instilled into Arielle a sense of meaningless. They never bonded with any paternal figure, thinking that her mother would ditch him as soon as she got bored. They stuck out boring odd jobs to bring in cash that their mother wasted. They held themselves steady until they were old enough into a place of their own ā age seventeen, to be specific. What they failed to predict was the sudden change to occur in their life, and they were hardly prepared for the questions should a change would raise.
The First Change
The first change came as an unwelcome surprise. They could not understand, at first, why their organs shifted inside their being, why the world around suddenly seemed to grow, why they could not stop the strange changes seemingly taking over. But in any case, they found themself in the body of a dove, surrounded by their own clothes in a messy pile on the floor.
Worse off, no one told them how to cope, and the Kingās ban on inherited magic made them too fearful to ask. What made it worse was the number of questions they had.
Why did the King ban inherited magic? What if many uses of magic - uses that could land a person in prison - were pure accidents? How many others lived in secret, and how many inhabitants were eager to spy and report for the Crimson King? These werenāt questions she had considered before, since her own mother was a regular Inhabitant and, to the best of their knowledge, none of the men she picked ever displayed magical abilities.
And Arielle thought puberty was bad.
For most of this early period, Arielle tried to restrict their shifts, only mastering their abilities in private. Each shift got easier and easier and, after some time, it became second nature. They knew how to think and speak with the brain and mouth of a bird just as they could with those of a human. Still, their ease with the shifts did not assuage with the loneliness that followed.
For a moment, Arielle understood why their mother was so quick to fall, but unlike her, Arielle thought herself knowledgeable and steady enough to take flight.
To Fly, To Fall
The first time Arielle fell hard for someone was when, during flight, a gush of wind had pushed her right into the bedroom of a girl her age. Woosh, and then splat went Arielle onto the hard tile floor, the shock of the impact sending them into a quick transformation. They barely had enough time to cover their body with a bed-sheet before the girl caught them wide-eyed and red-faced.
Luckily for Arielle, the girl was also a late-blooming shapeshifter. Eloise, her name was. A mousy thing with a high pitched laugh, she somehow managed to light a spark within the typically avoidant Arielle. The first day they met, Eloise had given Arielle a quick change of clothes and let them on their way, on the assumption that they would never see each other again. Then, Arielle found her way back. Again. And again. And again. Again she would find her way back, whether it be through a window purposely left open, or straight through the front door, passing herself off as a door-to-door salesgirl of flowers.
Over time, they developed a relationship. Sometimes Eloise would shift into a mouse, and Arielle a dove, and they would take flight. The secrecy of their acts gave them a rush they got from nothing else. Then, around this time, Arielle took up the job as a messenger, sending letters they never opened themselves. Not a fun, meaningful job, but they were good at it. It helped that they could simply fly to their destinations. Not that their bosses or clients knew about that. Sometimes their journeys left them away from Eloise for weeks at a time. When they back, though, they always returned with a gift. And as for what Eloise could give, her companionship was enough.
For all Arielle saw of this world, they could not predict the day they waited and waited on the rail of Eloiseās balcony, only for her to never show. At first, they took this as a rejection. Then, they took this as a reason to worry. So, they scoured Eloiseās room for any sign of where she could be. They took apart drawers, checked every nook and cranny, and pressed their feet against floorboards for anything Eloise kept hidden.
But, it seemed there was little sign of her. They went through the house, looking for the typical signs of life in each room, and found nothing. They ventured through the entire neighborhood, asking residents if they had seen a tall, mousy girl with a shy smile and a tendency to fidget with shaky fingers. They asked and asked until a shopkeep had quickly and quietly ushered them in and told them of recent, underground raids against magic users.
Then, in a pained voice, the shopkeep told Arielle that Eloise was among the raided, and Arielle promised themself this: that they would be far more careful than Eloise had, that they would not love so strongly, so as to protect themself from pain, that they would remove all doubt of their own anger toward the Crimson regime, and they would make Eloiseās disappearance (and later, Arielle found out, death) mean something.
Welcome The Messenger
In their search for meaning, they unwittingly crossed paths with the Welcomer, who saw potential in them. It happened when Arielle moved to Swampscott and carried out some deliveries there. At first, they did not deliver anything particularly dangerous from the Welcomer. They simply thought they were in for a change of scenery. But, unbeknownst to Arielle, the Welcomer started to send rebellion-related messages through them. Arielle went for a little while delivering these messages without knowing their content, and through this, they unwittingly learned the best ways to operate in secret.
The Welcomer taught them how to find meaning in their messages. Arielle learned to value the knowledge they picked up along their paths, to value the mystery of an unopened letter, to watch for the expression on each recipientās face when they received a pretty little envelope. Arielle found meaning in other things, too. They found a certain contentment in being surrounded by fellow magical beings, all of whom partook in magic secretly. They derived a little something about learning of the curious Wanderers, what with their strange stories and technology. More importantly, they found solace in the Welcomer himself. He offered a stability that Arielle had not known in their youth, and Arielle is getting a little used to having a paternal figure around.
Arielle supposed they surprised the Welcomer a little when they started asking questions about his goings-on. After all, they were not supposed to find out. They were supposed to send letters without question, and be able to quickly fly away if things got nasty. But, a delivery had gone wrong. A recipient was not where he was supposed to be and Arielle, suddenly reminded of Eloiseās disappearance, had decided to read the letter. Questions burned Arielleās mind, Arielle burned the letter, and knowledge burned through the sense of security Arielle once had.
Where security vanished, meaning took its place, and Arielle told the Welcomer they werein.
Iāve written some basic and some interpretive questions below for you guys to answer however you see fit, just to get into what your museās preferences are, why they are the way they are, and maybe get you to learn some things about your muse you didnāt know. Reply in short sentences, like an interview, or as a para, one at a time or all at once. Whatever works best for you. Be sure to tag them all #alice:talk!
What is your happiest memory?
What is your most upsetting memory?
What is your greatest virtue?
What is your greatest flaw?
How do you fall asleep?
How do you wake up?
Do you prefer the moon, sun, or stars?
What is your favorite season?
When you are in trouble, who is the first person you go to?
Do you prefer dawn or dusk?
Do you think youāll have children one day?
Have you ever been in love?
Who is the person you look up to the most?
What do you think is the difference between good and evil?
Speaking of the weather. Our next event/plot thing may be weather related, so keep an eye out... I sometimes give hints in my own threads.
Otherwise, I am going to try to work on things I need to get done before I go to work. Unfortunately now with school being over, Iām working literally every day between the two jobs, which means Iām a little useless the rest of the time... But Iām working on it! My slump in activity does not mean I wonāt be taking care of the main here and giving you guys things to do.
In the meantime while I write up details for the event and plot update, does anyone want me to put a task or two out? To keep things exciting and keep muse up?
Quick somewhat random question: what's the climate like in Wonderland? Is it like, a nice warm sunny summery type climate or is it a bit cooler?
Ha! You think thatās a quick question. Silly soul, where do you think you are? Wonderland as a whole does not have one single climate. It is a large place with any different places within it.
In the Woodland, they have all four seasons but moderately mild. Harmony Grove tends to have more precipitation/more extreme temperature changes due to its proximity to the sea.
In Tulgey, it is similar to the Woodland but always colder, due to the lack of sunlight through the tightly knotted trees.Ā
In Fevered, the place generally runs hot. It is more mild in the winter, but it never snows and only rains every so often. The only reason the plant-life is so abundant there is because of the work of the sprites who live there.
The Palace is similar the Woodland, but somewhat more extreme due to its proximity to the sea and to the Mountains. It makes winters much worse when they come, and they tend to last somewhat longer there. Rainstorms are also generally more harsh in the summer, but the rest of the time the weather tends to be very nice.Ā
is there going to be a summary of what happened during the event?
Oh, more than just that. Once I see a few more things come to a conclusion, I will be writing a small update in the major plotlines going on. Iāll be doing those periodically between plot drops/events.
Children. My Fiona is getting drunk. Iām getting drunk. Weāre all enjoying ourselves... Why not apply for some characters? Iām already dying for my fourth but trying to pace myself here. Anyone got a certain muse in mind? A certain FC? Trying to fill a hole in your life? I got you. Let me help you.
