application

[thereisnopie]

Player Information

Name: Lauren
Personal Journal: laverinth
Age: 29
Contact Info: email: unheard.rain (at) gmail [dot] com
Other Characters Played: n/a

Character Information

Character Name: Gamzee Makara
Character Series: Homestuck
Character Age: 13
Character Gender: male

Alternate Universe
Canon Point: around act 6 intermission 1, with some changes. details to follow.
Background Link: canon info
AU Background:
In this AU, everything happened (mostly) like it did in the original canon. Except that none of it was real.

The Skaia project was developed as a means of seeing if it was possible for a human being to live an entire lifetime in a virtual reality. The idea was to give people who would be spending years traveling the reaches of space in order to reach new colonies something to live through during that time, should cryostatis prove not to be a viable option. They are hooked up into full body machines where they're allowed to move and function so that their muscles aren't atrophied when they're finally released. Sensors are connected to the nerves to allow them to feel the world as if they were really in it.

There was more than one group of children used for these experiments. The first, composed of a small group of four, were given a relatively normal lifestyle to live through as they grew up and the project was considered successful enough to warrant a larger group for the second run, as well as permission to do a more unusual scenario. The combined imaginations of the doctors, as well as a switching out of certain key team members every few years or so, meant that elements of the new environment went a little over the top. Programmed versions of the original four children were brought in, and eventually the "trolls" would get to watch most of their life story, with changes made in the programming whenever one of the trolls had an influence on a certain character's life.

Gamzee was a member of this group of twelve. He was a bright mind from the start - perhaps a bit too bright, as he began to reject some of the programming, even regaining consciousness in the real world a couple times. To counter this, the sopor influence was initiated - tying in his real life continuous sedation with poor lifestyle choices in the virtual one. This kept him docile for a few years until one of the doctors became uncomfortable with the sort of world the children were being put through. He altered the programming slightly and removed the sedative tubing from Gamzee. The difficult time he had taking in the mix of real world and virtual world sensations was what contributed most to him going off the deep end. Killing Equius and Nepeta was his attempt to try and wake them up, and he meant to do the same to the rest of the trolls before the doctor got it across to him that this wasn't going to work. The "dead" remained in the program inside "dream bubbles", as they weren't actually dead in the real world.

He allowed himself to be calmed by Karkat, all the while trying to figure out how to get the others (and himself) free. The doctor who'd taken pity on them, Dr. Caliborn, didn't have the means to release them all himself, but he did try to make things easier for them. Unfortunately, he was found out and fired from his position. His name would become associated with one of the main villains of the story, eventually. As re-sedating Gamzee at this point would be too suspicious of an action, the story they were engaged in instead reached a lull that was to last for a time as those in charge worked on a way to get things back to normal.

As his final act before walking out of the labs for good, however, Dr. Caliborn did manage to free just Gamzee. He was written back into the program in some instances with excuses given for his absence, but in reality the actual 13 year old human who'd fulfilled that role before was on the run. Unfortunately, he wasn't running long before being recaptured. Unable to properly hook him back in and also unable to let the secrets of their project get out, he was being kept in a special mental ward at the time he was taken from his world, once again under sedation.

He might have been born with a different name originally, but having never gone by it as far as he remembers, he continues to go by the one given him in the program. The program played out for all those involved in real time. They were entered into it too young to remember anything else, and are all about as old as he is now. So that's about a decade of time hooked up to the machine.

Personality:
Understandably, given what he's gone through, Gamzee is a bundle of issues. The experience has left him rather detached from the real world. He was angry at first, but not as much anymore. Now he just doesn't give a damn about a lot of things. He has no family and, currently, no way to get the kids he knows out of their world and into the real one. He deals with it all through a rather dark sense of humor. There are a few individuals he cares about overall. Aside from that, the world is free to burn and he won't shed too many tears over it.

Despite escaping from the world he was trapped in and being very aware of how unrealistic it was, he still finds himself clinging to some of those lies just because they're all he's ever known. When he found he didn't have the scars on his face from Nepeta's claws in real life, having not suffered actual physical damage, he created them himself with three swipes of a scalpel. He was torn on whether or not to paint his face, but ultimately never had the opportunity. He has since decided that it isn't necessary, as it's tribute to beings that weren't even the messiahs he wanted to begin with.

The influence in the program from the Insane Clown Posse, which is quite possibly the most ridiculous addition out of all of their unnecessary past culture references, is something he's having a harder time getting rid of, even down to his speech patterns. So he simply isn't trying too hard to shake it. Instead, he's taken the concept of who he wanted the Mirthful Messiahs to be and developed a new personal religion around them with the excuse that it's just as good as anything else. After all, he's still the only one to break free of the program so far, so someone out there has to be looking out for him.

Gamzee is a smart kid. As much as the sopor in that fake world should have rotted his brain (had it been a real poison and not just an excuse for his sedation) he's able to catch onto things quickly now that he's off of it. While "high," he turned away explanations and reasoning for things that otherwise seemed magical, claiming such things took the miracles out of them. Now that he's more clear headed, he's taken more of an interest in the whys and the whatfors, but he isn't suddenly full of questions. He just pays more attention to the answers that come along. He's not a genius by anyone's standards, but he is fairly clever. However, he keeps much of his pondering to himself, which along with a perpetual no-quite-dopey-enough-to-look-suspicious expression makes him seem like something of a creep a lot of the time. It can't honestly be said that he isn't one.

Though he's human, Gamzee did grow up in a made-up society that included four different types of romance. He still can't help but see the purpose behind all four rather than sticking with just one, and as a result is a bit confused about his feelings on the subject all around. He still has feelings of two different sorts for both Karkat and Tavros, but that's another thing he's not sure of how to deal with outside of the program. A lot of how he views the world is still through the eyes of a troll, actually, and adjusting to being recognized as a human (a species that until now he'd mostly only watched on a viewscreen) is going to take some time. He may not make much of an effort to adjust at all.

His eyes are actually an indigo color, and it's been surmised that this might actually have been due to the program's influence somehow. He'd still type like his troll self too, given how used to it he is. Only his lines wouldn't alternate caps between them, simply remain in lowercase. (Unless he gets particularly angry, in which he'd revert back to the alternating.)

ITEM CHEST: A real life version of the Cal doll in the program was made for him as a gift from the one doctor he approves of, though he isn't generally allowed to have it with him in the mental ward. Aside from that, he owns nothing but the clothes on his back (jeans and a t-shirt given to him once freed). Those items and the straightjacket he was wearing at the time he was drawn into the tower will be all that's inside the chest.

Abilities:
While fairly physically fit for a boy his age, Gamzee has none of the abilities in the real world that he had while in the Skaia program.

Sample Entry:
Nothing ever really makes sense anymore, and he's beginning to wonder if it's even supposed to. Perhaps the world would cave in on itself if all the pieces ever fell into place just the way they were supposed to. Maybe it already had. He's here, after all.

Gamzee lays with his back on his bed, legs propped up against the wall to one side. If the room suddenly rolled itself over so that the back wall became the floor, he might actually be sitting like a normal human being. He tilts his head back, eyes lolling upwards so he can watch the doorway from this upside-down viewpoint. It wouldn't be anything out of the ordinary for his roommate to see by now, he assumes.

If said other teen did happen to enter just as he was looking that way, Gamzee would simply give him that slow, lazy smile he always wore and his roommate would probably just shake his head and go about his business. It was just one of those things the weird kid did, same as always. Though being thought of as weird in a place like this is something of an accomplishment. He hadn't even had to try hard.

The door doesn't open, though, and after a few more moments in that position he flops over to his side and pulls the one possession he cares about into his arms. Cal grins back at him with those vacant plastic eyes and he can't help but meet that grin with one of his own. That comforting voice won't whisper words in his ear anymore, though. Now it's just a doll, all stuffing and remnants of a long and troublesome dream. Its little bowler hat is tucked under his chin as he curls up into a tighter ball. For just a moment, he allows himself to look completely childish.

Then the moment passes and he sets Cal aside, rolling off the bed and to his feet in one fluid motion. Laying around isn't going to fix anything. He's got stalking to do.



---- (SECOND EXAMPLE BECAUSE THE FIRST LACKED DIALOGUE.)



"You know what this is?" The boy scoops up a bit of the mush currently filling his bowl, turning the spoon upside down and watching it take a good long while to give in to the laws of gravity and finally fall back to join the rest of it. "This is motherfuckin' ambrosia sent from whatever all beyond you got your belief on for, is what. Nasty ass shit, but fuck if I'm not so starved out of my pan I won't spoon it all down anyway."

And he does just that, swallowing down a couple spoonfuls before he frowns, a thoughtful expression crossing his face. He's not directing the look at anyone in particular, as its gone before he faces his tablemate again. "Pan... That ain't it, is it? Think pan ain't all of the fuckin' human vernacular. Starved out of my motherfuckin' mind is what I'm looking for."

He ignores the snarky reply of the person across from him. He doesn't need their sympathy and he doesn't really care about their opinion. They haven't exactly shown themselves to be particularly interesting company anyway, so he keeps talking as if they hadn't said anything at all. "Shiiit, bro. You know what? I bet this mix-up is all fuckin' toxic being. Why all else ain't no one else getting it?"

Either he's not actually worried about this or it doesn't matter, as he takes a couple more bites anyway. "Fucked up way to take out a bro, taking they trouble to drag him here by the honker just to off him with food. How about you give it a try?"

With the last comment, he shoves the bowl over to his tablemate, who's quick to decline. "Aight. Aight. Just gettin' my manners on." With some difference in the definition, perhaps, but then Gamzee always had gone by his own dictionary.