OOC
GAME: Household Tales
DESCRIPTION: What happens happily ever after?
DATE: March 2008
PB: Matthew Macfadyen
JOURNAL: quite perfect
IC
normal name Christian Francis Whitwell
normal age Thirty-one.
normal occupation Stock investment manager.
fairy tale The Snow Queen
fairy tale character Kay
fairy tale abilities When he first catches sight of someone, he occasionally gets a glimpse into the darkest, nastiest parts of their soul — a particular event they're ashamed of, or a flash of their least-pleasing personality traits shining through. It only lasts for a moment, and he can't see much detail, but it's enough to make Kay a bit of an unforgiving bastard when it comes to first impressions.
fairy tale history
• Kay was one of the first people to cross over in the early 1800s, intrigued by the thought of a new world with fresh opportunities and scientific advancements. He opted for two long-term lifetime enchantments at first, and both he and Gerda lived long and fruitful lives past seventy. The 1800s-1870 were spent as a Dane living in Schleswig-Holstein — which was an appropriate enough first assignment, filled with turmoil and uncertainty. It gave him a considerable taste of real-world conflict, worlds apart from wicked queens and snowstorms.
• 1870-1950: The next long lifetime took place as a withdrawn banker in England, rallying his family together in the midst of the panic of World War I. He served some time safely in the army, and by the time he neared the end of his natural life and WWII started rearing its ugly head, Kay had had enough. He was rapidly deteriorating while young men threw themselves into the line of fire once again. So when the man finally tipped over into death (due to a heart attack, as it happens), he decided that two times around the circle of life were more than enough — he consulted with the Blue Fairy and opted to switch to the non-aging enchantment. Gerda followed suit. Scared into a temporary life with shifting faces, Kay has been living a life of flux ever since, and is currently going by the name "Christian".
• Quiet, well-mannered, and pragmatic, he's is very much a fan of progress and innovation and the real world, and for moving on from whimsy and magic. "Pardon?" Polite and affable. Has a slight British lilt to his voice, thanks to his previous life, and a tendency to fall back on his wisdom and experience a bit too often, disparaging people for behaving foolishly or recklessly. Christian's standards are high for the people he knows, and he doesn't take well to being disappointed — as a result, mundies often think he's a lofty, pretentious asshole, and it seems like he's got a stick up his ass sometimes. He does have a tendency to see right through to a person's flaws and pick away at them like a scab, but he's struggling to overcome those old habits. In fact, he often softens and mellows out once he has a tempering female influence around. Cold hard reason meets feminine emotion, what?
• Switching to the flexible enchantment — and staying in his late 20s / early 30s — meant a more free and loose style of living. Time to grow up! The years taught him that children are far too easily taken advantage of, and plus, there's that whole thing with adult life being far more interesting. Ever the innovator, Christian lived a life of hedonism in the 60s for a while — before it blew up in his face and he went back to his careful well-planned existence. He always did have a tendency to wander off to the biggest, newest fads; today, it manifests as an interest in technology, constantly keeping tabs on the newest Mac announcements and staying desperately on top of the times.
• A social experimenter, he absorbs knowledge and wisdom like a sponge, constantly trying to learn from his experiences — which is fairly off-putting when the mundies realise just how severe and sombre he can be. At moments, he's more like a 50-year-old than a 30-year-old; but somewhere inside, Kay is still youthful at heart and wants to fit in amongst his younger peers, so there's an undercurrent of aimless recklessness to him, and a tendency to make wanton mistakes when the daredevil mood strikes. It's the same part of him that decided to hitch a ride with the snow queen's sledge once upon a time.
• Was a writer for a while, publishing a few books in the 70s, but he has since switched to more social occupations. Christian needs networking, and needs to stay grounded and know people. He's very, very good at switching faces and identity by now — he'll simply pick up all his paperwork, bring his attaché case, and deal with the process with the Blue Fairy as smoothly and calmly as possible. Without a family, he knows that his happiness is very, very dependent upon his colleagues and friends and (never long-term) romantic attachments — and, most importantly, Gerda. His grandchildren are still running around the world somewhere, but he adamantly refuses to track them down. It'd be far too strange.
• Stock investment manager. Spends his regular days crunching numbers, then occasionally going out for drinks with the coworkers. He's friendly with many of his clients once they've gotten used to his rather chilly exterior.
• The fact that he was a little boy in his story is a fundamental part of Christian's identity. Even 200 years post-tale, Kay's still trying to come to terms with having grown up and moved on. Instead of the dreamy mind of a child, today he's a central rock of sanity and mental arithmetic: "the icy game of reason". He tries to keep others calm and serves well as an older brother / friendly uncle figure to younger, less responsible tales.
• Nothing throws him quite as stuttery and off-guard as a good smile from a pretty girl. He forgets who and where he is, and falls over himself to impress her.
• "Clever" is about the biggest compliment you'll ever get from him. Forcing him to break down his emotional walls and be sappy with anyone else but Gerda is, er, extremely difficult.
• His religious belief was supposed to be rock-hard and unquestionable. But despite the happy ending of "The Snow Queen", Kay's spirituality has taken a heavy beating in the time since. Due to the shard of mirror giving him glimpses into the worst sides of life as a child, experiencing death and mortality in real world war, and knowing that his own strange immortality is permanently barring him from heaven … well, he's currently going through a pretty nasty crisis of faith. He's kept it entirely private so far, and hasn't let on to Gerda yet that his belief may not be what it used to.
