OOC
GAME: Canonish
DESCRIPTION: Literary multi-fandom game.
DATE: May 2008
JOURNAL: fearfullyquick
IC
CHARACTER'S FULL NAME: The White King; technically speaking, there's nothing more and nothing less. Since stirring free from the preordained pages of the Looking-Glass, however, he will respond to King and Roi.
PREFERRED PLAYED-BY: Michael Fassbender
BOOKVERSE: Through the Looking Glass, and What Alice Found There
AUTHOR: Lewis Carroll
CHARACTER HISTORY: Bumbling around the chessboard of his book, the White King was initially not very competent. He was pompous and overbearing, and very convinced of his own importance — he was content to leave his Queen alone to dangerous pursuit, because after all, he knew she'd be all right in the end. Despite the childlike nature of their tales, there was always an undercurrent of malice to the royalty, since they were the type of people who could sacrifice pawns willy-nilly and who knew, unnervingly, what was going to occur. Seeing them today, one can't help but feel as if they were always waiting for something like this to happen: war between the chaos of Wonderland and the frighteningly ordered existence of Mirrorland was never very far away.
The King has always been far more short-term than his female counterpart, however; whilst she can lay long, drawn-out plans of infinite complexity, he functions much better in small bursts of brilliance. Eventually, however, their standard games turned into something different. As political turmoil started rippling throughout the Carrollian worlds, they spied what looked very much like a power vacuum. White had always been pitted against Red, whether it was the red of chess pieces or of hearts — and with the Queen of Hearts missing and the King a puppet, the white royalty amped up their game. King has tossed his lot in with the Hatter and the Hare, but to him, they will always be his errant messengers; he finds it unnatural to obey these two, and can't help but think that he and Queen deserve their own time in the spotlight sometime soon.
In the meantime, they'll play along. Oh, yes, they'll play along nicely. They like substituting human subjects for chesspieces in life-size reenactments of games; they like putting prisoners of war under torture whilst forcing them to solve riddles and play chess, no matter what.
The games must continue.
CHARACTER APPEARANCE: The first thing one notices about the King is that he is tall — very tall indeed, and his back is unnervingly ramrod-straight, his legs constantly at right-angles, every movement like an automaton brought strangely to life. His skin is pale, his eyes steel-grey, his hair dark and slightly curled, and more often than not, he dresses in impeccable suits with long black coats. Having stepped out of the mirror, he looks less like a chess-piece and more lifelike than ever before, but beneath that tailored material lies skin of polished ivory. His emotions and facial twitches seem ever so slightly put-upon; his smiles are colder than the queen's.
CHARACTER PERSONALITY: Order, order, order — were King to rule over a trial, it would have been mercilessly organised, and nothing like the sham trial of Alice's days in Wonderland. He desires control and authority, wants to eradicate the middle ground, and remove ambiguity. Frankly put, chaos panics him — the lack of clearly-drawn lines in the sand makes him feel ill at ease and physically nauseous. Once upon a time, the king lacked guidance and didn't quite know where to go (Alice set him straight), but now, he is firmly convinced of his place and his direction. Which is terrible news for all involved, because King now knows his purpose involves more than meddlesome games within Carroll's world. He has developed ambition, and ambition is a horrifying prospect when it comes to psychopathic monarchs — his goal is to turn the other bookverses into conflicts of black and white, one versus another, with very little room for moral grey-zones in between.
King's personality itself is one of extremes; one moment, he may be cold and impersonal and sarcastic, and the next, he might be in a tempestuous rage. His behaviour is subtle upon the surface, but his driving forces are astonishingly simple: order. simplification. control. One underlying characteristic that has never, ever changed over time is his inherent selfishness — he lacks sympathy for others, even his queen. He is protective of her, of course, but King protects her with the absolute knowledge that if the Queen is gone, then so is he; they exist together, for without her, the metaphorical and literal game is lost. Her life is his, and if she dies, well, his skin is on the line. Other beings, on the other hand, exist solely for his benefit and his whim, and he will play them as he sees fit.
Which means that falling as a prisoner of war into the hands of the royalty is, needless to say, not a very pleasant experience.
Whenever King is outside the pages of his own story, he develops some frighteningly strong obsessive compulsive tendencies — specific counting systems, needing to possess all items in groups of two, aligning objects at perfect right-angles, dressing himself in a certain order, and so on. It is his only way to cope with a foreign world which is, to his eyes, disgustingly chaotic and messy.
