snowblind

the conception and birth of tuktuaitut

ablindeye — Wed, 11 Aug 2010 04:57:43 GMT

Who: Tuktuaitut ("Luck")
Where: uhhh sort of nowhere and then a bit of northern Quebec, then called "New France" by the European settlers.
When: 1742 - 1759, New France era, pre-Colonial Canada.
What: Memories/reflection about the beginning of her existence as a spirit and then as a "human."
Warnings: no content warnings, HOWEVER it will be impossible to understand if you don't sort of know Luck's history at least vaguely, so I'll give you a quick sum-up here. She was an intangible wish-granting spirit believed in by a native american Inuit tribe (made up by me) in the far north of now-Quebec. Each person has their own, sort of like a guardian angel, except it doesn't actually care about protecting you or anything and is just an indifferent part of nature and responds to certain things. Anyway, she was actually a corrupt spirit because her person, Philippe, was born to a believing inuit x a nonbelieving European. And then she was wished into "human" existence by him.
(If you want to read the rest of the belief system, what she is and her history, go here. Plus there is assorted other information in her personal journal.)

It exists.

Like the moment of human conception, the transition from nonlife to life, there has to be that instant in-between, of change: there is nonexistence,
and then there is existence.
But like conception, who was there to remember it? In birth, it's only delivered, not created. The moment came long before. And so It exists, conceived in some moment it cannot remember, and indeed It does not care to remember; there is no merit in why or how, there is no reason to dwell -- that is, there is simply no reason, only existence.

To describe the world as it was "seen" would be to explain colour to the congenitally blind. It perceives, anyway, in one way or another, and it "sees" Him, its ward, its child and brother, like a reflection in a mirror and one side is humanity. His side. It can see his face more or less as you might, fleshy, round, living, exuding desires. But It exists outside the senses, the other side of the mirror, perceivable through only wisdom and the whims of nature. And within, it can see Others like It.

They are faceless and shapeless, they have no form or design, only a feeling of themselves and their presence. They are not individuals but branches on a great eternal tree, and through Them all of humanity is linked. Without the body-soul that humanity possesses, they are only name-spirits and energy, and It finds them easy to look into but it certainly doesn't care to. It sees wisdom, It supposes, age and power and connection, and yes They are beautiful, but the perfection is repetitive, the silence and stoicism, well, simply boring. Simple. Its curiosity wanes; It doesn't care.

Some time later, without memory of conception, there exists the sharp understanding that Its curiosity and Its decision not to care are all Its own. In fact, even its perception of time is something quite alien. It sprouted from the great eternal tree, outside the realm of senses, and yet It can reach through the mirror and touch, feel, wonder. It wonders, in fact, if the Others can do this do and, for some inconceivable reason, choose not to. In time it comes to believe they simply can't, and in fact They can't choose to begin with. They are simple; They do or they don't, they act or they do not act. They do not choose.

This is a taint. It knew it from the start, whenever that was, but like a child It grew into Its understanding. It understands how the world should work and what nature intends, but this limb of the tree is disconnected. It feels for its human ward/brother, which the Others do not for theirs. They exist, symbiotic with their humans, but without passion or drive. They do not Want. It begins to feel like the western image of a ghost, a wandering spirit lost in the in-between, but it is magnificent here and It cannot feel lonely in good conscience. Life is all around It. The Others are not cold but simply proper, how they ought to be, a powerful and electrical component of life.

The world is a sea of existence and It exists.

But suddenly, in some imperceptible instant, existence is changed.
She has flesh and skin and hair, eyes, sight, smell, taste. Born into humanity, she feels cold for the first time. She sees her human, Philippe, there he is, how he smells, how he might taste, his cold skin, his lonely eyes. She looks at the world and there is everything in two ways: she perceives the life of the trees, the souls in Philippe, the deadness of the sled dogs beside them and the hollows where their life was, the wishes he continues to think and release into the air like the seeds of a dandelion. But she sees too, the other way, the human way, the shapes and the textures and the colours.

It never cared for the beginning of Its existence, Its why or how, reason, none of it. But she clasps her fingers together and rubs to rid the cold, she thinks, how did I get here?, she asks it aloud to Philippe in their language and she's laughing and she's crying, and she loves him and hates him but more importantly marvels at herself, her body, her improbable illegal incorrigible existence.

She might live one thousand lives and never remember the moment she became alive.

Tuktuaitut: Snapshot

ablindeye — Mon, 29 Mar 2010 19:57:05 GMT

Species: On the inside, Luck (as she is called) is an intangible gender-neutral wish-granting spirit of original inuit-inspired mythology, but she's crammed into a regular female human body. it's pretty easy (with supernatural ability) to detect that her soul does not match the body. She also carries small scraps of leftover human soul.

Appearance: Pretty, slim 20-something caucasian woman of average height, with long, medium-brown hair and freckles all over her face. For some reason people have 'shopped them out of most of her PB's icons.

Smell: Like deer and human, intermittently. Northern wilderness.

Aura: Her aura is a brilliant iridescently-pearl white, but the iridescence is partially from the mild, watered-down contributions of the small fragments of various human souls/auras she carries with her. From in the centre are a few black spots, as if someone punched a few small holes right through into twisted black-hole-nothingness and the darkness leaked out into her aura, although it is mostly eclipsed by the brightness of the white.

Abilities of note: See app for full details, but the important thing here is that she can detect the nature and presence/nonpresence of your soul, as well as your lifeforce and/or energy. She has trouble even hearing or seeing entities that are soulless and/or energyless, to varying degrees. She can also grant wishes and desires if they are expressed aloud, if she feels like it (which isn't always!). If your character is very hot internally, is around fire, is singing, has a very strong soul, or has a great magical or supernatural ability, she can sense wishes and desires that are thought; please feel free to slip those into narrative when tagging with her if you feel like it, or let me know oocly.

Permissions: Anything goes, but she will react accordingly and is quite willing and capable of getting physically violent. Swing it by me if something might kill or very seriously injure her, but otherwise I'm completely laid back about her getting harassed/insulted/attacked/hugged/kissed/etc. Psychic interference is okay too, but she's kind of a weird case so we'd have to figure out how it'll work.

cr tracker

ablindeye — Sat, 12 Dec 2009 21:21:19 GMT

posts
one wolf wandering

kiba -/+
dani ++
ike --
rigald +
graverobber
hélène

two lemmings leaping

rigald ++
kiba +
basch ++
glados --

three raccoons rummaging

dani +
evey
riella
jin +
yukari
kiba +
rigald ++
ike
glados --

four bats bumbling

kiba +
stas +
henry +
rigald +
glados --

five spirits speaking

jin +
kiba +
yukari +
dev +
glados --

six songbirds singing

kiba +
jin +
america

threads
rigald

wanderers: luck arrives in cicero and is greeted by rigald. they learn about each other's worlds. 12/dec/2009
mistletoe: luck and rigald kiss (for the first time) as per tradition. also, luck is a tease. 17/dec/2009
lemmings: luck builds an inuksuk too big for her so people will have to stop to help; rigald does, and brings her to his cidade. 24/dec/2009
careful concern: luck is blind, rigald's luis has vanished. luck wonders if she'll ever be able to return. 04/jan/2010
ike's sketchbook: they make monopoly jokes, she brings rigald to her world, and lures him into the frigid lake so she can warm him up. she learns a little about dionisio. 16/march/2010
dissolution: GLaDOS's chemical testing prompts rigald and luck to escape the town centre, out into the desert. 22/june/2010

kiba

wolves: kiba and luck discover each other. she marvels over his illusion-man. 12/dec/2009
tradition: under the mistletoe. 17/dec/2009
blind as a bat: luck is blind and kiba is missing homeworld people. they discuss how fucked up cicero is.
she's not good with kids: kiba creates illusion-babies, which luck tramples as a caribou. 05/february/2010
ike's sketchbook: kiba and luck talk about art, ike and then about his world's issues. 16/march/2010

invisible chair: GLaDOS chemical testing shenanigans. 22/june/2010

basch

men in uniform: basch and larsa arrive, Luck finds them rude. 17/dec/2009
lady luck vs judge magister: basch redeems himself. 24/dec/2009

russia

friendly strangers: their first formal meeting.

special nonluck lols

why do I ship this so much: ea and rigald get struck by mistletoe. 17/dec/2009
kitsune and courtesan: kiba and aegis make out. 17/dec/2009
handcuffs?: kid-criss and kid-edgar OTP. 09/jan/2010

possible post names
two lemmings leaping
x hawks hunting
x jackals jiving
x caribou cantering
x foxes frolicking
x squirrels squandering
x geese gobbling
x bears ?
x swans singing
x owls observing
x whales watching
x orcas ?
x seals ?

Tuktuaitut: Information

ablindeye — Fri, 11 Dec 2009 17:22:52 GMT

Your Name: Lynn
Your Livejournal: notlynn
Timezone: EST
Other Characters Played: Edgar Holloway

Character Name: Luck (Full human name Lucille Dompierre, true spirit name Tuktuaitut)
Fandom: OC
Canon Point: Present day
Species: Intangible wish-granting spirit from (original / made up) inuit folklore trapped in a human body.
Age: been in existence since 1742, so she's about 268 years old technically. Been living in human bodies for most of that (hopping to new ones every so often). Been in the current body for about ten-ish years, and the body was about 25 years old when it was taken.
Appearance: 25 year old chick, PB Pania Rose. She's slim, with long brown hair and freckles all over her face.

POWERS/ABILITIES
Wish-granting: Basically, you can say "I wish..." and she can grant it. That is, if she feels like it, and if she can "see" the wish well enough. The smaller the wish and the more you mean it, the easier it is for her to grant it without aid. The stronger the connection to Sila (the air, from which all souls are borrowed), the better she can "see" the wish. Fire, heat, energy, and electricity are all sources of strong Sila - shamans once used fire and chanting to summon the attention of wishgivers, so singing helps as well. In the presence of strong enough Sila she can "see" even wishes that are only being thought. If she's granting a wish over a flame (for example) the flame will often go out or shrink/flicker, as she's drawing energy from it. Therefore wishes done without a source of outside Sila will usually be drawn from the person asking, resulting in sudden coldness or (in the case of large wishes) fainting.

A side effect of her wish-granting abilities + her corruption = she can create unluckiness (misfortune). She doesn't really do it consciously, it just happens when she's mad. It can range from stubbing a toe to bad weather to whatever you want. It won't affect the soulless, only people who have a soul and are not spirits (basically, only normal & enhanced humans).

Soul Vision Goggles (tm): The presence of strong Sila also spurs her to "see" in terms of souls and life force (like a regular wishgiver, rather than light like a normal person), at which point her eyes cloud over white and she looks blind. Even when she isn't "blind" and in soul-vision mode, she's at a half-way point between light-sight and soul-sight, so in a way she can't really "see" the soulless (or it will take a good deal more to get her attention).

Body-hopping: When she was wished into humanlike existence, what happened is that she gained the ability to have a body-soul (which is what makes animals/people/plants individual beings capable of consciousness and physical reality). But she can hop between bodies, she isn't anchored. Basically she displaces the soul of whoever's body she's overtaking, which then wanders and disintegrates over time (returning to Sila to be reborn, eventually). When she leaves a body, the body still functions like a person, but it's a soulless, confused shell of its former self, and accumulates fractions of broken souls over time, eventually driving it into madness. She doesn't do this willy-nilly, so your characters (probably) don't have to worry.

Apparitions: She can turn into a deer/elk, which is her kindred animal. She can attempt to mimic any other natural animal but it will be weird and flawed, i.e. a dog with deer hooves. She can also create such apparitions in things like smoke.

Intuition: Because of the intangible nature of wishes, Luck has an aptitude for understanding the basic meaning of words (and wordless wishes) regardless of the language. Names, in particular, ring very clearly for her, and she takes the meanings very seriously in her judgment of a person's character. She can't just magically speak any language she hears once, but given the above, it's no surprise that she picks up language quite quickly.

Not really a power but: Speaking her true name (or thinking it over a flame/Sila), Tuktuaitut, is basically like grabbing her by the soul for attention. That's why she most likely won't tell it to you.
Also she's totally not really a chick. She's a genderless spirit, but happens to be in a female body at the moment.
And as an aside, because she carries the namespirit of her Philippe, she's actually about as physically strong as he was. C'est-a-dire, she's not superhuman but she's about as strong as a male hunter, despite how she looks. She usually fakes weakness anyway.

REALITY
Disclaimer: I took a lot of mythology from general sum-ups of Inuit culture/beliefs, but 90% of the details I invented, including the whole tribe thing and the wishspirits, etc.

the Ataninnuaq and the soul
Before European influence, the Ataninnuaq Inuit people were spread in the northmost tip of what is now Labrador, Canada. Like all Arctic peoples, the extremely volatile, harsh conditions of their reality left them at the mercy of the spirits governing the world around them. The Ataninnuaq beliefs therefore rarely separate human existence from the 'spirit world' or afterlife, because they believed it to be taking place all around them.

Each human and animal possesses three components of what the Europeans would call 'the soul': there is the life force, the body-soul, and the namespirit. The namespirit is what it sounds like: given the name of something/someone (a deceased relative, an animal, etc), you are both yourself as well as fractionally that entity; their strengths and wisdoms live in you. The body-soul is both soul and physical form, and makes one an individual capable of consciousness. The body-soul is 'borrowed' from the air, Sila (personified in some ways but not an individual entity - it's a unified body of continuous, connected souls that encompasses nature). In death, the body-soul returns to Sila to be reborn, the namespirit continues in namesakes, and the life force passes on to the sea where it may eventually re-enter the soil. Everything is a cycle.

The Aitut (Wishgiver)
Translated directly as "gift," an aitut is an intangible spirit-entity, attached to each believing family. It is said that when a couple unites in love and sex, their body-souls overlap, and in that overlap the Aitut ('Wishgiver') of each family mates as well, and a new one is born. The dominant wishgiver of a family is analogous to the eldest or strongest of soul (which often goes hand-in-hand). When the love that birthed a wishgiver dies (falling out of love, or both partners have literally died), the wishgiver moves on as well, passing into the roots of plants and so joining the soul of the plant. It will also move on if severely displeased, i.e. disrespect, disbelief or lack of ritual.

The Wishgiver itself is made up only of a spirit still connected and unsevered from Sila. It's said to be "blind" because it can only "see" in souls/spirits/life force. Intrinsically neutral, it does not actually have any cares or desires. Its attention must be summoned through ritual, and often fire (which is, like any burst of heat/energy/electricity, concentrated Sila) is needed for it to "see" the requests of the tribespeople. Small wishes/'prayers' can be asked over a small flame, while larger requests for favourable weather or fortune are done through large village-scale rituals around a bonfire with burning herbs, led by the tribal shaman (who are said to have body-souls still connected to Sila), at auspicious times of the year (i.e. under the Northern Lights). They don't often show themselves visually as they have no physical form, but can appear as movements or patterns in smoke during rituals, or as ghostly animals as omens of impending disaster.

Corrupted Wishgivers
Outsiders (particularly European settlers) are treated with wariness. A lack of belief kills wishgivers, and so the union of a believer and nonbeliever is flawed. If each parent is strong in soul, the human offspring is fine. The resulting Wishgiver, however, rather than being the offspring of two healthy Aitut, is the offspring of the believer's wishgiver and the nonbeliever's human soul. As such, there is a gap between the two souls, and the newborn wishgiver carries it as a void, a wound in nature that leads away from Sila, like broken skin that allows entrance of an infection. (The consequences can be less dire and can even be favourable if the other party carries with them a spirit as well, one that's different than the Wishgiver but is also connected to Sila.)

This corrupt Wishgiver's connection with Sila is severed slightly, and it is created with a humanlike flavour - it sees better the human world, but a little worse the spirit. In this way it can actually be more benevolent, as it is capable of love, sympathy and compassion. However, it also has desires and whims, and along with that comes the capacity for selfishness, envy, anger, and grudges. Its corruption is minimal in the early days, but accumulates over time like a spreading disease. Those with the largest rifts (due to weak souls involved) become so twisted and disfigured they make take on an entirely new form, and this is the source of Wendigo and the sicknesses of vampirism and insanity, etc. Some are even able to bring themselves solidly into the human world, as many are jealous of the human soul, and all are addicted to constantly morphing themselves, endlessly dissatisfied. These corrupt Wishgivers are also associated with plant disease, because when they 'die' they pass into the roots and corrupt them as well. When released from the plant upon the plant's death, the corrupt Wishgiver is obliterated by Sila and scattered through the air and the sea. Wishgivers of lesser corruption are still associated with illness, infertility and misfortune.

HISTORY
The Character: Tuktuaitut
Anyu was a tribeswoman, and the man was a French traveller during the colonization of the New World (mid 18th century). His technological aid convinced the tribespeople to reluctantly accept Anyu's deviation. They had a single son, Philippe Lucas Dompierre, and could not conceive again - with him was born the wishspirit Tuktuaitut. (Philippe had a second middle name, Kuyariyok, but his father didn't like to talk about it outside the tribe.) When Phillipe was sixteen, he saw an apparition of Tuktuaitut as a ghostly spirit-deer. Many tribesmembers saw apparitions as well, prompting great worry in the tribe. Through communion with the spirits of Sila, the shaman came to believe there would be bloodshed between the tribe and the French settlers, resulting in disaster. The traveller, Guillaume Benoît Dompierre, was sent to make peace, but unknowingly brought back with him an infection of Smallpox.

He and his wife died, as did over half the small tribe, including all of the wise elderly. Devastated, the survivors who were adept hunters thought to join another tribe to the east, but there was a great risk of rejection, which could be fatal after such a journey. No one wants more mouths to feed, and in times of trouble, everyone looks after only their own blood. Disheartened, bitter, and ostracized, Philippe set out on his own in an attempt to find the French settlement his father had come from. He ended up having to eat one of his dogs, and in desperation called out to his wishgiver over the fresh carcass. He wished he was not alone - he wished for the spirit to come to him with a body-soul, alive.

And it was so. Tuktuaitut was a woman, first. It loved Philippe passionately, and he it, but also hated him for what it perceived to be a great betrayal of the tribe and of Sila. They reached the French settlement and were accepted as Métis people (half-Euro half-Native). They lived as a couple for some time as farmhands, Philippe's association with Tuktuaitut granting him unnaturally slow aging. "She" did not age at all, and so they moved frequently to avoid suspicion. Their relationship was extremely high-tension, switching from passionate love to passionate hate at the drop of a hat, often fuelled by Tuktuaitut's fickle and volatile nature, which seemed only to grow in severity. Many times the spirit would attempt to leave Philippe, taking the form of a deer or other animal - these other animals often flawed, such as having deer hooves or human eyes - but it would return after a few days, apparently having forgiven Philippe's transgressions so fully it scarcely remembered them.

The Nineteenth and Twentieth Century
At seventy years old, Philippe served in the war of 1812 still appearing to be around thirty; he owed a good deal of his luck and, undoubtedly, his life, to the powers of the wishgiver that had his back from the sidelines. Unfortunately, Tuktuaitut's anti-aging effect did not last forever. Philippe passed away at 120 in the early nineteenth century. Having longed, as corrupt wishgivers do, to change form, Tuktuaitut abandoned the first human body it had known. That body continued to exist as a shell: a confused, functioning but soulless human, possessing life but not much else. These shells accumulate ruptured pieces of homeless, displaced souls over time (each of which was displaced by greedy spirits as well) and are generally driven to madness. Tuktuaitut then claimed the body of a servant in order to get close to one of the French noblemen of Lower Canada, and later overtook the nobleman himself. For the next decade and into the 1830's, Tuktuaitut hopped bodies almost every six months, experiencing a variety of lives temporarily before growing bored and restless, each time taking on a new name but keeping a small piece of Philippe's, to preserve his name-spirit.

That is, until it settled into the body of a woodsman who was involved in the Timber Trade along the St. Lawrence River. For the next fifteen years, Tuktuaitut lived as him, loving and being loved by a fellow woodsman in secrecy. 'His' lack of aging aroused suspicion, and 'his' lover grew gray. An accident that would have left Tuktuaitut's host body crippled spurred the spirit to hop bodies, a process that is not easily witnessed by humans. The woodsman was disturbed and horrified by what he'd seen, and would not allow the new body of Tuktuaitut near himself. Wounded by the betrayal, Tuktuaitut rationalized that the man could not exist having witnessed that, and that it was only just that he was mercy-killed. I guess that's one way to look at it, anyway.

By the late twentieth century, Tuktuaitut had acquired a taste for living one life at a time, but was bored of the original thrill of secrecy, and of restraining itself to the human characteristics of life. Each time it restarted was like playing a new game of the Sims: this time I'm going to cheat, this time I'm going to make it challenging for myself, this time I want kids, this time I want to mess with people, etc.

Present Day
By the twenty-first century, the phase of Sims-game-reality had begun to worn off. Present-day, it occupies a woman's body and calls itself Lucille Dompierre. If you ask, though, it'll say Luck, because it thinks that's really clever and likes to laugh at its own jokes.

snowblind

the conception and birth of tuktuaitut

further reading: luck, on humanity versus the aitut

Tuktuaitut: Snapshot

cr tracker

Tuktuaitut: Information