I don't really see much of a problem with nine players/eight patients, assuming we're all active and no-one falls off the face of the Earth. It sounds pretty good! ^^
Name: Hanneli ‘Anya’ Zeihn.
Species: Anya is a
Dreamweaver, one of the ancient tribes of people on her home world. Intertwined in glowing, beautiful markings, Dreamweavers generally have a float-y and birdlike look to them, seemingly incorporeal and capable of dissolving at the lightest of touches. As their name suggests, Dreamweavers are capable of manipulating dreams for their own uses, though it’s more of a tradition-based ability rather than having practical use.
On the contrary, they do not sleep. The weaker beings, with less and fainter markings, will fall into a peaceful trance, something akin to humans’ sleeping. The particularly skilled Dreamweavers will have parts of their skin covered in these markings, dulling in color when they draw off their internal energy reserves. In turn, the purpose of these markings is to subtly draw energy off of the surroundings, during which they glow brightly, making the entire process something like charging. Therefore, stronger Dreamweavers need no sleep and can function for years on end without the need for falling into the trance, instead simply drawing energy off their surroundings. Though their home planet is technologically advanced, there’s not enough energy to sustain them all and the absorption rate is lower, making the trance essential. In the human world, however, as humans don’t draw energy in such ways, there is plenty.
Gender: Female.
Age: Twenty-one.
Mental Illness: - Nightmare Disorder: Anya suffers from an extreme case of Nightmare Disorder for reasons unknown. Whether she wants to or not, she suffers from terrifying nightmares every single time she falls asleep. Anya has suffered from nightmare disorder all her life but every time she falls asleep, it’s like a whole new experience. It's unknown to the nurses exactly what she sees, as all she says is "Everything." when asked. These nightmares are the most common image she projects into others' minds, most often by accident. Nowadays, she cannot even discern between reality and fantasy at times. As a result, Anya suffers from insomnia, though it was never officially recorded. She stays up for days on end, before inevitably falling asleep.
- Psychosis: Unlike her Nightmare Disorder, her psychosis developed gradually as a result of always losing it after a nightmare. Hallucinations plague her most often, ranging from ridiculous things to the things out of her nightmares. It is because of this that Anya relives her nightmares even while awake, though it's not as common. Whenever this happens, it severely impairs her sense of normalcy and it reduces her to a paranoid, delusional mess.
- Intermittent Explosive Disorder (IED): A direct result of her nightmare disorder and psychosis. Anything random can trigger an episode of rage, often disproportionate to the situation, contrasting with her friendly personality. Nurses are careful not to mention certain things such as her nightmares and her home world, as to avoid her extreme and immediate wrath. It's still unknown why she has developed this disorder, especially as it's triggered by things other than her other disorders. The sweet, somewhat likable girl disappears and is replaced by a raging inferno that can suddenly disappear like it was never there.
Appearance: Anya doesn’t like sleep. Due to staying up for days on end, Anya’s once healthy skin now has a pallid look to it coupled with dark eyes and a perpetual exhausted look. Her eyes are almost always glazed over and staring at something others cannot see, an obvious sign that she’s ‘not really there’, so to speak. Dreamweavers don’t exactly have normal eyes; the iris is more mist than anything else, giving them a cloudy look. Anya has often been mistaken for blind when she can see perfectly well. Her hair is dark and flows almost like water, a trait brought over from her Dreamweaver form. She stands at approximately 5’4, her body structure being proportionate and somewhat lean.
In her
Dreamweaver form, Anya has a more bird-like appearance with several feathers in her hair that are obviously a part of her and growing on her head. Her eyes become cloudier and brighter; her body is lighter and her stature taller. Due to her sleepless nature, Anya has a gaunter look, appearing more frightening than ethereal. The skin on her shoulders, arms, legs, back, abdomen and the left side on her face is covered with
Dreamweaver markings, all a dull hue of lavender-blue that, when ‘charging, explode outwards in a golden glow. The markings on her skin are the only part of her that remain on her body at all times, no matter the form, remaining on her even as a human. They’re mostly swirls and other such symbols of the Dreamweavers, spaced out across her skin.
History: Anya was born in her home world’s capital, Syrron, to two fairly normal middle-class parents. Being brought up in one of the most technologically advanced megacities, she got used to the low energy output of the surroundings. From the age of four, she needed to fall into a trance to get her energy levels back up. But something strange was happening: it was as if she fell into a coma every night, her body dead to the world but her mind awake, seeing things that no one ever should. Terrible, horrifying things plagued her every time she lay down to sleep. And so she screamed, and screamed, and screamed. But it never got rid of the nightmares.
It was like that every single night. Entity after entity would plague her for hours on end, refusing to release her from their grip until they were done breaking her mind. She stopped sleeping, staying up for hours on end. She couldn’t talk coherently, only vague babbles of ‘monsters, demons, demonic faces, voices’ amidst tears coming out of her mouth. The Dreamweavers assumed she was possessed by a demonic entity but couldn’t do anything about it – so the nightmares recurred. Again and again until she lost it, literally.
In an attempt to restore her normalcy, her parents made the risky decision to send her to school. Anya coped fairly well, until she fell asleep in class one day – really, it wasn't entirely her fault, it was the rather boring professor that droned on and on – and saw a horrifying vision of a demonic entity. Her screams alerted the whole school of her disorder and it wasn't until her alarmed professor shook her awake that she stopped screaming her lungs out. When she regained her senses, Anya looked up into the face of the same demon looking down at her. Her fellow classmates' concerned faces melted away into the background and Anya had a fit, lunging towards the professor in an attempt to get rid of the demon. One gouged-out eye later, Anya was expelled.
Fed up with the psychotic, screaming mess that was Anya, the Dreamweavers debated on what to do. She couldn’t be approached or let out in public as she automatically drew anyone and everyone into dreams. As nightmares were the only thing she had ever experienced, the dreams she projected to others were equally horrifying, scarring most of for life, some never recovering. Anya was dangerous, reckless, hysteric and a complete mess, unable to discern reality from fantasy. Everyone and everything was a ‘demon’ to her, voices were everywhere, her screaming voice filled every corner of the isolated house they kept her in.
The house she was kept in was more of a mansion, belonging to a high-class family that had generously offered the empty house as a makeshift institution where Anya was the only patient. It was a traumatic experience, seeing as the house wasn't exactly built for a hallucinating Dreamweaver with zero control over her powers. She was given freedom to roam around the house but two weeks after arriving at the house, Anya shut herself into a tiny dark space and refused to come out. The caretakers searched for days on end, looking for a sign of the disturbed girl. It was only six days after she disappeared that they found her, following the screams that came from a tiny broom cupboard. She had fallen asleep after six days of staying awake, giving her position away. Even so, she protested violently as she was led out of the cupboard and into the hallways. Anya didn't reply when asked why she'd locked herself in a broom cupboard, only looking away and singing softly to herself.
A year or so after her solitary confinement, the caretakers were getting fed up of Anya as well. Most of them resigned, leaving only two to look after the elusive girl. One caretaker disappeared one sunny morning and another year later, long after Anya was gone, his charred remains were found in a ditch a few hundred meters away from the mansion. The other caretaker remained alone, trying and failing to keep the girl under control. One night, however, changed everything.
The caretakers had been instructed upon arrival not to bother Anya in the middle of a nightmare unless properly trained and equipped. However, unable to stand the screams, Anya's caretaker shook her awake. Anya's eyes flew open, only to see the monster that had been relentlessly torturing her right above her, in reality. In response, Anya accidentally conjured a fireball as a panic response and incinerated the caretaker. The house exploded into a fiery inferno. Anya stumbled around in the hallways, choking on the smoke that was filling every corner of the house every second. Thankfully, the authorities arrived before Anya could suffocate and pulled her out, only to plunge her right into court. She was put on trial for arson and destroying priceless heirlooms and artifacts. Her lawyer argued that they shouldn't have been there anyway when they knew there was a mentally unstable girl around. She was excused on an insanity plea, and forever labelled as a menace to society. Interestingly, the owners of the house were found dead right after the trail. When asked why she hid away in closets so much, Anya finally gave a proper answer.
"I could hear the walls. I could see the paintings look at me, judging me, waiting to slit my throat while I sleep. The house was alive. Everything was alive, laughing at me for my naivety. I could feel them reaching out when I lay in bed at night, grasping at me with tendrils itching to strangle me. They wanted me dead, to steal my life away. But you know, they never found me in the closet."In the end, the Dreamweavers decided to dump her in the human world. Upon arrival at Osmond’s, it was exact same thing. The institution was warned of her uncontrollable ability and was told not to look her in the eye as they led the hysterical Anya down the hallways. She was immediately placed in solitary confinement, away from everyone else. However, as a form of gratitude, the Dreamweavers sent a pair of cuffs that could limit Anya’s mental output, rendering her mostly harmless, apart from the random displays of violence and screaming. The cuffs were practically unbreakable and Anya was moved back into a normal ward following the change.
In the human world, Anya could and still does draw energy from the surroundings. The Dreamweavers thought that once she started doing that, her need for that strange type of sleep would cease. However, it didn’t. Anya automatically falls asleep, for reasons unknown. All night, her screams reverberate across the entire floor.
Personality: When one first looks at Anya, they'd most probably assume she was just as crazy awake as she was asleep. She's afraid of so many things, often staring at the walls as if having a conversation with them. Anya sings to herself a lot, a variety of songs in the Dreamweaver language that are somewhat soothing yet cheerful. She's afraid of her own shadow and seems completely and utterly loopy to the observer. At one moment, she's spouting complete nonsense about light bulbs being put on the ceilings to intentionally kill them all and the next, she puts forth philosophy that's entirely logical. Her morals are, at times, completely wrong but with her persuasive 'philosophy', one can assume she's right. At least in her own mind.
While she seems socially withdrawn and awkward, it all evaporates away when she's approached by someone. Anya is a natural social butterfly, and a talkative one at that. She's sweet, cheerful and to an extent, caring when normal. She's a person who loves company, talking, smiling and unless you're something that appears in her nightmares, she wouldn't hurt you intentionally. She loves laughing and is generally happy and stupidly optimistic. However, if one is perceptive, they can tell that there's something seriously off about Anya. Logically, she shouldn't be the 'sunshine and rainbows' person that she is. There's something wrong about her, something underlying that even Anya can't put her finger on.
Sexual Orientation: Heterosexual.
Fears: Anya has a long, long list of fears, but few are stronger than her fear of the uncontrollable. It drives her absolutely crazy, sending her into fits of hysteria that do not die down very fast. To Anya, uncontrollable things are unacceptable; she needs to know that everything is under control and safe. Another fear is her fear of large, open spaces with nowhere to hide. It’s a bit unconventional and even her own people don’t know where this fear came from, nor does Anya.
Capabilities: - Sensory Deprivation: One of the Dreamweavers’ primary abilities is their sensory deprivation. Upon eye contact with Anya, the senses of the target rapidly get inhibited to the point where their body's sense of sight, smell, touch, taste, hearing and balance are completely cut off, two or three at a time at most. It takes a minute or so to fully affect the body, yet it numbs the target to the point where they simply cannot sense anything.
- Illusions (Dream Projection): The Dreamweaver's signature and well-known ability is to use ‘dreams’ while the target is awake, inducing illusions where everything feels real but obviously isn’t. It deceives the mind into thinking that everything Anya directs at them is real, thus falling into an illusion of Anya's thoughts and dreams. The illusions are entirely realistic, even the sense of touch reigns as it can be used to cause pain. As it’s considered quite dangerous, she was kept in solitary confinement until her home world sent over technologically advanced cuffs that do not allow Anya’s mental capabilities to surpass those of an exceptionally intelligent human being, hindering her ability to project dreams. The cuffs glow blue when she's attempting to project her dreams into others' minds, most often unintentionally, and are simply a dull grey when inactive.
- Telekinesis: The actual ability of the Dreamweavers (only approximately a quarter are born with this ability) is the ability to ‘will’ objects to move, called Telekinesis in the Human world and Inner Will in the Dreamweavers' world. The Dreamweavers use this for only one purpose: fire. Though it can be used for other things such as basic Telekinesis, Dreamweavers have an affinity for creating fire over the generations. By exciting atoms, they create fire. However, while Anya alright at basic Telekinesis, using it for kinetics at a molecular level is much easier. At times, creating fire is purely accidental, most often in tandem with her IED fits of rage. However, as fire is uncontrollable, it tends to scare her.
Miscellaneous: Theme Song: Audiomachine // Prelude of DreamsOOC Notes: -
