charles. (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
pathetique) wrote2015-08-06 08:40 pm
pathetique) wrote2015-08-06 08:40 pm
inugami app
Player Information
Name/Alias: Rinna
Player Journal:panicking
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sodapoppet
Timezone: PST
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Character Information
Name/Alias: His given name is Carl; he has been known exclusively by Charles for around thirty years.
Fandom: Blood+ (manga)
Canonpoint: About a fourth of the way through volume three; after his death.
Gender: male
Age: ??? For appearance's sake, he looks to be about twelve or thirteen; he's been alive for much longer, though. Given the series' timeline, and Charles' role as Diva's first 'playmate' Chevalier, it wouldn't be unreasonable to assume he's been around since the late 1800s. Therefore, from then till present day in the manga, 110+ years old seems like a nice rounded guess, give a take a few... years? Decades? Ah, vague histories.
Physical Description: Charles is regal but small. Notably, he has only one arm; its stump is monstrous due to his nature as a Chevalier.
History: Wiki here, but there isn't much information. Here's what I have:
Charles is one of those characters whose entrance and exit are both riotous; he leaves no room for any gradual telling of his tale. Because of this, his backstory is hardly visited at all— when it comes down to it, we know two things about his past: he lost his humanity at a very young age, quite a while ago, recreated to be the resilient playmate of the childlike Chiropteran Queen Diva; and he lost his arm to Chiropteran Queen Saya during the latter years of the Vietnam War (about thirty years ago, the manga says). Apart from these hard facts, we can only speculate, and so we will, though sparingly.
'Charles,' by the way is a name given to him, right after that incident during the War. Once he was a boy called Carl, though so little is known about that: it can be guessed that he was French, due to him interjecting and leaving notes in the French language as one might do with their native tongue. Though the circumstances of this arrangement are never explored, young Carl was whisked away to meet Diva, a very cruel, very childish vampiric being, and, before he could hit puberty, was 'turned' by Diva into a vampiric being himself, subservient to her. The plan was for Carl, now forever a child, to be a playmate for Diva, forever childlike, and this worked well for some time, with Carl growing to be one of the only things Diva thought beloved. They played together and cared for each other, with Carl servicing Diva in whatever ways she required— this included protecting her, at times, from those who sought to harm her, the primary culprit in this being Saya, Diva's own sister.
It's Saya who changed everything, decades and decades after Carl first began his life anew with Diva. While battling fiercely with Saya, for the sake of keeping Saya away from Diva, Carl was struck with a vicious blow: Saya severed his arm. Normally such an injury wouldn't warrant a second thought from Carl, thanks to his regenerative abilities, but Queens are dangerous to Chevaliers. Saya's blood is all that can kill one of Carl's kind— when her blood mixes with theirs, it crystalizes, eventually killing the Chevalier. Carl found this out through firsthand experience of the most painful sort; she hacked off his arm, and he, desperate, hacked off the rest before it could crystalize into the rest of his body. Saya escaped and Carl was left crippled, an imperfect body for a perfect being.
Upon trying to return to Diva, Carl found that he was barred from doing so. Amshel, Diva's first and most commanding Chevalier, revealed to Carl that for his failings, and for endangering Diva, he was to be demoted. This meant that while Carl as a species was still a Chevalier, he was no longer permitted to use that title; and he was to be separated from Diva from then on, as she was told he'd been killed. Amshel stripped Carl of his name, re-christening him Charles, and decreed that Charles would now be nothing more than a test subject, used by the rest of Diva's Chevaliers to test their limitations and find out more about themselves. Banished back to Vietnam, Charles was left alone, thoughts of vengeance and a growing obsession with Saya his only companions. Holed up in a lavish manor, for decades, he crept and schemed and surrounded himself with beautiful blue roses, the only remnant of Diva left to him. He would participate in the Chevalier's experiments, he would wait for Saya to awaken, and he would avenge himself. This was his drive.
Present day, and Saya has come out of the hibernation typical to Queens - but she still isn't herself. When Charles catches wind of this, he takes it upon himself to travel to Japan and greet her— this is against the orders he'd received from his betters, but he cannot seem to contain himself. While making quite a spectacle - and massacre - of the school play Saya is performing in, Charles swoops in to see her for himself, and is quite irate to find that she cannot remember him at all. She can't remember anything about her nature as a Queen, in fact, and Charles, not taking kindly to this, sets to provoking her in any way he can. He insults and assaults Saya's own Chevalier, Hagi, but it's only when Charles threatens to hurt a boy named Kai that Saya retaliates angrily. Kai, after all, has become an important and much beloved adoptive brother of Saya's, and she cannot bear to see her family harmed. Charles finds this hilarious - this concept of family, of Saya having family - and it gives him exactly the opening he needs, though Saya and co. make their escape. Recovering from the excitement of the skirmish with Saya, and plotting once more, Charles picks and chooses from Saya's cozy little adoptive family— "The older brother doesn't interest me," he says, and then selects the younger brother, fourteen-year-old Riku Miyagusuku. His justification for this choice: "A princess in captivity is more appealing." What a way to make a decision! This means, though, that Saya finds a mutilated acquaintance, with a message carved into the poor girl's chest: Dear Saya, your dear little brother and I await you in Vietnam. Then Charles whisks poor Riku away, and settles back down in his Vietnamese manor.
Unfortunately, Solomon, Diva's second Chevalier and the 'older brother' who frightens Charles most, arrives to give his younger charge a scolding - and what a scolding it is, with Solomon severing all of Charles' remaining limbs in order to subdue him. Charles makes a show of compliance, after that, but Riku regains consciousness to find Charles weeping as he softly quotes a Biblical passage, feeling very sorry for himself indeed. Charles is flustered to be caught like this, while Riku is clueless towards his situation in general— and though Charles tries to flounder away, he realizes his altercation with Solomon has left him too drained to do much good, and, when his 'servant' Van doesn't answer his calling, he whirls on Riku and decides to bite into him instead.
A few good mouthfuls of blood later and both boys seem to be fine, each of them re-dressing properly, and accompanying each other to the library. It's here where Charles shows his 'shy side,' as Solomon calls it, which Riku apparently incites. They make good companions for each other, awkward as Charles is, and - most importantly - Riku's unflappable kindness allows Charles to trust and care for him, something entirely unintended on the Chevalier's part. They spend time reading together and talking together and learning things, and Charles almost seems personable. Riku proves to be a very good influence on Charles, who experiences a period of peace and companionship and normal interaction for the first time in a very long while.
It can't last long, of course, and the boys spend only a short amount of time with each other before Van Argeno returns and RUINS EVERYTHING. Charles flies to his underling immediately, domineering and angry, mind snapped back to plans and vicious vengeance. He asks why Van had gone ahead with a part of the plan Charles hadn't ordered, and Van shocks him: he says it was Solomon's command. Well, Charles' fear of Solomon certainly hasn't diminished, and it's safe to say he freaks out a bit - including begging Van not to leave him all alone, not to cast him aside (and including tearing out his own still-beating heart, augh, to offer to Van, promising immortality). He makes quite a mess of himself, and cries a lot, and really shows his loneliness then, but Van presses the heart back into the boy's chest (yikes) and basically tells him to stop being pathetic, since it is a pretty pathetic display. Exhausted, and slumped against Van, Charles reaches a bloody hand out towards Riku for comfort—
And poor darling Riku swats it away without thinking, startled by the blood. He realizes his mistake instantly, seeing Charles' hand for what it is, and quickly tries to amend it, but Charles takes the damage quickly and strongly, and reacts bitterly and with his special brand of feigned haughtiness. It only gets worse from here on out, with Charles whirling away, leaving Riku without another word, and scurrying off to speak with his superiors. Their experimentation has been going well, and they tell him it's his turn for testing: they've created an artificial arm for him to wear, which should help enhance his abilities. He dons it faithfully, and then returns to Riku - though all his warmth towards the boy is gone now, and he leads Riku to an underground bunker and then locks him in a little cell. "We part ways here," he says, and when Riku protests, Charles insists cruelly: "I am a 'Chevalier,' the noblest and highest form of life to walk the Earth... You, on the other hand, are nothing more than a bag filled with blood. We live in different worlds." Then he leaves, to do battle with Saya, who's arrived in search of her little brother.
And do battle with Saya he does, temporarily incapacitating her Chevalier Hagi, and raging at her for being a 'freak' - for killing off their own kind, while 'playing house' with the humans who would otherwise reject her. He seems angry at her for her fleeting happiness, and makes to attack her viciously— then his experimental prosthetic arm gives an alarming click, and Charles realizes that Amshel has rigged it. It explodes, blowing both him and Saya away, and though they're of course still alive, Charles has lost a great deal of blood from his injuries. This is when Van shows up. This is also when Van levels a gun at Charles. Apparently, the experimentation called for some greater data: the group Van belongs to wants to know if it is possible to kill a Chevalier, if it's possible to stop them from regenerating when their blood's been severely depleted. After taking that final blow of betrayal, Charles seems ready to accept his fate— though it seems Riku can't stop meddling. The boy shows up at the last moment.
Riku's older brother Kai had turned up to free him from his cell, during the aboveground fight between Charles and Saya, and so Riku was released (curiously, Charles had used a very flimsy lock to hold Riku in the first place), and what he found waiting for him was a last gift from Charles: a beautifully framed peacock moth. Despite his demonstrated phobia of moths and flying things, Charles had seen how Riku so admired the peacock moth, and saw it as a symbol of their time together. Likely Charles knew that Riku would be rescued, and left the moth as a token of his memory. Unfortunately, he underestimated how earnest and foolhardy exactly Riku was.
So Riku manages to throw himself in front of Charles as Van pulls the trigger, and takes the bullet. Van is inconvenienced, casually accepting that his experiment is ruined, now, and takes his leave; Charles, on the other hand, is absolutely horrified, knowing that as a fragile human, Riku will absolutely die, and wondering why on Earth the boy had done something like this in the first place. Riku explains that he wanted to thank Charles for the peacock moth, and that he 'just had to save him' — of course this wrecks Charles further, and he weeps over Riku, who is fading fast. Then he panics, and clings, and cries into Riku's chest, wailing, I never even wanted... to trust humans...!
Saya chooses this moment to show up, and despite the heartbreaking moment, can only see an enemy Chevalier with the bloodied body of her limp little brother. She rages, convinced that Charles has killed him, and charges; he thinks, A monster can only live amongst monsters. That is why... And just before Saya kills him, she expresses a flicker of doubt, because too late, she sees him smile as he says:
"I've been waiting for this."
Personality: Charles is childlike in appearance, and he's worlds more eerie for it; it doesn't quite match up with his demeanor, and it makes him seem precocious in a way that's easily unsettling. He's clearly an intelligent boy - well-spoken, elegant at his leisure - but devilish excitement tends to bring bursts of profanity, which he likes to use as an intimidation tactic by way of humiliation. Really, Charles does strive to intimidate— he assumes that he's frightening and seeks to play that up that as necessary (or on a whim). This intent to terrify, combined with what certainly appears to be a lack of conscience, makes him seem disturbingly removed from the childhood he should, apparently, be living. So, he’s not a child... but at the same time he is a child: he loves candy, he’s irrationally frightened of moths and other flying insects... If something doesn’t go his way, he’ll throw a tantrum: of the members of his kind, the Chevalier, he truly is the ‘baby brother’, and they never hesitate to mock or punish him accordingly. His acquired wisdom — his sense of being aged — it exists, but it’s an underlying thing. Charles is crabby, Charles is crass, Charles adores goading— or, he did, but he was so thoroughly humbled by the time his death comes at him (that is, by the time I pull him from canon), that he will have moments and moods of resignation: he is a thing that lives, but shouldn’t, but does anyway. Life is very unfair, Charles feels. And life is undeserved by the weak (human beings, and perhaps himself). Even so, he’s crushingly learned that certain soft and weak things deserve life after all, especially when it's swiftly taken away.
It’s really a testament to his twisted emotional development, that he’s only recently realized such a thing. Despite having long since passed the age of adulthood, Charles is such a child because he has been kept a child. The reason he was recreated as a Chevalier, in fact, was to be the playmate for a very childlike individual in the first place. His body stayed young, he was treated by the other Chevalier as though he was young, and so he acts young. Just— there’s a sense that he’s weathered, at the same time. His circumstances have left him stunted, and his days are spent reading and scheming, often alone. Charles has lasted the past fifty years or so, in fact, in relative isolation from the rest of his kind, keeping mostly with the men to whom he can give orders and taunt. It’s a chain of command, after all, and as he’s the lowest of the low when it comes to his ‘comrades,’ he can only flaunt himself to those insignificant creatures he does outrank. He'll give airy orders, he'll pull harshly on a man's necktie to bring them to the same level, and he'll also keep his great age a secret in order to make underlings feel belittled by someone more than half or even a third their age.
Charles has a great love for retribution and dramatics; he sings boldly during battle, quoting Hamlet and imitating Ophelia’s madness with a wild, reckless, cruel joy. He also weeps while giving himself a private reading of the Bible of all things, feeling very sorry for himself and commenting that 'even God makes things difficult', explaining later on, "I was just feeling sorry for my loss." At one point, Charles likens stealing the innocent Riku Miyagusuku away from his family to kidnapping a princess, which makes it 'interesting' for him. As for his fondness for dishing out punishments— Saya Otonashi is the protagonist of the story, and she is also the only person able to kill Charles; she’d nearly done so, during the Vietnam War, but succeeded only in severing an arm while rendering him unable to regenerate it. This character-defining, life-altering incident has led Charles to be driven by one sick goal: an eye for an eye. Though she, during Charles’ first appearance in the story proper, has no memory of this, Charles is quite eager to exact revenge; he wants to make her suffer, and he wants to make her remember, and—
Well, it seems her wants her to die, but as she makes to kill him, he’s really very relieved.
Humans are lowly. This is a natural fact to Charles, and he fancies himself quite grand for the species he’s become; he tells a boy, "You [...] are nothing more than a bag filled with blood. We live in different worlds." It’s perhaps unfortunate that he’d become irrevocably attached to this boy, Riku Miyagusuku, then; Charles’ firm and frightened belief that they could not coexist ultimately lead to his own death, and nearly to Riku’s. Charles’ ‘carektaker,’ a human man called Van Argeno, easily manipulated Charles into this belief, using Charles’ own dependency on him. The littlest Chevalier has, in his own words, always been alone, yet he begs for Van to stay at his side, offering his heart (literally— as in, the organ, tearing it out and offering it in his palm, so that Van might attain immortality himself) and weeping. (Charles is, in fact, surprisingly prone to crying.) Weeping leads to rage; rage leads to exhaustion; exhaustion leads to irritability, and this seems to be a pretty consistent cycle for such a scary monster. Basically, he’s in constant need of a nap. But he has his bright moments, his joyful noise, though it’s generally born of some sort of sadism or juvenile whimsy. He enjoys spilling blood, he enjoys hunting games— so long as he has the higher ground, of course. Things are like toys, or mice, or dogs to be ordered about: he takes pleasure in teasing, taunting, and lording himself coyly.
It's interesting, however, how exactly that pleasure may choose to manifest itself at any given time. Higher levels of excitement bring a sicker sort of glee, filled with profanity and childish cruelty, but other cases have him enjoying himself while being very refined. He acts and is treated as a Lord, as nobility (and it seems implied that he was perhaps of noble blood, before his turning), and surrounds himself with wealth and taste. His manor, his clothing, and... well, most of what he keeps, in fact— they're largely outdated, and this, along with his obsession with Saya, and other instances of laser-guided focus, points to him fixating on the past: he finds something prominent and will hold onto it for years and years.
His pining after days gone by is the only steady relationship he's been able to keep with anything, in fact. Relationships and ties in general are a problem for Charles. Cast down by his previous peers, he holds for them fear rather than faith, and humankind as a whole is unworthy of his trust. This is what he says, at least: the boy Riku Miyagusuku had earned that trust, by the end, and it made Charles cry and cry — "I never even wanted to trust humans!" Another Chevalier, Solomon, comments that Riku brings out Charles' 'shy side' - he interacts awkwardly with Riku, trying and failing to frighten the boy and blushing furiously when offered such simple yet genuine kindness and companionship. Though the two spent only a small amount of time near each other, most of that was spent with each other; they read together, sat together, and Charles (re-?)learned the sweetness of a human boy. Then, of course, disaster did strike, so Charles is either proven right or fate is just incredibly cruel to him. (He's absolutely the type to claim the latter, and sulk about his hard existence. If Saya hadn't been the one to kill him, he'd have ended up drowning in his own self-pity.)
Concisely, Charles is a very small terror who's caught between traits attributed to both his age and the youth of his face. Demanding, vindictive, and somehow endearingly awkward if you catch him just right, Charles is in a place emotionally where he does realize the value of life—
But it still doesn't mean his respect can be earned so easily.
Abilities: Charles is no longer a human boy: he is a Chevalier, ‘the noblest and highest life to walk on Earth’ (which is a self-proclaimed boast, but one that may hold water). More accurately, he’s what’s called a Chiropteran, more thoroughly described here. Though he was ‘removed from the line of Chevaliers’ due to his own shortcomings, it’s still essentially his species, and so it grants him a great deal: his body naturally comes with enhanced speed, strength, and senses.
He’s immortal— or, he can regenerate nearly instantaneously, but it’s theorized that if you barrage a Chevalier too quickly for it to be able to pull itself together, and then ‘kill’ it, it will actually die. (The only proven way to kill any Chiropteran is to inject it with the blood of a certain Queen Chiropteran.) As a note: The wikia link sent regarding Chiropterans states that Chevaliers can be killed by decapitation. This is not stated to be true in the manga version. Furthermore, he claims that his own blood or heart can grant a human immortality. This is never demonstrated, however, so the details are unclear.
His body has ceased aging and will never begin again; his hands, when he had them both, were able to shift into extremely large, monstrous claws. Now that he’s left with only one arm, his remaining hand is still able to do so, as pictured. Its skin is remarkably thick, impenetrable by something so simple as bullets or blades, and its claws can effortlessly cleave through bone and then some.
Brashness aside, Charles is very intelligent (even capable of strategizing when he's in the mood for it), as well as multilingual, ranging from at least proficient to fluent in, at minimum, French, Vietnamese, Japanese, English, and German. He's also got a wicked lovely voice, be it for opera or recitations (and that's when he's not singing at a tone too high for humankind to hear, similar to bat-like pitches, in order to draw out or lead the lowest creatures of the Chiropteran family). And, he's well-read, with a quick memory, spouting Biblical and Shakespearean verse with ease.
Samples
Dialogue: This is a sample thread from Holly Heights, but as the game doesn't really deal in horror, here also is something Charles might come up with in Inugami:
[Charles gives in and quietly pins a note to the school's bulletin board on his third day in the school. The handwriting is loopy and complex, though the hand to have written it seems to have been shaking.]
ASSISTANT WANTED
Requirements:
• competence (Must be able to carry out tasks satisfactorily.)
• common sense (Idiots need not apply.)
• respect (Don't talk back.)
• basic hygiene (Don't smell.)
• two hands (Self-explanatory.)
Preferences:
• tall
• physically fit
• aesthetically pleasing
• knowledge of the Arts
Your tasks will include washing and dressing me, but I don't want any perverts responding to this advert. I'm very powerful, and I won't be taken advantage of in any way by some pig. Other duties include securing food for all three meals, [since it's already getting hard for this shitty body to live on one hurried meal a day, and Charles doesn't fancy carrying his own meals through the cafeteria,] as well as finding a safe place to sleep each night.
Reply here with your credentials, and I'll be in touch with you.
[That line is crossed out, after Charles had stopped for a moment and realized that the kids hanging round here wouldn't have any credentials to provide — this isn't going to be like Van. There are no organizations for Charles to take charge of. So...]
Wait at the stairwell closest to the entrance of the school. I'll find you. We'll speak then, and I'll evaluate you for the position.
Don't look for me.
Exposition/Introspection: He's been wearing the same clothes for three days.
Truly, this is a personal hell. It's a really specific punishment — he's grimy. His clothing makes him feel almost as disgraced as he actually is. It clings to him, and his hair is... oily... It's enough to make Charles fully recede, sticking to what shadows he can, wanting desperately to hide his unclean self from even — especially — those who disgust him. (That's pretty much everyone who dares to come across him by accident.) He's at least washed his face in a bathroom sink, and he slinks around at lunchtime, trying hard to blend in with the other 'students' — which is mortifying, since he should be standing apart from all of this cattle. Even worse, he wants to keep hiding. But he's so hungry...
And it's a frightful hunger, a craving for more than iron and sugar. He doesn't want to drink blood. He doesn't exactly want to eat the soft white rice the school offers him, either, but it fills his belly once a day, and he gets sleepy afterward. Agitated, he's been tucking himself away underneath stairwells, forcing his eyes to stay open, and only growing more paranoid when he keeps himself from the sleep he somehow needs. His worst fears are confirmed when he tries and fails to summon his Chiropteran's claw: he's as soft and white as the rice, now. He's flimsy and human. So, yes, it's hell. And he's wearing dirty clothes, because he can't undo the endless buttons of his blazer by himself.
What about the long sleep? Where is the dark, the endless dream? Death is even crueler than expected, but Charles supposes it's meant to be this way, with how much he's sinned. Still, God has a pretty sick sense of humor, doesn't He? Charles curls further against the wall, underneath the stairwell. Three days in hell...
It's already too much.
Name/Alias: Rinna
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panickingContact: AIM — ridiculous moths / plurk —
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Character Information
Name/Alias: His given name is Carl; he has been known exclusively by Charles for around thirty years.
Fandom: Blood+ (manga)
Canonpoint: About a fourth of the way through volume three; after his death.
Gender: male
Age: ??? For appearance's sake, he looks to be about twelve or thirteen; he's been alive for much longer, though. Given the series' timeline, and Charles' role as Diva's first 'playmate' Chevalier, it wouldn't be unreasonable to assume he's been around since the late 1800s. Therefore, from then till present day in the manga, 110+ years old seems like a nice rounded guess, give a take a few... years? Decades? Ah, vague histories.
Physical Description: Charles is regal but small. Notably, he has only one arm; its stump is monstrous due to his nature as a Chevalier.
History: Wiki here, but there isn't much information. Here's what I have:
Charles is one of those characters whose entrance and exit are both riotous; he leaves no room for any gradual telling of his tale. Because of this, his backstory is hardly visited at all— when it comes down to it, we know two things about his past: he lost his humanity at a very young age, quite a while ago, recreated to be the resilient playmate of the childlike Chiropteran Queen Diva; and he lost his arm to Chiropteran Queen Saya during the latter years of the Vietnam War (about thirty years ago, the manga says). Apart from these hard facts, we can only speculate, and so we will, though sparingly.
'Charles,' by the way is a name given to him, right after that incident during the War. Once he was a boy called Carl, though so little is known about that: it can be guessed that he was French, due to him interjecting and leaving notes in the French language as one might do with their native tongue. Though the circumstances of this arrangement are never explored, young Carl was whisked away to meet Diva, a very cruel, very childish vampiric being, and, before he could hit puberty, was 'turned' by Diva into a vampiric being himself, subservient to her. The plan was for Carl, now forever a child, to be a playmate for Diva, forever childlike, and this worked well for some time, with Carl growing to be one of the only things Diva thought beloved. They played together and cared for each other, with Carl servicing Diva in whatever ways she required— this included protecting her, at times, from those who sought to harm her, the primary culprit in this being Saya, Diva's own sister.
It's Saya who changed everything, decades and decades after Carl first began his life anew with Diva. While battling fiercely with Saya, for the sake of keeping Saya away from Diva, Carl was struck with a vicious blow: Saya severed his arm. Normally such an injury wouldn't warrant a second thought from Carl, thanks to his regenerative abilities, but Queens are dangerous to Chevaliers. Saya's blood is all that can kill one of Carl's kind— when her blood mixes with theirs, it crystalizes, eventually killing the Chevalier. Carl found this out through firsthand experience of the most painful sort; she hacked off his arm, and he, desperate, hacked off the rest before it could crystalize into the rest of his body. Saya escaped and Carl was left crippled, an imperfect body for a perfect being.
Upon trying to return to Diva, Carl found that he was barred from doing so. Amshel, Diva's first and most commanding Chevalier, revealed to Carl that for his failings, and for endangering Diva, he was to be demoted. This meant that while Carl as a species was still a Chevalier, he was no longer permitted to use that title; and he was to be separated from Diva from then on, as she was told he'd been killed. Amshel stripped Carl of his name, re-christening him Charles, and decreed that Charles would now be nothing more than a test subject, used by the rest of Diva's Chevaliers to test their limitations and find out more about themselves. Banished back to Vietnam, Charles was left alone, thoughts of vengeance and a growing obsession with Saya his only companions. Holed up in a lavish manor, for decades, he crept and schemed and surrounded himself with beautiful blue roses, the only remnant of Diva left to him. He would participate in the Chevalier's experiments, he would wait for Saya to awaken, and he would avenge himself. This was his drive.
Present day, and Saya has come out of the hibernation typical to Queens - but she still isn't herself. When Charles catches wind of this, he takes it upon himself to travel to Japan and greet her— this is against the orders he'd received from his betters, but he cannot seem to contain himself. While making quite a spectacle - and massacre - of the school play Saya is performing in, Charles swoops in to see her for himself, and is quite irate to find that she cannot remember him at all. She can't remember anything about her nature as a Queen, in fact, and Charles, not taking kindly to this, sets to provoking her in any way he can. He insults and assaults Saya's own Chevalier, Hagi, but it's only when Charles threatens to hurt a boy named Kai that Saya retaliates angrily. Kai, after all, has become an important and much beloved adoptive brother of Saya's, and she cannot bear to see her family harmed. Charles finds this hilarious - this concept of family, of Saya having family - and it gives him exactly the opening he needs, though Saya and co. make their escape. Recovering from the excitement of the skirmish with Saya, and plotting once more, Charles picks and chooses from Saya's cozy little adoptive family— "The older brother doesn't interest me," he says, and then selects the younger brother, fourteen-year-old Riku Miyagusuku. His justification for this choice: "A princess in captivity is more appealing." What a way to make a decision! This means, though, that Saya finds a mutilated acquaintance, with a message carved into the poor girl's chest: Dear Saya, your dear little brother and I await you in Vietnam. Then Charles whisks poor Riku away, and settles back down in his Vietnamese manor.
Unfortunately, Solomon, Diva's second Chevalier and the 'older brother' who frightens Charles most, arrives to give his younger charge a scolding - and what a scolding it is, with Solomon severing all of Charles' remaining limbs in order to subdue him. Charles makes a show of compliance, after that, but Riku regains consciousness to find Charles weeping as he softly quotes a Biblical passage, feeling very sorry for himself indeed. Charles is flustered to be caught like this, while Riku is clueless towards his situation in general— and though Charles tries to flounder away, he realizes his altercation with Solomon has left him too drained to do much good, and, when his 'servant' Van doesn't answer his calling, he whirls on Riku and decides to bite into him instead.
A few good mouthfuls of blood later and both boys seem to be fine, each of them re-dressing properly, and accompanying each other to the library. It's here where Charles shows his 'shy side,' as Solomon calls it, which Riku apparently incites. They make good companions for each other, awkward as Charles is, and - most importantly - Riku's unflappable kindness allows Charles to trust and care for him, something entirely unintended on the Chevalier's part. They spend time reading together and talking together and learning things, and Charles almost seems personable. Riku proves to be a very good influence on Charles, who experiences a period of peace and companionship and normal interaction for the first time in a very long while.
It can't last long, of course, and the boys spend only a short amount of time with each other before Van Argeno returns and RUINS EVERYTHING. Charles flies to his underling immediately, domineering and angry, mind snapped back to plans and vicious vengeance. He asks why Van had gone ahead with a part of the plan Charles hadn't ordered, and Van shocks him: he says it was Solomon's command. Well, Charles' fear of Solomon certainly hasn't diminished, and it's safe to say he freaks out a bit - including begging Van not to leave him all alone, not to cast him aside (and including tearing out his own still-beating heart, augh, to offer to Van, promising immortality). He makes quite a mess of himself, and cries a lot, and really shows his loneliness then, but Van presses the heart back into the boy's chest (yikes) and basically tells him to stop being pathetic, since it is a pretty pathetic display. Exhausted, and slumped against Van, Charles reaches a bloody hand out towards Riku for comfort—
And poor darling Riku swats it away without thinking, startled by the blood. He realizes his mistake instantly, seeing Charles' hand for what it is, and quickly tries to amend it, but Charles takes the damage quickly and strongly, and reacts bitterly and with his special brand of feigned haughtiness. It only gets worse from here on out, with Charles whirling away, leaving Riku without another word, and scurrying off to speak with his superiors. Their experimentation has been going well, and they tell him it's his turn for testing: they've created an artificial arm for him to wear, which should help enhance his abilities. He dons it faithfully, and then returns to Riku - though all his warmth towards the boy is gone now, and he leads Riku to an underground bunker and then locks him in a little cell. "We part ways here," he says, and when Riku protests, Charles insists cruelly: "I am a 'Chevalier,' the noblest and highest form of life to walk the Earth... You, on the other hand, are nothing more than a bag filled with blood. We live in different worlds." Then he leaves, to do battle with Saya, who's arrived in search of her little brother.
And do battle with Saya he does, temporarily incapacitating her Chevalier Hagi, and raging at her for being a 'freak' - for killing off their own kind, while 'playing house' with the humans who would otherwise reject her. He seems angry at her for her fleeting happiness, and makes to attack her viciously— then his experimental prosthetic arm gives an alarming click, and Charles realizes that Amshel has rigged it. It explodes, blowing both him and Saya away, and though they're of course still alive, Charles has lost a great deal of blood from his injuries. This is when Van shows up. This is also when Van levels a gun at Charles. Apparently, the experimentation called for some greater data: the group Van belongs to wants to know if it is possible to kill a Chevalier, if it's possible to stop them from regenerating when their blood's been severely depleted. After taking that final blow of betrayal, Charles seems ready to accept his fate— though it seems Riku can't stop meddling. The boy shows up at the last moment.
Riku's older brother Kai had turned up to free him from his cell, during the aboveground fight between Charles and Saya, and so Riku was released (curiously, Charles had used a very flimsy lock to hold Riku in the first place), and what he found waiting for him was a last gift from Charles: a beautifully framed peacock moth. Despite his demonstrated phobia of moths and flying things, Charles had seen how Riku so admired the peacock moth, and saw it as a symbol of their time together. Likely Charles knew that Riku would be rescued, and left the moth as a token of his memory. Unfortunately, he underestimated how earnest and foolhardy exactly Riku was.
So Riku manages to throw himself in front of Charles as Van pulls the trigger, and takes the bullet. Van is inconvenienced, casually accepting that his experiment is ruined, now, and takes his leave; Charles, on the other hand, is absolutely horrified, knowing that as a fragile human, Riku will absolutely die, and wondering why on Earth the boy had done something like this in the first place. Riku explains that he wanted to thank Charles for the peacock moth, and that he 'just had to save him' — of course this wrecks Charles further, and he weeps over Riku, who is fading fast. Then he panics, and clings, and cries into Riku's chest, wailing, I never even wanted... to trust humans...!
Saya chooses this moment to show up, and despite the heartbreaking moment, can only see an enemy Chevalier with the bloodied body of her limp little brother. She rages, convinced that Charles has killed him, and charges; he thinks, A monster can only live amongst monsters. That is why... And just before Saya kills him, she expresses a flicker of doubt, because too late, she sees him smile as he says:
"I've been waiting for this."
Personality: Charles is childlike in appearance, and he's worlds more eerie for it; it doesn't quite match up with his demeanor, and it makes him seem precocious in a way that's easily unsettling. He's clearly an intelligent boy - well-spoken, elegant at his leisure - but devilish excitement tends to bring bursts of profanity, which he likes to use as an intimidation tactic by way of humiliation. Really, Charles does strive to intimidate— he assumes that he's frightening and seeks to play that up that as necessary (or on a whim). This intent to terrify, combined with what certainly appears to be a lack of conscience, makes him seem disturbingly removed from the childhood he should, apparently, be living. So, he’s not a child... but at the same time he is a child: he loves candy, he’s irrationally frightened of moths and other flying insects... If something doesn’t go his way, he’ll throw a tantrum: of the members of his kind, the Chevalier, he truly is the ‘baby brother’, and they never hesitate to mock or punish him accordingly. His acquired wisdom — his sense of being aged — it exists, but it’s an underlying thing. Charles is crabby, Charles is crass, Charles adores goading— or, he did, but he was so thoroughly humbled by the time his death comes at him (that is, by the time I pull him from canon), that he will have moments and moods of resignation: he is a thing that lives, but shouldn’t, but does anyway. Life is very unfair, Charles feels. And life is undeserved by the weak (human beings, and perhaps himself). Even so, he’s crushingly learned that certain soft and weak things deserve life after all, especially when it's swiftly taken away.
It’s really a testament to his twisted emotional development, that he’s only recently realized such a thing. Despite having long since passed the age of adulthood, Charles is such a child because he has been kept a child. The reason he was recreated as a Chevalier, in fact, was to be the playmate for a very childlike individual in the first place. His body stayed young, he was treated by the other Chevalier as though he was young, and so he acts young. Just— there’s a sense that he’s weathered, at the same time. His circumstances have left him stunted, and his days are spent reading and scheming, often alone. Charles has lasted the past fifty years or so, in fact, in relative isolation from the rest of his kind, keeping mostly with the men to whom he can give orders and taunt. It’s a chain of command, after all, and as he’s the lowest of the low when it comes to his ‘comrades,’ he can only flaunt himself to those insignificant creatures he does outrank. He'll give airy orders, he'll pull harshly on a man's necktie to bring them to the same level, and he'll also keep his great age a secret in order to make underlings feel belittled by someone more than half or even a third their age.
Charles has a great love for retribution and dramatics; he sings boldly during battle, quoting Hamlet and imitating Ophelia’s madness with a wild, reckless, cruel joy. He also weeps while giving himself a private reading of the Bible of all things, feeling very sorry for himself and commenting that 'even God makes things difficult', explaining later on, "I was just feeling sorry for my loss." At one point, Charles likens stealing the innocent Riku Miyagusuku away from his family to kidnapping a princess, which makes it 'interesting' for him. As for his fondness for dishing out punishments— Saya Otonashi is the protagonist of the story, and she is also the only person able to kill Charles; she’d nearly done so, during the Vietnam War, but succeeded only in severing an arm while rendering him unable to regenerate it. This character-defining, life-altering incident has led Charles to be driven by one sick goal: an eye for an eye. Though she, during Charles’ first appearance in the story proper, has no memory of this, Charles is quite eager to exact revenge; he wants to make her suffer, and he wants to make her remember, and—
Well, it seems her wants her to die, but as she makes to kill him, he’s really very relieved.
Humans are lowly. This is a natural fact to Charles, and he fancies himself quite grand for the species he’s become; he tells a boy, "You [...] are nothing more than a bag filled with blood. We live in different worlds." It’s perhaps unfortunate that he’d become irrevocably attached to this boy, Riku Miyagusuku, then; Charles’ firm and frightened belief that they could not coexist ultimately lead to his own death, and nearly to Riku’s. Charles’ ‘carektaker,’ a human man called Van Argeno, easily manipulated Charles into this belief, using Charles’ own dependency on him. The littlest Chevalier has, in his own words, always been alone, yet he begs for Van to stay at his side, offering his heart (literally— as in, the organ, tearing it out and offering it in his palm, so that Van might attain immortality himself) and weeping. (Charles is, in fact, surprisingly prone to crying.) Weeping leads to rage; rage leads to exhaustion; exhaustion leads to irritability, and this seems to be a pretty consistent cycle for such a scary monster. Basically, he’s in constant need of a nap. But he has his bright moments, his joyful noise, though it’s generally born of some sort of sadism or juvenile whimsy. He enjoys spilling blood, he enjoys hunting games— so long as he has the higher ground, of course. Things are like toys, or mice, or dogs to be ordered about: he takes pleasure in teasing, taunting, and lording himself coyly.
It's interesting, however, how exactly that pleasure may choose to manifest itself at any given time. Higher levels of excitement bring a sicker sort of glee, filled with profanity and childish cruelty, but other cases have him enjoying himself while being very refined. He acts and is treated as a Lord, as nobility (and it seems implied that he was perhaps of noble blood, before his turning), and surrounds himself with wealth and taste. His manor, his clothing, and... well, most of what he keeps, in fact— they're largely outdated, and this, along with his obsession with Saya, and other instances of laser-guided focus, points to him fixating on the past: he finds something prominent and will hold onto it for years and years.
His pining after days gone by is the only steady relationship he's been able to keep with anything, in fact. Relationships and ties in general are a problem for Charles. Cast down by his previous peers, he holds for them fear rather than faith, and humankind as a whole is unworthy of his trust. This is what he says, at least: the boy Riku Miyagusuku had earned that trust, by the end, and it made Charles cry and cry — "I never even wanted to trust humans!" Another Chevalier, Solomon, comments that Riku brings out Charles' 'shy side' - he interacts awkwardly with Riku, trying and failing to frighten the boy and blushing furiously when offered such simple yet genuine kindness and companionship. Though the two spent only a small amount of time near each other, most of that was spent with each other; they read together, sat together, and Charles (re-?)learned the sweetness of a human boy. Then, of course, disaster did strike, so Charles is either proven right or fate is just incredibly cruel to him. (He's absolutely the type to claim the latter, and sulk about his hard existence. If Saya hadn't been the one to kill him, he'd have ended up drowning in his own self-pity.)
Concisely, Charles is a very small terror who's caught between traits attributed to both his age and the youth of his face. Demanding, vindictive, and somehow endearingly awkward if you catch him just right, Charles is in a place emotionally where he does realize the value of life—
But it still doesn't mean his respect can be earned so easily.
Abilities: Charles is no longer a human boy: he is a Chevalier, ‘the noblest and highest life to walk on Earth’ (which is a self-proclaimed boast, but one that may hold water). More accurately, he’s what’s called a Chiropteran, more thoroughly described here. Though he was ‘removed from the line of Chevaliers’ due to his own shortcomings, it’s still essentially his species, and so it grants him a great deal: his body naturally comes with enhanced speed, strength, and senses.
He’s immortal— or, he can regenerate nearly instantaneously, but it’s theorized that if you barrage a Chevalier too quickly for it to be able to pull itself together, and then ‘kill’ it, it will actually die. (The only proven way to kill any Chiropteran is to inject it with the blood of a certain Queen Chiropteran.) As a note: The wikia link sent regarding Chiropterans states that Chevaliers can be killed by decapitation. This is not stated to be true in the manga version. Furthermore, he claims that his own blood or heart can grant a human immortality. This is never demonstrated, however, so the details are unclear.
His body has ceased aging and will never begin again; his hands, when he had them both, were able to shift into extremely large, monstrous claws. Now that he’s left with only one arm, his remaining hand is still able to do so, as pictured. Its skin is remarkably thick, impenetrable by something so simple as bullets or blades, and its claws can effortlessly cleave through bone and then some.
Brashness aside, Charles is very intelligent (even capable of strategizing when he's in the mood for it), as well as multilingual, ranging from at least proficient to fluent in, at minimum, French, Vietnamese, Japanese, English, and German. He's also got a wicked lovely voice, be it for opera or recitations (and that's when he's not singing at a tone too high for humankind to hear, similar to bat-like pitches, in order to draw out or lead the lowest creatures of the Chiropteran family). And, he's well-read, with a quick memory, spouting Biblical and Shakespearean verse with ease.
Samples
Dialogue: This is a sample thread from Holly Heights, but as the game doesn't really deal in horror, here also is something Charles might come up with in Inugami:
[Charles gives in and quietly pins a note to the school's bulletin board on his third day in the school. The handwriting is loopy and complex, though the hand to have written it seems to have been shaking.]
Requirements:
• competence (Must be able to carry out tasks satisfactorily.)
• common sense (Idiots need not apply.)
• respect (Don't talk back.)
• basic hygiene (Don't smell.)
• two hands (Self-explanatory.)
Preferences:
• tall
• physically fit
• aesthetically pleasing
• knowledge of the Arts
Your tasks will include washing and dressing me, but I don't want any perverts responding to this advert. I'm very powerful, and I won't be taken advantage of in any way by some pig. Other duties include securing food for all three meals, [since it's already getting hard for this shitty body to live on one hurried meal a day, and Charles doesn't fancy carrying his own meals through the cafeteria,] as well as finding a safe place to sleep each night.
[That line is crossed out, after Charles had stopped for a moment and realized that the kids hanging round here wouldn't have any credentials to provide — this isn't going to be like Van. There are no organizations for Charles to take charge of. So...]
Wait at the stairwell closest to the entrance of the school. I'll find you. We'll speak then, and I'll evaluate you for the position.
Don't look for me.
Exposition/Introspection: He's been wearing the same clothes for three days.
Truly, this is a personal hell. It's a really specific punishment — he's grimy. His clothing makes him feel almost as disgraced as he actually is. It clings to him, and his hair is... oily... It's enough to make Charles fully recede, sticking to what shadows he can, wanting desperately to hide his unclean self from even — especially — those who disgust him. (That's pretty much everyone who dares to come across him by accident.) He's at least washed his face in a bathroom sink, and he slinks around at lunchtime, trying hard to blend in with the other 'students' — which is mortifying, since he should be standing apart from all of this cattle. Even worse, he wants to keep hiding. But he's so hungry...
And it's a frightful hunger, a craving for more than iron and sugar. He doesn't want to drink blood. He doesn't exactly want to eat the soft white rice the school offers him, either, but it fills his belly once a day, and he gets sleepy afterward. Agitated, he's been tucking himself away underneath stairwells, forcing his eyes to stay open, and only growing more paranoid when he keeps himself from the sleep he somehow needs. His worst fears are confirmed when he tries and fails to summon his Chiropteran's claw: he's as soft and white as the rice, now. He's flimsy and human. So, yes, it's hell. And he's wearing dirty clothes, because he can't undo the endless buttons of his blazer by himself.
What about the long sleep? Where is the dark, the endless dream? Death is even crueler than expected, but Charles supposes it's meant to be this way, with how much he's sinned. Still, God has a pretty sick sense of humor, doesn't He? Charles curls further against the wall, underneath the stairwell. Three days in hell...
It's already too much.