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barge application
Jan. 19th, 2012 09:53 pmUser Name/Nick: Mouse
User DW: I...am lacking one. Sadly.
AIM/IM: AIM/runsfromtheshop
E-mail: myrp.accounts@yahoo.com
Other Characters: None.
Character Name: Charlene Roberta McGee AKA Charlie
Series: Firestarter (movies)
Age: 18
From When?: Before the events of the second film which I am ignoring for more reasons than I can count.
Inmate/Warden: Warden. She's stubborn, for starters, and doesn't take shit from anyone. She's also a bit emotionless, kind of selfish and really just wants to help someone for her own means. This makes her goal oriented, too. She's very focused when she needs to be. She also has a slightly softer, less mistrustful side and actually does want to see the best in people. It's just been a while since she's actually had that opportunity.
Item: Cellphone. Via text messages.
Abilities/Powers: (from wikipedia) Charlie was born with pyrokinesis, but she also had powers that she inherited from her parents: Mental domination (which is the ability to make a person do what she wants them to at a thought), telepathy, telekinesis, and precognition. All of her powers were connected with her power to start fires.
She sometimes had a hard time controlling her abilities, especially when she was upset or angry. Also, as she got older it did seem like her powers were growing and she was also getting better control.
It is later stated that, when Charlie grows older, she may be able to cause nuclear explosions by sheer force of will, with some of the doctors responsible for the experiment believing that she may one day be powerful enough to crack the world in two.
Unlike her parents, Charlie does not receive any strain from using her abilities.
A quick break-down of her abilities for you. The pyrokinesis is her strongest ability. It's the one that matters most and is the biggest source of emotional discomfort for Charlie. She doesn't want to use it unless she absolutely has to so it's not like she'll walk around just starting fires for laughs. It's defense, not offense. Like a porcupine shooting quills or a rattlesnake and it's bite. It's a last resort when cornered. It is connected with big, powerful emotions like panic or fear or rage. The bigger the emotion, the harder it is for her to focus on keeping her ability in check.
The Mental Domination ability isn't one she was aware of until a couple years after her run in with the Shop. Towards the end of the film when Charlie and her father were trying to make their escape, a Shop agent had lead her to the rendezvous spot and Charlie told him to leave. When he didn't, she tried again and wasn't aware she'd used this ability on him to get him to leave. She thought it was the threat to fry him.
Another thing to remember with this ability is how limited it is. She absolutely cannot just go around pushing everyone to do what she wants. It depends on the persons intelligence. If they're an idiot, it takes effort. If they're smart, it's significantly easier. She isn't sure why this is. She also has to push carefully, otherwise she's stuck with someone who is codependent on her, waiting for her to tell them what to do. Her pushes can also cause an echo, a chain of disconnected thoughts that the person obsesses over. This usually progresses to a mental breakdown. This ability is not something she likes using at all, same with her fire.
The telepathy is also highly limited and it's really more like intuition than anything genuinely telepathic. She can't poke around in someone's head. She can't just read the mind of anyone. And she has to have an emotional connection to that person. Case in point; her father and she were running from the Shop and they were trying to figure out where to go. At one point, her father had thought about going to his grandfathers cabin and not a second after he thought it that Charlie voiced it, asking why they couldn't go there for a while. Her father was someone she loved and trusted implicitly so it worked between them.
The telekinesis is always coupled with her pyrokinesis. Set something on fire, fling it towards the target. It's the only time she's seen using it and it's likely she wasn't even aware the burning and throwing were two separate things for a good long while. It's limited. She can stop bullets with it but usually ends up hitting those hard with her pyrokinesis to destroy them. She can also use it to shut doors or throw objects she's set on fire (Which we've mentioned) but it's not like she can lift a boulder with it. It's for lighter objects. Rocks, books, things of that size.
(Now, I understand full well that most mods will read this ability section and cringe. Her control over her pyrokinesis is impeccable, for the most part. It's in her personality section when it might be problematic. As for her other abilities, they will not be used on anyone without their permission and I do not plan on having Charlie cause any damage or harm to the setting or other players unless it's been plotted out and run past mods. I don't wish to step on toes with Charlie or her abilities or cause an uncomfortable environment for other players.)
Personality: Charlie has been through enough to change anyone drastically. She's been able to light fires since a week old and has, since then, been taught it was a very bad thing. This has given her a fear of it and because of this fear, it was uncontrolled for the longest time. Her father once had her practice her pyrokinesis on a piece of toast and Charlie ended up setting it on fire. Her mother said she'd had enough but Charlie wanted to continue. Her anger at being told no caused her to lash out subconsciously, the fire igniting her mothers oven mitts. While her mother remained mostly undamaged, it was still further enforced in the little girls mind that the fire was a Very Bad Thing.She learned control while being held captive by The Shop and even after she'd used it to take out the entire facility, she still felt remorse for what she'd done and vowed to never use it again to harm anyone else. Mostly because of the destruction she caused and partly because she enjoyed using such a Very Bad Thing so much.
She keeps her emotions even. For her, anything too big can be hugely problematic. Extreme emotions like rage or fear can result in fires she actually finds difficult to control, thus causing her more anxiety and stress in the situation. She also has herself convinced that the bigger, happier emotions will be problematic but this isn't true. She's just afraid to let those emotions happen. She smiles, she laughs. She jokes, teases, snarks, throws out sarcastic comments when she thinks it necessary (which is actually more often than it should be) but for all anyone knows, it's probably bull. She has unintentionally taught herself to be fake to survive whether it be lying about her name, where she's been, where she's going or even how something's making her feel.
She is still a sweet, kind girl but because of trust and abandonment issues, she doesn't try to form relationships. She's best with single-serving friends. That person you strike up a brief conversation with at the store simply because you liked their shirt or the cheerful barista at that coffee shop you visited once. Those sort of moments are what work best for her. A part of her thinks that she will either be rejected and hated because of what she can do. Or people will want something horrible from her for it.She's used to screwing up relationships, the few times she does let them happen. She sabotages any of her own chances of happiness by either pushing the person away or just leaving whatever part of the world she's in. Nothing is static for her through her own actions and she actually believes this is an acceptable way to live.
She's also used to people being taken from her. She's used to losing everyone she cares for so she just does not bother making those kinds of connections. They're not worth it, in her opinion and this leaves her feeling lonely. She tries to not make this loneliness obvious, though her social awkwardness and uncomfortableness in group settings might be obvious to people looking hard enough.
Charlie's going to feel uncomfortable in the Barge for a while. She's not used to such a constant and large amount of people so I think at first she'll be a bit shaken. She'll also still be certain this is too good to be true and this is just another trick. She's just naturally mistrustful of anything good in her life but, this is an opportunity to have the Shop out of her life and she's all for it, even if she does think that's just too good to be real. I think, though, she'll quickly come to the conclusion that this really is something she needs to test.
She'll be willingly interacting with the other wardens. Trading notes, trying to help them where she can and even trying to make friends with them. She'll see this as necessary and pivotal to her success since she's the new girl on the block and everyone else has been here a while. Other inmates not her own will be a little different. She won't quite be trying to form a relationship with them. Nothing huge, anyway. She'll be trying more to focus on her own inmate, put him above the others and try to form some kind of bond with them. She realizes this will be an uneasy bond at best, but feels it's in their best interest to show at least some kind of concern and caring and genuine interest in their well-being and graduation. But, again, this is also a lot to do with her need to improve her own life.
The only thing that triggers extreme stress for her is life-and-death situations. I mentioned she keeps her emotions calm and even and this is easy for her for the most part. Her life has programmed her with a quick fight-or-flight response to potentially hazardous and life threatening situations, however, and if she sees no other way around it she'll chose fight. She's survived by being stubborn. She doesn't get angry at people's behavior often. Annoyed, sure, but not enough to be stressed. If it does get to that point with people and she has the opportunity, she will get away from the situation as best as she can. She sees no point in causing damage to anyone or anything if she doesn't absolutely have to.
Another stress trigger for her is when someone she cares for is threatened. This is just flat out a no go for her and is something that will trigger a bigger fight response for her. It's a bit harder for her to handle this sort of thing, considering how many loved ones she's lost right before her eyes.
Personality-wise, there are some aspects of her personality from Firestarter 2 that I will draw from. In that movie, she was a bit quiet. Kept to herself and was a bit awkward in some situations. She walked in on a couple making out between shelves of books and her reaction was to look at her feet and hold up the book she was trying to put away. It wasn't something she'd ever experienced, herself.
She's also resourceful. She knows how to find the information she needs, even if she has to lie to get it. She was posing as a student to work in a library and probably pushed people to get the job since normally that'd require identification so she's also a bit dishonest but these are her survival skills. Without them, it's likely she'd have died years ago.
I think being on the Barge will change this for her after a while, to be honest. At first, she's going to think this wasn't a good idea because there was nowhere for her to escape to if things got to be too much. But then eventually she'll realize some of the people there are actually okay and it's really fine to trust people and feel things. It will be a while and take a lot of hard work on her end, but that's what will make being in this setting worth it.
History:
Charlie's story starts well before she was born. Two broke college students signed up to be part of an experiment run by a group known simply as The Shop. A chemical compound called Lot Six, a synthetic pituitary secretion designed to hopefully awaken psychic potential in humans, needed testing. It failed for the most part. Most test subjects either died or went insane, except for Vicki Tomlinson and Andrew McGee. They developed an array of abilities ranging from telepathy to empathy to mental domination and telekinesis and The Shop found this interesting. Things became even more fascinating when Vicki and Andrew got married and had a child and a week after the child was born, she became something of interest to The Shop. The little girl was also affected by Lot Six and she was a danger to everyone around her.
Charlie McGee could start fires with a thought.
For years, the McGee family was watched. Photographed. Spied on until The Shop decided they needed Charlie for their own, in a fashion. They wanted to use her to restart the Lot Six program again. Many attempts to kidnap the child failed one way or another and during a particularly horrible attempt, Charlie's mother was tortured and then murdered. Charlie was taken from a friends house before her father could get there and they almost got away with her had they not stopped at a rest stop. There was a shoot out, her father 'pushed' people into forgetting they were there or going blind or just falling asleep where they stood and so began a long year of running and almost getting caught.
Charlie was eight.
During their time spent running, they met an old farmer and his wife and things looked to be getting better. However, The Shop showed up at the farm and after a huge fight wherein the farm burned and the farmer was shot, Charlie and her father had to run again. They spent the winter at her fathers cabin, relatively hidden until a man named John Rainbird, employed by The Shop, caught them and brought them to the facility in Longmont, West Virginia. Charlie and her father didn't see each other for almost a year. Charlie was being tested to see the extent of her ability and her father was being drugged to keep his ability in check. During this unfortunate separation, John Rainbird had 'replaced' Charlie's father in her life. He took on the role of confidant, friend and father but it was just a role. An act that Charlie believed. And her father, sensing she was in danger, managed to fight the thorazine they kept giving him and with his abilities returning, he pushed someone into giving Charlie a note and planned their escape.
Charlie and her father had their final confrontation with the liar Rainbird in a stable and Andy was shot, dying after telling Charlie to take them all out. Show The Shop that this was war. Charlie did was she was told, killing almost everyone there and burning the place to the ground. She spent days, possibly even weeks, making her way back to the Manders farm. She almost died from starvation, exposure and an infected injury on her arm, an injury she received as she tried stealing food from an angry pig. Once recovered from her ordeal, Charlie and Irv headed into New York City and she told her story to a reporter. Her story was published after she demonstrated that she could indeed start fires with a thought and The Shop backed off.
Her life was peaceful for years. The Shop seemed to have forgotten about her and she lived a happy life with the Manders as their 'niece' Roberta MacCauly. She was home-taught, raised by loving people who worked with her and her ability during the rougher points in life (IE puberty where emotions and hormones are harder to control) and through the hears, maintained some stability, something she needed.
When Charlie was 18, the Manders passed on. Irv first and later Norma and Charlie packed a duffel bag and moved. She was unsettled by her loss and wasn't sure where to go from there since she was considered dead, died in a 'terrorist attack' on a government facility (which she finds amusing since she was the one that burned the place down). Charlie kept moving. She bounced from place to place using false name after false name since using her real one felt too much like waving a flag and pointing out where she was and once again developed a habit of constant motion.
At one point, she found herself working at the library for the same college the original Lot Six experiment took place. Posing as a student named Bobbi, she began gathering information of the original experiment in an attempt to find a cure. During this, she met a man named Vincent Sforza who was also seeking information. He thought he was helping find people to pay them part of a settlement case but the Shop was at it again, hunting down the survivors of the original experiment to kill them all and wipe the slate clean.
They were even looking for Charlie. Once she and Vincent figured out what was going on, Charlie took off again and this is where she's taken from in her timeline.
(barge relevant history)
When The Admiral approached her about a job, she was mistrustful. It took a while to convince Charlie that what The Admiral offered her was real and when it came time to ask for that one thing, she thought long and hard about it and finally decided on something that truly mattered.
She wanted The Shop to leave her alone for good. She could have asked for her parents back but The Shop would always be there so they just had to go. She's not sure how she's going to help whatever inmate she gets, but if it means freedom for her, she'll do what she has to.
Sample Journal Entry: [There's a redhead on your video screen now, people. One that looks a bit apathetic and maybe a little bit bored. The room she's in is severely lacking in any signs that someone might live in it, save for the duffel bag that's thrown unceremoniously in the corner. Charlie herself is also lacking in detail, as far as her clothing goes. Just a plain black long-sleeve shirt, jeans and her red hair is tied back in a pony tail.
For someone as pretty as she is, she sure is going to great lengths to not stand out.
She's silent for a moment, clearly sorting through what she should say. When she speaks, it's with slightly less apathy than her expression carries.]
So, hi. I'm--[A brief hesitation, a second long at least.] Charlie. We'll go with that. Sure. Why not? Anyway, that's my name. I'm nothing exciting.
[And there would be the faintest twitch of a smile on her face. She actually is pretty exciting but why on Earth would she want to spoil that surprise now?] I'm new here, one of the wardens. I'm not here to make friends. I'm just here to get someone straightened out or whatever so I can get something out of my life where I'm from, but I guess that goes without saying. This is probably the part where a new Warden says something about how quickly they want it to happen. I'm not exactly in the biggest rush to get home so whatever inmate I get stuck with, I'm going to be here a while to make sure we both get this right.
[That's pretty much all she has to say on any of this so...well, okay one more thing.]
When do I find out who I'm paired with, anyway?
Sample RP:
They'd pointed out her cabin on the Barge, told her to get settled and get her bags unpacked but she didn't. Just in case. See, she was paranoid and this whole not unpacking thing was just habit. Naturally, by this point. Her life had been one lie after another and she'd done so much running and escaping. Now all she could do was worry that she was eternally in one bad fix after another. Even on the Barge, she didn't feel safe. She felt like this was one big joke, honestly.
Too good to be true. But it was a deal Charlie just could not pass up. Get rid of the Shop, that once great and fearsome entity that dictated everything she did. From her short-lived relationships to the places she lived in briefly. All cheap hotels with seedy atmospheres and neon signs everywhere advertising availability. Jobs that paid under-the-table and so many miles she was tired of. Even her behavior on the Barge.
She was cold to her inmate, though by this point not intentionally. She just couldn't form emotional bonds with people, not even tentative friendships. And even the way she spoke to other wardens. All of it because of the Shop.
But to have them gone, oh how things would change once she was out of here. She could put her name on things without worrying it would alert Them and bring Them on her head. She could claim the cabin in Tashmore as her and live there. The money the Manders left her would be hers, too. More importantly, she would be her own person.
She just had to put up with here and helping someone redeem themselves and isn't it funny how it seemed as though their redemption meant her own? They become a better person, while Charlie's whole life changes for the best. It sounded impossible but then, Charlie defied the odds by her very existence. Her duffel bag got shoved into the corner of her room and she sat on the nearest chair with a small sigh.
"This is such an idiotic idea," she muttered to herself, running her hands over her eyes for a moment. Shaking those thoughts out of her head, she decided to introduce herself to the residents. All business, no bullshit. Keep it strictly first name basis. The sooner she got that done, the sooner she could get to work and get home. Just a little more time spent trapped somewhere and she could genuinely experience freedom.
Special Notes:
User DW: I...am lacking one. Sadly.
AIM/IM: AIM/runsfromtheshop
E-mail: myrp.accounts@yahoo.com
Other Characters: None.
Character Name: Charlene Roberta McGee AKA Charlie
Series: Firestarter (movies)
Age: 18
From When?: Before the events of the second film which I am ignoring for more reasons than I can count.
Inmate/Warden: Warden. She's stubborn, for starters, and doesn't take shit from anyone. She's also a bit emotionless, kind of selfish and really just wants to help someone for her own means. This makes her goal oriented, too. She's very focused when she needs to be. She also has a slightly softer, less mistrustful side and actually does want to see the best in people. It's just been a while since she's actually had that opportunity.
Item: Cellphone. Via text messages.
Abilities/Powers: (from wikipedia) Charlie was born with pyrokinesis, but she also had powers that she inherited from her parents: Mental domination (which is the ability to make a person do what she wants them to at a thought), telepathy, telekinesis, and precognition. All of her powers were connected with her power to start fires.
She sometimes had a hard time controlling her abilities, especially when she was upset or angry. Also, as she got older it did seem like her powers were growing and she was also getting better control.
It is later stated that, when Charlie grows older, she may be able to cause nuclear explosions by sheer force of will, with some of the doctors responsible for the experiment believing that she may one day be powerful enough to crack the world in two.
Unlike her parents, Charlie does not receive any strain from using her abilities.
A quick break-down of her abilities for you. The pyrokinesis is her strongest ability. It's the one that matters most and is the biggest source of emotional discomfort for Charlie. She doesn't want to use it unless she absolutely has to so it's not like she'll walk around just starting fires for laughs. It's defense, not offense. Like a porcupine shooting quills or a rattlesnake and it's bite. It's a last resort when cornered. It is connected with big, powerful emotions like panic or fear or rage. The bigger the emotion, the harder it is for her to focus on keeping her ability in check.
The Mental Domination ability isn't one she was aware of until a couple years after her run in with the Shop. Towards the end of the film when Charlie and her father were trying to make their escape, a Shop agent had lead her to the rendezvous spot and Charlie told him to leave. When he didn't, she tried again and wasn't aware she'd used this ability on him to get him to leave. She thought it was the threat to fry him.
Another thing to remember with this ability is how limited it is. She absolutely cannot just go around pushing everyone to do what she wants. It depends on the persons intelligence. If they're an idiot, it takes effort. If they're smart, it's significantly easier. She isn't sure why this is. She also has to push carefully, otherwise she's stuck with someone who is codependent on her, waiting for her to tell them what to do. Her pushes can also cause an echo, a chain of disconnected thoughts that the person obsesses over. This usually progresses to a mental breakdown. This ability is not something she likes using at all, same with her fire.
The telepathy is also highly limited and it's really more like intuition than anything genuinely telepathic. She can't poke around in someone's head. She can't just read the mind of anyone. And she has to have an emotional connection to that person. Case in point; her father and she were running from the Shop and they were trying to figure out where to go. At one point, her father had thought about going to his grandfathers cabin and not a second after he thought it that Charlie voiced it, asking why they couldn't go there for a while. Her father was someone she loved and trusted implicitly so it worked between them.
The telekinesis is always coupled with her pyrokinesis. Set something on fire, fling it towards the target. It's the only time she's seen using it and it's likely she wasn't even aware the burning and throwing were two separate things for a good long while. It's limited. She can stop bullets with it but usually ends up hitting those hard with her pyrokinesis to destroy them. She can also use it to shut doors or throw objects she's set on fire (Which we've mentioned) but it's not like she can lift a boulder with it. It's for lighter objects. Rocks, books, things of that size.
(Now, I understand full well that most mods will read this ability section and cringe. Her control over her pyrokinesis is impeccable, for the most part. It's in her personality section when it might be problematic. As for her other abilities, they will not be used on anyone without their permission and I do not plan on having Charlie cause any damage or harm to the setting or other players unless it's been plotted out and run past mods. I don't wish to step on toes with Charlie or her abilities or cause an uncomfortable environment for other players.)
Personality: Charlie has been through enough to change anyone drastically. She's been able to light fires since a week old and has, since then, been taught it was a very bad thing. This has given her a fear of it and because of this fear, it was uncontrolled for the longest time. Her father once had her practice her pyrokinesis on a piece of toast and Charlie ended up setting it on fire. Her mother said she'd had enough but Charlie wanted to continue. Her anger at being told no caused her to lash out subconsciously, the fire igniting her mothers oven mitts. While her mother remained mostly undamaged, it was still further enforced in the little girls mind that the fire was a Very Bad Thing.She learned control while being held captive by The Shop and even after she'd used it to take out the entire facility, she still felt remorse for what she'd done and vowed to never use it again to harm anyone else. Mostly because of the destruction she caused and partly because she enjoyed using such a Very Bad Thing so much.
She keeps her emotions even. For her, anything too big can be hugely problematic. Extreme emotions like rage or fear can result in fires she actually finds difficult to control, thus causing her more anxiety and stress in the situation. She also has herself convinced that the bigger, happier emotions will be problematic but this isn't true. She's just afraid to let those emotions happen. She smiles, she laughs. She jokes, teases, snarks, throws out sarcastic comments when she thinks it necessary (which is actually more often than it should be) but for all anyone knows, it's probably bull. She has unintentionally taught herself to be fake to survive whether it be lying about her name, where she's been, where she's going or even how something's making her feel.
She is still a sweet, kind girl but because of trust and abandonment issues, she doesn't try to form relationships. She's best with single-serving friends. That person you strike up a brief conversation with at the store simply because you liked their shirt or the cheerful barista at that coffee shop you visited once. Those sort of moments are what work best for her. A part of her thinks that she will either be rejected and hated because of what she can do. Or people will want something horrible from her for it.She's used to screwing up relationships, the few times she does let them happen. She sabotages any of her own chances of happiness by either pushing the person away or just leaving whatever part of the world she's in. Nothing is static for her through her own actions and she actually believes this is an acceptable way to live.
She's also used to people being taken from her. She's used to losing everyone she cares for so she just does not bother making those kinds of connections. They're not worth it, in her opinion and this leaves her feeling lonely. She tries to not make this loneliness obvious, though her social awkwardness and uncomfortableness in group settings might be obvious to people looking hard enough.
Charlie's going to feel uncomfortable in the Barge for a while. She's not used to such a constant and large amount of people so I think at first she'll be a bit shaken. She'll also still be certain this is too good to be true and this is just another trick. She's just naturally mistrustful of anything good in her life but, this is an opportunity to have the Shop out of her life and she's all for it, even if she does think that's just too good to be real. I think, though, she'll quickly come to the conclusion that this really is something she needs to test.
She'll be willingly interacting with the other wardens. Trading notes, trying to help them where she can and even trying to make friends with them. She'll see this as necessary and pivotal to her success since she's the new girl on the block and everyone else has been here a while. Other inmates not her own will be a little different. She won't quite be trying to form a relationship with them. Nothing huge, anyway. She'll be trying more to focus on her own inmate, put him above the others and try to form some kind of bond with them. She realizes this will be an uneasy bond at best, but feels it's in their best interest to show at least some kind of concern and caring and genuine interest in their well-being and graduation. But, again, this is also a lot to do with her need to improve her own life.
The only thing that triggers extreme stress for her is life-and-death situations. I mentioned she keeps her emotions calm and even and this is easy for her for the most part. Her life has programmed her with a quick fight-or-flight response to potentially hazardous and life threatening situations, however, and if she sees no other way around it she'll chose fight. She's survived by being stubborn. She doesn't get angry at people's behavior often. Annoyed, sure, but not enough to be stressed. If it does get to that point with people and she has the opportunity, she will get away from the situation as best as she can. She sees no point in causing damage to anyone or anything if she doesn't absolutely have to.
Another stress trigger for her is when someone she cares for is threatened. This is just flat out a no go for her and is something that will trigger a bigger fight response for her. It's a bit harder for her to handle this sort of thing, considering how many loved ones she's lost right before her eyes.
Personality-wise, there are some aspects of her personality from Firestarter 2 that I will draw from. In that movie, she was a bit quiet. Kept to herself and was a bit awkward in some situations. She walked in on a couple making out between shelves of books and her reaction was to look at her feet and hold up the book she was trying to put away. It wasn't something she'd ever experienced, herself.
She's also resourceful. She knows how to find the information she needs, even if she has to lie to get it. She was posing as a student to work in a library and probably pushed people to get the job since normally that'd require identification so she's also a bit dishonest but these are her survival skills. Without them, it's likely she'd have died years ago.
I think being on the Barge will change this for her after a while, to be honest. At first, she's going to think this wasn't a good idea because there was nowhere for her to escape to if things got to be too much. But then eventually she'll realize some of the people there are actually okay and it's really fine to trust people and feel things. It will be a while and take a lot of hard work on her end, but that's what will make being in this setting worth it.
History:
Charlie's story starts well before she was born. Two broke college students signed up to be part of an experiment run by a group known simply as The Shop. A chemical compound called Lot Six, a synthetic pituitary secretion designed to hopefully awaken psychic potential in humans, needed testing. It failed for the most part. Most test subjects either died or went insane, except for Vicki Tomlinson and Andrew McGee. They developed an array of abilities ranging from telepathy to empathy to mental domination and telekinesis and The Shop found this interesting. Things became even more fascinating when Vicki and Andrew got married and had a child and a week after the child was born, she became something of interest to The Shop. The little girl was also affected by Lot Six and she was a danger to everyone around her.
Charlie McGee could start fires with a thought.
For years, the McGee family was watched. Photographed. Spied on until The Shop decided they needed Charlie for their own, in a fashion. They wanted to use her to restart the Lot Six program again. Many attempts to kidnap the child failed one way or another and during a particularly horrible attempt, Charlie's mother was tortured and then murdered. Charlie was taken from a friends house before her father could get there and they almost got away with her had they not stopped at a rest stop. There was a shoot out, her father 'pushed' people into forgetting they were there or going blind or just falling asleep where they stood and so began a long year of running and almost getting caught.
Charlie was eight.
During their time spent running, they met an old farmer and his wife and things looked to be getting better. However, The Shop showed up at the farm and after a huge fight wherein the farm burned and the farmer was shot, Charlie and her father had to run again. They spent the winter at her fathers cabin, relatively hidden until a man named John Rainbird, employed by The Shop, caught them and brought them to the facility in Longmont, West Virginia. Charlie and her father didn't see each other for almost a year. Charlie was being tested to see the extent of her ability and her father was being drugged to keep his ability in check. During this unfortunate separation, John Rainbird had 'replaced' Charlie's father in her life. He took on the role of confidant, friend and father but it was just a role. An act that Charlie believed. And her father, sensing she was in danger, managed to fight the thorazine they kept giving him and with his abilities returning, he pushed someone into giving Charlie a note and planned their escape.
Charlie and her father had their final confrontation with the liar Rainbird in a stable and Andy was shot, dying after telling Charlie to take them all out. Show The Shop that this was war. Charlie did was she was told, killing almost everyone there and burning the place to the ground. She spent days, possibly even weeks, making her way back to the Manders farm. She almost died from starvation, exposure and an infected injury on her arm, an injury she received as she tried stealing food from an angry pig. Once recovered from her ordeal, Charlie and Irv headed into New York City and she told her story to a reporter. Her story was published after she demonstrated that she could indeed start fires with a thought and The Shop backed off.
Her life was peaceful for years. The Shop seemed to have forgotten about her and she lived a happy life with the Manders as their 'niece' Roberta MacCauly. She was home-taught, raised by loving people who worked with her and her ability during the rougher points in life (IE puberty where emotions and hormones are harder to control) and through the hears, maintained some stability, something she needed.
When Charlie was 18, the Manders passed on. Irv first and later Norma and Charlie packed a duffel bag and moved. She was unsettled by her loss and wasn't sure where to go from there since she was considered dead, died in a 'terrorist attack' on a government facility (which she finds amusing since she was the one that burned the place down). Charlie kept moving. She bounced from place to place using false name after false name since using her real one felt too much like waving a flag and pointing out where she was and once again developed a habit of constant motion.
At one point, she found herself working at the library for the same college the original Lot Six experiment took place. Posing as a student named Bobbi, she began gathering information of the original experiment in an attempt to find a cure. During this, she met a man named Vincent Sforza who was also seeking information. He thought he was helping find people to pay them part of a settlement case but the Shop was at it again, hunting down the survivors of the original experiment to kill them all and wipe the slate clean.
They were even looking for Charlie. Once she and Vincent figured out what was going on, Charlie took off again and this is where she's taken from in her timeline.
(barge relevant history)
When The Admiral approached her about a job, she was mistrustful. It took a while to convince Charlie that what The Admiral offered her was real and when it came time to ask for that one thing, she thought long and hard about it and finally decided on something that truly mattered.
She wanted The Shop to leave her alone for good. She could have asked for her parents back but The Shop would always be there so they just had to go. She's not sure how she's going to help whatever inmate she gets, but if it means freedom for her, she'll do what she has to.
Sample Journal Entry: [There's a redhead on your video screen now, people. One that looks a bit apathetic and maybe a little bit bored. The room she's in is severely lacking in any signs that someone might live in it, save for the duffel bag that's thrown unceremoniously in the corner. Charlie herself is also lacking in detail, as far as her clothing goes. Just a plain black long-sleeve shirt, jeans and her red hair is tied back in a pony tail.
For someone as pretty as she is, she sure is going to great lengths to not stand out.
She's silent for a moment, clearly sorting through what she should say. When she speaks, it's with slightly less apathy than her expression carries.]
So, hi. I'm--[A brief hesitation, a second long at least.] Charlie. We'll go with that. Sure. Why not? Anyway, that's my name. I'm nothing exciting.
[And there would be the faintest twitch of a smile on her face. She actually is pretty exciting but why on Earth would she want to spoil that surprise now?] I'm new here, one of the wardens. I'm not here to make friends. I'm just here to get someone straightened out or whatever so I can get something out of my life where I'm from, but I guess that goes without saying. This is probably the part where a new Warden says something about how quickly they want it to happen. I'm not exactly in the biggest rush to get home so whatever inmate I get stuck with, I'm going to be here a while to make sure we both get this right.
[That's pretty much all she has to say on any of this so...well, okay one more thing.]
When do I find out who I'm paired with, anyway?
Sample RP:
They'd pointed out her cabin on the Barge, told her to get settled and get her bags unpacked but she didn't. Just in case. See, she was paranoid and this whole not unpacking thing was just habit. Naturally, by this point. Her life had been one lie after another and she'd done so much running and escaping. Now all she could do was worry that she was eternally in one bad fix after another. Even on the Barge, she didn't feel safe. She felt like this was one big joke, honestly.
Too good to be true. But it was a deal Charlie just could not pass up. Get rid of the Shop, that once great and fearsome entity that dictated everything she did. From her short-lived relationships to the places she lived in briefly. All cheap hotels with seedy atmospheres and neon signs everywhere advertising availability. Jobs that paid under-the-table and so many miles she was tired of. Even her behavior on the Barge.
She was cold to her inmate, though by this point not intentionally. She just couldn't form emotional bonds with people, not even tentative friendships. And even the way she spoke to other wardens. All of it because of the Shop.
But to have them gone, oh how things would change once she was out of here. She could put her name on things without worrying it would alert Them and bring Them on her head. She could claim the cabin in Tashmore as her and live there. The money the Manders left her would be hers, too. More importantly, she would be her own person.
She just had to put up with here and helping someone redeem themselves and isn't it funny how it seemed as though their redemption meant her own? They become a better person, while Charlie's whole life changes for the best. It sounded impossible but then, Charlie defied the odds by her very existence. Her duffel bag got shoved into the corner of her room and she sat on the nearest chair with a small sigh.
"This is such an idiotic idea," she muttered to herself, running her hands over her eyes for a moment. Shaking those thoughts out of her head, she decided to introduce herself to the residents. All business, no bullshit. Keep it strictly first name basis. The sooner she got that done, the sooner she could get to work and get home. Just a little more time spent trapped somewhere and she could genuinely experience freedom.
Special Notes:
