Permissions meme! (of ridiculous length)
Let's face it - it'll be needed no matter where the kid ends up.
And it's an ever-shifting work in progress.
Completely revised as of 3 August 2009.
Notes for psychics:
-Jude's driving force is a desire to make the world a better place; he states at the end of canon that he wants to make those who came before him proud.
-The fear of losing control and killing someone without realizing what he's done took hold of him as the ARM did - he did, after all, destroy his own hometown.
He's good at appearing happy - and largely is. He keeps his fears and guilt buried, as best he can. If things aren't at the surface of his mind he pays no attention to them.
Threadhopping with this character - yes, no, or what?:
Yes. He's very social. Meeting new people is awesome!
Hugging this character?:
As long as you've been introduced, he won't mind a bit. (And even if you haven't, so long as it's obviously just a hug given freely he'll probably return it.) Headpats and hair ruffling are okay too. Jude's pretty free about physical affection; after all, he grew up with a lot of it! (He was pretty much everybody's kid in Ciel - the village was less a "hometown" than a "huge extended family" to him.)
Really, he needs physical affection. (Even before getting the ARM, the one sure way to calm Jude down from almost anything was a hug.) It's how he's most used to expressing extreme closeness. (May not be shown in canon, entirely, but... fffffff, you cannot deny that it fits, can ye?)
TEAL DEER VERSION: Hugs are nice. Cuddling... is nicer. If you end up with a Jude in your lap, he may not leave until you force him to.
Giving this character a kiss?:
He's thirteen. Raised by scientists or not, a kiss on the lips is going to make him flail and blush. He knows what that means when it's not a quick peck from your mom, and he's not ready for that just yet!
-A kiss on the cheek, depending on who it's from, will probably slightly embarrass him... but he won't really show it. Definitely not as much as liplocking.
-Forehead kiss? He won't mind, it reminds him of his mom. Same thing goes for a kiss on the crown of the head, and stuff like that.
-Basically, he knows there's no such thing as cooties but he will use that as an excuse to get out of awkward situations involving kissing.
Punching this character (provided they are given an opportunity to fight back):
Be very, very careful about this. Ideally, just don't. After a few months of travel in a world midway through moving on... even if it's meant lightheartedly, a blow from outside his line of sight is going to trigger the sort of reaction he'd normally have to an unexpected attack. Expect to have Shapeshifter pointed at your face... and if it was meant as nothing more than a greeting, expect him to freak out and apologize like crazy and possibly cry when he realizes what he's just done.
But a playful punch in the arm from a friend, in the middle of a conversation, won't trigger a reaction like that. He will, however, return it.
Is there anything YOU DO NOT WANT MENTIONED near this character?:
The fact that in some worlds, he's a videogame character. His world has videogames, he will eventually have played them (HELLO, EXTRA CHALLENGE, I HATE YOU SO MUCH orz), it would cause unnecessary angst and possibly anger at the person who told him. ("So, was it entertaining, then? Did you laugh every time I had to kill somebody!?" That sort of thing; mostly it'd be covering up a reaction along the lines of "oh god, oh god, I have no control over my own life".)
Fourth Wall Breakage:
Uh. Well... see above. If you really want to (say, if you're playing a character who's probably played WA4 in their canon and wouldn't think before fan-spazzing at the sight of Jude), discuss it with me first, all right?
Shapeshift:
Ask first - IC too, if possible.
Bodyswap:
See above.
Slash:
He's thirteen. You generally don't know for absolutely certain if you're straight or not at thirteen*, and he knows this (Ethelda gave him a very frank talk about puberty and the things that happen mentally as a result of it a little after his twelfth birthday - and then sent him to Henri for the things she didn't cover)... so while he'd be okay with perhaps realizing he likes guys, I'm not really sure about how to play that out.
Honestly, even straight pairings with pre-epilogue!Jude bother me, if they're not innocent fluff: he's too much a child for me to see him involved in anything remotely sexual without feeling really creeped out. (Not to mention I've got serious issues that I have a bad feeling would be triggered by that sort of thing.)
This isn't to say I'm not open to playing him as having a crush on, say, Arnaud or Yulie or someone, though. I definitely am. I just can't really play out anything past blushy nervous kissing and holding hands and the like unless he's aged up significantly.
TEAL DEER VERSION: FLUFF ONLY PLZ. (okay and possibly awkward-as-hell exploratory makeouts too but only after a lot of working things out)
Maim/Murder/Death:
But why?
In other words, please don't; or, if you must, it had better not be permanent. Injuries are okay as long as he'll be able to heal completely from them - and with the enhanced healing abilities of a Gene Driver synched with an ARM, he can bounce back from a lot. If maiming results from a fight scene, sure. I can deal with playing him physically broken for a while... just not permanently.
Badtouch:
NO. NO NO NO NO NO. ESPECIALLY NOT IF YOU'RE PLAYING GAWN, FOR GOD'S SAKE. As stated before: I have serious real-life issues about that kind of thing, and would rather not put Jude through it.
Special physical features, information, abilities:
And now, the fun part!
Were I playing him prior to Ciel Shelter's destruction, Jude would be a rather unremarkable thirteen-year-old boy. He's roughly average, physically; perhaps a small bit under average in height. He's had some sword training, but never really taken it seriously (and indeed avoids it at all costs...).
What makes Jude special is in his DNA...
His father, Hauser Blackwell, was a Global Union human weapon during the last years of Filgaia's civil war. Gifted with the ability to use ARMs - nanotechnological weapons - he was still human enough to fall in love and father a child with one of the scientists who maintained him. Neither he nor Ethelda Maverick knew for certain if his modified genes would be passed down... but they were. Jude is the only natural-born Gene Driver, the only natural-born wielder of an ARM, in existence.
As previously stated, he carries his gun (broken down to its virus-sized nanotechnological components) in his bloodstream. Given that the ARM also enhances his physical abilities (Accelerator, much? Also, Wolverine-grade regenerative abilities, 'least if his dad's anybody to go by. N.B. - I'm pretty sure he's not quite as able to come back from injuries as Mr. I Took A Nuclear Blast To The Whole Body And Lived.), I have an NPC conversation that I can quote stating that it's distributed itself within his nervous system - in fact, his entire body.
The ARM (in WA4, it stands for Ambient-Reorganization-Material, and as that would seem to hint, was not originally conceived as a type of weapon) Jude usually wields is the XERD_003SS. That too much of a mouthful? Well, it's more commonly called Shapeshifter - because it is one. A real Swiss Army Weapon (Swiss ARM-y Weapon? DON'T HIT ME!), its various forms range from a long-barreled semiautomatic pistol (its usual form, and the first that Jude discovered) to a sword (when he's out of ammunition) to a rifle to an EMP cannon... and many more besides. (If we consider the cover for a certain instrumental music collection to be "canon"... it can transform into a steel guitar.) It's highly possible that Shapeshifter is only limited by the imagination of its wielder....
The ARM also allows Jude to regenerate after injuries - though it's never stated to what degree. I really wasn't kidding about the Wolverine-grade healing factor his father possessed, though. Man stood within feet of an overloading nuclear reactor, and didn't so much as lose his hair after. Granted, it's also hypothesized that he replaced the cells of his disintegrating body with ARM nanomachines, but if Jude's capable of the same thing... well, er. He'd be quite hard to kill.
It also allows him to move at a much faster rate than a normal human (this would be that Accelerator thing I mentioned earlier...). The nanomachines making up his ARM apparently enhanced his nervous system considerably. By consciously taking control of his metabolic rate and speeding it up significantly, he can push his body to the limits and move at blinding speeds, but only for very short periods of time. The only drawback is that he has to consume a huge amount of calories to make up for the deficit, and he has to be careful how much he uses it, otherwise he could literally "burn out" and die.** In-game, there's a gauge at the upper right of the screen showing for how long you can use Accelerator, and after that time's up, things go back to normal; in "the real world" that gauge does not exist (I'm... fairly certain the ARM doesn't hack his optic nerve), and so Jude doesn't actually automatically decelerate when he's pushed himself to the limit.
TEAL DEER VERSION: He has carries his gun in his bloodstream, can move faster than a speeding bullet (and I ain't kiddin'), and has a healing factor that wouldn't be out of place in the Marvelverse. RPG HERO STUFF. WOO.
Easiest way to get on his good side:
Make him cookies! 8D (I'm only partly kidding with that - he's not so much a picky eater as he is just used to better food than you can usually find in Filgaia, and so good cooking is one way to ensure Jude's loyalty. For as long as you keep feeding him, anyway...) Really... be genuinely kind.
Easiest way to get on his bad side:
Hurt/threaten those he cares about. (Or be deliberately patronizing and not take him seriously because of his age. Sure, he admits he's a kid, but it's nice to be taken seriously once in a while....) Failing that, brag about what a horrible person you are and how many people you've hurt/killed/etc.
Favorite person:
His mom. Arnaud. Yulie. Raquel even though she's kinda scary sometimes Um... he only gets to pick one? That's not fair!
Prefers:
He's thirteen. He's really not sure yet. Maybe girls? He's only really gotten to know two, but they both seem nice and stuff....
*Especially when you're as undersocialized as Jude is, in terms of meeting people his own age.
**Explanation blatantly copied from the Dramadramaduck wiki's article on Jet Enduro. I do have permission to use it.
And it's an ever-shifting work in progress.
Completely revised as of 3 August 2009.
Notes for psychics:
-Jude's driving force is a desire to make the world a better place; he states at the end of canon that he wants to make those who came before him proud.
-The fear of losing control and killing someone without realizing what he's done took hold of him as the ARM did - he did, after all, destroy his own hometown.
He's good at appearing happy - and largely is. He keeps his fears and guilt buried, as best he can. If things aren't at the surface of his mind he pays no attention to them.
Threadhopping with this character - yes, no, or what?:
Yes. He's very social. Meeting new people is awesome!
Hugging this character?:
As long as you've been introduced, he won't mind a bit. (And even if you haven't, so long as it's obviously just a hug given freely he'll probably return it.) Headpats and hair ruffling are okay too. Jude's pretty free about physical affection; after all, he grew up with a lot of it! (He was pretty much everybody's kid in Ciel - the village was less a "hometown" than a "huge extended family" to him.)
Really, he needs physical affection. (Even before getting the ARM, the one sure way to calm Jude down from almost anything was a hug.) It's how he's most used to expressing extreme closeness. (May not be shown in canon, entirely, but... fffffff, you cannot deny that it fits, can ye?)
TEAL DEER VERSION: Hugs are nice. Cuddling... is nicer. If you end up with a Jude in your lap, he may not leave until you force him to.
Giving this character a kiss?:
He's thirteen. Raised by scientists or not, a kiss on the lips is going to make him flail and blush. He knows what that means when it's not a quick peck from your mom, and he's not ready for that just yet!
-A kiss on the cheek, depending on who it's from, will probably slightly embarrass him... but he won't really show it. Definitely not as much as liplocking.
-Forehead kiss? He won't mind, it reminds him of his mom. Same thing goes for a kiss on the crown of the head, and stuff like that.
-Basically, he knows there's no such thing as cooties but he will use that as an excuse to get out of awkward situations involving kissing.
Punching this character (provided they are given an opportunity to fight back):
Be very, very careful about this. Ideally, just don't. After a few months of travel in a world midway through moving on... even if it's meant lightheartedly, a blow from outside his line of sight is going to trigger the sort of reaction he'd normally have to an unexpected attack. Expect to have Shapeshifter pointed at your face... and if it was meant as nothing more than a greeting, expect him to freak out and apologize like crazy and possibly cry when he realizes what he's just done.
But a playful punch in the arm from a friend, in the middle of a conversation, won't trigger a reaction like that. He will, however, return it.
Is there anything YOU DO NOT WANT MENTIONED near this character?:
The fact that in some worlds, he's a videogame character. His world has videogames, he will eventually have played them (HELLO, EXTRA CHALLENGE, I HATE YOU SO MUCH orz), it would cause unnecessary angst and possibly anger at the person who told him. ("So, was it entertaining, then? Did you laugh every time I had to kill somebody!?" That sort of thing; mostly it'd be covering up a reaction along the lines of "oh god, oh god, I have no control over my own life".)
Fourth Wall Breakage:
Uh. Well... see above. If you really want to (say, if you're playing a character who's probably played WA4 in their canon and wouldn't think before fan-spazzing at the sight of Jude), discuss it with me first, all right?
Shapeshift:
Ask first - IC too, if possible.
Bodyswap:
See above.
Slash:
He's thirteen. You generally don't know for absolutely certain if you're straight or not at thirteen*, and he knows this (Ethelda gave him a very frank talk about puberty and the things that happen mentally as a result of it a little after his twelfth birthday - and then sent him to Henri for the things she didn't cover)... so while he'd be okay with perhaps realizing he likes guys, I'm not really sure about how to play that out.
Honestly, even straight pairings with pre-epilogue!Jude bother me, if they're not innocent fluff: he's too much a child for me to see him involved in anything remotely sexual without feeling really creeped out. (Not to mention I've got serious issues that I have a bad feeling would be triggered by that sort of thing.)
This isn't to say I'm not open to playing him as having a crush on, say, Arnaud or Yulie or someone, though. I definitely am. I just can't really play out anything past blushy nervous kissing and holding hands and the like unless he's aged up significantly.
TEAL DEER VERSION: FLUFF ONLY PLZ. (okay and possibly awkward-as-hell exploratory makeouts too but only after a lot of working things out)
Maim/Murder/Death:
But why?
In other words, please don't; or, if you must, it had better not be permanent. Injuries are okay as long as he'll be able to heal completely from them - and with the enhanced healing abilities of a Gene Driver synched with an ARM, he can bounce back from a lot. If maiming results from a fight scene, sure. I can deal with playing him physically broken for a while... just not permanently.
Badtouch:
NO. NO NO NO NO NO. ESPECIALLY NOT IF YOU'RE PLAYING GAWN, FOR GOD'S SAKE. As stated before: I have serious real-life issues about that kind of thing, and would rather not put Jude through it.
Special physical features, information, abilities:
And now, the fun part!
Were I playing him prior to Ciel Shelter's destruction, Jude would be a rather unremarkable thirteen-year-old boy. He's roughly average, physically; perhaps a small bit under average in height. He's had some sword training, but never really taken it seriously (and indeed avoids it at all costs...).
What makes Jude special is in his DNA...
His father, Hauser Blackwell, was a Global Union human weapon during the last years of Filgaia's civil war. Gifted with the ability to use ARMs - nanotechnological weapons - he was still human enough to fall in love and father a child with one of the scientists who maintained him. Neither he nor Ethelda Maverick knew for certain if his modified genes would be passed down... but they were. Jude is the only natural-born Gene Driver, the only natural-born wielder of an ARM, in existence.
As previously stated, he carries his gun (broken down to its virus-sized nanotechnological components) in his bloodstream. Given that the ARM also enhances his physical abilities (Accelerator, much? Also, Wolverine-grade regenerative abilities, 'least if his dad's anybody to go by. N.B. - I'm pretty sure he's not quite as able to come back from injuries as Mr. I Took A Nuclear Blast To The Whole Body And Lived.), I have an NPC conversation that I can quote stating that it's distributed itself within his nervous system - in fact, his entire body.
The ARM (in WA4, it stands for Ambient-Reorganization-Material, and as that would seem to hint, was not originally conceived as a type of weapon) Jude usually wields is the XERD_003SS. That too much of a mouthful? Well, it's more commonly called Shapeshifter - because it is one. A real Swiss Army Weapon (Swiss ARM-y Weapon? DON'T HIT ME!), its various forms range from a long-barreled semiautomatic pistol (its usual form, and the first that Jude discovered) to a sword (when he's out of ammunition) to a rifle to an EMP cannon... and many more besides. (If we consider the cover for a certain instrumental music collection to be "canon"... it can transform into a steel guitar.) It's highly possible that Shapeshifter is only limited by the imagination of its wielder....
The ARM also allows Jude to regenerate after injuries - though it's never stated to what degree. I really wasn't kidding about the Wolverine-grade healing factor his father possessed, though. Man stood within feet of an overloading nuclear reactor, and didn't so much as lose his hair after. Granted, it's also hypothesized that he replaced the cells of his disintegrating body with ARM nanomachines, but if Jude's capable of the same thing... well, er. He'd be quite hard to kill.
It also allows him to move at a much faster rate than a normal human (this would be that Accelerator thing I mentioned earlier...). The nanomachines making up his ARM apparently enhanced his nervous system considerably. By consciously taking control of his metabolic rate and speeding it up significantly, he can push his body to the limits and move at blinding speeds, but only for very short periods of time. The only drawback is that he has to consume a huge amount of calories to make up for the deficit, and he has to be careful how much he uses it, otherwise he could literally "burn out" and die.** In-game, there's a gauge at the upper right of the screen showing for how long you can use Accelerator, and after that time's up, things go back to normal; in "the real world" that gauge does not exist (I'm... fairly certain the ARM doesn't hack his optic nerve), and so Jude doesn't actually automatically decelerate when he's pushed himself to the limit.
TEAL DEER VERSION: He has carries his gun in his bloodstream, can move faster than a speeding bullet (and I ain't kiddin'), and has a healing factor that wouldn't be out of place in the Marvelverse. RPG HERO STUFF. WOO.
Easiest way to get on his good side:
Make him cookies! 8D (I'm only partly kidding with that - he's not so much a picky eater as he is just used to better food than you can usually find in Filgaia, and so good cooking is one way to ensure Jude's loyalty. For as long as you keep feeding him, anyway...) Really... be genuinely kind.
Easiest way to get on his bad side:
Hurt/threaten those he cares about. (Or be deliberately patronizing and not take him seriously because of his age. Sure, he admits he's a kid, but it's nice to be taken seriously once in a while....) Failing that, brag about what a horrible person you are and how many people you've hurt/killed/etc.
Favorite person:
His mom. Arnaud. Yulie. Raquel even though she's kinda scary sometimes Um... he only gets to pick one? That's not fair!
Prefers:
He's thirteen. He's really not sure yet. Maybe girls? He's only really gotten to know two, but they both seem nice and stuff....
*Especially when you're as undersocialized as Jude is, in terms of meeting people his own age.
**Explanation blatantly copied from the Dramadramaduck wiki's article on Jet Enduro. I do have permission to use it.