(no subject)
OOC:
Name: Ashe
Timezone: CST
The Character
Name: Pestilence | Lady Gaga | Gaga
Age: Old as dirt | Looks 20s
Claim to fame: Musician
PB: Lady Gaga
Journal: ladypestilence
Aim: superfeypower
Race: Horseman of the Apocalypse (Pestilence)
Job: Musician | Bearer of Plagues
RP Sample:
Ah, the putrid stench of thousands of bodies, all jammed into one small stadium, sweating, jumping around, clamoring for attention. Just like her. But she was the center of attention, she didn't have to clamor for anything, they gave her all the attention that she could want willingly and readily. They screamed her name, her taken name, and they chanted the songs that she sung, unaware of the damage they were causing to themselves. And she loved it. Lapped up the love and basked in it. And all of this just for a little show. If they knew what she was really capable of… Ohoho, they'd really have a reason to scream for her.
'You should have seen what I did during the early 1300s.' Pestilence smiled bitterly under the hot lights, waved her hand in greetings to the little minded people.
She retreated from the crowd with one final wave, weaving her way backstage. All these formalities bored her. They ran to greet her, offered her water, snacks, asked if there was anything they could get her. She waved them off, marched defiantly into the dressing room and then crawled out the window.
There were fans swarming the area as she walked back around front, all of them waiting eagerly for her to show herself. She walked through the crowd, head held high, and they were oblivious to her identity. She had to smirk to herself, pat herself on the back for her overt cleverness.
Background:
Diseases always suffer a bad rap, don't they? People's noses wrinkle up in disgust at the mention of some incurable, slimy concoction brewed up within their fellow beings, blaming only said illness for their comrade's disgusting state. And what they fail to realize is that it certainly isn't the disease making their friend unappetizingly ugly, it's only assisting in showing their true self, the potential that their bodies hold underneath that thinly caked on layer of muscle, fat, skin and cosmetics. No, disease is not disgusting. It's streamline. It's effective. When given a purpose, it fights tooth and nail to see it through and if a particular strand dies, it relays the message to its fellows of trouble - who then attack with reinforced power, overcoming their enemy, developing new and more complex codes to overtake the host. And then… --- well, it has complete control over the poor bastard.
When Lady Gaga first hit the music scene, she was regarded as a bizarre yet innovative force that commanded the attention of her soon to be adoring public. Her dramatic outfits, normally regarded as ugly, were praised and criticized, the fashion gurus flocking to insist that each one had a symbolic, powerful meaning and that we should all dress more like Gaga - with a freedom to express our opinions in a way that refused to be ignored. Her oddities became fashion and her trancelike approach to the music scene became the music that not only pumped through the clubs but through entire cities, traveling like a virus through radios, iPods, laptops and the mouths of thousands of her worshipers. Even those who thought themselves immune to popular music found her irresistible, flocking to her shamelessly. Lady Gaga had become her own god, defeating the barriers of social cliques, conquering the world and sitting atop the throne of popularity.
But what could the two have in common, aside for the imminent and fatal design of their nature - to conquer and enslave?
The Horseman (figuratively, of course) Pestilence found her human form within Lady Gaga, making the two one and the same. The ultimate goal of the Horsemen is to assist in dragging the world down and her speciality just happens to be the pure madness and chaos that plague often causes. She is separate completely from Death, who merely takes the lives of humans whilst she takes over their nervous systems completely, dragging them down into fiery insanity before destroying them completely.
Pestilence has not always been around on the earth, however, and is generally locked up behind the stable gates in Hell, waiting patiently for someone to either break the seal holding her back or for Lucifer to set her free to ravage the world (or, even less likely, to escape on her own). Her love for epidemics is often considered too strong to entrust her with roaming free, even if she promises to behave herself. While she was let out on occasion, Pestilence had found herself spreading diseases on the lower scale, infecting only small communities of humans at a time, most which went completely unnoticed. She grew bored with the lack of attention and, despite strict orders from the higher ranks, she released an epidemic that would go down in history to make her namesake proud --- The Plague.
Formally known as the bubonic and pneumonic plague, the disease skyrocketed to the number one spot amongst her favorites, earning its rank as being the foulest and most lovely illness she had yet to concoct. For well over 100 years, her precious baby scourged the Earth of humankind, along with over 100 different types of animals, and though it would make her flush with pride to admit it, nearly wiped out an entire continent (but at least decreased the populous). The Plague went down in the history books as being, by far, the worst infliction they had yet to come by and Gaga, living among the British at the time, found it all too delightful to handle. Before she could release the next big outbreak, she was reigned back into hell and scolded for the mayhem that she had prematurely caused. Much to her pride, the Plague was created to be hardy and continued to spring up of its own accord in much smaller scales across the globe, even becoming an annual illness that continues on today in countries such as Brazil, Burma and Vietnam. In stark contrast with the earlier ages, there is a much higher survival rate due to excelled sanitary conditions and better scientific knowledge. Recently, through her own subtle means, she transferred a portion of plasmid into the Plague, creating a new and improved strain that is antibiotic resistant. Only several cases had been discovered by medical specialists and though the disease would bring a modern-day, worldwide epidemic, she has stubbornly refused to release it, waiting patiently for the true Apocalypse. In total, her magnum opus has caused innumerable deaths throughout the ages, though the number is expected to be well into the 100 millions, possibly even reaching the billions. It has made her an insufferably proud creature. 'Hey, remember that Black Death thing that was all the rage a while back? Yeah, that was me.'
While lounging about in Europe as the Plague devoured up lives left and right, an unsuspecting man became her side project. He was unmarried, rich and of social prominence, making his status very desirable in Pestilence's eyes. With ease, she had seduced the Lord and, though his parents abhorred the idea, married him. He, oblivious to her power, lived alongside her for several years before growing weary of her. She demanded attention, ate it up greedily, and refused to be negotiated with, living her life as she pleased and without consent. And, what was worse, she had proved to be infertile. With no siblings and his parents elderly, the man became desperate to carry on his lineage within a son. Fearful of her wrath, he negated to inform her of his decision to seek out a courtesan and make her his mistress, determined that he would have a child. Of course, this decision ultimately cost him much more than his own demise. When the Lady had found out, her rage was so great that she could not even bring a hand against her husband. Instead, Pestilence did what Pestilence does best: she created a new disease.
Syphilis was designed not only to kill, but to torture and force its victim to slowly succumb to an agonizingly painful end. With intent to punish both her husband and his mistress, she created syphilis with the intent for it to spread through sexual contact and had, by no means, expected its popularity to rise as quickly as it did. Through the prostitute, the disease spread in tenfold and worked its way down the rungs of the social ladder before finding its place in the gutters, lurking amongst the most unsanitary of conditions. Though the Plague took the spot as number one contender against the human race, syphilis certainly played its part with working behind the scenes, delighting Pestilence with its overt cunningness, hiding unseen and striking after it was too late. Inspired by its nature, Pestilence's new batch of inflictions followed in its footsteps, designed to spread through sexual contact and cause immense pain to the infected before, eventually, causing death. In accordance with her husband's sneaking behavior, these sexually transmitted diseases were designed to be relatively undetectable until the late stages, making them remain as potent and deadly as they are today. And who said that old Apocalyptical creatures couldn't have a sense of humor?
More epidemics were to follow, including cholera, smallpox, influenza, the common cold and a top secret disease which she knows fondly as the Croatoan virus. Bred in the isolated and secretive conditions of Camp Roanoke, the disease was considered too foul and, ultimately, too deadly to unleash on the mass scale until the final judgement day. Operating primarily through the nervous system, it is designed with only two purposes written within its genetic code: consume the victim's nervous system and spread like wildfire. The disease, Pestilence reported with pale excitement, made the Plague look like no big deal. It was more streamline and effective than any other infliction previously created and, best of all, it didn't kill its host. Instead, the virus took over its victim's nerves, driving them into a mad state that can be equated to rabies. The infected's behavior becomes violent and irrational until the infection reaches its peak within 24 hours. The human succumbs at this point and is driven only by a primal desire to destroy everything and anything it can get its hands on. Its effectiveness in wiping out any population at any given time was so potent that even Pestilence herself regarded it as too much of a threat to unleash anywhere other than a tiny, close knit community. Even she, who should be afraid of nothing, finds its destructive force eerie and is not prone to unleash it anytime soon.
Compelled by her desire to hone the Croatoan virus, or at least create a separate strain that would infect the world on a lower, less destructive scale, Pestilence requested to be unleashed once more onto the world. She hit the scene hard once the gate was opened, riding in on a wave of euphoria and influenza. The flu spread, as it usually does, mutating and evolving as the years went on, going through radical stages such as the bird and swine flu, which sent people scurrying to their vaccinations. These epidemics were small card compared to what she truly had in store for the globe.
Amidst the chaos of her return, she emerged like a butterfly in the fashion and music scene, creating the largest uprising since Madonna. Her ego grew, naturally, as her popularity skyrocketed and her fame exceeded that of Miley Cyrus. There was just something about her music that attracted listeners of all demographics, bringing attention and love back to club music. With addictive beats and a trancelike vibe that pulsed through her music, followers fell in line, eager for their next taste of Lady Gaga. With a penchant for not only tradition but abidance to ceremony (or maybe it was just vanity), Pestilence had kept her title 'Lady', tacking on the whimsical name 'Gaga' to the other end of it. Even she laughed the first time she used it as her stage name.
Her music, unknown to its listeners, is laced with several carefully prepared components, designed to take over the mind of the human but to leave it intact, unlike the Croatoan virus. The takeover was that of her music, enraging the victim who just couldn't get that darn song out of his head, even though he loved thrash metal. Her newest plague, known only to her simply as 'Gaga Fever' is designed for no higher purpose other than boost her own sense of self importance and worth. In the long run, she would be able to use Gaga Fever to to vanquish a small portion of the human race or use humans as her minions, but she has no interest in that now. Her only desire now is to be loved regardless of her bizarre sense of fashion and unorthodox social life. But with music that envelops its listener completely and drags them into her disease, it doesn't really matter what she looks like or how she acts.
The only major problem with Gaga Fever and the majority of her other inflictions is that they are powerless against any inhuman being. Do you have any idea how hard it is to recreate a genome so that it will attack an angel's immune system? I think not. Nonetheless, Pestilence is a force to be reckoned with and should not be tampered with at any cost. Her temper is often volatile and even if she cannot cripple a supernatural being with the Plague, she certainly can pull out her flambard, a two-handed sword with undulating waves on each side of the blade that she has modified to actually light up with fire, making it especially painful. It makes one hell of a toaster whenever she needs a bread knife, though.
Atop of her giant bread knife/toaster, her powers are limited. She does possess the ability to cure illnesses but rarely chooses to do so, simply for the fact that it would make her soft. If a good friend were to ask her (or a nice price tag was attached to her service) then she would eventually comply after much moral debate. But, like many conceited and vain people, even she has a price she will stoop down to. Money, naturally, means little to nil at this time in her stardom.
Currently, she dwells in her three-story loft complex (Linked) based in L.A. When she goes out in public she's rarely recognized unless she chooses to dress in a way that she would be recognized. Otherwise, she eludes an aura of mystery, cloaking herself so that she will not be recognized - unless, of course, if she wants to be.
Picture:
