splendorocity information
Character Information:
Full Name: Bambi
Series: Original
Age: 20
Species: Human
Appearance/PB: Ashley Stymest with a pink polka dot dog collar around his neck. Tattoos intact, but Bambi has a few extra on his back and ribs, ornate 'windows' showing ocean scenes.
History:
Bambi was born Tyler Liam Kee, only child to a sweet, docile mother and an alcoholic, abusive father. Tyler witnessed his father beating his mother many times in his childhood, but was unable to protect her. As he grew older, his father's violence began to turn toward him, too, often goaded on by Tyler himself. However, his mother would always come between them, taking the blows intended for Tyler and always persuading Tyler not to attack his father in turn.
His bad homelife and relationship with his father saw Tyler developing a fierce disregard for authority, further encouraged by the ganglife rampant in the city they lived in. Tyler settled easily into the role of the typical teenaged hooligan, participating in petty crimes, acts of vandalism, underage drinking, as well as a general antagonistic attitude towards general members of the public. He rarely attended school, a behaviour born from the combined weight of his contempt for authority and a fatalistic belief that no amount of work or study would improve his situation.
Although having many friends amongst his peers, Tyler was usually found in the company of Jeffrey Lanaughee, finding more of a sense of family and safety in the Lanaughee house than he ever did his own.
With no money from their parents, and no workskills to see them in jobs, Tyler and Jeffrey often combined their anti-social behaviour with necessity, pick-pocketing or mugging people in order to feed Jeffrey's seven younger brothers. This was how they encountered Arabia, a young witch, who Tyler believed to look quite weak and well-off, a prime target. It proved to be the biggest mistake of his life, as Arabia repaid them the offence by cursing them, stealing their names, putting collars around their throats and setting a spell to introduce a Chihuahua mentality over their minds. Giving Jeffrey the name Tinkerbell and Tyler the name Bambi, Arabia took them home with him, having only just begun to punish them for attempting to rob him.
For the next two years, Bambi did everything he could to fight Arabia, from active acts of aggression, such as tearing up some of the humiliating costumes the witch wanted them to wear, to more subtle rebellions, such as sneaking cigarettes when they were expressly told not to smoke. Bambi's tenacity in this way helped him hold far more of his human mind and memories than Tinkerbell, who lost a great deal of himself to Arabia's spell. While he had always been the stronger and more assertive of the pair, he was now also the most aware and responsible, and so Bambi fell into the role of caretaker and protector, the alpha dog to Tinkerbell's beta.
Arabia's regime of humiliation and punishment changed, however, when the witch brought a new pet home, a golem called Fallen Tauzin, who Arabia had stolen from his family. Bambi and Fallen initially got on quite well, but a disagreement between them that escalated into a fight saw Bambi forced from his and Tinkerbell's room, unable to return due to the dog's sense of lost territory. Resentful of both the golem and his packmate, Bambi found himself spending more time with Arabia, who had begun to develop a softer and less cruel attitude. Without the constant humiliations to rail against, Bambi slowly grew more attached and loyal to the witch, responding far better to patience and reward than he ever would have done to punishment. While not necessarily content with this development in himself, Bambi was even actively concerned when Arabia's behaviour turned so out-of-character as to actually release Fallen back to his family.
With the golem gone, Bambi was reunited with Tinkerbell. However, in seeing his packmate's sadness over the sudden and unexplained departure of his newest friend, Bambi suggested using a left behind shirt to track the golem down by scent. This led to a month long trip by themselves, where they eventually crossed paths with Fallen's younger brothers. This meeting was unfortunate in most ways, Bambi and Tinkerbell having stolen one of their wallets, which saw them beaten, but they managed to explain their quest and were eventually taken back to the Tauzin family home.
Collected by Arabia and returned home, Bambi finds his relationship with the witch only growing stronger. He still fights the presence of the dog-spell in his mind, a constant push of willpower that he is largely unaware of, but is far less antagonistic within the home; has become instead something of a quiet companion and guard dog, often stationed at his master's feet.
Personality:
Upon first meeting him, Bambi seems much like the street-gang kid he used to be: brash and aggressive, irreverent, reckless and disdainful of authority. With Arabia's Chihuahua spell over his mind, these behaviours can also be displayed as a dog would, barking and growling, snarling and bared teeth.
Independent and assertive, Bambi is deeply protective of those he cares about, usually shown through an automatic desire to fight off whatever might be upsetting someone. However, if there is nothing solid to fight, his ways of expressing care can become awkward and somewhat stunted. He usually finds roundabout ways, such as the large collection of plushies he has acquired for Tinkerbell over the time they have been with Arabia. Bambi does not entirely trust himself not to be a threat, a fear of becoming like his father exacerbated by some of the stronger dog urges that he cannot always resist: a need to assert dominance sometimes finding him fighting very roughly with Tinkerbell. He is always incredibly apologetic of these incidents, and will blame himself over them for a lot longer than Tinkerbell will.
Despite seeming confident and extroverted, Bambi, when left to his own devices, is actually something of a quiet boy-a quiet dog-and prefers to spend his time people watching and exploring Arabia's home. He is incredibly unused to kindness, and where his days before the collar would have seen him actively rebuffing it, the Chihuahua in his mind reacts well to affection and attention. However, he does not entirely believe he deserves it, and this will cause him to act shy, often finding himself blushing. He has developed a mostly unconscious habit of rubbing his nose with the heel of his hand when confused or embarrassed, in an attempt to stop this.
Unknown, even to people who have known him for quite some time, is the fact that Bambi is a thinker. The situation with Arabia and Tinkerbell has forced him to finally start to use the mind that might have done him well at school, if he'd ever bothered to go. He is highly observant, logical, and good at judging human behaviour, all of this heightened by the dog's keener sense of body language and facial expression. However, he is undereducated, and does not always know exactly what it is that he's observed, or what to do with it. This can lead to incredibly long trains of thought, often going down paths that aren't necessarily entirely relevant. If something is particularly big or important, he can spend days trying to think it out, and while often able to come to conclusions on his own, sometimes needs outside guidance. He is not a quick thinker when faced with something new, and if not given the time in a pressing situation, will fall back on his old hooligan habits.
Tenacious and quietly wilful, Bambi has not stopped fighting Arabia's spell over his mind, although he has been doing so for so long now that he is largely unaware of the constant barrier he holds against it. He is only human, however, and cannot fight off its effects entirely. A lot of basic Chihuahua urges have slipped through. These are normally stronger in highly stressful situations, when first waking, or in Tinkerbell's company. He hasn't been taken as entirely as Tinkerbell, however. He retains a lot of his human memories, although they are vague and blurred, and lack names or definite senses of place. He is not as shameless as Tinkerbell, and generally manages to resist bizarre public acts, like obviously sniffing people or chasing squirrels.
Extra:
Character Abilities: Dog hearing and sense of smell, slightly better than human nocturnal eyesight, slightly better than human sense of body language. Rate of ageing slowed under Arabia's spell. Can understand any animals that 'talk'.
Possessions: A stolen wallet and a couple of claw-machine plushies in his pockets, the collar around his neck.
Anything else: His connection to Arabia won't be cut off, so Arabia will still be able to sense his actions and give basic signs/commands through sensations caused by the collar. Neither of the dogs are allowed to smoke, and cigarettes will literally explode in their faces if they try.
Samples:
Action/Communication thread/post sample:
They don't have money here, least I ain't seen none. Guess this thing looks like a coin. A really big coin. But it ain't. How do you buy stuff? Just take it?
[He pauses, thinking about how that isn't usually a concern of his, but he decides that probably isn't something he should share.]
Never been a place where it's okay to just take stuff. Not a trick or somethin', is it?
Log/Prose sample:
There's two snot-nosed little brats staring at him. He doesn't need to look at them to know, he saw them on his way over, he can feel them looking now. He knows why, too, knows how weird he looks, a guy like him heading straight for one of the claw machines at the arcade's entrance rather than all the racing or shooting games clattering and blaring out noises inside.
Bambi doesn't care about those games though, even though they can be pretty cool. They don't give you anything for your money, just eat it up til you've got none left. Not that the money he's got is his own - slipped a wallet out of some guy's back pocket two streets over - but he knows what he can get for it: a good load of claw machine plushies, maybe enough left over for a burger or two.
Well, it would be a good load of claw machine plushies, if those kids weren't staring at him, setting him completely off his game. He knows the proper course of action is to ignore them, but the chihuahua in his head wants to kick off, start barking in their faces until they get the message and get lost, and that only really inspires a similar sort of sentiment in the rest of him.
Or maybe, really, it's bothering him so much cause they remind him of Tink's little brothers. Tink's little brothers that Tink probably doesn't remember at all.
He loses the green rabbit for the third time, little plushie arm slipping out of the claw's clutch before he can get it over the bin. He swears and kicks the machine, glares at the multicoloured fluffy contents for a moment before deciding that the four he's already got stuffed into his pockets will be good enough for today. He'll take them to Tink, let the other boy add them to the collection of ripped apart ones that make their room look like the site of a stuffed toy massacre.
The kids snicker as he passes them, and he's feeling just irritated enough to let it go, turning back on them, barking like a crazy person. They leg it down the street immediately, maybe would have put up more of a fight if he was acting like a normal pissed off teenage punk, but why swear and threaten when you can sum up the same sentiment in a few barks and growls.
Bambi watches after them for a moment, but they're round the corner already, and in a week or so he'll have forgotten all about them. He heads off to find Tink.