Post by Deleted on Oct 28, 2013 1:51:55 GMT -6
||| SILHOUETTE |||
( Design & image credit to Equestria-Prevails )
#Name; Silhouette
#Age Group ; Adult
#Gender ; Female
#Species; Bat Pony
#Cutie Mark ; An open and watchful eye looking out over a crescent moon and stars.
#Occupation ; Night Guard, Private (former Corporal)
#Powers and Abilities ; She’s capable of flight, low-light and nighttime vision, echolocation, and cloud or surface-walking; much like any other Bat Pony. Also, she completed the same training as any other Guard, so she’s proficient with standard Equestrian weaponry, unarmed combat, and has a working knowledge of legal protocol.
Her special talent, however, lies in investigation; she’s good at finding things that have gone missing, or that haven’t been discovered in the first place. She particularly finds lost and stolen objects, but occasionally roots out missing or wanted ponies as well.
#Physique ; Light and lanky, but in quite fit condition, as her occupation requires. Slightly stiff on her right side due to a past injury.
#Mane and fur color and style ; Silhouette’s coat is a darkish blue-gray color, kept clean and no-fuss, save for the necessary fluffy tufts on her ears. Her mane is kept relatively short, so on the occasions she has to wear her helmet it fits in without getting in the way; it’s in a neat, choppy sort of style, manageable and maybe a tad casual. It’s indigo blue with lighter blue stripes.
#Eye color ; Deep magenta
#Other appearance details (optional) ; On the job, she’s often wearing her Night Guard uniform. Since she’s just a patrol, she wears the light version, usually without helmet except on special occasions; simple shoes, pauldrons, and chest/back guard.
#Personality ;
Silhouette is a strange, sometimes off-putting but very pleasant mish-mash of a pony. Overall she has a very calm, professional demeanor while on-duty, and a laid-back (if rather eccentric) attitude off-duty. She takes the values she swore to uphold as a Guard very seriously. Breaking her professionalism for the sake of a good time or a couple of laughs would violate some of her most core principles.
That said? If she’s off-duty, you look like you need it, and it’s within the law, she’ll prank your guts out and cackle about it all through the town.
In matters of the law, Silhouette is pretty unforgiving, and it takes very, very particular circumstances to make her cross the line in any way. She swore to uphold law and order in Equestria, but she of all ponies knows that what is legal and what is right don’t always overlap.
That said, she’s quicker to break the law herself than to overlook someone else’s lawbreaking. Call it hypocrisy, but those youthful days of rebellion aren’t totally behind her.
That's not the only un-Guardlike thing about her, though. Silhouette also has a rather strong belief in dream logic, superstition and divination. She sees "signs" and "portents" in the world around her, takes them as directions and acts accordingly—sometimes even in her duties as a guard. It's gotten her in trouble on more than one occasion. (It certainly makes her reports popular reads around the office, though.)
But on the other side of the coin, this means small beauties and simple things in life are never wasted on her. And she has an endearing affection for just about all of them. From the kind cashier she meets every day to that one cup of peppermint tea you can only find at Sugarcube Corner on Hearth’s Warming Eve.
However, this outlook is one of many changes that emerged from her efforts to cope with a case of post-traumatic stress disorder. She doesn’t often talk about it, or the event that led to her diagnosis, but adopting her “be in the present” outlook is part of what helps her cope. Unfortunately, by definition, it’s impossible to be “cured” of PTSD; she simply learned ways to live with it. She still struggles with recurrent nightmares during times of stress, and has a debilitating fear of open or uncontrolled fire.
When it comes to relating with others, Silhouette is a bit slow to warm up. She’s quite nice, but there’s an air of businesslike cool to her… that is, until you’ve wormed your way under her skin. But once you’re there, you’re there for life; Sil is as loyal as they come to her friends and comrades, and will fight to the ends of Equestria for you. (And maybe even further.)
#History ;
Silhouette was an only child, the filly of two Night Guards. An interesting pair, to be sure—but it meant that whenever papa was out on work, mama would be home to take care of her, and vice versa. She was the next in a long line of Night Guards; it was more or less expected that she’d end up as one too, and she never tried to fight it. She looked up to her dad and loved her mom, so despite their sometimes-rough line of work, she never had any problems.
However, growing up in the caves made her a little nervous when it came time to leave the nest. She wasn’t very social in her youth, and kept her nose in a book whenever possible. She did make one very close friend, though, in a pegasus filly named Midnight Melody.
She met Midnight the same night she earned her cutie mark. Midnight had run away from her parents, and Silhouette caught onto her trail from a discarded music-note barrette. Being in a bit of a precocious phase, she chased the trail through most of the night and the bigger half of Canterlot. The two were found by a passing Guard, fighting mercilessly in a cardboard box. By this time, Sil had a brand-new mark adorning her flank.
Despite the rough start, Midnight and Silhouette became fast friends and remained so for many years. Midnight’s boisterous nature dragged Silhouette out of her shell, and Silhouette’s level-headed attitude kept Midnight grounded.
As they grew, Silhouette and Midnight did many things together. In their young adulthood they even formed a “punk rock” band together with a few other friends. Silhouette performed half of the vocals and played second guitar. While they never grew to any significant fame, they had a great time playing underground gigs and making music together, and the days in the band are among some of Silhouette’s happiest memories.
However, Silhouette’s dream still was to join the Night Guard. So after a few years of playing with the ‘Wings, Silhouette left the band to sign up for basic training; not wanting to be left behind by her closest friend, Midnight followed her, and the band dissolved.
Even when they couldn’t work together, the two maintained a close friendship off-duty. Work sometimes came between them, but not often; and while Midnight had left her heart with the band, she had every intention of dragging Silhouette back in someday. Kicking and screaming if necessary.
It never came to be. One mission during the winter before Luna’s return had Silhouette, Midnight, and a small detachment of other Guards escorting a shipment of food, tinder, and valuables to a northern Equestrian settlement, with two stops on the way. But the shipment never made it. The rescue team that found them discovered them at their first stop, with the encampment in ruins, the shipment gone, and less than half of the guards left alive.
Silhouette’s memories of what transpired are mercifully fuzzy. She remembers waking up to screaming and the thick stench of smoke. Unearthly growls and fire in great, billowing gusts. Shouting orders and being shouted orders back. But more than anything else, she remembers something huge and heavy pinning her to the ground, and seeing Midnight’s prone form lying in front of her, completely still, and just out of reach. After that—nothing. Just empty darkness.
She survived, but not unscathed; after her physical recovery she still had a great deal of mental damage to sort through. Silhouette was kept off of active duty and placed under medical leave for a number of years while she underwent a rigorous therapy regimen, as per standard requirement of Guards who undergo severe trauma. She was quickly diagnosed with a case of post-traumatic stress, and was prescribed a combination of PE/CPT and anti-depressant medication.
Over the course of her treatment (about two years from the incident), Silhouette re-ordered almost everything about her prior way of thinking. The loss of Midnight was something she had a very hard time accepting or adjusting to, and it was Tartarus to get through the denial stage; but with the help of her doctor, she sought support in her old filly’s pastime of reading. She read mainly books of Eastern philosophy and Lunatarian thought, and absorbed their lessons voraciously.
After she was deemed again fit to resume duty, Silhouette was demoted and sent to do guard duty in a little town called Ponyville. It was a probationary job, she knew; they still weren’t sure she could be a stable member of the Night Guard. But that was okay with her. She accepted her duties, and to this day, has kept quiet watch over Ponyville’s streets after the sun has settled.The Roleplayer's Corner
#Nickname ; Dizzy
#Age ; 20
#Gender ; Female
#How did you find us? ; Follow-the-link adventure~!
#Sample RP ;
The townsfolk of Ponyville were fast asleep. While they were all chasing daylight in their warm beds, Luna’s night outside yawned infinitely, covering all the world in her dim blanket of half-toned blue. Silhouette walked the darkened streets, perfectly silent but for the sound of her breath and the soft clink of her armor.
Tonight, like the night before, and the night before that, she was out on her patrol. Despite the reputation Ponyville had earned from things like the “Ursa Minor” incident and Discord’s return, those kinds of things came few and far between. She rarely ever encountered any kind of real trouble. Still, no excuse to let her guard down (ha, ha).
She glanced down the main road, which led straight to Town Hall. The streetlights spilled yellow out over the street, so she didn’t want to go down there just yet; she’d loop around to Sugarcube Corner and come back, as usual. A few windows were still lit, too, and she got the feeling that every time she walked past those on her patrol, it intensified the rumors among foals of a ghostly guard that wandered Ponyville’s streets after dark.
Silhouette chuckled to herself, rustling her wings a little. Not that she’d admit it on the record, but she kind of liked that. It was fun, you didn’t get these quaint schoolhouse rumor-mills in Canterlot. Part of the small town charm. She could see why ponies chose to live out their lives here… and on some level, ever since she came here, she had it in the back of her head that the property values weren’t too bad.
A noise; she paused mid-step, tipping her ear toward a side street. About two blocks off there was an odd sort of scuffling sound. She stood ramrod still until it occurred again, this time a little closer. Traveling away from town center, then. That place was on her route anyway. It wouldn’t hurt to just cut through and check, right?
With a quick check of her three six and nine, Sil unfurled her wings and slipped into the darkness of an alleyway, cutting through to the other side. Once there, she lifted into the air and alighted on the underside of a second-story awning, taking care not to make a sound.
She peered out through the cover of shadow, the eerie glint of her magenta eyes the only evidence she was there. She had her vantage point. Now just to see where this funny noise was coming from...