Post by Kat on Dec 13, 2010 7:54:15 GMT -8
Nickname: Sly
Age: 21 (Late Spring)
Gender: Male
Sexuality: Bisexual—and rather promiscuous, too.
Rank: Candidate, former Apothecary
Location: Sayaie, currently, usually Chydyn.
Personality:
While Sil’us is the charming, quick-witted, and silver-tongued brother, Sylvester seems to be the complete opposite. He is not dumb, not by any means, but he does not express himself in words or expressions very well. In fact, Sylvester does not interact well with other people at all. He has no developed sense of social grace, no ability to read people, certainly not in the way that his crafty, sweet-talking brother can do. And so, Sylvester remains quiet for most of the time, and in social situations, he is the brother that stays in the background, because that is the way he prefers it. But Sylvester is not always lurking in his brother’s wake, because Sylvester possesses an edge to him, one that is dangerous and biting, which his rational and controlled brother lacks.
Thrill seeking and impulsive, Sylvester seems to always get himself into trouble, and not in the same way as his brother. He is constantly expressing his emotional pain as aggressive, powerful assertiveness. He is violent, to say the least, prone to fights and brawls, and even more so, Sylvester is reckless. The more danger an action puts him in, the more it thrills him. He hangs around the Chydyn guards, for example, just to see if he can edge into their fights—closer to Xymokoxi, and closer to danger. In fact, the closer Sylvester feels to imminent mortality, the more alive Sylvester feels. Danger invigorates him with a powerful rush, one that sends his heart, his hormones racing, and he loves it. To him, it links him to a sense of exhilaration which is a sort of twisted joy.
If Sylvester is not a masochist, he encroaches that state. He does not necessarily enjoy pain, although he is not afraid of it like other people, but rather that he enjoys activities which often lead to pain, and so he has developed a high tolerance for pain. He can take a lot before he backs down—which is hardly ever. He does not enjoy being dominated or losing. And Sylvester will fight until he wins, until he is incapacitated, or until Sil’us either physically restrains him or talks him down.
Sylvester’s pugilistic nature comes from his deeply rooted emotional pain. He never overcame the damaged caused by the supposed deaths of his parents, and the result is that his emotional damage manifests as a certain kind of anger and thrill seeking. He is the quieter brother, but Sylvester is not meek or controlled. Instead, he is emotional, almost overly sensitive, and so he acts out, he courses with anger, because that is all that he allows himself to feel. And when Sylvester goes under new emotional traumas, he tends to become even more impulsive, more thrill seeking, and more aggressive. Insults often set him off, as do mentions of his parents, or lovers who jilt him. He cannot seem to handle any sort of emotional upset, and he always acts out to express his pain.
Sylvester does not like being controlled, either. He wants to exist in his own realm, to act in his own way, and he only listens to a few select people—really only his brother and Graham, his guardian. But unlike Sil’us, who talks his way out of situations and who tolerates some leaders and rules, Sylvester is completely opposed. Even in rational situations, where following leadership would be in Sylvester’s best interest, he refuses to do so, solely because he refuses control. Defying any sort of authority is just another thrill for Sylvester, another way to get that rush of adrenaline that comes with physical nature. So when Sylvester wants to do his own thing, to act in the way he wants, he does so—with his fists, by thrashing his way out until he is so combative that other people allow him to be. With Sil’us, though, Sylvester is different. He listens to his brother, almost to a fault, and around Sil’us, Sylvester calms. And only to Sil’us, will Sylvester overcome his abrupt and lacking speech. He opens to his brother, and bears his intensity, his pain, and his thoughts.
Sylvester is also incredibly loving ,although few people ever see that side of him. He loves his brother, and his dedication to Sil’us is powerful and rather consuming. He will do anything for his brother, and his loyalty has no limitations or boundaries. He is equally attached to Graham, although Sylvester does not express it in the same way. He feels a fierce protectiveness around both his guardian and his brother, and Sylvester would die before he allowed anyone to hurt either of them. But Sylvester would never express just how responsible he feels for Sil’us. In his own quiet way, Sylvester understands that because Sil’us spends so much of his time bailing Sylvester, sometimes quite literally, out of trouble, Sil’us feels like the guardian. And Sylvester acknowledges that his younger brother is the responsible one—the behaved one, that Sil’us does dedicate a large amount of his time to saving Sylvester, and so Sylvester does not explain his own protective feelings for his brother.
The only way that people besides Sylvester know his softer, more protective, more caring side is through romance. Relationships split into two categories for the man, the shallow, reckless, intense, and abruptly sexual ones, and the other ones, which are far more emotional. He is a man of many affairs, both sexual and emotional, although he tends to favor the former. He seeks casual relationships, because they allow him to make a connection with other people easily, to envelop himself in some sort of intimacy which requires no attachment. Sil’us might be the brother with the charm, but Sylvester is the one who sleeps around. And he sleeps around a lot, and he does not usually allow these relationships to go on very long, because if Sylvester stays too long in a relationship, he risks the possibility of getting attached. Sometimes, the part of Sylvester that is emotional, falls for people, and once this happens, he changes entirely—he becomes more open, softer, caring, and fiercely protective.
Of course, Sylvester never opens up to people as much as he does to his brother, but he does get a bit clingy, a bit more vulnerable, and he listens to those people. Usually, he burns these relationships out—his own sensibility becoming tired and frustrated with the time he spends—or the beloved partner himself or herself tiring of Sylvester’s neediness. If he does not end the relationships, though, Sylvester tends to be rather damaged, and he always acts out. He is known for attacking later lovers of his past paramours, but then again, he is known for starting fights for no reason as well.
And the final way Sylvester expresses himself is through his work. While Sil’us works the front of the shop, dealing and selling, Sylvester is Graham’s apprentice in the apothecary. He likes the tedium of the work, especially the physical processes of treating the plants combined with the intellectual work of it, the science of it. While he may seem like a brut, and he certainly does, come off that way and act that way, he is intelligent in his own quiet manner. Sil’us is the more apparently intelligent twin, the more outwardly intelligent twin, but Sylvester is quite smart, even if he usually chooses not to express his intelligence. Behind the scenes of the shop, Sylvester diligently works, but he rarely expresses his intelligence to other people beyond Sil’us and Graham. And his impulsive nature, the one that gets him into trouble and which makes him act in was contrary to logic or reason only makes him look dumber, more brutish and pugnacious.
Appearance:
Sylvester is the ugly twin—that is not to say he is unattractive, but he lacks the eye-catching beauty of his twin brother. His appearance is much plainer, much less impressive and beautiful. Sylvester is softer looking, round and almost childlike, and the result is that he settles comfortable in the realm of chubby normality. The twins, though, share a similar mouth, dimpled, broad and curve, but while Sil’us often smiles, Sylvester rarely does. Sylvester’s smile might be his best feature, as it brightens his features and makes his eyes glow with a certain charm they usually lack, but few people ever experience his smile. Instead, Sylvester tends to grimace, his mouth set in a tight line, which keeps his muscles tense and tired looking. In fact, every feature on Sylvester’s face appears tired. His eyes are dull, distant, and underneath them are dark circles. His forehead usually wrinkles with a few lines of irritation, especially when other people speak to him. He even slouches a little, as if he is always dealing with some horrible, crushing problem that weighs him down.
Even though Sil’us’s eyes are dark, Sylvester has much lighter eyes. They are a strange color, often appearing brown, but sometimes green, and in certain lights, almost blue. It all depends on the brightness of a room and Sylvester’s choice of clothing. They are set in the framework of his face, which unlike his brother’s angled, sharp bone structure is round, rather plump, especially around his cheeks. His face is usually covered in various lengths of stubble, because Sylvester rarely takes the effort to shave his face. Like the hair on his head, the stubble is dark, almost black.
An inch and a half shorter than Sil’us, which makes Sylvester stand just under six feet tall, Sylvester is stocky like his brother. His shoulders are broad, as is his chest, which is covered with lean muscle. And while thin, a bit underfed, Sylvester appears fit, as all the time he spends fighting and preparing for such activities shows in his development. His arms, especially, show his effort. And his frequent brawling shows in other places on his body in a much less positive manner. His nose has been broken three times now, so it possesses a certain crookedness which shows the damage. His chest has a scar at the top, near his shoulder, and now, his newest scar is position right under his heart, splitting the lines of his ribs with a deep, raised, red and pink stripe. The injury is still quite recent, and the stitches can still be seen in the outline of the scar tissue.
Rarely well put together, Sylvester puts very little time into thinking about what he wears. It is not uncommon for the man to wear the same outfit for two or three days. His clothing is never washed. It is always just thrown on. His hair is always in disarray, a thick mess on his head, and he sometimes allows it to get a bit too long, so that it hangs in his eyes. He sometimes has tokens of his current affair-of-the-week, a handkerchief tucked into his pockets, a scarf tied around his arm, or a girlish necklace around his neck. His adornment changes quite constantly, but he almost always has one.
Family:
Gael, missing presumed dead- Father
Cyan, missing presumed dead- Mother
Sil’us (Silvanus) of Black Restaph, 21- Brother
Graham, 61 - Foster father, Mentor
Pets:
He really feels that his brother’s Maine Coon, Lady is partially his, but he allows Sil’us to claim the creature, but only because she likes Sil’us better, not because he dislikes her. Sylvester refers to Lady as ‘Puss.’
History:
Sylvester was born first. This is an important distinction. He was born minutes before his twin brother, to Gael and Cyan of Chydyn, in the 36th year of the settlement of Pohono. The birth was surprisingly easy—even for twins, and soon enough both sons were embraced by their parents, Gael taking Sylvester, the elder, and Cyan cuddling the second baby, Silvanus. Sylvester did not cry, while Silvanus, which, in retrospect seems to encapsulate their later forms of expression. Though, these early moments were perhaps the easiest for their parents as the two brothers proved to be quite a handful as they aged.
The brothers had a tendency to get into trouble, and not just a little bit of trouble, either. They were impossibly difficult, zooming around, and they also played an impressive amount of pranks on people. They painted the neighbor’s dog blue and yellow one day—they ate all the apples off of the opposite neighbor’s trees—they spread rumors, they pulled girl’s hair, they dumped worms from the garden into their parents’ bedroom sheets. And the two boys never saw anything wrong with their behavior. They had each other, and they did not need anyone else to approve of them. They were each other’s world—‘Silas and Sly’—Silas got listed first because he was the ring leader, the one that made the rules. Sylvester never felt the need to assert himself. He trusted his brother, and he enjoyed pleasing his brother. Furthermore, as long as Sylvester got the thrill of games—the wonder of breaking the rules and causing trouble, he hardly cared what forms of delinquency they engaged in, as long as they did something exciting. Gael and Cyan enabled their children, spoiled their sons, and the result was that the two of them ran around wild, unpunished, and uncontrolled.
Despite the fact that he loved his parents quite a bit, only less than his brother, Sylvester thought nothing of the planned trip Gael and Cyan took one day, when the boys were ten. In fact, Sylvester did not even tell his parents goodbye before they left. He was too busy changing the labels on their neighbor’s garden, so that the man would not know which plants were which when they grew. Sylvester thought it was a particularly inspired prank, and his parents left for trips like this one often—it was a common occurrence in their household. The neighbor whose garden Sylvester was terrorizing as his parents left for Sayaie was Graham’s garden, and it was situated behind the house of the man the twins were going to stay with in their parents’ absence. Their parents refused to take the children, because of their youth, on a trip which might endanger them.
Sylvester got in trouble for the garden debacle. In fact, as the weeks progressed, the two twins got in a lot of trouble with ‘Uncle Graham.’ Even though Sylvester was the first of them punished, Silas was the one that was punished most often, because the younger of the pair seemed to be the ringleader, especially to someone on the outside. At the time, Sylvester was the better behaved of the pair, the more passive one, the less difficult one, and the one who never seemed to act out of place. And Sylvester took an immediate interest to Graham’s work as an apothecary. From the moment the man made him organize, label, and identify the plants that he de-labeled the day of his parent’s departure, Sylvester found he enjoyed working with the medicinal plants. He bonded with Graham over this new interest, while Silas continued to argue about just about every aspect of their visit.
The day that his parents were to come home, Sylvester waited on Graham’s stoop for hours. In fact, he waited from morning until dark, before Graham forced him to come inside, dejected and abandoned. Soon, Graham, and by extension, the twins, heard that Gael and Cyan had left Sayaie at the appointed date, but no one had seen them since then. Graham insisted that the pair was just delayed, and that they would soon return. But after two weeks, Graham convinced some community members to dispatch search parties—the twins’ dark brown eyes and lighter greenish eyes worked wonderfully as incentive to motivate the Chydyn residents. But no sign was ever found of Gael or Cyan—no remnants of their cart, no horse skeleton, no remains of their stock—nothing. After a year, they were declared dead. Silvanus and Sylvester became orphans.
Graham felt responsible for the twins. They had lived with him for a year, and he felt connected to them. So, he adopted them, and took them both on as apprentices. While Silvanus found a home working the sales, dealing the products, Sylvester preferred the work itself, the physical process of creating the rubs, the detail involved with every step, even the research and the book learning. Especially, though, the boy loved looking for the products, going out in the woods and searching for them. He needed the time alone, because while Silvanus seemed to be getting over the death of their parents, Sylvester started spiraling into worse and worse patterns of grief. The boys started to grow apart them, because Sylvester could not fully embrace their new life. Ironically, this separation between them occurred as they both started to physically mature, and while they were once almost identical, they began to change. They looked related, always, but never quite alike again. Sylvester found that the grief soon turned into a certain empty pain, and the only way he learned to manifest it was through violence.
While Silvanus had always been the worst behaved twin, soon, their roles began to reverse. Silvanus charmed his way into situations, yes, but Sylvester started spending entire nights in bars, with women—with men. He started to get into fights, all the time, at bars, on the streets, everywhere. Silvanus might still get into trouble, but his trouble never harmed anyone, but Sylvester’s trouble was harmful, destructive, and dangerous. Silvanus could get his thrill, his pleasure, from conning people. Sylvester could not, and he kept having to raise the stakes of his “adventures” to keep the adrenaline coursing through his veins. Behavior that started out as sporadic incidents of delinquency became common occurrences. By the time he was fifteen, he was lurking around the Chydyn guards, sometimes sneaking out to watch them fight just to see koxi and to feel the rush. He felt closest to his parents in those moments, when he was most at danger. He started spending longer of stretches of time on his own—days at a time, weeks sometimes, although never more than two, because he remained loyal to both his brother and his guardian. And if Graham ever really needed him at work, Sylvester seemed to always make an appearance, sometimes horribly battered and bruised. He hated to allow either his mentor or his brother to see him with any injuries, sometimes escaping his house to heal at least for a day or two before he returned home. Silvanus became Sylvester’s guardian. The younger twin soon had to watch out constantly for Sylvester’s impulsive and dangerous behavior. It was not unusual for Silas to have to drag an injured, furious, and sometimes intoxicated Sylvester home.
When Silvanus suggested the two of them travel to the Eyrie, Sylvester only agreed because he felt pretty indebted to Silvanus. The journey interested him, as did the Eyrie, but he mainly wanted to appease Silvanus who seemed to constantly do so much for Sylvester. He had never been one to argue with his little brother. But after only a few weeks, when the novelty wore off, Sylvester became anxious and agitated. Sylvester hugged Silvanus one morning, and declared that he was heading to Sayaie with a caravan of merchants. Secretly, Sylvester was convinced his parents could still be in the big bustling city. He knew that if they did depart that morning, they would already be dead. Besides, Sayaie was the most exciting city of all three settlements, and Sylvester needed a thrill. He kept letter correspondences with both Silvanus and Graham, writing at least weekly, no matter his mental state. Sylvester started sleeping with a girl named Maggie—he was smitten after a month—he wrote them all about this too. When she broke up with him, Sylvester characteristically plunged further and further down his path of destruction which lead to an unfortunate brawl with Maggie’s new boyfriend.
Sylvester very rarely entered fights with weapons, but he was angry enough to overlook the fact that Maggie’s man was armed. After Sylvester landed a few well placed punches, the other man pulled a knife on Sylvester, who found himself bleeding on the floor of the tavern. He was lucky, because the bar owner took pity on him, and was friends with one of the local healers, who offered to take Sylvester as a patient, free of charge. The healer knew Sylvester through Graham, who was a personal friend of the other professional. The injury was two months ago, and Sylvester has only now recovered enough to attempt to travel or work again.
And Sylvester is currently looking for a way to the Eyrie, because after two months of no letters, Sylvester knows Silvanus will be a wreck.
Desired Color: Red.
Undesired Color: None.
Reasoning: I think of Reds as fighters—powerful and strong, and I think Sylvester pretty much embodies those qualities. I also think that his dislike of authority would suit a red very much, as well as his more passionate tendencies. I do think that Sylvester loyal and dedicated, though, and I hope that having a simourv which forces him to accept a some sort of leadership role would make him straighten out and embrace the more strict and upright side that he currently ignores. Well, and I want to play a red, so I’m working it. Honestly, though, per usual, I trust you guys to pick a simourv which fits him. I do not think that after a red, any of the other colors would not suit him or suit him. He really could go with whatever.
Injury/Mauling: DOOOOOOO ITTTTTTT. No death.
Icon:
http://i721.photobucket.com/albums/ww218/katfaces/Sly/avatsly.png
