PLAYER INFO.
NAME: kitty
PREFERRED PRONOUNS: she/her
ARE YOU OVER 18? yessir
CONTACT: pm or meowed
CURRENT CHARACTERS: Peter Parker (TASM)

CHARACTER INFO.
NAME: Mircalla von Karnstein. That said, she goes by any anagram she feels inclined to at the time. At the moment she's going by Carmilla.
CANON: Carmilla Webseries
CANON POINT: Just before the end of S1, where she stabs Mommy Dearest with the sword that kills the user.
AGE: 340. Died when she was 18, but has been successfully pretending to be a third year in university for decades.
GENDER: Female.

HISTORY:

❝ Posterity doesn't care. I should know. I live in it. ❞

APPEARANCE: Admired for her looks even at a young age, Carmilla has dark black-brown hair that she usually wears curled, dark eyes and fairly pale skin. She is almost always seen wearing dark clothes, darker eyeliner and she has an extreme fondness for black nail polish, too. She is slim and slight and not particularly muscular, and on top of that she barely clears 5'3. That said, she has confidence and presence that often makes her seem taller.

ABILITIES:

— VAMPIRISM. Carmilla is an old vampire, and that affords her some of the usual vampire skills. Super strength, super speed, super reflexes, you know the drill. she heals quickly if she's well fed, and the fed in this instance is blood (though she does still enjoy food, chocolate especially). She is more resistant to damage and is stated that she will survive most anything unless she loses her heart or her head. she has no weakness to garlic or sunlight, like some vampires, though she is burned by genuine holy water, as in properly blessed. She does not need to be invited in to enter a residence.

— SUGGESTION. For those particularly feeble of mind, Carmilla is able to persuade them towards her wishes. For example, she convinced someone she attacked that he didn't need to be upset about it, and then he wasn't. It requires the low hypnotic voice and eye contact, and it doesn't always work. She doesn't seem to use it much, and only on less-than-intelligent individuals, so it's likely it isn't effective on stronger willed people. I don't intend to use this much since Carmilla used it like twice in canon, it's clearly not her usual thing. She usually just does the bad bullshit and lets people be mad about it. That said, if it ever did come up, it'd only be with explicit permission!

— DREAM INFLUENCE. Anyone who sleeps around her is prone to having nightmares. Carmilla has no real control over this and it doesn't even indicate she has foul intent, it just happens. It seems to be something sprung from the original book. The dreams are usually about drowning in blood or giant cat monsters. Dreamcatchers seem to more or less prevent these, or the show forgot about it past s1. ANYWAY,

— CAT MONSTER. Speaking of cat monsters, she can turn into a cat monster. Think panther. Big enough to drag jocks across the quad in her jaws. This is apparently from the original novella, so, that's something.

— TELEPORTATION. She can poof around in black smoke. She can't teleport anyone else, just herself. Range is not clearly stated canonically, but this sort of ability can be prickly, so I'm cool with any nerfs if needed!

— PYROKINESIS. She usually uses this to light candles to mood light her brooding, but she also set a huge leather book on fire.

— PSIONIC SCREAM. Vampires of a certain age in Carmilla's canon have the ability to let out a psionic scream, which disorients or knocks out others. That said, she's young enough that she has no control over this ability and more or less it hurts people's ears when she is especially upset.

— NON-VAMPIRE STUFF. She is an old vampire, and especially well read. She is familiar with many languages, many of them dead, and some of them not. She's lived through a lot and knows a lot of history.

— REGAIN CONSIDERATIONS. Carmilla has a lot of powers so honestly, I'm not sure exactly what I would pick when and where. However, I'm pretty certain of what my first pick would be: undead status that requires her to drink blood. Considering how much simple vampirism entails, I'm cool to break it into stages if needed. She needs to drink blood is the first regain, she gets strength back the next regain, she gains her impervious nature in the next regain, etc. As far as her magical tendencies go, I am not sure of a particular order there, but in general I intend to give her the abilities that she does not like having first, moving towards the abilities she doesn't care much about or enjoys last. Because as a roleplayer I am under an obligation to make her suffer as much as possible. Also, since I love that she's a cat girl, I imagine turning into a panther would be a sooner rather than later thing.

SUITABILITY: Carmilla has gone through a great deal in her lifetime(s). She's suffered a lot and was the right hand of an evil goddess. While she did give up her life willingly (or tried to), that doesn't mean she wants to die. As a selfish creature by nature, she'd much rather be alive. And look, dying for the cause really sucked the first time, why try it again? If she can survive and get her own piece once this mess is over, then she'll do that. She won't love being trapped and the mind control aspects. She desperately wants to be free and is bound to writhe under any attempt to control her, at some point she'll learn to be smart about it and figure out the new way to survive. She's been at it too long to just give up on it now.

PERSONALITY.

● Your character has a chance to undo a terrible mistake, but in doing so, there could be unintended consequences for everyone they know. Is it worth the risk? Or should the dead stay dead?

Really depends on what the mistake itself is. Overall, considering the plenty of mistakes Carmilla has made in her life, she’s largely learned to begrudgingly live with them. Having to kill or hurt people, which she has done in the past and will be happy to do in the future if she has to, is an ugly reality but not one she hasn’t grappled with before. She feels guilt over things and knows she’s done things that can’t be forgiven (such as grooming girls for her mother or killing Vordenberg’s family). However, despite the fact she feels guilt and remorse, taking a life isn’t that big a deal to her. Killing more people to turn back the clock would not really improve things, now would it? She’s a realist – one life lost is better than two. The philosopher in her understands the trolley conundrum and would send it over the one to spare the many.

However, it really does depend on the mistake, and who she’s trying to protect. If it involves someone she cares about, someone she loves? Oh, absolutely she’d pick the important one to her over saving strangers she doesn’t know or care about. Again, she knows it’s morally wrong, but she’s selfish. For people like Mattie (her older vampire sister), she’s willing to make messy choices. Even in instances like Laura, she will quickly put Laura’s safety and wellbeing in front of countless others, even herself. Whether Laura asked for it or wants it is immaterial, Carmilla has lost too much and will sacrifice whatever she has to if she can protect the things that matter to her. This is canonically proven when Carmilla agrees to run off with Laura and let her mother keep on with her sacrifices. Laura was angry and rightly so, but Carmilla it seemed like a decent compromise. And far safer than trying to battle with her mother, odds she was likely to lose. Odds Laura was likely to lose, and Carmilla considers that just as bad.

Frankly, though, Carmilla avoids caring about anyone enough that she’d be willing to go to such extreme ends to protect them. So, while she’s capable of it, it certainly wouldn’t be any run of the mill mistake that would merit that kind of sacrifice.

● If your character had the option to permanently lose the ability to feel certain negative emotions like fear or grief, or permanently forget certain memories, would they take it? What if they will never know that something has been taken from them? Does loss only matter if it's known what's missing?

Honestly? Yeah, she definitely might consider it. She’s known for leaning on vices like partying, murdering, and drinking to douse her negative emotions. To be fair, she has a lot of them; her mother forced her into servitude, required her do things that she slowly realized was reprehensible and unforgiveable. When she finally fought back, she was interred in a coffin of blood for decades. Even beyond the mistreatment of her mother, Carmilla was also held hostage in her early years as a vampire and has plenty of horrific memories to go along with that.

She’d been known to avoid her guilt and pain by suppressing it with substance abuse or just pretending she doesn’t care. Carmilla would likely be plenty tempted by an opportunity to just wash all that away. She’s tired of hating herself, she’s tired of the guilt and she’s tired of the pain. Maybe it’d be easier if she didn’t have to feel all that anymore. It’s a heavy weight to bear for centuries and being coerced doesn’t really do much to alleviate the guilt.

That said, being stripped of that might strip away who she is. If she gets a sense of losing herself in letting go of those negative emotions, it might be more of a struggle. She isn’t Mircalla anymore and doesn’t know how to be that girl anymore. Maybe doesn’t want to be her, either, because she remembers how the world chewed her up and spit her out back then. Still, she’d be enormously tempted… tempted enough to try it. She’ll try anything once if it promises to make her feel good, even if the eventual crash after is a bitch.

If she never has to know what she left behind, it would almost sound too good to be true. Which is probably where she’d doubt it too much to go for it. Free happiness? A magical do over without strings or stipulations? Probably some ploy to get her back to blithe obedience from mother dearest, or someone else who wants to control her. In the end, that’d be enough to snap her out of being tempted, though there might be a lingering wonder of what it might be like if she did.

● Could your character ever forgive themselves for something morally wrong that they've done? No matter how much time has passed? No matter how much penitence has been done? Is being sorry enough to be a good person?

Carmilla believes strongly in philosophy. She’s been attending philosophy classes for decades and has enough credits in it for a doctorate. She has a very strong understanding of right and wrong, and on top of that, the systems humans create to define their behavior and justify their actions. She understands when what she does is bad, or wrong, or evil. She knows when she is hurting others and she knows when her behavior is morally reprehensible. That doesn’t stop her, but she’s well aware.

Because of that awareness, and usually choosing to do the violent wrong thing anyway, she’s aware that her soul is probably marred enough at this point there’s no going back. She knows she’s done countless unforgivable, evil things. She doesn’t expect forgiveness from others, in fact, seems to want others to hate her for what she’s done and expects them to revile her for who she is and her past. Moreover, she doesn’t forgive herself, either. She knows she doesn’t deserve forgiveness. She’s not a slight fall from grace, she’s sat at the right hand of a monster and willingly followed her. Even if at some point she bucked the reins, too long she was more than happy to be Lilita’s pawn and feeling sorry for those she hurt doesn’t absolve her. Being sorry is not enough to be a good person.

Being sorry is a part of making amends, but there’s a line somewhere in all the murdering and vengeance that you can’t come back from. At this point she feels she’s more or less a lost cause, so while she does feel guilty and the occasional pangs of remorse, Carmilla is willing to do more evil and unforgivable things to protect herself and those that matter to her. What’s a little more blood on hands that are already covered in it?

● Your character has a secret they have been sworn to, but revealing this secret could save the lives of countless others. Is it worth breaking the promise to save others, or is betrayal never justifiable?

She can keep a secret perfectly fine. It required tying her to an office chair and then a week of starvation to get her to cough up any details about her mother, and Carmilla does not even like her mother. It was more that the secrets were better left untold, because dumb redheaded twerps were more likely to get themselves killed than make a difference. Carmilla hides who she is and what she is capable of just about all of the time, and she’s gotten good at the act. She’s perfectly content keeping a web of secrets at all times, and even people she likes she’s not enormously forthcoming with.

There are absolutely some secrets that are worth keeping. That are worth others dying to uphold. There are occasions where the secret saves more lives than it takes, and she’s strong enough to watch the pawns fall knowing that keeping silent is the better option. Which is not to say she’s on the moral high ground, most of the time she’s absolutely not. She’s willing to let others die to keep her secrets to herself and would let others die to protect secrets for people she cares about too.

However, once someone she cares about gets in the crossfire, then she becomes more willing to compromise. This is shown in her willingness to share the secret of Mattie’s locket with Laura, which eventually results in Mattie’s death. Carmilla was willing to sacrifice both Mattie’s secrets, and eventually her life, because of her love for Laura. She definitely came to regret that decision, but that sort of choice is most certainly inside of her. Betrayal can be justifiable, and worse, Carmilla isn’t even that worried about justifying things if they serve her and her interests well enough.

● Has your character ever gotten joy out of hurting others, physically or mentally? If they have, does it scare them?

Short answer: Yes.

Long answer: Still yes, but it’s also complicated. When she was newly turned, Carmilla was kept captive for years in a situation that involved physical and sexual abuse. When she finally got the will and strength to break free of that situation, she intentionally murdered the family of the man that did it to her, leaving him alive to suffer. Upon escaping that situation, she was recruited into her mother’s cabal of vampires and did plenty of violent and horrible things at her mother’s request. Viciousness and violence were not only suggested but encouraged. Mattie speaks of times they would kill and maim their way through Europe like you’d recollect a backpacking trip in in your Freshman year. She enjoyed that violence, and she enjoyed feeling powerful and hurting others, and initially didn’t care about the lives she took or the pain she caused.

However… age provides perspective. Losing someone she loves to the same horrific game she’d been helping her mother enact for centuries forced her to look at it in a different light. She saw the terror and disgust in Elle’s eyes and now she can’t help but hate herself for who she is and what she’s done. She’s enjoyed violence in the past and hell, still does on occasion. Don’t presume that her guilty conscience will stop her from lashing out again. In fact, Carmilla is quick to suggest murdering something if it is a threat, or even simply bothering her. She seems to enjoy making threats about killing and hurting and carries through with it on occasion.

That said, the joy ride of a vampirism power induced high is long gone by now. While she has enjoyed hurting others (and continues to, if given the opportunity to hurt someone that has hurt her or hurt someone she cares about), she’s not above hating herself for that fact. She’s too far gone to be scared of herself for it, though. More like resigned to it. It’s a weapon she can use to protect herself and her interests, and you’d better believe she can and will if she has to. Just not quite as gleefully. (Unless it’s her mother, and then she will create a whole flipbook on the best ways to murder her.)

WRITING SAMPLES.

SAMPLES: Here she is at the TDM! While there are a few comments going there, here is another log sample from another TDM, and here is a text sample from another game! I always decide to do things last minute and never have TDM samples because I'm the Worst!!

NOTES.

QUESTIONS OR CONCERNS: As a vampire, at some point she will need to consume blood to survive. Will she be able to steal it off hospitals, or be required to feed on other humans? Would she be able to feed on NPCs? Not named ones, but townies and the like? What about a Robbie? I wonder what they'd taste like!