Application: Rekindle

[echoofanother]

OOC Information
Player Name: Sami
Player Age: 21
Player Contact: Personal journal is sami_fire, and I'm SamiFire on Plurk.
Player/Character HMD: Right here!
Other characters in game: None!

IC Information
Character Name: Echo
Character Age/Gender: 19 (but chronologically only about a year and three months old), Male
Canon Point: After seeing Sephira's ritual to interface with Ancient Simelian technology.
Character History:

On December 15th, Echo was found by the simulacrum search patrols outside the town of Simel. As a freshly-spawned simulacrum, he had no memory of his original life or his name. As was the custom for all recently-found simulacra, he was given a rundown of what he was and some information about the town. Since he was the only simulacrum found that day, he got his information from the head councilman himself. At the end of the meeting, he chose his name, thinking that simulacra were just "echoes of other people."

He was given a week to settle into life in Simel till employees from SPRI (Spiritual Protection and Research Institute) came to "index" him, or add him to their current database of simulacra. When he was indexed, a certain parameter of his was found to be three times higher than normal. Dr. Kana (the head scientist of SPRI) herself explained that this meant that he would have a significantly higher rate of simulacrum sickness than others. To study the effects of this parameter, he would be brought in for future examinations at least once a month. When he got home, he met his neighbor, Mia, and they got to know each other, beginning one of Echo's most important friendships.

A month after his arrival, more people from SPRI arrived at his doorstep to bring him to the facility once again. This time, they said that there was someone who might be of interest to Echo. This someone happened to be another recently-spawned simulacrum. What made this one so important was that he came from the same world as Echo did, and the scientists felt it might be a good idea to introduce them. When Echo met this young man, he didn't even have a name. Echo was the one who chose his name: Gold, for the gold accents on the jacket he arrived in. Echo was initially the only person Gold trusted or even responded to, but as time went on, he began to warm up and stop being so afraid of the world around him. It seemed that Echo's warm, friendly disposition helped him feel more at ease.

That August, the new Animid unit Sephira was born. This event marked the inception of the Simulacrum System, though the first round of simulacra weren't taken in till October of that year. At Mia's urging, Echo and Gold began to take note of who went missing, though they were unable to piece together any common threads between the people who had been taken. When December and Echo's birthday came around, Echo received quite a present. Gold confessed his love for him, and the two entered a serious (but nonetheless open) relationship. They would not be able to get any answers regarding where the simulacra were going and what they were doing till that January, when the simulacra returned.

When the simulacra returned from stasis in SPRI's main facility in January, Mia insisted that the trio go interview at least one person who had come back, and Echo agreed that this would be a good idea. After speaking with an old woman who had been chosen for the Simulacrum System, they learned the truth: that the souls of simulacra were being used as weapons. Mia reacted with great indignation, and while Echo wanted her to calm down a bit, he couldn't help but agree that the cons of the system far outweighed the pros and that something should be done. It was then that the idea of a protest was born, and they began to start spreading the word of what they wanted to do.

The first simulacrum protest occurred on February 5th. It started out small and quiet, but as the trio went through the town, people began to gather and the protest grew louder. Eventually, Mia came up with the idea to protest directly in front of the SPRI facility. Their words were heard, but not well-received; not long after they arrived, the protesters were greeted with a smoke bomb full of tranquilizing gas. While the protest seemed to be a bust, what the protesters didn't know was that they had indeed managed to reach someone on the inside. Sephira, the key to the Simulacrum System, was starting to question whether her duty was truly right.

Sephira and Echo would meet face to face when Sephira was dragged out for a walk around Simel. He made use of the limited time he had before Gold dragged him away to ask her to think about her position and what impacts she could have. He would get to meet her another time when he was brought in for one of his routine examinations. He asked her if she had thought like he had told her to. She had, but she had not come to a decision. When she did come to her decision, it was to adhere to her duties. When the simulacrum trio was informed of the decision, their reactions were mixed. Mia was angry about the choice and Gold remained as suspicious as ever, but Echo was accepting and tolerant of the decision. He simply said that things would remain the same, not worsen.

That would not be the case, however. Two weeks later, following a second round of simulacra being taken in by SPRI, another protest broke out. This one was much more violent than the first; people were getting into shoving matches with guards, and Mia was recognized as the instigator and captured. When Sephira learned that Dr. Kana planned to sacrifice Mia by using her life energy to create a charging station for recently-discovered technology, she left to tell Echo and Gold of what was going on. Echo, Gold, and Sephira ended up being too late to stop the procedure, but Mia survived despite a 90% chance of dying. When she woke up from her unconscious state, Echo confessed his love for her and Mia accepted, creating Echo's peculiar two relationship state. Sephira walked in on them and announced that she would refuse to use the Simulacrum System from that day forward, effectively putting an end to it.

A short while after the end of the Simulacrum System, Sephira invited the simulacrum trio to watch her perform a ritual that would allow her to interface with the technology that Mia had been used to charge. There were plans to take them with when SPRI conducted an exploration of the underground city that the technology had been taken from, but before that happened, Echo was taken to Saeng Seong.

Character World:

Echo comes from a world where magitechnology is widespread. Buildings are made of special magic-resistant materials, some machines are powered by magic and not mechanics (well, not entirely mechanics, anyway)... things like that. On a scale of 1 to 10, with 1 being Fantasy and 10 being Sci-Fi, I'd say it's roughly a... 7? You don't have crazy galactic warships zipping around everywhere, but the place is pretty advanced tech-wise.

A unique aspect of this world is that it has a weakened barrier between itself and other words. Because of this, all kinds of nasties slip in from time to time, and conventional weapons don’t always have the best effect on them. To combat these nasties, artificial beings called Animids were created. They are humanoids- cyborgs, to be more precise- that can summon apparitions that attack for them. These apparitions come from memory crystals that are from the world's equivalent of save points (in that they passively store memories of those who pass by).

The weakened barrier between worlds also results in another unique phenomenon: simulacra. A simulacrum appears when information on a person sifts through the dimensional weak spots. They tend to appear in the same locations, and towns of simulacra tend to spring up where simulacra commonly "spawn." Basically, simulacra are clones of people from other worlds.

Simulacra typically have laser-guided amnesia. They don't remember their names or the lives of the people they were copied from, but they remember things like how to talk and do basic functions and whatnot (rarely, they may also remember special skills that their original possessed). Since they don't remember their names, they tend to just pick something that they think suits them or have one given to them by someone else (this results in a lot of people with weird object or color names).

Simulacra can regain memories of their originals over time, but the interference from dimensional energy will make them sick. Typical symptoms include nausea, vomiting, fever, achiness, other assorted flu-like symptoms, and psychological symptoms like anxiety and depression. Typically, a simulacrum can be sick for roughly a few days before regaining a memory. Echo is a little special in that he has a higher level of dimensional interference than other simulacrums, which means that he gets much sicker for longer. While most simulacrums can typically push past their symptoms, Echo's spells tend to lead to him flat-out collapsing in the middle of where he is and being more or less off his feet for roughly a week. (As a side note: a simulacrum can get sick from dimensional interference and not regain a memory.)

Something in a simulacrum's composition allows their souls to be downloaded out of their bodies and used in something called the Simulacrum System, where their souls can be summoned and used to fight nasties that slip in through the weak dimensional barrier. The souls can be put back, mind you (the bodies are put into stasis while the souls are being used), but this is every bit as morally grey as it looks.

Character Personality:

Echo has an easygoing nature; not even arriving in the middle of nowhere with no memories made him particularly frightened (though being found before he could wander off and get attacked by monsters probably helped significantly). When someone gets too excited (for example, Mia's occasional outbursts), his first instinct is to calm them. If someone's not happy, he wants them to be happy. He operates on a very "tend and befriend" basis. Above all, Echo is warm and friendly. His sociable demeanor has made him popular with the townspeople, and if he sees you enough, he'll probably get attached to you.

On the topic of attachment, once Echo sets his sights on you, he will lavish friendship and affection on you. He has a habit of touching people (mostly nonchalant pats on the arm or the head), and sometimes it seems that he doesn't understand why you can't just express friendship through constant hugs. He will want to get to know you, and he'll probably bribe you with the occasional pleasant surprise (though it's not really a bribe, since he doesn't expect anything more than your continued friendship in return). Expect to be taken out to eat a lot.

It may seem that Echo is easygoing to the point of being almost passive, given how often he agrees with others. He can be a little impressionable and easily influenced. However, his final decisions are usually always a product of his own decision-making. He is used to having to arbitrate between Mia and Gold's suggestions and arguments, often being the one to provide the middle ground. For example, when Mia suggests going taking the protest to SPRI's main facility and Gold says that they shouldn't, Echo's middle ground is to go to the facility but keep the protest as tame as possible to avoid stirring up any trouble. His agreeableness should not be mistaken for a lack of ability to think about a situation.

On the flip side, Echo can be moody at times. While his more severe moods are typically caused by bouts of simulacrum sickness, his dark side can be rather murky indeed. He tends to sulk his way through particularly bad days; his anger is generally of a more low-key sort unless something truly strikes a nerve (when he discovered Mia unconscious, he was flat-out yelling at Dr. Kana and demanding to know why she chose Mia for the sacrifice). When he's in one of his moods, he can sink into depression, sometimes for no reason. He can be easily lured out of his funks by people he trusts, however.

Echo follows tenets from two sources: Mr. Owen, the head councilman, and the memories he regains of his original self. When Echo first arrived, Mr. Owen introduced him to the idea of making new memories to replace the ones that he had lost. Because of how he took the statement to heart, Echo is always eager for new experiences. He extended this concept to not just immaterial memories, but to sensual memories as well. As a result, he is something of a sensualist. He loves his food and his physical contact and intimacy. He will often want to mix the two types of memories, hence his habit of giving people friendly pats. As for what his memories do for him, they motivate him to gather people and be friendly to them. Most of his memories seem to involve his original's friends in some way or another, which has led him to conclude that his original was a friendly person and one worth emulating. (He also believes that his original might be a hero, given the memories of battle against demon-like creatures.)

Character Abilities: Echo's original had the ability to summon spirits and related entities, along with the use of some general offensive magic. However, Echo himself doesn't remember having this ability yet, so it effectively is a non-issue (unless regaining such a power through his natural memory regain process is allowed- and even so, he probably won't be able to summon anything across the dimensional divide).

Character Inventory: Echo probably won't have anything but the clothes on his back.

Samples:

This was really something.

Echo had really only been to two places in his life: the town of simulacra he lived in and the facility where research was done on simulacra. Being in a new place like this was a little jarring, but by the same token, it made him incredibly excited. He was always one for new experiences, and Saeng Seong promised to be quite the adventure. It would take some getting used to, of course, but didn't every big change in life have some sort of adjustment period? The adjustment period would pass, and then it'd be smooth sailing from there.

He listened to the instructions and warnings given to him intently. The whole debriefing reminded him somewhat of what had happened when he had first been discovered by the patrols and brought before the council that lead his town. He had been told what he was, what would happen to him, and what his life would be like. They had particularly focused on the periods of illness that would strike a simulacrum, information that reared its head once again when the scientists discovered his higher level of dimensional interference. Here they focused on the consequences that came from being "out of touch" for too long, so to speak. At least this new sort of illness didn't come out of nowhere, and something could be done about it.

Not that Echo minded the idea of having to fulfill a certain quota of physical contact. Heck, the idea made his excitement flutter inside him once again. He sometimes didn't understand why he couldn't just express friendship by hugging everyone, and yet here he could do just that! Plus, it was good for you, too. He saw no problem with helping others out with a hug or two. It would make introductions more interesting, that was for sure.

There was one qualm he had about this place. That physical contact quota would be so much easier to meet if Gold or Mia had been brought here with him. Gold and Mia really were his better fractions in many ways, with Gold's caution keeping him in check and Mia's passion making experiences just that much more exciting. Without them here, Echo felt a tad incomplete. Their presences would certainly make adjusting easier. Ah, maybe it wasn't such a problem anyway. As much as Echo would miss his partners, he had a feeling that Gold in particular wouldn't really have an easy time in this place. He was so much more reserved than Echo was, and getting physical contact from anyone other than Echo would probably unnerve him. Perhaps it was for the best that he wasn't here. Mia would probably be fine in a place like this, but she wasn't here, rendering the point moot. Echo hoped that they wouldn't mind sharing while he was in this place.

At this point, there was nothing left to do but begin the new adventure. Echo took his first step towards his new home in Saeng Seong, mind clear and ready for whatever might come next.

[Echo's threads of interaction can be found here. (No single thread is 10 comments long, but there are definitely 10+ comments total from him. Also, there's no smut in there. I promise.)]