BASICS
18
{ GENDER }
Female
{ PARTNER }
Rezia
ABILITY:
{ Healing }
Lydia has light healing abilities that are primarily time based. She can accelerate the healing process, but her reserves are limited and it takes her about twenty-four hours to regenerate her powers. For full body healing, not focusing on a specific wound, she can speed the healing process by about three days, a bit less depending on the severity and number of wounds. Typically, this power is enough to close most lacerations, and can also reduce swelling and bruising, and leaves and short sensation of good health and happiness around the recipient, due to her ability to balance the body's chemistry, though her power in this area pales greatly in comparison to her brother's power. If she focuses on a single wound, like a broken bone or a deeper wound, she can heal the victim up to one month, but her actions prevent the body from trying to heal the wound on its own, so for serious wounds or broken bones, she requires several sessions to heal the person, or there is a high chance the bone will not set right, or the wound will never heal fully.
Her power level is denoted by her eyes, which at top power are a light violet colour, and as she uses up her power for the day they first lose their red hues, then the cornflower slowly fades into cerulean, then royal blue, then cobalt, then a navy, then grey, then fully black and glassy. She can use her power on more than one recipient, as long as she doesn't fully use her reserve. Things like temporarily balancing body chemistry only take a small amount of power, and cuts and bruises take a bit more, deeper wounds and multiple wounds drain a little more than half her power, and healing internal injuries or broken bones takes her full reserve.
While her power is very limited, she has found that she is more effective on repeat customers, and the calmer she is while exerting her power, the better the results are. She has to have skin to skin contact with the recipient for successful healing, and typically has more success when using her hands and when the site she touches is closer to the site of the wound or in the head or facial region.
{ Weaknesses }
For one thing, Lydia's power is quite limited, and she has only been able to increase her ability a slight amount through practice, so she knows that there is little chance for significant improvement. Also, once her power is completely drained, she becomes more listless and empty, as if a part of her life force has been drained, and the sensation is quite unpleasant for her. She also has to consciously use her power on her own wounds, or they will not heal. Also, once she's drained her power completely, she cannot use it again until she is fully recharged, or it causes her extreme fatigue, nausea, and dizziness, as well as more than halving the effectiveness of her power.
{ Containment }
There has been little reason to prevent Lydia from using her powers, she has no ability to harm anyone, and typically helps anyone who comes to her for healing without hesitation, from her brother to the guards and scientists that she encounters. There are two simple ways to prevent her from using her power to either heal herself, or her brother, other than just asking her not to, because while she would willingly not heal herself to avoid punishment, it would be more difficult for her to restrain herself from healing her brother. The first would be to completely cover her skin so she cannot make contact between herself and the recipient, but that could not prevent her from healing herself. The other is to purposefully cause her or another harm so she drains her power, before she can use it elsewhere.
PERSONALITY:
Lydia has always been soft and delicate, relying on her brother to look out for her. She is kind and timid, always willing to give a word of encouragement and do everything in her power to help others, even at the point of sacrificing herself. She relies on her brother to keep her grounded and remind her that she needs to take care of herself too. She used to be a happy, innocent girl, carefree and at peace with the world, sure that good would always prevail, and while she was on the shy side, she knew her brother was there for her, and would pick her up if she stumbled, and she could do the same for him.
The more things change in Lydia's mind, the more they stay the same. Living in the facility has warped her mind, and her methods of coping are hurting her more than anything else. She has pinned her existence on her brother, only staying alive because he told her that he needed her, and she'd do anything for him, do anything he told her to do. If she lost him, she'd die, because what other purpose is there in her miserable life.
The innocence that once filled her heart is gone too. While still seemingly sweet and childlike, Lydia has become more like a machine, coldly rational, willing to do anything, manipulate anyone, to protect herself and more importantly, keep her and her brother together. While originally she helped the workers in the facility out of the goodness of her heart, when she was still foolish and young, unaware of the full implications of her stay in the facility, she quickly saw that she could make allies, accrue favors, and use her delicate appearance to keep things turned in her favor. But it meant that she couldn't fight at all, which was okay with her, as long as her brother said it was okay.
At this point, she's okay with the fact that she's barely hanging on to life, that having to use her power to frequently so the scientists can study it is causing massive weight loss and has taken a chunk of her personality with it, leaving her mostly empty, her eyes perpetually dull. The only thing that makes her happy anymore is her brother's attempts to cheer her up. She knows that he is hurting and is hiding it from her, and she does her best to keep his spirits up with her power when she can, but she's lost interest in most everything else, though she's good at putting up the facade when she needs to.
Despite all this, in the core of her being, though her spirit has been broken time and time again, she is still a kind, sweet girl, incapable of holding grudges, and willing to help those who are hurting, and though her motives are more twisted than they once were, she still feels some measure of happiness from healing others, because it validates her existence. But she is very close to only viewing herself as a number, an asset, a power, not an individual, worthless except in what she can offer others. Her brother's reassurance used to help her, but lately she's started to lose whats left of her confidence to the void.
{ Passions }
Rezia
Rezia is the most important thing in her life. He's almost always been there, a steady constant. Even though they've both become more broken as life went on, He's still the reason she continues living. She doesn't know what she'd do without him.
Stories
Fantastical, far away worlds, living in someone else's mind, seeing the world from another perspective, Lydia loves reading books, listening to other people tell stories, and telling her own stories.
Singing
Lydia likes to make up songs, sing little tunes, the lyrics from Rezia's favorite songs, and sing accompaniment to his violin.
Healing
While using her power drains her, there is something cathartic about fixing someone else's wounds. It makes her feel useful, needed, important.
Puzzles
Lydia likes all kinds of little games and puzzles that require her to think through them. They are very logical and predictable, and she enjoys that. They're safe. Logic games and riddles are often a good way to calm her down, especially when separated from Rezia.
{ Dislikes }
Pain
Well, naturally, Lydia is adverse to pain. Though she's become more numb to it as the years passed, she still hates being stabbed and cut for the sake of experiments.
Being Separated from Rezia
While she is easily quieted, she often puts up a fuss when separated from her brother. If he's not in her line of sight she becomes very uneasy.
Darkness
While not fully afraid of the dark, darkness still makes her uncomfortable, and she tends to cling to Rezia when she has to deal with dark environments.
Sadness
Being a kind soul, Lydia wouldn't wish sadness on even her enemies. She hates to see her brother so sad.
Nonsense
Lydia dislikes things or people who don't make sense, don' act rationally, or don't have an innate sense of logic.
{ Weaknesses }
While kind to a fault, Lydia isn't much of a people person, and has a hard time understanding other people. She likes things that are rational, and has a hard time relating to people who she doesn't perceive as rational. Or anyone other than her brother, really. She's also very timid, and doesn't stand up for herself at all, relying on her brother instead. She lives entirely for her brother's sake, and has no real will to live or do anything beside.
{ Fears }
Losing Rezia
She knows she'd die if she lost Rezia, whether through death or him being taken from her.
Losing her Power
Lydia's personality now revolves around the fact that she has a power, and she fears that she'll be worthless, useless to her brother, without it.
Harming People
Lydia, while she would hurt someone if it came down to that, is terrified that it might become a reality, because in truth she doesn't know if she could live with that weighing on her shoulders.
APPEARANCE:
Lydia is a willowy girl, long and slim, standing at about 5 feet 7 inches, though her once smooth figure now shows obvious signs of stress and malnutrition. She looks a bit like a hollowed out doll. She has large bambi eyes that make her look waifish and immaterial, taking up most of her once full face. She has a gentle, heart shaped face with a delicate chin and full lips that always seem to have teethmarks in them from her nervous habit. Her nose is small and looks straight, but if one touches it, they can feel where it's been broken several times and hastily knit back together.
Long blonde hair wreaths the girl's head, spiraling in soft, mussed curls down to the small of her back and shrouding her face in a corn-silk halo. She usually wears her hair like a curtain, dusting over her eyes and close over her shoulders so it can be used to hide her face at a moment's notice. Her hair also hides her collarbone and shoulders, where the bone protrudes from the thin layer of skin stretched over it, making her meduim-light skin an even paler colour. She had never been particularly curvy, but malnutrition has mostly returned her to a child's figure, her chest is small and her hips are narrow, but her waist is painfully thin. Her arms are also long and thin, and her hands are impossibly small, with dainty, thin rounded nails.
Her eyes are her greatest asset, and her greatest tool, it takes little effort on her part to look like a frightened doe, and her face has settled into that fearful/mournful expression so well that it has become her resting face. Other expressions take their manifestation on her face in small ways, her smiles are tiny, and so are the signals of true distress. Her brother is the only one who can truly read her face and know how she's feeling, and he's also the only one who can make her truly smile anymore.
Oftentimes she is dressed in white dresses or in natural earthy colours, or some combination of both, which adds to the innocent look she strives for and is born by it. Despite her frail body, she still moves with a light grace, pretending to be one of the princesses from her childhood. It helps her keep it all together.
{ Defining Features }
Despite her healing ability, Lydia doesn't have much to spare on keeping her body immaculate, so she usually heals herself until she's stopped bleeding, then leaves the scars, which don't heal on their own, and remain angry red tissue until she attends to them again, which is a rare occurrence. She has many lacerations on her body, from cuts on her forearms to sites of stab wounds and roughly administered needle scars on her upper arms and thighs. Her back is also in a similar state, and there is a certain fragility to her body from bones that were hastily and not completely mended. She has little cares about her appearance, and would much rather spend her healing power on her brother than on herself. Most of her wounds are from testing, not from punishment.
{ Weight }
109
{ Build }
Spindly
THOUGHTS ON OTHERS:
{ Pair One }
Lydia fears the dark ones, but she respects that they did what they had to keep each other. She worries what will happen if they are put at odds, because while she would do whatever it took to keep her brother alive and safe, she knows she does not match them in strength by a long shot. But on the same coin, thinking of them makes her grateful for her power, that she cannot kill, that, while she is subjected to painful testing, she does not have to kill for her brother, because while she knows she would, she also knows it would tear her apart and in keeping him, she'd lose herself.
{ Pair Two }
Stupid. Lydia finds them stupid, and their lack of rational thought is unsettling and dangerous. They only bring more punishment to themselves, and for what? The testing happens regardless, she can't see why they wouldn't want to keep each other more than their dignity. But she fears them too, for their obviously unpredictable behavior, and she wants nothing to do with them.
HISTORY:
{ Ability }
Lydia was born with her ability, though her birth was deliberate, part of a project to create more and stronger healers. She didn't start showing signs of her ability until she was about seven, however. Her ability is an amplified version of that of a mother she never knew.
{ Free Life }
Born into the facility, Lydia knows nothing of the outside world but what she's read in books, though even her reading has been carefully monitored by the scientists. She's never shown much interest in the outside world, assuming that it's really just the same as life inside the facility.
{ Facility Life }
Since she and her brother were young, many of the scientists treated them with kindness. Perhaps it was because they knew that her ability could never hurt anyone, or just because she and her brother were sweet, mild mannered children, a set of little blond cherubs running around the gardens and certain supervised portions of the facility. While Lydia never knew her parents, she assumed that the facility as a whole was her family, and Rezia, of course was her brother, and her only friend. So she grew very close to him.
As they grew older and she started exhibiting her power, she became worried that Rezia wasn't doing it too. They were siblings! They did everything together! She didn't want to leave him behind! She started to really dislike the testing, but everyone always promised her that if she misbehaved then she wouldn't get t stay with Rezia, so she tried her best to always be good. But she couldn't help but notice how now she was always getting warm attention from the scientists, especially when she healed them, and Rezia seemed to be getting the cold shoulder.
However, when he finally showed his power, Lydia started to realize what it meant to have a power in the facility. Gone were the days of sunshine and frolicking outside with her brother and scientists occasionally slipping them candies or little toys. While they were still treated fairly favorably, the testing got worse. She was separated from Rezia and promised that she'd never see him again unless she cooperated. So, even though from that point on the experiments became more painful and invasive, she took them with little complaint, as long as Rezia was okay. And of course, the other occasional gifts that they'd received were nice as well, and most of the scientists treated them fairly kindly. What more could she ask for?
OTHER
{ COLOR }
#0E8C3A
{ THEME SONGS }
Keane - Somewhere Only We Know