Post by topher lane on Jul 22, 2008 15:05:06 GMT -5
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CHRISTOPHER THOMAS LANE
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as i write this letter,
FULL NAME: Christopher Thomas Lane
NICKNAMES?: Though during his high school and early college years he went simply by the utterly unoriginal “Chris,” upon meeting Cora (the fair maiden who bestowed upon him the following nickname) he exclusively goes by “Topher.” Only his old friends from high school (who are ignorant of this sudden change in nickname) and his mother (who, being brutally old-fashioned, refuses to call him anything but “Christopher”) are exceptions to the rule. A lesser-used nickname, “Evil Toph,” was given to him by a disgruntled Scrabble opponent. Topher may be somewhat timid elsewhere, but in the realm of Scrabble, he is a pitiless dictator. And, to poke fun at his vegetarian sensibilities, Cora added the nicknames “Tophu” and “Topherukey” to his list of least favorites.
AGE: Twenty-five.
GRADE: None – he graduated two years ago, suckahs! Although, he hasn’t quite escaped the walls of Waverly yet. He is currently a graduate student, attempting to complete his master’s in journalism. He wasn’t too excited about having to throw himself in the vast, stormy seas of competition with only a bachelor’s, so he’s decided to burn some more of his parent’s cash. Not that they can’t afford it or anything.
GENDER: Male.
SEXUAL ORIENTATION: Cora. I mean, straight.
OCCUPATION: He’s the teacher’s assistant for Professor Brooks, the man behind “Techniques of Feature Writing.” Basically, he’s teaching the classes when the Professor is too busy massaging Katie Couric’s feet or something dignified and journalistic like that. Also, he has an internship with Geek Monthly, but they don’t pay him to do that, so, technically not an occupation. But he gets credit for the noble art of kissassery!
He plans on becoming an investigative journalist, despite the objections of several career aptitude tests. If the aptitude tests are right and his little career doesn’t pan out, he plans on finding a way to reverse the hands of time to play Mr. Spock in Star Trek.
SOCIAL STATUS: His family’s upper-middle, but if you don’t factor in all the cold, hard moolah his parents are backing his education with, he’s probably more of a lower-middle kind of guy.
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HEIGHT: 6’2.
WEIGHT: 170 lbs.
HAIR: It’s pretty plain and simple; short and a dark brown that looks more black than brown. He uses a smidgen of gel to get the effect of some sort of organization, since his hair tends to stick out in all directions if he doesn’t tame it with a bit of product. He constantly reminds Cora that though her preparations for a zombie apocalypse are nearly unparalleled, she’s missing what might be the simplest countermeasure; short hair. Of course, he doesn’t actually mean it – he rather likes her hair long – but in spite of that constantly teases her anyway, jokingly claiming that she isn’t as “committed” as he is.
EYES: Topher’s eyes aren’t really that extraordinary, other than being quite a bit darker than normal. He almost prides himself on this, seeing as most optical diseases afflict those with the oft-considered superior color of blue. He’s a little near-sighted, but not completely paralyzed by the prospect of wearing glasses. He prefers these geek-chic glasses, with thick, black rims. Yet in spite of their thickness, they do little to hide his single most distinguishing feature; his eyebrows. It’s not enough that they’re huge – wreathing nearly the entire eye with sharp, black hair – but they stick out even more due to the ridges framing his eye sockets. He himself has claimed that looking at his brows is like watching a horror movie about eyebrows in IMAX 3-D. This isn’t to say that this feature is a bad one – it merely just sticks out in a sea of already striking features.
BODY TYPE: He’s naturally slender, but the fact that he runs and swims (watch out for him on Sunday mornings in the pool at the rec center; he might be floating around in a speedo) a lot lends to his slightly muscled form. He doesn’t do a lot of strength training or anything like that, so his six-pack is merely a shadow beneath his awkwardly hairy chest.
PIERCINGS/TATTOOS: None of either, but he managed to convince his inebriated father on Topher’s twenty-first birthday that getting a tattoo of Captain America’s shield on the old man’s forearm was a good idea, if that counts.
ANYTHING ELSE?: Topher’s facial features are quite extreme – but somehow manage to be so without looking grotesque. His long, sharp face houses a somewhat narrow but protruding nose, full lips, and a wide, square forehead. He seems almost unnaturally curve free; every feature seems to be composed of angles. It’s as if his maker had drawn him out using an Etch-A-Sketch.
“Suit up!” is an exclamation often heard by Topher on those rare nights when he feels like leaving the cozy little cave in his apartment to socialize. He enjoys donning a full suit on a regular basis – but to make it a little more casual, he often pairs these usually formal outfits with a pair of red or black Chucks. When he isn’t wearing the suit – “pretty much my equivalent to running around in a cape and tights” – he does settle for jeans, a button-up, and a jacket. He favors collars that he can pop up – Cora says it makes him look like Dracula, but he think it makes him look pretty snazzy.
He has a massive patch of scar tissue on his left knee, and hasn’t told anyone how he got it. Just showed up in the house one morning during the summer between fifth and sixth grade with a profusely bleeding knee. Topher also has a much more explainable long, thin scar on his lower abdomen; he nabbed that prize when he got his appendix removed.
GENERAL APPEARANCE: It’s quite undeniable that young Mr. Lane is pretty much a hottie. But it wasn’t always a claim that was hard to rebuff. Topher was something of a late bloomer – in high school, his bushy eyebrow (the singular use of that noun isn’t a grammatical error) made him greatly resemble the love child of Mr. Snuffles and Groucho Marx. He was skinny and undefined, and wore clothes that made him look as if he was wearing bedsheets. But college was kind of that clean slate that motivated him to take care of himself. Most of the things he couldn’t see himself doing during high school were kind of a non-issue, now. Couldn’t make the varsity squad? No problem-o – just go out for a jog where you don’t run the risk of being pelted in the face with a dodgeball. He started to fill out his baggier clothes, but still wasn’t satisfied. One day, he just decided out of the blue to go to one of the dorm parties in something that fit. Seeing as his parents’ check wasn’t coming for another week, he picked out the only thing that made him look like he’d “grown some mass” (his words). The tux he’d rented (but mysteriously never returned) for his senior prom. He ripped off the bow-tie and replaced it with a wonderfully lurid tie with pink pigs all over it and wore a pair of black Chucks with it. Thus, the style he’s adopted to this day was born.
In summary; tall, dark, and handsome? A totally appropriate description.
FACE CLAIM: Zachary Quinto. <3
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GENERAL TRAITS: Snarky, glib, loyal, generally quiet-ish, nerdy, independent, insecure, intuitive, creative.
PERSONALITY:
- Topher’s a pretty quiet guy, only speaking when he finds it necessary to do so. It’s not because he’s particularly socially awkward or anxious around other people, he just doesn’t find the need to fill silence unless he has something to say. His lack of a lot of speaking has given him loads of time to observe the ironies in life, and, given the proper opportunity, has a sweet sense of humor. But the proper opportunities have a tendency to never arise – so the jokes tend to get inserted into rather inappropriate situations. And there’s a certain type of person necessary to appreciate his sardonic, dry sense of humor, especially in those kinds of situations.
- Despite his aloofness and cynical sense of humor, he displays an unbridled enthusiasm and interest when it comes to his line of work and for all things geekery. This is especially true when the two join hand-in-hand, like the time he managed to snag a forty-second interview with Harrison Ford for the Waverly’s student-run newspaper in his junior year. He shook the guy’s hand and didn’t wash it for several weeks, until he contracted a severe fever from that part of his immune system being decommissioned. While in his fevery haze, the nurses submerged him in an icy bath, washing every orifice and appendage – unfortunately, including the one Harrison Ford touched. Topher hasn’t trusted hospital staff since. Not that he really approves the medical field, anyway – well, he disagrees at least on the use of drugs when treating psychological disorders.
- Though he prides himself on being attached from most people, Topher tends to involve himself too emotionally with those few he does consider as friends. This is sometimes considered to be a good thing, seeing as it’s basically a synonym for saying, “he’s incredibly loyal.” He is. But when he aligns himself with someone, he tends to invest himself completely; protecting them, challenging those who oppose even if it’s really none of his business.
- When most people arrive at College Land, the first instinct one experiences is usually guzzle down as many six-packs as they can stomach. And usually more than that. This wasn’t the case with Topher. In fact, his bar-hopping was so rare that by the time he was legally allowed to do it, he hadn’t obtained any bar-buddies to enjoy it with. So, he invited his father into the city and hit the bars Topher’d never thought to go to. But his tolerance level was so incredibly low that it didn’t take much to bring Mr. Lane and Topher to the tattoo parlor, where his father – thankfully – became the only victim to the bite of ink that night. Though Topher rarely drinks, he does own a pipe – no, not a crack pipe or a meth pipe, just a regular little mahogany pipe for smoking tobacco and Hobbit weed – and it’s not beyond him to use it.
- He follows a rather specific pattern of behavior when he gets nervous; he usually needs to focus on something with this hands (you can use your sick, sick imagination to surmise what one of those of those things might be). He tends to munch on sunflower seeds in this condition, too. It’s a pretty busy food to eat, and very messy. They’re usually strewn over his areas of work, though since he has a slight aversion to vermin, the remains of sunflower seeds are usually the only junk in his apartment he discards, to keep the pests away.
LOVES:
Though Topher will attest that he and his father disagree on many points and argue a lot, though are, in fact, very close. Probably due to the fact that they share two loves; cats and Captain America. The love for cats I’m sure one doesn’t need to explain, but Captain America? Well, Topher was immersed in comic books from his boyhood, a practice his father didn’t tolerate well while he pushed Topher into such painful activities as baseball and basketball. But then, of course, when Topher came home with one of the fruits of his weekly allowance – an issue of Captain America – as they say, the Grinch’s heart grew however many sizes that day. Being a teacher of American Government, his father was as America-loving as they come, and he can’t love America and not love the Cap.
Topher, of course, has other pursuits that exist independently of his father. He’s often seen crouched over his laptop in his free time, being a hardcore CSS, JavaScript, and PHP nerd. But since crouching over has a tendency to ruin the spine, he has to exercise a little. While not particularly athletic, he is quite fast and enjoys sports with individual competition, such as track or swimming. Besides, they don’t require the coordination that he doesn’t have. He’s a huge horror and Brit movie fan, especially those of the zombie variety – though, since he’s introduced the concept to Cora, his devotion to it has waned quite a bit.
HATES: Brown M&Ms – he just doesn’t really see the point of making a candy-covered chocolate the color that it already is. He also dislikes artsy fartsy-ness. He was originally going to obtain a Graphic Design BFA from Waverly, but he found that his first art class – an Art Critique one, as it were – was completely ridiculous. I mean, you probably would too if the girl who sat next to you once exclaimed, “I find that highly offensive!” when looking at a still-life of a tea pot. Particularly hates figure skating, for no good reason.
FEARS:
- He likes to learn, but it isn’t his primary motivation factor in sticking around and getting a Master’s Degree. He’s actually quite frightened of not being able to obtain a job afterwards and is thusly putting it off for as long as he can. The job market isn’t exactly booming for journalism majors with pretty hefty to moderate computer skills.
- Ever since he fell asleep to an apocalyptic special on the Discovery Channel discussing the following event, he’s been quite afraid that the Earth’s atmosphere will suddenly leave and suck everyone into space. He once recounted this fear to Cora’s uproarious laughter. Naturally, he hasn’t spoken of it since.
- Accidentally ingesting that toxin that’s in puffer fish that he’s pretty sure is in every piece of sushi (even the vegetarian-friendly avocado rolls, which are pretty much the only thing he eats there) at Sushi Samba, even though Cora insists it’s highly implausible.
HABITS:
- Topher rarely, if ever, sleeps in his bed. The bedroom in his apartment is apparently used for storage of his accumulated junk – junk that makes its way in haphazard stacks toward the ceiling. Instead, he sleeps on the fainting couch in the living room, basking in the glow of the blaring television.
- Whenever he’s looking in the mirror – or seeing himself in any sort of reflection – he always wrinkles his nose.
- Says, “nailed it!” in a high falsetto, after finishing a piece or what have you, especially if it sucked.
- Whenever he’s in a car, or subway (even when he’s standing up), or airplane, or any mode of transportation that doesn’t require activity, he instantly falls asleep. Which is why he always needs a traveling companion to wake him so as to not miss a stop.
- He sleeps in the boxers Cora got him for Christmas last year. They have little UFOs printed all over them and the words “THE TRUTH IS IN HERE” sewed to the butt.
FLAWS:
- In spite of his quiet nature, when he’s being defensive or protective, he’s extremely quick to lose his temper and his senses. He often resorts to violence in his grief.
- He’s extremely overprotective. Just ask that poor kid who rejected his sister’s invitation to the Junior Prom.
- He has a pretty low level of confidence in his abilities, claiming his writing sucks not simply to gain reassurance from his peers, but because he genuinely believes it’s so.
- Topher is something of a slob. Moving in with Cora is probably not going to help.
- How Topher can live in New York is absolutely perplexing. He has absolutely no sense of direction; even in the contained environment of a building, he has the tendency to go down all the wrong corridors. He has pretty much no cartographic skills, and often has to condescend to ask Cora to accompany him on his rare shopping trips (well, he also needs her because he usually falls asleep getting there, too – he’s pretty helpless when it comes to shopping). But as annoying as this problem is in the city, it becomes exponentially worse in rural areas. Wanna hide from Topher? Just go to the countryside. Believe me, you will never see him again.
STRENGTHS:
- He has a vocabulary your English teacher would shake in her boots at. Hence, he rocks the hizzy at Scrabble.
- He seems to exhibit a rather accessible demeanor, at least when he’s interviewing. Hence, as a journalist, he can get almost anything out of anyone.
- Topher has pretty awesome survival skills, having been actively involved in Boy Scouts and making it all the way up to the second-highest rank, Life Scout.
- Is an incredibly loyal and dedicated friend; for those he cares about most, he will do just about anything (not even short of breaking the law).
- He’s a pretty decent artist. Recently, he’s been working on remaking posters of his favorite movies in the graphic style of the 70’s.
WEAKNESSES:
- Kitties – you can’t imagine how many times he’s almost brought – and has brought – a half-starved stray or two from the streets into the strictly no-pets apartment he occupies. He’s be nearly evicted for it more times than he can count with both his fingers and his toes (mind you, he has all ten of each).
- The ladies.
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Dolls– ACTION FIGURES! They’re not really even worth it, since he nearly always takes them out of the packaging.
ANOTHER PERSON'S OPINION ON YOUR CHARACTER:
[From Cora West, his proclaimed bff/leader of post-zombie apocalyptic survival group.]
Topher…ukey…is basically the most awesome guy from Maine in ever. Yes, I am aware that that’s not saying much considering that Maine kinda sucks – in comparison to New York, at least – but it’s still an honor when bestowed by yours truly. I feel like, if I was a man, I’d be a carbon-copy of him or something. Minus the eyebrows, of course, those are kinda scary…but other than that, he’s basically me with a penis. I mean, he loves zombie movies, he’s actually got a good sense of humor, and he’s probably the only person I feel comfortable clipping my toenails around (which is a big deal to me). Plus, he’s a good friend, and that means a lot in a place like New York City.
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FAMILY:
Thomas Lane
forty-seven . high school american government teacher/sex god . pop
Autumn Lane [nee Castilles]
forty-five . naughty secretary . mommy
Max Lane
twenty-four .
Lois Lane (his parents have no shame, obviously)
eighteen . high school student/mathelte. little sister
Peter “DJ Brakky Whacky” Lane
seventeen. high school student/really bad deejay/straight-up gangsta. littler brother.
HOMETOWN: The adorable little hamlet of Aubrey, Maine.
HISTORY:
Christopher Thomas Lane was born a healthy baby boy (as opposed to a sick, fully-grown woman, fortunately) on October 13th, 1982 as the result of an involuntary home birth. His mother had gotten into an estrogen-fueled verbal spar with Thomas, getting so angry that she spitefully withheld the fact that her water broke. Thus, when she was already ten centimeters dilated, she’d only just packed for the hospital located over an hour away (most civilization was, being in Maine and all). Topher’s birth was the subject of the musing of many a human-interest-story-depraved local news station for about, oh, two days before he and his family faded into obscurity.
Without a beat, Thomas and Autumn proceeded to add another squealing hurricane to the family, his parents naming him Maxwell while Topher thought “Max” sounded less lame and prone to schoolyard bullying. Not that Topher was an expert with lots of experience on the subject of how avoid those situations. Though he had some pretty fun ideas on how to play “pretend,” he usually only got to share them with his little brother and the other social lepers of elementary school.
His summers were exponentially more enjoyable than those times during the school year. Topher’s father had denounced any sort of heritage to whatever motherland he’d had before and insisted that the family explore their “America” heritage. Road trips were taken across the northeast, popping from colonial Boston to the mall at Washington D.C. to Monticello to the cute reenactments in Williamsburg, Virginia. On one of those trips, at ten years of age, he met his first love; New York City. The trip was principally to witness the glorious majesty of the Statue of Liberty, but Topher was madly infatuated with nearly every other aspect; the looming skyscrapers, the theatres, the museums, the food… the fact that the population exceeded five hundred persons (a characteristic Aubrey, Maine sorely lacked). At that moment, he made a promise he managed – with a lot of hard work – to keep, that he’d return to the city and live there. Possibly forever.
So when the convincing, colorful handout for Waverly University came in the mail when he was a junior, he immediately made plans to apply and – with his acceptance letter in the mail a few months later – to attend. His first attempt at a declaring a major was for a graphic design degree, but later in his freshman year determined he wasn’t quite cut out for that particular area of study. In his sophomore year, he took a class directed by Professor Alan Brooks entitled, “Techniques of Feature Writing.” In spite of the unimaginative title, it was one of the few classes he thoroughly enjoyed and a few one-on-one sessions with Professor Brooks convinced him that journalism might be the best way to go.
He graduated with honors two years ago and, though Brooks had offered to give his personal recommendation to a few publications, Topher decided that that wasn’t going to be the end of it, as far as education went. He instead obtained a position as assistant to Professor Brooks. It was such an accomplishment that his peers decided it was worthy of a rare night to get completely wasted (in spite of the fact that it was Wednesday). It probably gave one particular girl – Cora West – an inaccurate impression of his personality. But, then again, she was as hammered as he was and didn’t remember too terribly much of their first meeting. Other than, of course, his excessively lame compliment about how the moles on her arm looked like a constellation of stars (seriously – it’s Orion!).
It wasn’t to be their only fated meeting. As it transpired, Cora was taking one of Professor Brooks’s classes. Harboring only the single biggest crush on the petite blonde, Topher went a little out of his way to talk to her. Though they used their friendship in favor of Cora’s grade, it was definitely a little more than a means to an end. They both had a shameless addiction to zombie lore and odd sleeping patterns (which, although eHarmony doesn’t match its members based on these two qualities, they probably should – it’s very important in any relationship). Over time, Topher’d been kind of hopeful that he’d be satisfied with seeing her as a BFF, but, unfortunately, Cora’s a little too smokin’ hot and whatnot for that.
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YOUR NAME: Spooky.
YEARS RPING: Since the dinosaurs.
OTHER CHARACTERS: None, yet. But knowing me, that’ll probably change really fast.
PHRASE: ADMIN EDIT.
ROLE-PLAY SAMPLE:
Though they were probably equally startled by the other's appearance, both Noah and Elle had refined keeping up appearances. Elle's cover-up was a smirk that would've been quite charming if there wasn't another force at work behind her eyes. It was if she was restraining webs of lightning from erupting from her eyes and turning his skin a little more singed than he'd like. Noah hoped his imposing eye-fury wasn't easy to shield, either, even with the large lenses walling his gaze and hers. It would've been an opportune moment to fold his arms, make his already unreasonably tall figure all the more daunting, but he kept his hand inside his jacket as he approached. Though the grass underfoot was quite green, it crunched with the feeble cries of dehydration. There was still an agonizing wait to be had for the Bennets' lawn – there were still a few minutes before the sun dipped below the horizon and the automatic sprinklers would activate. The grass rustled beneath Elle's heels, as well, as she straightened up, informing him of the why he was here.
He didn't smile, but his tone was slightly amused, as if sharing a joke with himself that someone as childish as Elle wasn't capable of understanding, “Last I checked, Bob still kept you in that cage up in Hartsdale,” where you belong, he almost tacked onto the end, but although it was never verbalized, it was conveyed as clearly as if he did, “that's an awful long walk from your neighborhood.”
So there he was – there they were, more like – proverbial claws outstretched, each waiting for the other to do something really stupid. The tension could already be cut open with a dull cheese knife, but as the conversation continued, even when it seemed there couldn't be any more veiled hostility contained in their tone, it somehow managed to get even worse. And, really, they hadn't even begun. But this was different from every other time they'd come into contact. Usually, there was some room for sympathy, in spite of everything. None of this – not even the too-familiar murderous intent observed presently in her gaze – was her fault. If he was feeling particularly guilty, he'd even place some of the blame upon himself. As Elle glanced toward the wide kitchen with his two children milling about the kitchen, he even allowed for that single second of guilt. If things were different, could she be the blonde girl in there, anxiously picking at her waffles, thinking about how being different would interfere with her normal hairdresser (Noah always pictured Elle as a hairdresser if she hadn't become a sadistic killing machine) life? But he saw past the what-could've-been almost instantly when he saw who really was in there. The girl Elle so fondly referred to as “pom poms.” The girl for whom he'd kill – and had killed for – a thousand times over. And, if his jittery instincts were correct, Elle might be one of those people standing in the way of the life Claire deserved.
“Claire's business,” he enunciated sharply, “is none of yours.”
He didn't smile, but his tone was slightly amused, as if sharing a joke with himself that someone as childish as Elle wasn't capable of understanding, “Last I checked, Bob still kept you in that cage up in Hartsdale,” where you belong, he almost tacked onto the end, but although it was never verbalized, it was conveyed as clearly as if he did, “that's an awful long walk from your neighborhood.”
So there he was – there they were, more like – proverbial claws outstretched, each waiting for the other to do something really stupid. The tension could already be cut open with a dull cheese knife, but as the conversation continued, even when it seemed there couldn't be any more veiled hostility contained in their tone, it somehow managed to get even worse. And, really, they hadn't even begun. But this was different from every other time they'd come into contact. Usually, there was some room for sympathy, in spite of everything. None of this – not even the too-familiar murderous intent observed presently in her gaze – was her fault. If he was feeling particularly guilty, he'd even place some of the blame upon himself. As Elle glanced toward the wide kitchen with his two children milling about the kitchen, he even allowed for that single second of guilt. If things were different, could she be the blonde girl in there, anxiously picking at her waffles, thinking about how being different would interfere with her normal hairdresser (Noah always pictured Elle as a hairdresser if she hadn't become a sadistic killing machine) life? But he saw past the what-could've-been almost instantly when he saw who really was in there. The girl Elle so fondly referred to as “pom poms.” The girl for whom he'd kill – and had killed for – a thousand times over. And, if his jittery instincts were correct, Elle might be one of those people standing in the way of the life Claire deserved.
“Claire's business,” he enunciated sharply, “is none of yours.”
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