Hu
03-02-13, 05:27 PM
Hu Tian, Private Investigator (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vg-0DFNTBm0)
2914
"I dismount from my horse and I offer you wine,
And I ask you where you are going and why.
And you answer: "I am discontent
And would rest at the foot of the southern mountain.
So give me leave and ask me no questions.
White clouds pass there without end."
Wang Wei 701-761 A.D
Name: Hu Tian
Alias: White Cloud
Race: Human
Gender: Female
Height: 5’9”
Weight: 144lbs
Eye Colour: Blue
Hair Colour: Black
Mother: Hu Xiaolong (Living, 1930 Shanghai)
Father: Qiu Tan (Deceased)
Age: 26yrs
Place of Birth: Shanghai
Nationality: Chinese
Religion: Atheist
Current Residence: Shanghai, 1930 & 2030
The Diary of Hu Tian
November 29th, 2030
My father once said to me, shortly before he died, that life was an eternal journey. I think that he meant for it, in some great Tao manner, to have inspired me. He was hoping to instil in me a new level of belief in something, nothing, and anything. I had always been my mother’s successor, in ideology, and by some small grace, looks. We had been what you might call ‘close neighbours’, more so than relatives, my father and I. After nearly a decade of living in the city, away from Chengdu, the idiom had meant little to me – it certainly did not console me in my grief.
It is funny, though, that the moment his journey ended, mine truly began. I had, until that sunny day in March, 1930, been nothing more than a typist at the Embassy in Shanghai. With the dichotomy between imperialism and communism forming in the political melting pot of the city, I was confined, for want of a better word, to the small boundaries of the western quarter. I saw very few people, save for colleagues, and when I did venture out into the city, there was a constant and confusion mix of welcome and loathing.
I began to experience strange dreams roughly a month after my father’s passing. They were nothing more than obfuscating nightmares at first, no meaning to be found in their erratic representations of what I thought was the grieving process swiftly undoing my resolve. As the political fallout of the Nauru riots reached Shanghai, the dreams only worsened. I felt, without a doubt, as if every event in the world was echoing in my mind. I felt as if I were responsible, as if could have done something, everything, and all things to stop them.
When I slept that night, on April 13th, 1930, I had the most realistic nightmare in months. I was in another world, where the Japanese kami and the Chinese devils were real. I could reach and touch the sky, as it swaddled me in vapours, and look down across a strange, yet wondrously familiar land. All the myths of my childhood, both east and west, were as real in that realm as you or I. I was somehow looking at the worlds my books as a child described. I saw the mythology of my home given form.
I awoke with a start, lathered in sweat, and eyes glistening with what I can only describe in abstract terms – ‘magic’. Cloud vapour with thick in the room, so thick I mistook myself for being in my old chamber, in my mother’s villa in Chengdu. In the spring, the clouds seemed to descend over the grounds, carrying with them the spirits of the sky. Then, as if my mind were playing tricks on me, it vanished.
Ever since, when I sleep, I find myself in that place. It is an unavoidable occurrence, and one I have stopped fighting to try and avoid. Strong coffee and engrossing classic fiction can only go so far, and even when I do manage to stay awake during arduous times, the cloud always finds me, takes me away, and sends me into the unknown. Slowly but surely, I became horrifyingly aware that I was not dreaming.
This world in my head was real.
By the end of the summer, I had resigned myself to attending the physician, Dr Mortimer’s surgery, and having myself tested. My mother would have fainted at the thought of her blossom being anything but the perfect, dutiful, and politically minded protégée she believed me to be. For all my longing for answers, something quite strange happened. Whilst in the waiting room, surrounded by the ill, destitute, and culturally diverse denizens of the Shanghai French Concession, I disappeared once more.
I awoke in a Shanghai utterly alien to me. I stumbled out into the street of the relic of a bygone age, now a museum, and bewildered, I found myself a newspaper. Rattling a still valid coin into the metre, I unfolded the broadsheet, an unrecognisable publisher, and read the headlines.
It was not 1930 any more.
It was Wednesday, 14th January, 2030.
My disbelief could have cracked time and space itself, and those ensuing months, or at least, what I thought were months, were occupied with flitting back and forth between two strange, now unfamiliar times, and the world in my dreams where the people called me ‘White Cloud’.
Maybe I can find my answers in another life, before the duality of my existence becomes my undoing.
Skills:
Unnerving Intellect: Hu Tian is an exemplary problem solver, possessing the keen, analytic, and deductive thinking required of a private investigator.
Researcher: Whilst studying politics and Chinese history in the 1930’s, Hu Tian developed well-honed research ability, and is able to find, analyse, and summarise information from a bewildering variety of resources.
Adaptability: Living in two times, and two worlds, requires a certain amount of quick witted adaptability. As such, though Hu Tian’s skills and experience are embedded in contemporary China, she has become able to make the best of what she has to offer, and somehow, perhaps with a bit of luck, get by.
Cultural Graduate: Hu Tian has extensive knowledge of Asian, and colonial British culture. Her peculiar background and origins allow her to have a head start on integrating into Althanas life, though; it is limited to her upbringing, similarities between Akashima and China, and her understanding of diplomacy, politics, and body language.
Abilities:
Time-Travel: For an as yet unknown reason, Hu Tian possesses the ability to travel through time, and to a degree, space as well. Whenever she does, there will always be low lying cloud in the immediate vicinity, perhaps mistakable for a sudden mist, and then an overwhelming sense of vertigo, nausea, and a need to scream. As such, this ability is seldom applicable to making a quick escape, and its implications for offensive measures are limited, if any.
Time-Lock: Hu Tian can freely travel between two time-locks. She can move between 1930, and 2030, and anywhere within those times that she has previously been. She must be incredibly weary whenever in either, as she can affect the progression of history in 1930, potentially causing her harm and trouble the next time she is in 2030 (though, she can inextricably travel back and set things ‘right’).
Spatial Shift: Hu Tian can, when she falls asleep on Earth, travel through time and space to a world she does not yet understand. In essence, this allows her to appear on Althanas, in varying times, and operate as an individual. Hu Tian will automatically travel back to Earth if ever she falls asleep (deep sleep), is knocked unconscious, or if she is hit with either electricity, or time based magic (of varying descriptions).
Immortal: For as long as Hu Tian is time-locked, she does not age, at least physically. She will not die from natural causes, and if she dies on Althanas, she will merely return (somewhat mortified) to the part of Earth history nearest to where she left that is locked and concrete (time, it seems, requires its investigators, wherever they want to live or not).
Intuition: Hu Tian’s vision is twice as focussed, attentive, and perceptive as a normal human being (X2).
Resourceful: Utilising her ability to slip into and out of places otherwise unreachable, and to store things for later use, Hu Tian can be in the possession of a bewildering variety of mundane items at any one point in time. She has a small room in a shikumen in the French Concession, Shanghai, and a small urban apartment in neo-Shanghai. She is not particularly wealthy, and this ability cannot be used to acquire magical items, nor can the items be sold for profit.
2914
"I dismount from my horse and I offer you wine,
And I ask you where you are going and why.
And you answer: "I am discontent
And would rest at the foot of the southern mountain.
So give me leave and ask me no questions.
White clouds pass there without end."
Wang Wei 701-761 A.D
Name: Hu Tian
Alias: White Cloud
Race: Human
Gender: Female
Height: 5’9”
Weight: 144lbs
Eye Colour: Blue
Hair Colour: Black
Mother: Hu Xiaolong (Living, 1930 Shanghai)
Father: Qiu Tan (Deceased)
Age: 26yrs
Place of Birth: Shanghai
Nationality: Chinese
Religion: Atheist
Current Residence: Shanghai, 1930 & 2030
The Diary of Hu Tian
November 29th, 2030
My father once said to me, shortly before he died, that life was an eternal journey. I think that he meant for it, in some great Tao manner, to have inspired me. He was hoping to instil in me a new level of belief in something, nothing, and anything. I had always been my mother’s successor, in ideology, and by some small grace, looks. We had been what you might call ‘close neighbours’, more so than relatives, my father and I. After nearly a decade of living in the city, away from Chengdu, the idiom had meant little to me – it certainly did not console me in my grief.
It is funny, though, that the moment his journey ended, mine truly began. I had, until that sunny day in March, 1930, been nothing more than a typist at the Embassy in Shanghai. With the dichotomy between imperialism and communism forming in the political melting pot of the city, I was confined, for want of a better word, to the small boundaries of the western quarter. I saw very few people, save for colleagues, and when I did venture out into the city, there was a constant and confusion mix of welcome and loathing.
I began to experience strange dreams roughly a month after my father’s passing. They were nothing more than obfuscating nightmares at first, no meaning to be found in their erratic representations of what I thought was the grieving process swiftly undoing my resolve. As the political fallout of the Nauru riots reached Shanghai, the dreams only worsened. I felt, without a doubt, as if every event in the world was echoing in my mind. I felt as if I were responsible, as if could have done something, everything, and all things to stop them.
When I slept that night, on April 13th, 1930, I had the most realistic nightmare in months. I was in another world, where the Japanese kami and the Chinese devils were real. I could reach and touch the sky, as it swaddled me in vapours, and look down across a strange, yet wondrously familiar land. All the myths of my childhood, both east and west, were as real in that realm as you or I. I was somehow looking at the worlds my books as a child described. I saw the mythology of my home given form.
I awoke with a start, lathered in sweat, and eyes glistening with what I can only describe in abstract terms – ‘magic’. Cloud vapour with thick in the room, so thick I mistook myself for being in my old chamber, in my mother’s villa in Chengdu. In the spring, the clouds seemed to descend over the grounds, carrying with them the spirits of the sky. Then, as if my mind were playing tricks on me, it vanished.
Ever since, when I sleep, I find myself in that place. It is an unavoidable occurrence, and one I have stopped fighting to try and avoid. Strong coffee and engrossing classic fiction can only go so far, and even when I do manage to stay awake during arduous times, the cloud always finds me, takes me away, and sends me into the unknown. Slowly but surely, I became horrifyingly aware that I was not dreaming.
This world in my head was real.
By the end of the summer, I had resigned myself to attending the physician, Dr Mortimer’s surgery, and having myself tested. My mother would have fainted at the thought of her blossom being anything but the perfect, dutiful, and politically minded protégée she believed me to be. For all my longing for answers, something quite strange happened. Whilst in the waiting room, surrounded by the ill, destitute, and culturally diverse denizens of the Shanghai French Concession, I disappeared once more.
I awoke in a Shanghai utterly alien to me. I stumbled out into the street of the relic of a bygone age, now a museum, and bewildered, I found myself a newspaper. Rattling a still valid coin into the metre, I unfolded the broadsheet, an unrecognisable publisher, and read the headlines.
It was not 1930 any more.
It was Wednesday, 14th January, 2030.
My disbelief could have cracked time and space itself, and those ensuing months, or at least, what I thought were months, were occupied with flitting back and forth between two strange, now unfamiliar times, and the world in my dreams where the people called me ‘White Cloud’.
Maybe I can find my answers in another life, before the duality of my existence becomes my undoing.
Skills:
Unnerving Intellect: Hu Tian is an exemplary problem solver, possessing the keen, analytic, and deductive thinking required of a private investigator.
Researcher: Whilst studying politics and Chinese history in the 1930’s, Hu Tian developed well-honed research ability, and is able to find, analyse, and summarise information from a bewildering variety of resources.
Adaptability: Living in two times, and two worlds, requires a certain amount of quick witted adaptability. As such, though Hu Tian’s skills and experience are embedded in contemporary China, she has become able to make the best of what she has to offer, and somehow, perhaps with a bit of luck, get by.
Cultural Graduate: Hu Tian has extensive knowledge of Asian, and colonial British culture. Her peculiar background and origins allow her to have a head start on integrating into Althanas life, though; it is limited to her upbringing, similarities between Akashima and China, and her understanding of diplomacy, politics, and body language.
Abilities:
Time-Travel: For an as yet unknown reason, Hu Tian possesses the ability to travel through time, and to a degree, space as well. Whenever she does, there will always be low lying cloud in the immediate vicinity, perhaps mistakable for a sudden mist, and then an overwhelming sense of vertigo, nausea, and a need to scream. As such, this ability is seldom applicable to making a quick escape, and its implications for offensive measures are limited, if any.
Time-Lock: Hu Tian can freely travel between two time-locks. She can move between 1930, and 2030, and anywhere within those times that she has previously been. She must be incredibly weary whenever in either, as she can affect the progression of history in 1930, potentially causing her harm and trouble the next time she is in 2030 (though, she can inextricably travel back and set things ‘right’).
Spatial Shift: Hu Tian can, when she falls asleep on Earth, travel through time and space to a world she does not yet understand. In essence, this allows her to appear on Althanas, in varying times, and operate as an individual. Hu Tian will automatically travel back to Earth if ever she falls asleep (deep sleep), is knocked unconscious, or if she is hit with either electricity, or time based magic (of varying descriptions).
Immortal: For as long as Hu Tian is time-locked, she does not age, at least physically. She will not die from natural causes, and if she dies on Althanas, she will merely return (somewhat mortified) to the part of Earth history nearest to where she left that is locked and concrete (time, it seems, requires its investigators, wherever they want to live or not).
Intuition: Hu Tian’s vision is twice as focussed, attentive, and perceptive as a normal human being (X2).
Resourceful: Utilising her ability to slip into and out of places otherwise unreachable, and to store things for later use, Hu Tian can be in the possession of a bewildering variety of mundane items at any one point in time. She has a small room in a shikumen in the French Concession, Shanghai, and a small urban apartment in neo-Shanghai. She is not particularly wealthy, and this ability cannot be used to acquire magical items, nor can the items be sold for profit.