No matter what people tell you, words and ideas can change the world. -- Robin Williams, Dead Poet's Society
BASICS
RETIRE INFO: retire, but reuse expy idea
NAME: K'lir (Kotalirran)
GENDER: male
PRONOUNS: he/him/his
ORIENTATION: akoiromantic demisexual
BIRTHDATE: Fall 2742
AGE: forty-five as of Summer 2768
LOCATION: High Reaches Weyr
OCCUPATION: retired rider, transfer, assistant weyrlingmaster
WING: retired
APPEARANCE
EYES: dark brown
HAIR: black, going both bald and gray
HEIGHT AND BUILD: six feet and four inches, wiry
PLAY-BY: Don Cheadle
FULL APPEARANCE:
K'lir is a long human. His face is long, his limbs are long, his memory is long. He is slow to smile, with his lips bisected by a thick scar that trails from just below his left eye socket to his chin. Part of that is obscured by the bristly beard he has grown in recent Turns. His wrinkles fall into traditional frown lines, especially on his forehead and around his mouth.
After the war, K'lir does not like to wear anything that approaches 'armor', or the like. Even his flying leathers are as non-threatening as possible. He prefers fabric over leather, and if it were possible, he would forgo animal products entirely.
PERSONALITY
PERSONALITY: Some people are natural parent figures. Some people are naturally not.
K'lir falls into neither of these categories. K'lir has learned how to take authority when needed - his time as a candidate master helped with that. He can take orders, too, without argument. K'lir can present himself as the perfect subordinate.
But underneath? K'lir's drive is to avoid the bloodshed he lived for so long. He lost a lot in the war and its aftermath. He finds satisfaction in teaching the next batch of riders in the hope that they will be able to avoid the mistakes his generation made. It's slow going, particularly with Fort and Benden rocking the boat again, but he has hope.
There has to be hope.
HISTORY
FAMILY: orphaned at young age, one daughter
SIGNIFICANT OTHER: D'sia of green Schuyth deceased
BIRTHPLACE: Benden Weyr
HISTORY:
Kotalirran was a Benden weyrbrat born to a Master Healer and a brown rider. At least, that's what the aunties who raised the children of the crèche always said. His parents died when he was two, and Kotalirran had no clear memories of them. He, like most weyrbrats, began Standing for clutches as soon as he turned fifteen.
And he Stood.
And he Stood.
Ten Turns later, Kotalirran aged out of Candidacy, and became an assistant candidate master. It never quite clicked with him that he was teaching these children in order to send them off to war - to die - although he couldn't help but see the blatant colorism all around him. He resigned himself to his life as a non-rider, where he was a second-rate citizen. He was, at least, never cannon fodder.
His dragon, when he was hatched, turned out to be in the Revolutionary clutch. Kotalirran was thirty, and corralling candidates when Prodigy of Princeton hatched into a very average brown. Bursirth walked the line of candidates twice before sitting down, ten feet from his chosen.
Fools who run their mouths oft wind up dead. You are not a fool, Kotalirran.
Bursirth hated to fight - it was too much like declaring a position - and participated in war only reluctantly. Some of their clutchmates distinguished themselves in various battles. Hamith, for one, came to Benden's notice during just such a battle. Ashintoth got tapped as wingleader. Lafeyth earned himself a reputation as the last minute savior. And Bursirth? Bursirth and K'lir did nothing to rock the boat. They fought, but only because they were told they must. It quite soured them on a great many things. Things like bad orders, and color-based hierarchy, especially.
Riders don't do lifemates, or handfasting, or any of the usual methods holders use to declare their affections for another. But if they did, K'lir would have pledged himself to D'sia. D'sia and green Schuyth transferred in from Telgar Weyr about three Turns after the end of the war, and it - well, 'love at first sight' doesn't really do it justice. K'lir and D'sia were instantly fascinated by each other. First they were friends, and then they were weyrmates. Suddenly, they were always together. Even when their dragons didn't agree. If either had been of holder stock, one might have suggested handfasting, but D'sia was just as weyrbred as K'lir.
They had one child together - a precious daughter named Letiria. Both K'lir and D'sia had been more or less abandoned by their parents. They spent as much time with Letiria as they could, up until D'sia got lose between. K'lir maintains that Schuyth had to have been hungry and disoriented to have lost her way, but the truth of the matter was that D'sia had never been that adept at holding coordinates in her head.
K'lir transferred to High Reaches with his daughter, Letiria, after the political coup. Bursirth would hate to admit it, but he and K'lir put in their transfer request after T'line and Hamith. The rest of their clutch followed suit, and K'lir applied for the vacant position of assistant weyrlingmaster. He hopes that in this, the most progressive of the weyrs, history can be averted.