"If my ancestors' dragons are watching me from beyond between, I will make them proud."
BASICS
NAME: Allag
GENDER: Female
PRONOUNS: She/her/hers
ORIENTATION: Homosexual
BIRTHDATE: Early Winter 2743
AGE: 31 as Early Summer 2775
LOCATION: Fort Weyr
OCCUPATION: Proud dragonrider
WING: Dusk Squad
APPEARANCE
EYES: Brown
HAIR: Dark brown, kept short
HEIGHT AND BUILD: 5'10, muscular
PLAY-BY: Amaya (The Dragon Prince)
FULL APPEARANCE: On the taller side of average, Allag has been shaped by her turns as first a candidate, then a dragonrider. She is strong and muscular and looks it, with more bulk and muscle definition than most cis woman. She has an angular face with expressive brown eyes. Allag has collected her share of scars over her decades as a rider, although none are particularly large or dramatic. She keeps her dark brown hair cropped short to better fit under her riding helmet. Her clothing is largely practical- her wardrobe a mixture of well-tended riding leathers and casual, sturdy clothing that won't get in the way while she's washing her dragon or sprinting across the weyrbowl. Allag does have some fancier dresses and will dress up for hatchings and other big events, however. Allag is deaf and communicates primarily through a mixture of sign language, lip reading and Babyloth's telepathy. She will have a conversation through writing if necessary, but prefers to avoid this as she finds it frustratingly slow.
PERSONALITY
PERSONALITY: Allag takes being a rider extremely seriously, arguably to a fault. Fighting on the ground crew does not change the fact she is a dragonrider. She has a dragon. She fights thread. She is a very proper rider. She can get prickly if the weyr's honor or her dignity as a rider is any way slighted, by anyone. She will remind everyone she is a rider and from a family with a long, exalted history of producing excellent Fort riders, frequently. She can and will recite her lineage by heart, supplemented with some tall tales and "words of wisdom" of very dubious historical accuracy. Allag addresses or invokes her ancestors' dragons. Nobody knows what happens beyond between, so who's to say they aren't watching over her?
That said, Allag is capable of having fun while off-duty. She enjoys baking and is surprisingly good at it and maintains a large collection of pretty painted dishes and pottery. She has occasional flashes of a sense of humor and is capable of cracking a joke, as long as it's not about the weyr or her rider ancestors. While she is pretty intense, about most things including her hobbies, Babyloth encourages her to stop taking life so seriously all the time and can usually get through. The pair balances each other well- Babyloth reminds Allag that not everything is life and death and Allag tells Babyloth when it's time to get to work. They're good friends and make a solid team despite their differences. Allag is decently friendly but only to people she likes. She isn't going to try to force a connection for the sake of a connection and not super bothered if she doesn't get along with someone.
Allag is traditional, but not overly so by Fort standards. She finds Semaca and High Reaches to be strange and doesn't consider the Assistant Weyrleader a real weyrleader, with full and just authority. That said, she is not a colorist and has no issues with garnetriders and accepts orders from more senior green and blueriders without resentment. She respects wherhandlers and considers them a full part of the fight and does recognize the wherleader as a rightful leader of the weyr. Allag finds hold and craft values confusing at times and can struggle to relate to people from outside the weyr. Allag would fight an honor duel if challenged to one and would initiate her own challenge if she saw the cause as just.
Allag's sleeping schedule is somewhat confused and inconsistent because she's not a wherhandler but trains and fights thread with them. Her sleeping hours vary greatly by the day and whether and when they are training and she can sometimes be caught yawning a short night. She grabs naps where she can when she's tired and is not shy about grabbing a catnap on the floor or much of anywhere else.
HISTORY
FAMILY:
Rider parents
Younger brother: Alkylacrylate
SIGNIFICANT OTHER: Single and open to mingling
BIRTHPLACE: Fort Weyr
HISTORY: The firstborn child of a weyrmated pair of dragonriders, Allag was given a good, sensible, practical name, by two parents who later both grew annoyed they didn't get more of their names in there and that they were losing their "legacy." They tried to compensate by filling Allag's head with as many stories as they could of their own respective family lines full of dragonriders each time they visited her in the creche. Allag absorbed these stories like a sponge and could soon recite them by heart. When Allag's younger brother was born, her parents incorporated as much of both names as they could manage in a single name. If it bothered the young Alkylacrylate, he could elide. Both his parents from excellent riding families, after all. Surely Allag and Alkylacrylate would follow in their footsteps. Allag, who had never heard or said out loud Alkylacrylate, didn't see anything wrong with her brother's name. Why shouldn't her parents preserve the names of as many of their ancestors as they could?
Allag knew she was deaf from an early age and equally early, her parents made it clear that this changed nothing about their pride in, or expectations for, her. Which was just fine by Allag. She wanted to be a dragonrider and was very proud to be a future dragonrider. Dragonriders were Pern's finest protectors, after all, and she would be part of her family legacy. As soon as she came of age, Allag entered candidates. She stood for a few clutches before Impressing at 18, which was a very good age to Impress, in her opinion. Not so late she was worried about aging out but not so early she was a literal child.
Her dragon was Babyloth, making her the first female brownrider in her family. He was large, flew skillfully, had a good heart, made wonderful conversation and could focus well enough when he needed to. Allag wouldn't allow a word to be spoken against him. He couldn't see as well as other dragons out of his dulled eyes, it was true, but they made do well enough and if it didn't bother Babyloth, it shouldn't bother anyone else. When it became clear that Babyloth's sight would prevent them from entering the fighting wings, as the many fighting riders in Allag's line had before her, Allag chose to join the ground crew rather than the healers. They would fight thread and be a part of the battle with the ancient menace which meant Allag was still a true dragonrider of Pern.
Allag entered the squads and found success and fulfillment in her work there. To her surprise, her brother, Alkylacrylate never Impressed, despite their long rider lineage. Such a thing had never happened before in her family, according to her parents' stories. Instead, he bought a wher egg and joined the ground crew alongside Allag, which to Allag meant he had a dragonrider's heart, even without a dragon, and had as much right to their grand legacy as any of them.
Like her ancestors before her, Allag was a warrior, not a politician, and rarely involved herself in Fort's political affairs. She disapproved of the meddling from other weyrs, whether Benden or Ista, and would have gladly fought at her weyrwoman's orders, but would not stop an insurrection. She did not approve of Nornth's actions, but believed murdering her rider to be a coward's way out. She spoke her mind when asked, but otherwise, remained focused on her job and the greater fight.
Allag did not support Z'osh' coup and was disgusted by his actions. Taking valuable fighters out of commission over petty prejudice did harm to all the weyr and devalued their many turns of service and dedication. She did not actively stand against him, however, and remained at Fort. She was a Fortian rider, through and through, and thread would not stop falling because Fort had a short-sighted weyrleader. Her job was to fight thread not play politics. Someone had to stay focused on their existential battle for survival. Z'osh eventually fell, which was best, leading to reforms Allag had mixed feelings on. Wherhandlers deserved a leader, but riders had enough leaders already. More just encouraged things and the system encouraged riders to focus too much on politics and not enough on the fight. Just because Serapheth didn't like blueriders didn't mean no blue or greenrider could ever rise under the traditional system- just look at Kreta, only a few turns later!
When the time travelers arrived, Allag was eager to hear their stories. A part of her hoped one of her ancestors might make the trip, but she supposed if they had, she'd have already heard about it in her family history. Unfortunately, none of the timetraveler's were assigned to her squad, which limited Allag's chances to speak to them. Whenever she can, she steal tries to tease out details about her ancestors. Surely one of them must at least have heard them! They'd been Fort riders for generations!
