"We're better than this."
BASICS
RETIRE INFO: Adopt dragon, retire character
NAME: Azul
GENDER: Female
PRONOUNS: She/her/hers
ORIENTATION: Steady, responsible people
BIRTHDATE: Late Summer 2742
AGE: 28 as of Late Summer 2770
LOCATION: High Reaches Weyr
OCCUPATION: Dragonrider
WING: Firestorm
APPEARANCE
EYES: Blue
HAIR: Brown
HEIGHT AND BUILD: 5'3, athletic
PLAY-BY: Bastila Shan (KOTOR)
FULL APPEARANCE: Azul is a put-together, professional looking young woman who tries to put her best foot forward for the weyr. She tries to dress respectably, but not ostentatiously, and carries herself with dignity. The rigors of riding keep her in good shape and while she's not the strongest or the fastest on Pern and is a little on the small side, she's entirely capable of keeping up and doing her job.
PERSONALITY
PERSONALITY: Azul is a woman who lives very much in her own head. She has principles and values she’s thought through at great length and can articulate easily. An idealist at heart, she struggles with the practical choices real life often requires and often hesitates too long when faced with a difficult decision. She enjoys reading in her free time and while not an expert on anything in particular, tries to know at least a little about a broad range of topics.
Azul is also a woman who knows exactly what tyranny looks like and what it doesn’t. She has little patience for hyperbole about the current leadership and is quick to remind complainers of exactly where they were before Golre. Today’s High Reaches might not be perfect, but it’s a damn sight better than it was. She has even less patience for continued prejudice towards or against the metallic riders. They’re supposed to be better than that now.
There’s a surprising streak of cynicism to Azul. While she has her morals and stands by them, she is firmly realistic about the world. She knows full well that terrible things sometimes happen and that bad people can hold immense power. But she refuses to let that knowledge rule her life. All she can do is be the best she can be and hope it’s enough.
HISTORY
FAMILY:
Mother: Analla of Green Miriath, estranged
Father: Be'zul of Bronze Herocath, estranged
Various half-siblings
SIGNIFICANT OTHER: N/A
BIRTHPLACE: High Reaches Weyr
HISTORY: Azul was always a bit too smart for her own good. From an early age, she understood that there was no future, for any of them. Her mother was a greenrider, entirely loyal to Golre. She couldn’t save Azul or even herself. Her bronzerider father saw her as nothing more than the result of a flight dalliance. Azul was on her own. She was never taught a craft or anything else that could have won her a place outside the rider hierarchy. She was a greenrider’s daughter, after all. Her place was clear and when she came of age, she had no choice but to stand, when she would have preferred anything else. Azul had no illusions that Impression would bring freedom. Even Pella and the bronzeriders had no choice but to go along with Golre’s madness. Some of them must have realized it was WRONG but to speak out against tyranny would only get them exiled...or worse.
When Azul saw a chance to escape, she took it, sneaking out hidden in a trader caravan. Perhaps she should have felt guilty for betraying her weyr, her family and her people, but she was a candidate with no real power. The only fate she could change was her own and the only thing she wanted was to never see High Reaches’ peaks again.
Not really knowing where else to go, Azul went to Fort Weyr and offered herself as a candidate. She had no particular wish to be a rider but it was all she knew how to do. She had heard Fort was better than High Reaches and while she wasn’t sure she believed it, it couldn’t be worse. Her application for candidacy was refused. Fort had no wish for unwilling candidates on its sands. Instead, Azul was given work in the lower caverns. This suited her fine. Life was better for weyrfolk. Azul knew that. It was simply the way of the world.
Except...at Fort, it wasn’t. Every day, Azul saw that it was different. That riders were treated with respect, no matter what color they rode. While Fort wasn’t perfect, it was trying to build a fair world for all its people. And Golre was declaring High Reaches the Peacekeepers. Azul had no illusions that it would end at political statements- that had never been her weyrwoman’s way. And when trouble came, she wanted to protect her home. So she applied for candidacy again, freely. This time, she was accepted. She Impressed brown Claarisath soon after and he was perfect. A little grumpy, but he had a good heart and the resolve to act on it.
When High Reaches attacked, Azul didn’t fight them. Claarisath was far too young and her first duty was to him. Instead she watched as Fort pushed them back again and again and the unthinkable happened...Golre fell. It was the start of a new tomorrow for her birthplace and Azul was glad for it, even as she mourned for the many lives lost to yet another of Golre’s violent urges.
Because Fort was a good weyr at the end of the day, they sent riders to rebuild High Reaches. Azul did not join them. High Reaches had too many memories.
Instead, she entered Fort’s wings, where she served well. Fort was still not perfect. But it faced the evil that remained in the world and that was enough. Even Nornth’s bloody flight didn’t shake Azul’s faith. Nornth’s rider was punished, something that at the High Reaches of old would have been unthinkable.
High Reaches changed too. First appointing a greenrider weyrwoman than moving towards out and out democracy. Azul was content to hear of the changes from a distance. When they lost much of their strength, with no gold to replace their numbers, she was proud to see other Fortians offer their service. But her place was at Fort. Fort was home.
And then...Anaiya came to power. She claimed to be a radical, a liberator. But it was just the same rhetoric, with only the names changed. Azul couldn’t let that happen. She was still nobody special, but she wasn’t a child anymore and she had a dragon now. So she filed for transfer and went home, to be at least one more voice against the madness. It was all she could do.
