#benthic oddity

[fhtagn-and-tentacles]

BENTHIC ODDITY

by Nino Is

[writ-in-violant]

Vivian Levy

Name/Title: Vivian Levy, the Sharptongued Stormwatcher

Pronouns: They/them

Referred to as: Correspondent, Professor, "you pest", "Vergil" (in specific situations)

Profession: Correspondent (no specialisation yet, leaning Epistolant), Professor at Benthic College.

Closest to: Urchins

Ambition: Hearts' Desire (ongoing)

Associated Stats: Watchful, Persuasive, Artisan of the Red Science, Shapeling Arts

Associated Quirks: Steadfast, Magnanimous, Hedonist

Destiny: Authority

Personality

Vivian is an inquisitive, generally kind person with a sharp tongue for those who they dislike and a love for the esoteric, strange, unlovable, or terrifying. People who meet them when they're in the midst of a revel or causing a scandal often are shocked to learn they are one of the Neath's foremost minds on the Correspondence; their skill as a poet and lyricist is far less surprising. Vivian never breaks their word and often tries to be kind and generous to all around them, but crossing them is a horrible idea. They have an orphanage of sorts in their townhouse, and any threat to them that endangers the children is met with lethal force or worse. Rumors persist of the worst thing they inflict on those who hurt people under Vivian's protection: a recitation of Vivian's nightmares in exquisite, beautifully-written detail. Rare is the assailant who makes it out of that without being driven to the Royal Beth, raving.

Background

Vivian was born in 1871 as the child of a young English nobleman, currently on his "grand tour" of Europe, and an Italian woman he met while traveling. Perhaps sincerely, perhaps not, the nobleman promised that he'd marry his summer sweetheart and take care of her; however, when she -- pregnant and shunned by her family for the out of wedlock child -- made it to England, she was turned away at the family manor by her lover's father. Vivian was born soon after, to a mother struggling to make ends meet in a foreign land.

Vivian's mother didn't survive an outbreak of sickness, and Vivian -- told their whole life that their father was a lord -- did their best to seek him out afterward, only to be ridiculed and laughed off the property as a child, assumed to just be an urchin with delusions of grandeur. They were placed in an orphanage, and remained there for several years, with their oddities (even then, they were a daydreamer, and that combined with their mistrust of all adults to make a child people didn't find 'pleasant') preventing any chance of adoption.

The first major turn in their luck came when their father married another noble lady, who learned of his youthful "transgressions" and the fact that a child had claimed to be his and declared it was his Christian Duty TM to care for said child, as the repercussion for his actions. At her insistence, he sought out the child Vivian and brought them into his house.

Vivian, at the time around nine, was a living reminder of the man's more bohemian past, and he didn't like acknowledging that or them. Primarily, he dealt with this via icy silence and shipping them off to boarding schools to get them out of his hair. There, though, Vivian discovered their talent with poetry and languages -- which still got them ridiculed, some, but provided them with an outlet other than pure rage. When they completed school, doing quite well, they applied to University, which their father agreed to keep funding to keep Vivian well out of his personal sphere.

And then, when Vivian was around seventeen, their stepmother died in childbirth with Vivian's second half-sibling. Vivian was not invited to the funeral, and all funding for their education was immediately cut. Vivian was ripped away from their studies and their poetry and had to make their way on their own, with almost no resources.

Through connections of former professors and their own ingenuity, they eked out a living as a governess or tutor for some years, but deeply resented the way their life was dictated by the whims of the powerful. They had heard tell of a card game in the strange cavern London had fallen into -- one which, if won, allowed one to pick their heart's desire.

In 1894, 25 years old, they descended into the Neath and introduced themself for the first time as Vivian Levy -- an entirely fabricated name, for the person they were determined to become.

Time in the Neath

Here's where I shamelessly invoke the Treachery of Clocks because uhh, while I've been playing this game for six years, I uh. Um. Get forgetful. So while in our real world, Vivian hasn't completed their Ambition yet...they absolutely have in-universe. It probably happened sometime around 1986. I just don't know how it's shaken out yet (although I have some plans). This character sheet will definitely get updated when it does, but like. In 1899 (2), Vivian has completed their Ambition. Just not in 2023.

That said! Vivian descended into the Neath in 1895, which might be the last solidly reliable date they can cite, given that time gets strange in the Neath. Once there, they set about arranging the Marvellous, following their ambitions. However, they also quickly got sidetracked. Firstly, they had a burgeoning career as a writer and poet in Veilgarden that they took great joy in continuing -- as well as several dalliances. The freedom of the Neath, where nobody cared about what Vivian's body was compared to their pronouns, meant Vivian was far more flirtatious and promiscuous than they had been on the surface, and they discovered they quite enjoyed living life to the fullest. Secondly, they began having dreams of thunderstorms; upon leaning into these to the fullest, they grew more and more consumed by the poetry of lightning and thunder, the songs of the wind, and one day looked in the mirror to discover their previously-brown eyes had turned grey. Finally, they learned of the Correspondence, and immediately set about studying it with the fervor of one who had found a vocation.

Vivian's time in the Neath has brought them into contact with many powerful figures and dramatic circumstances. Their infatuation with Storm and study of the Correspondence has led their mental health to be unstable at best, ending with them often in the care of the Royal Bethlehem Hotel; between that and learning of the Manager's past, Vivian imprinted on him as a baby bird and is very fond of the man, who returns it in his own somewhat creepy and nightmare-harvesting way. Listen, man's a gardener of a sort, and Vivian can appreciate his gardens! It just further wrecks their already tenuous sanity. Vivian and the Manager both share the quirk of nightmare-cultivation, and the Manager is pleasantly surprised that Vivian has of their own accord stumbled upon weaponizing their nightmares against those who cross them.

Of the Masters, Vivian interacts most frequently with Wines and Pages. Pages they first met when strong-armed into finding a stolen book; upon hearing the story of the Epigrammatic Irishman and the Wilting Dandy, they hand-copied the Irishman's book to give to Pages, allowing the Dandy to leave with the original. They are fond of Pages, finding its poetry endearingly bad and finding it to be a good discussion partner when it comes to literature, but do their best not to let themself forget that at its core, it is as dangerous as the other Masters, and they're hesitant to call it a friend.

Wines, on the other hand, Vivian has a much more fraught history with and is far fonder of. Their early interactions were somewhat contentious, with Wines making Vivian fund revels and Vivian at one point (in the Empress's Shadow ES) writing a story about a royal having an unrequited crush on Wines and getting hate mail in the correspondence; however, the more time Vivian spent around the Master, the fonder they became of it and the more aware they became of the fact that Wines is uh, not doing well. Vivian is so used to what they term as "love" being overwhelming fear and awe for things larger than themself that I don't think they've clocked that that's their emotion towards Wines yet, but as their writer, they're not fooling me about this one.

A few Exceptional Stories are particularly important to Vivian's plot, mentioned down here: The Gift - Started some of Vivian's wariness around the Royal Family and their fear and mistrust of the Captivating Princess, as well as their firm belief in the necessity of giving people fully informed choices. Many of the themes in it came up again in Reunion, where Vivian befriended Albert Victor and convinced him to remain in London -- but not to side with his aunt.

The 12:15 From Moloch Street - An early interaction Vivian had with Hell, it ended in them freeing the Lily from his contract with Hell and becoming his roommate for a few years, while he got back on his feet. They're still good friends! Vivian also got a tour of hell that wasn't fantastic for their mental health.

The Tempest - The Tempest played out very differently than as written, with Storm cleaving Vivian's own childhood out from them to serve as Slivvy's helper and its new speaker (this is largely because the Tempestuous Urchin's backstory was so uncannily like Vivian's own that I couldn't help myself). During this impromptu soul surgery, Vivian lost all memory before age around 10, and much of the anger they'd carried from a young age with it -- all of it now in the person of Vivi Storm, the younger, unaging ghost of Vivian's past who haunts London's rooftops and serves as minder and mouthpiece for Storm.

[carterhaughs]

So my Fallen London character, Aurelia Dedlock, lost her soul yesterday! I thought I would try to get the “Intimate of Devils” quality up to 17 so that the devils would stop pestering Aurelia forever (even though I love them lol) and she’d keep the quality so she could get the discount on the Brass Embassy lodgings but there’s always a 10% chance of losing your soul whenever you play the card so unfortunately that’s what happened. From an RP perspective, it fits my character though...she would totally keep meeting the devils trying to figure them out and study them for her own purposes and mess up and lose her soul! She's definitely one for playing with fire so long as it's only her own welfare that is concerned (and it is good to have the Intimate of Devils cards out of my tiny opportunity deck permanently, which is what happens when you lose your soul, as much as I enjoyed their company!). Her deep need to know and understand the Neath, linked as it is to whatever amounts to an afterlife in this universe and therefore her deceased daughter, drove her underground in the first place. Getting your soul back is no easy feat and largely dependent on luck but it is doable and having read about the various ways you might get it back, I know eventually I’ll open a bundle of oddities and there it will be. I’m locked out of certain revels at the University because Summerset College discriminates against the soulless, but my character was always more ideologically inclined towards Benthic anyway, and it will be interesting to experience that plotline as a soulless character. 

If I ever write Fallen London fic involving this character, it'd be interesting to write about her being soulless for a time. She probably felt pretty dead inside most of the time since the death of her daughter, but she definitely didn't want to lose her soul. And I wonder what would drive her in the absence of a soul - would she lose motivation? I think perhaps people's reactions to soullessness depend on how tightly they cling to life and she clings very tightly, so I imagine the echoes of emotion would remain with her. It would be very interesting to explore that state of mind and being in fic.