InsaneJournal

Character Name: Cassandra... that's all.
Nicknames/Aliases: Cassie (when she was young), The Cursed One
Gender: Female
Race: Human
Actual Character Age: 18
DOB: Feb 11
Physical Description: For most of her life tall and gangly fit her physcial description. Growing up she was always several inches above everyone she knew, always towered over her contemporaries. She hated never fitting in. But she'd never fit in with anyone from the start. Cassandra has long dark brown hair, a set of blue eyes that stand out shockingly on her pale features, framed by the dark hair. She's grown somewhat into her body, still remaining tall (at around 5'10") and thin (approx 130lbs).
Distinguishing marks: Most would say her eyes. Scars around her wrists and ankles from shackles. Far more ragged upwards scars on both wrists from her "escape". Cross shaped burn on her chest.
PB: Liv Tyler
Birth Location: South Carolina
Personality: Quiet and closed off. It wasn't the way she naturally was. In fact as a small child she was quite bubbly and a smiled covered her features in all the pictures she'd ever seen. That all changed when she was 6 though. From that day on, Cassandra became incredibly reserved, fearing herself and the powers that she doesn't understand. She holds a great deal of hatred for the power that she possesses and in that for herself. Cassandra is incredibly wary of new people, rarely believes anyone at face value, especially their motives. At the very core of her being though exists a desire to fit in, to be accepted and to be in control of herself. Too many years of her life were spent without any of those simple things.

Personal Background: Cassandra was born to an older couple Glenda and Thomas Gardner, her mother had been long thought past her ability to bear children. Glenda had had 5 children before Cassandra came along as a surprise to all. Her parents had spent their entire lives in rural South Carolina. Her father worked in a furniture factory and her mother had been a stay at home mother.In their home, religion ruled all and Jesus saved all. Her first memories are of her parents at church every Sunday morning, Cassandra standing between them hands held while they sang.

Her family was loving, but strict. Gods word was the law. Deviation from that brought a switch out for punishment. Cassandra was never a trouble maker. She was a quiet girl, who had friends in her small preschool classes and enjoyed playing with dolls. Nothing out of the ordinary. But that didn't last for long. She remembers it clearly to this day. Just barely a week after her sixth birthday. Sunday morning Service. It was the middle of the preachers sermon. While Cassandra remembers those details clearly what happened next remains a blur as it does every single time. She was holding her parents hands, when a sharp pain travelled through her head, echoing across her skull, her mother later said she went limp in their arms... but her voice carried out across the pews and through the parishioners ears. It didn't sound like her sweet child like voice. It was much lower, rougher. But it was the words that affected everyone the most. Simple words, that made little sense except to make clear that Walter, the tall strong man that held his daughters limp hand, would be meeting his maker.

No one knew what to make of it. Her parents were confused and upset. They'd raised a good girl, raised five good children before her. Why did this one choose to act up in church and in such... a manner. To create such a spectacle as that. Cassandra was punished, not really understanding what she'd done wrong. She barely remembered anything except a horrible headache and fuzzy vision, something about a voice echoing through her head but she'd thought it was her fathers voice.

It wasn't until a freak accident at the furniture Werehouse where Thomas worked, that Cassandra began to see the change. He died quickly or so they said. He'd been older, but in excellent shape. Who would have ever foreseen the machinery malfunctioning in the way it did. Hadn't happened in the history of the plant.

One person had though. One six year old girl.

Her mother never looked at her the same again. Her mother was never the same either. She started looking at her daughter with fear. Especially as her little episodes began to increase. Her first day of school. She let her teacher, Mrs. Honeycutt, take her to her seat only to stare up at her with wide eyes as a vague series of words slipped from her lips in a haunted voice, telling her to find her sister and tell her she loved her. Two weeks later, Mrs. Honeycutt lost her sister in a car accident. It happened again and again. Not always something bad, but more often than not it was a death.

Her mother didn't know what to do with Cassandra. Friends at the church told her that Cassandra was probably just acting out since the loss of her father. Had to have affected the poor dear. Glenda didn't think so. Glenda rather thought that her sweet innocent daughter had had everything to do with her father's death. She'd predicted it hadn't she? It was the devil. The devil was in her poor sweet daughter. It was just Cassandra and her mother in the empty farmhouse. But soon it became filled with the screams of her mother as she tried to beat the devil out of her daughter. She invited preachers, ministers and even resorted to priests to come and try and exorcise the demons that had to be living in her out.

It wasn't until one night, just before her 10th birthday that it finally ended. Every attempt by her mother had failed. The "incidents" continued with frequency and with intensity. Cassandra remembered more and more each time, although never having the ability to do anything about it while it occurred. Rather, it was after the fact that it would all come back to her, hanging heavy in her mind. Sometimes it would be triggered by coming into contact with someone, other times it would just occur, leaving Cassandra confused and scared of her own self. Her mother had brought in some religious guru who could supposedly work the demon out of Cassandra. She'd been locked in her room for days, an odd combination of food sent to her periodically, to cleanse the soul or some rubbish. Finally she was pulled out of the room into some bizaree ceremony where the cross was burned into her chest. She still can hear the echo of her screams as the hot metal touched her pale skin.

She'd had enough. She waited until they left her, tired and weak in her bedroom to heal and to see if they'd been successful. Cassandra didn't feel like she had a devil in her. She didn't want to believe she did. All she did know was that she couldn't take it anymore and in the cover of darkness she climbed from her room and ran off into the night, headed toward anywhere...

She was too young to be out alone, far too young and far too physically weak. It wasn't long before she was picked up. In a stroke of luck you could say, she was found huddled on the side of the road by a man named Jack, just Jack he never said more. He wasn't a religious man. He wasn't a man of many morals at all, except for his own survival and success. He'd seen Cassandra's picture in the local paper, stories about her "visions" and whether they were some hoax. While Jack didn't believe in many things... he didn't believe this was a hoax. Or at least he was going to try and find out. He took Cassandra in, for his own benefit, to see if he could use this ability she seemed to possess.

She was kept in his basement. Jack would come down periodically, touch her, bring others to touch her, trying to see what he could find out about people. He videotaped her to see if she'd ever reveal some future earning he should pursue. It was trying on Cassandra. The more he touched her, the more he pushed for her to exercise a power she had no ability to control or even comprehend, the weaker she got physically. She tried to run away twice. Jack quickly learned his lesson and kept her chained in that basement. Finally charging a fee to those who wanted to know their fates. A small fee to come and touch the hand of the Charleston Oracle.

He moved around with Cassandra, her mother never trying to get her back. Perhaps she was happier that she didn't have to deal with her possessed daughter. Each city it was the same thing, the same schtick. Cassandra's emotions growing more and more ragged with each move and set of people that were forced upon her. As her emotions became more frazzled so did her visions. They would come on with a frequency, leaving her more and more spent, the whole process becoming more violent. Jack didn't care as long as he was still turning a profit off the little freak.

Seven years of this went by. Cassandra grew into a young woman, longing for a different life and as that possibility became more and more remote she just longed for her life to end. For it wasn't really any sort of life. Held captive at night and put on display during the day. None of which she'd wanted. She'd once been an intelligent girl, learning to read at such an early age, but she hadn't seen a book in years. Cassandra cursed the "gift" she possessed that Jack so often praised. It had robbed her of a life, robbed her of a family, robbed her of everything but this meaningless existence.

In a fit of desperation, Cassandra tried to end her own life, chipping a sharp edge into the shackle that she wore at night she cut at her wrists, letting the blood fall and hoping that she could go to heaven and see her daddy. Hoping that she didn't have the evil in her that her mother thought she did. Instead she woke up in a stark white room, in a hospital. Wrists bandaged and a stranger standing over her. It was a scout from Halcyon. She was taken to the new school and told that she wasnt' evil, there wasn't anything wrong with her at all. In fact she just possessed a power that she needed to learn to control... and the could teach her.

Cassandra doesn't know what to make of the school she's in. She doesn't know what to make of this power she has. She doesn't know what to make of anything. But she does know that in this new setting where she's not an outcast, not some freak to be put on display... that she'd like to find out.

Family: None as far as she's concerned
Mother - Alive (presumed)
Sister - Ada ada_crowe
Four other siblings she knows nothing about
Weakness: her power, rejection, all human weaknesses and poor health.
Magical Abilities: N/A
Any Training: None
Special Skills: The gift (or curse) of Prophecy
House: Zephir House
Number of years in Halcyon: Since August
Classes:

Early Morning - Energies and Emotions: how to control
Mid Morning - Dream Interpretation
Late Morning - Astronomy
Mid Afternoon - Scrying
Late Afternoon - Math