Avi

Edit: THIS IS OLD. Henceforth most of it is outdated and should be disregarded.

And now poor Avi is being thrown into Challenge of the Gods, another cool OCT! Yes, I know his picture sucks, I shall re-do it eventually. >>

Warning: large wall of text ahead.

Name: Avi/Iva

Species: Koolie

Age: about 7 human years old

Size: 20 inches tall at the shoulder (about 24 inches in all) and roughly that long, plus 5 inches with his tail.

Gender: Male (but thinks of himself as female some days and acts like his female “counterpart”, Iva, when he feels like it. He identifies as both genders.)

Abilities: If he’s touching any kind of stone or metal, he can absorb it onto his body in a sort of ‘coating’. For example, if he were touching metal he could draw some of it onto half of his leg and his paw would be covered with it.

It takes longer to draw more of the element onto his body, and he can only draw as much as is there. Whatever part of him he imbibes metal/stone onto becomes more difficult to move, so it also slows him down somewhat, especially if he has a large amount of him covered.

He can’t really move at all if he covers himself completely or almost completely – and if he does so, he has to be careful not to cover his eyes, ears, or nose, because if he did it would really, really hurt him and possibly lock him that way forever. He can sustain small coatings (like a paw or half of a leg) for ten minutes at a time, but full-body ones for only about half a minute.

It also varies in how long it takes to cover parts of him – a paw would only take a few seconds, a full-body covering would take at least three minutes.

The second his entire body is off of a surface, any coverings on him from it will dissolve back into the substance

(however, the part of his body that's being covered doesn't have to be in direct contact as long as some part of his body is touching the material).

The coverings themselves are about half an inch thick.

Strengths:

-About average speed, strength, and stamina for a koolie
-good at leaping distances (say, about 7 feet or so.)
-good at keeping his balance if hit or pushed


Weaknesses:

-somewhat small, it would only take two or three strong blows to incapacitate or kill him

-has a third of his tail missing, as well as having had his tail broken. It has healed, but is still sensitive.

-very sensitive to bright lights and shocking/horrifying things; if it’s too much for him he will faint on the spot and won’t wake up (unless severe pain is inflicted on him or from strong scent or noise stimuli) for at least five minutes.

-delicate feet; even a little bit of gravel can cause him quite a bit of discomfort. If he feels pain in his foot/pad area he will spazz out, twitch, and lose his cool completely.

Personality: Avi is a timid little thing. He generally likes other creatures but is often too paranoid to try and talk to them, unless he’s seen them talking to someone else and knows they’re friendly.

Once he does start talking, however, the other person might wish he hadn’t. Rarely one to hold anything back, he will often ramble on about something until he dissolves into nonsense with little regard for the other dog’s words. Or he’ll blurt out some embarrassing comment that honestly isn’t intended to harm, but turns the whole atmosphere awkward.

However, if you call him out on it he'll get very embarrassed and awkwardly shuffle away to mope.

He can’t stand to be around creatures who he feels are threatening, scary, or large and will run away if they come anywhere close to him.

Avi is lacking in morals. He would prefer not to kill someone, but he would do it if he felt it was necessary to his own safety. He doesn't enjoy being a trickster or a thief, but has taken on both roles in the past to survive, if reluctantly. (He and Iva share this, though Iva is even more reluctant to kill someone she'd rather get to know.)

And of course, there's his other half, Iva. (Avi thinks of her as simply his feminine half; Iva argues that she's her own personality.)

In comparison to Avi, Iva is bold and often sarcastic (especially to Avi). She's usually quite friendly, but like Avi lacks many social skills (including tact and understanding body language). Avi often tries to keep her restrained, since he fears others will think him a freak for having two different-gender sides.

It’s usually random who's dominant on a certain day.(though it's more often Avi, since he's the original personality. So he says.)

Their biggest difference is probably that Avi is completely and utterly afraid of any sort of romance and Iva...let's just call her an example of the Anything That Moves trope.

History: Avi was born and raised in Pripyat, a ghost city that was abandoned after the infamous Chernobyl reactor incident.

Avi was born into a litter of three, he and his brother and sister. He was the middle pup, and seemed perfectly normal.
He was, until it was time for him to stop being a puppy and learn how to be a dog, by hunting and learning to fight and survive.

It was a tough world out there, said Avi’s father, so we have to be tough back. Avi tried to learn. He really did. Yet while he was okay at hunting, he’d rather be chasing butterflies instead. He didn’t mind fighting, but while learning he’d drift off and think of laughing and joking with his sister.

Oringo, Avi’s father, tried to be patient at first. As time went on, though, and the young canine showed no sign of being as dedicated or ‘macho’ as his father was and his brother pretended to be, Oringo finally snapped when his middle son was 3 years old and completely lost his temper.

“You are a disgrace, Avi! You are no boy – you are practically a female! I am sick of giving my best effort when you show half of your potential on a good day. Get out of this house.”

Avi’s siblings did little to defend him, sitting by with pitying expressions, not willing to intervene. Avi hated them for being so passive and hated his father for not accepting who he was. He admitted that his father had a point, but he wasn’t willing to change for him.

Avi’s mother simply moaned and wailed, covering her face with her paws while she lay on the floor. Avi left with no farewells, bitter and resentful – but free.

Eventually he began to call his ‘regular’ or male self by his given name and gave the female part of his psyche the name Iva, finding it too confusing to be both at the same time.

Shortly after being cast out from home, Avi was on the edge of insanity. He barely knew how to survive, and his father made sure that everyone he knew shunned him. (Before, his oddness was a family secret.)

He wandered to the very edge of Pripyat, where he met...it.

An unknown entity, shadowy in form, that said it had taken an interest in him and wanted to help him survive so it would have entertainment. Avi, terrified, asked how it would do that. It reached out with a tendril of smoke and touched him, saying it had given him the gift of earth, which he could now control - but eventually there would be a price.

So with this edge Avi managed to survive in the city for far longer than a normal feral dog.

After losing to Erx in the tournament of his hometown, (which he expected) Avi wondered to do with his life. Then Creation appeared, terrifying Avi (it reminded him of the entity a bit) but also interesting him. At first the mention of another tournament made him leery, but escaping Pripyat also sounded good, at least. So he went.

Shared Likes between Avi and Iva: Plants (especially flowers), soft things, jokes, herding things (ingrained koolie habit, not that they're able to do it much), jumping up on stuff to have a better view (he loves the feeling of being up high and strong), metal, stone, things made out of clay (especially pottery. He loves pottery.

Likes specific to Iva: Romance, dirty jokes, snuggling.

Likes specific to Avi: Singing, being clean, beautiful places.

(Iva doesn't care about Avi's specific likes, and Avi's terrified of Iva's. XD)

Dislikes specific to Avi: dirty/inappropriate things, huge or scary animals, gravel, glass, and anyone who thinks him being Iva is freaky

Dislikes specific to Iva: People who won't flirt with her, and just grumpy people in general.

Other: Avi has an Australian accent and sometimes uses Australian words/terminology that he picked up from his parents.

As Iva, their voice is slightly higher.