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                                          Dramatis Personae:  Bookwyrm                                                                                        

“Happy the man, and happy he alone,

who in all honesty can call today his own.

He who has life and strength enough to say,

‘Yesterday’s dead and gone I want to live today!’

-From, “The Booklovers” composed by The Divine Comedy

(adaptation from Dryden’sImitation of Horace. Book iii. Ode 29, Line 65 )

 Vitals:

 Name:  Akira

Moniker:  Bookwyrm

Age:  19   

Sexuality: Straight and narrow.

Creativity: Writer.

Appearance:  

He has Albinism, which he credits an asset, it being something that makes him distinctive.  Bookwyrm’s skin and hair have no pigment, and thus appear stark pink and white; subsequent to his condition his eyes are red and very sensitive to changes in light.  Standing at about 6’ 4”, he is thin almost to the point of being insubstantial.  As if just being white weren’t enough, he wears garishly bright colors, including the red Lenin-style glasses that he is never without. Other constants in his wardrobe include the vintage bunny slippers that he somehow acquired, which he wears no matter what the occasion.

 Personality: 

                 Outwardly, Bookwyrm stumbles through life.  Everything he does is haphazard, from his intellectual pursuits, which he doesn’t enjoy actually discussing with anyone (evidence of it just randomly vomits from his mouth from time to time) to emotional interaction; it is all seemingly dictated by caprice.  For the most part, he treats everyone he interacts with rather well.  With his face split ear-to-ear with a lazy smile, he spends most of his time questing to not only find aspects of existence that are interesting, but to push others toward seeing them as well, even if there is abso-fucking-lutely nothing there.  He is not happy if things become boring.  Treating others well and trying as hard as possible to avoid hurting people are two very important mores for him.  However he always ends up inadvertently doing quite the opposite; Puk puts it well by saying, “That boy’s head is not just in the clouds; he sucks vacuum.” Bookwyrm puts himself into a daze, whether it is through drug use or various obsessions that tend to come and go like the wind for him, where he can only focus on one thing.  People and their feelings just fade into the background and he becomes oblivious to their presence.  He begins to act without taking contingencies into account and, even though he doesn’t consciously mean to, Bookwyrm often slights those close to him.

 Family:

                 Father:  Bookwyrm never really got along with his father.  In fact at heart he his quite scared of the man’s  idiosyncrasies.  Daddy often encouraged Bookwyrm to develop his metaphysical abilities, which he relishes because of the power and idividuality they give him.  In the same stroke he hates his father for pushing the metaphysical into the family's lives because of what it cost all of them emotionally.

                Mother:  He has always felt estranged and disconnected from the woman.  Once he became powerful enough, he saved his mother from her fate as one aspect of a powerful, multipersonalitied metaphysical being.  Unfortunately the process left her irrevocably scarred and she is quite listless and unresponsive to the needs of her children.  Bookwyrm finds this unforgivable.

                 Koyumi:  His sister is one of the few people that he actually cares about and will work to ensure her happiness.  He allows her to baby him, and indeed may go out of his way to appear to need her attention because he knows how much she depends on his dependency. Koyumi needs to be needed and, as loathe as he is to admit it, part of him enjoys her mothering. Having raised her through their childhood, it is rather nice to be cared for himself.

More details on Bookwyrm and Koyumi's past may be found here. Spoilers! (As if this entire site wasn't one big spoiler already... -_-;;)

Job:

                Upon arrival in Krysolis, Bookwyrm discovered that he was chosen to be a Saint when they finished their application for citizenship. Saints are picked at random by the government to fill whatever jobs that happen to be needed and that they have the skills to fulfill. They are given pensions, scholarships, any any other monitary help that they might need, in return for their service. They have no control over which job they are assigned, however, and cannot volutnarily leave it. He was initially overjoyed because this gave him independence from his family. 

Much to Bookwyrm’s eventual dismay, he soon discovered what it actually meant to be a Saint: he must work like a slave to a government he cares nothing for in a job not of his choice. This job, ironically enough, turns out to be the Kindergarten teacher for a class of five-year-old geniuses. Try as he might, and genius that he is, Bookwyrm cannot manage to outsmart his pint-sized pupils, a source of great frustration to him and amusement to everyone else. Naturally, all the others think the kiddies are adorable.

Getting Along:

Tsuke:  Bookwyrm does not return Tsuke’s affections. At all. He hides his distaste from the boy, however, and treats him the same as his sister's other friends. Annoying as Tsuke may be, he is also useful, and it's more trouble than it's worth to try shaking off his sister's sometime-boyfriend.

Maria:  The one other person Bookwyrm feels real affection for, he tries to take care of her in any way that he can, despite her pesky robot, Maiuu, whom he recognizes to be as evil as the robot recognizes him to be. Bookwyrm protects and councils Maria, and provides sanctuary when the world is too much for her. In a way, he has adopted her as the little sister he lost, though Bookwyrm would very much like their relationship to be more intimate.

Pük:  Bookwyrm is actually truly friendly towards Pük, the other half of their Dynamic Duo.  He allows the “bum” to stay in his home whenever he wishes to and to play with his TV.  Bookwyrm finds Pük’s uncanny observations into people useful, and, because of his sensitivity, Pük probably knows Bookwyrm best, better even than Koyomi.

  Masakazu- Being who he is, Masakazu knows all about Bookwyrm’s past.  Bookwyrm  couldn’t care less, and enjoys antagonizing the Old Boy, but not to the point  of an actual challenge. There remains an unspoken truce between the two, each recognizes the other’s power to fuck their life up royally.

Frustration:

                Bookwyrm wants nothing more to be creative and original, especially in his writing.  What always hampers him however is the influence of those that came before; his voracious reading, which can range from high brow to the most abysmal crap (if it has print he’ll read it) almost has him believing there is nothing left to say.  His biggest fear is to end up living a life that is ruled by the ghosts of dead writers.  This also ties into the way he uses magic.  While people like Tsuke and Puk are mindlessly able to do amazing feats, Bookwyrm actually knows about the way magic functions and the rules that go into the use of libretto.  He believes that the more one actually knows about magic the less one is able to unconciously tap into its resources, just as the more he knows about writing and creativity the less he is able to produce it himself.  This bothers him to no end.

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