Alias: Phoebe White
A note on her name, or lack thereof: It is common for Time Lords, especially renegades who travel far from their homeworld, to take on a title or nickname to use in place of their given name, which is often a mouthful. The origins of the Haruspex's moniker are still difficult for her to remember, but she nevertheless finds it more comfortable to use than her real name. Phoebe White was the name she chose for herself while in human guise, and she rarely uses it afterward.
Gender: Female
Species: Time Lord
Home World: Gallifrey
Age: Apparently 29
Occupation: Time traveler
Height: 6'2"
Build: Remarkably tall, thin and reedy; very expressive body language and facial expressions.
Hair: White; about chin-length, with lots of volume. Has a texture and appearance like a white puffy cloud around her face.
Eyes: Ultramarine blue
Skin: Exceedingly pale, with high color in cheeks, earlobes and lips (and any other areas where capillaries are close to the surface of the skin)
Tattoos/Piercings: None
Clothing: Her most frequent outfit is a full swing skirt (similar in shape to a poodle skirt) made of brightly colored and patterned patchwork; a pair of lady's pointy-toed hobnailed boots; and a blue argyle-patterned sweater with several layers underneath (usually a white blouse and a teal camisole, the tails of which tend to be visible underneath the sweater). She may or may not be wearing a fire-engine red wool peacoat; she very often wears a dapper pair of pince-nez spectacles which she absolutely doesn't need, but which she insists make her look professorial.
Personality: Being a Time Lord, she possesses the sharp, incisive and often frightening intelligence characteristic to her long-lived species, and isn't at all shy about flaunting it or talking over the heads of humans or anyone else she considers a "lesser" being. She comes across as cranky, acerbic and sarcastic, and prefers not to get close to people if at all possible (not that they would really want to, with her attitude). However, she has a deep and abiding sentimentality that belies her outward curmudgeonly demeanor; she is captivated by all things fleeting, ephemeral and energetic. She is obsessed with ambient sound, independently working mechanical parts, involuntary organic systems, and light filtering through glass; she is deathly phobic of still, silent, dark, enclosed spaces. Her preferred position is to be a fly on the wall, surrounded by living things or mechanical devices that move, breathe and make noise, where she can observe and delight in the ever-changing life all around her, but never get involved. She's slowly amending this now that there are (as far as she knows) no other Time Lords left to set things straight when necessary, but still tries to get involved with people's lives as little as possible (companions notwithstanding). This is, however, highly subject to change depending on her mood.
Background: The Haruspex was born and raised on Gallifrey as a Time Lord, and is innately familiar with the workings of the time vortex and the subtle turning of the universe. In the days before the advent of the Great Time War, when the beings of Gallifrey were plentiful in number, she had an intense whirlwind romance with the Gallivant, another of her kind. After growing bored with their relationship, he broke up with her in the most dramatic possible way: abandoning her somewhere in the reaches of space and time without means of escape. She was found by a second Time Lord who offered to return her to Gallifrey, and the two became friends in their own travels together. When the coming of the war between Time Lord and Dalek could not be avoided, the older man sent the Haruspex to Earth along with his time machine (known as a TARDIS), disguising them both with chameleon technology. During their temporary stay on Earth, the TARDIS would appear as a mundane antique object, and the Haruspex herself would in all ways appear to be biologically and mentally human, to the point of forgetting her original identity. For unknown reasons, the technology failed to awaken the Haruspex (now taking the alias Phoebe White, a PhD candidate at the University of Glasgow in the year 1985) to her unearthly nature after the end of the Time War, and only the activation of a Dimensional Vault inside the city allowed her to recall any of what had happened and reclaim her true identity. Even now, she still has large holes in her memory of her previous life as a time traveler and her childhood on Gallifrey.
About the Red TARDIS: The ship itself (often referred to as the Red TARDIS, to differentiate it from the better-known Blue TARDIS belonging to the Doctor, with whom the Haruspex is not acquainted) is not fixed in appearance, but its chameleon circuit is nevertheless slightly faulty; it will blend in perfectly with the surroundings of its immediate previous location. For instance, if it started in an antique shop in the 1980s and ends up in on a streetcorner of a city in 2010, it might appear as an old-fashioned wardrobe; or when traveling to Roman Britain from an American diner in the 1950s, it may appear to be a jukebox. Its default setting is that of the red antique Glasgow police box from 1891, and while it can access that form at any time, it is by no means fixed. When choosing a form, the Red TARDIS will more often than not choose a form that is red in color; however, this isn't a fixed trait either. For more info on the previous operator of the vessel, who now comprises much of its interactive personality, see the info on the Archivist below.
Relationships:
Companion: Brody Kimball- A young punk with predictable disrespect for authority and a conspiracy-spotting bent, Brody nevertheless trusts the Haruspex in spite of her brusque and often condescending manner... although her behavior does grate on him and he enjoys messing with her in return. He was present when she was awakened to her nature as a Time Lord, and insisted on being taken with her when she piloted her inherited TARDIS the first time. Intending to show off just a little, she did take him with her, and her inexpert piloting threw them unpredictably forward into time and space... so he might be with her for a long haul. While initially this was not ideal, he's been very amenable to being a test subject for her to observe firsthand the long-term effects of time travel on a human. She attempts to keep their relationship purely businesslike and they both deflect one another's more personal questions, although they do have a growing fondness for each other. She's nursing a baby infatuation for him because of her affinity for all things ephemeral, but refuses to act on it.
TARDIS interface "personality": The Archivist- After parting ways with the Gallivant, the Haruspex was found by an elderly, avuncular Time Lord called the Archivist. He offered her transport back to Gallifrey, but his navigation was far from perfect and it took them some time (and several distracting adventures) before they made it, bonding the two in friendship. At the coming of the Great Time War, the Archivist sacrificed himself by installing psychic remnants of his personality in his own TARDIS, which he sent to Earth and disguised as a mundane antique object so it wouldn't be discovered. He now resides as the vocal and audible holographic interface of the TARDIS which has come into the Haruspex's possession. The Archivist's interface appearance is that of an aging, gaunt, yet proper Victorian gentleman.
Former lover/companion: The Gallivant- The Haruspex and another more experienced Time Lord simply known as the Gallivant have a tangled and fraught romantic history. When she was younger, he romanced her completely with charm, intellect and good looks, and the two ran away together in his TARDIS to traverse time and space. They agreed to a mutual philosophy of total hands-off uninvolvement, since getting embroiled in other people's problems was too complicated for the level of superficial time-space tourism he generally enjoys, and she's not one to disrupt that which appears to be solving itself, for good or ill. Their romance was dramatic, cyclonic and set against a backdrop of all that the universe had to offer, but eventually he grew tired of their dalliance and abandoned her without means of transport and navigation, leaving her to find her own way back to Gallifrey. She still thinks wistfully of their time together because it was by far the most exciting and romantic of her life, but nevertheless, the Haruspex hates him for ditching her.
Pets:
The Haruspex keeps quite a lot of animals with her. She loves them all, but much like with her human companions, they're subjects to be observed first and "friends" second. Her animal companions are as follows:
Cat: Jennica - female, all white with green eyes. Jennica is not a big hunter; she prefers to spend her time sleeping on top of warm things.
Mice: Her first generation of white mice, which live loose in the TARDIS, are all identified with a color coded dot on their backs. Subsequent generations become color coded (and possibly named) when they survive to adulthood. The first generation (and corresponding colors) are as follows:
Smythwycke: red
Fiammetta: yellow
Erroll: green
Benedict: blue
D'Artagnan: purple
Parakeets: Achilles and Patroclus - The parakeets are kept in the aviary and don't usually go outside of it. Both are male.
Art by me
Skin: Exceedingly pale, with high color in cheeks, earlobes and lips (and any other areas where capillaries are close to the surface of the skin)
Tattoos/Piercings: None
Clothing: Her most frequent outfit is a full swing skirt (similar in shape to a poodle skirt) made of brightly colored and patterned patchwork; a pair of lady's pointy-toed hobnailed boots; and a blue argyle-patterned sweater with several layers underneath (usually a white blouse and a teal camisole, the tails of which tend to be visible underneath the sweater). She may or may not be wearing a fire-engine red wool peacoat; she very often wears a dapper pair of pince-nez spectacles which she absolutely doesn't need, but which she insists make her look professorial.
Personality: Being a Time Lord, she possesses the sharp, incisive and often frightening intelligence characteristic to her long-lived species, and isn't at all shy about flaunting it or talking over the heads of humans or anyone else she considers a "lesser" being. She comes across as cranky, acerbic and sarcastic, and prefers not to get close to people if at all possible (not that they would really want to, with her attitude). However, she has a deep and abiding sentimentality that belies her outward curmudgeonly demeanor; she is captivated by all things fleeting, ephemeral and energetic. She is obsessed with ambient sound, independently working mechanical parts, involuntary organic systems, and light filtering through glass; she is deathly phobic of still, silent, dark, enclosed spaces. Her preferred position is to be a fly on the wall, surrounded by living things or mechanical devices that move, breathe and make noise, where she can observe and delight in the ever-changing life all around her, but never get involved. She's slowly amending this now that there are (as far as she knows) no other Time Lords left to set things straight when necessary, but still tries to get involved with people's lives as little as possible (companions notwithstanding). This is, however, highly subject to change depending on her mood.
Background: The Haruspex was born and raised on Gallifrey as a Time Lord, and is innately familiar with the workings of the time vortex and the subtle turning of the universe. In the days before the advent of the Great Time War, when the beings of Gallifrey were plentiful in number, she had an intense whirlwind romance with the Gallivant, another of her kind. After growing bored with their relationship, he broke up with her in the most dramatic possible way: abandoning her somewhere in the reaches of space and time without means of escape. She was found by a second Time Lord who offered to return her to Gallifrey, and the two became friends in their own travels together. When the coming of the war between Time Lord and Dalek could not be avoided, the older man sent the Haruspex to Earth along with his time machine (known as a TARDIS), disguising them both with chameleon technology. During their temporary stay on Earth, the TARDIS would appear as a mundane antique object, and the Haruspex herself would in all ways appear to be biologically and mentally human, to the point of forgetting her original identity. For unknown reasons, the technology failed to awaken the Haruspex (now taking the alias Phoebe White, a PhD candidate at the University of Glasgow in the year 1985) to her unearthly nature after the end of the Time War, and only the activation of a Dimensional Vault inside the city allowed her to recall any of what had happened and reclaim her true identity. Even now, she still has large holes in her memory of her previous life as a time traveler and her childhood on Gallifrey.
About the Red TARDIS: The ship itself (often referred to as the Red TARDIS, to differentiate it from the better-known Blue TARDIS belonging to the Doctor, with whom the Haruspex is not acquainted) is not fixed in appearance, but its chameleon circuit is nevertheless slightly faulty; it will blend in perfectly with the surroundings of its immediate previous location. For instance, if it started in an antique shop in the 1980s and ends up in on a streetcorner of a city in 2010, it might appear as an old-fashioned wardrobe; or when traveling to Roman Britain from an American diner in the 1950s, it may appear to be a jukebox. Its default setting is that of the red antique Glasgow police box from 1891, and while it can access that form at any time, it is by no means fixed. When choosing a form, the Red TARDIS will more often than not choose a form that is red in color; however, this isn't a fixed trait either. For more info on the previous operator of the vessel, who now comprises much of its interactive personality, see the info on the Archivist below.
Relationships:
Companion: Brody Kimball- A young punk with predictable disrespect for authority and a conspiracy-spotting bent, Brody nevertheless trusts the Haruspex in spite of her brusque and often condescending manner... although her behavior does grate on him and he enjoys messing with her in return. He was present when she was awakened to her nature as a Time Lord, and insisted on being taken with her when she piloted her inherited TARDIS the first time. Intending to show off just a little, she did take him with her, and her inexpert piloting threw them unpredictably forward into time and space... so he might be with her for a long haul. While initially this was not ideal, he's been very amenable to being a test subject for her to observe firsthand the long-term effects of time travel on a human. She attempts to keep their relationship purely businesslike and they both deflect one another's more personal questions, although they do have a growing fondness for each other. She's nursing a baby infatuation for him because of her affinity for all things ephemeral, but refuses to act on it.
TARDIS interface "personality": The Archivist- After parting ways with the Gallivant, the Haruspex was found by an elderly, avuncular Time Lord called the Archivist. He offered her transport back to Gallifrey, but his navigation was far from perfect and it took them some time (and several distracting adventures) before they made it, bonding the two in friendship. At the coming of the Great Time War, the Archivist sacrificed himself by installing psychic remnants of his personality in his own TARDIS, which he sent to Earth and disguised as a mundane antique object so it wouldn't be discovered. He now resides as the vocal and audible holographic interface of the TARDIS which has come into the Haruspex's possession. The Archivist's interface appearance is that of an aging, gaunt, yet proper Victorian gentleman.
Former lover/companion: The Gallivant- The Haruspex and another more experienced Time Lord simply known as the Gallivant have a tangled and fraught romantic history. When she was younger, he romanced her completely with charm, intellect and good looks, and the two ran away together in his TARDIS to traverse time and space. They agreed to a mutual philosophy of total hands-off uninvolvement, since getting embroiled in other people's problems was too complicated for the level of superficial time-space tourism he generally enjoys, and she's not one to disrupt that which appears to be solving itself, for good or ill. Their romance was dramatic, cyclonic and set against a backdrop of all that the universe had to offer, but eventually he grew tired of their dalliance and abandoned her without means of transport and navigation, leaving her to find her own way back to Gallifrey. She still thinks wistfully of their time together because it was by far the most exciting and romantic of her life, but nevertheless, the Haruspex hates him for ditching her.
Pets:
The Haruspex keeps quite a lot of animals with her. She loves them all, but much like with her human companions, they're subjects to be observed first and "friends" second. Her animal companions are as follows:
Cat: Jennica - female, all white with green eyes. Jennica is not a big hunter; she prefers to spend her time sleeping on top of warm things.
Mice: Her first generation of white mice, which live loose in the TARDIS, are all identified with a color coded dot on their backs. Subsequent generations become color coded (and possibly named) when they survive to adulthood. The first generation (and corresponding colors) are as follows:
Smythwycke: red
Fiammetta: yellow
Erroll: green
Benedict: blue
D'Artagnan: purple
Parakeets: Achilles and Patroclus - The parakeets are kept in the aviary and don't usually go outside of it. Both are male.
Art by me
Guest Art
