What gets the Owl flying

[LuckyOwl]

INTRODUCTION

First of all, please, I urge you to read my ons & offs. Once you're done with that, come back to this thread and maybe we can figure something out.

GENERAL INTERESTS

I'm generally interested in playing the following, if you have an idea that can fit the theme and I don't have many similar stories:

• Original universes (do you worldbuild? Throw your work at me and let's craft a story)
• Low / dark fantasy settings.
• Steampunk Victorian London (Or other Steampunk settings)
• Historic settings (specifically, Italian Renaissance and pirate stories are a favorite)

Lastly, I'll list some of my favorite authors here so that you kind of know what I enjoy reading, even though this doesn't excuse you from reading my Ons and Offs, where you'll find a detailed explanation. Don't worry, I don't expect you to be Hemingway - I know I'm not. These quotes are just here so that you can get a feel of the moods I'm going for. I enjoy Pat Rothfuss, Tolkien, Sapkowski, Hemingway, F. Scott Fitzgerald, John Steinbeck, and pretty much everything that aces descriptions close to magical realism. I love that sense of wonder that comes from the things that are truly beautiful, and I love making them feel even more wonderful by making them contrast with darker backgrounds.

“Words are pale shadows of forgotten names. As names have power, words have power. Words can light fires in the minds of men. Words can wring tears from the hardest hearts.”

Patrick Rothfuss, The Name of The Wind

THE CHARACTERS I PLAY

I can play pretty much any character you can think off, depending on what a particular story demands. I could list a few characters, but I believe in crafting an original character for every occasion. I'm okay if you use a character you've used before, I just don't like doing it myself. Consider it a sign of respect towards you - every RP partner is different and I enjoy crafting a different experience with each one, a different persona that evolves in a different way.

ABOUT THIS SOLO RPs WANTED THREAD

As you might have noticed, this isn't your typical "One on One - Solo RP Wanted" thread. I don't throw out any ideas, I don't have possible pairings or plots listed and I don't give any information whatsoever on my preferences except for possible settings and themes.

Why does this happen?

Personally, I believe having a good RP is about finding the right partner, not about finding the right plot. Once again, I urge you, if you haven't already, read my Ons & Offs. If you feel like we could be a good writing match, hit me up on PM or post here in this thread, and I'll be happy to try and come up with something for us to play. I enjoy the experience of knowing someone new and tailoring a story that suits us both, and I'm comfortable playing pretty much anything (except for some very clear exceptions, like scat or watersports, listed in my offs) if I think you're a good writing fit.
This is not laziness on my part - standard, fixed ideas offer, in my opinion, less customization and you need to have the luck of finding someone that's as excited as you are about a particular plot you want to play. I'm looking for people here, long term partners, not plots. If I'm terrible excited about a particular plot, I'll probably end up writing a short story or a novel by myself - when RPing, I'm interested in finding a good writing partner and crafting something unique that belongs to us both, and that we both can enjoy and have fun playing.

If that sounds like a fit to you, hit me up on PM. My inbox is always open.

WRITING SAMPLE

It's only fair, so that you know what you're getting into.

Sometimes, when you wake up, you really don't want to. Your brain keeps rationalizing conscience itself, telling you you're asleep and denying ever having spoken. Your mind tries to talk itself to sleep again, clinging to the sweet and soundless melody of darkness. You feel the warm embrace of the blankets lying on top of you, but you refuse to think about them. You acknowledge them with your soul, not with your mind, for conscience comes with the burden of identity and identity implies responsibility. And sometimes, you just don't want to handle responsibility. Sometimes, you just don't feel like being.
    You'd think something like that would happen when all of you is pain. I always thought that when I died, I'd let myself slide gently out of my own body and into the air. My father used to tell me old people don't sleep less because they have slower metabolisms, but because as the years go by, they start being afraid of never waking up. Each time they close their eyes, they think about not being able to open them. And when morning comes, they let out sighs of relief and chase out the dark, lest it become eternal. My father died screaming. He used his last breath to curse at Death itself and stopped only when his voice faded into a whisper of painful groans. I always thought I wouldn't be like that. When my time came, I'd greet the consummation of my demise and show the courage I lacked in life. I guess I was lying to myself once more. I was quite good at that. They say practice makes perfect.
    I woke up that night with a gasp, lungs screaming for air as If I had been drowning. I sat up in my bed, not knowing where I was. The moonlight came through the window, dodging the curtains to stop the bedroom from being pitch-black. I raised my arm and touched my head, feeling something similar to cloth. A sudden burst of pain made me gasp once more, loudly now.
    "Hello?"
    Trying to numb the pain, I laid back down. The voice was merely a distant sound, hidden by the rhythmical hammering in my head. 
    "Hello?"
    There was movement. The pain faded away with immobility. A light was lit. The sound of curtains being pulled. Suddenly there was a presence near my bed. I slowly turned my head to face it, praying not to awake the pain.
    "Are you okay?"
    There was a boy. He was ten, maybe younger. My brain struggled to process the information as he started talking again.
    "I heard you. You were making noises. Are you in pain?"
    "No. Not anymore." My voice sounded weird and my throat was dry.
    "They said you were in an accident. They said you might not wake up."
    I was still looking at him. Whenever I got to making sense of what he was saying, he was already saying something else.
    "They said you shouldn't move for a while if you ever woke up. They said you have a trama."
    "Trauma?"
    He thought for a second.
    "Maybe. But I think it was trama."
    I couldn't find the words. He wore Batman pajamas, small dark knights in heroic poses lit up by the bulb on the bedside table, but I knew from looking at them that no hero could help him, and the pajamas were only a cruel joke. I didn't have to ask what was wrong with him. I knew. His bald head was the frame to his struggles, the bones growing against the skin, pushing as if they were trying to break it. The skull tried to lead an escape from the madness of a body destroying itself, but he couldn't, no one could. There was no escape. His eyes were painfully calm as he waited for a response, and when I couldn't give him one he took it upon himself to keep the conversation flowing. He was trying to comfort me.
   "Would you like some ice-cream? I still have some. They give me tons of ice-cream."
   I smiled. It felt like lying. Not like lying to myself, but worse, like I was the worst kind of con man. The joyless smile on my face felt filthy, but he didn't seem to notice. He took it as an acceptance and turned around to get some ice cream. When he came back, he had a sad look on his face and I was thankful that I could stop smiling.
   "I'm sorry," said he. "It melted."
   Those words hit me like a truck. He was sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry. The ice-cream melting was nowhere near as terrible as him having ice cream-left, for that meant that the doctors and parents and people who visited him had no other way to comfort him than to give him ice-cream, as if candy could cure his pain but it couldn't, and yet they gave him ice-cream because there was nothing else they could give him. I was scared of that sixty-pound little boy, scared to look at him and scared to look away, but in the end I was also scared of watching him look at me so I looked away. I felt bad, but only a bit - I would've felt worse if I let him keep staring.
   "I'm Pete."
   Like a performer he threw his hands up in the air, then he disappeared for just a second. When he came back he was holding a vase, full of dirt but with no plant. Pete looked happy even though there was no green, only brown.
   "This is my plant. My mother gave it to me. I'll leave it here on the bedside table." He smiled at me. "My mother said that by the time the plant was all grown up, I could go back home and become all grown up too. I can't wait to go back home." He was still smiling. "I'll leave the plant here. Maybe you can go home too once it grows. Do you miss your home?"
    I didn't answer, but that didn't matter. He didn't care.
    "I miss home sometimes, so you must too. I'll leave the plant here. It's settled."
    I felt tears running down my cheeks and all the bottled up words that had been building up on my throat imploded and merged together to form a single question, one that I knew I shouldn't ask but still had to, one that wasn't nearly as mine as it was his.
   "Do you know you're going to die?"
   He looked at me as if he hadn't heard me, then he came closer and put his hand on my face.
   "You're crying. Are you sad? Is it because you're hurt?" He shook his head. "Don't worry. My mother says everyone gets hurt every once in a while. That's why we come here. So they can make us better."
   He dried my tears with his hand as they kept pouring and pouring, until I forced myself to stop them, I forced myself not to cry in front of him. After a while he went back to his bed and I could tell he was tired, I could tell he had been sleeping and it hurt him to stay on his feet for that long. I struggled not to cry again. I thought he probably didn't hear my question, or maybe he didn't want to answer it, and I thought it was probably for the best. As I thought this, his voice made itself heard once more.
   "Oh, and that's bullshit." I was shocked by the word, shocked at how I felt he had earned the right to use it. I began to forget he was a child, but then he spoke again, his voice only a whisper. "Please don't tell my mother."
    "I won't," I said. That I could say, that I could promise. Lit up by the moonlight, we both went to sleep.
    Pete died that night. I was passed out, too focused on my own darkness to wake up at the sound of the paddles and the doctors shouting Clear!. When I woke up the next morning the bed was empty and the plant was still on the bedside table, so I pressed a button to call a nurse and asked for Pete. That's when they told me he had died.
    I got out of the hospital two weeks later. I took that vase with me and transferred it to my garden and made sure it grew, and when it didn't I asked myself if I had planted the seed too deep, if maybe it was my fault that it didn't grow, but then I realized some plants just aren't meant to grow. The first time I left through those hospital doors I held my breath for a long time until my face grew purple, because a young boy had once taught me that every breath you take is accounted for and if you aren't careful you'll run out before your plant has the chance to grow.

FINAL WORDS

That's all the info I can think off. Please do feel free to PM me if you're intrigued. If you feel like there's some info lacking or want to ask a question, you're also welcome to do so.

Best regards,
Owl

[LuckyOwl]

Monthly bump.

[LuckyOwl]

Writing sample updated to better reflect my style and skills. Merry christmas, everyone.

[LuckyOwl]

Thread updated after a considerable amount of time.

[LuckyOwl]

Any cyberpunk or space opera fans out there? Poke me and let's work something out!