Avatar of Light
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They ain't Marked. They're just people. That's all. |
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— Himself |
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"Naw, I ain't no angel. That's for sure."
Raised on a farm until the Great Depression and the Dust Bowl made things difficult, fatherless Okie miscreant Ben Hawkins, with his mother dead and farm reposessed by the bank, a fugitive from a chain gang, begins to travel with a carnival he feels a strange connection to. Keeping his healing touch a secret, his nature eventually leads to conflict with his evil counterpart, his generation's Avatar of Darkness. Afterward, he inexplicably wakes up in the modern day, a man out of time.
"Everything's impossible til it ain't."
Personality
Ben is a reserved young man, troubled by his upbringing, roused by the development of his Inner Light. He is strong of will, maybe too trusting, accepting, loyal to a fault, emotionally resilient, haunted beyond his years, yet doesn't necessarily let his past scars rule him.
Background
Milfay, Oklahoma, 1916
In ages past there was a prophet. The details of the Prophet's life was largely lost in the destruction of the Library at Alexandria. But the Prophet had two sons, one a creature embodying the Light and one embodying the Darkness. Every generation since has seen two Avatars, a Creature of the Light and a Creature of the Darkness, usually the firstborn son of a previous Avatar.
Henry Scudder was the Avatar of Darkness for his generation, but his personal nature was at cross-purpose to his nature as an Avatar. He attempted to suppress the Darkness, settled down as a farmer, bought land he named Big Sky Farms, took a wife. But when his son was born, the boy's nature as an Avatar took its toll on the woman, who became extremely paranoid. Henry left when the Avatar of Light was getting close, leaving his wife and son to the farm, which was successful enough to sustain them. For a while.
Miscreant
Flora Hawkins, who stopped using her husband's name when he left her and their infant son, was unable to give their boy affection. She saw the boy as unnatural. When she witnessed him bringing dead animals back to life when he was young, this just cemented her paranoid suspicions, believing Ben to be demonic.
A boy who raises himself rarely becomes wise. Ben ran off as a teenager, got involved with miscreants in Texas, was imprisoned on a twenty-year sentence for a botched bank robbery. Two years in and the ongoing issues in the Dust Bowl claimed his mother with dust pnemonia. This prompted Ben to leave his chain gang so he could go heal his mother, a guard being killed during the escape. Naturally, Ben was held responsible.
Roustie
Another Avatar of Light had sensed Ben when he was born, and had been keeping a mystical eye on him. This moment he sensed was the time, so he directed his Carnivàle traveling show to Milfay, Oklahoma, where Ben's mother would refuse the healing touch of her son, and Ben allowed her to succumb to her condition. Ben would attempt to bury her, but a demolition of the house was planned by the bank who had repossessed the farm. While the two argued, the carnival helped him bury his mother, complete with an impromptu funeral while the house was demolished. They took Ben in, at behest of the Avatar of Light who ran the show.
Ben slowly integrated himself into the carnival working as a roustabout, his reserved nature keeping him from personal connection at first. But he would slowly warm up to others, becoming one of them, adopted into the strange roaming family.
Avatar of Light
Dreams drew Ben to find his father, eventually succeeding and bringing him back to Carnivàle to bring the two rivals together, something the Avatar of Light orchestrated, knowing he wouldn't be able to get Ben to take on the full weight of his nature unless he thought his father was in danger. After the confrontation, with the mantle passed down to him, he became aware of the old game, the battle of Light and Darkness.
Ben's father was kidnapped by an agent of the Darkness to bring the elder Avatar to the younger. This spurred Ben to give chase, and Carnivàle went with him, slowly crossing the West toward California.
Light vs Darkness
After reaching the Dust Bowl refugee camp set up by his rival Avatar, Ben infiltrated the Darkness's home. With the carnies helping him, Ben plotted a trap for his rival in the Carnivàle itself. Unfortunately the Avatar of Darkness was able to escape the trap, chasing Ben into a nearby corn field, fulfilling a dream he kept having, a chase in a corn field in a storm. The events of the confrontation are vague to Ben's memory. He was found by the carnies, placed in the old Avatar of Light's wagon where he disappeared.
Inexplicably, when Ben woke up, the 1930s had become history long since past. Now a man from a time long gone, roaming a time almost a century removed from his own. A man now drawn to seek answers, forge a new path.
SIGNATURE ABILITY
The Show Must Go on
Ben's predecessor was a man of manipulation and control. His nature infused itself into his traveling carnival. Over time, things run down and continued to work primarily because he wanted them to. The extent of this influence was shown when he passed on his boon to Ben, the entire carnival went dark, generators failed, machines were worn out.
Ben has been many things, but at his core he is a force of growth and repair. At first it seemed like gaining his boon gave him the same power as his predecessor. But this was not the case. The carnival came back to life, yes. But this was due to a different force. Ben was sustaining the carnival but his power was working with the carnies, not in spite of them. The generators were fixed, the machines repaired, and less and less of Ben was needed to sustain the carnival until none of his own power was in the machines, long before they pulled up stakes for the road. The carnival was legitimately repaired.
When time is of the essence, Ben has the power to sustain the broken for a time, but also inspire people to do what's needed to quickly bring the broken back to life, working together in uncanny efficiency even if the task seems impossible.
SKILLS
Avatar Knowledge - Expert Level
When Ben received his Boon from his predecessor, he received the basic knowledge of the First Prophet, the Prophet's Avatara progeny, the Light and the Darkness, and the Great Struggle between the two sides.
He also gained greater knowledge of the Power of the Light and the Darkness which allows him better control over his abilities, makes him more efficient in their use, and enhances his overall mystical strength.
Cultivation - Expert Level
Ben is skilled in low-tech crop farming as would be consistent with a farmer in the Dust Bowl of the 1930s. Adapting modern gardening techniques shouldn't be too much for him.
Firearms - Competent Level
As a farmer and as a delinquent, Ben knows how to operate and upkeep simple firearms, primarily hunting rifles, shotguns, and revolvers.
Handywork - Competent Level
As a farmer and as a carnival roustabout, Ben is familiar with low-tech handywork. This includes repairs on buildings and machines (and the non-computerized conponents thereof), upkeep of work and farm animals, and erecting and dismantling temporary structures such as tents and carnival stalls.
Melee - Competent Level
As a young delinquent, Ben is familiar with fisticuffs as well as simple weapons like knives or inprovised weapons like bats.
Survival - Expert Level
Ben can survive with minimal (sometimes even no) equipment for days on the land alone. For much longer if he has a more reliable source of food and clean water, even more so with a tent or other shelter.
Thievery - Competent Level
Part of survival for Ben was theft of necessities. Part of his miscreancy was theft of not necessities. This is usually grabbing something unnoticed and pocketing it. Or grabbing something and walking away like nothing is going on. While this was far easier in the time and place of his youth, the skill can still be useful.
ABILITIES
Magic: Ageless - Basic Level
While Ben can be killed like most mortal beings, his aging stopped when he received his predecessor's Boon at age nineteen.
Magic: Astral Perception - Enhanced Level
Ben sometimes picks up vibrations in the astral, snippets of the past, present, or future. These manifest to him as dreams most often. Sometimes they manifest as visions playing out around him like a three-dimensional recording. When this happens, if he chooses to listen to the message, he may seem to have zoned out for a moment.
Direct skin to skin contact may cause Ben to have visions related to that person's fate. He has no control over if there is a vision or what a vision reveals to him. Though these visions used to be shocking to him, he has since gotten used to them enough that he can usually suppress a reaction when they occur, though if he chooses to pay attention to the message, he may seem to have zoned out for a moment.
These dreams and visions are ultimately intended to lead him forward on his path as the Avatar of Light.
Magic: Astral Projection - Enhanced Level
Ben is able to project his astral self great distances, able to witness places without being physically present. While he is projecting, his body appears to be asleep.
Magic: Aura of Peace - Enhanced Level
Ben has an uncanny knack for calming people, his words naturally soothing and his eyes gentle, no matter how much his outer presentation may be at odds.
Avatar of the Prophet
As an Avatar of the Prophet, Ben is a semi-divine entity aligned with the Light, or Good. Having received his Boon from his predecessor, he is on par with many minor demigods.
Magic: Avatar Sense - Enhanced Level
Avatars of the Prophet are able to sense each other, if they know what to look for. Avatars of like alignment are able to do so over great distances, while those of opposite alignment must be quite close.
Magic: Illusion - Enhanced Level
Ben is able to conjure illusions, usually targeted at a limit of one person though expanding to very small groups is possible with effort. These illusions appear to be very real, encompass all the senses, and remain as long as Ben concentrates. Despite this, the illusions feel off somehow in some way undefined.
Magic: Life Manipulation - Enhanced Level
Healing Touch: Ben can heal with but a touch. There is a price for this healing, though, as the restored health must be drawn from somewhere. Since receiving his Boon from the previous Avatar of Light, Ben no longer has to randomly take life from the closest targets. He is now able to choose where the life force comes from with concentration. The more complex the life and the more severe the injury, the more life must be drawn to heal.
Life Sense: He also has a sort of instinctive sense of how much life is around him and in what concentration.
Resurrection: Ben can resurrect the dead. While non-sapient life and the life of the very young can be brought back to life in the same manner as his healing touch (as long as the body is still relatively fresh and mostly intact), bringing back older children, adolescents, and adult sapients requires killing another. There is no range to this resurrection, but Ben must be aware of the death.
Life Drain: Ben can transfer life in the reverse, draining life force from the one he is in direct physical contact with and he can funnel it into other life. He is able to kill with a touch and can satisfy the sacrificial requirement in order to resurrect another life by doing so.
Mystical Substitution: There are items that Ben is able to draw life force from in order to heal or resurrect due to their connection with healing and rebirth. Lyngurium, for instance, is a mystical healing stone that can be permanently drained of its healing power to resurrect someone without the need for a balancing death. The down feathers of a phoenix are a more well-known material.
As the mere conduit, Ben may not use his own life force to heal or resurrect others, nor may he heal himself in this manner.
Magic: Purify Spirit - Supreme Level
Ben has the ability to cleanse others of corruption, whether it's true mystical corruption or a natural mortal inclination. In the former case, Ben severs any connection with the corruptor. In either case, Ben provides a path for the target to give up their vices and shed their spiritual turmoil. The target must truly want to be better, if they are undecided or trying to deceive Ben, the purification will fail.
Magic: Regeneration - Enhanced Level
Ben's inner light heals superficial wounds like cuts, bruises, and burns almost instantaneously. He recovers from being heavily banged up quicker than normal. More severe wounds like broken limbs heal faster, but not fast enough it would garner more attention than a raised eyebrow.
Magic: Tongues - Basic Level
Ben is able to innately understand any language, whether verbal, written, or somatic. This doesn't grant him the ability to speak, write, or gesture in languages he hasn't actually learned.
Magic: Unweathered - Enhanced Level
Ben doesn't suffer many adverse effects of most weather conditions. He doesn't breathe in particulates or get abrasive burns from sand or dust storms, doesn't suffer hypothermia or frostbite from the cold, doesn't suffer heat stroke or aggrevated dehydration from severe heat, lightning from thunderstorms ignores him.
Magic: Vitae Divina - Enhanced Level
Ben's blood changed when he gained full use of his power from the previous Avatar of Light. It contains power that can be absorbed by mundane objects. If an object absorbs enough of his blood, roughly equivalent to its own mass, it gains the ability to inflict wounds that are unable to heal without paranormal intervention. The object becomes able to harm creatures that are only vulnerable to magic, silver, or divine Light.
ADVANTAGES
Scudder Knife
When looking for his father, Ben met his grandmother. She gave him a brass knuckles trench knife that belonged to his father. This knife was bled upon by the previous Avatar of Light during the confrontation between the two previous Avatars and imbued with the power of the Vitae Divina.
Unfazable
Ben is not prone to finding situations disconcerting. No matter how difficult or strange, he seems to take everything in stride. He moves from environment to environment smoothly, from situation to situation without seeming to really notice. Most of the time.
WEAKNESSES
Alcohol
By today's stereotypes, a rural kid raised on a farm might be expected to be a veteran drinker, of beer if nothing else. Ben, though, can't hold his liquor. He'd been called out as a lightweight by a good number of his fellow rousties and even some of the other carnies had made the observation.
Awkward
Ben has never really had a strong connection to society at large. The rules of interaction most people seem to absorb growing up are not instinctive to him and he often appears like he's actively following a list of niceties like he's an alien who was given a report on how to act human. As a young hayseed Okie in the 1930s traveling with a carnival as a roustie, this was often overlooked. In the modern era, it may draw a lot more attention.
Due to several circumstances of his nature and upbringing, Ben does not like direct physical contact with others unless he is in control of it. Or at the very least is accepting of it. Even then, he may still be uncomfortable with it, at least at first.
Blue Blood
Ben, due to his blood becoming Vitae Divina, bleeds blue instead of red. While not having any negative effects on its own, the blood does mark him as inhuman.
Moral Core
It may not seem like it from a first glance, but Ben has a strong moral core. He doesn't take life lightly, especially sapient life, which often limits the use of his primary power.
He's also not typically willing to use his power against someone's will. (Including having let his own mother die rather than heal her against her protest.)
Power Strain
Using his powers usually requires him to exert some effort and can be physically and mentally taxing. Even those that are reflexive take their toll. This is not typically extreme, shed with rest or sleep like any other labor. Excessive use of his powers may be as tiring as any mentally exhaustive endeavor or labor-intensive work.
Records
As of his passing from 1935 to the present, the only legal records of Ben's existence are a birth record for Benjamin Krohn Scudder of Creek County, Oklahoma, to parents Henry and Flora Scudder on April 21, 1916, a 20 year bank robbery sentence in Texas for Ben Krohn Hawkins in 1932, imprisonment in a Texas state penitentiary in 1932, and a warrant for escape and murder in 1934. Official records weren't as pervasive back then and such records are basically useless in the present.
Wanted posters of the time do have a mug shot. Ben Krohn Hawkins, 57217 2 934. Anyone digging more than superficially into records of a Ben Hawkins will likely find this among the numerous others bearing that name. It'd be easy to dismiss it as obviously not him if not for the very obviously him photograph.
There's also a legend of a Benjamin St John. Despite only using the stage name twice, the persona of faith healer Benjamin St James grew into a legend in the Dust Bowl. A photograph taken during the first event links Ben's appearance to the legend.
There is also a legend of Ben Hawkins in the tale of an Okie farmboy taken in by a carnival, seeking a great evil, confronting the evil, then disappearing with the evil, locked in eternal struggle with one another. This first spread through the carnival scene before becoming a brief mainstream bit of folklore that has largely died off decades ago. It can still be found in old collections and on web sites devoted to the esoteric.
Trusting
Ben tends to take people at face value. He typically needs a solid reason to not believe what he's told.
