Gentry/The Stultified Puppeteer

The Stultified Puppeteer

Always female, The Stultified Puppeteer is a member of the local Gentry.

Description

      "Humans crave melodrama, they crave fiction. When you are sitting alone and texting its because you are bored. That is because you are bored all the time. This is what fiction does for us. It gives a simulation for bigger things, bigger emotions. That is what Lord of the Rings is, that is what Phantom of the Opera is, that is what Goodfellas is. That is everything. It is us watching and feeling. The human capacity for imagination. That is why we have stories. That is what you need, man! That is what we all want! From Long John Silver to Perseus to Neo to Walter White. We love to watch grow, change, struggle. Good people, bad people, we don't care, man! We need entertainment and we need it now!" - Max Landis

      The Stultified Puppeteer is utterly inhuman, but she is human-like. She craves emotion, but she cannot produce it alone. She craves story but she cannot write them. She craves for companionship but only cares for herself. In many ways the Stultified Puppeteer is every man or woman corrupted by power in such a disproportionate way they would lose all perspective of the others around them, from Emperor Commodus to Kim Jong-un. The key difference is that the Stultified Puppeteer has never brushed with mortality or imperfection. In her realm, she is God, and she wants entertainment, and she wants it now.

      Nothing exists within the Stultified Puppeteer's realm that doesn't work exactly how this Fae desires. She has everything under control, all the time... except for her Changelings. Ever since the first Lost-to-be looked the Puppeteer right into her cold, dead eyes and denied her, this unknowable god has become mystified with the mortal world and the potential for something new that it brings. Something she cannot control. Entertainment. Fear. Excitement. Melodrama!

      That Changeling was killed on the spot, as the denial startled the True Fae so she couldn't hold back her fury, but to this day her body exists in the courtyards of The Stultified Puppeteer as a gold and flesh statue, a saint and role model, her first love. No one compares to The First One. No one.

      But several have tried. Mortals abducted by The Stultified Puppeteer are expected to be entertaining. Those captured to be villains are usually the worst of the worst in the most stereotypical ways: murderers, serial killers, rapists, war criminals, politicians, lawyers, drug users, heirs to great fortunes and scientists (because of course). The heroes of her realm are just as grossly misunderstood individuals. Some are just beautiful, others had turbulent pasts, soldiers of any armies, mothers and fathers, firemen, policemen and children. If left to her own devices the Stultified Puppeteer sets up her own entertainment like a game of checkers or chess, in black and white.

      And she gets bored very, very fast.

      What happens when the Fae gets bored varies. If she gets tired of a storyline she may decide to change it, be it by killing a loved one of her protagonist or adding another villain of three to see what happens then. Maybe she brings in her protagonist's brother as his nemesis or decides to take part more directly.

      And sometimes people just get cancelled. Happens to the very best one of them.

Suggested Themes for Escapees

• Beasts (The Support Cast): Beasts are rarely Stars, but are often their best friends, trusted mounts or sidekick. Anything too low for the Darkling and Fairest is probably done by Beasts, and although only the Ogres get a worst treatment from the Keeper, they at least get the chance to lash back against the Stultified Puppeteer by hurting her favored Stars. Beasts very rarely get that chance. To escape as a Beast is relatively easy: unless those Changeling are the steeds, confidants or doormats of the Keeper's Stars, she doesn't care where Beasts roam in her Shire.

• Ogres (The Extras): This Seeming is almost unanimously present in villains. Ugliness is evil, and as such these Changelings are hamfisted into roles where, should they not act like brutes and savages, the likeliness of renovation for another season drops severely. Ogres mostly escape the Shire of Moving Pages after they have been hurt enough to have lost their appeal, having become useless as cannon fodder for the heroes or as whipping boys for the best villains. Compelling, powerful ogres are so rare that they almost never escape.

• Elementals (The Scenery): Rare are the Elementals in the Stultified Puppeteer's domains, and even more rare are the ones that escape, or survive. Of all Seemings, this one has the highest termination ratio when compared to their absolute numbers, and that is mostly because their Keeper grows bored with them all the time. Escaping from her grip as an Elemental would take uncanny intellect and an ability to draw attention to someone else to cover one's track.

• Fairest & Darkling (The Stars): Light and Shadow, Good and Evil, the Fairest and Darkling are the most precious of Changeling in the Stultified Puppeteer's kingdom. These are carefully crafted and meticulously planned, their stories the most promising and most intriguing. Given how obsessed the Keeper is with each and every one of these, save for the rarest exceptions, escaping often means being interesting enough to avoid termination while one gains power and insight on the Puppeteer's weakness, and then intelligence to abuse such flaws to trick the Fae.

• Wizened (The Agents): These Changeling are the heart of the Shire of Moving Pages. They are often old, and paired with young protagonists to teach them the ways of combat and leadership, while also instilling in them the urge to adventure (and to be entertaining, for their own sakes). Because they are usually older than most, and are allowed to impart their accrued wisdom, these Wizened are usually the ones teaching their protagonists how to survive, and then escape, acting as career managers. Some do it out of the goodness of their heart, while others sometimes just want to make the plot move forward with a good escape, chase and capture scene. Escaping, for a Wizened, is a relatively easy task. The spotlight is never on them, and they know their Keeper well enough to convince, trick or reach an agreement when time comes.