Post by louise on Sept 15, 2007 21:15:30 GMT 1
Name: Luisa (Louise) Maria Constanza
Nationality: Italian (in an alternative world)
Mortal age: 50
Immortal age: over 400
Species: immortal, non-vampire
Powers: extreme strength (can bend metal planks or carry loads no ordinary human would be able to lift); night vision; may shoot energy beams out of her palms that are deadly to mortals and immortals of her species alike; when calm, may use the light on her palms instead of a lamp at night-time
Looks: Louise is beautiful woman, but her beauty is of a very specific sort. She has an extremely smooth face with delicate features; her bluish-gray eyes are eerily large, and usually look black and deep because her pupils are permanently dilated (it is something related to her autism). There is a wide, wondering look in them which is amplified by the fact that her gaze is very intent and unfocussed at the same time, and she tends to stare into the distance, either past other people or right through them. Regardless of how she feels, she always has a smile on her face which looks bright, excited, but also dreamy, as if she were witnessing some miracle that was visible only to herself. There is a look to her that is almost childlike, or rather, altogether ageless, so that people who meet her for the first time have difficulty telling how old she really is; there is a wisdom written on her face which even many old people lack, but there is also the happiness which comes with such wisdom, and which makes her look youthful, as if she were still no older than eighteen.
Louise’s hair is wavy and long, and almost reaches her ankles. It used to be a golden shade of blonde when she was younger, but by the time she had become an immortal it had turned half-gray. Immortality had made it lustrous and almost glowing, so that it now looks like a luxurious mass of silver and gold. However, Louise sees it as a bother more than anything and would rather cut it off, but, since she cannot do it (immortals’ hair grows back within 24 hours), she wears it in a braid which she may wrap around her head in a special way if she needs it not to dangle.
Louise is not particularly concerned about the way she appears to others – she has no concept of “good looks” and “bad looks” and thinks every person is beautiful in their own way, so that she fails to see the reasoning behind such distinctions, - but she likes to look neat, tidy and modest, so she chooses simple, convenient clothes that do not stand out too much. She also has extremely sensitive skin, so she avoids rough and prickly fabrics, or clothes that ‘d be too tight or would confine her movements. During the times when Louise grew up, women wore very long skirts, so she still prefers to wear a dress or long skirt due to habit when she is at home. Typically, she wears either a long, straight khaki skirt with a white or black-and-white pinstripe shirt whose sleeves are always half rolled-up, or a khaki bib dress. When she is out doing fieldwork, she will wear khaki unisex-style pants and a khaki shirt. She gets used to her clothes and likes wearing the same trusty ones for months until they are completely worn down, so people can tell who she is just from what she is wearing. Louise cannot stand shoes and will wear them only when it is absolutely necessary (to avoid being bitten by snakes etc.), and, when possible, prefers soleless soft-skin boots that are specially made for her. However, when she can, she always goes barefoot.
One quirk of Louise’s is that she wears a chainmail shirt on top of an ordinary cloth shirt. She had found it in a storage room once while still living with her husband and younger children, and had worn it since, sometimes even sleeping in it. She simply likes the feel of weight and pressure on her body, and finds it calming, but to the people who know her the armor had become a symbol of her resilience and strength. She also has a silver bracelet on her right hand, decorated with a floral design, which has her full name etched on it as well as a message saying that she is mute and will communicate in writing only. While some people find this somewhat embarrassing, Louise is comfortable wearing it and thinks it is a useful thing, since showing it to somebody is much easier for her than, for example, pointing at her lips in order to say that she cannot speak. It also serves as a handy way to start any conversation (or whatever written/spoken exchange that passes for one in her case), and makes for a special way of communicating that is peculiar to her alone.
Personality:
Louise is deeply autistic. She never learned to speak and can communicate only in writing or sign language (the only exceptions being the times when she says a few words while under extreme emotional stress). Her writing style makes for a stark contrast with her sincerity and directness; it is highly formal, hard to understand and full of scientific terms, and it both creates a feel of extra distance and, at the same time, somewhat dampens her brutal honesty, which may have been next to unbearable otherwise. Louise always carries a pad and pen with her in case she needs to state precisely what she wants. But verbal language as such is largely alien to her (she thinks in pictures or feelings only), and, where possible, she prefers to use sign language instead. While mute, Louise is not silent – most of the time she will hum softly to herself, as a way of showing that she is happy or absorbed in doing some task, or will make small sounds when something had made her excited (sometimes it happens because she tries to speak and cannot, so she will moan instead). In a sense she has a language all of her own, consisting of sounds and body movements, which often conveys more of her emotions than she intends to show, but few people ever bother to try and decipher it.
Louise is a loner. She has neither the capacity nor the need to communicate much. Trying to socialize tires her almost at once, so, if she is made to take part in a social situation, after a while she will simply get up and leave. She likes to sit around other people, observing them and listening to them talking, provided the atmosphere is pleasant and quiet, but she doesn’t like being addressed directly and asked questions (if she is, she is likely to leave). However, she forms a very strong attachment to one or two significant others, who are very important to her and with whom she loves spending time. When she was young, her nanny Francesca was such a person, then, much later, it was her youngest son Bertrand. Louise also likes to see other people happy and hates it when anybody is hurt, and, when she sees someone suffering, she will do her best to help. But this does not mean she is going to become attached to that person, and she is most likely to let them drift away once they no longer need her assistance. On the whole, Louise prefers the company of animals to that of people; she never tires of them, and finds them much more pleasant and easy to communicate with, as they never lie or insult, and give warmth freely without trying to put up any barriers. Seeing an animal tortured would be the greatest nightmare to Louise, much worse than having most of her children murdered (which did happen at some point and which she survived without becoming too depressed), because animals provoke much stronger feelings in her than does the great majority of people.
One remarkable quality of Louise’s is her extraordinary resilience, in which autism played a part. Due to a combination of a very positive and strong personality with severe autism, she never became embittered despite the ugly life she was made to lead, and managed to retain her optimism and a sort of primal sense of wonder that most adults do not have. She was able not to become depressed throughout her mortal lifetime even though she was confined to a mansion in a remote rural area, with only her books, children who ignored her and a husband who thought her subhuman for company.
Louise’s sense of wonder is a huge part of her strength. In part, it was shaped by her autism – most autistics have heightened senses, which may make daily life very difficult for them (since, say, the sounds in a shopping mall or on a crowded street may be so overwhelming the person will be reduced to a meltdown), but may also make ordinary things really beautiful to look at. They also tend to become absorbed, "lost" in the tiny details of things, sometimes for hours. Louise is like this too, and she not only possesses this ability, but has worked on it throughout her conscious lifetime. She sees an immense beauty in the surrounding world, which sometimes becomes nearly unbearable; and, behind the beauty, she sees God (and it was the beauty that helped her her understand the concept of God itself - for a long time, it was far too abstract for her, until one evening, standing at the seaside looking at the sunset, she suddenly realized that God must be the One Who made all this). She sees a great significance in small things others usually don't notice - in the veins on a dry leaf, in a crack on the wall, in a droplet of dew on a strand of moss etc. Each of these, to her, is a little miracle that reveals something new and wonderful, so she always feels like a child who is taking their first steps through the world. Science, and, in particular, the natural sciences she studies, is also not just "dry science" to her (she doesn't understand what people really mean when they say "dry science"); it's a way of discovering more about how things work in this wonderfully complex world, so that she can feel amazed yet again and thank God for creating it.
This permanent feeling of profound awe something almost violent about it - the beauty is everywhere and she can't escape from it, even if she wanted to. So, during the rare times when she feels like pitying herself and wallowing in negativity for a while, she feels she cannot do it, because the beauty pulls her back. It is still staring her right in the face, and disregarding it like that (because one can waste one's time on whining only if one deliberately closes one's eyes to it) would mean defiling it.
Louise finds the "large world" - the world inhabited by most other people who consider themselves normal - too fast-paced, baffling and frightening. She is especially bewildered and frightened by the twisted motives people commonly have, and by their ability to create problems literally on an empty spot, since extreme directness and lack of ulterior motives is natural to her (and then it has been so hard for her to master some very essential things that she would have neither the will nor the ability to deliberately complicate matters further, even if she wanted to). She cannot comprehend most social rules; they feel like something very tangled, difficult and frightening to her, like being caught in a spider's web, where, the more you thrash and try to escape, the more trapped you become. She doesn't distinguish between ranks or classes and will treat all people equally, as unique individuals, not as members of certain groups. She does not have any concept of ambition, either, and doesn't understand why one would deliberately subject oneself to such torture as being at the center of everybody's attention. Ocassions like balls or dinners organized in order to get a favor from a high-ranking official are a complete mystery to her; even if she could speak and wanted to take part in one, she would find all those small moves people make - like making chit-chat, exchanging compliments that mean nothing, etc., - very puzzling, and would come to think of the whole thing as odd and pointless.
Louise does not even have a clear understanding of what laws are, and follows only her conscience (or rather, she simply lives according to the principle "hurt no living being"); since conscience and law sometimes clash, she tends to think of laws as some tangled restrictions people have made who knows for what purpose. She never learned to lie or beat about the bush, so she will always write exactly what is on her mind, however hurtful it could seem. Then, when people take offense, it is difficult for her to understand why, and it takes a long time to explain it to her. She is saying the truth, and, as far as she is concerned, truth is by no means something that could offend - on the contrary, it is something to be glad and thankful about. After all, she herself requires other people to be completely frank with her, and is happy when someone speaks their mind and sets things clear and straight, so she often fails to understand why others should not want the same. She also does not know when to start or finish a conversation, and needs the person she is talking to or a companion to indicate when she should do it (for example, by saying “hello” or “allright, that’s it, bye” first); when there is nobody by her side to help her with this, she can end up in a very awkward situation and may choose to back out of it by leaving, because this is the only way of sorting it out that is known to her.
Louise’s social impairment is her great weakness, but, in sense, it isone of her strengths as well. It makes her oblivious to many things that would have otherwise made life much more complicated for her. As a result, she has a much more forthright view of the world and of other people, without many complexes that seem to be mostly socially conditioned, and is free to live according to her own values.
Life story:
Louise was born in a noble family who hoped to marry her (read: sell her at the highest imaginable price) to some wealthy person like themselves, and were devastated when they realized she was autistic - or just "mad", as they said then, - and this wasn't going to happen. The only person who really cared for her was her nanny, Francesca. It was Francesca who got Louise interested in animals, first by teaching her to hold a cat and stroke it without hurting it, and then by telling her about various animals and giving her books to read about them. This had a great impact on Louise's later life - she never really became interested in people, but because she was curious about animals, she was motivated to try and imitate other people's actions and become more like them, so that she could have a chance to learn more. Francesca also taught Louise to read and write. When Louise was 13, her parents noticed she was acting less strange, so they figured out that, with some more fixing, something could still be done with her. In the end, they managed to marry her to Eugene, a man with a good title and lots of land and money. They were quite satisfied with what they did; it meant they got Louise off their hands, and also profited from the marriage because they now had access to Eugene's money. Eugene , however, was basically tricked into the marriage and didn't find out what his wife was really like until he brought her home. When he did, he was very angry with Louise's parents and was very reluctant to speak to them or admit them to his place. (Louise was only happy with that, because she didn't want to see them either. She didn't even know them too well, as she had always been with Francesca; her only memories of her mother involved being shouted at, hit, or locked up in a dark cellar. This latter thing gave her a problem that lasted her whole lifetime - she became severely claustrophobic, on an instinctive sort of level, and would start screaming and struggling uncontrollably whenever she approached the entrance to a small room. Being within four walls for too long made her uneasy, so she normally brought out her rocking chair and books onto the veranda and sat there for days on end. Later, as an immortal working in wildlife observation and registering new species of insects, she had to have special transparent tents made for her, or else, sleep right under the open sky. Having to climb into an ordinary canvas tent was more than she could handle).
Eugene wasn't particularly concerned about Louise's wellbeing. He was angry because he was bound hand and foot with a "mad" wife who (at the time) couldn't take care of herself - according to the laws of the country, divorce was prohibited, and he could not even give her away to a convent or asylum since he was supposed to look after her himself. He raped her repeatedly, and, as a result, she gave birth to eight sons. She couldn't look after them, especially the youngest four who were born when she was under 20, and still incapable even of dressing or feeding herself properly; besides, all of them avoided and were afraid of her, making it impossible for her to initiate contact even if she wanted to. At first, she couldn't do much, but read a great deal - she'd just come to the library, sit down, and someone would discover her engrossed in a book hours later. By the time she was 20, Eugene had grown tired of her wandering round the house like some silent ghost, so he thought that, since this _thing_ reads, he might hire teachers for her to keep her occupied. He had money to spare anyway, and there was this element of smugness to it too. He was stroking his ego by telling himself that it was he who had provided her with a proper education. She finished secondary school at home (which was common practice among noble families, she was only unusual in that she was older than your average pupil) and ended up completing a distance course at university that was equivalent to a combined BSc/MSc degree in entomology and started to write a doctoral thesis. They had to make some concessions for her - she was hopeless at abstract subjects like math, because her thinking was purely factual (she thought in pictures), and equally hopeless at the humanities, because she had no clue about human relationships or about the way human emotions work, so she was taught only the basics of these, while the main focus was on the natural sciences. By then Eugene was not very happy again, because he felt that with so much knowledge, Louise was completely outside his control (the fact that she didn't/couldn't communicate with him only made it worse, since one cannot manipulate somebody who totally ignores one); this time it was a case of being badly jarred seeing the _thing_ poring over books in which he couldn't understand anything, even the headlines. But he couldn't do much about it.
Louise's last, ninth, son, Bertrand, was born mildly/moderately autistic. Like his mother, he was obsessed with the natural world and with insects inparticular, and almost instantly became the family's scapegoat for being "different" and a weirdo and more like his mother than his father or brothers. To Louise, he became practically her only friend, and the only person to whom she was attached, among everyone who surrounded her. They were similar in more ways than one (apart from both being autistic and having similar ways of perceiving the world and interacting with each other), which contributed to the special connection that formed between them. Louise realized that she had to send Bertrand away from the house to keep him sane, and that it had to be done as soon as possible. She hired teachers for him and had him complete the typical secondary school (lycaeum) program when he was sixteen, even though other children in noble families typically did not finish it until they were twenty or even older. This lead to a lot of rumors circulating about how Louise had suddenly become ambitious and decided to make a child prodigy of her youngest son, which she was the last person to learn and did not particularly mind. Then, at sixteen, Bertrand went to university, where he got a double degree in veterinary science and conservation/ecology. While he was studying, a scientist who needed human subjects for an experiment captured him along with Louise, who had come to visit him in the city, and made them into “artificial” immortals by injecting them with serum collected from one of the ancients. Then they were dumped out into the street without being told what had been done to them; Bertrand returned to his studies while Louise came back to her husband and other sons, oblivious at first to having become much more beautiful and to not changing, unlike her aging husband.
Then, when Bertrand should have been twenty-nine, disaster struck. A civil war broke out, and Louise, who had been away from home, was cut off and was unable to return. She was never to see her husband and other children again. She had no choice but to go to Bertrand (now a Doctor of Science like herself, and an excellent vet) and flee the country with him. When they were already abroad, news reached them of their family having been massacred. Louise was very upset, but not as devastated as someone else would be in her place, because she was never too attached to her older children, and she was absolutely indifferent towards her husband and did not care if he was dead or alive.
After that, Bertrand and Louise chose a place to live in and stayed together for a while. Louise found the noise and bustle of the city practically unbearable, but stuck by her son because she knew he needed her. But finally, after suffering a series of ugly meltdowns, she realized she could no longer go on like this, and wrote a letter to Bertrand saying she would like to seek a quieter, more secluded place to live, somewhere in the woods or in the mountains. Bertrand, who was extremely concerned about her by then, was only happy that she had decided to go and live in a way that was more suitable for her. He helped her buy a small cabin in the mountains where she could live undisturbed, and gladly let her go, knowing that his mother will now be happier than she had ever been before. Louise continued to live alone, writing regularly to Bertrand and living a life she had always dreamed about – spending days on end in the forest, finding and charting new species of insects, observing known ones and enjoying the peace.
Nationality: Italian (in an alternative world)
Mortal age: 50
Immortal age: over 400
Species: immortal, non-vampire
Powers: extreme strength (can bend metal planks or carry loads no ordinary human would be able to lift); night vision; may shoot energy beams out of her palms that are deadly to mortals and immortals of her species alike; when calm, may use the light on her palms instead of a lamp at night-time
Looks: Louise is beautiful woman, but her beauty is of a very specific sort. She has an extremely smooth face with delicate features; her bluish-gray eyes are eerily large, and usually look black and deep because her pupils are permanently dilated (it is something related to her autism). There is a wide, wondering look in them which is amplified by the fact that her gaze is very intent and unfocussed at the same time, and she tends to stare into the distance, either past other people or right through them. Regardless of how she feels, she always has a smile on her face which looks bright, excited, but also dreamy, as if she were witnessing some miracle that was visible only to herself. There is a look to her that is almost childlike, or rather, altogether ageless, so that people who meet her for the first time have difficulty telling how old she really is; there is a wisdom written on her face which even many old people lack, but there is also the happiness which comes with such wisdom, and which makes her look youthful, as if she were still no older than eighteen.
Louise’s hair is wavy and long, and almost reaches her ankles. It used to be a golden shade of blonde when she was younger, but by the time she had become an immortal it had turned half-gray. Immortality had made it lustrous and almost glowing, so that it now looks like a luxurious mass of silver and gold. However, Louise sees it as a bother more than anything and would rather cut it off, but, since she cannot do it (immortals’ hair grows back within 24 hours), she wears it in a braid which she may wrap around her head in a special way if she needs it not to dangle.
Louise is not particularly concerned about the way she appears to others – she has no concept of “good looks” and “bad looks” and thinks every person is beautiful in their own way, so that she fails to see the reasoning behind such distinctions, - but she likes to look neat, tidy and modest, so she chooses simple, convenient clothes that do not stand out too much. She also has extremely sensitive skin, so she avoids rough and prickly fabrics, or clothes that ‘d be too tight or would confine her movements. During the times when Louise grew up, women wore very long skirts, so she still prefers to wear a dress or long skirt due to habit when she is at home. Typically, she wears either a long, straight khaki skirt with a white or black-and-white pinstripe shirt whose sleeves are always half rolled-up, or a khaki bib dress. When she is out doing fieldwork, she will wear khaki unisex-style pants and a khaki shirt. She gets used to her clothes and likes wearing the same trusty ones for months until they are completely worn down, so people can tell who she is just from what she is wearing. Louise cannot stand shoes and will wear them only when it is absolutely necessary (to avoid being bitten by snakes etc.), and, when possible, prefers soleless soft-skin boots that are specially made for her. However, when she can, she always goes barefoot.
One quirk of Louise’s is that she wears a chainmail shirt on top of an ordinary cloth shirt. She had found it in a storage room once while still living with her husband and younger children, and had worn it since, sometimes even sleeping in it. She simply likes the feel of weight and pressure on her body, and finds it calming, but to the people who know her the armor had become a symbol of her resilience and strength. She also has a silver bracelet on her right hand, decorated with a floral design, which has her full name etched on it as well as a message saying that she is mute and will communicate in writing only. While some people find this somewhat embarrassing, Louise is comfortable wearing it and thinks it is a useful thing, since showing it to somebody is much easier for her than, for example, pointing at her lips in order to say that she cannot speak. It also serves as a handy way to start any conversation (or whatever written/spoken exchange that passes for one in her case), and makes for a special way of communicating that is peculiar to her alone.
Personality:
Louise is deeply autistic. She never learned to speak and can communicate only in writing or sign language (the only exceptions being the times when she says a few words while under extreme emotional stress). Her writing style makes for a stark contrast with her sincerity and directness; it is highly formal, hard to understand and full of scientific terms, and it both creates a feel of extra distance and, at the same time, somewhat dampens her brutal honesty, which may have been next to unbearable otherwise. Louise always carries a pad and pen with her in case she needs to state precisely what she wants. But verbal language as such is largely alien to her (she thinks in pictures or feelings only), and, where possible, she prefers to use sign language instead. While mute, Louise is not silent – most of the time she will hum softly to herself, as a way of showing that she is happy or absorbed in doing some task, or will make small sounds when something had made her excited (sometimes it happens because she tries to speak and cannot, so she will moan instead). In a sense she has a language all of her own, consisting of sounds and body movements, which often conveys more of her emotions than she intends to show, but few people ever bother to try and decipher it.
Louise is a loner. She has neither the capacity nor the need to communicate much. Trying to socialize tires her almost at once, so, if she is made to take part in a social situation, after a while she will simply get up and leave. She likes to sit around other people, observing them and listening to them talking, provided the atmosphere is pleasant and quiet, but she doesn’t like being addressed directly and asked questions (if she is, she is likely to leave). However, she forms a very strong attachment to one or two significant others, who are very important to her and with whom she loves spending time. When she was young, her nanny Francesca was such a person, then, much later, it was her youngest son Bertrand. Louise also likes to see other people happy and hates it when anybody is hurt, and, when she sees someone suffering, she will do her best to help. But this does not mean she is going to become attached to that person, and she is most likely to let them drift away once they no longer need her assistance. On the whole, Louise prefers the company of animals to that of people; she never tires of them, and finds them much more pleasant and easy to communicate with, as they never lie or insult, and give warmth freely without trying to put up any barriers. Seeing an animal tortured would be the greatest nightmare to Louise, much worse than having most of her children murdered (which did happen at some point and which she survived without becoming too depressed), because animals provoke much stronger feelings in her than does the great majority of people.
One remarkable quality of Louise’s is her extraordinary resilience, in which autism played a part. Due to a combination of a very positive and strong personality with severe autism, she never became embittered despite the ugly life she was made to lead, and managed to retain her optimism and a sort of primal sense of wonder that most adults do not have. She was able not to become depressed throughout her mortal lifetime even though she was confined to a mansion in a remote rural area, with only her books, children who ignored her and a husband who thought her subhuman for company.
Louise’s sense of wonder is a huge part of her strength. In part, it was shaped by her autism – most autistics have heightened senses, which may make daily life very difficult for them (since, say, the sounds in a shopping mall or on a crowded street may be so overwhelming the person will be reduced to a meltdown), but may also make ordinary things really beautiful to look at. They also tend to become absorbed, "lost" in the tiny details of things, sometimes for hours. Louise is like this too, and she not only possesses this ability, but has worked on it throughout her conscious lifetime. She sees an immense beauty in the surrounding world, which sometimes becomes nearly unbearable; and, behind the beauty, she sees God (and it was the beauty that helped her her understand the concept of God itself - for a long time, it was far too abstract for her, until one evening, standing at the seaside looking at the sunset, she suddenly realized that God must be the One Who made all this). She sees a great significance in small things others usually don't notice - in the veins on a dry leaf, in a crack on the wall, in a droplet of dew on a strand of moss etc. Each of these, to her, is a little miracle that reveals something new and wonderful, so she always feels like a child who is taking their first steps through the world. Science, and, in particular, the natural sciences she studies, is also not just "dry science" to her (she doesn't understand what people really mean when they say "dry science"); it's a way of discovering more about how things work in this wonderfully complex world, so that she can feel amazed yet again and thank God for creating it.
This permanent feeling of profound awe something almost violent about it - the beauty is everywhere and she can't escape from it, even if she wanted to. So, during the rare times when she feels like pitying herself and wallowing in negativity for a while, she feels she cannot do it, because the beauty pulls her back. It is still staring her right in the face, and disregarding it like that (because one can waste one's time on whining only if one deliberately closes one's eyes to it) would mean defiling it.
Louise finds the "large world" - the world inhabited by most other people who consider themselves normal - too fast-paced, baffling and frightening. She is especially bewildered and frightened by the twisted motives people commonly have, and by their ability to create problems literally on an empty spot, since extreme directness and lack of ulterior motives is natural to her (and then it has been so hard for her to master some very essential things that she would have neither the will nor the ability to deliberately complicate matters further, even if she wanted to). She cannot comprehend most social rules; they feel like something very tangled, difficult and frightening to her, like being caught in a spider's web, where, the more you thrash and try to escape, the more trapped you become. She doesn't distinguish between ranks or classes and will treat all people equally, as unique individuals, not as members of certain groups. She does not have any concept of ambition, either, and doesn't understand why one would deliberately subject oneself to such torture as being at the center of everybody's attention. Ocassions like balls or dinners organized in order to get a favor from a high-ranking official are a complete mystery to her; even if she could speak and wanted to take part in one, she would find all those small moves people make - like making chit-chat, exchanging compliments that mean nothing, etc., - very puzzling, and would come to think of the whole thing as odd and pointless.
Louise does not even have a clear understanding of what laws are, and follows only her conscience (or rather, she simply lives according to the principle "hurt no living being"); since conscience and law sometimes clash, she tends to think of laws as some tangled restrictions people have made who knows for what purpose. She never learned to lie or beat about the bush, so she will always write exactly what is on her mind, however hurtful it could seem. Then, when people take offense, it is difficult for her to understand why, and it takes a long time to explain it to her. She is saying the truth, and, as far as she is concerned, truth is by no means something that could offend - on the contrary, it is something to be glad and thankful about. After all, she herself requires other people to be completely frank with her, and is happy when someone speaks their mind and sets things clear and straight, so she often fails to understand why others should not want the same. She also does not know when to start or finish a conversation, and needs the person she is talking to or a companion to indicate when she should do it (for example, by saying “hello” or “allright, that’s it, bye” first); when there is nobody by her side to help her with this, she can end up in a very awkward situation and may choose to back out of it by leaving, because this is the only way of sorting it out that is known to her.
Louise’s social impairment is her great weakness, but, in sense, it isone of her strengths as well. It makes her oblivious to many things that would have otherwise made life much more complicated for her. As a result, she has a much more forthright view of the world and of other people, without many complexes that seem to be mostly socially conditioned, and is free to live according to her own values.
Life story:
Louise was born in a noble family who hoped to marry her (read: sell her at the highest imaginable price) to some wealthy person like themselves, and were devastated when they realized she was autistic - or just "mad", as they said then, - and this wasn't going to happen. The only person who really cared for her was her nanny, Francesca. It was Francesca who got Louise interested in animals, first by teaching her to hold a cat and stroke it without hurting it, and then by telling her about various animals and giving her books to read about them. This had a great impact on Louise's later life - she never really became interested in people, but because she was curious about animals, she was motivated to try and imitate other people's actions and become more like them, so that she could have a chance to learn more. Francesca also taught Louise to read and write. When Louise was 13, her parents noticed she was acting less strange, so they figured out that, with some more fixing, something could still be done with her. In the end, they managed to marry her to Eugene, a man with a good title and lots of land and money. They were quite satisfied with what they did; it meant they got Louise off their hands, and also profited from the marriage because they now had access to Eugene's money. Eugene , however, was basically tricked into the marriage and didn't find out what his wife was really like until he brought her home. When he did, he was very angry with Louise's parents and was very reluctant to speak to them or admit them to his place. (Louise was only happy with that, because she didn't want to see them either. She didn't even know them too well, as she had always been with Francesca; her only memories of her mother involved being shouted at, hit, or locked up in a dark cellar. This latter thing gave her a problem that lasted her whole lifetime - she became severely claustrophobic, on an instinctive sort of level, and would start screaming and struggling uncontrollably whenever she approached the entrance to a small room. Being within four walls for too long made her uneasy, so she normally brought out her rocking chair and books onto the veranda and sat there for days on end. Later, as an immortal working in wildlife observation and registering new species of insects, she had to have special transparent tents made for her, or else, sleep right under the open sky. Having to climb into an ordinary canvas tent was more than she could handle).
Eugene wasn't particularly concerned about Louise's wellbeing. He was angry because he was bound hand and foot with a "mad" wife who (at the time) couldn't take care of herself - according to the laws of the country, divorce was prohibited, and he could not even give her away to a convent or asylum since he was supposed to look after her himself. He raped her repeatedly, and, as a result, she gave birth to eight sons. She couldn't look after them, especially the youngest four who were born when she was under 20, and still incapable even of dressing or feeding herself properly; besides, all of them avoided and were afraid of her, making it impossible for her to initiate contact even if she wanted to. At first, she couldn't do much, but read a great deal - she'd just come to the library, sit down, and someone would discover her engrossed in a book hours later. By the time she was 20, Eugene had grown tired of her wandering round the house like some silent ghost, so he thought that, since this _thing_ reads, he might hire teachers for her to keep her occupied. He had money to spare anyway, and there was this element of smugness to it too. He was stroking his ego by telling himself that it was he who had provided her with a proper education. She finished secondary school at home (which was common practice among noble families, she was only unusual in that she was older than your average pupil) and ended up completing a distance course at university that was equivalent to a combined BSc/MSc degree in entomology and started to write a doctoral thesis. They had to make some concessions for her - she was hopeless at abstract subjects like math, because her thinking was purely factual (she thought in pictures), and equally hopeless at the humanities, because she had no clue about human relationships or about the way human emotions work, so she was taught only the basics of these, while the main focus was on the natural sciences. By then Eugene was not very happy again, because he felt that with so much knowledge, Louise was completely outside his control (the fact that she didn't/couldn't communicate with him only made it worse, since one cannot manipulate somebody who totally ignores one); this time it was a case of being badly jarred seeing the _thing_ poring over books in which he couldn't understand anything, even the headlines. But he couldn't do much about it.
Louise's last, ninth, son, Bertrand, was born mildly/moderately autistic. Like his mother, he was obsessed with the natural world and with insects inparticular, and almost instantly became the family's scapegoat for being "different" and a weirdo and more like his mother than his father or brothers. To Louise, he became practically her only friend, and the only person to whom she was attached, among everyone who surrounded her. They were similar in more ways than one (apart from both being autistic and having similar ways of perceiving the world and interacting with each other), which contributed to the special connection that formed between them. Louise realized that she had to send Bertrand away from the house to keep him sane, and that it had to be done as soon as possible. She hired teachers for him and had him complete the typical secondary school (lycaeum) program when he was sixteen, even though other children in noble families typically did not finish it until they were twenty or even older. This lead to a lot of rumors circulating about how Louise had suddenly become ambitious and decided to make a child prodigy of her youngest son, which she was the last person to learn and did not particularly mind. Then, at sixteen, Bertrand went to university, where he got a double degree in veterinary science and conservation/ecology. While he was studying, a scientist who needed human subjects for an experiment captured him along with Louise, who had come to visit him in the city, and made them into “artificial” immortals by injecting them with serum collected from one of the ancients. Then they were dumped out into the street without being told what had been done to them; Bertrand returned to his studies while Louise came back to her husband and other sons, oblivious at first to having become much more beautiful and to not changing, unlike her aging husband.
Then, when Bertrand should have been twenty-nine, disaster struck. A civil war broke out, and Louise, who had been away from home, was cut off and was unable to return. She was never to see her husband and other children again. She had no choice but to go to Bertrand (now a Doctor of Science like herself, and an excellent vet) and flee the country with him. When they were already abroad, news reached them of their family having been massacred. Louise was very upset, but not as devastated as someone else would be in her place, because she was never too attached to her older children, and she was absolutely indifferent towards her husband and did not care if he was dead or alive.
After that, Bertrand and Louise chose a place to live in and stayed together for a while. Louise found the noise and bustle of the city practically unbearable, but stuck by her son because she knew he needed her. But finally, after suffering a series of ugly meltdowns, she realized she could no longer go on like this, and wrote a letter to Bertrand saying she would like to seek a quieter, more secluded place to live, somewhere in the woods or in the mountains. Bertrand, who was extremely concerned about her by then, was only happy that she had decided to go and live in a way that was more suitable for her. He helped her buy a small cabin in the mountains where she could live undisturbed, and gladly let her go, knowing that his mother will now be happier than she had ever been before. Louise continued to live alone, writing regularly to Bertrand and living a life she had always dreamed about – spending days on end in the forest, finding and charting new species of insects, observing known ones and enjoying the peace.