Chatterbox: Inkwell

Character ER!

We had one of these a few years back, started by the luvverly TNÖ. the idea was basically to "rent out" characters that you had problems with, didn't like anymore, or were turning into Mary Sues, with advice on de-Sueifying prevalent throughout.

I seek to revive that thread with my darling Katrina who I kind of want to strangle sometimes. I'm looking for some help with making her a more likeable protagonist, or, barring that, giving her a suitably extreme situation for her to work through.

Teal deer... -.-''

Her name is Katrina Cassidy Sharpe, but she goes by her middle name because of a rather troubling time in her mid-teens that will be revealed later when it is more relevant. In the story, she is approximately 23. 

Appearance, because I guess that could matter when fixing: She's tiny. As in, 4'11''. She has brown eyes and dirty blond hair that she dyes blue.

Anyway, now we get down to the stuff. Cassidy is generally a very ambivalent person. She is a member of the council of guardians (WHAT a cheesy name) that kind of has to look out for the well-being of the ten dimensions and make sure that the overly creepy aetherbeings don't accidentally invade everything. However, she really doesn't care and would much rather do her own thing than listen to Leonard (yes, this is the Shady Cat). Her boyfriend's name is Dallas, and he is a rather distracted astrophysicist. I don't have much to say about him here because I've got his character pegged pretty well. But I digress. Cassidy has been shown to be good at quasimagics, capable of going to other dimensions, in ownership of magic knives that can cut holes in reality, and rather distrusting of randoms. And sadistic. Generally without any point. Yeah... she kind of threatened to ~unspeakable acts~. 

This, overall, wouldn't really do much to Sueify her, but her backstory is a little tortured and I feel like I need to fix her, but then I would have to fill in the great big plot holes. She has this habit of accusing tons of other people of stuff to cover her tracks. Maybe I should tell you what's going on instead of rambling. *ahem*

Originally, Cassidy (then called Katrina) lived Somewhere Else in a fairly normal family, but then she made some poor choices and basically did some horrible stuff. When she moved, she started going by her middle name, dyed her hair, changed the way she talked so people couldn't connect her to the "Hurricane of [enter name of place she lived before]". She kind of cut all ties with her family and got a pet ferret that has nothing to do with the story other than the fact that his name is Oliver Ellwood because it sounded cool to me when I was writing that scene.

The clincher is this: Cassidy has a split-personality disorder. Not outright, it's never been diagnosed (until she was thrown into an everlasting wormhole ((where you just keep falling and falling and falling until it's opened again)) and a fifth dim Ignatius with fidelity issues told her about it so they could escape). It's also kind of random and I really hope I'm not royally screwing myself over because I know people actually do have this problem and I don't want to offend anybody because I just read this huge article about socially-conscious writing and...

...and I'm rambling again. Vee, you are rubbing off! Anyway, the whole thing is balanced on her view of herself. If she's hating herself at the time, then she'll delve into Katrina-dom, which basically drops a magnifying glass onto her more negative traits, like impatience and anger management issues, and other whatnot. When she's feeling pretty neutral, it's most likely she's in the land of Cassidyisms, in which she's toned down most of everything but has a fierce pride and is rather suspicious of people. Also with the Cassidy state comes the inability to be very serious for very long. 

So what do you think? I'm not really thinking Mary-Sue, as should probably be obvious, but I feel like I'm treating her like an anti-Sue. I'd like some pointers for making people like her! Because I sure don't. Wait, that wasn't worded right. I don't like her character. It's very aggravating sometimes. I feel like she functions fairly well in the setting I've put her in. More information on worldbuilding shall be coming if you are needing it, but here's the only thing I know you need at the moment: This takes place in the modern world, with some deviations into the seventh dimension and other random places. You can access the random places in one of two ways: if you have an hourglass pendant issued to guardians, or you are an aetherbeing come to wreak havoc on stuffs.

Sorry for the long post?

Yava: mvhr.

--L