Soucal Carver

Soucal Carver is a troll NPC. He is the leader of the Southern Surf Gang, an unofficial group of four other trolls established in his adolescence. Soucal habitually hoards friends and funds, and gets very defensive when either is threatened. He has for a long while worked multiple jobs within the city to fund his love of marine biology, and desires acclaim and recognition for his research. Since meeting Caviar Polloi, his gang has since disbanded, and he has decided to pursue a highly subversive lead concerning the seadweller's lusus.

Wiggler Trials and Early Life
Not much is known about Soucal's wiggler trials except that when he emerged alone he was energetic and had a huge clawmark across his forehead, implying that it was dangerous, but totally radical. He immediately attached himself to Bramli Pommes, who had emerged from his own Trials just earlier with Matewa Drumon. Upon his exit from the Trials, Soucal and his lusus settled down in a humble hive near the Coastal Beaches of Newmoon. As Bud isn't particularly fond of the land, the young troll spent a good chunk of his childhood sailing in the harbors and learning about sealife with his lusus. The sea is calming to Soucal (not to mention the influence of his lusus), and by fortune his ill temperament on land was assuaged by his moirail Bramli, who lived at the time in a high-rise in the center of the city. Soucal was a bright, but unattentive student during his schoolfeeding sessions, having specific study favorites and having little interest in anything else. His fostering of mindreading abilities did nothing to help, and he frequently capitalized on Bramli's kindness to get by in school.

Southern Surf Gang
Soucal's lack of drive outside of his field of study gave him a rocky start after schoolfeeding. He instead pursued social exploits. Soucal frequently spent time at the Coastal beaches with the Northern Surf Gang, lead by Hellra Ocerdo (who he was in a relationship with at the time). The two had a falling out, and with his best friend he formed a group of trolls who frequented the Southern Coastal Beaches. Hoxton Abrone was the first recruit, followed by a brownblood who would quickly become Hoxton's moirail, Loulou. Afterwards, a friendship with the irresistable socialite Bomobi Kobudo completed the group.

The group itself served primarily as a family group for the trolls. It offered goals and responsibilities to Soucal, and with the greenblood at the head he became incredibly protective and proud of the tight-knight group. Bramli offered balance and the moral center, keeping Soucal's selfishness in check and spreading opportunities fairly throughout the group during seasons of competition. For Hoxton and Loulou, staying off of the streets was a focus of the group. Together, they formed an effective moiraillegiance. Bomobi, the late-comer in the group, joined during a flight of fancy during a competition. It was, in fact, a shock to Soucal that the popular yellowblood stuck around after her sweep in the competition, but she and the gang immediately hit it off. She never strayed from the gang afterwards, and the proximity of other trolls useful for keeping off her droves of fans.

Infiltration of the Surf Gang
Everything changed for Soucal when Vidien Mandra became involved. A deadly mixture of sadistic envy and curiousity lead him to target the surf gang as the subjects of his experimental game. He sought to destroy the tightly bound group that he envied from the inside. Vidien disguised himself as not one of his normal aliases, but as his moirail Caviar Polloi, with the idea that his escape could be made if anything turned sour. He began his exploits slowly, by initiating a flushed relationship with Bramli so as to keep Soucal and his moiraoil apart and out of each other's minds. At the same time, he made a deal with Hellra Ocerdo, and she offered him some information and his effects to get even with Soucal - though not in a way that Vidien implied. Vidien turned the knife by aggressively propositioning Bomobi while disguised as Soucal, and soon tensions in the surf gang were ready to snap. Shortly after, Vidien impersonated a seadwelling official and cornered Loulou on her way home one morning, armed with evidence of her past as well as a threat to obey his demands or face judgment. After Loulou fled from Newmoon with little explanation, Hoxton was shattered. Vidien, realizing that he had succeeded, decided to disengage with the group. He set up Caviar to meet with Soucal (who had a vision revealing to him that something was horribly wrong with the imposter), under the assumption that upon realizing that he was not the same person, Soucal would leave Caviar alone. This was not the case.

Soucal and the rest of the gang captured Caviar and took him to the beach. Soucal's rage was unrelenting, and upon realizing that Caviar was not only a different individual but a tyrian-blooded seadweller, Soucal jumped to a horrifying and scientific conclusion. For his part in not stopping his moirail for his crimes against the surf gang, Soucal used one of his tracking tags for marine life to tag Caviar's gills with, effectively torturing him. He forced his way into Caviar's mind during the process to extract information, overwhelming himself and leaving his friends completely in the dark. While they obeyed Soucal's orders, the gang was deeply disturbed by the events, and without Soucal's insight there was little they could do to reason with him.

Soucal's relationship with the gang was strained from then on. Hoxton spent most of his time in his hiveblock, and Bomobi typically went from her workplace with her protective moirail to her own hive as much as possible, to avoid her fanbase. Bramli and Soucal fled to Bramli's hive in the country, a 2-day train ride, in order to recuperate and try to patch things up between them and sort out what had happened.

Unfortunately, in a path of vengeance, Caviar's matesprit Kostyr Tszyun found out the whereabouts of the two. He made his way to Bramli's hive and incapacitated the blueblood before subduing Soucal. Caviar and Hoxton, who had followed upon the realization that Kostyr was out for blood, made it just in time to stop Kostyr from beating Soucal to death. After his recovery, Soucal agreed to remove Caviar's tracker. Upon a second probing into his mind, he found the little evidence or ability for Caviar to do anything to stop his moirail, which both upset and gave Soucal resolve.

After the Incident
Soucal spent the sweep in recovery from the events that unfolded with the implosion of the surf gang. He and Bramli moved back to Newmoon and resumed their lives. Soucal picked up extra jobs to support his scientific exploits, which he decided to go back to with more vigor. He attempted recovery with the relationships between the surf gang, but found a broken spirited Bramli inconsolable. After being shut out by his moirail, Soucal's own feelings of hatred towards Caviar grew into fascination, and soon he began harboring black feelings for the seadweller.

Time passing allowed for friendships to heal, although the road to recovery was rife with conflict. After Hoxton's lusus and Caviar's lusus produced a nest of peepers (and after their brief alliance to track down Caviar's matesprit), the two became entwined, and any feelings from Soucal (and greedy attempts at using the peepers for experimentation purposes) were exacerbated. His obsession with marine life and his posession of knowledge over Caviar's predicament additionally tipped the scales. Soucal made many stops to Caviar's new livingspace with Kostyr and confessed his feelings upon assisting Caviar with a package mistakenly mailed to his hive.

Upon experimentation with Caviar's lusus and the peepers, Soucal realized that Seagulldad was not, in fact, a lusus at all. Further experimentation revealed that Seagulldad has properties of an immortal organism, and realizing this fact Soucal found that it could be his big break. He immediately set to working extra hours so as to fund his expedition to the South, to uncover the secrets behind Caviar's guardian.

Personality
Soucal is an aggressive but charismatic troll. He is quick to lose his cool if he's excited or angry, but he doesn't go into fits of rage unless his possessions or friends are threatened. He is a very hard worker when his specific interests are on the line, but gets extremely bored and listless with things outside of his immediate interests. Soucal's obsessions can be very specific and unyielding, and he tries to rationalize them in order to make sense of the situation. This has occurred most recently in his relationship with Caviar, which he was very vocal about.

Soucal is notoriously unorganized. He hoards all kinds of things that he deems to have value, and Bramli is responsible for keeping him from being buried in his own hive. He also has issues with time management and stress, and has frequently spent days studying with work the next day. Because of this, Soucal has fostered somewhat of a reliance on sopor patches when Bramli isn't around to shepherd him into his recuperacoon. Soucal's intelligence is often betrayed by his impulsive actions and loud attitude, but he has a highly analytical mind. Socially, he gets along with others well enough, though when invested in a relationship he becomes very high maintenance and needy.

Physical Appearance
Soucal is very tall and lean. He is well-built, spending much of his free time exercising, but frequently looks haggard due to his work habits. Soucal has three horns, one of which is in the center of the top of his forehead, and a scar from his Wiggler Trials on his forehead. However, his hair is mid-length shaggy, and covers it most of the time.

Soucal has a rather atrocious sense of style, especially for a troll. He opts for large, loud troll-Hawaiian-print shirts with his symbol on it, and wears flip-flops and shorts most of the time. He also will often wear part of his uniform from whatever job he's working that night, if he can get away with it.

Skill Specialties

 * Science - Oceanography: Soucal has a good grasp over the general science concerning the ocean
 * Science - Marine biology: Soucal also has a focus on marine biology and ecology from his studies.
 * Athletics - Swimming: Soucal is very capable in the water after spending most of his life in or near it, and having a water-dwelling lusus.

Abilities
Soucal has honed his physical abilities towards his interests - namely, swimming and surfing. He has very strong lungs and an impressive capability in the water.

Most prominently, however, is Soucal's inherent and rare ability of mind reading. He is able to open up a pathway between the consciousness of himself and another troll, in order to conjure memories, pass his own memories, or communicate back and forth. This frequently causes some residual visions and/or dreams for both parties afterwards, which can leave to some unexpected consequences.

Bud
Soucal's lusus, an immense sea turtle. Bud and Soucal get along, with Bud being rather absent for much of Soucal's land-dwelling life. He spends most of his time catching "sweet jellies" in the ocean, and Soucal has very fond memories of his childhood spending time with his lusus. However, in terms of preparing the child for life as a troll, Bud left much to be desired. This assisted the cultivation of Soucal's disinterest in certain topics and fixation on the ocean. Soucal occasionally catches up with his lusus (probably by blowing on a conch shell or something stupid).

Bramli Pommes
Bramli is Soucal's oldest friend, since prior to even his lusus. The two of them exited the Trials together, and even Bramli's prairent found it appropriate to attempt a life near the young greenblood so as to foster the child's social skills. Bramli and Soucal immediately became moirails, and rely on each other on a night to night basis. They often communicate telepathically, and while Bramli helps Soucal keep his ego and chaos in check and organizes his nightly life regularly, Soucal helps Bramli open up to others and not take himself so seriously or allow others to get under his skin.

Since the affair with Vidien, Bramli has found it very hard to reconcile his feelings for Vidien/Caviar, and Soucal's sudden black romance with Caviar at one point made their relationship tense. Since then, Bramli has agreed to see Soucal off on his journey in order to spend time on his own.

Caviar Polloi
Soucal's odd relationship with Caviar has been rationalized and re-rationalized inside of his head for many sleepless days. What began as irrefutable unromantic hatred slowly grew into a nagging need to prove himself to the seadweller that he mistakenly assaulted. Over time, his fixation on the issue at hand and Caviar's status as an anonymous tyrian seadweller gave Soucal an academic interest that he used as an excuse to see the troll, and his black crush grew. Soucal often comments that Caviar is "his" due to his fragile status in the culling order, but trusts Caviar enough to not press the issue and even manages a bile-engaging amount of respect for him.

Hoxton Abrone
Soucal inticed Hoxton to join the surf gang after realizing that Bramli had an interest in the greenblood. At the time, Hoxton was on the way out with a band of hoodlums, and being the punk that he is Soucal made sure to prove his and his moirail's worth to Hoxton to get him to join. It's unclear as to what Soucal did to convince him, though Hoxton's old habits of crime and persistant hate of the establishment are clues enough. Hoxton had a rocky start in the group until Bramli roped in Loulou, and the two immediately became friends and later moirails. After Bramli and Hoxton ended their romantic relationship, they fell in immediately as friends in the group. Soucal remains friends with Hoxton.

Bomobi Kobudo
Bomobi's reputation was known far before she joined the group. Soucal, in an interest of entering a competition with the surf gang, was looking for a ringer and found Bomobi sweeping an entire surf contest. Everyone in the group considered her joining to be a long-shot, particularly with her here-and-there attitude, but after meeting with the group she stuck tight. Soucal is particularly easy on her in case there's a need for a fight or a show of athletic prowess, and tends to be a pushover to her needs - which she takes advantage of frequently. He keeps their relationship professional around her moirail so as to not evoke his rage.

Loulou Raquen
Bramli's inclusion of Loulou into the group required a leap of faith from Soucal. He grew to quickly like her, particularly for her miraculous ability to stop Hoxton from fretting, and got along with her very well after that.

Hastil Estrie
Hastil tends to hold the surf gang in favor. Being Bomobi's moirail, he respects and appreciates the extra watchful eyes on her, finding her droves of fans distasteful at best. Soucal and Hastil get along with tense formality. Occasionally Hastil will suggest a potential red candidate for Soucal.

Kostyr Tszyun
Soucal has never had a direct relationship with Caviar's matesprit, except for the time when he was nearly beaten to death. Since then, he's left a lot of space for the seadweller and a huge amount of fear. While their relationship has softened somewhat due to their mutual relationship with Caviar, Soucal and Kostyr's relationship is strained to say the least. However, this didn't stop Soucal from fanboying over a potential mob hit and political intrigue when he realized that he was responsible for assisting Caviar in his trip out of town, going to show that Soucal's occasional blitzes of enthusiasm wipe out a great deal of ill feelings.

Vidien Mandra
There isn't much to say about Soucal's relationship with Vidien. After being used and betrayed by him, Soucal feels nothing but disgust for Vidien. He has vowed to cause harm to Vidien for what he did to him and his friends.

Hellra Ocerdo
Soucal was childhood friends with Hellra, and their common interests spurred a relationship in the midst of schoolfeeding. Hellra's straight-forward attitude perplexed and frustrated Soucal, who was in return needy and griping. As part of her surf gang he wasn't satisfied with his station, but she wouldn't budge in her leadership and Soucal soon became a thorn in her side. Upon some rather unsavory actions that allowed the surf gang a win, Hellra decided to oust Soucal for his selfishness, at which point he started his own surf gang. Hellra and Soucal's messy ending was unresolved, and the two don't speak much now.

Trivia

 * Soucal's name comes from the abbreviation of Southern California, SoCal or SouCal. It's pretty obvious.