[Character Information | Kaede Kaburagi]
Nov. 10th, 2020 11:00 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
![]() Kaede Kaburagi
hmd / permissions / visualosities / contact ![]() About/Personality
In many ways, Kaede can seem like the typical eleven year old. Her personality is bubbly but strong, sometimes hinging on being a bit of a brat, while being concerned that she (and the things and people around her) are still 'cool', as many young girls are. Considering her age, perhaps it doesn't come as a surprise that she can come off as stubborn and particularly forward for a young girl, but considering what has happened in her life, it's not just 'that age' but also a bit of a defensive mechanism against past pain. Still, once you get beyond that, there is still the natural sweetness and innocence that comes with being a child, even as she begins the earliest changes towards adulthood. However, particularly if you asked her closest family, there is less of that innocence in her than they would have hoped at her age. That increasing loss of innocence and recognition about the harsh world around her has particularly picked up since she discovered her powers as a NEXT. With NEXT being so new to the world, the first known ones appearing only within the last half century, there is still an uncertainty from people who haven't experienced the powers personally. HeroTV may have made certain NEXT very popular, but in smaller communities, and definitely with children, there can be a certain fear of being different. That fear has certainly worked itself into Kaede's life, doubly so due to the nature of her ability that it can be so very random in nature and without proper training to keep it fully under control when she gets upset, scared, or angry. She's also learned that people really can be hurt, even killed, and that HeroTV is real, not just a show on TV designed to be exciting. It's a lesson not every person learns in their life, never mind at such a young age.
Two major points in her life have proven to be massive changes for Kaede and have shaped her deeply - the first being the death of her mother. Tomoe's death had taken something that no child should ever have to lose, but because of her father's continued promise to his beloved wife to keep heroing and burying down the pain of her loss, Kaede's mother's death essentially took her father from her as well. It left Kaede in the hands of her grandmother, Anji, and uncle, Muramasa, living in a small town away from her father and the bond that should have grown stronger with it only being the two of them. Though Kotetsu had attempted to be there for her, his work as a hero had all but removed him from her life no matter how much he loved her to the point where Kaede had been growing further and further apart from her father, more likely to lash out at him than greet him with a hug. It changed her slowly, making her grow more emotionally independent at such a young age. There is much she tries to deal with on her own and much she has been forced to manage emotionally. She pushes past these challenges with her chin held high, determined to keep moving forward in her life, even if only on an unconscious level at her age. That doesn't mean she isn't very much still an eleven year old and need her family close and keeping her from her own rash decisions. The second major change in her life was the mix of learning of her father's true identity as the hero Wild Tiger and the awakening her own NEXT powers. These came nearly one on top of each other and in such a short period of time, she needed to come to terms with a great deal. All of a sudden, her father's absence from her life was, mostly, explained. It left her both overjoyed to finally know the truth that had been hidden from her for so long, and that her father would give up everything to protect her, but also left her with more questions, so much more that needed to be asked and discovered. Over the course of the year since that fight, father and daughter have become closer together (in particular with Kotetsu living at home) and Kaede's ability to forgive him of the past has grown. Even more, she's come to realize the desire of people needing to do something that is integral to them, such as her father's need to be a Hero, even if it would take Kotetsu away from her again, enough that she gets him to return to the line of work he loves so dearly by pointedly telling him he's 'uncool' because he's become a couch potato. She might be young, but she knows it will be enough to get him back in the game while 'proving' to him that she won't hold it again him. There is also a great deal of rebuilt trust that has started to show in her life, as now she trusts her father to not return to his previous non-existence in her life as he returned to being a hero. It's spread past just their relationship into all of her other ones. After the fight above Sternbild, there is another big change that she is only just really learning how to handle, and even more so as her powers develop, which is how to be less of a child and more of an adult on a conscious level and fight. Never again does she want to be in the same situation where she is helpless without a way to fight. So over the course of the last year with her father at home, the pair has been working on training her skills as best Kotetsu can manage to show her. It's brought them closer, and in the first few weeks of his return home, became the opening point between them to really start trying to be father and daughter fully again. Like her father, Kaede believes in doing the right thing even when it puts her straight in the path of danger, seen at a crowning moment when she takes all of her money and travels to Sternbild to try and prove her father's innocence when he is accused for murder, knowing that no matter what kind of parent he might have been, there was no way he was a murderer. She hasn't forgiven him, but deep down, she knows that proving his innocence is more important than even grudge of their degraded relationship. AppearanceHeight: 4'4" Weight: 80lbs Hair: brown Eyes: brown (blue when NEXT power is active) Kaede is very much your typical young teenager, keeping up with the styles in Oriental Town and it's nearby big city of Sternbild. Her brown hair is cut just above the shoulders, usually with fun little barrettes holding her bangs back or little braids and a ponytail high and off to the side held by a blue holder. At just about 4'4", she stands a little taller than some of her female classmates which indicates she very well might get her father's height, but over all most people would say she takes after her mother in appearance. Her love of figure skating keeps her build lean, along with her father's genes. Her eyes are brown, taking after both sides of her family. Her typical outfit consists of a loose three-quarters sleeve black tee shirt, a blue and pink short hoodie, capri jeans with the ends rolled up, and a pair of yellow, high top sneakers. AbilitiesStrengths Her greatest strength, at this point in her life, is without a doubt her ability to keep moving on no matter what has happened in her life. While not her only strength, it is undoubtedly what has given her what she's needed to not buckle under everything that has happened to her or what continues to challenge her now. It gives her the inner strength she needs to keep trying with her father, to fight for him and herself. Weaknesses However, what makes Kaede strong has made her stubborn, which leads her to sometimes turning people off and also not always wanting to see other possibilities than the one she believes is true. While her changing relationship with her father has helped to start working on her stubbornness, her relationships changing with her friends and even the world around her can be making her even more stubborn than before. Tied into her growing, deep worries about touching people (that, sadly, she's really kept from everyone especially her father) as she tries to keep track of what power she has as to contain it, it is slowly starting to close her off from being as open as she once had been, maybe even drastically so. Other Abilities & Skills The Mimic Power Kaede is still very much the eleven year old that is developing a NEXT power in a world where NEXT powers are still something people are trying to understand, but even as far as NEXT powers go, hers is unique. At first, others believed she had the Hundred Power like her father, then they believed she had two powers... but it turns out that Kaede's NEXT power is to take on the power of any one she touches. In her world, it immediately takes on the ability of any NEXT that comes into contact with her, even without skin-to-skin contact. There is no sign, visually or for Kaede, that a power has been exchanged. She is only capable of having a single ability at any one time which will be that of the last to touch her. |