Astrid Hofferson

( Here there be pokemon. )

Last Edit - 4/13

[Astrid is carefully setting a series of pokemon eggs into a little pile as the camera turns on. She glances over at the camera as she finishes, and then back to the pile, doing a quick count before.]

Okay, so, apparently my pokemon finally decided to dump a bunch of eggs on me. Well, more than just a bunch of sheep anyway. And hey, this time we can give those away!

Unless they change their mind.

Anyway. [She dusts her hands off.] If anyone wants them, they're for sale, there are...[She's really not as good at this as Hiccup.] Some birds, some sheep, a couple shinx, and I think...that's a whale egg.

Because that makes perfect sense.

Anyway, let me know. Otherwise I'll probably just donate them to that breeding place.

[ooc: The list of eggs is here if anyone else would like to claim one.]

[Astrid is in Ecruteak, and she looks...puzzled. She's frowning at her gear absently as she starts to talk.]

Okay. So, I've learned to deal with a lot here, really. Riding on the back of a giant bird, eggs that hatch into dogs, animals that get 'knocked out' instead of killed.

Ghost masks that make you think you're other people and no I am never going to talk about that.

Ghosts in general. I caught a ghost! He looks like a furry floating dark thing that grins. Which is weird. It's all weird.

But I think...this sort of wins.

[She turns the camera away now, to where her Wailmer is sitting on the ground looking gigantic and very happy. He sort of wiggles at the camera in what might be an attempt at a tail wag.]

He hatched from an egg that I could hold in my hands. Egg to that. He's HUGE. [And back to Astrid.] The 'Ball Whale Pokemon.' Seriously? And the strangest thing? Someone mailed me the egg. Anonymously. Someone looked at this and thought 'I'm going to give this whale thing to the viking girl.'

[She just shakes her head.]

I think I'm gonna name him 'Ball.'

[Astrid is sitting on the ground when she turns on her gear, her back resting against the flopped-out form of her Luxray, Crackletail, who looks pretty beat but his tail wags occasionally. The viking teen has a smile on her face, and after a few seconds she holds up the violet city gym badge.]

I got it!

[She tosses it in the air and catches it, a big grin on her face.]

It wasn't as hard as I thought it would be...I guess I spent a little too much time training and letting these guys get so big. Look at Crackletail, I could probably ride him if I wanted to, and he used to fit in my lap! Actually, he's still kind of small for that, maybe...

[But she is suitably impressed with evolution at this point.]

And Tuskgrinder evolved into this huge...I don't even know. It's amazing. But he won't come near the gear, I think he's embarrassed. I'm not sure why, he's really strong now.

Anyway, I'm done here in Violet. Hiccup, where are you guys now? I'll try to catch up. Once this guy stops

[When the camera clicks on, Astrid is sitting on a chair, with her sentret perched on her shoulder, tail hooked around the Viking teen`s neck. In the background, a growlithe pup and her axew are chasing each other in circles. Astrid is stuffing things into her bag, and after a few seconds she glances up at her phone. She looks...worried, honestly. And tired. And she doesn't seem to have any idea what to say. After another moment, she sucks in a breath.]

Hiccup`s gone.

[She says this rather matter-of-fact ly, and continues to talk as she resumes packaging.]

I was told people disappear. But Hiccup had been here for months, he said. I didn't think...[She shakes her head.] It doesn't matter.

[Another pause as she stuffs some more things into her bag, and her sentret climbs up onto the top of her head, prompting the girl to reach up and lift her off, setting her down on the floor. The little pokemon bounces up on her tail to stay in the frame.]

...I guess I'm going to head back to Violet. I wanted to get the gym badge there, and I...[She hesitates.] No reason to keep waiting around here.

[She reaches out to pick up her gear, looks like she might say something else, then shrugs and turns it off.]

[It's hard to tell exactly where Astrid is when she turns her gear on, but there are trees around, and her Axew is visible resting against one behind her, keeping watch over two pokemon eggs. (She hasn't really gotten the hang of keeping them in pokeballs yet, it seems...mean.) Her attention isn't on them though, she's looking at the screen almost thoughtfully.]

I've been trying to get the hang of all the...little things here, so I decided to try and catch one of the wild pokemon running around on the paths. Which worked, except...

[She turns her camera around to reveal a Sentret happily sitting on the ground in front of her, bouncing up and down on her tail as she watches Astrid.]

I just picked it because it was the first one I found. And now I've caught it and I'm...not really sure what to do with it.

I mean...[She turns the camera back to her.] There are dragons here. And fire breathing dogs, and electric vermin, and so many other powerful looking creatures...

[She turns the camera back to the Sentret, who seems quite happy to be the center of attention.]

Then there's her. ...She looks like something babies sleep with. Or something bigger, stronger animals like to eat.

Do people really train these?

Player
Name: Dalrint
Personal Journal: dalrint
E-mail: use LJ messenger
AIM/MSN: AIM: Farobservr
Timezone: EST
Current Characters in Route: Nope

Character
Name: Astrid Hofferson
Series: How to Train Your Dragon
Timeline: Post Gift of the Nightfury
Canon Resource Links:

http://howtotrainyourdragon.wikia.com/wiki/Astrid_Hofferson

Personality:

Astrid is a very competitive teenager, always needing to be the best at whatever she is trying to do. She needs to be the best, but she also doesn't particularly need to brag about it. She just needs to know she's the best. As an example, when it comes to studying the dragon manual, she doesn't show off that she's done it, or need to do it in front of others so they know, she just has to do it. She knows she knows it, as it were. That's enough.

Of course, when someone is better than her at something, it really irritates her, and her temper tends to flare, and get worse and worse the longer she can't figure out why they are better than her. She's not exactly quick to frustration, but it's not a long fuse either.

She tends to overcompensate for the fact that she's a girl yet is one of the better warriors of her generation. She wants to be taken seriously, she doesn't want being female to matter, so she covers her clothing in spikes, she hides her pretty face with her hair, and she expresses herself violently in the face of adversity. The fact that someone will stop fighting a dragon to hit on her, for instance, infuriates her because that's not the point, damn it.

She isn't terribly good at expressing emotions, outside of battle and irritation, and they often come in 'either or' scenarios. She's mad at hiccup, so she hits him. She's half-mad and half not-mad so she hits him and then kisses him. She expresses herself physically far more than verbally, and while she's not bad at words, she'd rather use actions thank you. If someone is being a jerk, she'll just hit them and get it over with. Unless they're much bigger than her. ...Actually, even then probably.

She does have a somewhat bad temper, though it flares more from frustration and irritation than anything else. She'll let it build up and build up and then lash out at whatever is annoying her, and then once she's let it out she feels much better and calms down...relatively...quickly.

She's smart, not 'Hiccup' smart but smart as far as Vikings go, and can see the rational side of an argument as well as the 'Viking Smash!' side, though her training leads her to be a bit more towards the 'Smash' aspect. She can stop and listen to someone who seems to have a different angle of what is going on than she does. And she can be very curious about things, too. When Hiccup suddenly got so much better than her at 'dragon training', she was angry that he had done it, but also extremely curious how he did it.

She does have all the normal 'viking' oddities though. Scars are cool, muscles are awesome, being strong is way better than being smart (though both is the best), and lots and lots of 'stubbornness issues.' Fighting runs in her blood, hitting things is usually the go-to solution, etc. Hiccup's been tempering that simply by being around her but still. See enemy, Smash enemy is pretty ingrained in her.

Her face is often hidden by her hair, but the more she gets to know someone, the closer they get, the more likely she is to brush it out of her eyes while they're talking and stop 'hiding' behind it. This is rather obvious the more she talks to Hiccup throughout the movie. The more she likes him, the more often she's brushing her hair out of her face, and the more 'open' she becomes.

Strengths/Weaknesses:
• Viking: A strength and a weakness, Astrid has been raised to be strong and fearless and never back down from a challenge. Of course, this also leads to being reckless, and stubborn, and not knowing when backing down is the best course of action. ‘Stubbornness Issues.’
• She’s very driven, when means she tends to put her all into accomplishing something, at being the best at something. But this can also result in frustration when she can’t do something, or when someone else is better no matter what she does.
• She’s human, despite all the vikingness, and still young, so she has all the normal strengths and weaknesses of your very-well-exercised teenage girl.

Pokémon Information
Affiliation: Trainer
Starter: Axew. Astrid is a Viking who loses her axe and her dragon, and then gains a dragon pokemon named Axew. It seems too poetic (or just wonderfully punny) to pass up.
Password: Scrambled Eggs
Samples
First Person Sample:

[Video]
[When the camera turns on, it’s upside down, and shows a lovely pair of fur lined brown boots sitting on the ground, folded beneath a red leather skirt covered in…are those spikes? They certainly look like spikes. The camera shakes a few times, and then violently shifts to the left as though someone smacked it. And then there is a sigh.]

This can’t be right.

[The voice is female, and frustrated, and after a moment the camera moves wildly again, as it lifts up into the air, showing an image from above of a blonde teenager sitting on the grass somewhere, leaning her back against a tree, and there is a green pokemon curled up on the ground next to her chewing intently on what might be a rock. She looks like she’s about to throw the pokegear away, even make a little growl of frustration, but she happens to glance up at the last second and see that the screen is actually doing something.]

[She brings it back down, frowning at it (still upside down) as she taps the screen with her thumb a few times and finally turns it the right side over. After a few more seconds of poking and prodding, and a few more of pushing her Pokemon out of the way when it becomes a bit too curious about what’s on the shiny machine, she slumps down where she’s sitting and just stares at the screen.]

Okay. That guy. That professor said I can use this to talk to people. Other people, I mean, besides…everyone in this town…people who also woke up in a weird house with a little creature following them around, I mean.

[Some of her anger might be showing through there.]

So, hello. Hi. Whatever. I’m Astrid. I need- [She cuts off as the Axew suddenly pokes his head back into view again, and there’s more shuffling as she pushes him back off-screen.] Sit. Stay. Right there. Good boy.

Anyway. Other than some stuff that didn’t make any sense, all I know is I’ve got this guy following me around and something about training and collecting and…look, it doesn’t matter. I just need to know where Stormfly, my dragon, is…and my axe…and how to get home.

In that order. Thanks.

[Some more fumbling and she manages to turn it off after fifteen seconds or so of a shot of her palm.]

Third Person Sample:

“Okay. So you’re a ‘dragon’ type, huh?” Astrid stood in a clearing right at the start of Route 29, stuffing her pokegear back into her bag as she considered the Axew standing in front of her. ‘Standing’ wasn’t exactly the most accurate term, as it was actually turning in a slow circle as it took in everything in the clearing. “I guess you’re…sort of cute.” He wasn’t Stormfly, of course, but he wasn’t bad, either. Not that appearance mattered, anyway, not for a fight.

It just wasn’t necessarily a bad thing, that’s all.

She swung her bag over her shoulder and hung it on a branch, then turned to survey the road. ‘Practice’ and ‘training’ had both been suggestions for what she should do, and they both certainly appealed to her. Although the fact that she couldn’t find, it had to be her...pokemon…was a bit frustrating. She could see creatures out there, running through the grass, living in the trees. She couldn’t walloped any of them with just her backpack.

But she supposed that wouldn’t actually do anything to help her Axew get better. And that was the point, right? To make him stronger, tougher, and then go beat these…gym leaders…and get their badges. Odin, there were enough stupid new terms to remember here, she was never going to keep them all straight.

But enough procrastinating. She turned back to her Axew, who appeared to be headbutting the side of a nearby tree, and snapped her fingers. “Hey, over here.” A finger pointed at the ground at her feet, and the little creature hurried back and plopped down, sitting exactly where she had pointed. Well, that was…obedient. She couldn’t help but smile faintly. “Okay, good boy.” She leaned over and gave him a pat on his strangely shaped head, and he nuzzled at her hand. So…that was sort of endearing…

“Now. We’re going to try and fight something, and then I’ll finish reading the rest of that manual, okay?” He just stared up at her, of course. So instead she snapped her fingers and pointed towards the grass where she thought she had spotted something, even as she began walking towards it. “There. Go.”

The little Axew immediately darted off towards the grass. Hmm. He was going to need a name…