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Your Nickname: Kit
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Is this a Primary or Secondary Character?: Primary
Full Character Name: Cassandra Rachel Alice Motley
Character Birthday & Age: 19th June, 1973, 38 (39 in 2012), but still appears to be 33
City & Country of Birth: Dagenham, London, UK
Blood Purity: Halfblood
Alma Mater: Hogwarts, Hufflepuff
Job/Position: WWN Presenter
Wand: None
Physical Description: Cass has a love affair with high heeled boots. They make her feel awesome and powerful. She could kick arses in them. (She might have to grab something for balance.) They also allow her to tower over some men. Standing just under 6ft barefoot, Cass is tall, with long limbs. She could move like a dancer, but her mind is too busy running off with her mouth.
Where once Cass would chase a bit of summer sun, she now has a deathly pale complexion. It’s been a challenge, but Violet Islington is a key inspiration on how to change a makeup routine for vampire skin. She thinks she has a huge nose, and until she was turned, was most self-conscious about it. These days it's more about her teeth, which are the biggest giveaway.
Cass has bright blue eyes, and long wavy bleached blonde hair with dark roots. It is often all over the place, and she is one for scraping it up into a messy bun or ponytail. When it is down, she always parts it at the side. She spends forever trying to select a decent shampoo these days.
Cass likes simple block colours and stripes for clothes. She loves a jumper, and owns more than a woman should do. She’s not a strict follower of fashion, more what she feels comfortable and inspired by. She likes to look good, but she also doesn’t like to freeze her backside off. London at night can get pretty damned cold.
An animated speaker, Cass has an East London accent which is rather more melodic than one might expect for a vampire. Developed by speaking for radio, her voice today is only slightly more moderated than her witch self.
Personality Description: It is perfectly ordinary for Cass to have six projects on the go at the same time. She will flit from one to the next without finishing. She is also notorious for meeting deadlines to the last minute. She finds her best work is done up against the wire. Her creative workspace is often a tip, her hair is all over the place and she’s wired on coffee but she’s happy.
Cass is guilty of talking too much. Her job is to talk, and at school she was always being told off for talking in lessons. She had no qualms about talking to anyone, about any thing. Sometimes her classmates would appreciate the distraction she provided - especially if Cass went off on a tangent with Professor Binns. Sometimes they’d hex her to get her to shut up. Her professors learned to cut her off before she began, or dock house points to curb it as necessary.
When she was turned, Cass withdrew into herself. She barely spoke, refused to interact, preferred to spend time alone. She considered herself a risk to everyone she loved. It took some time to cope with the change to herself, her life and the discrimination it brought. Her life revolved around her job, it was her love and her energy, and she was unable to continue.
Where she was happy and optimistic before, Cass is now less ‘we won’t know unless we try’ and more ‘don’t try to stop me’ in her approach to what she sets her mind to. She feels she has less to lose, and is prone to rash decisions. Her softer friends have left her acquaintance and she aligns herself with the more opinionated, preferring discourse. She uses humour and self-deprecation to hide. Beneath the front, Cass finds it exhausting, but feels it strangely necessary to protect herself.
Before she turned, Cass lived and dreamed for summer. Of sunrises as she set off to work, of sunbathing when the British weather allowed and festivals. She prefers winter these days for the long nights, meaning her days out are longer and she is able to enjoy fresh cold air and dark skies. A suntan is no longer an option.
History: Early Years, 1973-1984
Cassandra’s Muggle born parents raised a happy family of children, taking the best of both worlds. Cass was well aware of what a television was by the time she was ready to study Muggles, or as she knew them better, her extended family and neighbours. Along with her siblings, Cass played Pong, owned a bright red space-hopper and gawped at the fashionable older girls in their mini-skirts.
Her parents had grown up in the fifties and sixties, in the peaceful decades after WWII and the defeat of Grindelwald. The seventies were a decade of liberation for women, and Cass’ mother was all for it. The Muggle world lagged behind the wizarding world which saw witches as near equals with their wizard counterparts. It also suffered from the economic crisis - and rolling blackouts from the coal miner strikes. It was times like that when magic really came in handy.
Mr Motley was a magical engineer, who worked on the wizard rail services, maintaining trains from Platform 7½ across Europe. Mrs Motley found minor fame and fortune by penning a best-selling household charms book aimed at the Muggle-born market. She kept up a regular guest column, Motley’s Mop-Up, in Witch Weekly answering letters sent in by readers.
One of Cass’ fondest memories of her mother’s success was visiting the Wizarding Wireless Network with her for an interview. Cass was transfixed. The family had grown up listening to the wireless every morning before school, and every evening for the news. Mr Motley, being an engineering sort, had shown Cass how the valves worked when she was old enough to be fascinated by their glow. She begged for a set of her own for Christmas and spent late nights listening to it with the volume turned right down after she should have been asleep.
The end of the seventies, and the years where Cass became self-aware of the divide between worlds she moved through, Voldemort was growing in power with his followers. Neither Muggle nor wizarding world seemed all that friendly. Margaret Thatcher was Prime Minister, and Millicent Bagnold was Minister for Magic, and Cass put her hope in two women to sort the world out.
She keenly remembers the celebrations in November 1981 following the fall of Lord Voldemort at Godric’s Hollow. Though she does remember her parents being sad about the loss of the Potters which made the victory bittersweet.
School 1984-1991Cass reached Hogwarts in 1984, sorted into Hufflepuff. She made friends across all the houses and years, and adored meeting new students after their sorting. She’d offer them gleeful hugs on becoming badgers, and more when the homesickness set in.
Her favourite subjects were charms and transfiguration, even though it was tricky. Not overly fond of getting her hands dirty with potions and herbology, she preferred waving her wand and found the tales of Defence Against the Dark Arts interesting. She would occasionally indulge in dramatic re-enactments to liven up revision in the common room.
Cass sang in the school choir, wrote for the school paper and wheedled every opportunity to commentate on quidditch matches as she could. Her wireless went with her to school and her dorm-mates had to contend with her falling asleep with it on her pillow, ear pressed against the speaker. The walls around her bed were plastered with photos and posters of the bands she heard.
Establishing a Career 1991-1995Cass graduated in 1991, just before the Golden Trio arrived that September. Living with her parents, she worked unpaid for the WWN, in that she submitted an audition record, but they did not seem all that interested. She turned up at the offices and refused to leave, started making coffees and persisted. Eventually the breakfast-time presenter relented, admiring her tenacity and offered her to sit in. She had to do exactly as he said, and Cass agreed, though she gritted her teeth.
On her nights, Cass attempted to form a band of her own, covering popular Muggle songs for wizarding audiences. It wasn’t a success, but allowed her to get closer to future famous names, and bolster her autograph collection. Not to mention more than a few dates...
In October 1991, Bryan Adams was enjoying the longest consecutive stay at the top of the UK Singles Chart with Everything I Do (I Do It For You). Cass was inspecting a record for scratches ahead of loading the turntable for one last song before Friday morning's eight o’clock news, when the morning presenter began to choke on a handful of dodgy Bertie Botts Beans sent in by an obsessive fan. Cass leapt into action, smacking him clean between the shoulder blades, catapulting the beans across the studio from the choking presenter’s throat. An efficient but not at all elegant solution.
As colleagues assisted a gasping wizard out to mediwitches, Cass switched records, read the news and then lobbed Bryan Adams on the wizarding airwaves for good measure. She finished the last hour with chatter about upcoming concerts and events as if nothing had happened before queueing up half an hour of records due to the increasingly angry protests of the producer. Although they gave her a lengthy lecture for taking advantage, Cass didn’t listen. She was too busy grinning from ear to ear.
That girl, as listeners described her in their letters, soon became a regular voice. Cass read the eight o’clock news, and then chatted on air with the host in between records until nine.
In 1994, Cass was offered her own late evening slot for an hour, and filled it with latest releases, topical issues and band interviews. She encouraged her younger listeners to thwart curfew to hear. Cass was obsessed with her job, and the magical technology that allowed her to broadcast.
Second Wizarding War and Established at Last 1995-2006The years that followed saw WWN turned into propaganda, and as a Muggleborn descendent, Cass fled and went into hiding. Her family were amongst those the Prewetts helped to hide. She offered what support she could to Potterwatch.
In 1998, Cass returned to WWN, and became the voice of the morning. Her cheery tones woke up listeners across Britain with positive news of Minister Shacklebolt’s post-war government and triumphs of businesses back on their feet.
Success brought Cass comfortable wealth. Her flat was full of bags of letters from weird and wonderful fans. She still mixed with old friends, bands from her younger years, but the recreation changed. Afternoons were lost to gillyweed and mornings were no longer fuelled by coffee but something stronger. In 2006, when Cass was suggested a new heady high from a female vampire acquaintance, she was game to try. But in their pursuit, things went too far.
Two Dark Years, 2006-2008Turned, Cass’ life turned upside-down. WWN dropped her officially on hearing she had become a vampire. She was unable to host her show with the daylight hours as it was. She lost her voice, her spark and withdrew. Her family were devastated. Although her vampire friend was punished, her father was incensed, attempted to stake the vampire who had bitten her in revenge for his daughter and was imprisoned for six months.
For two long years, Cass moved from project to project, trying to find another career. Her father tried to teach her magical engineering, her mother suggest she try writing a book, she even tried getting a muggle job stacking shelves as her savings dwindled. Nothing inspired her quite as much or gave her the drive to get up every day. She tried to integrate with the vampire community, learn the culture, rather haphazardly. She still feels out of place. Cass even tried keeping pets and well… the less said about what happened to them the better… she wanted to tear her teeth out.
Her Voice Returns, 2008-In 2008, Cass brokered an interview with her old boss at WWN. The listeners from 1am to 3am aren’t quite the same, but they don’t seem to mind that her fangs sometimes get in the way of her speech when she’s excited. She’s not able to get many interviewees these days, either, but she fills the time and entertains the dead of night before slipping back home before dawn can reach her, trying not to smell the dementors.
Just before Christmas 2010, Cass’ landlady evicted her. Being awake all night rather than during the day was driving her neighbours to distraction. Being a vampire she couldn’t cast silencing charms. When she wasn’t at work, Cass would listen to hours of new music sent to her for review, when most wanted to sleep. Public treasure or not, she was out. Hissing and showing her fangs only got her in mild trouble with Being Division.
An awkward Christmas was spent with her family in London. Cass struggled to control her natural urges to feed on her own kin and sought help from her fellow vampires to find somewhere to live, which brought her to Moonstone Mews as a lodger.
Describe your job duties and how you go about them: Cass presents a radio show from 1am to 3am on the Wizarding Wireless Network. She works with a producer to ensure her coverage meets their guidelines, but takes charge on the content, format and the music choices.
Elaborate on your expertise in your field: Worked at WWN almost constantly since leaving school, learning from the bottom up.
Writing Sample: N/A
Sum up your character in one paragraph: Cass was turned by a vampire in 2006. She was a chatty, happy go lucky Hufflepuff witch who presented a breakfast show on the Wizarding Wireless Network. These days she presents a middle of the night slot, and acts first, thinks later.
Cassandra Rachel Alice Motley: WWN Presenter