Tag: who says women are not heroes ( julia headcanons )

Mun Note: Julia is semi-immortal as a result of her deal with a heathen goddess. While the basics of this are covered in her profile, this is to provide a more detailed look into how she functions. 

• Longevity – Julia does not age – though time passes, she remains exactly the same as she did when she exchanged her promises with the goddess. 

• Immunity ( Illness ) – Illness does not affect Julia, which can be alarming as it is useful – twice she has lost a crew to yellow fever, standing alone amid corpses bloating under the sun with no way to sail her ship. Were it not for certain interventions, she would doubtless still be floating aimlessly due to these incidents. 

• Immunity ( Weather ) – Julia’s temperature never changes. Like her age, her body as a whole is unchanged from the moment of her oath. If it is scorching hot, she feels the same as she would in milder weather – if it is freezing cold, she is as warm as she was on that day. Her skin is always the same to the touch, no matter the elements around it ( with exception to water – she can get soaked just like anyone else, much to her chagrin. ) 

• Immunity ( Bodily Functions ) – Julia does not need to eat or drink to sustain herself – something she discovered quite on accident when she and her crew were becalmed. Due to her body’s stasis, she is always in a state of comfortably hydrated and sated – if she eats or drinks, be it for subterfuge or pleasure, her body responds as a normal one would, and digests everything in a functional manner.

• Regenerative Healing – Julia is not inhuman. She can be stabbed and shot just as anyone else can – the difference is that she heals a great deal faster than most. That which would take weeks to heal ( such as broken bones ) debilitate her for no more than three to five days. Cuts and lacerations seal and do not scar – the only scar on her body is the one that killed her, though that is its own story.

  Generally speaking open wounds close within three minutes to an hour depending on depth and complexity of the damage – which brings us into what can kill her. The old standbys all work – headshot, heart shot, severing the spinal chord, explosion proximity etc – and with that last, fire ought to be noted as particularly damaging, and taking almost as long as a normal person to recover from – with the notable exception that, over time, those scars fade away. 

• Healing Exchange – This is the only real “power” Julia possesses that can affect anyone other than herself. Julia can “acquire” the damage of another if she wills it, and heal from the wound in her own time. This heals the person almost completely – they will be tender for two to four days depending on how badly wounded they were, but otherwise there will be no lasting effects from their damage. Julia is capable of this exchange provided said damage is not:
• Something that would by rights kill her
• AKA: She cannot trade her life for someone else
• Something that has already killed the recipient
• AKA: She cannot revive the dead 
• Something that has already healed 
• AKA: She can only heal fresh wounds

In Captain J. Ward’s

My Lyfe Amonge The Pyrates, there is frequent mention of Captain Ward’s own ship. This of course to lend credence and reality to so much fantastical element, but also to forge a legend in and of itself. 

Julia knew full well that if she ever wished to utilize her book as a method of recruitment there would need to be some things to prove her claims as the author – and the foremost among those things was the ship itself. Though in the book, Hope’s Song bears no name ( just as Captain Ward holds no actual description ) there are a few notable things about her that would be difficult to replicate. 

The figurehead of the ship is mentioned as having been carved with skill to match Michelangelo – and indeed, the angel that cuts the Song’s path through the waves looks as though it might have been taken from St. Peter’s Basilica, with detailed drapery shrouding the androgynous form, and wings arching back into the hull of the ship, impossibly long and serving as detail along the wood. The eyes stare unseeingly ahead, a sword held at the ready in one hand and another outstretched and clasping on to an equally ornate lantern. In later years, when Julia changes ships, the Song’s angel is transferred with great care and affixed to Angel’s Mercy, seeming to be the reason for the ship’s name. 

Below decks, everything is painted white and teal, with unnecessarily ornate detailing throughout that is repaired by artists aboard and ashore as needed when the ship takes on damage – due to varying styles over the years, those details have a unique quality to them that cannot be replicated – and while the book notates some of the contributors, there is enough information granted to make it clear that what has been withheld can also be verified if necessary, by the legitimate guilds involved in crafting the ship’s interior. 

When Julia had to retire the Song, she approached those guilds again and had the Mercy done up again, and pieces drawn out of the Song to set into the Mercy and keep those lost stories alive. For the details themselves are paintings and carvings dictating adventures not yet immortalized by books, stories that may only ever be told by the wood of Captain Ward’s ship, and serve as a visual account for the Song and the Mercy’s travels.