Sidewinder (School OC Contest)

Introduction
Sidewinder was made for a School OC Contest where the prompt given to me was "loser." If bullying is a trigger for you, please feel free to check out another character who has a happier backstory.
All coding was learnt from Himmalerin's coding guides! Read them and learn, young padawans. 
Character
Appearance
Small and fine-boned, like a baby bird that has yet to learn flight. Trips over her feet and her words. Picks at her scales, with their pebbly, gritty texture. Dewy black eyes that are downcast, and a facial expression that is guilty and woeful.
Personality
Loser. Loser. Loser.
Timid. Anxious. Gullible. Neurotic. Exhausted. Morose. Dependent. Socially constipated.
Not the most intelligent, but thinks too much.
Not the most physically capable, but stays up until the most absurd hours of early morning.
Not the prettiest, but steals pretty trinkets to adorn herself with, so that she may look into her dirty glass of a mirror and imagine herself as such.
Loser.
<tabber>
|-|History Part One (Childhood)=
A week after hatching, both of SideWinder's parents enlisted as soldiers to Queen Blaze. They left their daughter at home, and entrusted her care to a veteran aunt, a stoic SandWing who's tail had been bitten in half during some long-ago battle, and who was wholly unprepared to raise a dragonet. The aunt was reliable enough, but her idea of care was to give Sidewinder the carcass of a meaty animal once every three or four days, and visit in between to ensure that she hadn't died. 
Being a rather antisocial individual herself, the aunt never thought to introduce Sidewinder to other dragonets, or to find a playmate of some sort for her. It did cross her mind that she should at least teach Sidewinder how to hold her tail properly so the dragonet didn't end up stabbing herself. 
The aunt also taught Sidewinder how to speak, after the latter spoke her first sentence, which was a variation of the aunt's customary greeting whenever she visited her. The aunt began to talk more regularly with Sidewinder, in conversations that were so disjointed and inarticulate that maybe they can't actually be called conversations. 
The point is, the aunt tried started to interact more with her niece, and extended her visits from ten minutes to a half-hour! (Whoa, such an improvement) Beyond this, Sidewinder was left alone for the better part of the week with nothing to entertain her mind with. She made it a habit to convert the bones of her food carcasses into toys, and amused herself by playing with the various insects and spiders that crossed her path. 
After four years went by in this manner, the aunt received word that her brother and his mate had been found dead. She realized this meant she had been given permanent baggage. She was not exactly elated by this news, and contemplated it for a long while. (A long while being two minutes) Then she made an unscheduled visit to her brother's den, took all of his valuables, ignored the squeaking cries of Sidewinder, travelled to the nearest market, and promptly sold every last piece of jewellery he had ever had. With the money she got, she bought several instructional scrolls on how to raise dragonets. Thus began her long journey of actually raising a child. 
The scrolls recommended that dragonets be given balanced meals every day, so that they could grow properly and healthily. The aunt started bringing in more food, including fresh fruits and vegetables. The scrolls recommended that dragonets be played with, in order to develop necessary motor and social skills. The aunt taught Sidewinder how to play board games. The scrolls mentioned that music is thought to improve the mental skills and hand-talon coordination of young dragonets. The aunt taught Sidewinder how to play the kazoo. 
The scrolls advocated for dragonets to be sent to school a year or two after their hatching. Sidewinder was five. When the aunt read this, she picked Sidewinder up and flew to the nearest school available, barging into the middle of a class and dropping the dragonet off there. 
 
|-|History Part Two (School Life)=
So began Sidewinder's loser status. It was such an awkward, embarrassing moment that the tale of the SandWings who interrupted class is still told at the school. It's practically a legend. What made it even more legendary was how much of a failure the new SandWing student was.
Sidewinder, who had only recently been introduced to concepts like "socializing" and "actually eating fresh food," or "being able to leave the house" and "flying logistics," was overwhelmed by the novelty of school. So many sights! So many smells! So many noises she had never heard before, and dragons she had never met! She had not known the world had so many dragons. She spent most of that first day gawking at everything, trying to absorb all of it in. The teacher and the students of the class she had been dropped into were confused as to what to do with her. 
Eventually, the school was able to contact Sidewinder's aunt, and they formally added her to their registry. Sidewinder, having been isolated from the world for most of her childhood, was developmentally far behind other dragonets her age. Not only physically and mentally, but also socially. They placed her in a class that was specifically catered to her needs. 
At first, Sidewinder was very agreeable with this arrangement. She was content learning shapes and colours, spelling and counting. However, she began to notice that the other students were not subject to the same treatment. They walked with each other, and talked with each other, and ate with each other. Sidewinder had no one to talk to but the one dragon who taught her, and as he was rather old, he had quite some trouble hearing anything she said. 
Sidewinder did not want to be trapped in a room again, in one place with only one other person to talk to. She wanted to be with the other students, she would have given anything to belong with them. Once, she worked up the nerve to approach several dragonets who were playing a game. She had thought to ask if she could join them, but she flew too fast in her eagerness and messed up her landing, skidding to a stop by crashing into a nearby wall. They laughed at her, before leaving to play their game elsewhere. Sidewinder did not try introducing herself again. She took to skipping class and wandering the halls, spying on other students and wishing she were among them. 
Two weeks into this new schedule of hers, Sidewinder noticed that there was a group of dragonets separate from the other students. They laughed the loudest and smiled the brightest, they talked confidently and strode through the school like they owned it. Most of all, Sidewinder never, ever saw any of them on their own. There was always a crowd around these dragonets, at least three or four other students who were eager to chat with them. It was remarkable. It was the popular crowd. 
Sidewinder stood in awe of them. She most often gawked at Tanzanite, the resident popular girl of the school, with her glittering scales and sparkly jewellery. Sidewinder followed Tanzanite around constantly; she was pulled to her like a moth drawn to candlelight. She didn't notice the calculating look in Tanzanite's eyes whenever the popular girl's gaze fell on her. Sidewinder was elated to even be acknowledged by a fellow student. She would have done anything to fit in. 
Anything to be accepted. 
No, anything to be loved. 
</tabber>
Relationships
Likes her aunt. Her aunt gives her food and taught her how to play board games and the kazoo. She wishes her aunt were more affectionate or around more often, but she's not angry at her that she isn't.
Neutral feelings for her parents. She never knew them well, she can barely remember them. She knows they existed, because her aunt talks about them sometimes, but she doesn't think about them much.
Adores and admires Tanzanite. She would do anything to be like her, and be liked by her.
Has a positive relationship with Coda. She thinks he's amazing, and he's probably the only dragonet who is genuinely nice to her. He wouldn't laugh at her for stuttering or for being clumsy.
Trivia
* Sidewinder's first sentence was "I see you aren't dead yet."
** Her second was, "Here's your camel, now stop jumping on me."
* When Sidewinder first began flying, it was an accident. She had jumped up to catch a dragonfly just beyond her reach, and her wings had instinctively started flapping.
** This freaked her out so much that she stopped moving her wings and fell down.
** She didn't try flying again for several weeks.
*** Sidewinder had formerly been under the impression that she couldn't fly, because when she had tried doing it before as a hatchling, her wings had just beat the air uselessly. She had resigned herself to believing that only birds, insects, and her aunt could fly. She hadn't understood that her wings back then were too small to enable flight.
*** As it was, Sidewinder couldn't practice flying much because her parent's den was a small, one-room space, and she never thought to venture out.
* Sidewinder is a species of desert snake that is so-called for the side-winding way they move.
** Her name is Sidewinder because I thought it sounded a bit like the word Sideliner, which is a person who does not participate with the rest of the group.
Category:Characters
Category:Dragonets
Category:Females
Category:SandWings
Category:Occupation (Student)
Category:LGBT+
Category:Content (LivVirtual)
Category:Work in Progress