Elyon Meir

Elyon with his Bishie Sparkles

Elyon Meir (born 13th April 1573 AD) is a doctor and activist in Bandar Subuh. He was made an artistic martyr by artist Judith Nevrakis during the April Rebellion, although he had been her model and muse for longer before that. He advocates for accessible medical care, communal fresh produce, and rights for children.

## Backstory

Elyon was born to Ahava and Melech Meir in Suncreek, Solerro, on April 13th, 1573 AD. This was during the Solerro Civil War, and Melech was conscripted as an army medic by the Meziavelan Army while Ahava was pregnant. Elyon was born while Melech was away, and first met his father when he was two; he was also born blind. Elyon's older sister Lilach was born five years prior. Their family is of mixed Meziavelan Jewish and Huetlalli ancestry. Elyon transitioned very early, impressing on his parents that he was a boy by the time he was five, making Ahava terribly smug as she had predicted he would be when she was pregnant.

Upon returning to Suncreek, Melech studied to become a rabbi in order to avoid further conscription in the instability of Solerro under Meziavelan occupation, while also working with the local medicine woman Xochil. Ahava was a builder and unionist, working out of the home for most of the day and leaving Elyon to spend a great deal of time with Melech. He developed a strong connection to religious Judaism and learnt a combination of Jewish and Huetlalli medical practices, and was assisting his father in synagogue and their back room clinic by the time he was ten.

When Elyon was twelve, Ahava was suspiciously killed in a building accident, and her body taken from the village under the pretenses of an autopsy. It was widely suspected that it had been a deliberate murder to prevent her from continuing to build unions and challenging Imperial control. A year later, Elyon began hearing Ahava's voice, and started interacting with and calling her spirit home to Suncreek. He was the only one able to sense her ghost, surprising both Melech and Lilach with his repetition of knowledge only she could know. This indicated to Melech that perhaps Elyon was a spirit healer.

While Elyon was being tutored by Xochil in healing, the 1589 AD Plague Epidemic reached Solerro, wiping out approximately 35% of the population and disproportionately affecting the indigenous Huetlalli, Chalicue, and Quetzapal communities. Melech, Lilach, and Xochil all died during this year, leaving Elyon an orphan. Without teachers, he and Ahava had to work together to decipher Melech's journals and Xochil's possessions, and continue his training. He took over as the local doctor, but was unable to maintain the synagogue.

Elyon lived alone for three years before accepting his first roommate, the revenant Remmy. They lived together for around nine months, before Remmy continued on to search out other revenants. Two years later, Elyon was by chance pickpocketed by Mikey, an orphan who had been the sole survivor of a nearby shipwreck that killed his parents. Elyon took Mikey in, kickstarting a long tradition of housing and caring for children. Most children came and went as they needed assistance and found new directions, with the next permanent adoptee being Belinda, adopted in 1599 AD.

In 1601 AD, Elyon met the activist Niv Levine, as he had fled from Imperial backlash to Suncreek. Elyon took Niv in, and they began a relationship shortly thereafter. Around six months after this, Niv convinced Elyon to uproot himself, Mikey, and Belinda and move with him to Bandar Subuh, on the other side of the world. Ostensibly this was to escape the Meziavelan threat, however, Niv was actually manipulative and abusive, and very successful in isolating Elyon from his support networks.

Bandar Subuh was a severe culture shock to the previously untravelled Elyon, who only spoke Meziavelan and Hebrew, and was discouraged from making friends by Niv. The one place he was allowed to visit was the local synagogue, where he met Gisila Raskopf and slowly developed a rapport. Two years later, he confided in her that Niv was hurting and controlling him, and she immediately whisked him, Mikey, and Belinda back to her home. Her grandson Oshri also assisted by breaking into Niv and Elyon's house to retrieve Elyon's belongings.

The experience left Elyon with debilitating anxiety, and it was the help of Gisila, Oshri, and Oshri's girlfriend Judith that he managed to get back on his feet and begin learning Talian Trade. This allowed him to begin working at Gisila's bakery, then assist at an apothecary and eventually run a free clinic from the apothetcary's back door. However, in 1607 AD, only a year after marrying Judith, Oshri died at sea in transit between Bandar Subuh and Meridiem. Judith was pregnant with their first child, and Elyon was heavily involved in supporting her, Gisila, and then the new baby Miriam.

During this period, Elyon made friends with the architect and activist Sally Han, and became involved in the political sphere. He aided Sally's pro-independence group Dhalang by offering medical assistance at protests, demonstrations, and raids, and was in a key position to covertly pass messages between Dhalang and other like-minded groups using the apothecary shop. He also started exploring the BDSM scene to reclaim his sexual agency, and began casually dating Adriano Florentino, a city cartographer. When the butcher below Judith's flat vacated and the space went up for rent, Elyon used his savings to pay and moved his children and his clinical practice there, starting the first fully-functional, 24 hour free clinic in Bandar Subuh.

Mikey was a great help during this process, and Elyon began training him to become his assistant and protege. With the new space, he also resumed his fostering and adopting of children, housing permanent adoptees Alex, Felipe, Flora, and Jae Yoon. Jae was the youngest child Elyon had ever adopted, at two years old when Mikey found her abandoned on the street, but his experience helping Judith and Gisila with baby Miriam helped him rise to the challenge. This also revitalised his passion for children's rights and advocacy, and he began working with the specialised counselling group Orangtua to assist prospective parents in supporting their adopted children. Through this he met Fehrouz al-Jebra, a typesetter and printer of Orangtua's educational materials, and they started dating.

Running a free clinic and raising children required more income than just relying on charitable donations, so he learnt art modelling and started working with Judith consistently. Given his help with Miriam and Judith's constant exposure to his medley of children, they were already essentially co-parenting each other's kids, but working together in private sparked romantic feelings, and eventually they took the plunge and began seeing each other in 1610 AD. Amusingly, this was sparked by Judith trying to deal with her feelings by sleeping with a university professor, Fernandez, who 'just happened' to look very similar to Elyon. This one night stand resulted in an accidental pregnancy that Judith decided she wanted, and in 1611 AD, Philip Meirley was born.

The joy was short lived, however, as two months later the April Rebellion began, and Elyon was heavily involved in transmitting rebel messages and medically assisting the revolutionaries. The Subun Government could not access the main ringleaders, and instead picked strategic secondaries to arrest and transport to the notorious Selangah Prison to break morale. Elyon was arrested without trial and imprisoned in solitary confinement for seven months. During this time, he was repeatedly interrogated, but the past caught up with him in a saving grace as one of his fellow prisoners was Remmy. Remmy was able to shift into a ghost form and move to Elyon's cell, and they kept each other mostly sane throughout the imprisonment.

To raise awareness of the revolutionary cause, and to protest the treatment of the political prisoners, Judith began an artistic campaign known as the Abolishment of Atonement, wherein she portrayed Elyon as a pseudo-religious figure and referenced imagery from Judaism and the Creed of Atonement. This came to a head in October, when she released *Efseveia,* or *Charity,* which depicted Elyon crucified and then-Prime Minister Keng Gu Chin with Elyon's blood on his hands. This caused a massive uproar and has remained Judith's most famous and sought-after masterpiece. In response, the Subun government actually did crucify Elyon, and photographed and sent pictures of it to the press to dissuade further rebellions. This backfired immensely and caused Judith to storm the prison, razing Selangah to the ground and rescuing Elyon.

The recovery process was perhaps more brutal than the months spent apart, but they did adopt a therapy kitten that Elyon named Lilach, and were married in December of that year. Oshri, returned and grown into Oliver, was once again a help during this process, and in 1612 AD once Elyon was strong enough to travel, Judith entrusted him to Oliver and they left Bandar Subuh until the government's ire had cooled enough to return. They journeyed to Solerro and returned to Suncreek to learn more about the origins of revenants and where Elyon was able to help reconnect Oliver's memories, and then to Meridiem, where Oliver had been raised and worked during his absence. Over the course of this journey, Elyon and Oliver caught feelings for each other and got together, and they returned to Bandar Subuh in 1613 AD.

Elyon slowly resumed his clinical practice and dipped his toe into activist work again in a much more casual context. He, Oliver, and Judith had another child who Elyon named Olive 'Liv' Mia Meirley, after Oliver and Remmy, and Elyon devoted the bulk of his time to being a house husband. Later, he started working part-time as a kindergarten teacher once all the children were either grown or at school.

## Personality

Elyon's strength is his compassion, and he loves with a deep intensity and gentleness that guides his moral compass. He is kind, generous to a fault, and has a warm disposition that is charming without guile. However, this is also his vulnerability, as he is very trusting and has difficulty acknowledging danger and setting boundaries. He relies a great deal on his partners, particularly Judith, to protect him and to help him navigate the world. He likes puns and silly innuendos.

His time with Niv shaped him and his self-esteem greatly. He has low self-image and his inherited stubbornness is a double-edged sword that, while committing him to his principles, makes it challenging for him to break out of negative thought patterns and change his behaviours. This is particularly troubling when it comes to his anxiety and PTSD, exacerbated by his experiences after the April Rebellion. While being transgender, he does not have dysphoria and instead gender euphoria, and his body issues are tied more to his perception of his own attractiveness and his disabilities.

## Appearance

Elyon is tall and dangerously skinny, a result of growing up rurally and then the effects of poverty and imprisonment. He has tan skin with golden under- and over-tones, as his spirit healing causes him to glow when he is particularly happy. He exists in shades of brown, and his hair began greying very early. He keeps his facial hair somewhere between stubble and a full beard, usually plaits his hair back to tie it off with coloured ribbons, and has constellations of freckles across his face, shoulders, and arms. His wardrobe is small and old, with staples being his black turtleneck, a big flappy coat, overalls with utilitarian pockets, and firetruck red 'Are You Nasty?' shorts. Almost everything is oversized.

## Abilities

### Jazz in the Night

* Divination: You may use ordinary components to Commune with the world and diagnose illness.
* Fortune's Favoured: You may use your almanac to divine clues about the day of the mission. Take +1d to engagement and mark almanac in load.
* Friends in High Places: The source of your healing is a link to a supernatural entity. You may Commune with them to Gather Information that would normally be inaccessible.
* Ihiyotl: Your connection to your breath of life allows you to harm as well as heal. You may use your healing abilities to hurt in the same manner,
* Spirit Healer: You can Sculpt bones, blood, and souls to treat wounds of stabilise the dying. Everyone in your crew gets +1d to their healing treatment rolls.
* Teyolia: You can ask an extra question while you Gather Information because you have trained to remember information quickly or accurately.
* Tonalli: Souls are fragmentary things. You may push yourself to Sculpt someone's soul back together or Dissect one apart.

## Cultural Touchstones

Elyon is Sephardic and Mestizo, being a mix of white Meziavelan heritage and indigenous Aztec. His healing is greatly influenced by Aztec medicine, particularly the role of the ticitl and the symbolism of Xipe Totec. His aesthetic and imagery are incredibly thinly veiled Jesus metaphors, harkening back to Jesus' 'real' identity as a Jewish rebel against the Roman Empire. He is inspired by, uh, Jesus, Anders, and Joly.

## Gallery

Elyon MeirJudith, Elyon, and PhilipJudith, Elyon, and OliverPolaroid of Judith, Elyon, and OliverElyon Bishie SparklesElyon & LivElyon and Judie DancingPietaJudith and Elyon - Just Married!

## References

1. ↑ https://www.helpguide.org/articles/anxiety/anxiety-disorders-and-anxiety-attacks.htm
2. ↑ https://www.helpguide.org/articles/ptsd-trauma/ptsd-symptoms-self-help-treatment.htm
3. ↑ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sephardi\_Jews
4. ↑ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aztec\_medicine
5. ↑ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xipe\_Totec
6. ↑ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jesus
7. ↑ https://dragonage.fandom.com/wiki/Anders
8. ↑ https://lesmiserables.fandom.com/wiki/Joly