PrincessMeredith

Princess Meredith was the founder and first ruler of Centralia, as well as the first Asterian to come to Earth.

Biography

Arrival on Earth

Long before the founding of Centralia, an ethereal being made of pure magic traveled to Earth from the distant planet Asteria. Upon arriving on Earth, the Asterian assumed the form of a human woman...much to her confusion, as she had never seen a human before. The Asterian found herself in the middle of a dense forest, where she wandered for several days, simply taking in the sensations of her new home planet. The sights, the sounds, the smells, even the tastes: The Asterian was in awe of it all.

After a few days in the forest, the Asterian came face-to-face with a human for the first time. While following a creek through the woods, the Asterian happened upon a young human woman wading in its shallow waters. The Asterian was absolutely captivated by the sheer grace and elegance of this unfamiliar life form, and asked one simple question: "Are all of this planet's creatures as beautiful as you?" The words came naturally, despite being in a language she had never heard spoken before. The human woman responded simply by thanking the Asterian for the compliment and asking her name. The Asterian, of course did not have a name: the very concept of names was completely foreign to her.

The human woman, who told the Asterian her name was AdorabelleWallace, invited the Asterian inside, offering her food and clothing. The Asterian was unsure of the purpose of food and clothing, but Adorabelle insisted upon giving them to her, so she assumed that eating and getting dressed must be important rituals to Earth creatures. Adorabelle then proceeded to patiently explain to her what names were, and eventually the two of them decided the Asterian would adopt the name Meredith.

And thus began a close friendship that would last for centuries to come.

Princess of Centralia

While magic had long existed on Earth before Meredith's arrival--Adorabelle herself was a very powerful mage--the people of Earth quickly found that Meredith's magical abilities far exceeded any of their own, verging on omnipotence. A faction of Earth creatures thus decided to appoint Meredith as their leader, and The Principality of Centralia was established, with Princess Meredith as their sovereign.

During her reign as princess, Meredith remained close with Adorabelle, even appointing her as her official royal advisor. It was often observed that their relationship seemed to be almost romantic in nature, though they never formally married. When a second Asterian arrived on Earth, in the form of a small child, Adorabelle persuaded Meredith to take her in and raise her alongside her, effectively making her their adopted daughter. That Asterian went on to be known as Jeanette.

Princess Meredith, being effectively immortal, initially saw no reason to draft a succession plan, expecting that she would simply rule Centralia indefinitely. Adorabelle, however, urged her to adopt a succession plan to ensure the nation's stability if, for any reason, Meredith were ever unable to carry out her duties. Meredith thus reluctantly declared that each Princess of Centralia would appoint her own successor. Meredith originally intended to appoint Adorabelle herself as her successor, but Adorabelle declined. Meredith eventually chose Jeanette as her successor, citing her familiarity with both Asterian magic and the culture of Earth creatures. (The immense magical ability inherent to Asterians also probably helped.)

Adorabelle would be proven right much sooner than she anticipated.

"The Santa Claus Incident" and abdication

Princess Meredith's unfamiliarity with Earth culture proved problematic at times. The most notable example occurred one December when Meredith became convinced, for reasons that nobody quite understands, that SantaClaus was a pretender to the throne and wished to stage a coup. Meredith responded by attacking Santa during his December 24th rounds. Santa successfully fought off Meredith's assault, and Meredith was eventually subdued by members of the CentraliaHonorGuard, who, after many hours, managed to convince her that she was mistaken in assuming Santa wanted to usurp her.

While Meredith maintained that she had done nothing wrong, she abdicated the throne a week later, on December 31. "I've been doing this whole 'ruling' thing for a long time," Meredith said, "and it's really, really hard sometimes." Meredith's successor, PrincessJeanette, acceded to the throne the following day, on January 1.

Unfamiliarity with Earth and "unique" lexicon

As the first Asterian to arrive on Earth, Meredith initially lacked familiarity with many aspects of Earth life, especially language: If she doesn't know the word for something, she'll just make one up. Examples include "wingbeast" (bird), "beanwater" (coffee), and "lowercase people" (babies or toddlers).

Adorabelle often found herself in the position of explaining Earth customs to Meredith. For example, the two once had a conversation about birthdays:

ADORABELLE:     Oh hey, tomorrow is Ralph's birthday! Don't forget!
MEREDITH:       ..."Birthday"? What does that mean?
ADORABELLE:     OK, so, remember that time we discussed how Earth creatures reproduce?
MEREDITH:       Do not remind me. It is so gross...
ADORABELLE:     Remember how, at the end, the baby human comes out of the mother?
MEREDITH:       Yes. *shudders*
ADORABELLE:     That's called birth. And every year, people celebrate the anniversary of the day that happened to them.
MEREDITH:       That is...very strange, I must admit. But I suppose I will take any excuse to celebrate with friends!
ADORABELLE:     That's the spirit!
MEREDITH:       May I have a "birthday" as well?
ADORABELLE:     Well, OK, this gets complicated, because years on other planets don't last the same amount of time. When were you born?
MEREDITH:       How could I possibly know that?
ADORABELLE:     ...Yeah, OK, you've got me there.
MEREDITH:       Oh, I have an idea! You have a birthday, correct?
ADORABELLE:     Yes, I do. March 15th.
MEREDITH:       What if we share? Instead of just being your birthday, it can be both our birthdays!
Adorablle:      That's a wonderful idea. From now on, every March 15th, we will celebrate our birthdays together.
MEREDITH:       I love this planet!!

In another example, Adorabelle attempts to explain carbonated soft drinks to Meredith:

(Meredith walks in holding a can of diet cola)
ADORABELLE:     Oh, you have some pop! You see, that's a kind of drink. They're not really very good for you. You found one of the ones that doesn't have sugar in it, but it's still not—
MEREDITH:       Please, Adorabelle. There is no need to humansplain. I understand perfectly well what an Earth soda pop is.
ADORABELLE:     OK. Sorry if I came across as condescending.
(Meredith stares at the soda can for a bit)
MEREDITH:       How does one unseal the vessel to gain access to the liquid contained within?
ADORABELLE: OK, well, first of all, you're holding it upside down.

Miscellaneous

• Princess Meredith's true age is not known, not even to Meredith herself. Meredith previously kept track of her age by counting the Earth years on a small digital counter, but found the device could only count to 255 before rolling over to zero. The counter's current reading is 9, though nobody quite knows how many times the count has rolled over. "I know it's rolled over at least twice," Meredith said, "but after that I kind of stopped paying attention."

• Unlike her successors, Princess Meredith frequently used her powers to levitate herself or fly. Meredith had the PalaceOfSerenity built with trapdoors in most floors, allowing her to float between stories of the building without needing to use stairs. Other palace residents and staff learned very quickly to pay attention to where they were walking, as Meredith often left these trapdoors open. Flight came so naturally to Meredith that she often had difficulty determining what beings or objects could or could not easily fly, leading her to commission the Railroad Track Leading To A Cliff And Nowhere Else as a platform for flying trains. While the track was laid, the flying train project never got off the ground (pun very much intended).

• In 1978, Princess Meredith bought out homes in the Lilith Avenue neighborhood of QueenCity to be demolished to make way for an expansion of PollyannaWhittierMedicalCenter (known, at the time, as Queen City Central Hospital). However, rather than properly notifying the residents in advance, Meredith simply showed up with a bulldozer, gave each resident a sack of money, and called a taxicab to take them to the nearest homeless shelter. Thankfully, members of the CentraliaHonorGuard convinced Meredith to give the dislocated residents more time to get moving arrangements in place.

• In 2005, Princess Meredith briefly operated a DVD rental service known as Meredisc.

• Early on in her reign, Princess Meredith learned about the Earth custom of funerals. She found it grossly unfair, however, that only dead people get to have funerals, and insisted on staging her own "funeral" in the PalaceOfSerenity. However, after lying in the coffin for about half an hour, she got bored, and decided to cancel the rest of the proceedings in favor of taking all her friends out for frozen yogurt. It probably worked out for the best.

CategoryRoyalty