App for TLV
User Name/Nick: Meredith
User LJ: shiplizard
AIM/IM:Tejarik/ shiplizard on googletalk
E-mail: shiplizard at gmail dot com
Other Characters: Vasilia Aliena
Character Name: Chief Brachi Stildyne
Series: Jurisdiction
Age: 47
From When?: From the end of Warring States
Inmate/Warden: Warden; in the last five years, he's gone from being lazily, low-grade evil in a lazy, low-grade evil world, through a redemption process of his own; he's aware of his previous faults, looking to mend them, and with an awareness he can't shake of what's right.
Item: Stopwatch
Abilities/Powers: No particular powers, abilities only what comes with being a competent soldier and leader.
Personality:
Stildyne is fairly laid back, for head of a medical security troop; less so in his youth, but he's older now (and significantly uglier and more scarred). He's seen what life has to give him; survived it, and developed a philosophy of 'deal with it and move on' that has served him extremely well. He understands the dynamic of soldiers and slaves, and is well-versed if not an avid participant of military political games. Ask first; bribe second; go over the other bastard's head third; force last.
He clung to the mantra 'Every man for himself and devil take the hindmost' for most of his life; it's only recently that he's been forced to abandon this comfortable mindset. The defenseless need defending, the hurting need cared for, and having a family made of like-minded souls who share not only the same goals but a species of affection is infinitely preferable to outrunning hell alone. This doesn't fit in a pithy phrase and it goes counter to the raising of his life, but it's the fact that he was offered family and care (and someone who trusted him to care) that's led him to a deeper understanding of who he is and what he wants of himself.
He blamed it, initially, on lust and then love-- not his fault, not his idea, never asked Andrej to be vulnerable and conflictedly moral and trusting. The deeper cause was his starvation for affection-- it came as jarring shock to him how little he wanted to be alone at the end of his life, how little he wanted to be alone after he knew what it was to be family. He always will love Andrej-- in an aching and unrequited way, said backwards little troublemaker being heterosexual by biological and religious proclivity both-- but is fairly well over being bitter about it. He can accept the species of fraternal love that Andrej has (equally grudgingly) offered him; he knows that his dedication doesn't entitle him to anything. In his inimitably Stildonian manner, he's dealt with it and moved on.
The barge will be a comfortable environment and having an inmate will be good for him; someone to care for, someone with whom he'll likely be able to sympathize-- it being easier to be a bastard than a decent man, and he'll frequently grumble (but never mean) that if he could go back he would. It's not quite military, but there are regulations of a sort and a pecking order of a sort and the food will be better than he got on Ragnarok. He's good with a wide array of personality types-- spoiled brat, morally conflicted healer, full-on sadist-- and that was just from taking care of Andrej Koscuisko. He speaks the jargons and body languages of Military and Street Brawler, passingly conversant in Bureaucrat, and perfectly fluent in Officer.
He's not used to outright defiance after working with bonds and enlisted folk as long as he has, but frankly it will be a novel thing after the kind of covert defiance developed by the conspiracy of slaves and the by-the-letter-not-the-spirit adherence to regulations that an unhappy corporal can offer. He's got a lot of patience to use when it comes to people who don't want to listen to him, as well as the cunning to let the absolutely recalcitrant have enough rope to hang themselves with-- and then come cut them down after and say 'You see? And this is why you listen to me.'
History:
Stildyne is out of Jurisdiction-- a name for all of settled space controlled by the ancient judicial body called the 'Bench'. The Bench likes to flatter themselves that Jurisdiction is all of settled space, period, but it's getting increasingly difficult to ignore the settlements in Gonebeyond, just outside the reach of Fleet. He's not exactly human; he's one of the species that humans became after they colonized the wide galaxy, forgot the other colonies existed, evolved for ten thousand or so years, rediscovered each other, and grudgingly formed government.
Old and mighty and paranoid in its old age and might, jurisdiction indulges in the flashiest and least effective way of deterring treason-- Inquisition, divided into protocols that specify the allowable harm one can do and the drugs one can use based on the crime committed. It doesn't work, of course; torture is a pretty shoddy way to get reliable information and a good way to foment revolt. Someone should tell the Judges.
For Stildyne's part, he was born a mongrel of no particular race, a type 1 hominid (the most common of six, divided by body chemistry and bone density and other factors that control how a body reacts to medication) on a planet neither wealthy nor culturally cohesive. He was raised by a father whose idea of child rearing involved beatings, and lots of them-- up until Stildyne was big enough to hit back-- along with a sister. She never did get big enough to hit back. Didn't live long enough.
As few people on the planet actually cared who murdered the elder Stildyne as cared about what happened to his young daughter, but Stildyne took himself off-planet pretty briskly anyway and enrolled in fleet. He engaged in basic training, went on a few military campaigns, got a few more scars to enhance his beauty (born ugly, raised ugly, brought up by ugly's elder brother, frequently held his own in horrific smile contests with a man nicknamed 'sharksmile'--he's very proud. )
He hadn't done anything to earn being assigned to the experimental ship Ragnarok, a convenient dumping ground where Jurisdiction put the unlikeable and the unpolitical and the generally unreasonable non-team players. In fact, he was an entirely commendable officer of mild distinction and no demerit right up until Andrej Koscuisko started filling his head with seditious nonsense like 'maybe it's wrong to make slaves of your enemies' and 'torture harms both the victim and the torturer and it doesn't do any good anyhow'; he'll likely be a footnote in the history books when they're talking about how the Koscuisko prince got in a moral huff and turned everything upside-down.
Not long before the point where he leaves canon, he went AWOL with Andrej's bond involuntaries, to protect them from Andrej's political enemies and see them free men in Gonebeyond. Despite his technical lack of a rank, he'll still answer to 'Chief' as easily as he will to 'Brachi' because you can't be called something fifteen years and not start to take it as a part of your given name.
Sample Journal Entry: [5-10 Sentences]
Good morning, gentles, this is Chief Warrant O-
No it isn't, beg pardon. This is Chief Stildyne. You needn't take it as a rank, I understand most of you aren't military. It's only friendly to address a man by his given name. Mister Stildyne, if you aren't feeling friendly.
[He raises an eyebrow; just one, the other one being pinned in place by one of his many scars. He doesn't smile, which is a mercy to all present, just gives the impression of being in a decent mood]
I'm a recent arrival; I'll try to stay out from underfoot while I learn the ropes. Point me at something to eat and I think I'll get on fine.
Sample RP: [3-5 paragraphs, 3rd Person POV]
Stildyne liked the Barge's mess, and he liked it thoroughly. It afforded him a couple luxuries he hadn't had on Ragnarok and certainly hadn't had on the Combine freighter that had spirited him off towards Gonebeyond and the unknown. Mostly: bean tea.
Oh, they called it coffee, but it was the same stuff, something dark and roasted and caffeinated. However they brewed it here must be lower pressure and lower temperature than he was used to-- there was a burnt flavor on the edge of it that meant he took a sweetener when he normally wouldn't have bothered to, but it was bean tea and plenty of it, and no stores running low because someone hadn't bribed the right reasonable people.
The second thing he liked and that he hadn't had on Ragnarok or the freighter was the people watching. The freighter, well; there were seven of them and the pilot and it was a long, quiet haul. But Ragnarok wasn't much better; less than a hundred souls, he'd been eating with all of them for years and they all knew each other and things were pretty set in stone. But there were people coming and going, here; awkward little political alliances and friendships, fights and reconciliations.
He filed it away-- had to, gossip was the main currency of any large enough ship-- let his eyes drift and take note of this one doesn't eat with that one and those ones aren't speaking and those two share secrets and I'd have a bite of that if it was on offer.
It was a good way to pass the time, and if it weren't for the bonds waiting somewhere along the Vector for him to get the job done-- not that they knew where he was or what it was he was asking-- he wouldn't have seen a problem with doing it indefinitely.
But there were the bonds to get back to, and he'd need an inmate soon. Some poor soul in the comfortable compromise of low-grade cruelty to others who'd need to be introduced to the complex and vexing world of giving half a damn about something beside themselves. He was already sympathetic.
Special Notes: None.