App for sirenspull
Player Information
Name: Famine
Age: 23
AIM SN: novatierrie
email: devil.shield@gmail.com
Have you played in an LJ based game before? Yes. Far too many in fact.
Bonus: How did you hear about Siren's Pull? dear_mun, that vile pit of scum and villainy
Character Information
General
Canon Source: Weiss Kreuz
Canon Format: Two anime series, drama CDs, OVA, manga
Character's Name: Ken Hidaka
Character's Age: 25
What form will your character's NV take? Something like this.
Abilities
Character's Canon Abilities: Ken is a highly trained operative of a secret organization that functions outside Japanese law. Specifically, he's an assassin--and accordingly, he has training in handling quite a few varieties of melee weapon, firearms, explosives, etc. He also is capable of running reconnisance and monitoring communications, though he's not particularly fond of it and therefore not very good at it. Mostly by choice. Otherwise, he's 100 percent non-special human.
Conditional: If your character has no superhuman canon abilities, what dormant ability will you give them? Due to Ken's particular relationship with fire, I'd like to make him pyrokinetic. At first this would be limited to manipulating the temperature of his body, and the ambient temperature of the air around him, progressing up to being able to light on fire anything within straight-line eye contact within a certain radius--10 feet or so? He'll need to obtain and hold eye contact without blinking, and concentrate for a set period of time (defaulting to about 10 seconds or so, shorter if his target is closer, longer if it's far away) to activate this power--it won't be something he can use on the fly. Furthermore, using it often will drain his energy very quickly--if he uses it too much he'll chance passing out until he's gotten accustomed to the drain, he'll need to rest to recover energy afterward. Perhaps with practice he'll be able to control already existing fire, which won't be such a drain on his energy as he didn't generate it.
...and did I mention he's actually somewhat pyrophobic? Even having the ability, he won't usually have the inclination to use it out of fear. Darn traumatizing experiences. For the average person, or even some of the not-so-average ones, his giant kitty claws o'death will be probably enough.
Weapons: Ken uses a set of clawed gauntlets I refuse to call them bagh nakhs on the premise that I giggle every time I do with four blades that extend a good seven or eight inches from his knuckles. The set he currently has does NOT retract as they did previously, when not actively trying to eviscerate someone he wears them in a sheath on his thigh. They also can detach from the gloves they're mounted on and be flung out on ropes. PHYSICS HAVE NO PLACE HERE. They're a very visceral and messy way to kill someone, especially seeing as how Ken usually goes for the gut shot. Not nice.
History/Personality/Plans/etc.
Character History: beware tl;dr.
Ken was born in the prefecture of Niigata in Japan on December 23rd, 1978--he was his parent's first--and only child. His mother died (the cause of which is unspecified) when Ken was young, after which Ken became dangerously depressed. His father was unable to deal with the change in his son, so Ken was sent to a Catholic church/children's home where one of the sisters practiced psychotherapy on the children living there. (She turned out to be an Evil Nun and was actually brainwashing the children under her care to kill for her. Weiss is later sent to kill her, and Ken is the one that struck the final blow. This is Very Important to his interaction with Nagi, who's basically sworn to make him pay for it.)
It was during this time that he met Kase, and also developed a lifelong love of soccer. He didn't test into high school, instead deciding to pursue a professional soccer career alongside Kase--both succeeded, getting put on the same team in the J-League. However, while Ken was an extremely talented goalkeeper, Kase was little more than a benchwarmer. He became incredibly jealous of the boy who was his best friend and joined a gang called Creeper, which was running an illegal soccer gambling ring. 'Cause this is just what you do when you're jealous of someone, I guess.
Kase was given the task of bringing Ken down so he would cause their team to lose a game, to great profit for those betting on it. Kase succeeded. Ken was thrown out of the J-League under suspicion of being involved in the gambling ring. Unfortunately for him, he also started investigating the events surrounding his disgrace and attracted the attention of Creeper, who decided that he had to go and Kase was just the guy for the job. Ken was convinced to go to a meeting with his 'friend' at an abandoned warehouse, where an attack was set up. Ken was beaten and left to die, the warehouse burning down around him. This is why you don't let friends play with matches, kids.
However, he was rescued. Kritiker found him before it was too late, and took him in--though the Ken Hidaka the world had known before then was widely considered to be dead. He healed from the terrible burns covering his back and legs--physically, though not completely mentally and therefore having a lasting fear of fire, was trained, and put on Kritiker's team of elite assassins, Weiss.
The team was rounded out by Yohji and Aya sometime after, and they began to do missions together--one of which was to assassinate the leader and second of the Creeper gang. Kase had risen in the ranks by this time--and he was one of the targets. Ken insisted on his friend's innocence, and was stabbed in the back yet again. However, he was almost ready to forgive Kase and once again plead for his friend's life...Kase spat on that trust and tried to kill him again. Ken finally struck the fatal blow with tears in his eyes. Why Ken didn't catch on long before is beyond me.
He continued on with Weiss, eventually assisting in the mission Weiss as it then existed had been formed to carry out in the first place--assassinate Reiji Takatori, who was a major bag of douche who had somehow taken over all of Japan and instated martial law within half a week. Ken was witness to the rooftop battle between Aya and Takatori Reiji, the one that ended his teams reason for existing--at least in theory. Funny how those don't work out.
Weiss's final goal accomplished and their employer dead, a casualty of the battle against Takatori, the team split and went their separate ways to try and reclaim some semblance of a normal life. Ken continued to coach the neighborhood boys in soccer, until he found himself targeted by a mysterious assiliant that seemed to hold a grudge against him. (Wonder who THAT could be.) Faced with the prospect of putting the children he cared about in danger by his continued presence, Ken returned to the destroyed basement of the Koneko to investigate just who was trying to kill him--and ran into the rest of Weiss.
Drawn back together, the four once again fell into the life of murder and chaos--this time, there would be no reprieve, no escape. And an enemy worse than the Takatori clan could even dream of being--Essett itself. WE NEED MORE DRAMA AFTER ALL. In their quest to revive their ancient leader, the cult abducted Aya's comatose sister and pitted their elite team, Schwarz, against Weiss directly--whereas before the two teams merely clashed because of Schwarz's temporary assignment to protect Takatori Reiji. The conflict came to a dramatic head when Weiss attacked the museum where Essett leaders and followers were gathering for the ritual that would awaken the cult's demon head in the body of Aya-chan. Weiss managed to throw the place into chaos by setting off explosives in the building, and killed two of the three elders, but found that Sakura, a young girl who looked like the twin of Aya-chan, had taken the comatose girl's place. And no one noticed because...because. The ritual interrupted, Weiss focused on rescuing Aya-chan, and to do so, had to contend with Schwarz. Ken fought against Farfarello, and was losing badly--Farf was merrily using his head as a wrecking ball in his one-man vendetta against masonry--until Omi jumped in to knock the berserker off of him. Ken in turn managed to get up and attack, hitting Farfarello under the jaw with his claws. Their battle ended only when the building, weakened by Omi's explosives and all the telekinetic energy flying around, collapsed and sent both teams into the sea. You'd think it'd end there, but no.
Against the odds, Weiss survived. After a time spent recovering, the team was assigned to travel around Japan in a florist's trailer, trying to allow the situation in Tokyo to cool down. Before they left Tokyo, however, they recieved a mission to take out an American officer killing Japanese civilians to cover up his illegal arms dealing. However, there was a problem with that--the officer's superior had Manx captive, and was using her to issue false orders to Weiss. Since they couldn't be sure where she was, they had to play along with the man's schemes--and it split the team in two, Ken and Omi against Yohji and Aya. To complete the deception, Yohji and Aya had to go after the targets assigned by Powell--more specifically, Akira Hibana, the older brother of one of Omi's classmates, Kaori. The sibling's parents had been killed when an American military aircraft crashed into their home, and Kaori had on many occasions hacked into the base's computer to see if she could find anything to use against him. Akira took the more violent and direct route of attempting to kill him. Both siblings fell under the protection of Ken and Omi, however in going against Powell's orders filtered through the mouth of 'Persia,' they were added to the target list. Because it's dramatic. Oh, and the viewer doesn't know this until later, so for all you know the first time out, they're serious.
While it all may have been an elaborate ruse, they had to keep up appearances--they had no idea if they were being monitored or not. After the death of Akira and the kidnapping of Kaori, Weiss faced off in the snowy ruined amusement park that had been the siblings and Omi and Ken's sanctuary. The fight was suitably bloody and violent--enough so to make one really think that they were trying to kill each other. Ken was the last one standing, covered in blood both fake and real (everyone makes mistakes, hey?) and claws broken.
Powell had thought he won. However, Weiss obviously lived--and they killed all of his soldiers, infiltrated the American base, and cornered the man in short order. Ken was the one who killed the corrupt man--taking Akira's sawed-off shotgun in hand, he shoved it down the general's throat and pulled the trigger. And kinda painted his face with brain matter in the process. Ew.
Well, that marked a bit of a downward spiral for Kenken. He became more and more bloodthirsty--going even so far as to mutilate already dead corpses when Weiss's mission targets were killed before Weiss could arrive on the scene, while angrily shouting that someone stole their kills. His kills. And advocating going after likely targets before Persia gives them the green light.
Yeah. Boy ain't right in the head. The thing is, he knew it. Aya confronted him about why he was acting so off, completely contradictory to how he had before...Ken admits that he's fully aware of what's happening to him, and he really doesn't seem to care. After the confrontation, Ken walks off and runs into a girl, Reiko, being chased by a couple of thugs trying to rape her--Ken nearly beats them to death with his bare hands. After Reiko pulls him off of them, they talk for a bit and end up at a Japanese restaurant where things proceed to get a little hot and steamy. Yeah, he has sex in the private booth of a restaurant with a woman he just unwittingly rescued from two guys trying to rape her. Because he wanted to kill them. Dear God this series is screwed up.
Later Ken and Reiko have a little chat about philosophy and faith--Ken again brings up his Christian background, saying that he's neglected the teachings so much that he's pretty sure he's on the devil's side now. Reiko brings up in rebuttal that she thought he was an angel come to rescue her. Both admit to being bad people, but in doing so become closer in an incredibly twisted way, going to each other for comfort. Of course this can't end well. Reiko turns out to be one of the ringleaders of a human trafficking operation that Weiss is sent to eliminate. Ken kills Reiko just before another group shows up...calling themselves Weiss.
Dun dun dun.
This other Weiss was led by Shion, Ran's old teacher, and represented a faction of Kritiker trying to take over, and in the doing they captured Birman, one of the higher-up operatives connected to Weiss as a handler. There was a rescue attempted, but the other Weiss was by far and away too strong--there was only one that managed to get away, Manx, and she was fatally wounded beside. She warned Weiss and asked them to take over the mission--to kill Birman so she wouldn't break and share information about Kritiker's structure that would lead to the organization's downfall, and then she died. Weiss went to confront Shion's group and rescue Birman, but couldn't even do that--horribly injured, Birman took Aya's gun and shot herself in the head. In the escape, Ken and Youji were faced with two of Shion's group, Ayame and Azami...two nearly perfect reflections of their own particular brands of insanity. Ayame lived for the kill, just like Ken was falling into. But those two were far worse off than Ken and Youji--the four fought and Ayame and Azami lost and died.
Bodes well for our boys, doesn't it?
But they manage to survive the final mission given by then-Persia Yoshirou Kurasuma--eliminate the remaining two of the Shion-led Weiss (Rindou and Shion himself) and the leader of the wayward faction of Kritiker they belonged to, a man named Nakasugawa. After that was finished, Weiss would be disbanded and they could all rebuild their lives. Instead, Nakasugawa was killed by Shion and Ran, Youji, and Ken went after him to finish the mission entirely. Ken and Youji were injured and could only watch the final fight between Shion and Ran...which Ran managed to win. With that, Weiss was disbanded, and Ken was free to make a new life for himself.
...it didn't exactly come at a very good time. Ken was too mentally unstable to do much but barely care for himself, sometimes look in on Youji, and look for fights. When Aya came back to talk to him about returning to Weiss, Ken agreed--though it wasn't because he wanted to kill or because Aya was doing it, Aya wouldn't let that be his answer. He instead returned to look for his redemption. So Weiss was brought back together, with Ken and Youji going off to investigate Esset holdings in Europe while Aya kept an eye on the two new kids and held down the fort at Koua Academy in Japan. Well, shit there went down in epic fashion, and Ken and Youji were dragged back before completing their mission in Europe, much to Ken's annoyance since there might've been a few Esset-brainwashed students he didn't get to eviscerate yet. He went undercover at Koua as a college student, doing surveillance on the side in an attempt to find the leader of Essett, Epitaph, believed to be the headmaster of the school. He ALSO has another meltdown at Aya, during which he says he'll follow Aya wherever he goes, if he decides to leave Kritiker. Also important.
Weeeeell they found the headmaster. And also trouble in the form of Tsujii, an instructor at the academy who ended up really being an Essett scientist and her gang of superpowered clones. Youji has an identity crisis and attacks Aya and leaves Ken and Omi with the final redshirt standing to go down into the Essett doom lab to end everything.
Yeah that doesn't go well. There are superpowered Essett agents waiting for them, and even better, Schwarz joins in the fray and it becomes a cameo clusterfuck ending in the revelation that Epitaph really IS the headmaster of the school, Fumie Kisaragi, and also one of those new guys? Her son. But wait! It gets better. Epitaph is REALLY a giant supercomputer and Tsujii wants to download all the information on it into the brain of one of her superclones who can kill you with a single word. Ken somehow gets a brainflash that if the kid can't speak, he can't use his power, and in a true show of spectacular genius, stops the kid from talking by grabbing him from behind and covering his mouth and then telling Aya to run them both through.
...yeah he didn't think about that one. But it worked, and the entire doom lab fell down around their ears, trapping Youji in the rubble...in an explosion ordered to be set by Saijou Takatori, Omi's dear grandpa and ex-leader of Kritiker. What an ass. But aside from Youji's unfortunate loss and the end of the redshirts, everyone in Weiss survives...but whether Schwarz did is unclear. Aya goes off to be all awesome assassin in America, Omi goes off to play Takatori, and Ken...
...Ken gets himself put in prison. To get his head straightened out. I don't even know. Successful in that endeavor after a short time spent going in and out of solitary for breaking people's arms, Ken leaves to finish up his business in Japan before gallivanting off halfway across the world after Aya. He meets Youji, who also survived the explosion but is now an amnesiac and living as Ryou Itou and has his mind put at ease about his friend's fate, retrieves Aya's sword from him, and then calls in yet another favor from Mamoru--he gets Aya's location, thanks to Kritiker intelligence, gets a weapon, and a plane ticket to London to surprise Aya. They join up with Krypton Brand, a British organization that kills people in the name of justice and just where have we heard that before but anyway...
...this time it's actually kinda true, and Krypton Brand turns out to be not half as bastardly as Kritiker could be. Ken and Aya's new teammates and mascot (they have a freaking owl. its name is Trabant.) and incidental girl that really should be more traumatized by the fact that she's living with a bunch of guys that killed her parents while she watched all live and work in a flower shop called the Kitten in the House and OKAY WHO COMES UP WITH THIS. SERIOUSLY.
Anyway, that incidental girl, whose name happens to be Kurumi, was being used to create a drug called Orphan which...either gave you superpowers or drove you insane. And killed you. And this was being distributed to a group attempting to create superhuman soldiers to fight for Welsh independence.
Why on God's good earth do I like this series, again?
Anyway, one of these guys was an old soccer buddy of Ken's, and well. They fight. Ken gets his ass kicked. But soccer buddy doesn't have main-character immunity to sharp stabby things and gets a fatal case of bladed fists to the midsection. This somehow lead to a bit of information indicating that some major shit was gonna go down at a wedding, and they decide to crash it.
This doesn't go well. Ken teams up with Free and Michel to take out some more of the superpowered drug addicts outside, and as all of them but Free (who got a dose of the stuff himself) are thoroughly normal, and also outnumbered, well...
Free ends up getting impaled while trying to protect Michel, and Ken shot while trying to come to their aid. And then...the series ends. No, I'm serious. Youji and Omi come back on the scene and then we're done.
Point in Canon: Weiss Kreuz Side B, specifically during the ending which can be summed up in 'God...what did I drink last night? ...and who are you and why are you in my bed?' on the level of wtf-is-going-on-here. I'm pretty sure Ken ended up getting shot. This is what happens when the drugs run out mid-production.
Character Personality: Ken is hot-headed and impulsive, his temper can boil over with very little warning. Even so, his temper has mellowed considerably with age. He's somewhat cautious with people he doesn't know, far less so than he used to be, but with those he knows well and trusts, he's a very open person--and also incredibly loyal. After you gain his trust, it takes a lot to lose it...but it takes even more to gain it back once you do. Even though generally he's a happy person, he's prone to fits of melancholy (but these are usually pretty well justified.) He's sweet, sentimental, and a bit of a dork. He gets along well with children and is patient with them (but few others.) He enjoys cooking and playing soccer, and of course teasing his teammates. He's not particularly book-smart, but he does have a good measure of common sense--he's just impulsive enough that he might end up doing what he knows is a bad idea anyway, for the sake of expedience. Or do it before he realizes that it is a bad idea. Even odds. Ken was also raised Catholic, and therefore still has impulses towards being somewhat spiritual--spend your formative years in a Catholic church getting raised by nuns, and you'd be largely the same. He believes in God, but he also believes in Hell, and has a pretty good idea of where he's likely to end up.
Ken deals daily with a great amount of inner conflict over becoming a killer. This is due to his sense of honor and morals. He hates liars and betrayers, and due to the fact that he has become a liar and a betrayer, as well as a murderer, he does have some measure of self hatred, usually fairly well hidden to anyone on the outside looking in. Through the last six years, Ken has fallen from an idealistic and naive young man who only wanted to prevent people from suffering as he had, to a blood-crazed berserker with little remorse over the lives he's taken, then risen back to an optimistic, if jaded, man who almost fears the killer he was, a man who lost sight of his ideals and paid for it. The catalyst for the change was Aya, and his friend was the reason Ken took the time to remember who he was and regain his sanity before leaving for Britain--probably the only reason he managed it, as Ken has a perhaps unhealthy attachment to Aya as an idealized person; someone who's gone through the same shit he has and come out almost better for it on the other side.
Now that he's mostly at peace with who and what he is, Ken's demeanor while in Britain is one of someone who is much happier with himself. He usually has a smile on his face and has taken easily to teasing the younger members of his new team as well as sniping back and forth with Chloe. In addition to his soccer playing, he's also taken up cooking (no small task for a household full of bachelors.) He's not always sunshine and rainbows, of course, but he's also certainly not the broken and insane man that he was...most of the time. There's still a dark edge to him that he's trying to overcome.
Character Plans: ...not getting killed by Nagi and Schuldig and Tot? That's a good plan, right? Seriously though, for now he'll be trying to lie low and make connections with the other people here while simultaneously getting very frustrated as he's trying to figure out just what's going on. (He is not the brains of the operation.)
Appearance/PB: Pic!
Writing Samples
First Person Sample
[The video feed opens up on a friendly enough looking face, in pain if you're observant enough, but he's hiding it well. Or at least the full extent of it, because being shot bloody well hurts. The video is close enough that where he is, exactly, isn't all that obvious--but he hasn't moved off the baseball diamond, he's too injured to. His half-mask is hanging down around his neck, scarf sacrificed for the greater good of trying to keep his blood in his body where it belongs...yeah, he's a mess. His voice is raspy when he speaks and he's breathing rather hard.]
Well, this is new.
Free, Michel...if you can hear me...
[he stops again, gasping. He's in a bad way and he knows it.]
Any chance of a hospital around here, anyone?
Ran, you better be okay.
Third Person Sample
Well, Ken wished he could say that he was used to all this weirdness, but one thing he'd realized over the years was that whenever he thought he'd seen it all, something was going to come along and top it. Feeling like he'd been pulled through a too-narrow tube on top of taking a bullet to the torso--really a place that didn't do to have bullets put in it--and landing in what looked to be an abandoned sport field (baseball, not a decent sport like soccer) graffitied to Hell and back with messages entirely not comforting.
Ken Hidaka was, needless to say, not having a good day.
He managed, barely, to pull off his scarf and wind the thick fabric tightly around his waist, trying to stop the flow of blood. He needed to get to a hospital, post-haste, if he wanted to have any sort of chance of survival--but even the knowledge that he was dying by inches failed to cause much panic. He'd been in this place before, many different times--he'd accepted long ago that his luck was bound to run out eventually. No, his only concern was for his teammates, his friends--Free, Michel, Yuki, Chloe (that bastard,) and Ran.
His hand was bloodied, slipped down and landed on...a cell phone, but not one like he'd ever seen, and with no functions like any cell phone he'd ever seen, or owned.
Well, he needed help. He was too injured to go very far...and he couldn't see anyone around. And here he was bleeding on someone's cell phone, all ready to be used. Okay, what was the emergency number again? It wasn't 110, that was what it was back home (where everything made sense and the food wasn't terrible.) Why couldn't it be the same everywhere, the damn Brits were making everything a hell of a lot more difficult than it needed to be...
When he dialed 999, though, he got nothing but an obnoxious voice telling him that the number he was trying to call didn't exist. The hell it didn't. Who's bright idea was it to change the damn emergency number and not tell anyone? Bloody brilliant...
...did he want to record a video message? Sure, why the hell not...
Name: Famine
Age: 23
AIM SN: novatierrie
email: devil.shield@gmail.com
Have you played in an LJ based game before? Yes. Far too many in fact.
Bonus: How did you hear about Siren's Pull? dear_mun, that vile pit of scum and villainy
Character Information
General
Canon Source: Weiss Kreuz
Canon Format: Two anime series, drama CDs, OVA, manga
Character's Name: Ken Hidaka
Character's Age: 25
What form will your character's NV take? Something like this.
Abilities
Character's Canon Abilities: Ken is a highly trained operative of a secret organization that functions outside Japanese law. Specifically, he's an assassin--and accordingly, he has training in handling quite a few varieties of melee weapon, firearms, explosives, etc. He also is capable of running reconnisance and monitoring communications, though he's not particularly fond of it and therefore not very good at it. Mostly by choice. Otherwise, he's 100 percent non-special human.
Conditional: If your character has no superhuman canon abilities, what dormant ability will you give them? Due to Ken's particular relationship with fire, I'd like to make him pyrokinetic. At first this would be limited to manipulating the temperature of his body, and the ambient temperature of the air around him, progressing up to being able to light on fire anything within straight-line eye contact within a certain radius--10 feet or so? He'll need to obtain and hold eye contact without blinking, and concentrate for a set period of time (defaulting to about 10 seconds or so, shorter if his target is closer, longer if it's far away) to activate this power--it won't be something he can use on the fly. Furthermore, using it often will drain his energy very quickly--if he uses it too much he'll chance passing out until he's gotten accustomed to the drain, he'll need to rest to recover energy afterward. Perhaps with practice he'll be able to control already existing fire, which won't be such a drain on his energy as he didn't generate it.
...and did I mention he's actually somewhat pyrophobic? Even having the ability, he won't usually have the inclination to use it out of fear. Darn traumatizing experiences. For the average person, or even some of the not-so-average ones, his giant kitty claws o'death will be probably enough.
Weapons: Ken uses a set of clawed gauntlets I refuse to call them bagh nakhs on the premise that I giggle every time I do with four blades that extend a good seven or eight inches from his knuckles. The set he currently has does NOT retract as they did previously, when not actively trying to eviscerate someone he wears them in a sheath on his thigh. They also can detach from the gloves they're mounted on and be flung out on ropes. PHYSICS HAVE NO PLACE HERE. They're a very visceral and messy way to kill someone, especially seeing as how Ken usually goes for the gut shot. Not nice.
History/Personality/Plans/etc.
Character History: beware tl;dr.
Ken was born in the prefecture of Niigata in Japan on December 23rd, 1978--he was his parent's first--and only child. His mother died (the cause of which is unspecified) when Ken was young, after which Ken became dangerously depressed. His father was unable to deal with the change in his son, so Ken was sent to a Catholic church/children's home where one of the sisters practiced psychotherapy on the children living there. (She turned out to be an Evil Nun and was actually brainwashing the children under her care to kill for her. Weiss is later sent to kill her, and Ken is the one that struck the final blow. This is Very Important to his interaction with Nagi, who's basically sworn to make him pay for it.)
It was during this time that he met Kase, and also developed a lifelong love of soccer. He didn't test into high school, instead deciding to pursue a professional soccer career alongside Kase--both succeeded, getting put on the same team in the J-League. However, while Ken was an extremely talented goalkeeper, Kase was little more than a benchwarmer. He became incredibly jealous of the boy who was his best friend and joined a gang called Creeper, which was running an illegal soccer gambling ring. 'Cause this is just what you do when you're jealous of someone, I guess.
Kase was given the task of bringing Ken down so he would cause their team to lose a game, to great profit for those betting on it. Kase succeeded. Ken was thrown out of the J-League under suspicion of being involved in the gambling ring. Unfortunately for him, he also started investigating the events surrounding his disgrace and attracted the attention of Creeper, who decided that he had to go and Kase was just the guy for the job. Ken was convinced to go to a meeting with his 'friend' at an abandoned warehouse, where an attack was set up. Ken was beaten and left to die, the warehouse burning down around him. This is why you don't let friends play with matches, kids.
However, he was rescued. Kritiker found him before it was too late, and took him in--though the Ken Hidaka the world had known before then was widely considered to be dead. He healed from the terrible burns covering his back and legs--physically, though not completely mentally and therefore having a lasting fear of fire, was trained, and put on Kritiker's team of elite assassins, Weiss.
The team was rounded out by Yohji and Aya sometime after, and they began to do missions together--one of which was to assassinate the leader and second of the Creeper gang. Kase had risen in the ranks by this time--and he was one of the targets. Ken insisted on his friend's innocence, and was stabbed in the back yet again. However, he was almost ready to forgive Kase and once again plead for his friend's life...Kase spat on that trust and tried to kill him again. Ken finally struck the fatal blow with tears in his eyes. Why Ken didn't catch on long before is beyond me.
He continued on with Weiss, eventually assisting in the mission Weiss as it then existed had been formed to carry out in the first place--assassinate Reiji Takatori, who was a major bag of douche who had somehow taken over all of Japan and instated martial law within half a week. Ken was witness to the rooftop battle between Aya and Takatori Reiji, the one that ended his teams reason for existing--at least in theory. Funny how those don't work out.
Weiss's final goal accomplished and their employer dead, a casualty of the battle against Takatori, the team split and went their separate ways to try and reclaim some semblance of a normal life. Ken continued to coach the neighborhood boys in soccer, until he found himself targeted by a mysterious assiliant that seemed to hold a grudge against him. (Wonder who THAT could be.) Faced with the prospect of putting the children he cared about in danger by his continued presence, Ken returned to the destroyed basement of the Koneko to investigate just who was trying to kill him--and ran into the rest of Weiss.
Drawn back together, the four once again fell into the life of murder and chaos--this time, there would be no reprieve, no escape. And an enemy worse than the Takatori clan could even dream of being--Essett itself. WE NEED MORE DRAMA AFTER ALL. In their quest to revive their ancient leader, the cult abducted Aya's comatose sister and pitted their elite team, Schwarz, against Weiss directly--whereas before the two teams merely clashed because of Schwarz's temporary assignment to protect Takatori Reiji. The conflict came to a dramatic head when Weiss attacked the museum where Essett leaders and followers were gathering for the ritual that would awaken the cult's demon head in the body of Aya-chan. Weiss managed to throw the place into chaos by setting off explosives in the building, and killed two of the three elders, but found that Sakura, a young girl who looked like the twin of Aya-chan, had taken the comatose girl's place. And no one noticed because...because. The ritual interrupted, Weiss focused on rescuing Aya-chan, and to do so, had to contend with Schwarz. Ken fought against Farfarello, and was losing badly--Farf was merrily using his head as a wrecking ball in his one-man vendetta against masonry--until Omi jumped in to knock the berserker off of him. Ken in turn managed to get up and attack, hitting Farfarello under the jaw with his claws. Their battle ended only when the building, weakened by Omi's explosives and all the telekinetic energy flying around, collapsed and sent both teams into the sea. You'd think it'd end there, but no.
Against the odds, Weiss survived. After a time spent recovering, the team was assigned to travel around Japan in a florist's trailer, trying to allow the situation in Tokyo to cool down. Before they left Tokyo, however, they recieved a mission to take out an American officer killing Japanese civilians to cover up his illegal arms dealing. However, there was a problem with that--the officer's superior had Manx captive, and was using her to issue false orders to Weiss. Since they couldn't be sure where she was, they had to play along with the man's schemes--and it split the team in two, Ken and Omi against Yohji and Aya. To complete the deception, Yohji and Aya had to go after the targets assigned by Powell--more specifically, Akira Hibana, the older brother of one of Omi's classmates, Kaori. The sibling's parents had been killed when an American military aircraft crashed into their home, and Kaori had on many occasions hacked into the base's computer to see if she could find anything to use against him. Akira took the more violent and direct route of attempting to kill him. Both siblings fell under the protection of Ken and Omi, however in going against Powell's orders filtered through the mouth of 'Persia,' they were added to the target list. Because it's dramatic. Oh, and the viewer doesn't know this until later, so for all you know the first time out, they're serious.
While it all may have been an elaborate ruse, they had to keep up appearances--they had no idea if they were being monitored or not. After the death of Akira and the kidnapping of Kaori, Weiss faced off in the snowy ruined amusement park that had been the siblings and Omi and Ken's sanctuary. The fight was suitably bloody and violent--enough so to make one really think that they were trying to kill each other. Ken was the last one standing, covered in blood both fake and real (everyone makes mistakes, hey?) and claws broken.
Powell had thought he won. However, Weiss obviously lived--and they killed all of his soldiers, infiltrated the American base, and cornered the man in short order. Ken was the one who killed the corrupt man--taking Akira's sawed-off shotgun in hand, he shoved it down the general's throat and pulled the trigger. And kinda painted his face with brain matter in the process. Ew.
Well, that marked a bit of a downward spiral for Kenken. He became more and more bloodthirsty--going even so far as to mutilate already dead corpses when Weiss's mission targets were killed before Weiss could arrive on the scene, while angrily shouting that someone stole their kills. His kills. And advocating going after likely targets before Persia gives them the green light.
Yeah. Boy ain't right in the head. The thing is, he knew it. Aya confronted him about why he was acting so off, completely contradictory to how he had before...Ken admits that he's fully aware of what's happening to him, and he really doesn't seem to care. After the confrontation, Ken walks off and runs into a girl, Reiko, being chased by a couple of thugs trying to rape her--Ken nearly beats them to death with his bare hands. After Reiko pulls him off of them, they talk for a bit and end up at a Japanese restaurant where things proceed to get a little hot and steamy. Yeah, he has sex in the private booth of a restaurant with a woman he just unwittingly rescued from two guys trying to rape her. Because he wanted to kill them. Dear God this series is screwed up.
Later Ken and Reiko have a little chat about philosophy and faith--Ken again brings up his Christian background, saying that he's neglected the teachings so much that he's pretty sure he's on the devil's side now. Reiko brings up in rebuttal that she thought he was an angel come to rescue her. Both admit to being bad people, but in doing so become closer in an incredibly twisted way, going to each other for comfort. Of course this can't end well. Reiko turns out to be one of the ringleaders of a human trafficking operation that Weiss is sent to eliminate. Ken kills Reiko just before another group shows up...calling themselves Weiss.
Dun dun dun.
This other Weiss was led by Shion, Ran's old teacher, and represented a faction of Kritiker trying to take over, and in the doing they captured Birman, one of the higher-up operatives connected to Weiss as a handler. There was a rescue attempted, but the other Weiss was by far and away too strong--there was only one that managed to get away, Manx, and she was fatally wounded beside. She warned Weiss and asked them to take over the mission--to kill Birman so she wouldn't break and share information about Kritiker's structure that would lead to the organization's downfall, and then she died. Weiss went to confront Shion's group and rescue Birman, but couldn't even do that--horribly injured, Birman took Aya's gun and shot herself in the head. In the escape, Ken and Youji were faced with two of Shion's group, Ayame and Azami...two nearly perfect reflections of their own particular brands of insanity. Ayame lived for the kill, just like Ken was falling into. But those two were far worse off than Ken and Youji--the four fought and Ayame and Azami lost and died.
Bodes well for our boys, doesn't it?
But they manage to survive the final mission given by then-Persia Yoshirou Kurasuma--eliminate the remaining two of the Shion-led Weiss (Rindou and Shion himself) and the leader of the wayward faction of Kritiker they belonged to, a man named Nakasugawa. After that was finished, Weiss would be disbanded and they could all rebuild their lives. Instead, Nakasugawa was killed by Shion and Ran, Youji, and Ken went after him to finish the mission entirely. Ken and Youji were injured and could only watch the final fight between Shion and Ran...which Ran managed to win. With that, Weiss was disbanded, and Ken was free to make a new life for himself.
...it didn't exactly come at a very good time. Ken was too mentally unstable to do much but barely care for himself, sometimes look in on Youji, and look for fights. When Aya came back to talk to him about returning to Weiss, Ken agreed--though it wasn't because he wanted to kill or because Aya was doing it, Aya wouldn't let that be his answer. He instead returned to look for his redemption. So Weiss was brought back together, with Ken and Youji going off to investigate Esset holdings in Europe while Aya kept an eye on the two new kids and held down the fort at Koua Academy in Japan. Well, shit there went down in epic fashion, and Ken and Youji were dragged back before completing their mission in Europe, much to Ken's annoyance since there might've been a few Esset-brainwashed students he didn't get to eviscerate yet. He went undercover at Koua as a college student, doing surveillance on the side in an attempt to find the leader of Essett, Epitaph, believed to be the headmaster of the school. He ALSO has another meltdown at Aya, during which he says he'll follow Aya wherever he goes, if he decides to leave Kritiker. Also important.
Weeeeell they found the headmaster. And also trouble in the form of Tsujii, an instructor at the academy who ended up really being an Essett scientist and her gang of superpowered clones. Youji has an identity crisis and attacks Aya and leaves Ken and Omi with the final redshirt standing to go down into the Essett doom lab to end everything.
Yeah that doesn't go well. There are superpowered Essett agents waiting for them, and even better, Schwarz joins in the fray and it becomes a cameo clusterfuck ending in the revelation that Epitaph really IS the headmaster of the school, Fumie Kisaragi, and also one of those new guys? Her son. But wait! It gets better. Epitaph is REALLY a giant supercomputer and Tsujii wants to download all the information on it into the brain of one of her superclones who can kill you with a single word. Ken somehow gets a brainflash that if the kid can't speak, he can't use his power, and in a true show of spectacular genius, stops the kid from talking by grabbing him from behind and covering his mouth and then telling Aya to run them both through.
...yeah he didn't think about that one. But it worked, and the entire doom lab fell down around their ears, trapping Youji in the rubble...in an explosion ordered to be set by Saijou Takatori, Omi's dear grandpa and ex-leader of Kritiker. What an ass. But aside from Youji's unfortunate loss and the end of the redshirts, everyone in Weiss survives...but whether Schwarz did is unclear. Aya goes off to be all awesome assassin in America, Omi goes off to play Takatori, and Ken...
...Ken gets himself put in prison. To get his head straightened out. I don't even know. Successful in that endeavor after a short time spent going in and out of solitary for breaking people's arms, Ken leaves to finish up his business in Japan before gallivanting off halfway across the world after Aya. He meets Youji, who also survived the explosion but is now an amnesiac and living as Ryou Itou and has his mind put at ease about his friend's fate, retrieves Aya's sword from him, and then calls in yet another favor from Mamoru--he gets Aya's location, thanks to Kritiker intelligence, gets a weapon, and a plane ticket to London to surprise Aya. They join up with Krypton Brand, a British organization that kills people in the name of justice and just where have we heard that before but anyway...
...this time it's actually kinda true, and Krypton Brand turns out to be not half as bastardly as Kritiker could be. Ken and Aya's new teammates and mascot (they have a freaking owl. its name is Trabant.) and incidental girl that really should be more traumatized by the fact that she's living with a bunch of guys that killed her parents while she watched all live and work in a flower shop called the Kitten in the House and OKAY WHO COMES UP WITH THIS. SERIOUSLY.
Anyway, that incidental girl, whose name happens to be Kurumi, was being used to create a drug called Orphan which...either gave you superpowers or drove you insane. And killed you. And this was being distributed to a group attempting to create superhuman soldiers to fight for Welsh independence.
Why on God's good earth do I like this series, again?
Anyway, one of these guys was an old soccer buddy of Ken's, and well. They fight. Ken gets his ass kicked. But soccer buddy doesn't have main-character immunity to sharp stabby things and gets a fatal case of bladed fists to the midsection. This somehow lead to a bit of information indicating that some major shit was gonna go down at a wedding, and they decide to crash it.
This doesn't go well. Ken teams up with Free and Michel to take out some more of the superpowered drug addicts outside, and as all of them but Free (who got a dose of the stuff himself) are thoroughly normal, and also outnumbered, well...
Free ends up getting impaled while trying to protect Michel, and Ken shot while trying to come to their aid. And then...the series ends. No, I'm serious. Youji and Omi come back on the scene and then we're done.
Point in Canon: Weiss Kreuz Side B, specifically during the ending which can be summed up in 'God...what did I drink last night? ...and who are you and why are you in my bed?' on the level of wtf-is-going-on-here. I'm pretty sure Ken ended up getting shot. This is what happens when the drugs run out mid-production.
Character Personality: Ken is hot-headed and impulsive, his temper can boil over with very little warning. Even so, his temper has mellowed considerably with age. He's somewhat cautious with people he doesn't know, far less so than he used to be, but with those he knows well and trusts, he's a very open person--and also incredibly loyal. After you gain his trust, it takes a lot to lose it...but it takes even more to gain it back once you do. Even though generally he's a happy person, he's prone to fits of melancholy (but these are usually pretty well justified.) He's sweet, sentimental, and a bit of a dork. He gets along well with children and is patient with them (but few others.) He enjoys cooking and playing soccer, and of course teasing his teammates. He's not particularly book-smart, but he does have a good measure of common sense--he's just impulsive enough that he might end up doing what he knows is a bad idea anyway, for the sake of expedience. Or do it before he realizes that it is a bad idea. Even odds. Ken was also raised Catholic, and therefore still has impulses towards being somewhat spiritual--spend your formative years in a Catholic church getting raised by nuns, and you'd be largely the same. He believes in God, but he also believes in Hell, and has a pretty good idea of where he's likely to end up.
Ken deals daily with a great amount of inner conflict over becoming a killer. This is due to his sense of honor and morals. He hates liars and betrayers, and due to the fact that he has become a liar and a betrayer, as well as a murderer, he does have some measure of self hatred, usually fairly well hidden to anyone on the outside looking in. Through the last six years, Ken has fallen from an idealistic and naive young man who only wanted to prevent people from suffering as he had, to a blood-crazed berserker with little remorse over the lives he's taken, then risen back to an optimistic, if jaded, man who almost fears the killer he was, a man who lost sight of his ideals and paid for it. The catalyst for the change was Aya, and his friend was the reason Ken took the time to remember who he was and regain his sanity before leaving for Britain--probably the only reason he managed it, as Ken has a perhaps unhealthy attachment to Aya as an idealized person; someone who's gone through the same shit he has and come out almost better for it on the other side.
Now that he's mostly at peace with who and what he is, Ken's demeanor while in Britain is one of someone who is much happier with himself. He usually has a smile on his face and has taken easily to teasing the younger members of his new team as well as sniping back and forth with Chloe. In addition to his soccer playing, he's also taken up cooking (no small task for a household full of bachelors.) He's not always sunshine and rainbows, of course, but he's also certainly not the broken and insane man that he was...most of the time. There's still a dark edge to him that he's trying to overcome.
Character Plans: ...not getting killed by Nagi and Schuldig and Tot? That's a good plan, right? Seriously though, for now he'll be trying to lie low and make connections with the other people here while simultaneously getting very frustrated as he's trying to figure out just what's going on. (He is not the brains of the operation.)
Appearance/PB: Pic!
Writing Samples
First Person Sample
[The video feed opens up on a friendly enough looking face, in pain if you're observant enough, but he's hiding it well. Or at least the full extent of it, because being shot bloody well hurts. The video is close enough that where he is, exactly, isn't all that obvious--but he hasn't moved off the baseball diamond, he's too injured to. His half-mask is hanging down around his neck, scarf sacrificed for the greater good of trying to keep his blood in his body where it belongs...yeah, he's a mess. His voice is raspy when he speaks and he's breathing rather hard.]
Well, this is new.
Free, Michel...if you can hear me...
[he stops again, gasping. He's in a bad way and he knows it.]
Any chance of a hospital around here, anyone?
Ran, you better be okay.
Third Person Sample
Well, Ken wished he could say that he was used to all this weirdness, but one thing he'd realized over the years was that whenever he thought he'd seen it all, something was going to come along and top it. Feeling like he'd been pulled through a too-narrow tube on top of taking a bullet to the torso--really a place that didn't do to have bullets put in it--and landing in what looked to be an abandoned sport field (baseball, not a decent sport like soccer) graffitied to Hell and back with messages entirely not comforting.
Ken Hidaka was, needless to say, not having a good day.
He managed, barely, to pull off his scarf and wind the thick fabric tightly around his waist, trying to stop the flow of blood. He needed to get to a hospital, post-haste, if he wanted to have any sort of chance of survival--but even the knowledge that he was dying by inches failed to cause much panic. He'd been in this place before, many different times--he'd accepted long ago that his luck was bound to run out eventually. No, his only concern was for his teammates, his friends--Free, Michel, Yuki, Chloe (that bastard,) and Ran.
His hand was bloodied, slipped down and landed on...a cell phone, but not one like he'd ever seen, and with no functions like any cell phone he'd ever seen, or owned.
Well, he needed help. He was too injured to go very far...and he couldn't see anyone around. And here he was bleeding on someone's cell phone, all ready to be used. Okay, what was the emergency number again? It wasn't 110, that was what it was back home (where everything made sense and the food wasn't terrible.) Why couldn't it be the same everywhere, the damn Brits were making everything a hell of a lot more difficult than it needed to be...
When he dialed 999, though, he got nothing but an obnoxious voice telling him that the number he was trying to call didn't exist. The hell it didn't. Who's bright idea was it to change the damn emergency number and not tell anyone? Bloody brilliant...
...did he want to record a video message? Sure, why the hell not...