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View Full Version : New characters backstory, what do you think?



Typewriter
2011-11-03, 09:18 AM
New character, thought maybe someone might enjoy reading it. Bonus points if you can point out the "Spider-Man: The animated series" reference.

Warning: Not short


Name: Roland Emeric
Known Aliases: The Cat, Echo, Tom Hardeski, Roman Ciles
Born: January 23, 1961

Roland’s parents were killed in a car crash while traveling through London in 1964. Originally he was going to be sent home to France to be taken care of the system there, but it was discovered that he had no other family, and that his parents had been quite wealthy. Whatever institution took care of Roland would be given the money for his care. Roland was put into an orphanage in London, and the money was taken in the system ‘for his care’.

Roland spent the next few years avoiding trouble and keeping quiet. Often, the staff where he stayed would forget about him entirely. He would be left to his own devices for hours at a time while all the other children were cleaning or working. He took this opportunity to wander around the orphanage learning all he could about it and finding ways into places that the children normally weren't allowed. He even manage to find ways to get out of the facility undetected.

In 1968 Roland left the orphanage one night and went to one of his favorite locations - a library in a private school several blocks away. He had been coming here fairly often but it was getting exhausting constantly going through the hassle of climbing the gate and wiggling through chained doors. He had considered taking some books, but realized that even though he may have been hard to miss the teachers at the orphanage would probably notice the sudden appearance of giant new books. Roland instead broke into the Principals office and looked through records. He found a new student his own age whose parents were paying for his schooling and had also made large donations in the past. He added his name as a second child and doubled all the amounts to be billed, making the assumption that the wealthy family wouldn't notice the tuition fees rise. One trip to the locker room and he got enough clothes to keep him blended in for a few days.

His plan worked perfectly. He began going to the private school regularly and was generally a very focused student. Rarely did he ever do anything to stand out, purposefully aiming for middling grades. He discovered he had a head for working with chemicals in the science lab, and this was the one place he regularly allowed himself to excel.

In 1977 the school issued a notification for selection of a scholarship for science to the home listed as the residence of "Tom Hardeski". When Thomas Hardeski found out his son had been selected for a scholarship he was quite pleased. Then he noticed the typo. His son was named "William", not "Tom". A few phone calls later and "Tom Hardeski" was pulled out of class by police. He stayed quiet at first and refused to give up any information on who he really was, but when they searched his locker they found his uniform from the orphanage.

They threatened to lock him up, they threatened to send him home to France to live in squalor, they threatened him with anything and everything they could imagine. What wound up being his saving grace though was his friend, William Hardeski. William convinced his father to not press charges against Roland, but Thomas was still insistent that something happen to the young man. He contacted a friend of his in the military and told him all about what Roland had pulled off. Roland was taken from the police by a few military men. They got him waived to enlist before his 18th birthday, and away he went for special training.

Because of Roland’s abilities to blend it and avoid detection, combined with his ability to find ways through secure areas they decided to place him in Russia as a spy. He was given time and money to stand up a new identity in Russia, which he used to create Roman Ciles. He found work as an lab assistant, but his long term goal was to find a way to gain continuous access to confidential documents and leak them out. No one that he interacted with would know his actual identity, they would all think he was a Russian turncoat. The codename that he used whenever he would need to transfer documents was Echo.

Roland made a habit of going to bars and attempting to listen in on peoples conversations. He was usually able to get a bit of information here, a bit there, but he was never able to come up with anything substantial. Then he hit his break. He was in a particularly seedy location one evening when he overheard a name dropped by a couple of thugs. Apparently one of them had heard that this politician had received a shipment of diamonds, and they were planning a break in, but none of them had the skill to crack the safe that they heard the owner possessed. Roland introduced himself under the alias of "The Cat" and offered to perform the deed for a small fee. They would supply him with the address and any information they had on security, he would return with the diamonds. They laughed at him at first, but agreed, feeling they had nothing to lose and everything to gain.

Roland had taught himself how to break into locks at a young age. It's how he had earned the small amount of freedom he had in the orphanage, it was how he got the education he did. This was something completely new. Getting into the house wasn't difficult, but when he found the safe something inside of him clicked. A feeling of bliss came over him from the moment he entered the study. Going through the drawers one at a time, copying documents, relocking the drawers that had been locked but not those that hadn't. Then the safe. He put his ear to it and began to listen as he turned the knobs. He could hear others in the house moving about. He thought about being caught. The safe opened.

Roland returned to the bar 3 hours and 37 minutes after first accepting the assignment. He gave all but one of the diamonds to his new friends and accepted their payment. Before slinking away he told them that he would be in touch. Every few days he would take on a new task and every time he pulled it off flawlessly. He never accepted contracts that were too dangerous regardless of the possible payout, avoiding situations that would put him in undue risk. All contracts that he did accept he treated as if it were his first, his most important. At first he considered only taking on tasks that would put him against government officials, but he decided that might end up looking suspicious - a thief known as "The Cat" who only targeted government officials. He told himself that was why he accepted so many tasks for personal gain. In truth it was more the thrill that interested him.

As a result of all his jobs "Roman" began to become rather wealthy. Not wanting to draw undue suspicion to himself he began to distribute his wealth among several different locations. A room he stayed at once might have 10,000 dollars hidden in a wall, a locker in a train station in France might hold a collection of trinkets - diamonds and a lock set. He never kept large sums in any single location, spreading it around as safely as he could manage. He didn’t live outside of his apparent means, sure he might have an antique watch that he ‘inherited’, but Roman was never seen spending heavily.

It was 1980 when Roland first set foot in Russia under the identity of Roman, and it was 1988 when everything went wrong. He was on a fairly simple task when he was confronted for the first time. He was in the home of the Chief of Police looking for documents when the man stumbled upstairs drunkenly. He made eye contact for a few seconds before Roland drove a dagger into his throat, driven purely by instinct. This was the first time Roland had had to take a life. He'd successfully avoided encountering any of his targets for 8 years, but now there was blood on his hands. He didn't bother to copy the documents, instead just stealing them. He decided not to show his face as the Cat anymore after that. The Cats first failed mission would also be his last.

He waited a week before making contact as "Echo" to deliver his most recent collection of documents. He had intended on explaining the situation to them and telling them he needed time to come up with a new method of gathering data or would instead possibly require extraction. Instead he handed over the documents, and before he could say anything his contact whispered into his cuff, "Verified, his documents come from the man killed by the Cat". Roland was startled for just a few seconds before, "Confirmed. We appreciate the effort you've put forth for us, but you've become a liability". Roland was shot and left to die in that alley.

Word spread that the Cat had been killed, all records of "Contact: Echo" were destroyed, and those that knew the connection between Roland Emeric and Echo made the appropriate actions so that Roland would show up as dead. A significant donation was made to the orphanage he grew up in under his name.

Roland was dead, completely written off. Roman, on the other hand managed to walk away with minimal harm. He didn't know if maybe his contact had shown mercy after so many years of working together, or maybe he was just a bad shot, but a few weeks in the hospital and Roman returned to work as if nothing had gone wrong. He had spent 8 years wearing Roman as a mask, but had never taken the time to really delve into that life. Now though it looked like this life was everything he would ever have. He had spent half his life feeling unassociated from those around him, only feeling excitement when he was breaking the law. Now he had taken a life but it didn’t feel right. It didn’t feel like it did when he cracked a safe, or pulled off a mission. He felt dirty, but he paid the price. He lost a life to the mistake, but he still had one more left to live.

Roman stopped committing crimes, changing his focus to work and relationships. He excelled at work, getting promoted several times, but never quite got the hang of relationships. His work buddies were never buddies anywhere else, and most nights at the bar ended with Roman taking a prostitute rather than a lovely stranger home.

In 1990 he met his love and when he proposed he did so with a ring made with the first diamond he ever stole. Within a year she was pregnant and they had a lovely, healthy girl. Being a father was the only thing that ever made him feel the same way as his safe cracking days. Every hug, every tear, every smile was the same to him as opening a safe for the first time or popping a lock without being detected.

But Roman began to yearn. He worked in the sciences and as time went on the focus was beginning to shift more and more towards computers, something that Roman had never had any interest in. He didn't trust them, didn’t see the value. He yearned for the days of the hunt, for having to find the path, the perfect execution. Then it came to him one day while reading a magazine. An old investor by the name of Thomas Hardeski had purchased an antique safe at auction, spending a small fortune on it. Roman became more and more curious as time went on.

Roman orchestrated a trip to London and within a month he had found his way inside the safe. Mementos, a bit of cash, evidence of embezzling. Roman couldn't help but contemplate turning these documents over to the police anonymously. He felt a grudge against this man for everything that had happened to him even though he knew it wasn't his fault. Even though it had all been because of his own mistakes. Finally, he decided not to do anything, but then he noticed the pictures under some other documents. Pictures of children. Thomas was arrested 2 days later.

Roman made a habit over the next couple years to keep an eye out for antique safes or vaults. They were his great weakness, these relics. If he was in someone’s office he might check behind pictures, if he was at someone’s home he would peak his head in to every room on the way to the restroom, just in case. Anyone who ever slighted Roman or his family found themselves in legal trouble soon after, and most of the time it was legitimate, though Roman wasn't above planting evidence in people’s homes. His wealth began to increase again, and he returned to his old habit of stockpiling loot across all of Europe.

He added a few more tricks to his collection, knockout gases, and toxins - never lethal. At one point Roman even overheard one judge in his home accepting a bribe. He was unable to find evidence of these crimes, and the man was too well protected to get anything planted to stick, so Roman made a mixture that would send him into a permanent coma. The judge drank his juice that evening, never knowing that would be the last action he took unassisted again.

Roman was also careful about one other thing - he could never lead anyone back to his home. He kept a cyanide caplet at the ready, and never took anything that could be used to identify him. He had it set up so that an old acquaintance of his would make a delivery to his home if he ever failed to show up for 2 or more weeks that would explain the situation to his wife and daughter as best he could - along with a healthy sum of money and documents to help them get away. This wasn’t a scenario he wanted, he hoped his family never knew about his extra-curricular activities – but it was a scenario he was prepared for.

It probably never would have been enacted if not for the fact that Roman happened to catch a glimpse of something in a museum magazine in 1998. An interview with a curator had taken place in his office, and reflected in his glasses was obviously a safe. No mention in the article, Roman thought he must be crazy. Yet there it was, so... obvious. So distinct.

With no fanfare, and not even a bedtime story to his daughter he left the house that night, and slipped into the curators office. There was the safe, but it was unlike any safe he had ever seen. It had numeric locks on it, tumblers on the outside that were connected to dials, at least three different keyholes. He went to work on the oddest safe he had ever seen, working for hours, but he never noticed the passing of time. Finally, after what seemed like an eternity he opened the final lock, yet the door stayed shut. He rechecked every piece and everything was open. Must just be design he thought. He was still pleased with himself and turned to leave when he noticed that something was wrong.

He was no longer in the museum. He was in a mansion where every door had a dozen locks, where the colors shifted continuously, and where his eyes couldn't focus. Before him stood a creature, though it could not be described.

"Where am I?", he asked.
"You are where those who get lost in the locks go", the creature responded.
"Am I free to leave?", Roman said, terrified.
"You are free to attempt to do so.", the creature said with a smile, before walking up some stairs and sticking one of its fingers into a keyhole and exiting through a door.

Roman surveyed the room, doors everywhere, but one massive door stood at the center of the room. Through a nearby window, shut tight, he could see a road leading up to said door. Somehow he knew that was the road home. The massive door had a single small lock in the middle of the door. Roman went to work.

As Roman worked at the lock he would occasionally become hungry or thirsty, and whenever he needed the creature would return to barter with him. At first Roman didn't understand what the creature was asking for but over time he began to realize. "The more help I accept from this creature, the longer I am here, the more changed I become."

Sometimes the creature would make Roman work, scouring pots and pans that didn't exist, sometimes Roman was forced to dance. The creature was polite when dealing, horrible in extracting his payments. Sometimes the creature would sit and whittle with Roman, and in these times he felt that the creature was almost nice to him.

Roman began to be overcome with hopelessness, his joints were replaced with swiveling locks, he could feel tumblers moving in his chest as he breathed. Even if he ever escaped this place he would never be able to return home. But what's worse is that he was beginning to forget home. He couldn't remember his daughters name or smile. Just that she was out there. One day, on a whim, he decided to start toying with the locking mechanism that he had become. He spun his joints round and round, he pinned the tumblers that covered his body, and with minimal difficulty he cracked the lock that he had become. And then he remembered. He remembered his daughter, his wife, sneaking out of the orphanage, the first time he cracked a safe, the first time he went to school. What had been a lifetime of small moments of bliss was suddenly experienced all over again in an instant before suddenly winking out. Already he was having trouble remembering the details, and then... it was gone again. He felt something inside of him shift, but he ignored it and began working again. Again, he opened, this time it was a bit harder. Again he experience a lifetime of bliss. And then he felt the shift again. Part of the way through his next attempt at opening himself he realized what was going on.

Who he was, his life and memories - the ones that mattered to him, were locked inside himself. He had become an old antique safe. Every time he accessed his memories it became harder to do so again. He sat on the steps weeping.

Finally he looked up at the door that had barred him for so long. He didn't even know how long. Bitterly he thought to himself, "Maybe I knew once, but don't remember". He stood up and began to approach the door, but at the last minute turned instead towards the window. He looked out at the road for a long time, the road that he knew led home. Then he reached up to the window and pushed it. Shut tight, but never locked the window popped open. There wasn't even a moment of shock, this had been what he expected as soon as he decided to try. He looked out at the road, to where it met the house he was in. There was no door there, just a brick wall.

No longer lost in the locks he hopped down from the window and ran off, never once looking back. He had chosen to lose himself in the locks and in his arrogance he had never considered that there was another way out. He had given up so much of his life.

Eleven years had passed, and now he was back in the real world, but the real world was no longer what he knew. He couldn't find his way home because he couldn't remember where it was, he couldn't remember the names of those who lived there. He remembered the things that mattered the least, the treasures he had stowed away. With these he began to build himself a new life.

Hyudra
2011-11-03, 11:29 AM
It jars credulity at times, and there's a few confusing bits.

Exclusive schools tend to have an interview process. I imagine it would be hard for your character to worm his way in without a way around that.

An individual wouldn't be placed in Russia as a spy without knowing Russian very well. You wouldn't stick just anyone somewhere as a spy, either... or you run the risk of double agents and misinformation campaigns. To be a spy, someone needs a really good track record.

You also wouldn't place a spy without a goal in mind. You don't just drop someone (much less a young man) in unfamiliar territory and tell him to gather information on stuff.

The bit about breaking locks could fit in earlier in the background. You might want to talk about how he figured out how to make lockpicks (rake, etc) and where he got the materials. You might also want to discuss where he learned to crack safes. Not an elementary science.

It seems silly and unprofessional to cut ties with your old identity, the Cat, and then start with a new identity by selling very traceable materials you got from your last failed job as the Cat. No small wonder he got shot.

A lot of time seems to be put into setting him up as a savant, a genius, but he makes some singularly bad judgement calls and stuff doesn't quite fit, which detracts from this. The supernatural bit comes out of nowhere (perhaps you could reference a mysterious or unexplainable event earlier in the background?). It's hard to know how Tom/Roman/Echo's personality really fits in with this sorta angsty, amnesiac (fey?) creature he's become, because the stuff that would translate to his new form (his skills, personality, desire to steal/crack safes) aren't really elaborated on enough.

Typewriter
2011-11-03, 01:05 PM
It jars credulity at times, and there's a few confusing bits.

Exclusive schools tend to have an interview process. I imagine it would be hard for your character to worm his way in without a way around that.

An individual wouldn't be placed in Russia as a spy without knowing Russian very well. You wouldn't stick just anyone somewhere as a spy, either... or you run the risk of double agents and misinformation campaigns. To be a spy, someone needs a really good track record.

You also wouldn't place a spy without a goal in mind. You don't just drop someone (much less a young man) in unfamiliar territory and tell him to gather information on stuff.

The bit about breaking locks could fit in earlier in the background. You might want to talk about how he figured out how to make lockpicks (rake, etc) and where he got the materials. You might also want to discuss where he learned to crack safes. Not an elementary science.

It seems silly and unprofessional to cut ties with your old identity, the Cat, and then start with a new identity by selling very traceable materials you got from your last failed job as the Cat. No small wonder he got shot.

A lot of time seems to be put into setting him up as a savant, a genius, but he makes some singularly bad judgement calls and stuff doesn't quite fit, which detracts from this. The supernatural bit comes out of nowhere (perhaps you could reference a mysterious or unexplainable event earlier in the background?). It's hard to know how Tom/Roman/Echo's personality really fits in with this sorta angsty, amnesiac (fey?) creature he's become, because the stuff that would translate to his new form (his skills, personality, desire to steal/crack safes) aren't really elaborated on enough.

The way I figured the private school was that if his name was just listed as belonging in classes and his payments were all handled it wouldn't be looked into that strongly. If someone were to ever think twice about it they would assume that someone else did the interview, or the interview was waived completely due to the donations made by the family.

The Russian thing actually did occur to me, and it caused me a bit of difficulty when it came to character creation. The character had a few years of training before he was placed, and I kind of just made a mental note to myself that he studied Russian in school then heavilyi in his few years of training. The final character actually has Russian listed as his core language, and English as his secondary.

As for the spy with a goal thing - I think it's perfectly reasonable to believe that a government would place an agent without further support. Create your identity and get established. As for having more of a defined aim, it would probably be safe to assume he was given more information, I'm a poor student when it comes history and so avoided anything specific. If it would make more sense for him to target KGB then it would be safe to assume that he was given a goal that reflects that. Mainly though he was an expendable kid with no family that they could drop into an unsafe location with a hope for a return on the minor investment. Nobody is there to question if he goes missing, nobody is there to confirm his identity should he be caught.

I wasn't really trying to set him up as a genius, just someone who knows when to act and when to stay out of the away. His great falling in this is his love of commiting crime. Most of his bad judgement calls come from his desire to break the law, even when he has no reason to do so.

Thanks for the feedback, I may go into a bit more detail about where his skills come from in a revision, but I'm not sure. The focus is on what he can do, and while some of it might be interesting to hear about how he got into it's kind of superfluous.

Xuc Xac
2011-11-05, 05:28 AM
I see problems from the beginning. Why does France let an English orphanage keep one of their citizens and transfer all his money to the orphanage's management? Why doesn't the orphanage just let him enroll in the private school if he has the wealth to pay for it? Orphanages aren't prisons for kids, after all. When he gets caught impersonating a student, why don't they just bill him for the tuition and refund it to the Hardeskis? He is a wealthy orphan as you said. Only in comic books and Hollywood blockbusters do militaries recruit "rebels with skills". For every anti-authoritarian ninja savant protoge, there are ten others who are just as capable but who don't have a problem with authority figures and following orders. And putting aside the absurdity of his recruitment and deployment, what was his training like? What part of "keep a low profile while spying in Russia" is compatible with "set up a colorful identity as a master criminal with a cutesy nickname and trademark style"? And then shooting him when he becomes a liability? Why not just let him retire and go back to his old life? The way they made his old identity "die" at the same time as his cover identity was shot (a rather mysterious assault on what everyone assumed was a nobody lab tech) and immediately after the famous Cat's final botched job? That does more to blow his cover than just letting him walk away and pretend he was never a spy. And then he's obsessed with antique safes. Why? They aren't more challenging: they might look prettier but people stopped using them for a reason. Modern safes are more difficult to crack. And then, suddenly, weirdness out of nowhere. And why didn't he just try to break the window and run for it? Whenever I find myself in another dimension with the path home blocked by thousands of doors with complicated locks on one side and a single pane of glass on the other, I always just bust out the window and run back to my own plane of reality.

Jayabalard
2011-11-07, 03:46 PM
Originally he was going to be sent home to France to be taken care of the system there, but it was discovered that he had no other family, and that his parents had been quite wealthy. Whatever institution took care of Roland would be given the money for his care. Roland was put into an orphanage in London, and the money was taken in the system ‘for his care’.This is a citizenship issue... it's a dealbreaker for me right off the bat.


when they searched his locker they found his uniform from the orphanage.A locker seems an odd place for this to show up, and a uniform is kind of odd thing to keep around.

I agree, the "suddenly a spy in Russia" bit is way too fast. You need a "after a series of missions blah blah blah, proved himself trustworthy yadda yadda" with some buildup.

I may read the rest later

Typewriter
2011-11-08, 03:18 PM
I see problems from the beginning. Why does France let an English orphanage keep one of their citizens and transfer all his money to the orphanage's management? Why doesn't the orphanage just let him enroll in the private school if he has the wealth to pay for it? Orphanages aren't prisons for kids, after all. When he gets caught impersonating a student, why don't they just bill him for the tuition and refund it to the Hardeskis? He is a wealthy orphan as you said. Only in comic books and Hollywood blockbusters do militaries recruit "rebels with skills". For every anti-authoritarian ninja savant protoge, there are ten others who are just as capable but who don't have a problem with authority figures and following orders. And putting aside the absurdity of his recruitment and deployment, what was his training like? What part of "keep a low profile while spying in Russia" is compatible with "set up a colorful identity as a master criminal with a cutesy nickname and trademark style"? And then shooting him when he becomes a liability? Why not just let him retire and go back to his old life? The way they made his old identity "die" at the same time as his cover identity was shot (a rather mysterious assault on what everyone assumed was a nobody lab tech) and immediately after the famous Cat's final botched job? That does more to blow his cover than just letting him walk away and pretend he was never a spy. And then he's obsessed with antique safes. Why? They aren't more challenging: they might look prettier but people stopped using them for a reason. Modern safes are more difficult to crack. And then, suddenly, weirdness out of nowhere. And why didn't he just try to break the window and run for it? Whenever I find myself in another dimension with the path home blocked by thousands of doors with complicated locks on one side and a single pane of glass on the other, I always just bust out the window and run back to my own plane of reality.

I honestly don't remember why I made him French raised in London. I think I had a purpose originally and then chose to no longer pursue that story path, but didn't change it.

He wasn't recruited because he was a rebel, he was recruited because he had proven the ability to break into locations and remain unnoticed. From the beginning this guy was a plain nobody who just kind of blended in.

The reason they didn't let him retire is because the people making the decision were unaware of who he actually was. The ones making the decision knew they had a russian contact that supplied them with information. They didn't know he was a lab assistant or anything like that. They figured out, over time, that victims of break ins performed by the cat often had their information leaked to them. They thought the Cat was their contact Echo, but the people who interacted with Echo didn't know anything else. Then the cat murdered someone, and Echo showed up with documents from that person. He confirmed their suspicions, but had also become dangerous. He knew where to meet people for drops, as well as what information had been delivered to them (keep in mind, nobody knew the Cat was stealing information, but if he was caught he could reveal all that he'd stolen).

The obsession with antique safes is supposed to be irrational and poorly explained. Of course there's nothing more valuable in them, but as he got older and more disillusioned with technology his mind wandered back to his glory days of cracking antiques. Antique safes are his weakness.

The magic randomness from nowhere actually makes context with the system (Changeling: The Lost). He lived in a normal world, our world, and one day something supernatural happened to him.

As for why he didn't just break the window it never occured to him that that would work. The character is imperfect and stubborn. In a game nobody would spend 10 years trying to crack a lock, but in telling a story letting character flaws shape them is more important than "I'm in a room, touch all the things until something moves".

Sorry if I missed anything specific in what you were saying, it was a bit hard to read as one massive paragraph. For the record, I do appreciate the input - I agree on some points and disagree on others. I do think I would redo the 'how he got into the orphanage' thing for instance. For a lot of the rest of it it's supposed to be kind of kitchy so I'm not especially bothered by some of your remarks, but some things I think you just misunderstood.

Thanks.


This is a citizenship issue... it's a dealbreaker for me right off the bat.

A locker seems an odd place for this to show up, and a uniform is kind of odd thing to keep around.

I agree, the "suddenly a spy in Russia" bit is way too fast. You need a "after a series of missions blah blah blah, proved himself trustworthy yadda yadda" with some buildup.

I may read the rest later

As I mentioned above, the citizenship thing could take a rewrite/modification. I figured the locker would be the best choice for them to find evidence of who he actually was, and the uniform was all I could think of.

I think the transition of him getting taken -> entering Russia is actually three years, but that's not specifically stated. They take him at 17, then later it says he entered Russia at 20.