spaceracist | I'm a Revenance app!

[OOC Information]
Name: Anarin
Age: 29
AIM/Plurk/Dreamwidth/Email: Zeteram/anarin/(n/a)/anarin@gmail.com
What characters do you already play here, if any? None!
How did you hear about the game? I think I have at least half of the game on my plurk

[IC Information]
Character Name: Emile-A239
Series: Halo: Reach
Gender: Male
Age: 29
Species: Human

Appearance: Emile is 6'10, 235 pounds, and built like a tank. He wears state-of-the-art MJOLNIR armor, powered vacuum-tight battle armor that doubles as a space suit. It's as natural to him as his own skin - moreso on some levels, since he's been in it longer than out of it. The armor itself is grey, brick-red, and brown with a very distinctive helmet: domes in the EVA style, he's carved his signature skull into it, giving himself a grinning visage even when completely masked by it.

Headcanon-wise, since we never actually see under the helmet, Emile is scarred from countless battles and, like his voice actor, black. His hair varies from perfectly shaved to a few inches of stubble depending on how long it's been since he had any time off the battlefield. Coming into Traverse Town, it will have been quite some time but he'll probably seek out a barber if he can find one that doesn't give him the creeps. If forced to go armorless, he'll wear either Army fatigues or the closest approximation he can find, unless he's working out in which case a pair of sweatshorts is all he needs. Most of the time he'll be found in armor.

Personality: To put it mildly, Emile is a walking ball of anger issues that's been trained into a highly skilled assault specialist. He was made, not born, and he's been made use of for his entire life. He's been a hidden weapon in a war the human race has been losing and he's proud of it. He has very little experience with non-military life, though, and almost never talks to outsiders if he can help it. They don't understand him and he doesn't understand them. Thanks to a very abnormal childhood, Emile finds it difficult to trust non-Spartans or interact easily with non-military personnel. The comment in Halo 4 about Spartans being borderline sociopaths definitely applies to Emile as a result of this. This is one of the reasons Emile is always assigned to a team rather than being sent alone on missions; he's a well-greased cog in his specific part of society, but uncomfortable and even unhappy if there's nothing around to fight. Sometimes his viciousness becomes a bit much and he's rotated off his home team or given psychiatric evaluations before continuing on a mission, and the recent situation he's coming from hasn't helped that in the slightest. In fact, he's given in to a fatalistic outcome about everything since the rest of his team died in an assault and he's unlikely to try to replace them any time soon - making him function for what may be the first time as an individual. Not Noble-Four, his pride of a callsign. Just Emile.

His armor is more than a protective suit to him. It's his shield from the world. The original Spartan-IIs were taught to be featureless, indistinguishable, and almost lacking in personality. By contrast, Emile's helmet can be immediately spotted out of a crowd and he takes a perverse joy in watching the enemies flee from him. He wants to make a name for himself at least among his foes, and in this he's succeeded.

Emile is quick to anger, especially about attacks on innocent people or those trying to be subversive and causing others to be hurt. For his entire life he's been defending the human race and he takes this very seriously; aside from AIs (who he's used to dealing with), if it's not human it's probably out to kill humans in his experience, which might make things a little awkward. (Who's going to get Stop cast on him by a bunch of Moogles before he learns to behave? This guy.) That said, though, he's incredibly loyal to his friends, even if he argues with them constantly. If he says he has your back, you can count on him until the cows come home.

Though he doesn't display it openly, Emile is fascinated with alien technology. He keeps a large collection of alien weapons, strictly against regulations, and was in awe when he visited the Forerunner structure under Sword Base. Headcanon is that he would have been a xenoarchaeologist if he hadn't been involved in the war; this bodes well for eventual study of the construction of Dream Eaters once he realizes they can be allies.

As with all Spartans, Emile is afraid of little except failure. Failure means cities blasted into nothingness, farmland hit with plasma until it becomes sheets of solid glass, poisoned air and water and only a bare fraction of survivors making it off a colony world. Failure means losing companions who are closer than brothers and sisters and the parents he barely remembers. Failure means the triumph of the hated enemies he's been hunting for as long as he can remember. Failure means losing, and every Spartan is trained to win.

He's been fighting on the front lines of a losing war since he was fourteen years old.

Abilities: Emile is strictly human, but at the absolute top of what the 26th century can offer in terms of humanity. He's gone through intense military training since the age of eight and been on the front lines for the past fifteen years. He knows not only every standard UNSC weapon including many common weapons like pistols and assault rifles, but also has a broad variety of knowledge about strange alien weapons like plasma rifles, energy swords, fuel rod guns, and more. When given a choice, his weapons are the shotgun and the grenade launcher, although he's also very good with a rocket launcher. His favorite by far and never away from his side is his long-bladed kukri knife. Emile's also trained in all the standard vehicles from jeeps to tanks to dropships, though he prefers to ride and shoot down enemies. He also has pretty passable computer skills, though he's not a hacker by trade.

As a Spartan, he's also been augmented with various chemicals and procedures which make him not only have a much higher muscle density than the average human but also enhanced vision, reflexes, and endurance, and his bones have been treated with a chemical that makes them virtually unbreakable. This does increase his metabolism and he needs several thousand calories a day, but there are no other downsides.

Items: Emile has a fairly damaged set of Mark V MJOLNIR armor, customized in a couple of ways including for a left-handed fighter. He has a grenade launcher and shotgun, both out of ammo, and a kukri knife. Four days of emergency rations are in his pouch along with (headcanoned) two sets of dogtags: Carter and Kat.

History: Emile's history begins in the year 2530 when he was seven years old. He lived in the capitol city of Luxor on the human colony Eridanus II (coincidentally also where the Master Chief was from, though he'd left the planet many years earlier). His life was normal until this point, but during the battle of Eridanus II his family was killed by the Covenant and the world was glassed and abandoned. Being one of the few survivors, Emile was rescued and kept in custody of the government for a year until asked if he'd like to volunteer to fight. Immediately accepting, he was one of the oldest Spartan-III candidates at the ripe old age of eight. The only documented candidate who was older was Carter, twelve, with whom Emile would later be assigned on Noble Team. The rest of the Alpha squadron, as they were named, were mostly five or six.

For the next six years, a series of intense training and conditioning sessions left each of the three hundred members of Alpha superbly trained in all aspects of military life, seamless teammates, and far closer than brothers or sisters. Upon their "graduation", a series of augmentations significantly enhanced their combat abilities and strength. They served in several vital engagements under the cloak of secrecy, but after only a few weeks in the field Emile, Carter, and several others were pulled for special projects. Except for this handful, every other member of Alpha class was sacrificed in a suicide mission that supposedly set the Covenant campaign back by many years. Emile's history from this point is relatively unknown, but it is assumed he spent the time serving on various teams and in engagements until finally being assigned to Noble Team, a combination of Alpha-class and Beta-class Spartan-IIIs.

After many other successful missions, Noble Team was sent to investigate a possible Insurrectionist uprising on the military headquarters planet of Reach. Insurrectionists, unlike the alien Covenant, were human rebels and terrorists dedicated to freeing the colonies from what they believed was a UNSC chokehold; however, without UNSC protection the Covenant were even more destructive than usual and there were often no survivors. Insurrectionist activity on a military planet was not to be tolerated. Naturally, what was thought to be only a small rebellion turned out to be a Covenant invasion, and within a few short weeks Noble Team had lost most of its members, Reach was glassed, and there was only a single chance to get a very important package to a very important ship off the planet. In delivering Cortana to Jacob Keyes on the Pillar of Autumn, Emile chose to stay behind on Reach and man a cannon capable of knocking out the last Covenant ships preventing the Pillar of Autumn from leaving. Knowing it was a suicide mission, he began shooting down dropships and screaming his fallen comrades' names, until finally one ship landed too close and high-ranking Elite Zealots came at him with their plasma swords.

The final member of Noble Team picked up where Emile left off and ensured the Pillar of Autumn escaped from Reach, but Emile was too badly wounded to continue fighting and died among the last of his slain foes.

Headcanon: since Noble Six is a bit of a malleable protagonist, in Emile's particular timeline she was a woman.

First-Person Communicator Sample: [The video feed clicks on to show an empty street somewhere in Traverse Town and Emile's voice begins to narrate. He can't be seen, as he's currently holding the communicator up like a video camera.]

Those damn bear things are at it again. Found four of them here a couple minutes ago. Keep an eye out if you're movin' between areas, and you need any help, you just call for me.

[Okay, so Nightmares aren't exactly the caliber of enemy he's used to dealing with, but they can be damn dangerous if someone isn't prepared for them or thinks they can just go shopping without a care in the world. It's not quite as much action as he's used to, but at least it's something. Which reminds him--]

Anyone know if these Moogle things carry shotgun rounds? I ain't talkin' to them if I don't have to.

Third-Person RP Sample: The sound of rushing wind covered up everything else for a moment as Emile dropped out of the Pelican, but he was already rolling to break the impact before he registered it. Carter's smoking dropship continued on ahead, being chased by various Banshees as it drew the attention away from Emile and Six. He looked over quickly to see that yes, she and the package were intact after the landing. It had felt a little disappointing when the AI had chosen Six for her bearer rather than Emile, but he could understand why. Six was very objective-driven and if the rest of the team fell, she wouldn't have much of a problem finishing it by herself. Emile, by contrast, was still fuming about Carter's stubborn insistence not to seek medical attention. He'd meant it when he said his goodbye to Noble Leader, because it really had been an honor to serve with him.

He felt his tactical soft case quickly to make sure Carter's dogtags were safe there, along with the second set Carter had handed him. Kat's. Of course Carter had taken Kat's. Damn sniper had got her right as they were almost inside the shelter. Just as dead, but somehow not as heroic as--Emile's mind shied away from Jorge's sacrifice as it had been almost constantly since the big man left. Jorge always had to make the rest of them look small, didn't he?

Realizing Six was waiting on his cue, Emile shook his head to clear it of emotion and focused on his core. The anger was easy to find today. He rushed out to the end of the gully they'd landed in and saw Carter's Pelican again. "Still with us, Commander?"

Carter's response that he'd draw fire and they should focus on the objective heartened him. A destination. Yes. He'd save the thinking until they got there. For now, they had a mission to complete.

What’s the mod’s favorite Dream Eater? Pricklemanes!