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[startedtheflamewar]

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Player name: Crow Player age: 21+ Player contact: PM here, or crowskyler Character name: Cash Valiant Gillingwater Canon: Original Info: History: Born to August and Harriet Gillingwater in Abingdon, Virginia, Cash was the youngest of ten other siblings when he was born. His mother had two daughters after, and Cash's earliest memories were of the giant family around him — and a lot of noise. Having twelve siblings meant that Cash never wanted for company, and also that peace and quiet were difficult to find. Even for a fairly outgoing person, the situation was wearying. He got along least with his eldest brothers, Jackson and Connor, who constantly belittled and micro-managed him. His older sisters left him alone because he looked after his younger sisters, Callie and Tara, with whom he felt the closest. Cash was essentially put in charge of looking after them and, most of the time, he didn't mind it. August Gillingwater was a Lutheran preacher, and a prominent citizen of the town. Being one of his children meant that Cash had a small measure of fame in Abingdon, which he found uncomfortable given the fact that he and his parents did not get along well. His sarcastic and flippant nature was a strong contrast to his very serious — and literal — mother and father. As he grew older, he became more and more at odds with his family, only speaking to his younger sisters at any length. His father's reputation in Abingdon meant that he felt a shadow over him at all times, an expectation of him that he wanted nothing to do with. He was well known for being the more personable and easy-going of his siblings, and the town started to whisper about following in his father's footsteps. Cash tried everything he could to distance himself from the idea. He started to get into fights, both at school and online, and seemingly changed overnight into a provoker of them. This perception of "family footsteps" was not helped by Cash's magic, which had started to manifest — as was normal — around puberty. He was, unusually, the only one of his siblings to manifest magical abilities, and his prime connection was to nature — Ridnar magic. His cuts and scrapes from those rebellious fights began to heal themselves almost immediately, and he felt a lot like the world was stacked against him. His father, on the other hand, was delighted to have a divinity — an archon, no less — in the family. About then, when he was 14, the pressure became too much for him. Cash had no intention of going into religion. Indeed, he was the only one of his siblings who didn't have any faith, and he found the idea of himself as a preacher entirely laughable. He intended, at first, to simply ignore the pointed looks from his mother and "talks" from his father, but then his father began to speak seriously about eventually sending him to a religious college. He gathered up what money he had from doing odd jobs around town, which he'd been doing since he was old enough to lift something heavier than a wrench, and bought a fake ID. He was often mistaken for being far older than he was, and it was this perception that got him his ride out of town. Any direction was preferable to staying and becoming something he didn't believe in. From there, odd jobs became the mainstay of how he ate and found places to sleep. He often relied on his good looks to get him jobs, fixing things for older people or getting seasonal work. At first, he tried to be as honest as he could. But soon, his travel expenses began to mount. His father had put out a Missing Persons call with the police, requiring him to move more than he wanted. After his first year, Cash finally caved and worked on the skill of being a con-man and pickpocket — when necessary. He would look for more productive things to do, at first, but if he couldn't find anything, he took his expenses from the pockets of people who looked like they weren't hurting for money. He didn't lose his kind streak. A woman hurt her hand in front of him in Chicago, on his first day there, and Cash healed it for her. This was spotted by a girl who immediately attached herself to him: Madison Halling. At the tender age of 15, Cash was smitten. He would learn later that Madison's father was a well-to-do figure in organized crime and that she was specifically recruiting an Archon for him, a resource most mobs would have killed for. At the time, all he knew was that he had his first girlfriend, and he was willing to heal people for her if she asked him to. But when he figured it out and tried to back out of the situation, Madison's older brothers, Jasper and David, wouldn't let him. Among other things, they threatened to sell him to an Archon Farm (a black market establishment where organs are cut out of Archons and they're forced to regrow them, repeatedly). He fled the city twice, but was beaten ruthlessly and driven back, locked in a shabby apartment, and all but put in solitary except for his healing duties. For four years, reluctantly, Cash was a part of the mob. The Hallings taught him how to fire a gun and he discovered a real knack for it, prompting them to use him on jobs for more than just his healing. They would also sometimes loan him out to other criminals they were friendly with, and Cash made a lot of contacts and money that way. But in the end, the Hallings always made him return to his apartment to be their Archon. He was trapped. He had a few other relationships but these were always revealed to be things of convenience. The other person always just wanted an Archon, not a partner. He stopped initiating relationships altogether -- not hard, considering they never lasted longer than a week because the other person would walk away after their healing was done. He sought comfort in short-term hookups, instead, becoming afraid that people would always just try to use him. When he was nineteen, it all came crashing down. The Police showed up on his doorstep. Cash waited in a cell. Things didn't look good: it turned out that a guy whose hand he'd regrown, Terrence Stax, had gone on to kill three people and steal a lot of data from a large bank. One of Stax's underlings had been the one to give up Cash's name, in his mad bid for reduced sentencing. Cash's mother and father visited and gave him a stern, disappointed lecture on the state of his life, refusing to post any bail and telling him that he needed to face his decisions. They walked out without another word, no matter how much he begged them to come back. It was this guilt that made his next decision an easy one. A man, clad in a plain suit, came in and asked him if he wanted to make a difference in the world, rather than rot in a jail cell for a year or more. He was, as it turned out, from the Office of Strategic Services. Cash had impressed them on how quickly he had inundated himself in each of his new locations, and with how good he was at staying under the radar in Chicago; his strong magic was icing on the cake. Cash accepted the strange offer, and his training as an OSS agent began immediately. Responsibility for his training was given to the man who'd picked him up, Ganix Ochoa, an man only a decade his senior. Initially, Cash and he didn't get along. Cash felt trapped by this strange new occupation, and his encounter with his father was still haunting him. Cash passed his training in the OSS with good marks. His lesser marks were because of that prickly, rebellious streak that he'd developed, which often showed its ugly head where authority was concerned. But his intelligence and head for planning meant that he was placed in the field almost immediately, Ochoa essentially telling him to get over himself and turn a new leaf. Working for the OSS meant that Cash's new job was monitoring other world powers, and giving constant reports on their actions. He wasn't sure about this new work; some of it seemed more than a bit questionable. But it was mostly legal work, at least in the eyes of Uncle Sam, and it gave him the ability to travel the world. With the exception of regular contact with Ochoa, being an OSS agent meant that he was still largely friendless. The nature of his work required blending in, becoming a new person in every country he was sent to. Friendly contacts he made had to be discarded for security purposes. But one mission changed that, at least a little. He was sent to Brazil to monitor an up-and-coming leader there on a joint mission with an intelligence agent from Imperium. They weren't allowed to know each others' true identities, but later he would know her properly as Bethmora Fortescue. Unknown to him, she was the Black Magus of Imperium — their prime assassin, a title passed down since the formation of the Empire. Fortescue had many of the same problems that he did. She was friendless due to a work necessity and thrived on human contact, and they very quickly struck up a real friendship despite the need for secrecy on both sides. It was a platonic friendship, punctuated by a lot of drinks and bets and shenanigans. Over the course of the next handful of years, they did several more joint missions. Their superiors had noted how well they worked together. Working with the government and being a magic user meant that he was automatically enrolled in what America thought of to be its most important duty — void traveling. In 1839, the Imperium Empire (in our world, England, but on this Earth, Imperium) had invented the Angel Gate — a machine infused with magic, able to transport individuals into other universes and then back again. This was really a joint effort between American and Imperian scientists, and resulted in many technologies being "invented" (i.e. stolen) before their time. Being a void traveler meant a lot of pomp and circumstance, sort of like being an astronaut. Magic users were always chosen because of their sheer durability, when compared to those without. The program became all the more important at the start of World War II, with Imperium looking for all the advantages they could get. It was 1940 when Cash received his summons. Being a void traveler meant a sizable amount of training beforehand. His bosses were loathe to pull him out of the field, but they had no choice; the decision had come from higher ranks. He was sent to London to train for 4 months, which meant that when he wasn't training or studying, he and Fortescue often got drinks with each other. She, too, had been a void traveler for a few missions, and knew a little of what to expect. It was impossible to tell for certain — going to a new universe was a lottery. Even ending up on an alternate Earth was an uncertainty, or a planet with air. Luckily, a device surgically implanted in the wrist — called a Celestial Interface — could be immediately pressed to return the void traveler home. But deaths still occasionally happened. Some never returned from their missions. Cash was lucky. His mission sent him to an alternate Earth, far in the future, where space travel and exploration of the universe was a common thing. The high level of technology meant that he returned back with plenty of goodies under his arm for the rise of technological advancement, but he dallied a little longer, enjoying himself. Using the Interface meant that he would return in the same moment he left, with none the wiser, and so he spent a total of a month in space travel, using his skills as a conman to get by. It was a vacation, of sorts. Space travel had not been accomplished on his own Earth, yet, due to the necessities of using advancement for war and defense. Being in that world meant he was able to fulfill a few sci-fi fantasies of his childhood. But eventually, he did return, and after a celebratory drink with Fortescue, he returned to the US. On one of his breaks, he received a phone call from his mother, asking if they could patch things up. Cash put up all his defenses, but he went home to see his family all the same. Things were prickly, at first, but seeing his siblings — his younger sisters, especially — was worth it. With void traveling under his belt, he had seemingly repaired his reputation in his parent's eyes. He spent a week in his family home, catching up, at which time he and his father finally came to understand each other. One of his sisters, Anna, had stepped up to follow in August Gillingwater's footsteps, and the pressure was resoundingly off. They were able to speak candidly about that very troubled period in Cash's life. At first resentful, Cash came to realize that without that tough love — that push — his life would have happened very differently. And he was, for the most part, satisfied with where it was. He'd always been the odd one out, and now he could utilize that for his career. In the December of 1941, with America full-force in the war, Cash was once again pulled from his surveillance and infiltration work. This time, his worth as an asset was offered to the world, and a task force was constructed between America and Imperium. Fortescue was also pressed into this task force, a group of people who could be entrusted to succeed with very rough — almost suicidal — missions. Alongside them, there was also Aron Mattli, another American. The distant but wise Mattli was also an OSS agent, and he and Cash had worked together once or twice. Percy Wolf, an older man like Mattli, was an Imperian pilot entrusted with getting them to and from danger. A war veteran, Wolf kept things light with constant jokes and jibes. Rounding out the team was Ivy Chance, a strict and very smart Imperian Breaker (essentially, a hacker of nautex — a hybrid of magic and technology). Chance was prickly, but could be counted on to do her part like clockwork. Initially, the group clashed more than it worked together. All of the members, with the exception of Wolf, were used to doing things on their own terms. Instead, Cash had been given the authority by the Allied governments to call the shots. Chance and Mattli were resistant at first, but eventually, Cash's genius for planning won them over. Even if Chance verbally objected, she still fell in line to follow the plan in the end. Having Fortescue along was a bonus for Cash, a friend he could count on. The two of them had an easy confidence that began to rub off on Wolf, Chance and Mattli. Slowly but surely, the group connected. By the end of their first year, the group became a little family. During the course of the war, the task force had a varied but distinguished career. Much of it was to take out enemy encampments and other dangerous squads of magic users, but they also dealt with disabling enemy weaponry (technological and biological), rescuing those captured in war, and other difficult missions. They lived from base to base, wherever was closest to their next mission, not knowing when they would get to see their homes again (for those who had homes). Cash spent most of the war corresponding with his youngest sister, Tara, over the telenet (internet), whenever he had a spare moment to do so. She and the rest of his family became his reason for making sure that the war ended, so that they would be safe. Personality: Cash has faced much of the world armed with nothing but a sarcastic sense of humor and a scrappy will to live. Arguably, it's done him fairly well. Being raised in a large family and being an extroverted person meant that he learned how to deal with people quickly. For all the problems he had there, Cash enjoys people immensely; he wouldn't last very long by himself. For the most part, he has a very casual manner when interacting with others, and this is something he enforces, often to the chagrin of his superiors. When in his mid-twenties he was far more prickly, but these days his prickly nature is mostly confined to the telenet, where he actively trolls others when bored. Still, if someone says something very stupid to him and he has no reason to overlook it, he can't resist a sarcastic comment. Sarcasm is simply his second tongue, and he often means nothing personal by it. He no longer carries with him the tremendous anger and hurt that fueled his running away from home, as that has been dealt with during interactions with his family since. Alongside his sarcasm is a very keen intellect which he, more often than not, keeps to himself. He has no fancy diplomas to show for it, due to his childhood, and had to learn the majority of his skills by himself (or otherwise with very shady company). Sometimes this manifests by him not knowing something basic college education would have covered, which he inevitably feels embarrassed and then irritated about. But Cash is by no means a simpleton — he has a mind for strategy, and he quite often uses others' preconceptions of him against them. Most assume his laid-back, sarcastic mannerisms speak of a lazy individual, and Cash is anything but. Most of his free time — when not antagonizing others online — is spent reading. Nonfiction is a favorite subject. As far as relationships go, Cash keeps people at arm's length because of a fear that others simply want to know him to gain access to his magic — or for his looks. Or, this is what he tries to do. He often develops feelings, regardless, when he spends enough time with a person. Though his life has made it difficult to have a stable relationship, this is one thing that Cash craves. (Not that he'd tell anyone.) He craves companionship, to not be alone. Curiosity is another strong trait of his. It's curiosity that fuels his reading, and it's curiosity that keeps him on his toes when he's planning. He wants to know what's going on around him, and he rarely takes no for an answer on that front. Even if the answer is ridiculous or painful, it's better than not knowing anything. Cash doesn't believe in telling white lies, even if not telling a white lie would be harmful. He doesn't like lying at all, in fact, and only lies when he has no other alternative, just as he only pick-pocketed when he had to, as a child. One of the reasons he likes talking to people so much is to get hints as to how they're put together — what drives them, what their fears are. Of course, due to his own insecurities, this can be a fairly one-sided conversation, unless the other person insists asking the same questions back. Canon point: 1944 (age 32). Cash has just completed a few missions into the War, but his task force has not solidified yet beyond his friend, Fortescue. His last mission, to infiltrate France and take out an enemy research post, ended in all but disaster, completing the objective (well, blowing the place sky high) but with the casualty of every other member of the group of soldiers that was sent with him. Samples: Text/log, log, text/log. Plans: Having Cash acquire a job on the ship (he'd opt for security, but he could also be a medic with his healing magic, or be flexible), some friends, and hopefully having him do some planetary exploration since he'd love that.