Agent North Dakota | Andrew Engelsen (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
bothbarrels) wrote2014-06-27 11:14 am
bothbarrels) wrote2014-06-27 11:14 am
Sanctum App
Name: Marti
Contact Information: martienne17@gmail.com | martienne on AIM and Plurk.
Personal Journal: martienne17.dreamwidth.org
Age: 34
Characters Played: n/a
Who Referred you: Anarin
Name: Agent North Dakota
Fandom: Red vs. Blue
Age: Unknown | [estimated at around 31]
Canon Point: As he is being attacked for his AI by the Meta
Original Universe or Alternate Universe? Orginal
Personality: North is a trained mercenary soldier, willing and able to confront dangerous situations and improvise solutions. He’s a realist and knows the importance of following rules and regulations. He seems to put priority on following orders as close to the letter as he can, though he will deviate when circumstances call for him to deviate. He’ll still worry about the consequences, though. He couches his concerns with an easy humor, but he can’t help but ask around when he gets called in to answer for one such deviation to find out what his potential consequences could be.
He’s known for being supportive, and at one point the project’s counselor even refers to his ‘nurturing nature.’ Perhaps nothing in life has given him cause to learn how to calm and mentor others than his relationship with his twin sister, South. She is rash and impulsive, often mouthing off when something upsets or irritates her. While he seems unwilling to call her out on her outbursts in front of other people, he usually goes to find her in the aftermath to calm her and talk her through what’s upsetting her. This isn’t to say that he likes putting up with her behavior, however. When she can’t see his face he reacts with a restrained exasperation, shaking his head in the knowledge that soon he’s going to need to intervene in her anger once again.
By nature, he’s contemplative, and though he may gently tease his friends, he’s not as much of a joker as fellow agent York. His more introspective nature leads to an easy camaraderie between the two of them, and York’s seen going to North more than once to help him think something through. He’s even something of a mentor to the younger Washington, easing things over when York’s antagonizing of him goes a little bit too far. When sharing his opinion he often pauses before speaking, as though to make sure he has his thoughts straight before presenting them.
He has a strong sense of morality, but he also places his trust in the leadership. Therefore, he’s more reluctant to conclude that they aren’t “the good guys” than York, even when York shares his suspicions. Though he had been forming a friendship with Tex, it’s likely that his trust in York, along with the evidence Tex has in her possession, is what persuades him to go along with the plan to break in and rescue the Alpha AI. In the end, in the choice between right and wrong, he casts his lot in with them rather than continue to help the leadership carry out unethical research.
The contrast between his personality and his sister’s comes to a head as things in the project start to break down. He chooses to act as the inside man, knowing that he won’t be able to convince South to go in on the plan. He relies on his persuasive skills and their history of standing together to convince her to leave with him once the break-in has already taken place. Unfortunately his trust in his ability to influence his sister ends up being his downfall; Tex warns him that his sister is an opportunist, and though he admits to Tex that South has acted inappropriately in her quest for an AI of her own, it seems he was taken by surprise by the fact that in the end, he couldn’t trust her to do everything she could to keep him from falling to the Meta.
Of special note is North’s relationship to his AI, Theta. AIs can choose how to project themselves and how they sound, and Theta is childlike in both voice and his hologram body's proportions. Theta is timid and fearful when he is first introduced. North was chosen specifically to host Theta because of Theta’s anxiousness; the Counselor cites his 'nuturing nature' as a reason he was given the special charge. Unlike other agents, North is reluctant to shut his AI down to spare himself the difficulty when Theta’s worries and fears become overwhelming. Instead, North stays up late into the night to walk the halls and comfort the AI, comparing it to the way his father would take South for car rides to lull her to sleep. He shows himself successful at the task from the start, coaxing the AI to bring his avatar out from hiding and to speak more directly to his fellow agents. Over time Theta begins to seek North’s approval, creating animations such as of fireworks or himself riding a skateboard, simply to hear North compliment him on them. North teaches Theta that they can trust one another; once Theta learns he can rely on North, he seeks North’s reassurances whenever a new situation presents itself.
Background: Reference: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_vs_blue | http://rvb.wikia.com/wiki/North
Red vs. Blue takes place primarily in the Halo fictional universe--it started out as a fanfiction serial in itself; though it grew to have its own set canon, for the most part it follows the rules set in Halo canon. Set 500 years into the future, the story takes place during the time of an interstellar war between humankind and a Covenant of alien enemies. The aliens worship technology left behind by an ancient civilization known as the Forerunners. The ruling class in the Covenant sees humans as a threat, as unbeknownst to them, humans are the closest living descendents of this long-ago civilization. Unfortunately for humankind, Covenant technology is far advanced, able to obliterate planets full of human colonists, and the aliens prove to be ruthless in pursuing mankind’s obliteration. Humans are struggling to keep up.
To that end, a number of organizations arise, attempting to find a “magic bullet” to get an edge by creating the ultimate super-soldier. While the secretive ONI (the Halo equivalent to the CIA) had developed a top-secret and ethically-questionable program to create the genetically-enhanced Spartans, an scientist named Leonard Church secures government funding to start a group of operatives known as Freelancers. It is unknown where recruits came from, but the soldiers who entered the program were given durable body armor, advanced weaponry, and special enhancements such as super speed or energy shielding. In an unorthidox move, Church chooses to rank the soldiers to spur them to compete with one another. Consequently, there is much animosty between the operatives who desire to acheive top rankings. All of the Freelancers are adept at using the tech they’ve been assigned, and run a number of successful missions before the project begins its final phase: using the rankings, the soldiers are chosen to be assigned helper AIs to more efficiently run their equipment.
In order to continue to advance the training of the Freelancer force, Church also creates a sham civil war, pitting Reds against Blues in simulation bases to create more scenarios in which they can fight. Unfortunately, the AIs are not all the most stable pieces of software—Church created the AIs by torturing the Alpha, the only AI he had secured funding to support, made by copying his own mind. Though their assignees don’t realize the origins of the AIs at first, once the truth comes out, those who had had suspicions don’t hesitate to take action. Even as things should be gathering steam in the project, it breaks down, and a number of top operatives end up going rogue. North, along with his friend York, join top-ranked Agent Texas to try to rescue the original Alpha AI. Unfortunately, the plan fails, and the ship where the Project is headquartered crashes onto a nearby planet.
In the aftermath of this, the remaining Freelancers with AIs are left fending for themselves, on the run from one of their own, the former Agent Maine, who begins to call himself the Meta. The Meta is obsessed with gathering the AI fragments for himself. North himself is one of the Freelancer agents who is killed when the Meta comes after his AI, his fellow-agent and twin sister South failing to protect him at the last. In the aftermath of the Project’s breakdown the Alpha AI is placed in a squad of simulation Blues, believing himself to be an ordinary soldier. The simulation base training continues, but run-ins with the Meta and other former and current Freelancers change the magnitude of the situations the simulation troopers need to deal with. They end up being involved in the key events leading to the fall of the Project.
Other Notables: North has been recruited into an elite force of mercenary soldiers. As such he is skilled in hand-to-hand combat, self-defense tactics, shooting, and survival. His specialty is the sniper rifle; he’s nearly as accurate shoting without a scope as he is with it. In the confrontation with his sister, he’s seen dual-wielding sniper rifles, one in each hand.
Inventory: Four sets of workout clothing, including a Freelancer logo T shirt, along with an appropriate number of pairs of underwear. A picture of himself with his sister.
NETWORK SAMPLE: From Tu Shanshu: http://tushanshu.dreamwidth.org/43717.html
LOG SAMPLE: Awakening seemed difficult at first, and for a while he drifted, not quite able to bring himself out of that state of twilight, but eventually he stirred and managed it. Awakening in strange surroundings was concerning and he immeidately reached out in his mind for Theta. He found only silence. He sat up, his brow slightly furrowed, and spoke. "Theta?" That only confirmed what he already knew was true. Theta was gone.
The rest of it came back to him as he sat up and turned to stand. Maine had been shooting at him, and he'd been calling out for his sister's help, but he'd apparently blacked out before finding himself here. Had Maine succeeded in capturing Theta? It would seem so. His heart leapt to his throat and he felt the back of his neck for Theta's chip. Sure enough, it was gone. But there was another sensation, a feeling that seemed similar to when the neural port had been installed, but lower down on his back. He curled his arm behind him and found the metal implants along his spine. He had surely been captured, and apparently Maine had had accomplices, something he hadn't thought to suspect before.
Until then he'd been about to call out, to find out if someone was about, but instead he came to his feet and surveyed the area. If there was some way to escape, he needed to find it. Nearby was the table that held a few of his effects, and he picked up the picture of himself with his sister with some consternation. That picture had been left behind in his locker on the <i>Invention</i>. So apparently Maine was still working for the Project in some capacity.
Very little of this made sense but he did know he would be in a world of trouble at such time that someone would come after him here. He would have to do his best to escape and find some way to break his sister out, too. He quietly prepared himself for a violent confrontation.