Post by atkilihoujun on Jan 21, 2009 22:20:22 GMT -5
Name: Faruq Basim Isra (Rui Heru)
Age: 24
Gender: Male
Group: Earth Kingdom Civilian
Nation: Earth Kingdom
Bender?: No
Physical Appearance: He has a rather pointed chin with no cleft and a long nose with a straight bridge. His hair is a dark warm brown shortly cropped in the back with slightly longer bangs. It tends to part off to the side on it’s own. His skin is a naturally tanned color. His eyes are olive drab in color. They’re set low on his brow but still high above his nose making his face look long. Their normally wide in excitement and constantly moving. He has thin lips with a darker fleshy tint that are normally turned up in some charming half smile. Rui is of medium build, shoulders slimmer than most and lean, weighing in at 175 lbs and standing at about 6 foot. He hasn’t officially done any muscle training since his military career, only a spastic amount of energy and his inability to lay still for long amounts of time has kept him in good condition. He doesn’t like to admit that he’s starting to develop a paunch ever since he started riding ostrich-horses.
Clothing/Armor:
He currently owns a basic side lacing tunic in olive drab with wide myrtle trim, the sleeve ends at just past the shoulder, held tight around him with a belt in the same color. He has a longer sleeved undershirt that has a stiffened collar in plain olive with fern trim. He rarely wears this if he’s working on the stable because of the heat. His pants are a worn fern coloring, covered in a few patches where they’ve ripped that are in the same color but fresher and newer.
His boots are probably the most expensive piece of clothing he owns, well made leather in a dark skinned brown. They reach below his knees and are held closed by wooden pins.
The few pieces of armor he owns are hoarded away. They consist of brass shoulder pads that are slightly to big for him and a leather jerkin that he clumsily made himself.
His armor when not in use are stored in the hallowed tree out in the forest. He doesn’t wish the village to know about it, because as of right now he is considered a rude but peaceful person. He thinks that seeing the armor might make the village too curious about him. His long sleeved tunic is stored away in his ‘home’ on the village, which is actually inside the stable in the loft.
Weapons:
A basic mildly rusty iron dagger with a worn hilt that he keeps tucked in his boot at all times. The blade is about 5 inches with a 3 x 2 inch hilt.
The left half of a Ox-tail Daos pair, that he found at a traders booth for dirt cheap. It’s not nearly as effective without it’s partner, but it was worth far more than it’s price. A sword is still a sword as far as he’s concerned.
A large chain he had snuck from the stables that he’s currently attached a large hook to. It’s less of a weapon (thought certainly dangerous), and more of tool. It’s 10 feet long. The hook is about 3 inches at it’s longest part in a fish hook shape. The metal is made almost an inch in diameter. In his spare time he clumsily practices hooking it onto tree branches and attempting to catch wildlife with it.
All these weapons are stored in the hollowed trunk. They would be even more suspicious than his armor. As of right now he has no way of carrying anything for any long term travel.
Personality:
Sarcastic and rather outspoken, he tends to see things from many views as he tries to get into peoples heads, this leads him to only get a temper when surprised or something he deems unforgivable happens, and this is a pretty small list. He doesn’t really consider what he is to others beyond what he wants. If the conversation will only last a few minutes and is only needed for informative purposes then he doesn’t care if the other person leaves the table thinking he’s a self-centered ass. If the relationship has to last for a longer time, he’ll take this into much more consideration, trying his hardest to keep hostilities to a minimum and treading more carefully to get what he wants. He still hasn’t quite mastered this and will occasionally screw up his entire plans with an un-thought action, such as sleeping with the mayor’s wife when he wanted to stay in town for a long-term.
He has two types of tempers, one that can be held at general, a small grievance such as getting refused pay. This one tends to be a lot more quiet and reasonable; he is in control of himself and will work hard to get his way with words and trickery, sometimes going as far as stealing or running for it. His other temper is one when his ‘unforgivable list’ is checked, and he can only keep minimal control over that one. Assuming this is stopped early, he won’t fly into a blind rage. His blind rage is more destructive than life threatening, and assuming he gets his ass kicked, he’ll make plans for revenge like taking Ju-Long and ripping through someone’s house or sending faked messages to the guards about a pedophile in the village and pointing them in the direction of the perpetrator.
His list is mostly dire crimes that he’d like to think most people would be upset about. He hates when people beat their children beyond the good wap to the fanny, he is disgusted by people who would chose to touch a child inappropriately. He can handle death, but doesn’t like tearing up families, especially those consisting of women and young children. Whenever he see’s a man hit a woman he will attempt to deck the guy, sometimes failing, but always willing to buy the girl enough time to run. Occasionally he’ll join in a fight if the circumstances seem ridiculous, like ganging up on a man who stole a piece of bread. Rui particularly doesn’t like Fire Nation, soldiers or not, and is suspicious of them even being near town. He always has the urge to flee when he notices them, but will fight the initial urge and only flee when the danger becomes real.
In general he finds himself most at home in a spotlight, maybe not the only spot light, but with at least one person’s attention on him he could easily bask and tan in it. When everyone gets distracted he has to fight the urge to make an ass of himself for everyone look at him instead. He won’t go as far as starting a full blown fight for attention, but maybe jump up on the bar and sing loudly, or flirt with a taken woman and have her boyfriend rough him up a little. He actually likes a bit of rough handling as long as it never goes further than a spilt lip. When someone is outright ignoring him, pretending not to notice him, he normally moves on. In cases where it’s absolutely necessary that he gets this person’s attention he might do something stupid that will result in injury, mostly to himself, including sneaking into this person’s window at night or jumping in front of their cart and faking (or not) injury.
He doesn’t consider himself a leader, but sometimes his self-assuredness tends to attract followers, seems he gives off a feeling of knowing what’s going on even in situations he‘s extremely confused about. He has taken advantage of this before, though for no ‘great’ reason, (Like say, fighting tyranny) normally using people around him to get him out of situations that might other wise become difficult for him, such as calling out the people and lying to them about his crimes while the guards attempt to drag him away. He’ll shout out that he was being wrongfully accused or that he killed a Fire Nation soldier in disguise. His loud antics have worked so far.
His likes and dislikes will vary according to his current taste. As he tries new things he loses interest in older ones until possibly revisiting them later. Currently this applies to his taste of clothes and food. He used to hate wearing longer tunic’s, feeling like they got in the way, now he rather likes the swishy feeling of the fabric moving about his legs, and he used to be obsessed with beef curry, but now he’s moved on to vegetable stir-fry. Both of these were originally out of necessity, as it was what his current home offered to him, but continued exposure fostered a fondness. This also includes his mount, Ju-Long who was originally moving food, his love for stables and working with animals, fostered early in his years. It was always rather off-putting that his father made him do the nastier chores in the stable.
He attempts to never get strongly attached to people. In his head, he knows that animals will likely die earlier than him, it places them in a different location in his heart, so even when one he loved dies, it only stings. But with people, he knows it would be more powerful, and so he prefers to keep others at a distance so he can’t get to attached. This is the prominent reason why he tends to flirt with different girls or boys every night.
He does carry around guilt with him; guilt for his cowardice. He doubts that he’ll ever be able to become brave. So many people he’s failed over the years, his mother, his father, his regiment. He hates when it happens, but he’s too scared for his own skin.
Background:
He was born in a small village between Tachi Dai and Kei Lan, to Chang and Bao Heru. It was a farming village that supplied food for many of the other villages around it, and his family raised various cattle. Never praised nor picked, he was studiously home raised for cattle and nothing but. His father, Chang, had inherited the ranch from his own father. After a fairly rushed marriage, his mother was moved in. The only family that he ever knew were his parents. His mother, Bao would occasionally mention in an off hand way that she was ‘visiting’ someone and leave. Normally it was her mother, who Rui was told lived in another village. He never met her. These visits stopped when he was around 4. His parents were never quite that cheerful after. There were very few children in the village around his age and so he chose to stick close to home, playing by himself and very rarely his busy mother, who would always be leaving the house or working on her sewing. The next year his father started to take him out of the house more. He was taught how much to feed the cows and when, how to pump the water and do all the other simple farm chores so his father could focus on other things.
At 6, a band of refugee’s moved into the city. They settled in fast, his dad using their desperation had hired a few teenaged boys to work for next to nothing. Rui caught on to how his dad would threaten to fire them if they were too slow to do anything. He began to threaten to tell his father if they wouldn’t take his work from him. He then ran off into town and noticed it wasn’t just teens who had moved in. There was a group of children his age finally and he joined up in their ‘innocent’ antics. Most of kids were part of the normal refugee group, but there was another group belonging to families that had the ‘right’ apparently to kick some of the villagers from their large homes and take over. He saw little of these people. Instead he chose to follow along with the other kids, snatching fruit from stands, startling some of the other cattle (He made sure they never did this at his home), and generally making a nuisance of themselves.
Sometimes they would get caught and this would shame his mother and, noticing how her eyes would suddenly be on him like never before, he only felt slightly encouraged to do thing’s again. His father would shout at him sometimes when he heard, but he would just be dragged back into the barn, with a swat on his rear and told he would do double the amount of chores for the next day while the teens were dragged out to help his father shave the sheep pigs. He’d be left in the stables, cleaning out the stalls and brushing down the panda cows. It was a general routine for the next 6 years. He only got in major trouble once or twice, like that time him and the kids decided to act out the war when they were 10 and tormented the poor kid who had been forced to ‘play’ as Fire Nation. The kid was a bit bruised up, Rui never saw what the big deal was. The other time was when he broke his own rule and he, with two other boys, startled a panda bull with a sling shot and sent it careening into the group of teen’s, nearly goring them, and then running through the streets. His father was livid as was most of the village. He was called a disgrace and felt mildly contrite, especially when he was made to do almost all the stable chores at that point, for the poor workers were injured and needed time before they could come back.
He never particularly cared for his father’s opinion, only more fearful of the consequences, especially when at 13, he was caught with a high ranked local girl in the shed, receiving his first kiss with a hand up her dress. His father had ripped him off the girl, then screaming and raging started belting him for dishonoring the family in front of the girl’s father. After that, most of what he did was considered a disgrace, and the term began to lose it’s once powerful effect. He had never once talked back before this time, and now he couldn’t shut his mouth, no matter how much pain it caused him. After all, it was the only attention he ever seemed to receive, and he was too amused by how purple and red his father’s face would get and how his mothers eyes would shoot from her work or her sulk, to his face.
A plague had swept through the village, killing much of the stock and causing some of the farmers to keel over. His family’s business thrived during this time, as they were raising one of the hardiest cattle known to man, saber-toothed panda cows. Much of the food supply in their village and in the surrounding villages depended on them now with their 100 or so cows, though not all of age yet. His father settled down during this time, and his mother never seemed bothered by what he did for the next two years, completely at peace with the money rolling at a steady pace. They expanded their farm, taking over one of the larger ranches whose previous tenants were worn away by sickness. His father hired more workers to do all the work now, paying them for speed and efficiency and buying out some of the other cattle stocks, because panda cows were difficult to breed and raise to a ripe eatable age. The sickness faded after a few months but the damage was done. A few of his friends had died during this plague, and many of them left to other towns to avoid getting sick. He was now one of maybe 10 kids left, and most of those were of the upper ‘society’ that existed almost half out of the village. Since nothing he did could cause those big watery looks or those raging bellows in this time of theirs, he used this time to explore the surrounding forests more, learning to climb into the ridiculously tall trees and nearly getting mauled by a platypus bear after teasing it too much. His father seemed only mildly disappointed that it hadn’t succeed, which Rui counted as an improvement because this time he was sure his father had been joking.
At age 16 the village was taken by the Fire Nation Army, hording as much as they could of the supplies, cattle, and clearing out what they considered a decent place for a post while destroying many refugee‘s and their homes. It was a great advantage for them in many ways, as it put them close to Kei Lan, Tachi Dai, and left them with another supply post near Omashu. Most of the villagers escaped to other towns or Kei Lan, where they were likely not heard from again. His mother died in the initial raid, struck down in their own house by a fire nation soldier, while Rui ran from the building without looking back. He crashed into his father, who was sporting a broken leg and riding on one of the bulls while holding a tether to 3 cows. He and Rui went first to Kei Lan for a year before deciding to settle in another small, sheltered village. His father was extremely upset about his loss (Rui was never quite sure whether he was upset more about the lost wealth or the death of his wife) and tended to take it out on Heru, thinking it was his fault. He got more irritable as his leg got worse, leaving him with a growing limp.
Rui learned through during the next 2 years how to work with his new life. There were was a sort of gang in Kei Lan that consisted almost entirely of teens and would occasionally take in younger children as a form of fostering. They few kids that survived long enough to get to Kei Lan were recruited immediately and forced to follow the pecking order. The gang specialized mostly in robbing some of the passer bys and occasionally when the picking was ripe they’d rob the actual villagers. He picked fights within the ranks, a fairly normal form of amusement for the gang and would learn to fight with words to bother his opponents and make them lose their obvious advantages in rage.
He’d get bruised up plenty of times and eventually he started to play it safe, learning that some of the smarter ones couldn’t be twisted by words and it was best to avoid those people. Sometimes he’d use similar techniques on his father, confusing his father into leaving Rui alone or steer around chores making his father feel mildly superior while Rui avoided physical confrontations with him anymore. When they moved to another sheltered village full of refugee’s, there was no organized gang, just a bunch of smaller groups composed of strictly personal ties. Rui preferred to stay alone, it was easier than getting any of the various teens to trust a newcomer, and tried to stay out of trouble. He and his father attempted to raise cattle again, as that was all his father really knew how to do, but the business really never took off and they had only 4 saber-toothed panda cows, and 2 bulls and they weren’t breeding at a very good rate.
Any girls he brought home were hardly of any respectable upbringing, not that his current situation could be considered as such. His father seemed to have impeccable insight of where he could be at any of these times, and easily scared the poor girls off by calmly saying things about Rui being sick in some off hand matter or for Rui to go wash up since he had been handling bull crap all day.
When he was 17, desperate for some action after all the girls in town were essentially scared of him, he was again caught in the shed, lips locked with the acting mayor’s son, and given a sound beating for his ’disgusting habits’, and again because he couldn’t stop his mouth from flapping, “Dad, you’re giving me mixed signals! I figured you didn’t want any grandchildren.” Rui never really considered this abuse on his person, just his dad’s rather unintelligent way of disciplining that only encouraged him.
At 18 an Earth army recruiter dragged all the ‘able-bodied men’ out of the village, which included Rui, and most of the animals from the village to feed their men. Rui attempted several times to get out of working after the army had left his village. He didn’t want to be stuck under his father any longer, but he definitely did not want to go to war. During registration, he attempted to convince the soldiers he was only 15, which almost worked. Unfortunately he was nearly fully grown at that point, and the guards said, “You’re big enough.” Later on he attempted to leave, claiming the need to go to the bathroom. But there were a couple of soldiers who came out looking for him after being gone for an hour. He was caught after he tripped on a tree root and dragged back to camp. They couldn’t afford to lose a single soldier.
First year of training he was promoted fairly quickly as his troupe was ill prepared for war making him, sadly, one of the best fighters in the group. After their first battle and near wipe out, their regiment was combined with another small regiment that included a bunch of unprepared earth benders, who had next to no bending training nor military training. There was only about 100 soldiers in the entire regiment.
Rui at 20 was made essentially to baby sit the earth bender group. They were ill-trained and either wanted to get some action or run away. The regiment was desperate and couldn’t allow any of them to leave or get killed before the earth benders could be properly trained after they meet up with the regiment at Omashu and were given proper teachers. Rui put up with this in good grace, even knowing that anything the earth benders did would put the blame on him. The earth benders still went to drills and were made to act as regular soldiers until their training. However, because of their bending skills, untrained or not, they tended to get into trouble, including escaping for a night out and upsetting a bunch of women.
Near the fortress of Omashu, a large Fire Nation army was settling down, preparing for attack. He ran, no amount of military loyalty brainwashing could hold him to a spot that his instincts all told him to flee, and so he left like a coward, dragging the only piece of meat with him, a teenaged saber-toothed panda bull, as soon as the Fire Nation soldiers were within sight. The others called out to him, but he was already far enough a way that they couldn’t chase him without leaving their posts unguarded. He’s not sure what happened to the regiment, and too many rumors have been floating about too many different armies. The regiment did survive though, retreating to Omashu where the earth benders finally got a skilled teacher, and much more pro-active babysitter. Rui ran to Kei Lan for a few months. He acted as a deviant, gambling with money he had stolen in small portions from easy victims to a small travelers fortune and pawning off his military uniform in separate pieces to separate stores so that it couldn’t be properly linked back to him. Buying a very cheap and simple center closing tunic out of a dirty brown canvas that only reached down to his thighs and a pair of pants made out of the same materials, he set off to Ba Sing Se.
He changed his name to Faruq Basim Isra, so it could be assumed that ‘Rui‘ had died on the field, assuming his regiment did not survive. He was refused entrance into the Ba Sing Se after claiming he was from the Prasana Highlands, because the guards became suspicious on whether he was telling the truth or not. They began to question why he was of a fit age and yet not in the army, and he swung the conversation around about how he needed to go fetch his mother and he’d be back with her eventually. He has jumped over the past 3 years to 4 different outskirt villages around the giant city, his well trained panda bull now being used as both a pack animal and mount. (Just to clear it up, I was implying before that his ‘current’ job as of the very rping moment, was at the ostrich horse place, not that it was his job during the whole three years.)
At the first village he stayed for a year and was hired within the first month as a landscaping servant in the mayor’s household and was kicked out when he was found sneaking out of the Mayor’s wife’s room. She had been visiting the gardens and, with all his charm and glory, he had chatted her up a bit. She was cold to him for the first few days, but eventually liked his constant chatter began to tell him a few of her secrets and bemoaning the fact that her husband barely talked to her anymore. Within the next couple of months he began sneaking into her room in the night, originally at her request to continue the conversations beyond the time she was allowed to wander about. They never went beyond the occasional wooing, but all the same it was obvious the woman was getting attached to him and he was already planning on leaving soon before it was mutual. Them getting found out had been near perfect timing. According to the village, he was a pervert sneaking glances and coping feels, possibly a creeper. According to the Mayor’s wife, he was her savior, considering she had given birth 10 years ago and her husband hasn’t touched her since.
At the second village he was blacklisted as he tried to sell overpriced and cheaply made armor to some of the ’local military’. During the haggling process, a young waitress was tweaked by one of the guards and it sent her toppling onto the table, easily shattering the ’armor’ he was trying to sell. He probably only survived because his mount was right out the door, and because the waitress was absolutely livid and started to beat the guard right there.
At the third village he worked at the main watering hole as the tender, his striking looks were a double edged sword, as a 53 year old man had taken a shine to him, and was rather disgruntled when his affections were absolutely not returned. It turned out this man was well respected among his community and in order to keep Faruq from telling anyone about the incident, he set fire to Faruq’s room at one of the dilapidated inns near the outskirts of town. It was dingy enough and far away enough that no one stirred much of a fuss, thinking it was the owners own fault, either accidentally setting fire himself or for letting vagrants stay there. No one died that night, but the inn’s owner was devastated and Faruq lost most of his belongings, only keeping the shirt and pants he was wearing to bed and his bull which was tied up outside, which was spooked for the next few days and not in riding condition. He hid out in the forest, unsure of whether the fire was meant for him or not. The nearest village was a few days away, and he was stuck walking until his bull had calmed down. He forced himself to eat various plants that looked like they wouldn’t kill him and getting himself sick a few times.
When he finally reached the village he was tired and dirty. He had no money, nor anything to really trade except for his bull, which he was loathe to do for a very specific reason. Considering he was in such a desperate state he knew he wouldn’t get nearly the worth of the bull in trade until he at least looked like he didn’t need the money. It was basic trading tactic. As of right now the bull was worth more alive. There were only two courses of action that he could see. He could steal what he could from the village and then move on; best to not stay in the same location that he would need to take so much from and the chances of getting caught taking all those supplies would be high. Or, he could play the pity card. The pity card was a dangerous tactic, as it could easily backfire especially in these hostile times. Still, it would better serve the current purposes, as he was too tired to really consider stalking about in the night and stealing. Faruq slathered on more dirt to his face and matted his bull’s fur up.
He waited until the village was at it’s most bustling, late enough in the morning were the villagers would be going in and out of houses and stores. Then he stepped just barely into the village with a limping gait before collapsing. He’d either be ignored and forced to get up and possibly steal his way to the next village or someone would approach, concerned or curious. Concerned it was, as an older woman bent down to his head and spoke gently to him, coaxing him from his faux faint. He was guided up to the clinic where he nearly didn’t fool the old man, but he was weak enough for his fainting to be plausible and he was housed at the clinic for three days of easy meals and plenty of water, and his bull was fed and watered at his personal request. To pay for all the help he received he was sent to assist Mr. Cheng on his ostrich-horse farm. The hospitable Mr. Cheng allows him to live in the loft of the stable and has helped him acquire some clean and better weather clothing. He has lived there for nearly four months now and has paid off the debt he owed the clinic and other villagers for healing and feeding.
With the money and hoarding some ‘found’ materials he has managed to begin a fairly good collection of weapons and armors, some made by his hand and other’s given as presents which he hides in a small hollowed out trunk. He has only finally named his bull Ju-Long, finally coming to terms with the fact that he will probably never eat the animal. (He only never named it out of the principle that names create fondness, and it’s hard to butcher an animal you’re fond of.) His reputation in the village is solid, but has no real room for improvement. Currently his plan is to venture again for entrance into Ba Sing Se.
Sample RP:
It was a windy day out in the posts. Sand was whipping against the sides of Rui’s tent and he was staring into the air with a look of intense concentration while he spun his calligraphy brush in his fingers. It was dry and ink-less just like the paper on his mat. He was supposed to write a report about the ‘incident’, but he was still having trouble doing anything but chicken scratch. He only barely learned to write in his time out here.
His little troupe of untrained Earth Benders were found fooling around, entertaining themselves. Rui still wasn’t quite sure what happened. He just heard one of the Sergeant’s yelling at them for ‘lewd behavior’ and a few girls screaming. He was supposed to be having his group come in one at a time and tell him what happened and then write it down and report that to his higher ups…
He instead went ahead and sent out one of the other privates to snoop for him and now was waiting. Rui sucked in the wooden handle of his brush and began chewing on it. The wind outside picked up again, blowing some dirt and debris under the tent sides.
A cough drew his attention away from his painfully important task of marking this bamboo as his own. The private he had sent out was barely peeking his head in with his brow drawn. He looked nervous, sweat staining his collar. “Um, I’ve got the information you wanted and located the girls.”
Rui pulled the brush out with a pop and stood up quickly with a curt, “Good work. Tell me the juicy details.”
“Er,” the private swallowed and stepped inside the tent. He rubbed his palms nervously while looking anywhere but at Rui. “The group Earth Benders had decided to go into the village about a half a mile north. They were caught by the Sergeant running out of the local inn with a bunch of women yelling at them. Apparently the women were refused payment for… things.” He swallowed again.
Rui raised a brow, “Things?” The private nodded. “Were they harlot’s or prostitutes?” The private stuttered, flushing red and Rui shook his head, “Bit shy arent’cha? It’s fine.” He stood up, patted the private on the shoulder and shooed him out. “Send in one of the girls, your pick. You can send the rest home. I doubt I’ll need to talk to all of them.”
The private saluted, bowed and then carefully stepped out with his face still red. A few mumbled orders hushed by the cloth and one of the girls stepped in. She was wearing a tight fitting ao dai in dark green with leaf patterns and flowers decorating the front. Her hair was done up in a small bun with ornate chopsticks. Her makeup was laid on thick but nicely and her perfume was strong, but her face was one of annoyance and she sniff haughtily at Rui. “I hope you plan on paying.”
“Sorry, I’m not hiring your services.” He grinned charmingly and offered her his mat while he sat on the floor. She rolled her eyes and sat down ungracefully, not bothering to put on a show for no money, but that was fine, Rui could appreciate her frustration, “Would you mind telling me, in brief,” he tacked on when she looked like she was going to go on in full-out rant mode, “what exactly my men did last night when I turned my back?”
Age: 24
Gender: Male
Group: Earth Kingdom Civilian
Nation: Earth Kingdom
Bender?: No
Physical Appearance: He has a rather pointed chin with no cleft and a long nose with a straight bridge. His hair is a dark warm brown shortly cropped in the back with slightly longer bangs. It tends to part off to the side on it’s own. His skin is a naturally tanned color. His eyes are olive drab in color. They’re set low on his brow but still high above his nose making his face look long. Their normally wide in excitement and constantly moving. He has thin lips with a darker fleshy tint that are normally turned up in some charming half smile. Rui is of medium build, shoulders slimmer than most and lean, weighing in at 175 lbs and standing at about 6 foot. He hasn’t officially done any muscle training since his military career, only a spastic amount of energy and his inability to lay still for long amounts of time has kept him in good condition. He doesn’t like to admit that he’s starting to develop a paunch ever since he started riding ostrich-horses.
Clothing/Armor:
He currently owns a basic side lacing tunic in olive drab with wide myrtle trim, the sleeve ends at just past the shoulder, held tight around him with a belt in the same color. He has a longer sleeved undershirt that has a stiffened collar in plain olive with fern trim. He rarely wears this if he’s working on the stable because of the heat. His pants are a worn fern coloring, covered in a few patches where they’ve ripped that are in the same color but fresher and newer.
His boots are probably the most expensive piece of clothing he owns, well made leather in a dark skinned brown. They reach below his knees and are held closed by wooden pins.
The few pieces of armor he owns are hoarded away. They consist of brass shoulder pads that are slightly to big for him and a leather jerkin that he clumsily made himself.
His armor when not in use are stored in the hallowed tree out in the forest. He doesn’t wish the village to know about it, because as of right now he is considered a rude but peaceful person. He thinks that seeing the armor might make the village too curious about him. His long sleeved tunic is stored away in his ‘home’ on the village, which is actually inside the stable in the loft.
Weapons:
A basic mildly rusty iron dagger with a worn hilt that he keeps tucked in his boot at all times. The blade is about 5 inches with a 3 x 2 inch hilt.
The left half of a Ox-tail Daos pair, that he found at a traders booth for dirt cheap. It’s not nearly as effective without it’s partner, but it was worth far more than it’s price. A sword is still a sword as far as he’s concerned.
A large chain he had snuck from the stables that he’s currently attached a large hook to. It’s less of a weapon (thought certainly dangerous), and more of tool. It’s 10 feet long. The hook is about 3 inches at it’s longest part in a fish hook shape. The metal is made almost an inch in diameter. In his spare time he clumsily practices hooking it onto tree branches and attempting to catch wildlife with it.
All these weapons are stored in the hollowed trunk. They would be even more suspicious than his armor. As of right now he has no way of carrying anything for any long term travel.
Personality:
Sarcastic and rather outspoken, he tends to see things from many views as he tries to get into peoples heads, this leads him to only get a temper when surprised or something he deems unforgivable happens, and this is a pretty small list. He doesn’t really consider what he is to others beyond what he wants. If the conversation will only last a few minutes and is only needed for informative purposes then he doesn’t care if the other person leaves the table thinking he’s a self-centered ass. If the relationship has to last for a longer time, he’ll take this into much more consideration, trying his hardest to keep hostilities to a minimum and treading more carefully to get what he wants. He still hasn’t quite mastered this and will occasionally screw up his entire plans with an un-thought action, such as sleeping with the mayor’s wife when he wanted to stay in town for a long-term.
He has two types of tempers, one that can be held at general, a small grievance such as getting refused pay. This one tends to be a lot more quiet and reasonable; he is in control of himself and will work hard to get his way with words and trickery, sometimes going as far as stealing or running for it. His other temper is one when his ‘unforgivable list’ is checked, and he can only keep minimal control over that one. Assuming this is stopped early, he won’t fly into a blind rage. His blind rage is more destructive than life threatening, and assuming he gets his ass kicked, he’ll make plans for revenge like taking Ju-Long and ripping through someone’s house or sending faked messages to the guards about a pedophile in the village and pointing them in the direction of the perpetrator.
His list is mostly dire crimes that he’d like to think most people would be upset about. He hates when people beat their children beyond the good wap to the fanny, he is disgusted by people who would chose to touch a child inappropriately. He can handle death, but doesn’t like tearing up families, especially those consisting of women and young children. Whenever he see’s a man hit a woman he will attempt to deck the guy, sometimes failing, but always willing to buy the girl enough time to run. Occasionally he’ll join in a fight if the circumstances seem ridiculous, like ganging up on a man who stole a piece of bread. Rui particularly doesn’t like Fire Nation, soldiers or not, and is suspicious of them even being near town. He always has the urge to flee when he notices them, but will fight the initial urge and only flee when the danger becomes real.
In general he finds himself most at home in a spotlight, maybe not the only spot light, but with at least one person’s attention on him he could easily bask and tan in it. When everyone gets distracted he has to fight the urge to make an ass of himself for everyone look at him instead. He won’t go as far as starting a full blown fight for attention, but maybe jump up on the bar and sing loudly, or flirt with a taken woman and have her boyfriend rough him up a little. He actually likes a bit of rough handling as long as it never goes further than a spilt lip. When someone is outright ignoring him, pretending not to notice him, he normally moves on. In cases where it’s absolutely necessary that he gets this person’s attention he might do something stupid that will result in injury, mostly to himself, including sneaking into this person’s window at night or jumping in front of their cart and faking (or not) injury.
He doesn’t consider himself a leader, but sometimes his self-assuredness tends to attract followers, seems he gives off a feeling of knowing what’s going on even in situations he‘s extremely confused about. He has taken advantage of this before, though for no ‘great’ reason, (Like say, fighting tyranny) normally using people around him to get him out of situations that might other wise become difficult for him, such as calling out the people and lying to them about his crimes while the guards attempt to drag him away. He’ll shout out that he was being wrongfully accused or that he killed a Fire Nation soldier in disguise. His loud antics have worked so far.
His likes and dislikes will vary according to his current taste. As he tries new things he loses interest in older ones until possibly revisiting them later. Currently this applies to his taste of clothes and food. He used to hate wearing longer tunic’s, feeling like they got in the way, now he rather likes the swishy feeling of the fabric moving about his legs, and he used to be obsessed with beef curry, but now he’s moved on to vegetable stir-fry. Both of these were originally out of necessity, as it was what his current home offered to him, but continued exposure fostered a fondness. This also includes his mount, Ju-Long who was originally moving food, his love for stables and working with animals, fostered early in his years. It was always rather off-putting that his father made him do the nastier chores in the stable.
He attempts to never get strongly attached to people. In his head, he knows that animals will likely die earlier than him, it places them in a different location in his heart, so even when one he loved dies, it only stings. But with people, he knows it would be more powerful, and so he prefers to keep others at a distance so he can’t get to attached. This is the prominent reason why he tends to flirt with different girls or boys every night.
He does carry around guilt with him; guilt for his cowardice. He doubts that he’ll ever be able to become brave. So many people he’s failed over the years, his mother, his father, his regiment. He hates when it happens, but he’s too scared for his own skin.
Background:
He was born in a small village between Tachi Dai and Kei Lan, to Chang and Bao Heru. It was a farming village that supplied food for many of the other villages around it, and his family raised various cattle. Never praised nor picked, he was studiously home raised for cattle and nothing but. His father, Chang, had inherited the ranch from his own father. After a fairly rushed marriage, his mother was moved in. The only family that he ever knew were his parents. His mother, Bao would occasionally mention in an off hand way that she was ‘visiting’ someone and leave. Normally it was her mother, who Rui was told lived in another village. He never met her. These visits stopped when he was around 4. His parents were never quite that cheerful after. There were very few children in the village around his age and so he chose to stick close to home, playing by himself and very rarely his busy mother, who would always be leaving the house or working on her sewing. The next year his father started to take him out of the house more. He was taught how much to feed the cows and when, how to pump the water and do all the other simple farm chores so his father could focus on other things.
At 6, a band of refugee’s moved into the city. They settled in fast, his dad using their desperation had hired a few teenaged boys to work for next to nothing. Rui caught on to how his dad would threaten to fire them if they were too slow to do anything. He began to threaten to tell his father if they wouldn’t take his work from him. He then ran off into town and noticed it wasn’t just teens who had moved in. There was a group of children his age finally and he joined up in their ‘innocent’ antics. Most of kids were part of the normal refugee group, but there was another group belonging to families that had the ‘right’ apparently to kick some of the villagers from their large homes and take over. He saw little of these people. Instead he chose to follow along with the other kids, snatching fruit from stands, startling some of the other cattle (He made sure they never did this at his home), and generally making a nuisance of themselves.
Sometimes they would get caught and this would shame his mother and, noticing how her eyes would suddenly be on him like never before, he only felt slightly encouraged to do thing’s again. His father would shout at him sometimes when he heard, but he would just be dragged back into the barn, with a swat on his rear and told he would do double the amount of chores for the next day while the teens were dragged out to help his father shave the sheep pigs. He’d be left in the stables, cleaning out the stalls and brushing down the panda cows. It was a general routine for the next 6 years. He only got in major trouble once or twice, like that time him and the kids decided to act out the war when they were 10 and tormented the poor kid who had been forced to ‘play’ as Fire Nation. The kid was a bit bruised up, Rui never saw what the big deal was. The other time was when he broke his own rule and he, with two other boys, startled a panda bull with a sling shot and sent it careening into the group of teen’s, nearly goring them, and then running through the streets. His father was livid as was most of the village. He was called a disgrace and felt mildly contrite, especially when he was made to do almost all the stable chores at that point, for the poor workers were injured and needed time before they could come back.
He never particularly cared for his father’s opinion, only more fearful of the consequences, especially when at 13, he was caught with a high ranked local girl in the shed, receiving his first kiss with a hand up her dress. His father had ripped him off the girl, then screaming and raging started belting him for dishonoring the family in front of the girl’s father. After that, most of what he did was considered a disgrace, and the term began to lose it’s once powerful effect. He had never once talked back before this time, and now he couldn’t shut his mouth, no matter how much pain it caused him. After all, it was the only attention he ever seemed to receive, and he was too amused by how purple and red his father’s face would get and how his mothers eyes would shoot from her work or her sulk, to his face.
A plague had swept through the village, killing much of the stock and causing some of the farmers to keel over. His family’s business thrived during this time, as they were raising one of the hardiest cattle known to man, saber-toothed panda cows. Much of the food supply in their village and in the surrounding villages depended on them now with their 100 or so cows, though not all of age yet. His father settled down during this time, and his mother never seemed bothered by what he did for the next two years, completely at peace with the money rolling at a steady pace. They expanded their farm, taking over one of the larger ranches whose previous tenants were worn away by sickness. His father hired more workers to do all the work now, paying them for speed and efficiency and buying out some of the other cattle stocks, because panda cows were difficult to breed and raise to a ripe eatable age. The sickness faded after a few months but the damage was done. A few of his friends had died during this plague, and many of them left to other towns to avoid getting sick. He was now one of maybe 10 kids left, and most of those were of the upper ‘society’ that existed almost half out of the village. Since nothing he did could cause those big watery looks or those raging bellows in this time of theirs, he used this time to explore the surrounding forests more, learning to climb into the ridiculously tall trees and nearly getting mauled by a platypus bear after teasing it too much. His father seemed only mildly disappointed that it hadn’t succeed, which Rui counted as an improvement because this time he was sure his father had been joking.
At age 16 the village was taken by the Fire Nation Army, hording as much as they could of the supplies, cattle, and clearing out what they considered a decent place for a post while destroying many refugee‘s and their homes. It was a great advantage for them in many ways, as it put them close to Kei Lan, Tachi Dai, and left them with another supply post near Omashu. Most of the villagers escaped to other towns or Kei Lan, where they were likely not heard from again. His mother died in the initial raid, struck down in their own house by a fire nation soldier, while Rui ran from the building without looking back. He crashed into his father, who was sporting a broken leg and riding on one of the bulls while holding a tether to 3 cows. He and Rui went first to Kei Lan for a year before deciding to settle in another small, sheltered village. His father was extremely upset about his loss (Rui was never quite sure whether he was upset more about the lost wealth or the death of his wife) and tended to take it out on Heru, thinking it was his fault. He got more irritable as his leg got worse, leaving him with a growing limp.
Rui learned through during the next 2 years how to work with his new life. There were was a sort of gang in Kei Lan that consisted almost entirely of teens and would occasionally take in younger children as a form of fostering. They few kids that survived long enough to get to Kei Lan were recruited immediately and forced to follow the pecking order. The gang specialized mostly in robbing some of the passer bys and occasionally when the picking was ripe they’d rob the actual villagers. He picked fights within the ranks, a fairly normal form of amusement for the gang and would learn to fight with words to bother his opponents and make them lose their obvious advantages in rage.
He’d get bruised up plenty of times and eventually he started to play it safe, learning that some of the smarter ones couldn’t be twisted by words and it was best to avoid those people. Sometimes he’d use similar techniques on his father, confusing his father into leaving Rui alone or steer around chores making his father feel mildly superior while Rui avoided physical confrontations with him anymore. When they moved to another sheltered village full of refugee’s, there was no organized gang, just a bunch of smaller groups composed of strictly personal ties. Rui preferred to stay alone, it was easier than getting any of the various teens to trust a newcomer, and tried to stay out of trouble. He and his father attempted to raise cattle again, as that was all his father really knew how to do, but the business really never took off and they had only 4 saber-toothed panda cows, and 2 bulls and they weren’t breeding at a very good rate.
Any girls he brought home were hardly of any respectable upbringing, not that his current situation could be considered as such. His father seemed to have impeccable insight of where he could be at any of these times, and easily scared the poor girls off by calmly saying things about Rui being sick in some off hand matter or for Rui to go wash up since he had been handling bull crap all day.
When he was 17, desperate for some action after all the girls in town were essentially scared of him, he was again caught in the shed, lips locked with the acting mayor’s son, and given a sound beating for his ’disgusting habits’, and again because he couldn’t stop his mouth from flapping, “Dad, you’re giving me mixed signals! I figured you didn’t want any grandchildren.” Rui never really considered this abuse on his person, just his dad’s rather unintelligent way of disciplining that only encouraged him.
At 18 an Earth army recruiter dragged all the ‘able-bodied men’ out of the village, which included Rui, and most of the animals from the village to feed their men. Rui attempted several times to get out of working after the army had left his village. He didn’t want to be stuck under his father any longer, but he definitely did not want to go to war. During registration, he attempted to convince the soldiers he was only 15, which almost worked. Unfortunately he was nearly fully grown at that point, and the guards said, “You’re big enough.” Later on he attempted to leave, claiming the need to go to the bathroom. But there were a couple of soldiers who came out looking for him after being gone for an hour. He was caught after he tripped on a tree root and dragged back to camp. They couldn’t afford to lose a single soldier.
First year of training he was promoted fairly quickly as his troupe was ill prepared for war making him, sadly, one of the best fighters in the group. After their first battle and near wipe out, their regiment was combined with another small regiment that included a bunch of unprepared earth benders, who had next to no bending training nor military training. There was only about 100 soldiers in the entire regiment.
Rui at 20 was made essentially to baby sit the earth bender group. They were ill-trained and either wanted to get some action or run away. The regiment was desperate and couldn’t allow any of them to leave or get killed before the earth benders could be properly trained after they meet up with the regiment at Omashu and were given proper teachers. Rui put up with this in good grace, even knowing that anything the earth benders did would put the blame on him. The earth benders still went to drills and were made to act as regular soldiers until their training. However, because of their bending skills, untrained or not, they tended to get into trouble, including escaping for a night out and upsetting a bunch of women.
Near the fortress of Omashu, a large Fire Nation army was settling down, preparing for attack. He ran, no amount of military loyalty brainwashing could hold him to a spot that his instincts all told him to flee, and so he left like a coward, dragging the only piece of meat with him, a teenaged saber-toothed panda bull, as soon as the Fire Nation soldiers were within sight. The others called out to him, but he was already far enough a way that they couldn’t chase him without leaving their posts unguarded. He’s not sure what happened to the regiment, and too many rumors have been floating about too many different armies. The regiment did survive though, retreating to Omashu where the earth benders finally got a skilled teacher, and much more pro-active babysitter. Rui ran to Kei Lan for a few months. He acted as a deviant, gambling with money he had stolen in small portions from easy victims to a small travelers fortune and pawning off his military uniform in separate pieces to separate stores so that it couldn’t be properly linked back to him. Buying a very cheap and simple center closing tunic out of a dirty brown canvas that only reached down to his thighs and a pair of pants made out of the same materials, he set off to Ba Sing Se.
He changed his name to Faruq Basim Isra, so it could be assumed that ‘Rui‘ had died on the field, assuming his regiment did not survive. He was refused entrance into the Ba Sing Se after claiming he was from the Prasana Highlands, because the guards became suspicious on whether he was telling the truth or not. They began to question why he was of a fit age and yet not in the army, and he swung the conversation around about how he needed to go fetch his mother and he’d be back with her eventually. He has jumped over the past 3 years to 4 different outskirt villages around the giant city, his well trained panda bull now being used as both a pack animal and mount. (Just to clear it up, I was implying before that his ‘current’ job as of the very rping moment, was at the ostrich horse place, not that it was his job during the whole three years.)
At the first village he stayed for a year and was hired within the first month as a landscaping servant in the mayor’s household and was kicked out when he was found sneaking out of the Mayor’s wife’s room. She had been visiting the gardens and, with all his charm and glory, he had chatted her up a bit. She was cold to him for the first few days, but eventually liked his constant chatter began to tell him a few of her secrets and bemoaning the fact that her husband barely talked to her anymore. Within the next couple of months he began sneaking into her room in the night, originally at her request to continue the conversations beyond the time she was allowed to wander about. They never went beyond the occasional wooing, but all the same it was obvious the woman was getting attached to him and he was already planning on leaving soon before it was mutual. Them getting found out had been near perfect timing. According to the village, he was a pervert sneaking glances and coping feels, possibly a creeper. According to the Mayor’s wife, he was her savior, considering she had given birth 10 years ago and her husband hasn’t touched her since.
At the second village he was blacklisted as he tried to sell overpriced and cheaply made armor to some of the ’local military’. During the haggling process, a young waitress was tweaked by one of the guards and it sent her toppling onto the table, easily shattering the ’armor’ he was trying to sell. He probably only survived because his mount was right out the door, and because the waitress was absolutely livid and started to beat the guard right there.
At the third village he worked at the main watering hole as the tender, his striking looks were a double edged sword, as a 53 year old man had taken a shine to him, and was rather disgruntled when his affections were absolutely not returned. It turned out this man was well respected among his community and in order to keep Faruq from telling anyone about the incident, he set fire to Faruq’s room at one of the dilapidated inns near the outskirts of town. It was dingy enough and far away enough that no one stirred much of a fuss, thinking it was the owners own fault, either accidentally setting fire himself or for letting vagrants stay there. No one died that night, but the inn’s owner was devastated and Faruq lost most of his belongings, only keeping the shirt and pants he was wearing to bed and his bull which was tied up outside, which was spooked for the next few days and not in riding condition. He hid out in the forest, unsure of whether the fire was meant for him or not. The nearest village was a few days away, and he was stuck walking until his bull had calmed down. He forced himself to eat various plants that looked like they wouldn’t kill him and getting himself sick a few times.
When he finally reached the village he was tired and dirty. He had no money, nor anything to really trade except for his bull, which he was loathe to do for a very specific reason. Considering he was in such a desperate state he knew he wouldn’t get nearly the worth of the bull in trade until he at least looked like he didn’t need the money. It was basic trading tactic. As of right now the bull was worth more alive. There were only two courses of action that he could see. He could steal what he could from the village and then move on; best to not stay in the same location that he would need to take so much from and the chances of getting caught taking all those supplies would be high. Or, he could play the pity card. The pity card was a dangerous tactic, as it could easily backfire especially in these hostile times. Still, it would better serve the current purposes, as he was too tired to really consider stalking about in the night and stealing. Faruq slathered on more dirt to his face and matted his bull’s fur up.
He waited until the village was at it’s most bustling, late enough in the morning were the villagers would be going in and out of houses and stores. Then he stepped just barely into the village with a limping gait before collapsing. He’d either be ignored and forced to get up and possibly steal his way to the next village or someone would approach, concerned or curious. Concerned it was, as an older woman bent down to his head and spoke gently to him, coaxing him from his faux faint. He was guided up to the clinic where he nearly didn’t fool the old man, but he was weak enough for his fainting to be plausible and he was housed at the clinic for three days of easy meals and plenty of water, and his bull was fed and watered at his personal request. To pay for all the help he received he was sent to assist Mr. Cheng on his ostrich-horse farm. The hospitable Mr. Cheng allows him to live in the loft of the stable and has helped him acquire some clean and better weather clothing. He has lived there for nearly four months now and has paid off the debt he owed the clinic and other villagers for healing and feeding.
With the money and hoarding some ‘found’ materials he has managed to begin a fairly good collection of weapons and armors, some made by his hand and other’s given as presents which he hides in a small hollowed out trunk. He has only finally named his bull Ju-Long, finally coming to terms with the fact that he will probably never eat the animal. (He only never named it out of the principle that names create fondness, and it’s hard to butcher an animal you’re fond of.) His reputation in the village is solid, but has no real room for improvement. Currently his plan is to venture again for entrance into Ba Sing Se.
Sample RP:
It was a windy day out in the posts. Sand was whipping against the sides of Rui’s tent and he was staring into the air with a look of intense concentration while he spun his calligraphy brush in his fingers. It was dry and ink-less just like the paper on his mat. He was supposed to write a report about the ‘incident’, but he was still having trouble doing anything but chicken scratch. He only barely learned to write in his time out here.
His little troupe of untrained Earth Benders were found fooling around, entertaining themselves. Rui still wasn’t quite sure what happened. He just heard one of the Sergeant’s yelling at them for ‘lewd behavior’ and a few girls screaming. He was supposed to be having his group come in one at a time and tell him what happened and then write it down and report that to his higher ups…
He instead went ahead and sent out one of the other privates to snoop for him and now was waiting. Rui sucked in the wooden handle of his brush and began chewing on it. The wind outside picked up again, blowing some dirt and debris under the tent sides.
A cough drew his attention away from his painfully important task of marking this bamboo as his own. The private he had sent out was barely peeking his head in with his brow drawn. He looked nervous, sweat staining his collar. “Um, I’ve got the information you wanted and located the girls.”
Rui pulled the brush out with a pop and stood up quickly with a curt, “Good work. Tell me the juicy details.”
“Er,” the private swallowed and stepped inside the tent. He rubbed his palms nervously while looking anywhere but at Rui. “The group Earth Benders had decided to go into the village about a half a mile north. They were caught by the Sergeant running out of the local inn with a bunch of women yelling at them. Apparently the women were refused payment for… things.” He swallowed again.
Rui raised a brow, “Things?” The private nodded. “Were they harlot’s or prostitutes?” The private stuttered, flushing red and Rui shook his head, “Bit shy arent’cha? It’s fine.” He stood up, patted the private on the shoulder and shooed him out. “Send in one of the girls, your pick. You can send the rest home. I doubt I’ll need to talk to all of them.”
The private saluted, bowed and then carefully stepped out with his face still red. A few mumbled orders hushed by the cloth and one of the girls stepped in. She was wearing a tight fitting ao dai in dark green with leaf patterns and flowers decorating the front. Her hair was done up in a small bun with ornate chopsticks. Her makeup was laid on thick but nicely and her perfume was strong, but her face was one of annoyance and she sniff haughtily at Rui. “I hope you plan on paying.”
“Sorry, I’m not hiring your services.” He grinned charmingly and offered her his mat while he sat on the floor. She rolled her eyes and sat down ungracefully, not bothering to put on a show for no money, but that was fine, Rui could appreciate her frustration, “Would you mind telling me, in brief,” he tacked on when she looked like she was going to go on in full-out rant mode, “what exactly my men did last night when I turned my back?”
. But for all his fighting in the streets, was he ever part of a gang or posse? Or did he simply try and pick fights with people he figured were weaker? Did he ever misjudge someone and end up getting a beating himself? If so, did that teach him any humility, or simply encourage him to pick his targets more carefully?