[hider=Another Newbie Pilot] [center][h1][color=silver][b]Lucius Dylan Sterling[/b][/color][/h1][/center] [color=silver][b]Name[/b][/color]: Lucius Dylan Sterling [color=silver][b]Gender[/b][/color]: Male [hider=Appearance] [center][img]https://i.imgur.com/FXWNpL8.jpeg[/img][/center] [/hider] [color=silver][b]Pilot Type[/b][/color]: Gifted Pilot [color=silver][b]Age[/b][/color]: 19 [color=silver][b]Personality[/b][/color]: A generally relaxed and laid-back sort of person, though equal parts diligent and earnest in his efforts all the same despite this. In formal situations he usually seeks to be generally polite and friendly around others, and will due to his training and discipline will on the proper formalities in front of superiors. A hard-working soul overall, thoughh, he has a good heart that desires to do good in the world and for others, and in this vein whose thoughts upon being set on course to become a Framewerk Pilot was to embrace it while also finding it to be problematic in his life in more ways than one at the same time. He likewise is a natural polymath of sorts, at least in effect, enjoying the taking up of and looking into how to do things like cooking, baking, tinkering with machines, and even repairing something like a broken coffee machine and learning what the components of it do and their importance to the whole of the coffee machine in question. At the same time, he's someone who will bear the wounds he has silently and try to do what he can as best as he can due to thinking that bottling it up is 'the best choice' at this point in time. Further, he is also someone who despite all the preparation he has been given has a notable fear of death he tends to bury deep down, and yet is trying to adopt a rather forced form of stoicism ahead of time to help himself counteract those stresses in his mind atop the discipline instilled by his initial training and such alike. Indeed, to stop the Cruxi is to stop the flow of death into the meat-grinder of a conflict, he hopes at the very least, but in contrast taking a human life itself would be a rather big and hard thing to imagine swallowing all the same in his mind (a possible but hard reality that even he can't ignore). To an extent he is additionally someone who could be described as ‘ambivert’, both finding people ‘ok’ to be around yet being out of his depth as a fresh new pilot and preferring alone time and ‘time to think’ on his end despite at times enjoying the company of others perhaps. [color=silver][b]Background[/b][/color]: [hider=The Backstory Until Present Times] The second of three children born to his parents, Lucius was born to what felt like a loving and whole family at first glance. A mother who was a Framewerk researcher working at a government-contracted company who was producing them, but seemed to try to always make time to be home, and a father who had been an engineer in the military before losing an arm and a leg and ultimately being sent home and working at a local mechanic shop to try to stay closer to his family. He and his older sister, Lira Sterling, were happy to spend time with their parents where they could as they all sought to make the best of things. Albeit they would begin with having to have babysitters for a while, for when both their parents were working, until Lira got old enough at the tentative age of thirteen that she was allowed to step in and take care of things instead (at least around the house). Yet it was also around this time that their mother, ultimately, would bear the third and final child of their marriage: Patrick Sterling. This pregnancy, however, would also mark a stark change in things for their family overall. Their mother would suffer complications, being stuck in the hospital for longer stretches of time, and about the time she gave birth her job would refocus her and several others in their staff onto a new type of project aimed at new Framewerk developments of a ‘special’ sort. Where she had once been trying to avoid becoming a ‘workaholic’, and enjoyed the rare vacation with her children and husband, his mother seemed to ‘become possessed by something’ in their eyes. Something about her new area of investigation and research, or perhaps new project that she had been assigned to, seemed to garner her attention in more ways than one. Sometimes she’d stare at Lucius himself while quiet, sometimes glancing at Lira, and where she’d tentatively been there for Patrick she seemed to gloss over his existence more and more and put it off on her husband. More and more often she stayed at work, or slept as close to work as possible instead of coming home, and less and less she paid any attention to even her own husband (her last remaining warm link to her family as it would end up being). The money from her work kept the household running and lights on, that much remained certain for the time being at least, but where there had once been warmth things began to cool more and more until a once warm household became about as cold as ice as even their father became seemingly disconnected from her in kind. When Lucius turned fifteen years old, or like a day before to be more precise, his mother would make a decision that would shake up their family more than not….she would sign up her children, without talking to her husband about the matter, to undergo ‘early testing for potential future Framewerk pilots’ in order to help fill the slots for a new and experimental early pilot-preparedness program (think some USA-like ROTC-type deal for potential future Framewerk pilots instead). A matter her work was incentivizing employees to do, as the government was beginning the start of such a program to ‘test pilot’ it on their homeworld, when agents suddenly showed after they had all gotten back from school it was certainly a surprise that led to them calling their father in the process. This led to a worried father scrambling home while the agents waited for him to arrive, which then turned into an argument back and forth and a few failed attempts to call their mother, which then led to their father being held overnight in the local police station while Lira had to lock up the house in a hurry before they were taken off to be tested. And the results, as it would end up being, were strongest for Lucian, with Lira herself having the second best results to some extent and Patrick not having good results at all. All to the delight of the government and their mother, the fear and anger of their father, and the confusion of themselves in the middle of it all. It was enough to enroll Lucius, and Lira for a lesser time, into the so-called “Future Pilots Program” (FPP) while they remained in standard schooling. Lira, being older already, was only in the program a year before being allowed to stay home due to ‘family needs’, though she’d be placed on a ‘reserve pilot candidate list’, and this simultaneously came at the cost of Lucius volunteering essentially being guaranteed to serve as a military pilot after graduating from school and the program ‘due to having far greater potential’ and being seen as a more desirable candidate overall anyways compared to his older sister. Even so, the whole affair had his father fuming, arguing with their mother over the phone what few times he could get her on it, and more and more often coming home oddly later than normal….and sometimes with the smell of an unknown perfume clinging to his collar despite his attempts to get his clothes into the laundry as soon as possible after walking in the front door. Patrick had grown to become a more cold and uncaring person himself, perhaps to cope with what was going down, and Lira became the last ‘warm heart’ at the center of the family for herself and her siblings as best as she could manage in the meantime. Even their father became a bit more distant from them, though he also made even more efforts to ‘be there with us’ as Lucius would put it. This despite his own struggles and decline happening along the way as well. Though as Lucius neared the end of the program and his graduation from it and school alike, his father seemed to take Lira or Patrick aside more and kept him somewhat more at a distance. It all would culminate in Lucius’ graduation from school and the program being briefly attended by his father and siblings, before they left early and, well, he never saw them again. Because at the ripe age of eighteen, freshly graduated, and having been prepped to leave for the military the next day already, he arrived home to find his father, older sister, and younger brother having disappeared alongside the family vehicle and a fair amount of their things. Only his room remained untouched, left behind, save for a note that Lira had slipped under his pillow and seemingly wrote down alike amidst a fair bit of rushing and haste. His father had fled, fled to another planet, one his older sister couldn’t divulge in her note at their father’s behest, to set up a life with Lira and Patrick far from their mother and the chances that Lira would be taken ‘also’ as a pilot. Lucius? Lucius, as it were, was the sacrificial lamb of the whole affair whom they couldn’t bring along without causing more trouble. Lucius didn’t much question it, or perhaps it was better to say that he perhaps has some instinctual suspicions but had kept it at arm’s length to try to enjoy what good time he had left with his father and siblings…maybe some tiny sliver of him hoping that something like this wouldn’t have happened. Yet even so, it was what it was and Lucius was taken in by the military the next day as he locked up the now-abandoned house behind him and told them what had happened. Not like his mother, whom he’d actually go to meet as well a few days later, thought on the matter. Albeit she frankly had news to share, much of which was nothing to her but was news to Lucius. She already divorced his father, a thing he hadn’t told Lucius at least, two months prior over long-distance. But she had hoped to get Lira in the piloting program, much to her actual frustration, and paid no mind to Patrick who had produced no results during the prior testing years ago. Likewise his father had taken a good chunk of her bank account in the divorce as well, it seemed, before she had gotten him off of it. That money itself was more of a bother to her than anything else at this venture, and the warmth she seemed to give Lucius was due to ‘his potential’ and his becoming a pilot. Because as it turned out, not that Lucius is supposed to officially know despite hearing his mother talking in the background by chance to one of the military escorts who had taken him to see his mother (at least), his mother had been for years now working on technology that ‘worked alongside those bearing humanity’s true potential’ so that ‘we can finally, hopefully, see the end of this war’ in her own words. As his mother had lost her parents to the Cruxi, and his father lost a brother to them, it did make some sense to his mind….but even so he kept his mouth shut in this case. He was then escorted out, the last he’s seen his own mother even by now, and for a year thereafter he was put into general training, simulations, sparring matches with other new recruits, and such things to try to ‘gather useful data’ from him (likely for his mother and her government-contracted employer to also use in part for all he knew) before moving him to the Framewerk Program proper. And thus, perhaps a touch late, he is being transferred finally to the Fortress Ship Solaire alongside his new Framewerk unit. [/hider] [color=silver][b]Missing People[/b][/color]: Maternal grandparents he never got to know, and a paternal uncle that he did actually get to know a little bit before he died to a Cruxi attack on another world. None of it was as personal as losing everything to them....though.... [hider=Some Truths] Yet it can be said the Cruxi in some manner took his mother from him and his family, by giving her the (unknown to him) silent and hidden obsession with the Cruxi’s defeat that led her into years of struggling therapy as well as military-grade R&D work with a company contracted with the Galactic Federation’s government. An obsession that, while better managed than not due to her therapy, when she came to be turned toward research development aimed at ‘people like Lucius’ brought her to see her own children in a new light and into the realm of her obsession. The obsession had then turned into an addiction, one where she felt something along the lines of: “I can help stop them….and now, now two of my children could do so as well at least. We can end this. Help end this. Do SOMETHING rather than nothing.” Thus her mental filter and now blossoming obsession overrode maternal instinct, all while her employers only intervened as far as ‘it ensured she doesn’t work herself to death or such things for her own good’ as they’d claim, and her husband struggled to ‘ground her back again’ alongside her therapist. Yet her therapist’s home network would be silently ‘unapproved from the company list of mental health services they use for their employees’, being changed alongside other policies, which left the work on ‘grounding her back on her own two feet’ to her husband and kids alone….and her husband bore the brunt of that, a brunt that led even him to break and try to cope underneath it all while seeking to at least ‘be there’ for his own kids. Ultimately, Lucius’ father decided that his wife had ‘become someone else totally’, seeing ‘the warm and human part of her, one that we’d both fought to ground and maintain and help thrive, die out almost overnight’ in his eyes. He divorced her in secret, which she didn’t care about at the time so ‘sure’ was her response, and planned to take Lira and Patrick and ‘hide far, far from military eyes’ to avoid Lira being taken as a pilot. Fake names, a new bank account, everything he could do to get away from his wife and ‘what she did to us’ even at the cost of Lucius. Because in the end ‘Lucius was a cost worth sacrificing to save the family’ in his eyes….and something he did despite initially struggling for months about the matter and Lira trying to get him to bring Lucius along before he graduated. Yet the boy’s graduation, and the military wanting him much more than they did Lira, it was the perfect time to flee. So Lucius’ older sister, ill-adjusted younger brother, and struggling father abandoned him while the military didn’t have eyes on them. Took the best they could, ran with a chunk of their mother’s formerly-shared bank account that had been taken out just after sending in the divorce papers and before she removed his father from the account, and only Lira had cared to leave behind even a hasty note trying to explain anything about what was going on in some capacity at least. Lucius’ mother currently solely owns the house, his father’s name being taken off of it by now, and he technically can still live there as far as she is concerned…Lira too, if she ever happens to pop up again that is, as far as his mother is concerned. Further, the moment it was confirmed that her second oldest child wasn’t ‘mentally ill’, Lucius’ mother celebrated his and Lira’s discovery as ‘special people’. Both to celebrate their status as ‘the next step in humanity’ and in terms of her work regarding them, and, well, in some small sliver of a part as a mother who was glad for the fact her kids were ok and didn’t have ‘other problems’ as had been feared prior to this point. Not that she ever voiced it aloud, or even realized it even actually registered in her mind for a moment deep in her state of Cruxi-obsession fueling her at work and otherwise by now. Indeed...perhaps some sliver of his mother remains in there, though could anyone be certain of that for sure? Or would that be simply another tragedy of the whole situation? [/hider] [hider=Keyword and Definitions/Some Flavoring] [color=silver][b]Background Potentials[/b][/color]: 1 ) [i]Awareness[/i] - You possess an uncanny sense for danger, and can react to situations faster than others. Your actions always happen first during an event. You also receive a chance to avoid invisible attacks or attacks from ambushes, and gain improved dodging equivalent to a single level of lower weight class. However, you are also more jumpy as a result, sometimes shifting your eyes to scan for dark shadow or fleeting glimpses of movement. ((Between this, his “Master of Directions” perk, and his “Clairvoyance”, it is flavored overall as him having a proper ‘sixth sense’ or ESP of sorts. Albeit one he has to learn to better focus upon and will be honing to a fine edge in battle and outside of it moving forwards, but a peculiar sort of one which works even passively for him at times alongside his subconscious and which he just seems to ‘roll with’ as he ever has. Not that he didn't get medically looked at due to his 'visions' and peculiarness when he was younger, or that his sister Lira wasn't at some point in the past as well, either. However, his passiveness about the matter of this 'ESP' of his is, for him, just how he’s adjusted to it all over time as its always 'been a part of me' in his eyes. As natural as breathing. Yet while doctors once debated alongside his parents privately giving him medications for his ‘visions’, when they became more frequent and vivid for a time when he actually told his parents about them, before his therapist settled the matter by noting that ‘he is a growing boy, it is most likely his imagination, a healthy one at that, going off a bit’. Not that it also didn’t help with him stopping talking about the visions to his parents, though Lira would admit to him in private later that she had less frequent episodes of the same things but had always kept quiet about them usually thinking they were ‘nothing but dreams’ and a small incident involving one when she was even younger. It was the sort of thing his mother came to increasingly think back on, though, when her research turned to ‘people like him’. Along with the government providing more information and evidence of their actual existence, then, and her mind going back more and more to her second oldest child…it finally convinced her inside of her own mind to sign him and his siblings up to be tested to see if any of them were truly ‘special people’. If they were the ones that she’d been focusing her work toward developing Framewerk tech for more and more so over the years. If they were ‘the next step in human evolution’ as it spread across the stars, so one theory about such people might have spelled it out, and it turns out…her instincts were right on the money with Lucius, and partly so with Lira to boot in a secondary sense. Not so much with Patrick though.)) 2 ) [i]Clairvoyance[/i] - Sometimes you have what you could only describe as visions. Most of the time they make no sense, but rarely you might learn about something that has happened, is happening right now, or could happen in the future. You possess the ability to sometimes see glimpses, the contents of which are determined by GM. Also, you may automatically dodge any attack that can be physically avoided, explained as foreseeing the attack before it happens. The chance to dodge reduces the more times the ability is used in a single battle, resetting after a proper rest. You also tend to see things that aren't there. You might become more nervous and paranoid, or become chatty about them, such as spoiling the twist of a movie others haven't seen. 3 ) [i]Humanity’s Potential[/i] - You are special, even among Gifted Pilots, and capable of something extraordinary. A caveman would simply call it magic, but a learned scholar might theorize it to be a visible manifestation of a theoretical concept invisible to the naked eye, but able to be manipulated by the select few. You're capable of performing actions that defy the known laws of physics when invoking the ability. However, these actions and their results are determined by the GM, with the pilot unable to control how it exactly occurs. Also, the effect diminishes the more times it is used in a single battle, replenishing after a proper rest. [color=silver][b]Perks[/b][/color]: 1 ) [i]Master of Directions[/i] - You gain a supernatural sense of direction towards an object or person you have seen before, and will have better chances of finding locations you know about. 2 ) [i]Creative[/i] - You're innovative, and capable of making all sorts of things, from cooking soup and baking cakes to inventing smaller inventions to impress your fellow pilots. You could even add tiny little modifications to your Framewerk, though not to the same extent as a Machine Mind. If you have both, you can make two modifications per event. [/hider] [color=silver][b]Additional information[/b][/color]: 1 ) His siblings also have middle names, I just have to think of them eventually. 2 ) Is there a chance to run into his father and runaway siblings? Perhaps. His father wanted to flee to deeper, even safer space, but also wanted to flee to avoid the military’s attention. Fake/new names, etc, the whole nine yards within what he can manage to do to keep Lira from becoming a potential pilot and so forth. 3 ) His favorite desserts are actually fruit tarts, admittedly, and things like chocolate-dipped berries and banana splits and fruit-preserve-filled pies or chocolates and such things that also incorporate fruits into them. But ancient Earth’s idea of fruitcake from centuries ago? Well-....w-wait, he even likes that too?! 4 ) He is, as taken from one of the Perk descriptions: “[C]apable of making all sorts of things, from cooking soup and baking cakes to inventing smaller inventions to impress your fellow pilots. [He] could even add tiny little modifications to [his] Framewerk over time, though not to the same extent as a Metal Mind [could].” His skills range from video games to computers, to tinkering with and repairing machines (exposure to his father’s mundane work also helped this), to cooking and baking, to drawing, to even reading and skills like welding. This is the general breadth of his polymath-grade skills, however, not meant to be a “he pulls ‘X’ skill out of his arse whenever it is needed at all possible occasions” type of deal. [/hider] [hider=The New Unit] [center][h1][color=silver][b]“Rex Artus”[/b][/color][/h1][/center] [color=silver][b]Framewerk Name[/b][/color]: Rex Artus, aka “Rex” (([u][b]Official Technical Model/Title[/b][/u]: The [color=silver][i]GFX-17-2 “Newtype” Framewerk[/i][/color] It is also the successor Framewerk developed from the [color=silver][i]GFX-J-17-1 “Special Pilot Innovations Testing” Unit[/i][/color], aka: [color=silver][i]“SPIT-U”[/i][/color], or as it is most colloquially and affectionately best known to the engineering team that it works alongside back 'home'- [color=silver][i]“Spit”[/i][/color].)) [hider=Appearance] [center][img]https://i.imgur.com/huvVeWX.jpeg[/img][/center] [/hider] [color=silver][b]Weight Class[/b][/color]: Heavy (Bonus: Speed) [color=silver][b]Framewerk Type[/b][/color]: Backliner (Has improved Dodging and Speed equal to Medium weight class units) [color=silver][b]Primary Weapon Systems[/b][/color]: 1 ) [b][i]Moonbreaker Railgun[/i][/b] ((A high-powered long-range weapon. The weapon does not give a big energy signature due to primarily firing physical projectiles with electromagnetism, making it suitable for sniping. Capable of piercing even thick armor. The weapon can fire specialized projectiles that are either Anti-Battleship Armor Piercing (Kinetic) or High Explosive Crowd Control projectiles (Energy). The weapon's projectile can be accelerated to increase both range and power to a safety limit. Charging the weapon past its safety limits further empowers the shot considerably, but risks melting the weapon. The weapon also has a slow firing rate, and is not suited for close combat.)) [color=silver][b]Secondary Systems[/b][/color]: 1 ) [b][i]Stargazer[/i][/b] - ((An experimental propulsion and defense system that uses extremely powerful magnets harvested from super-dense star systems. The system was originally designed for deep space exploration where fuel sources are scarce or non-existent. By aligning the magnets with bodies with greater mass like stars in the direction that the Framewerk is set to travel in, the Stargazer is then able to push and pull the Frame in that direction simultaneously. Similarly, the system is capable of pushing projectiles off of their course and away from the Frame or other targets, keeping them safe. Given enough time, the pilot can redirect attacks to specified directions to avoid redirecting the attack into an ally or even force the projectile to strike an enemy target. When used for space travel, it doubles the Frame's forward speed.)) 2 ) [s][b][i]Multiple Fire Control System[/i][/b] - ((A suite of comprehensive software and hardware, and sensor arrays. Able to acquire targets using RADAR, LADAR, Infrared and traditional optical target acquisition. The Framewerk is able to freely and easily distribute power from its energy cells to the first three detection modes, allowing for great flexibility on the battlefield. If necessary, the modular nature of the system makes it possible to install active/passive sonar for marine warfare in less than five hours in a standard Framewerk berth. The system also sports highly advanced target tracking and firing solution computation abilities owing to a specialized logic core that runs synchronously to Framewerk's own computer chipset. In proper conditions, only a few types of enemies may outgun the Framewerk within medium range owing to the constant effective firepower provided by the system. In addition, the system may compile esoteric data on-the-fly into the standard communication packet format for transmission to any applicable friendly networks for their use and perusal in real-time. When activated, the user may make a weapon attack against as many targets in a single action as they can reach in medium range.))[/s] [b][i](placeholder here for replacement Secondary System once it is decided upon)[/i][/b] - 3 ) [b][i]Attack Drones X-Type Variant 2 [/i][/b] - ((A relatively new type of drone of which these are an experimental subtype, 4 of these are housed and maintained within the Framewerk's upper back. These drones are armed with a medium particle cannon for greater firepower, instead of a small laser and melee-range laser dagger, and are fitted with both bladeless propulsion for in-atmopshere movement and a set of several smaller Microburst Monopropellant Thrusters for improved maneuverability and dodging capabilities when moving in zero-g. They further have an equipped plasma reactor, and are capable of attacking in synchronized teamwork. These drones can fully operate at medium range and are capable of hovering. When out of range of the Framewerk, they will enter standby mode and partially power down until either an emergency 'recall' function is activated (a one way recall to bring them back to dock with the unit specifically, not just bringing them back into range) or they otherwise return to being within range of the Framewerk itself. If given an override command the pilot can cause their reactors to overload, resulting in a detonation with high destructive power.)) (Update 5/31/26 - During this free time period, at some point, Lucius is going to use his "Creative" perk to mod his drones before the free time's end. The mod is as follows: [u]"The drones automatically 'piggyback' his control signals, acting like signal boosters/transmitters, extending the range of his drones. This is because one drone can sit within range of the Framewerk, doing it job while also piggybacking Lucius' control signals, and then other drones can go up to a medium range distance from the first drone as if it was the Rex Artus. This effect could be made into a chain via multiple drones, or acquiring/modifying more drones, so Lucius can send his drones much farther afield than normally possible."[/u]) [/hider] ------- [b]EDIT 3/21/26[/b] - Neatened up Lucius' personality section a touch, and added a line or two I'd forgotten when intially writing his app (that is my bad). [b]EDIT 4/21/26[/b] - Added his missing chosen bonus for the mech, which will be Speed.