Name: Michael Gray
Nickname(s): None. Not at the moment anyway.
Age: 22
Gender: Male
Appearance: Michael is a short, broad shouldered and slightly chubby lad. He's 5'6 tall and weighs 168lb. Despite his slight chubbiness he is solidly built and strong, his muscular arms, legs and chest evidence of a semi-regular exercise routine. He is somewhat baby faced with a complexion that sits between pale and rosy. He has dark brown hair and eyes of a slightly lighter brown. His appearance tends to be rugged, bordering on scruffy. He cares little for style or fashion, often just wearing jeans that are always a little too big and whatever dark t-shirt is clean. His hairstyle is simple and scruffy and he tends to have some facial hair growth. He certainly isn't unhygienic, but finds regular grooming to be tedious.
Personality: Michael is a bit of a weird guy. Kind-hearted, yet seemingly cold and distant. Uneducated in a way, but relatively intelligent. He's willing to take part in violence and conflict and understands it's usefulness, even enjoying a decent fight himself, yet he sees it as a last resort in most circumstances, believing that if conflict was his first reaction to every slight he may as well be an animal. Also, he's comfortable with violence, but not cruelty. He reads a lot and thinks a lot and is often considered surprisingly smart by the rare people who get close enough to hear his thoughts. He doesn't consider himself intelligent however, thinking instead that he has aspirations of being knowledgeable but unfortunately believes that his wanting to be and actually being intelligent are two separate things. Finally he holds his thoughts and feelings close in most circumstances, considering them personal and private.
History: Michael had a strange childhood. His father worked mostly in construction but had an alternate career in relatively petty crime. Robbery, insurance fraud, occasional muscle work and later on some drug dealing. He was a violent and angry alcoholic of a man who regularly smashed up the house in front of his wife and children causing terrible distress. Michael didn't hate him for this until many years later. As a result of his reckless life and terrible parenting however he was often in prison and thankfully his violent outbursts eventually led to he and Michael's mother separating. A lot of damage had already been done however.
His mother was a kind and bright woman, but over a decade of suffering her husband and raising five children practically by herself had made her depressed and after years of barely coping she eventually became angry and mentally unstable. To make matters worse her last child was born with severe cerebral palsy and taking care of her whilst already in a very dark place did little to help things. As a result of their fathers influence the boys of the Gray family all found themselves drifting towards crime. Luckily Michael's interest in computer games and books meant that he spent far less time getting into trouble than his brothers and after a couple of years of petty vandalism, shoplifting and the occasional fight he stopped getting into trouble outside of school altogether. His brothers weren't so lucky, one ending up in a juvenile detention facility due to various burglaries and street robberies and later a foster family and the other later joined the infantry due to a perceived lack of other options. Luckily both came out okay, but their absence meant that Michael had to be the man of the house from a very young age. This mostly meant helping his mum with his disabled sibling and trying to curve her breakdowns.
So unfortunately Michael's issues didn't stop with getting out of petty crime. Due to a lack of discipline, his messy childhood, bad parenting or maybe simply the way he was he ended up sleeping, fucking around and generally doing anything but pay attention throughout his entire school career. This lead to him leaving at 16 with no qualifications, no grades and a bad case of depression. Not being able to get a job and not being able to do anything at college other than repeat the courses he had just slept through in school he basically ended up doing nothing productive for almost a year. He read, he gamed, he spent a lot of time online. Eventually a social worker noticed him procrastinating his life away and enlisted him in some courses that specialized in troubled youth and the ball began rolling again, gradually.
The course was good for him. He made a couple of friends, his confidence in his intellectual ability grew from non-existent to “Maybe I'm not a complete dumb-ass” due to the courses refreshing approach. Eventually though the course ended, and despite having successfully completed various exams and gotten half a dozen qualifications he still couldn't get a job. This once again lead to him spending a lot of time on the internet. Not all was bad however, for it was at this time he met his future wife online. They met, they messaged a lot, eventually they Skyped a lot and soon their young and dumb teenage brains lead them to believe they could sustain an international relationship. Thankfully, they could, they fell in love and a little over four years later were married. During those four years Michael's disabled sister died and his brothers moved back into the family home, absolving him of his responsibility as man of the house in a very crude way. So that is what lead Michael to Ashton, Colorado. A woman he loved, for who would go through all that godforsaken green card trouble otherwise? To this day he is convinced the phrase “All's fair in love and war” is a valid reference to the difficulty of immigrating to the U.S and the only two sane reasons one would pursue it.
Relationships:Emily Gray – Wife
Note(s): Until very recently Michael spent almost all of his life in England, so still has a distinct accent, although if he were to spend much time back there he would be questioned (taken the piss out of) for the American twinge in his voice.
Michael grew up in a way that meant he was a part of more violent exchanges than the average person, but in case anyone gets the wrong idea this does not make him a skilled combatant. At most he's more comfortable with violence than is typical and this might give him a slight edge, but because he's seen both serious injury and serious time in prison come out of dumb aggression he's probably even less likely to “go there” than the average guy.
