Dante's Characters
Name: Colonel Montgomery Molyneux
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Age: 72
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Faceclaim: Idris Elba
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Pronouns: He / him
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About:
Born in 1876, 27 years before the meteor fell, Monty Molyneux comes from a long line of service members. His parents met in the Army, married on a base, and delivered him in an Army hospital-- so, when he came of age, he saw only one option for his future: enroll at West Point academy, and become an Army officer. He graduated with honors and was quickly appointed a high rank. Monty saw combat a handful of times, and was commended for bravery in battle on multiple occasions. He was on a fast track to top brass, and not one of his colleagues had a negative word to say about him. With an undoubtedly promising career ahead of him, It seemed that Montgomery Molyneux would be etched into history as another important army man.
That is, until the world shifted beneath his feet. After the disaster, the world's armies struggled to maintain the relevance-- with humanity's minds on their collective survival, war and combat were far from the top priority. Eventually, in 1940, the infamous Progress Treaty was signed, shrinking each involved country's military to only the absolute essentials in personnel and equipment. Monty, despite his bright career, was quickly cut from the Army's billing sheet-- with a severance package that felt more like an insult than a warm goodbye.
Monty had never known a life outside the rigid structure of the armed forces, and for a short period of time, struggled to find direction in his life. As his small sum burned a hole in his bank account, he came across an opportunity: a recently-abandoned army airfield, located high above the fog in New York's Catskill mountains. Seeing the possibility to take leadership into his own hands, he purchased the base, and began assembling a cherry-picked team of defenders, with one goal: protect the undefended denizens of the new world, and make a pretty penny doing it.
The Flyin' Lions Private Air Group was formally established in 1930, originally a team of no more than 5. Since then, Molyneux, ever charismatic and a cunning leader, has grown his force, and continues to send his pilot up into the sky, upholding the potential for mankind to continue being good.
Monty Molyneux is a man of passion and fortitude. Though he does see profit as an important aspect of the work they are trying to accomplish, when it comes down to the wire, he will always make the decision he feels is morally correct. Ironically, he possesses no skill at flying himself-- in fact, he probably couldn't even if his life depended on it. He prefers to run his business from the ground, and is responsible for a majority of the Lions' strategic and financial decisions. Thanks to his less-than-glamorous dismissal from the Army, he no longer hold prim and proper structure in a very high regard-- he upholds what order is necessary to keep the base and their operations running smoothly, but will not disparage his crew for expressing themselves. After all, he was always sort of an odd bird.
Name: Chief Mechanic Giancarlo La Rosa
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Age: 33
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Faceclaim: Christopher Abbott
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Pronouns: He / him
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About: (CW: Drug addiction mention)
Giancarlo was born in 1915, inside the towering domed walls of the Big City. He is the son of an Italian immigrant and a third-generation Spanish mother. From a young age, Gian worked alongside his father in the family’s rather prosperous Bicycle repair shop. Eventually, as automobiles became more commonplace, the La Rosa bicycle shop became an auto repair garage. On a particularly unpleasant winter day, Colonel Molyneux drove his sputtering Staff car into the garage. Busy working on another vehicle, Giancarlo’s father let him take the job on his own. Impressed with the 19-year-old’s speedy and skillful work, the Colonel invited Gian to come work alongside the Flyin' Lions. Salvatore worked as a flight crewman on the base for five years, refueling planes and checking tire pressures, working his way through the ranks. His goal was to eventually become the flight mechanic for Big Bess, the bomber/cargo plane. After five long years, his dream of flying was within reach. He had been promoted to an aircraft mechanic, Ground crew for now, but it was a step in the right direction.
Two months after his promotion to mechanic, disaster struck. Gian was starting the engine for a trainer plane by hand when the prop exploded, lodging a fragment of wood in his lower back. Thanks to a fast surgery, he survived-- but lost most of the use of his left leg. A leg brace left him capable of continuing his work on the ground, but flying on the bomber crew would remain a distant dream. The injury left him in a deep depression for months, and he grew unhealthily the morphine he was prescribed. He even came close to being kicked out of the crew on a number of occasions.
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Then, almost exactly one year since his accident, Giancarlo received word that his father had fallen ill, and was not expected to make it much longer. Gian traveled back to the Big City to see his sickly father one last time. At the sight of his son, gaunt, ungroomed, and limping, Bernardo La Rosa burst into tears-- and his father’s grief struck Gian in a way that nothing else had been able to before. He vowed to the man who had molded him that he would turn his life around, and stop wallowing in his misery. Bernardo passed away in his sleep the next night, and Sal returned to the Catskills with a new fire. He weaned himself off his pain medication and went back to work. After a total of 13 years under the Lions' employ, he worked his way up to Head Mechanic. His gifted new apprentice developed him a brand new leg brace, a contraption of springs and ratchets that returned his leg to almost perfect working order-- a gift for his big promotion, hard-fought and well-earned.
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Giancarlo still dreams of flying. He’s happy (well, as happy as he can be) working on the ground, but one day, he promises to take to the sky. He's an inconsolably grouchy man, should you only meet him once, but those whom he allows to grow close have a habit of whittling away his coarse exterior. Deep down, he is a man of fiery passion, and a skilled worker to boot. He's not traditionally smart, but hand him a burned-out husk and a bag of tools, he'll make it fly somehow. Gian is heartily protective of his comrades in the Lions, though he may not show it outwardly, and would gladly put his life on the line again to protect the ones he loves. He's even been known to crack the occasional bad joke, and is often the spark for spurious banter among the crews.
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Name: Aislinn "Ash" Song
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Age: 24
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Faceclaim: Deb Never
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Pronouns: They / Them
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About:
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When the city of Dublin became overcrowded, and finding a job became virtually gladiatorial combat, 20-year-old Caelan O'Callahan decided it was time for her to leave. A seasoned telephone switchboard operator, she was certain that her talents could be appreciated elsewhere. So, she struck out across the Atlantic, with a one-way ticket to the Big City. There, she found work with the U.S. Army as a radio operator-- and met Jae-woo Song, a Korean immigrant and Army pilot with a sparkling reputation. The two fell madly in love and were wed within months.
Some such marriages are often flashes in the pan, but Caelan and Jae-woo were inseparable. They had seven children together, comfortable with their lifestyle and confident in their ability to raise them fully and properly. Aislinn was the eldest of seven, and for the first sixteen years of their life, they lived comfortable. A small family home on the army base accommodated them well, even with their ever-growing number of siblings. They floated between their mother and father's posts when they weren't in school, beginning their education in the trade of flight from a very early age. Only weeks after their sixteenth birthday, however, their family was presented with a metaphorical brick wall: the Progress Treaty had been signed, and their mother and father were suddenly out of work.
Caelan struggled to manage her gaggle of children while Jae-woo became more and more distant. Having spent most of his days being a pilot, not a father, he was confronted with the fact that he was not exactly parent material. As he spent more and more of his days reminiscing with other men in smoking clubs and bars, Ash was thrust into helping their mother raise their family. Eventually, Jae-woo simply stopped coming home. No explanation was offered, and they never heard from him again-- although, the general consensus among those who were old enough to think about it was that this was probably for the best.
Ash watched helplessly, for a while, as their mother aged before her time. The meager jobs they bounced between were far from enough to keep them afloat, and eventually, the Songs were near destitute. So, Ash took a risky gig-- co-pilot for a high-value cargo plane. They were going cross-country... with absolutely no protection squadron. As was seemingly inevitable, pirates were upon them within hours of taking off. After they went down atop a mountain, Ash fought tooth and nail to repel the besieging raiders, but it was no use.
Eventually, they were alone, hunkered down in the cockpit with only the body of the pilot to keep them company. They listened as the pirates plundered the plane, revolver held on the door for hours. At nightfall, things grew quiet. The only sound was one set of heavy footsteps, nearing the cabin door. But it was not a bloodthirsty pirate who thrust open the door-- It was a tall man, in a dark suit, with kind eyes and tales of a better life, of better money, and a safety net for their family.
So, Ash took the oath and followed Sage. For the last five years, they've taken to the skies under the colors of The Devils Ivy, taking pride in the motivations of their group-- however twisted the methods they employ. In time, Ash has proven to be an increasingly competent pilot, and relishes the time they spend in the hot seat. Their plane is their baby, decorated over every inch with hand-painted scenes of flight, dogfights, and the nature surrounding their camp. Much to the chagrin of the mechanics and ground crew, they attempt to do a lot of maintenance and upkeep themselves-- and when they are shooed away, they hover behind the workers, micromanaging every inch of repairs.
Ash is bold and brash to a fault, always opting to take the riskiest of options, so long as it could mean any manner of increased success. They are rarely seen without a smile on their face, a bounce in their step, and their mouth running about dreams, plans, and gossip. They are always looking to expand their skills, to make themselves more valuable, to give the raiders a reason to keep them around. These traits come from overcoming years of insecurity and not knowing what their future held. Now, they are undyingly loyal to their gang, their friends, and Sage, holding these people responsible for saving not only their own life, but the lives of their family. The divisions among the raiders continue to confuse them, however-- they have repeatedly found themselves in hot water over being too friendly with the wrong people.
