Post by Joseph "Hades" Forsythe on Mar 30, 2013 14:47:13 GMT -5
"You know there's got to be a faster way to do this. How about we just change the first question to 'have you recently dated a homicidal pyromaniac?"
-Derek Morgan, Compulsion
Your Name: Waggy
How many years roleplaying?: Around 10
Joseph Mitchell Forsythe
-Derek Morgan, Compulsion
Your Name: Waggy
How many years roleplaying?: Around 10
Joseph Mitchell Forsythe
B a s i c s
32 • Hades • New York City, New York • Sniper • April 25th
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
32 • Hades • New York City, New York • Sniper • April 25th
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
- Age - 32
- Aliases - Hades, the Roman Sniper (disused)
- Residence - New York City
- Profession - Ex-military sniper, third-in-command of the Olympians
- Date of Birth - April 25
- Criminal Background/Rap (If Applicable) - Since joining the Olympians, Joseph has at least seven kills under his belt, including the assassination of Mayor Michael Bloomberg. He kidnapped Temperance Evans, was arrested, and subsequently escaped. He has since been on the run from the Counter Terror Unit and various other law enforcement branches.
A p p e a r a n c e
Tall • Charming • Dark eyes • Longer hair • Burn scar
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Joseph almost constantly has a look on his face that would label him as a charmer. Rather than a normal smile he has a smirk that practically shouts 'confidence'. Those who know him would identify it as part of his sniper complex, but the man insists it wasn't the military that made him this way; they simply honed the attitude. At first glance he looks like someone you would trust enough to ask for the time, thought not enough to ask to house-sit. He stands at 5'9" when he thinks about his posture, 5'8.5" when standing relaxed. His hair is dark brown and almost always messy. Ever since getting out of the military, he's made a point of keeping it longer than average and rarely bothers to make it look neat. Joseph's eyes are very light brown, often wide with eyebrows arched above them as if he's expecting anyone to acknowledge whatever random joke he just made.
Joseph enjoys dressing up, but he's often in casual clothes, as they attract less attention. Anytime they're not on a job or scouting for one, however, he's usually seen in slacks and a button-down shirt. A few have told him it's fairly pointless as they aren't exactly looking to impress, but he simply enjoys good clothes. As he once pointed out, "If we're going to bring down the most powerful nation in the civilized world, we may as well look good doing it." The messy hair throws off the 'proper' appearance, but that doesn't concern him much at all. Joseph has only one noticeable scar - an impressive feat for his line of work. There's a burn along his right side, about as thick as a computer mouse at the widest point, that stretches from the top of his shoulder to his hip. It doesn't hinder movement at all, and not many have actually seen it as shirts will cover the mark completely. Those who have seen it, however, already know the man well enough to avoid asking about it.
P e r s o n a l i t y
Cocky • Sarcastic • Temper • OCD • Scarred
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Some may find it odd for one of the leaders of a well-known terrorist group to have the sense of humor that Joseph does, but he has never been one to meet stereotypes. Though he's dead-serious when it's necessary, he finds it's easier to keep up a cheerful outlook than it is to try and wade through the 'doom and gloom' that most of his colleagues do. He's been accused before of using the 'happy facade' to hide whatever damage was done before he left the military. That man spent a few weeks in recovery after that statement, and no one has brought it up since. With his self-confidence, flirting is almost second-nature to him. Sometimes it doesn't immediately occur to him that flirting with a federal agent isn't really the best idea, but it's occasionally hard to restrain. Despite that, however, he would never actually follow through with any of it. Ever since he was deployed, Joseph has avoided any relationships like the plague. It seems odd to some, especially when he'll be charming for an hour or more and then turn down an offer of dinner in a split second.
The rare times he doesn't have a smirk firmly in place, Joseph can be one of the most serious people many will meet. Despite his jokes, he thinks of his 'job' as the most important a person can have and, like those working with him, is perfectly willing to die for it. When planning and setting up a mission, his eye for details and aptitude with numbers make him a key part of achieving whatever goal they have. Though he hates actually making the explosives - or handling them at all, for that matter - he can give the equations and formulas to make them work. He has an excellent memory and his obsession with numbers keeps all of his math knowledge at the front of his mind. Joseph is extremely determined all the time, whether it shows or not. Though it's true that no terrorist organization has managed to fully overthrow any part of the government, the man is certain that the Olympians will be the first, the ones to make history. He holds his title with extreme pride. In his mind, their cause is the most noble that someone can have, and he'll let anyone who will listen know it.
The alias 'Hades' is a fitting one. The man holds himself in very high regard and, while usually hard to faze, has occasional bursts of anger that have become well-known to the people he works beside. His past is an extremely touchy subject and Gabriel is one of the only ones who knows most of it. Any time the rest of the 'team' starts discussing the past, Joseph will become conveniently deaf until the subject has changed. Most know he used to be a sniper - his skill with the gun proves that much - but there are few who have heard why he was discharged and his actual reasons for joining the Olympians. After personally sending the one man to the ER for suggesting that he had been somehow mentally damaged by it, no one bothers bringing the topic up anymore.
His OCD is both helpful and an annoyance at points. While the obsession with organization is good for putting together plans and keeping supplies orderly, the compulsive part of it can give him headaches. If he sees something out of place, no matter where he happens to be at the time, he has an almost unrelenting urge to fix it, to set things straight. Sometimes, however, it isn't exactly subtle to stride up to some book vendor and start rearranging their shelves. Ignoring the compulsion is something that has taken him a lot of practice, and he still gets fairly jittery when it happens. Joseph has found having something for his hands to do often helps, and he's started carrying a spare bullet casing in his pocket to twirl between his fingers.
When it comes to numbers, it's a bit easier to control than the organization fetish. Numbers can be silent, and the man has learned to count everything in his head rather than muttering them out loud. He'll count the steps on a flight of stairs, how many people are standing in a line, the concrete slabs on one block of a sidewalk...it certainly helped in sniper training, as well. He became excellent at measuring distances and can usually get the figures no more than ten feet off of the exact length.
A combination of the two traits is usually found when Joseph files anything. While most would label drawers with the name of whatever is enclosed, he simply uses numbers - Roman numerals, to be exact. He has no trouble remembering where things are kept if they're numbered, and he's taken to storing the supplies his team brings in in such a manner. Most have gotten used to the system, though a few have to grudgingly ask for someone else to find a certain blueprint or design.
H i s t o r y
Military family • Sniper • 'Betrayed' by government • Olympians • Vendetta
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Joseph grew up in the East amidst the cold, rain, and bugs. Though they moved often, with his father's position in the military, it was always somewhere in the north. North Dakota, Michigan, New York, and Virginia are the places he knows the best, though he feels more at home in New York as that was where he spent most of his high school years. Their family was as normal as any military family could be. Joseph and his younger brothers - Samuel and Andrew, identical twins - were always good at making friends no matter how many times they moved and there was rarely resentment felt about leaving in the middle of a school year.
Joseph's OCD was 'diagnosed' his junior year of high school. Though never actually official, one teacher told them enough for them to draw the conclusion. It wasn't a very big deal at the time; he simply was far more organized and counted everything he came across. His father didn't feel the need to get treatment for something that wasn't doing any harm in the first place. Because of his love for numbers, the boy always exceeded in math. Writing was another matter entirely, and there were many weekends and summer days spent attempting to raise his English grade to anything that could count as passing. His intelligence is higher than average - an estimated IQ of 129 - but it didn't happen to include much with words.
When he was 26, Joseph married Carol Summers. He had already finished with basic and was going through the beginnings of sniper training when they met. She worked in hospital on base as a resident nurse. Their first actual encounter wasn't the most romantic in the books; Joseph had broken four ribs in a recon training accident and - despite his complaints - had to spend a week in the hospital to make sure he didn't completely mess up any healing by going right back to training. When he was deployed, Carol remained Stateside. It was because of her that Joseph wasn't the flirt that some of the other snipers were; he simply had no reason to be, and would just sit back and laugh whenever one of his team attempted to catch the interest of some waitress. They had it slightly easier than some military couples; as she was on base, communication was easier to come by than if it were from elsewhere. The one time they had to move, Carol's job came with her easily. Neither were exactly eager for children so there weren't problems with trying to raise them while their father was overseas. It wasn't an ideal situation, considering how often Joseph was gone, but it worked out well.
Once set in his 'fairly permanent' squad, Joseph met a man named Gabriel. Gabriel worked as a demolition expert, alongside his brother, and was one of the more interesting people on the team. The man was a genius - literally, if one were technical about it - when it came to explosions of all sorts. He was a generally nice person and the two got along fairly well. Joseph wasn't one of the men sent to the situation while they were in Afghanistan, but he heard enough about it later on to fill in the gaps. After that bombing, Gabriel changed. He was much quieter, never laughing like he used to, and when someone did manage to get him talking the conversation always seemed to turn towards the inadequacy in Washington. If there was one thing about Gabriel that never really changed, it was his ability to convince people of almost any opinion he had. Many of the people on the team began sympathizing with him, but it wasn't long before he was given a pysch eval and discharged.
Joseph was 28 when they had a leak. The mission itself went off without a hitch; someone posed a threat and they were taken out. It seemed, however, that the target happened to be far more influential than most had realized. Though no one has figured out exactly how it happened, Joseph was identified as the one to pull the trigger. His name got into the wrong hands and they discovered just how resourceful - and vengeful - those particular people could be. He refused to be taken away from the job for a 'risk assessment', but Carol was taken into protective custody the next day.
A few weeks later was when the government failed him. The protection didn't work; Joseph got the news that his wife had been killed a day after it happened. They never caught the one responsible and there was never any threat against the sniper himself. After about a week running risk assessments, he was allowed a leave in order to attend the funeral. When he returned to the job, everyone noticed the difference. The man didn't joke like he used to and his temper was extremely short. His OCD kicked in like some sort of shield and he often sat around, a bullet casing twirling in his fingers as he muttered off random strings of numbers with a blank expression. The casings he saved began having roman numerals written on them, though no one was able to figure out what pattern he used. After two months and multiple pysch evals, Joseph was sent home. Though it wasn't a dishonorable discharge, it still seemed like on in his eyes. His dissent for the government grew. They had failed to protect his wife and then promptly taken away the one profession he excelled in.
When Joseph returned Stateside, he moved back to New York. After a few months there, keeping to himself as much as possible, he remembered Gabriel. The other man's anger against the government made sense after the ordeals both of them had gone through, and he could empathize with it now. After a good deal of searching - some of which was questionable in legality - Joseph found his old 'friend' again and got in touch with him. The two began discussing plans, varying in magnitude and madness, but once they gained a few more people who had similar qualms against the government, they began following through with them. Joseph was eventually made third-in-command of the Olympians. His knowledge of math assisted in the designing of various explosives, though after one incident of which only Zeus knows many details, he refuses to build or set them anymore. He has a huge respect for fire and avoids close proximity with it as much as possible. The man's OCD is excellent for organizing things, but his newfound humor often gains some disapproval. It's been said that it's simply a shield against everything that's happened, but Joseph disagrees. Either way, the ex-sniper has proven to be a powerful weapon in the midst of the Olympians, and after Washington practically tossed him out the back door, he's determined to kick it down and toss a few pounds of C4 in after them. Metaphorically speaking, of course.
Family
Mother: Martha Forsythe – Substitute Math teacher
Father: Robert Forsythe – Retired US Army General
Siblings: Andrew Forsythe – Fence ; Samuel Forsythe – FBI Agent, currently in the CTU (Identical twins)
Other: None
L i k e s
- Guns
- Explosions
- The sound of foundations cracking
- Cracking jokes in the middle of a job
- Math
- Roman numerals
- Studying different accents
- Sleight of hand tricks - though he isn't good at them
- Crossing the line between genius and madness
- Preparation
- His kill brass
- A clean get-away
- The smell of accelerents
- Mint
Di s l i k e s
- Computers
- The government
- Authority of any sort - though he respects Gabriel
- Fire
- Setting up explosives
- People who call him 'Joe'
- The smell of fresh wood
- Rain - it messes with plans
- Losing track of anything
- Interruptions
- Not getting credit for a good job
- Anyone disrespecting Gabriel
- Being reminded of his time before he joined the Olympians
- Having his hair 'overly' short
S t r e n g t h s
- Good memory
- Very accurate shot
- Good at planning missions
- Very attentive to details
- Extremely organized - part of his OPCD
- Can easily switch between a joking demeanor and dead-serious as quickly as he needs to
- Skilled at imitating accents
- Doesn't stand out when he doesn't want to
W e a k n e s s e s
- Obsessive compulsive - about numbers and organization
- Finds he has to take a mental tally of almost everything; steps in a flight of stairs, the number of people in a line, etc.
- Has occasional anger issues, especially when his past is brought up
- When actually face-to-face with a cop, he finds it hard to look natural
- Often thinks he sees his wife in a crowd
- Nearly pyrophobic
- Has a hard time spotting when people are beginning to get annoyed or angry
- Constantly moving - he often twirls things between his fingers if he has to sit in one spot for long
O t h e r
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Q: (OPTIONAL!) How did you come to find Absolutely Arresting? TEMPY
Q: For those making second characters; what is your main account? N/A
Q: If you had to pick a theme song for your character, what would it be? Gun ~ Battleme
Q: What mental disorder(s) and/or quirks if any does your character suffer from? Do they know about it? Obsessive Compulsive Disorder - learned about it in high school
Marks every bullet casing with a roman numeral and occasionally leaves them at his perch for the CSU to find. Before discovering his affiliation with the Olympians, it gained him the nickname 'Roman Sniper'
Q: Anything Else? His rifle is a Styer HS .50
(This bio was just copy/pasted; if any details should be different, let me know. If/when we do get a Zeus, I'll change his history to accommodate.)
A Role Playing Sample
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Say what people may about New York - he had missed the place. It wasn't the people, really. The people could get annoying within two minutes. The city smelled strange no matter where you went. Traffic, of course, was always terrible...but somehow the mixture of everything packed together on the streets made it unforgettable. The competitive part of him had claimed New York as his city. In a way it was true; there had been another sniper in the shadows before Joseph showed up, someone who went by Wolf, but the rumors on that end had gone quiet after a few months. Having to run was the worst part of having Feds on his tail. Virginia was a decent place, but nothing really beat New York and the man had made his way back the moment he knew he wouldn't end up shot entering the city limits. They could keep him away for a few months, but that was pushing it. There was no way he'd let the Feds have his city.
Even so, having to walk the streets with his head down constantly was annoying. Most of the posters with his picture had since been taken down or just blown away, but he knew there were occasional spots on the evening news and far too many people would like nothing better than to recognize Hades outside a coffee shop. He had only been in prison two days, and that wasn't technically prison - that was just a holding cell while they set up trial dates and processed everything. Either way, Joseph was not eager to go back. It paid to be cautious these days, and so far he hadn't earned more than two second-glances on the sidewalk. As often as everyone kept up with media, very few actually bothered to memorize a face. They figured the cops would deal with it. It was, after all, the job of the Feds to bring in terrorists. Civilians had no part in something like that. His walking the streets just proved that people were far too trusting in their government to take care of things.
The subway never used to be a favorite method of travel, but it was pretty much necessary these days, as his car was gone. The sniper had come to almost appreciate the odd atmosphere of the trains. If it hadn't been for the deep-running paranoia, he might actually enjoy them. Still, he could deal with the crowds and the odd noises as long as he kept his head down.
Twenty two...no, twenty four. It took his conscious mind a second or two to realize what exactly he was counting - the people sitting on benches beside the track - and Joseph shook his head quickly as the arriving subway slowed to a halt. Swarm of people got off, swarm of people got on...normalcy for New York, really. No one could tell at a glance that this was the same city that had been bombed twice a few months ago, that so many of these people had been glued to their TVs with similar looks of horror as they saw the mayor collapse after taking a bullet from the sky. Funny how quickly they could move on. It was reminiscent of battles, oddly enough. Tragedies happened and there was no choice but to keep going. Of course, in battles people didn't stop to wail about it for a while...
The entire subway seemed packed. Just your luck, really. Suddenly backing out would seem far too weird and Joseph contented himself with ducking his head as he squeezed in. Crowds used to be good - easy to blend in with and cops lost faces in crowds quickly. Now, though, it made him a little more wary than usual. Crowded subways were hard to get off of in a hurry. One hand ran absently over his hair and he suppressed a small scowl. It was shorter than he liked it, simply to keep himself looking as little like the mug shot as possible. He hated short hair...
There was only one apparent seat open - the only one that wouldn't force him to squeeze between an overweight man with his taco dinner and some old dear knitting - and he took it without hesitation. Now it was just a matter of getting back to Master's apartment without raising suspicions and praying she wasn't playing anything that gave him whiplash every time it decided to change...
After a pause the sniper took his eyes off of the metal floor to scan the compartment quickly. It was fairly loud, smelled odd, and packed full of people. Typical of New York. Usually, though, people didn't look like they were carrying half of their belongings with them on the commute. Brown eyes paused on the woman next to him, glancing over her bags briefly before lifting an eyebrow and looking up at their owner. She was pretty, that was for sure. Long nose, very dark hair...definitely not some hobo vagrant type. Joseph let a smirk flip into place - they seemed rare these days - and leaned back.
"You moving somewhere?" he asked, his voice raised a little to be heard over the general babble. "If that's just stuff for work, I'd suggest quitting."