David Reed
Apr 9, 2014 18:34:41 GMT -5
Post by David Reed on Apr 9, 2014 18:34:41 GMT -5
The Basics
Name: David James Reed
Nicknames: Just call him Dave… never Davey
Age: 25
Orientation: Heterosexual
Desired Rank/Job: Local - Owner/Manager at James Auto Repair
Powers: Technopathy
Dave can mentally interface with anything that contains any sort of computer chip. At least, that’s the technical description for it. His experience of it is more of communication, however. To Dave it is like talking to another person. Each machine has it’s own personality based on the complexity of the electronics and the programming. Interfacing with that is just like “interfacing” with a person, and equally as challenging.
Ultimately, Dave can manipulate the programming of the electronics, but this requires time and focus… a lengthy conversation that culminates in either convincing the electronic to change its' ways or perhaps "aiding it to feel better" about an error that was bothering it. At least, that's the only way he knows how to explain it.
He can help an electronic to run more efficiently and expand it’s purpose, but he cannot take an average smart phone and give it the complexity of a supercomputer. His limitations are that of the inherent circuitry and whatever can be physically added to upgrade it. Additionally, the more complicated the computer the more focus is required to commune with it. This results in a more complicated and in depth conversation, often challenging Dave’s ability to alter the programming.
Supercomputers, for example, are beyond him. Conversing with them would be like getting into a discussion with a super genius. Dave may not be half bad if he ever put his mind to something, but he certainly doesn’t have the IQ or focus required for that.
Dave can handle a few electronics at a time and communicate with less complex and/or a couple of more familiar ones without needing to touch them. However, the deeper the conversation gets, the more he has to focus, ultimately blocking out everything around him but that one thing. He gets lost in it, sometimes for hours on end. He will often neglect to eat, drink, or sleep, which has been detrimental to his health on more than one occasion. As a result he has been known to struggle with insomnia and to pass out from exhaustion.
Play By: Max Thieriot
The Details
Hair Color: Brown
Eye Color: Brown
Any Piercings? None
Any Tattoos? None
Any Scars? None
General Appearance:
At 5 foot 10, Dave isn’t anything particularly special. He’s not athletically built and he wouldn’t exactly call himself handsom, but he doesn’t really care. Generally speaking, you can tell at a glance that he doesn’t put much time or effort into his looks. His brown hair is a little unkempt and his wardrobe contains little more than a few pairs of jeans and miscellaneous tees. Not to mention his favorite black sweatshirt.
However, there is another side to Dave - the office-friendly, polite society Dave. He can give off the perfect smile and amiable demeanor. With the right pair of pants, button down shirt, belt and shoes he would fit right into any cubicle. If you know him well, however, you can see the discomfort in his eyes. Then you might start to pick up on the way he fidgets around people, chews his nails when no one is looking, or picks whatever surface is nearest.
The second he gets away from that, however, you can see the tension roll off and his face soften. Once the shirt is unbuttoned a little, his hair mussed, and a fresh cigarette lit in his hand he’s practically a whole different person. Relaxed and carefree. That’s the true Dave.
Personality:
A nomad at heart, Dave is the kind of guy who just doesn’t fit into the standard 9 to 5, corporate, cubicle world. Yet it’s the only life he ever expected to lead. That’s what everyone does, right? Grow up in a little old town, endure the boredom of school, move on to the tedium of work, and then get married, settle down and grow old…. all in that same old town, or another one like it, or another one like that, or another one like that one, or another one…
…… And that’s all he has done for the vast majority of his life. Even at Hammel, Dave never aspired to much. Some people said he was lazy, but lazy isn’t quite the word for it. It’s more like… he was just never inspired. Without that he never saw a direction in which he could take his life. So into the mold he fell. It never worked, but what else was he supposed to do living a life drowned in boredom?
Recently, however, Dave’s eyes have begun to open to the possibility of a life outside of the norm. A life on the road. For the truth is Dave just isn’t comfortable sitting in one place for long. The same people. The same routine. The same work. It’s all so dull. But the road is different. When he is on the move, Dave doesn’t answer to anyone but himself. No one pays any mind to what he does or where he goes or why. It’s freeing. That freedom is air to stifled lungs. It brings a peace of mind unlike any other.
Dave never envisioned such a life for himself, though. He’s never known anyone to live that way and has no idea how it could be possible to truly get by like that. It’s liberating to discover his true self, but he can’t help feeling tentative about it. The world just isn’t designed for drifters and there isn’t really a manual for the life style.
The good news is he’s an easy-going guy and can be quite personable. He just doesn’t seek out conversation and will generally avoid any real confrontation. He might tell someone to piss off, but he’d much rather talk something through than get riled up about it. Just not worth the energy, you know? Not to say Dave won’t get mad or take it out on something or someone. It just takes a lot to get there. “A lot” being that inability to escape or being cooped up in one place or with the same people, same life, same stress for too long.
Then he gets ALL kinds of irritable and that irritability can turn nasty. Feeling too stifled, Dave becomes little more than a trapped animal. He will lash out with blame and anger, losing introspection and care as well as any ability or desire to hold himself accountable. Pushing people away becomes his speciality, even a necessity, disconnection and isolation his sanctuary. But it's nothing but a brief respite - the pressure still looming over him, bearing down. At that point not even a smoke will help. Nothing will, except the open air and the road laid out before him.
Your Vices
Likes:
- The open road
- Driving for long periods of time
- Long, pointless walks
- His car
- Hanging out in an open, secluded area on a nice quiet night
- Laying on the hood of his car, having a light smoke or a bit of a drink
- The countryside
- The empty woods
- A light conversation with someone new
- A cool hard cider.
Dislikes:
- Being called “Davey”
- Being cooped up in one place all of the time
- Working constantly
- Being stuck on a regular schedule, all day, every day, day after day after day after…
- Being micromanaged
- Being reminded that smoking is unhealthy
- People who are high strung, nitpicky, or look for trouble
- Drunks and drinking as a coping mechanism
- Drinks with caffeine
Strengths:
- Is able to do one thing for hours and hours on end without much of a break
- Being able to let his mind drift
- Not taking much too seriously
Weaknesses:
- Anything sports related
- Caring about something he has already perceived as being pointless
- Knowing what to do next
- Anything involving navigation, despite how much he likes to travel he has a high tendency for getting lost.
- Writing or reading computer code
- Coping with stress and worse yet, holding himself accountable for failing to cope well
Fears:
- Not knowing what he’s going to do with his life or whether or not he will ever figure that out
- That he might end up alone, truly alone with no deep connections to anyone or anything
- That he will never find a life partner who can accept and live with who he truly is
- That he won’t have a place to return to if he lets it go
- That it isn’t possible to get by in this world without conforming to the norms
- That he will never find true happiness and freedom
- That he might be truly incapable of owning up to his own shortcomings, much less do anything about them
- The thought of bugs and parasites, particularly them crawling in his skin
Secret: While he considers himself to be very open and honest, Dave also does not go out of his way to reveal things about himself. However, the one thing he tries to keep locked away is just how afraid he is that he might not ever be capable of doing what it takes to be happy.
Family Ties
Father: James Alan Reed
Mother: Debbie Marie Reed
Siblings: None
Any Other Important People:
FI, short for F.I.N.D. (Friendly Intelligent Navigational Device). FI is Dave’s one, true best friend. She is a GPS that Dave found discarded with a bunch of unwanted electronics. The two have rarely been apart since. She’s peppy with a kick of attitude. She loves to pick on Dave, push his buttons and laugh it off just when he gets riled up. Having been previously abandoned, she is careful not to ever truly upset him and is afraid to let him down. She is also curious to know more about the world and what people are like and why they are like that.
History
James and Debbie Reed were the classic American high school sweethearts in 1969. The 18 year old football star and the 17 year old head cheerleader. They had everything. James had a full scholarship and Debbie was prom queen… and by the end of the school year they had a baby on the way. Their wedding was that summer. James gave up his scholarship to work in his uncle’s garage and Debbie settled in to be a house maker. But Debbie suffered a miscarriage and then it was too late to return to the dreams of the year before. So the couple settled in together and became just another young American couple trying to get by.
They tried again and again to have children but luck was not on their side and soon the issue was tearing apart their marriage. That’s why Dave’s birth was such a blessing. It brought the couple back together. To escape their past they moved their new family to Pilot Ridge and James started at a local garage.
Dave grew up knowing very little of his family’s past. As the miracle child, he was the center of his parent’s world. His mother gave him all of her love and his father often took him to work at the garage. When the garage’s owner retired, James bought the business with what little he had saved. After that David spent most of his free time there. He didn’t care for fixing up the cars at all. The mechanics tried to get him involved, but all he wanted to do was cause trouble. When the trouble causing turned dangerous Dave was removed from the garage and forced onto helping his father in the office and cleaning up.
As he got older, Dave wanted less and less to do with his father’s business. That’s why he was so cooperative when a one of the nearby private school’s recruiters showed up at the garage to speak with his father about having Dave attend. He didn’t really care about being a Meta but it was a good way to escape his father’s ever attentive gaze.
So Dave went to Hammel. It was alright. He made a few friends but never got very involved with anything that was going on at the school. Even when his power manifested he didn’t really get what the big deal was about. For him it wasn’t much trouble learning to control his ability. It wasn’t even an ability he really cared to have. Communicating with computers might have been cool if it didn’t involve all those conversations.
As a result, Dave drifted through his time at Hammel with relatively little impact on the world around him and rarely tested the true extent of his powers. By the time he graduated he was little more than the average freeloader, much to his parent’s dismay. Still, he managed to spend some time at the local community college and got decent grades there while working at the office his mother got him a job at.
By the time he was 22, he couldn’t take the monotony of it all anymore. That’s when Dave disappeared. Or rather, he woke up one day, threw a bunch of clothes in a bag, told his girlfriend goodbye, and hit the road with the little money he had. For many it seemed to come out of nowhere, but if you asked around enough you might have found evidence of his discomfort and restlessness.
That time on the road was like being reborn. Dave found that he could breath for the first time in his life. He found inspiration in everything. It’s also when he met FI, as he came to call her. In need of some things for living out of his car and with no real money to spend Dave turned to sifting through junk at a market. Passing a stall with used parts and he heard a voice call out to him. The poor GPS was worn and battered, abandoned in a wrecked car and up for parts. The sad little voice promised to be good to him. He would have continued by but he just couldn’t leave her there to be torn to pieces.
So Dave bought FI and from that day on they went everywhere together. Her poor coding was outdated and often gave him bad directions. They fought a lot, but no matter how many times Dave threatened to leave her behind she always managed to soften his heart. Before he even realized what had happened Dave had completely reprogrammed the GPS. She now called herself his Friendly Intelligent Navigational Device and Dave shortened it to FI. The two were best friends tackling the road of life together.
Then Dave got the call. His father had a heart attack. It was fatal. He didn’t want to return to Pilot Ridge, but he had to, for his mom… and for his father.
Dave returned and has tried to settle into a life in Pilot Ridge. The garage was given to him though he had real no idea how to run it. He has tried to make it work. There have been ups and downs, but it is somehow still there. Barely. But it is a lot of pressure for someone who never had much in the way of aspirations. Dave doesn't want to let his mother down, or his father, but the situation is getting harder and harder to navigate.
Roleplay Example
See Damia Owens
What About You?
Name: SemiSigh
Age: 20s
Experience: Off and on for a bunch of years
How Did You Find Us? RPDirectory
Ready To Play? Yes, please.
