Anton Kresnikov; the Specialist
Sept 19, 2013 21:33:37 GMT -5
Niema "BlackDeath" Pyke and MADDOX like this
Post by Anton Kresnikov on Sept 19, 2013 21:33:37 GMT -5
Played By: Michael Fassbender
Category: Freelancer
Name: Anton Kresnikov
Alias/Nicknames: "the Specialist"
Age: 38
Status: Believed Widower
Height: 6'2"
Weight: 194lbs
Eye Color: Blue
Hair Color: Auburn to Black
General Demeanor/Personality: Typically quiet unless someone has been foolish, or something needs to be said, Kresnikov prefers to observe more than contribute to a conversation taking place. This usually leaves him on his own by choice in social situations. It is difficult to get a rise out of him, but when he is angered it is even more of a challenge to calm him down again.
++ Quirks ++
- Desensitized: From the violence he witnessed as a child on through to the violence he has performed himself, violence does not shock him, and he seems to have no empathy for those being hurt.
- Prosthetic Forearms: Due to the combination of scars from his fights and the torture later ( See Bio ) Anton has no sense of touch in his arms.
++ Best Skills ++
- Cruelty, Brutality, Agony, Pain and Fear: The trade of the Specialist. Five aspects of devastation that he employs before and during the kill.
- Endurance, Survival: The torture he has endured has taught him how to withstand harsh pains and push through them regardless of the cause or environment.
- CQC, Short Blades: Kresnikov learned to fight at an early age, both hand to hand and with knives or other blades. He uses a deadly blend of martial arts with no formal style, making his attacks unpredictable and often debilitating if not lethal.
- Improvised Combat, Improvised Weaponry: The Specialist is never without a weapon. Walls, pipes, the ground, even the target's own limbs can all be used in a fight if you do not care to appear barbaric. He does not.
- Study: The Specialist does not undertake a single task without learning everything he can about it. Sometimes this requires additional time to complete what he is after, but the end result cannot be argued with.
- Perception, Intuition, Conjecture: Anton pays attention to the world around him, and minor details do not go without notice. Further, as he sees these details, he is able to recognize importance and causational links between pieces of information quickly, allowing him to draw what are often shockingly accurate conclusions with what could be considered little information.
- Grudges: He is not a man to be crossed. He may bide his time to attain his vindication, but it will come, and it will be unpleasant.
++ General Skills ++
- Firearms: Capable in many forms of combat, the Specialist is also an able hand with many forms of firearms, but they are too impersonal for his tastes.
- Tracking: As a part of his Study, he will often learn the behavioral patterns of his targets and find a way to track them down. Others may be faster at it, but his patience brings him to his quarry in time.
- Explosives: As with firearms, the Specialist has learned the craft of terror and will frequently employ explosives with a high level of skill. While he is able to manipulate them to his needs, they are hardly his focus for anything more than distraction or shock.
- Linguistics: Growing up in a settlement that had a strong oral tradition, Anton picked up an ear for languages at a young age. He practices them in his spare time as a hobby to keep them fresh in his mind, and with some time picks up others despite his age. Languages from the World Asunder are among his favorite to practice.
Reputation: A master in the tradecraft of gruesome and shocking death. Eating at the resolve of those he faces, he is a weapon of morale devastation. While some play bridge to pass time, the Specialist cripples the spirit of others. There have not been many witnesses to both the Specialist's and the Harbinger's cruelty, but those who have that can retain a shred of sanity and are still able to speak say that there are striking similarities.
There are also a great deal of rumors about his background and where he came from. People who talk about the Specialist now tell rumors about the boy that was and how he left the small settlement where he grew up. Some say it was the JSS that found him turning Raiders into corpses, others say that Harbingers thought him one of their own when he turned his own village into a slaughterhouse. Only he knows the truth, but he does not speak of it. When his services are required, it is very much a dark day.
Anton Kresnikov has worked very hard to keep the rumors of the Specialist very separate from his life, moreso after the Midway Station Blackout. Kresnikov remains a member of society, occasionally providing translation on texts for commission, trying to find his way out of the Underside.
Brief Bio: As a boy, his early years were not overly kind. The settlement where he had been born was constantly under siege by raiders or worse, but he found himself able to survive by remaining out of sight of others all while able to watch them take their toll on those who had not been so fortunate. But a boy can only witness the cruelty of men so many times before he becomes desensitized to it. With every raid he hid away and watched, but soon watching turned to study, and by sheer exposure he learned the trade of cruelty, the effectiveness of brutality, the usefulness of agony, the efficiency of pain, and the power of fear. When he had learned all he could from the study of those that would take their toll on the ravaged settlement, he decided to take his leave on the first ship that would come through.
When he came to Midway, he had no prospects and knew only one trade. Fortunately opportunity was readily available in the wager-pits of Underside. He had no name to give that he could identify with any longer, but the pits needed one they could provide for betting, and so he gave one that he remembered hearing about as a child from someone who remembered the World Asunder. In the story of the Strakhznakov, the man made traps of his enemies, leaving wounded to be rescued by their allies only to then be dropped themselves. A ruthless killer who would maim his targets. Anton Kresnikov. In the pits he was no different. He left traps, offered himself up in minor ways to turn the attack around on his opponent with brutal efficiency. In the end the fights left him scarred, and in some cases the injuries were too severe to simply heal, and permanent repairs became necessary. His success afforded him enough to see to the repairs, and the mechanical limbs that had been fitted to him were crude at first, but over time he was able to find other methods of payment and other forms of work.
Anton studied his opponents and his targets, learning everything he could in what time he had in order to find how to hurt them the most. In the wager-pits it had earned him the nickname of the Specialist. An expert in his field, it wasn't long at all before he was approached for a more active application of his services. Certainly not wishing to be a gladiator for spectators all his life, Anton agreed to the call. For a few years he worked for one of the Under-Merchants as a messenger of debt, taking payment in the form of blood and flesh. He built a life there and despite his trade managed to attract the attentions of the Under-Merchant's daughter. Rumor has it that the union was given as payment or appeasement to keep Kresnikov in check, believing that he would never be so brash as to lash out at the father of his wife.
To him the target was unimportant, and when his employer realized that Anton could easily be turned for a better paycheck, it was decided that the man was too big a threat to let live without conditioning. The more work he did, the more they began to fear him, and soon the allegiance he had built as a trusted blade had been soured by his apathetic view of the life of his targets. Growing wary of his capabilities, and certain that it was only a matter of time before he turned on them despite his ties, Anton was locked away in the hopes his spirit would be broken. Carved on, scarred, and tortured for months, he was left in lock up while surgeons made frequent augmentations to his body and all without any sense of anesthesia. The shock nearly killed him several times, but they always left him just on the brink. After a series of particularly vicious surgeries, he was left for near dead just as the Midway Station Blackout began.
Sudden darkness masked his rage, and armed with only a scalpel and bone saw, the Specialist left the facility where he was held a gruesome canvas of corpses. On his way to freedom, he could hear the slaughter coming his direction. Painted with the gore of his victims, and in the process of eviscerating a particularly disliked surgeon in horrible ways, a momentary stand off with Niema's Piked-Men was resolved by informing her that she had no enemies left in the building, and neither did he. When the lights returned, he returned to what had been his home and found it abandoned for the months he was locked away. There was no sign of the Merchant's daughter to be found.
In the years that followed the Blackout, the Specialist continued to work for those that were willing to hire him, but the rumor of what he had done to his captives spread and had earned him a reputation as a man not to be crossed or considered lightly. During the time between his Study Sessions, he would work to refine his life, pouring resources into resolving the tortured scars and mangled flesh of his body. The augmentations that the now dead surgeons had installed were archaic but functional to his needs, and some minor cosmetic adjustments left him looking well enough to rejoin society without being a gruesome specter of a man. Living in plain view of the others kept his works hidden from all but those that needed him, and offered him a wider range of work.
Underside may have been filled with violence and crime, but there was jealousy and blood to be had everywhere in the AtVerse, and those who had witnessed the results knew that the Specialist was more than fit to spill it.
++ Glossary Terms ++
- Strakhznakov: A term used by the village of his upbringing from the World Asunder. It translates as "Dreadmarks", and refers to a group of brutal military killers.
- Study Sessions: The term used by those familiar with Kresnikov's work to describe the targets of his contract killings, e.g. "I heard that the Specialist has a Study Session with the Vory. Those poor bastards."