Player: Hecatonchires

Character Name: Marsus "Gargoyle" Arinides

Age: ???

Sex: Male

Species: Ram

Height/Weight: 6'

Social Status: Outer Class

Physical Description: Is he 'live or dead? Has he thoughts within his head? There is no mistaking that rather than simply "awkward," there is something very wrong about this man. As limbs draw further away from the man's core, the flesh is hardened, petrified, and cracked beneath a seamless glaze resting on the surface. Even the palest of those born in the sunless world have some sort of flush of life, but the hairless skin of each extremity (if it indeed can be called skin) is utterly devoid of color, and darker than it should be. Veins bulge beneath the surface in places, but as they extend outward they take on the geometric appearance of circuits. The musculature of the entire body is deformed along arithmetical proportions, blatantly ignoring nature. The chest is gaunt enough to cling visibly to extra ribs, and musculature seems lovingly dismissed as trivial. As a ram, the "Gargoyle" sports massive, curled horns resting as mirror images of each other on either side of his face, and cloven hooves at the end of his feet. These effects are the most visibly petrified of his natural features, and what little hair remains is too long, wispy, and even the split ends have split ends; a corpse's hair.

The ends of his stony arms hold hands with thumbs on each side of the standard set of four fingers. Cracks in the surface run in defiance to visible, geometric seams. The arms open, and three mechanical arms tipped with interchangeable instruments flay out, each with a mind of its own. All machinery carried or incorporated into the body of the "Gargoyle" is an artful combination of commercial and industrial junk gathered and repurposed as is needed. Each piece has a story of its own, that contributes refinement to the mystery of the man, himself.

The mystic's habit is drawn of the same basic material that time has weathered to roughly the same faded color. Precisely cut, wide strips of the cloth run vertically from the hooded cowl, and meticulous inscriptions have been stained with oil down the lengths. The incomplete messages around the frayed ends of the garment suggest that there was once more to each one that has been lost to time's passing.

The mystic's stave is a technological marvel unto itself, though as a symbol rather than a tool, each aspect tends to appear ambiguous in its specific purpose: A piston creates a charge that leaps down coils to light an electric display, half of which advertises cola in a loud and intricate foreign language. Patchwork metal encasing a neon tube draw runes on the ground when the staff is planted. At the "top" is an incomprehensible mess of blades and gears that unfold, extend, rotate, and retract into a compact frame in obscure but deliberate patterns. Though it comes to a point at the bottom after several rings of alternately rotating gears, when placed upright by its owner it never topples over.
Each aspect echoes with monumental symbolism and significance to the owner and undoubtedly to any other cultists who happened upon it, surely bearing a similar instrument on their person.

Background: Death in the AbZero holocaust that ravaged the Colonies proved not to be the end of the either blessed or wildly fortunate Marsus Arinedes. A tomb of rubble that trapped his corpse with the advanced computer mainframe dedicated to the moderation of his home's life support became the womb for his rebirth as the fallout of the sinister weapons of mass destruction warped his body in unspeakable fashions along with that of the machines. His consciousness was energized by electric currents, and rewritten based on the idle will of the computer systems as it responded to his needs and subconscious queries. His mind absorbed the connection between the biological and the mechanical as canon law. With the connection firmly established, the reconstruction of his broken body began. Subservient to the human will and input, the machines obliged his needs until he was able to awaken to action once more and dig himself from his crypt, undead, but very much aware.


It wasn't long ago that the strange, reclusive monk-mechanic began showing up with an increasing degree of frequency in the Undercity. His mysterious ways of dealing with seemingly hopeless technological problems have proven immensely useful to some in the MidCity. Ferreting out the problems with a preternatural sense, fixing them amid strangely arcane and needlessly complicated rituals, and disappearing into the depths, there's little way the "Gargoyle" could avoid becoming something of an urban legend, though albeit a benign one.

Personality: As only a fanatic could, the "Gargoyle" knows only the truth of the machines, but he is nowhere near beyond reason. Indeed, there is justification for his adoration of the mechanical, and he will defend his perspective logically and tirelessly. Because his biology has ceased, living biorhythms are futile. He is physically incapable of becoming bored, does not tire, and only "feels" emotions he is capable of recalling from his life. His motivations are as present and honest as any person's: He seeks transcendence and knowledge from the font of all vitality and knowledge, the unseeable, unreachable Heart Machine. The electricity fed to the city is the life's blood of his deity, rendering his acts of mechanical repairs in a sacramental air.

Machine logic is the keystone of his morality: Key among his virtues are responsibility over one's creations, acting with appropriate force to avoid a drop in efficiency, and avoiding the waste of what could someday be useful.

Weapons/Equipment: Engineered for the role of a seeker in his technological cult, combat nearly a non-issue. When threatened, the "Gargoyle" is capable of improvising means to defend himself. His crystallized flesh is moderately resilient and his ability to operate tirelessly could be considered a benefit in the realm of combat. His stave will smart when used to bludgeon, and is certainly capable of dismembering if the right areas are applied to the right places of an attacker's anatomy. This is not it's primary purpose, however, which makes it an improvised weapon, at best.