Post by Jordanna on Apr 13, 2006 20:54:46 GMT -5
Character's Name: Francis McCarty.
Mutant Nickname: Handy. He is most often addressed by this name, and only occasionally referred to as Frank.
Mutant Power: Handy has four completely functional arms, and two hearts.
Occupation: Personal lieutenant to the mutant vigilante Jerod Vance.
Gender: Male.
Age: Thirty-seven.
Height: 5' 4".
Hair Color: Brown.
Eye Color: Hazel.
Physical Description: Handy is a small, sturdy, terrier-like man. Other than his extra arms (which are slightly smaller than his natural pair, and are kept hidden beneath a coat in public), his build and appearance are quite average and unremarkable. However, he is agile and quick, especially with his hands--all four of them.
Country/Hometown: Queens, New York, USA.
Immediate Family: Abandoned soon after he was born, Handy has no knowledge of his family.
Personality: In many ways, Handy has the characteristics of a faithful dog. He is very loyal to Jerod Vance, and although he frets about Vance's actions, he is eternally uncomplaining--even when treated harshly. He tries to bluff fierceness when put on the spot, but he is not a hardened man, and he dislikes violence. He is regarded by most people as a stooge, but this sometimes works to his advantage; he can be surprisingly quick-thinking and proficient when given a task he is properly suited to.
Weaknesses: In spite of having twice the fists, Handy's dislike of fighting has left him fairly unpracticed and clumsy when it comes to hand-to-hand combat.
Additional Skills: Handy is an almost unrivaled pickpocket and petty thief, able to keep his two main hands innocently in sight while the hidden extra pair is busy lifting an object. From his sideshow days, he gained a talent for sleight of hand which enhances his thieving abilities--as well as an excellent ability to juggle, which he uses at times to distract people while in the act of thieving.
Although he finds guns rather distasteful, he can handle them with a reasonable amount of skill, and he has been known to pack four pistols at once. Naturally, he prefers to use them only for intimidation, always hoping he will not be forced to fire them.
He can write with both of his right hands, and curiously, their handwriting styles are very different.
Hobbies/Interests: Handy is fond of poker and other assorted card games. He's been accused of cheating with his extra hands, but no one has ever been able to prove it.
Personal History:
Handy is one of those rare cases of mutation that was apparent at birth; in fact, some doctors who examined him have argued that he is not quite a mutant at all. It is believed that he began to develop before birth as a Siamese twin, suffering extensive medical complications that would have been fatal under normal circumstances--but his mutant genes activated prematurely to help him survive, and somehow caused him to fully assimilate the tissues of his undeveloped twin into his own body. As a result he was born just as he is now, with four completely functional arms and two hearts.
What is clear is that Handy's mother or parents, whoever they may have been, were repulsed by his freakishness. He was left on the steps of a Catholic church that ran a charity for abandoned mutant children, and spent his childhood in the care of their pseudo-orphanage, receiving a humble but decent upbringing. However, in his teenage years, he felt an urge to move beyond the refuge of the charity and make a life for himself. Against the urgings of his caretakers, he struck out on his own--but his mutation made it all but impossible to find or keep an ordinary job. Eventually he submitted to joining one of the last surviving freak shows on Coney Island, where he began learning the tricks that would later make him a skilled thief.
When the show's steadily dwindling business forced it to close, Handy found himself once again out on the street. Too proud to seek the help of the church charity that raised him, he began stealing to survive as he searched for a legitimate job. Then he accidentally made the acquaintance of "Louie": a scheming old petty criminal who was not a mutant himself, but recognized Handy's potential as a pickpocket, and mentored him still further in the art of thievery. At length Louie died from the effects of a lifetime of hard drinking, but by this time Handy had become a highly skilled thief and was well able to look out for himself. His life of petty crime never rested very easily on his conscience, but he rationalized it as something forced upon him by a society that had rejected his best efforts to make an honest living.
Inevitably, Handy found his way to Lusus Naturae, where he was drawn into the mutant mafia. Nocturne exploited not only his thieving abilities, but his innocent looks as well; he was often sent to steal objects and information by posing as a drunk or lost bystander who had stumbled into the wrong place. After bungling a job through no real fault of his own, he was fatefully assigned to work with the hard-bitten Jerod Vance--who was not at all pleased, and did not treat him kindly. However, when Handy was trapped in a fire during a warehouse-torching job, Vance grudgingly risked his own life to save his little tagalong. From then on, the grateful Handy was devoted to Vance, and when his improbable idol quit the mutant mafia, he followed.
Although Handy made himself useful, Vance largely continued to ignore his self-appointed companion--until his daughter was murdered, and he found that Handy was the one friend he had left. He then accepted Handy as a loyal lieutenant in the work of destroying Nocturne.
Anything else:
Handy adopted his surname from Father McCarty, the priest who ran the charity that raised him. Even after his slide into criminal ways, he continued to secretly visit McCarty until the priest's death. Now whenever he has any money to spare, he donates it anonymously to the charity, in the hope that other mutant children may be saved from taking his course in life.
In a dark humor, Handy named his pocket-picking extra arms after Louie, his old mentor in crime. He sometimes even refers to them by that name as if they were a more or less separate entity--almost literally a sort of built-in "evil twin".
Handy is one of the few associates of Jerod Vance who knows about his past with the mutant mafia.
Mutant Nickname: Handy. He is most often addressed by this name, and only occasionally referred to as Frank.
Mutant Power: Handy has four completely functional arms, and two hearts.
Occupation: Personal lieutenant to the mutant vigilante Jerod Vance.
Gender: Male.
Age: Thirty-seven.
Height: 5' 4".
Hair Color: Brown.
Eye Color: Hazel.
Physical Description: Handy is a small, sturdy, terrier-like man. Other than his extra arms (which are slightly smaller than his natural pair, and are kept hidden beneath a coat in public), his build and appearance are quite average and unremarkable. However, he is agile and quick, especially with his hands--all four of them.
Country/Hometown: Queens, New York, USA.
Immediate Family: Abandoned soon after he was born, Handy has no knowledge of his family.
Personality: In many ways, Handy has the characteristics of a faithful dog. He is very loyal to Jerod Vance, and although he frets about Vance's actions, he is eternally uncomplaining--even when treated harshly. He tries to bluff fierceness when put on the spot, but he is not a hardened man, and he dislikes violence. He is regarded by most people as a stooge, but this sometimes works to his advantage; he can be surprisingly quick-thinking and proficient when given a task he is properly suited to.
Weaknesses: In spite of having twice the fists, Handy's dislike of fighting has left him fairly unpracticed and clumsy when it comes to hand-to-hand combat.
Additional Skills: Handy is an almost unrivaled pickpocket and petty thief, able to keep his two main hands innocently in sight while the hidden extra pair is busy lifting an object. From his sideshow days, he gained a talent for sleight of hand which enhances his thieving abilities--as well as an excellent ability to juggle, which he uses at times to distract people while in the act of thieving.
Although he finds guns rather distasteful, he can handle them with a reasonable amount of skill, and he has been known to pack four pistols at once. Naturally, he prefers to use them only for intimidation, always hoping he will not be forced to fire them.
He can write with both of his right hands, and curiously, their handwriting styles are very different.
Hobbies/Interests: Handy is fond of poker and other assorted card games. He's been accused of cheating with his extra hands, but no one has ever been able to prove it.
Personal History:
Handy is one of those rare cases of mutation that was apparent at birth; in fact, some doctors who examined him have argued that he is not quite a mutant at all. It is believed that he began to develop before birth as a Siamese twin, suffering extensive medical complications that would have been fatal under normal circumstances--but his mutant genes activated prematurely to help him survive, and somehow caused him to fully assimilate the tissues of his undeveloped twin into his own body. As a result he was born just as he is now, with four completely functional arms and two hearts.
What is clear is that Handy's mother or parents, whoever they may have been, were repulsed by his freakishness. He was left on the steps of a Catholic church that ran a charity for abandoned mutant children, and spent his childhood in the care of their pseudo-orphanage, receiving a humble but decent upbringing. However, in his teenage years, he felt an urge to move beyond the refuge of the charity and make a life for himself. Against the urgings of his caretakers, he struck out on his own--but his mutation made it all but impossible to find or keep an ordinary job. Eventually he submitted to joining one of the last surviving freak shows on Coney Island, where he began learning the tricks that would later make him a skilled thief.
When the show's steadily dwindling business forced it to close, Handy found himself once again out on the street. Too proud to seek the help of the church charity that raised him, he began stealing to survive as he searched for a legitimate job. Then he accidentally made the acquaintance of "Louie": a scheming old petty criminal who was not a mutant himself, but recognized Handy's potential as a pickpocket, and mentored him still further in the art of thievery. At length Louie died from the effects of a lifetime of hard drinking, but by this time Handy had become a highly skilled thief and was well able to look out for himself. His life of petty crime never rested very easily on his conscience, but he rationalized it as something forced upon him by a society that had rejected his best efforts to make an honest living.
Inevitably, Handy found his way to Lusus Naturae, where he was drawn into the mutant mafia. Nocturne exploited not only his thieving abilities, but his innocent looks as well; he was often sent to steal objects and information by posing as a drunk or lost bystander who had stumbled into the wrong place. After bungling a job through no real fault of his own, he was fatefully assigned to work with the hard-bitten Jerod Vance--who was not at all pleased, and did not treat him kindly. However, when Handy was trapped in a fire during a warehouse-torching job, Vance grudgingly risked his own life to save his little tagalong. From then on, the grateful Handy was devoted to Vance, and when his improbable idol quit the mutant mafia, he followed.
Although Handy made himself useful, Vance largely continued to ignore his self-appointed companion--until his daughter was murdered, and he found that Handy was the one friend he had left. He then accepted Handy as a loyal lieutenant in the work of destroying Nocturne.
Anything else:
Handy adopted his surname from Father McCarty, the priest who ran the charity that raised him. Even after his slide into criminal ways, he continued to secretly visit McCarty until the priest's death. Now whenever he has any money to spare, he donates it anonymously to the charity, in the hope that other mutant children may be saved from taking his course in life.
In a dark humor, Handy named his pocket-picking extra arms after Louie, his old mentor in crime. He sometimes even refers to them by that name as if they were a more or less separate entity--almost literally a sort of built-in "evil twin".
Handy is one of the few associates of Jerod Vance who knows about his past with the mutant mafia.