COMMANDER ERWIN SMITH, PEACEKEEPER

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“And now that you don't have to be perfect, you can be good.” - steinbeck

COMMANDER ERWIN SMITH, PEACEKEEPER Mar 5, 2014 3:54:24 GMT -5

Post by ✌ʕ•ᴥ•ʔ on Mar 5, 2014 3:54:24 GMT -5

N a m e : COMMANDER ERWIN SMITH
A g e : TWENTY-EIGHT
G e n d e r : MALE
L o c a t i o n : CAPITOL
F a c e c l a i m : TIM BORRMAN
J o b : COMMANDER OF THE SURVEILLANCE CORPS
S o n g : PARALYSIS - YOUNG THE GIANT
P l o t : WINGS OF FREEDOM
C o d e w o r d : ødair

Last Edit: Mar 6, 2014 4:19:12 GMT -5 by ✌ʕ•ᴥ•ʔ

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✌ʕ•ᴥ•ʔ
Graphics

5,831 POSTS
Pronouns: they/them
last seen Apr 17, 2024 14:37:45 GMT -5

“And now that you don't have to be perfect, you can be good.” - steinbeck

COMMANDER ERWIN SMITH, PEACEKEEPER Mar 5, 2014 4:25:39 GMT -5

Post by ✌ʕ•ᴥ•ʔ on Mar 5, 2014 4:25:39 GMT -5

[presto]

[/presto]

They say that all great men come of the same stock, as if they are all descendants of the same man. It is true that many great commanders are attributed to having elven-like features and a voice so strong that men fell to their knees and wept just to hear it. Some would have us believe that a great Commander is born, not made or shaped. For one who allows himself to be molded by the world around him is a weak man. They would have us believing that Men like Alexander The Great, Attila The Hun and Napoleon Bonaparte were all the same man reborn again and again. Some say that a Commander is the purest soul, born only once and never recycled. They would have us believing many things, teaching us many things. However, I have come to believe that not one of them is correct in any of their assumptions.

It is under my discretion that a great commander is not made up of features, small words, nor great. A commander is not great for his strength or courage, although those are both helping factors, but a commander is made great by the men and women he commands. The idea that a commander should not be shaped by his community or environment is one that I do not agree with. In fact, how could he not be? I could plan a million battles, map a million maps, but they would never succeed if I did not have the loyalty of my troops. To me, what it means to be a great commander is to see it in the eyes of the people I lead. If I show them my love and respect, they are bound to show it back.

To me, what makes a good commander is the ability to be humble.

I've never aspired to be anything more than who I am.

You might say I am lying when I say this. No man who travels up the ladder of promotion so quickly does it without a few bribes here and there or some black words spoken in the dead of night. However, I can truthfully say that I never entered the academy all those years ago with the thought of being in command. In truth, I simply wanted to protect the people who had taken me into their community.

Most are born with a story set in place long before they arrive, I suppose the same could be said for the likes of me. Although it might come as rather shocking, I was not one of the ones chosen to be born with a silver spoon in his mouth. Such a tidbit of information might be hard for one to swallow, but it is nevertheless fact. I was born in the gutters of the outlying area of the Capitol, with no identifying piece of information. Unlike the stories, I was not swaddled with a ring, necklace, or letter. Simply a scrap of paper was tucked into the folds of my only protection from the cold.

It reads in letters, 'E-R-W-I-N'.

The letters are scrawled out hastily, poorly, by a hand that was unaccustomed to holding a pen, this being because they never had a chance or were disallowed to. Nothing else was given with me, unless it was taken by thieves. I still have the scrap of paper of course, it being the only thing that was left to me by a mother that couldn't have me. (I have never hated her for not wanting me as I understand that she might not have had a choice.) In truth, holding a grudge has never been something that I was particularly good at. There is something about people in general that makes me instantly forgive them.

I understood the message in the hasty scrawl from a young age. As long as I remained Erwin, my mother might be able to find me one day.

I suppose that thought is what has always kept me level headed, even in times of trials and tribulations, I have always remembered that first thought. It didn't matter really what I chose to do, as long as I stayed true to myself, I would always be correct. That is what lent me stability in my early days of running around the streets of the poorest part of the Capitol.

I never found out who cared for me when I was very small, something I deeply regret. I simply remember warmth, an old face, a dry chuckle. It was an early life spent in a place of very much love for an unexpected surprise that is a little baby boy. I often think back to that morning so long ago, when I woke up cold for the first time in my short life to find that my caretaker had died of old age in their sleep.

From there, I became a street boy and ran in the packs of the rest of them. We slept in heaps in abandoned buildings, any food or money we were able to aquire went to everyone. I still have a small fondness for the taste of rat, not that it has a particularly nice flavour. If I could stay nourished on nostalgia, I would be far too fat now. However, it is an impossible feat to be happy on memory alone. One becomes malnourished, sad, unable to cope if they chew on one for very long.

It happens that as I grew, I not only became taller, but handsome. When I was ten years old, my looks attracted the attention of a man and wife going by the name of Heinrich, socialites from the Capitol who would go into the poorer side for publicity. The pair had been giving soup and bread to the beggars when they spotted me in line, waiting. Even then my thick blonde hair and hopeful blue eyes made me stand out in a crowd. "Something about them," my brothers in arms would say, "Makes us unable to lie to you, unable to disappoint you. You make us want to be good."

I'd had a hard life and it showed even then. My childhood was spent running from people, for people, to people and at people. I'd never had any qualms about attacking people for their money, however, they had to fit my list. It consisted of not being poor themselves, not being a crook and not needing the money more than I. To be honest, thieving was one area that I never did really well in. I could not bring myself to take from people, not when I knew how it was to have so little. This resulted in skinniness and muscle that clung to bones with little fat in-between.

An angular bone structure and a strong jaw only added to my features, I was fairly handsome for a gutter rat. Fair enough that the Heinrichs decided to take me home with them and adopt me as their son. It has always been odd to me that the one thing that made me desirable was my looks, although they did not know me, they decided to take me in. If I was born with a hump or dull eyes I might still be back where I began.

I accept this fact with no feeling towards it. Life is how it is and if my looks give me an advantage I will take it, especially if it means a hot bath. I'd never lived in such luxury before I lived with the Heinrichs. I was given my own room, too big and empty, too quiet. I was given my own clothes, too empty of treasures in the pockets, none holding the scent of my fellow orphans. I was given meals three times a day, I felt so guilty that I almost threw them up. I couldn't believe that I was living like this, in luxury when my friends at home were still cold, still hungry and still unloved by anyone.

I learned the unfairness of life through this fact and decided to work hard so that one day I would have a fortune of my own and be able to give back to my community.

With the Heinrichs as my sponsors, I threw myself into my studies and quickly became top of the class in nearly every subject I chose to pursue. I had never believed in doing anything halfheartedly, to me it was very important to always give everything one hundred percent. Intent on being the best that I could be, I barely noticed as I grew up into a rather good looking young man. I have never put much stock in appearances, but my adopted parents were pleased with me, deciding that I was a fine enough specimen for them to keep.

As I aged, I shot up to the height of six feet and two inches, towering over the petite Mrs. Heinrich. Never being the type to lay about when there was something to be done, my body was stocked well with muscle from various sports. Everything about me has always been hard angles, my expression usually neutral but for the small smile that finds it's self unexpectedly upon my features.

My eyebrows are thick and usually bent into a thoughtful expression. They rest above eyes that have seen much more of the world than they bargained for. For since I was younger I have grown far more knowledgeable about the world and how it works. Like a snake, I shed my old skin of earnest care and settled upon indifference. It was not that I discontinued the need to be a caretaker, but it became mixed with my need to do well for my fellow men as well as a young man's pride.

At the age of fourteen, I went back to my humble beginnings to find the boys I had spent my early life with. What I found there was hateful to the heart. Two of them had perished from cold and hunger, three were found guilty of murder when a pick pocketing went wrong, and the last four were so broken by their lives that they had a glazed look in their eye and barely registered my presence. After that, I only worked harder, determined to make life better for my birthplace and the people who inhabited it.

When I reached my sixteenth year, I realized my dream of joining the special ops unit of Panem's Peacekeepers. As an orphan, I could never hope to take over my adopted Father's business, nor did it interest me. I still felt the yearning to protect my fellow citizens.

Although my foster family had offered me their own last name many years back, I opted for the last name 'Smith' when I signed my life away to the Peacekeepers. I did not want advancement based on the strength of my name, but for the strength of my heart. I found it fitting, elated almost when I went unrecognized by any of the young men and women I trained beside. That is until I began to stand out for my own skill that I had been honing near all my life.

It was like breathing for me, fighting in the training yard. I surprised most of my opponents with my speed and dexterity even though I was built like a tree, with the height to match. Spending my short life in constant activity only helped my life within training, until I was quickly moved into a squad. It was there that I finally felt at home again, becoming as close to my fellow squad mates as I once was with my brothers in the slums. I learned to laugh and joke again with them, and I began to care for them.

I decided then that I would always do everything in my power to watch out for them without sacrificing humanity's needs. Where I would have liked them to come first, it was always the people that we were protecting that did. So there were casualties, moments when I had to choose between my friend or the lives of civilians. Although these decisions had to be made, they weighed deeply on my consciences. I never regretted my choices, only regretted that I had to make them.

I rose up to the role of lieutenant in my twenty-first year. You might say that was the year where my life took its second major turning. It was an instance that happened out of nowhere. I was patrolling the barracks of special opps with five others when three burglars came into view, each strapped to the special gear that we use in battle. I remember being filled with curiosity, not fury, at the sight of it. What makes a man so daring, so stupid, as to steal from the law it's self?

I resolved to find out then and there. My friend and I went after one of them while the other four split of to find the other two. I remember being impressed already with the boy's technique as we followed him. He flew threw the air like he had been practicing with the gear his entire life. I held back as we chased him through the streets and alleys of Panem's Capitol, interested in how he would choose to move with the gear. He was daring with it even as he was careful. Watching him move through the air was exhilarating. It was as if the gear had been created for him alone. I knew I wanted him for the squad.

We cornered him finally, there was no way out for them. Even as we did, it came over the radio that his buddies were also held in captivity. The question came with what they were to do with the vagrants. The thought formed in my head as I spoke, and yet I knew it was perfect. I was never a harsh man, but I knew what reality was. Sometimes a man, even a fair one, has to make a threat every now and then. Never the type to beg, I looked into the eyes of the young man in front of me and saw that he would never join special opps just because he was asked to.

So I gave him the choice, "Join us, or your friends die," and I delivered it with an expression that hinted at nothing, a body stance that was unforgiving. I knew the man and his friends to be high on the list of enemies of the state, but I was never one to let good talent go to waste. I could see the horrible hatred he had in his eyes, it made dread form in the pit of my stomach. However, I remained staunch and unmoved by his feelings towards me. For many minutes we battled each other in words, but in the end he gave in. I was secretly relieved, happy to not have to have the thieves killed and only imprisoned.

In my twenty-fourth year, I rose up to Captain and then Commander of the Special Ops team. Not only because of the death of the original Commander after an encounter with a wild latchcrab, but because apparently I deserved it. I could not understand why this was, as I held no great name, nor did I particularly want it. However, like most orders I was given, I accepted the position with a nod and have been commanding officer since then. My first order of business was to make the boy I'd forced into joining us a Captain. Since then, muttation complaints and sightings have gone down three fold.

Everyday is a day that I work hard for Panem, every breath I breathe is for the people who reside in Panem. I may come across as hard, cold, uncaring or I may come across as delightful, warm, and as a caretaker to the people. It all depends on who I am speaking to, or how I want them to see me as. Everything I do is for the good of mankind. I have forgotten the last time I have done something that was good for me. Such is the life of a man in command.

[presto]

[/presto]

Last Edit: Mar 6, 2014 5:59:43 GMT -5 by ✌ʕ•ᴥ•ʔ

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✌ʕ•ᴥ•ʔ Graphics 5,831 POSTS Pronouns: they/them last seen Apr 17, 2024 14:37:45 GMT -5 “And now that you don't have to be perfect, you can be good.” - steinbeck	COMMANDER ERWIN SMITH, PEACEKEEPER Mar 6, 2014 4:19:35 GMT -5 Select Post Deselect Post Link to Post Member Give Gift Back to Top Post by ✌ʕ•ᴥ•ʔ on Mar 6, 2014 4:19:35 GMT -5 done! Cass has dibs~<3
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cass Retired Staff 4,822 POSTS last seen Oct 24, 2021 18:11:43 GMT -5	COMMANDER ERWIN SMITH, PEACEKEEPER Mar 6, 2014 5:11:48 GMT -5 Select Post Deselect Post Link to Post Member Give Gift Back to Top Post by cass on Mar 6, 2014 5:11:48 GMT -5 KJBDSAJHBCKJBCKJSC SQUEALS AHHH THIS IS SO PERFECT. Your writing is flawless <333 omg I want ErwinxLevi ship right now kthnxbye. ILY ACCEPTED! <3