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| User: | twofacedliar (895106) |
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| Name: | Marco Valentino | ||||||||||
| Bio: | Character Info; Source work, author and character: Othello, Shakespeare, Iago. Journal name: ![[info]](http://www.insanejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small} twofacedliarName: Marco Valentino Age: 32 Played By: Raoul Bova Apartment complex and unit: Aubade 103 How long have they been in the human world?: 4 years. Source of income: Co-owns a club with Gaius Asher; owner of a medium-scale moving company, a storage facility franchise and a small-scale construction firm; narcotics and arms dealing. Personality: Marco's manipulative nature means he can put on any number of facades to get what he wants, and any number of them could be true depending on the situation. Beneath the surface of supportive phone calls to incompetent workers amidst a nervous breakdown and kind smiles to office employees who have no idea who they are working for, he is extravagant, he likes his women, and every once in a while he'll take a small cut from the shipment of cocaine and spend the next three or four nights on the town, making his name and his face known, only to disappear after his high and submerge himself in his work again. He knows people. He knows people in his trade - the ones higher up, the ones he can look across, wink and smile to, and the ones down below with the crowbars and tire irons, peddling little ziploc bags of white powder to the homeless spending what scraps they can gather up for that one moment of instant high. He also knows people who are trying to knock over his house of cards, and he has law enforcement agents on his payroll to try and keep the meddling children away. For him it is not so much a game of cat-and-mouse as it is rounding up all the cats, turning half of them into mice and seeing what happens. It's a game. A very enjoyable one. Something everyone should have a go at at least once in their lives. Though he might not like to do things by himself, he is careful. He knows those who work for him - he knows that sometimes you just have to do things yourself to make sure it's done right. He is happy to get his hands dirty, and the only reason he can say that is because nothing ever sticks when he gets thrown into the back of a police car and flung into an interrogation room. He has solid alibis, at the club, in his office in his shipping company, editted security footage to put him somewhere else at the time of the assault or murder - it's not that 'bad people', whatever that means, can get away with 'bad things'. If you're careful, you can get away with anything. He might have many connections, and they certainly come in handy when he needs a lawyer, or an auditor to sign off on his companies' books, or a politician to call off investigations into his affairs, but he oversees his real business himself. The moving company is convenient for import/export, and also the one he has to be the most cautious with because he never likes to explain why there's twenty cases of Russian rifles in one of his trucks, he uses about a fifth of half of the spaces in his storage facility to stock his goods - and you are most welcome to search each one to see if you can find anything - and the construction company is good for explaining large deposits and withdrawals from the bank account, as well as starting building projects with fellow associates and assisting the general community at large. You ought to know he is a very kind man. History: Family life was wonderful. Smell of fresh bread from the kitchen, laughter from dirty jokes that should never be told around the children, songs from the hometown, wine in the cellar next to the guns and bombs, and of course, the side of violence, especially to those who had something against the family. There were always people around in his house for as long as Marco - Marcello, back then - could remember. Both his parents were first generation Italian immigrants and they had a big family come over to America with them. Family meant a lot to them. They were Catholic and they lived by a strict code - not saying grace before a meal warranted a smacking, and you had to pray for forgiveness and for the life you were about to take before putting a bullet into his skull. He was the youngest of five - parents seemed to like to alternate with the boy-girl-boy-girl-boy pattern - so he never really got to learn about the family business firsthand. It was the eldest son's responsibility, and 'free will' was not exactly on the table. It wasn't until he finished high school that he learned that his oldest brother's 'car accident' wasn't quite so accidental. Giovanni had pulled out and paid the price for it - a hit called by his own grieving parents, and an example for the community. His older brother had to take over, and he wasn't quite as competent, so Marcello was, not unwillingly, dragged into the fray. It was just like old times, when he was four feet tall and everyone was in the bustling house doing what his father was telling them to do, except now he was getting to know quite a few people who weren't family. People who knew other people who knew other people; people who had authority and control over parts of the city. He didn't have to start off small, but he did. He wanted to know what people had to do to keep the family business going; he wanted to take crumpled bills from the dirty hands of the 'lowest of the low' in society, he wanted to sit in a car and get pulled over by the police with submachine guns in the boot, he wanted to sit in the same shipping container as crying virgin girls from Eastern Europe. He had to know these things so he could see where they were at their most vulnerable, where things could go wrong, and at what point he needed to cut someone loose and leave them to fend for themselves at the hands of the judicial system. He started using cocaine when his eldest sister was found in six pieces in a garbage bag. She had nothing to do with their operations but she got caught up in their mess anyway. He still uses it recreationally, but it brings back memories he does not particularly want to remember. Hunting down the perpetrators was not without a price. He got his vengeance, and his family was left alone, but the murder charge was going to stick. He was facing death behind bars, but he knew he had another option. You can't really call it 'permanent exile' - it's not all that different over here - but he called up a few of his connections, left everything behind and started all over again on 'the flip side'. It only seemed right to restart - reinvent - the family business here, and now he oversees his areas of expertise by himself. He has slotted himself neatly into the system, now as Marco, but he is still a Valentino. Ability/Powers: Marco can be very persuasive; he has a flair for identifying and playing on the fears that others have, and he can use this to his advantage. Through careful, selective word choice and a reassuring smile, he strikes a chord deep within an individual, either planting seeds of doubt and suspicion towards others and their intentions, or magnifying the effects of irrational core beliefs that s/he might already have - 'the world is a dangerous place', 'everyone is out to get me', 'they are always watching me', 'I am never alone', 'I cannot trust anyone'. He has to be careful, though, not to fall into his own trap - it is not easy to persuade someone about something he does not genuinely believe in himself. It would be nice if it worked everywhere whenever he opens his mouth, but he can only use it with the people he knows - only those who trust him can possibly believe what he has to say, after all - so he has to build a rapport with someone before he can work his magic. Certain conditions would also increase how likely his ability is to succeed - alcohol, for example, or someone with low self-esteem. It would be better if he attempts it somewhere he is comfortable and familiar with - his home or his offices, perhaps. But it is not an easy ability to harness and fails often enough that he would rather pay someone else to take care of problematic people in a... more efficient manner. How they came to be in the human world: Marco came over to the human world 4 years ago, essentially running away from the police to avoid trial/incarceration for murder. Purpose: Initially Marco came over, in essence, just to save his life. Now that he has established base here, he is more bad than good or neutral. He runs a business and there is a lot of money at stake - and it doesn't really bother him what this blood money is made on. Future Plans: Marco knows his limits so he won't overextend himself. He is, however, still running his operation, and quite successfully at that, and he has no intention to change. Source conflict: Iago has a rivalry with Cassio and is not entirely fond of Othello. He is the kind of person who knows what he wants and refuses to let anyone get in his way. If that means he has to fake a few tears and lie about everything, or if he has to take the safety off the handgun, then so be it. Disclaimer; I am not Raoul Bova, nor am I William Shakespeare. | ||||||||||
| Friends: | |||||||||||
| Friend of: | 98: a_great_thief, aliensarehere, alienspacebats, alleyrat, andadoctor, arachnoid, ariadnethread, arrogantprick, awaitress, bearable, beyondspareoom, biggerdreams, boo_radley, bytwos, captivechild, catnipgirl, cold_blades, coldwind, commandandlead, corbinian, cravened, creationsmasque, curiosities, darkestoflords, djshewolf, dreamsmadeflesh, dyingatherfeet, elegantkick, eternal_boy, exsweetheart, eyrienbully, fasttofurious, faultorvirtue, forthevictims, foundmyway, generalbecker, goblinfruit, harmonybunny, herstiletto, hewhomovesfirst, incendiaestmei, insomebook, inundate, iquakewithfear, jadedcop, judo_chop, kingdomofsheol, leadhisarmy, littlemissred, littlewilson, lostandbrave, malgraine, manilove, marigoldsinarow, maternalistic, mercurialman, miroirs, missjove, neverawakened, nogentleexit, nogravity, notbarry, nunchakuturtle, oldmanpenn, ooohburn, orniphobia, pinktie, poizonous, prettydarngay, radicalalbert, ratedawesome, readtheend, ruinous, saucyballads, secondknight, sicklekind, sinsremembered, sonador, strikes_twice, thatshellfire, the_shadowman, theironman, theredtail, touchdeadpeople, toujours, twofacedliar, umbrellagun, unforgivabelle, vayacondios, voicelikemoney, wakawakawaka, walkingmyth, whatmanhasnot, why_agonize, wokawoka, xoxoes, zacbloodymason, zacfuckingmason | ||||||||||
| Account type: | Free Patient | ||||||||||
