Name .............................. Rick Turven
Rank ............................... Civilian Contractor
Title ................................ Mech Engineer
Callsign .......................... "Mop-Boy"
Battlemech .................... ARC-2R Archer
Date of Birth .................. July 3, 3004
Current Residence ....... Cockpit of his mech
Physical Description
5'3, 320lbs, Rick is a short fat man who is constantly covered in grease and carries a large wrench. His clothing is torn, typically in a thick over-coat that seems to just as likely been used as a shop-towel. Wearing a cloth skull-cap on his head to hide his balding head, he has soft blue eyes that tell of a gentile natured person who is clearly in the wrong business and in over his head.
History
Rick couldnt tell you much about his childhood except for one thing: He loves Battlemechs. Through out most of his teen years he was finding every little scrap of footage, tech manual and first-hand expirence he could get. His enthusiasim gave him a job mopping floors of a mech bay, while watching the hardened warriors return from galant victories he could only imagine. Eventually his expirence in the bay lead him to getting some more hands-on expirence as he went under the wing of the head engineer, learning to maintain mechs and strip them down and back again.
His enthuisiasim grew over the twenty years he spent cleaning up other people's messes and repairing gyros in damaged battlemechs. Eventually he learned each mech would eventually never return, so he made it his own mission to save any mech he could, the sight of rusting heaps that use to be glorious battlemechs was too much for him. Unfortunetly this would be his undoing from the safty of a mop to a green mech pilot.
An ARC-2 Archer was about to be scrapped after a punctured gyro and faulty electronics eventually left the mech 'non-functional'. Rick pleaded with his superiors that he could get the goliath to walk again, and the sarcastic captian of the former Archer spat 'If you could get that thing standing, I'll let you pilot it yourself, mop-boy'. Rick was having it running laps around the compound by the end of the night.
Unfortunetly because he was not a truely trained or registered mechwarrior, Rick would not see the honour of combat with for his house. The Archer was writen off as 'scrap' however, and Rick somehow got it into his head that it was meant to be, that he would become a mercinary.
It's been several years since he began his career, and though Rick may not be known as the best mech-pilot around, his resourcfulness in mech repair and logistics have earned him a slight, if not laughable reputation. Taking on garrison assignments, he is also contracted by other mercinary bands who need to remain small, his engineering expertise along with his own mech has made him a mixed bag, supplimenting a lance with his ARC-2R Archer for fire-support.
His mech looks like it's frankenstiened from other Archers, most of the paint still upon seperate hull armour plates from various mech companies, with a large 'SCRAP' Stencil painted among it's center torso, the only bit of paint that looks as though it was purposly placed was a black band around it's right arm with a red trim, a 'gift' from his one campaign along side Wolf's Dragoons in order to be easily identified as a friendly during a previous skrimish which he refuses to discuss with anyone other than members of the legendary mercinary company.
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The night had been late, and Rick found sleep was a hard enemy to fight in the wee-hours. Still, the work persisted, remaining quiet as he fiddled with wires under the control pannel of his Archer. There was an issue of feedback going into his nerohelm that kept giving him headaches over the last few test-walks, and he couldnt aford that as a mission distraction. He had only been on site for about two weeks, working as a tech for the local authority. They paid him a low cut, but it was enough to eat and gave him pleanty to keep busy.
Looking over the consol, he sighed as he took in the sights for this patheticly make-shift mechbay. Sure it was better than nothing, but parts were scarse, took forever to order anything in, and even if it did arrive, you'd be sure the Cheif would have a better use for it.
A sudden jolt burnt his fingertips and sent him thrown back into his seat. He bit down on his thumb trying to take away the numbness and tense pain, like his teeth would find some way to circulate it out. "Common girl, dont be like that. Ya came out of worse, and we dont need to be fighting eachother, do we? Not after all we been through."
His hand was placed atop the consol, a soft touch as though he could gain the mech's forgivness. Leaning back in his chair, Rick closed his eyes. He was imagining on how he got this assignment, how after his last contract went south that some friends bailed him out, and found him this 'nice repair and garrison' gig. What he wasnt told was they were pretty much renting him as a mechanic, and that the actual 'garrison' duty was being taken up by younger, more expirenced, and over-all better paid mechwarriors. Still, the job didnt leave him hungry, and at least he negotiated for fair-use of the 'scrap' bin to keep his own mech in fighting condition. Hell, he at least has a few salvos of LRM avalible, which was alot better than some assigments he'd undertaken.
Maybe he could get to work on some other mechs. Aside from the routine maintnence and moon-lighting on his own mech the days were getting stale, a repetition day in and day out that was starting to remind him of his youth in the mech bays, learning the basics of his trade. At least then he was LEARNING something new. Here he could barely hold some mechs together, and unless you were one of the 'higher-ups' or 'People of Worth', you'd be lucky if the work got done at all. After all, the commanders have an image to maintain.
Slipping out of the cockpit, he shook his head. The resentment he felt wasnt doing him any good. Work. He had to get to work. Grabbing a push-broom from inside one of the gurders lining the walls, he pressed brissles to ferrocrete floor. With rythmic sweeps he began to clean around his mech. There was something calming in the simplicity of sweeping the floor. He felt for a moment at peace, just him, his mech, and the work. Always the work.
Edited by MacabreDerek, 02 April 2012 - 06:00 PM.