Here's the 20 questions from the Runner's Companion (I condensed two into one at the beginning). I wish I knew how to hide them with BBCode.
1. What was your heritage? What did your parents think of you? What did you learn from them?
They named me Mathew. Richard and Edna Harrison were their names and they were both humans. They were closet meta-haters. I can’t say that my childhood was filled with love. I often helped my father, who was an electrician, at his workplaces, and I was often given difficult, boring, and sometimes dangerous tasks to complete. I kinda got what he was doing fairly quickly; my father was holding out hope that fate might remove me from their otherwise perfect lives. They already had three other children before me, and another after. Not like I really interacted with my siblings. My parents worked real hard to make sure I was kept separate from them. Hell, my mother avoided me while she was pregnant with my younger sister. I guess she though my “mutant” genes might infect the unborn child.
It didn’t surprise me that I wouldn’t be able to attend college, so when I matured a few years before my siblings, I took the money I had saved up, or stolen, and acquired a good enough fake ID to enlist in the UCAS military. That was the last I saw of my family was just before he went to boot camp and frankly I don’t miss it.
My parents did teach me a valuable lesson, however: trust in yourself and work with what you have to make things better; No one else will.
2. What historical events do you remember?
Crash 2.0. Well, not so much that I remember IT, but rather what happened to me around it. I was remote controlling a drone in the field that day while our unit was on deployment. Nothing big, really, just a minor peace-keeping mission in the Africas. I went as dead as the unit’s matrix gear, along with two other riggers and a guy on Matrix overwatch. They apparently sent all of us to a local hospital rather than the unit barracks, and when the other three recovered quickly, they decided to leave me behind. Bastard that led the unit had it out for me. He’d made that clear from day one. He treated the other metas like shit too, but at least most of them were the brawny, but stupid types. I was too smart for my own good. Found out later that he was Humanis, but I disgress. So they left me behind with orders to send me back should I recover. Problem was that the little third-world hospital barely had a functioning mainframe at the time and the Crash fragged it. The paperwork got lost in the shuffle. They kept on caring for me and charging the military. After I woke back up, I was discharged with nothing much to go on. My bank accounts didn’t exist anymore; in fact, as far the UCAS was concerned, I didn’t exist anymore. I managed to scrape enough cred together to call an old military buddy. At least I thought I had, but more on that later. Luckily, he was still using the same number. Torque, as he was calling himself now, was in my unit and had since been discharged. He offered to help set me up, even offering to get me back into the military, but I refused that last one.
3. How did your character get into Shadowrunning?
Well, after Torque got me set-up, I was looking for a job so I could begin again, but without a SIN, I wasn’t left with many options. It was at that point I found that I could talk to ‘links, drones, vehicles, and other electronics without a ‘link myself. Fuckin’ confused the shit outta me the first time, then scared the shit outta me. Once, I’d calmed down a bit, I decided to explore the nature of my abilities for a while. Turns out that they’re useful for hacking ATMs and vending machines. I also figured out that I didn’t actually have the cred for the call to Torque. I had just done it, innately hacking the system into thinking I had the cred.
I was starting to learn my abilities when a sprite shows up on my doorstep. It jumped into the shitty cleaning drone I had “recovered” from a newly abandoned office complex and started wheeling the blasted thing all over the place. I had a hell of a time catching it, but once I did, that sprite started talking to me. The conversation we had gave me so much more insight into my abilities and what they are. “She” thanked me for entertaining me and left, but I got the better end of the deal in that encounter. They were spirits of the machine, and so many were sleeping, lying quiescent in information that streamed around me. Eventually, I was able to coax them out of their quiescent state. They were great companions, friends even, and helped me further my abilities.
I had told Torque about my abilities just before the first sprite visited me. Well, one day I get a call from him. He tells me he’s got a job that might suit my newfound skills and give me quite a bit of cred, perhaps enough to upgrade from the shack I was living in. Since then, I’ve been running the shadows. It’s been a hell of a ride, but worth it. I’ve found something here that I haven’t seen before: friends.
4. What are your living arrangements?
Some nice couches, access to the ‘trix, and plenty of room for my drones and vehicles. What more could a guy ask for? This place was a shit hole before I got here. Now it’s a more comfy place than most in half of Seattle. Fairly secure, too. Gotta love drones and monowire.
5. What are your religious beliefs?
Honestly, I haven’t found anything that really tickles my fancy. I don’t view the ‘trix the same way as some technomancers do, and none of the religions that people like to thrust at you really make much sense to me. It’s not that I’m an Atheist, it’s just that I’m not too interested in it now… I guess.
6. What are grating parts of your personality?
Ummm… my laugh can be a bit grating… and loud. Otherwise? Shit, umm… I can have a bit of an ego, but really, I think that I can get a bit obsessive about new tech sometimes. I’m a bit irrevelant, too.
7. What are you most and least favorite of the Megas?
Well, I respect Ares pretty well for the stuff that they put out and they’ve got a decent rep in the shadows, too. I still wouldn’t turn my back on them for all of China, but their cars and guns are top notch. I’m really wanting to get my hands on one of those Roadmasters.
As for my least favorite… Ummm… maybe Aztechnology, or Saeder-Krupp. The Azzies have got a bad rep in the shadows, but Saeder is run by a dragon. I’ll be damned if that’s a good thing.
8. What’s the story with your contacts?
Well, I’ve already mentioned some of my past with Torque, but I’ll go into it a bit more. See, Torque is a human born to ork parents. Kinda the opposite of me, eh? So he knew what it was like growing up in an ork family as the weakest member of the bunch. Funny was, he didn’t resent them for it. He always knew they were teasing him, but they WANTED him to be stronger. Oh sure, he was a little hellion way up into his teens, but once he realized that his family gave a shit about him, he calmed down quite a bit. I think he took into the military to help support his family. Honestly, I’ve never been clear about it. Anyways, he’s always kinda felt more at home around orks than around humans, so he hung around with me and some of the other orks and trolls in the unit. Shit if the commander didn’t hate that, but Torque was an information specialist, and damn good at it too. He was just too valuable to fuck with. We got on good terms with each other, but honestly I didn’t see as much of him as the other guys. I guess he was just more at home playin’ with a disadvantage. Not really sure there. Anyways, he comes up for discharge a bit after Crash 2.0 and when he’s asked to renew his contract, he tells them no. On his way out, he gives the commander an earful of what he thought of his treatment of the metas in the unit. Shit, I wish I had been there for that. Anyways, afterwards he moves to Seattle and begins to set up a network of contacts and informants in the city. He’s lookin’ to take it easy afterall.
Now, about Samantha, or “Sam”, I’d already met her before my first run. See, she was that sprite I ran into when I was still learning my powers. Well, on one run, I met her again. She’d been caught by some subsidiary of a mega or somethin’ and they were running experiments on her, a couple of other sprites they had contained, and a few technomancers they had duped into volunteering. We were there to recover one of the technos, but I caught a glimpse of her in one of the nodes. I got curious and started prying deeper, trusting in my sprites to deal with the spiders that were lookin’ for me. I managed to bust into the node that they were keeping her in. Shit, she was in bad shape there. Have you ever seen the source code of a sprite? It’s a beautiful thing, but hers was… damaged. I managed to pull her into a spare ‘link I keep on me, and took her back to my place once the run was done. I got a closer look at her there, she was damaged beyond her ability to repair herself, but she guided me through a process that would fix her damaged source code. I had to sacrifice one of my friends to do it, but in the end… it was worth it. She started to say something to me, I think it may have been a threat about using her source code against her, but I just told her that what I had seen I her was the most beautiful thing I had ever seen. She didn’t continue, but simply went back into a rest cycle to recover fully.
When Sam went to leave, I told her she was free to come and go as she pleased. She took me up on it and began to spend more and more time here. I began to spend more time in the ‘trix to talk with her and in return she showed me new tricks that I hadn’t considered before. From our talks, I think she’s a former machine sprite, but I’m not entirely certain. She’s helped me numerous times, pulled my fat outta the fire a couple of times, and repayed me more than once over, yet she still sticks around. I got that Renraku Manservant-3 just for her. Frankly, she’s my best friend in the world… maybe even more than that…
9. What do you do if you’ve got no commitments?
I’d probably spend part of the day talkin’ with a tutor sprite about current upgrades for one of my drones, and the rest in the ‘trix with Sam.
10. How did you come to learn your skills?
Well, I learned how to use a gun real well in the military. See, piloting is usually the easy part. Hitting your target is the hard part. Honestly, though, I used to be a better pilot, but I’ve gotten really rusty over time. Plus the Crash did a number on my mind. I woulda said more about my childhood, but really, I can’t remember about half of it. Torque told me I was a decent mechanic, but now I’m lucky to not lose a finger. Most of the time I have a drone do, or ask a sprite for assistance.
I picked up some of the hacking tricks I know on my own, but Samantha’s been a great help there. She’s helped me refine a couple of points and given me better insight into threading my complex forms. It’s funny that someone with such child-like curiosity about meatspace can have such intricate knowledge of the ‘trix and act so mature much of the time.
11. What is your limit on jobs?
Shit, I’m not sure, really. I won’t stab my friends in the back. Wetwork leaves a bad taste in my mouth, as does blackmail and extortion, but I’ve got to pay the bills at the end of the day. Plus, it’s usually one mega against another, and they’re worse than many of us in the shadows. Really, I hate doing anything against the small, indep guys. It just doesn’t feel right.
12. What drew you to your outlook regarding your abilities?
I’ve just thought about it for a long time. Sprites are spirits of the machine. They are the machine personified. My abilities allow me to awaken them and interact with them on a level similar to how they operate. I found my love for drones and vehicles in the military and I always found that you get the best out of a vehicle if you coax her and believe in her. Commanding her, kicking and hitting her, and yelling at her will only cause her to give up on you. Really, it all makes sense to me now. After all, why does the machine care whether they’re moving or not? They sit still for far long than they’re moving.
The thing that makes machines great is that they’re constantly evolving. Through the minds of men, they continually change, each being replaced by the next generation, similar to evolution in a biological sense. I want to work towards that, but I’ve been woefully insufficient in that goal. Running is always getting in the way.
13. What are your feelings on augmentation?
I think it’s fantastic! People are perfecting themselves by merging with machines. They are becoming one with the spirit of the machine. However, in my own case, my flesh failed me before. It coulda just been that asshole of a commander, but I was told that my results on the cyber-compatibility tests came back negative. It’s why I never picked up and ‘ware in the military.
14. What do you think of mainstream culture?
It sometimes produces new and interesting works, but really, it’s a pretty stilted thing. Honestly, I’m not much interested beyond the occasional interesting trid that comes out.
15. Do you have a recurring nightmare?
I get flashes at times when I sleep of alien realms and disturbing code. I think it may be from my time spent trapped in the ‘trix after Crash 2.0.
16. Is there anything or anyone you’re really attached to?
We talked about Sam already. She’s pretty much the most important thing in my life.
17. What were your dreams as a child and what are they now?
When I was a kid, I wanted to be a magician and go on action-packed adventures slinging spells and fighting outrageous bad guys. Think of my disappointment as the years went by and I showed no magical talent. However, I have my own mojo to sling about now, so it’s been fulfilled in a way.
As for what my dreams are now? I’d really like to own my own body shop and garage. Something big enough to fabricate new designs that I’m always thinking up. Oh, and get a new, better body for Samantha.
18. Why’d you choose the clothes you’re wearing?
It’s a rough neighborhood, so I want to at least look a bit intimidating. I got some of the metal on dares and the rest I got because I found that I liked them there. As for my hair, I got used to shaving it off and I haven’t really found a reason to not do it. Besides, I hate my hair. It’s too damn thick and curly.
19. How did you get your name?
When you show up to a run with steel stuck through your face and then get into a walker for combat, people just have to give you a moniker. Really, though, it happened on one of my first runs, just after I had picked up that bike and modded it a bit. The armor wasn’t as heavy, and the gun not a big, but it worked. Well, I had climbed into my rig when the team’s tacnet being run by the amateur hacker started going off. The corp emergency response team had arrived in record time and with a LOT more backup than what we were expecting. Fortunately for us, they hadn’t been expecting me either. It engaged in a fighting retreat into the museum next door, and at one point, we had gained the higher ground. There was a group of corp goons advancing up a nearby staircase. I looked around for something to chuck down at them, when I saw it. It was a replica of one of the old Ironclad ships from the USA’s Civil War that was the size of a small car. I busted through the case, slid it over to the staircase, a shoved it over the edge. Flattened the corp goons pretty well, and gave us the opening in the weapons fire to retreat to a staircase in the rear. We blew the back wall of the museum on our way out and managed to get out. You might remember the news reports of an engineering failure on that museum.
Anyways, we go out to celebrate living after telling the Johnson that we lived through his little trap, and they asked me what that thing I tossed down the stairs at corp security. When I told him, he exclaimed that it was, “Perfect!” and its stuck ever since.
