Lucian

The long and the short of it: Didn't think I'd end up here.

Started out workin' docks when I was just a kid. My pops was a fisherman and my ma' a barmaid. Wasn't a fancy life, but it was ours. I've got two little brothers, Vincent & Simon. I'd give the world for them, you know. Born and raised in Shelby, a pretty tiny port town just north of Songhigh. That's the problem with small towns, isn't it? You tend to outgrow them. There wasn't enough jobs, the people livin' there were already fighting for them and I figured, you know what? I'm just gonna get out of here. I was, sixteen I think. Seventeen? I dunno, a couple blows to the head makes things kind of fuzzy. Anyway, found myself in Songhigh and got wrapped up in a brawler's ring with the dockworkers at night and it turns out that I'm actually pretty fuckin' good at beating in a bastard's face. Had myself a pretty mean right hook.

Eventually I worked the dock less and fought more. Bar brawls, alleyway rings, eventually landing myself a right proper boxer! I was fighting three events a week and things were goin' great. I lived that life for, gods... eight years, I think it was. They say that a boxer in Songhigh doesn't make it longer than three, but there was no stopping me. I was on top of the world.

I got careless and smug. My hubris was my end, ended up taking a pretty hard blow to my right elbow and things just weren't the same after that. Had it in a sling for at least two months and every time I straightened it, it was like a rod of fire goin' through my marrow. I found a guy who built me a brace for it, and while that helped stop the pain, it was the end of my boxing careers. Cheater's laws, you know. Honor among thieves. I don't know if I say I miss it, but there was something about that rush of adrenaline. That shit's addicting, I tell you. I'd do it a hundred lifetimes over as long as it got those in the nosebleeds screaming my name.

A man's gotta eat and I couldn't live off of sunshine and fresh sea breeze alone. Got myself picked up as a mercenary grunt on a few sea vessels. It wasn't glorious work, but it was work and it kept food in my belly. Those jobs came and went, you know how sailors are. Finnicky fucks. It was never bad work, it was just time for me to find something different. Sell-swords are a dime a dozen, so even if I didn't leave, it'd only be a matter of years til I was replaced anyway.

That was before I saw her. Most beautiful airship I've ever seen in my life. There she hung like an ornament in the air, just waiting to be reached out and plucked. Primes, I gawked up at her for a good ten minutes before I made my way to the workhouse to see if anyone knew more. Granted, I hadn't seen an airship let alone step foot on one, but they had to be pretty similar to sea vessels, right? She's a ship, just.. higher. I knew, just by setting eyes on her for the very first time that she was something incredible.

They had a job opening for a mercenary and I reported in as fast as I could get my ass over there. That was the different I wanted.

A long story particularly short, I worked under their First Chief, Taner. Good guy, didn't talk much and I think I preferred it that way. I did my job and I did it damn well. I take pride in what I do. If you're going to do anything, do it right or don't do it at all.

I guess that's what caught Captain Thibault's eye.

When Taner left, I was a natural shoe-in for the job. What red blooded man would turn down a job like this? To sail the sky, to see exotic places, to live the dream? No one. That's who.

I'm the First Chief of The Sunbird and really, there's nowhere else I'd rather be.