Ivan Braginski, Lone Wolf

[Ivan Braginski]

Name: Иван Петрович Брагинский (Ivan Petrovich Braginski)
Nicknames: Vanya, Ivanushka, Vanka
Age: 26
Date of Birth: June 12th
Gender: Male
Occupation: Freelance Programmarhacker?, Part-time Security Guard/Bouncer
Heritage: Canis Lupis Lupis (While more regarded as a Eurasian Wolf, Ivan’s wolf ancestry includes Tundra Wolves as well, making him very large and heavy in his wolf form.)
Seed Rank: Heavy Seed
Birthplace: Vladimir, Vladimir Oblast, Russian Federation


Appearance:

Ivan’s penchant for wearing bulky clothing usually helps with the immediate observations of people upon meeting him; he’s very large. It’s usually hard to figure out if he’s overweight because of the many layers he tends to where, but it’s obvious he’s much taller than the average person. He tends to be an intimidating figure. When his shirt is off it’s plain to see he’s actually very well-muscled due to conscription in the army and just heavy built.

Ivan has a round face, giving him a slightly childlike appearance in the face and a large and long nose. His eyes are a light shade of blue-violet and he is quite pale. He has straight ashen-blonde hair, a shade named Rysaye Volosi (Russian Hair) among his countrymen back home. He doesn't seem to particularly style it, preferring to let it grow, the fringe sometime framing his face. Ivan walks with a certain grace, despite of his build, and is known for being noiseless when walking, which causes situations where he ‘creeps on’ others out of nowhere. He’s both swift and strong. He always has a most curious smile on his face, and it is very wide. This doesn't really match the usually cold look in his violet eyes.

His Zuman form is of a large wolf, cream-colored but with dark grey portions throughout the coat.

Distinguishing Features:

He has several tattoos, all acquired after his time in the military. One is above a scar on his arm he received after being knocked on to the street by police during the Election riots of 2011. It reads, “Svoboda” or freedom in Russian. Another is on his bicep, of a snarling wolf with sunflowers in his mouth.

His scars are more extensive, due to military experience and the South Ossetian war, his childhood, and general childhood rough housing.

Another distinguishing feature is the prominent carnation scarf he wears around his neck, despite the Mediterranean weather. Once a year he unthreads it and re-knits it to keep it together. Under the scarf is a set of deep scars from his childhood that he’d rather not talk about it.

Sexual Orientation: He’s usually more attracted to men, but generally he can swing either way. He kept mostly very quiet about his orientation, not going to protests anti-homophobic laws until they got much stricter a few years ago. Ivan's not out to his family, however, and he's quite frightened of their reaction.

Likes:

• A warm seaside. One of the many reasons he’s in France is of his love for warm climates with warm beaches to lie on.
  
  
• Vodka. When he was younger observing his father, he swore he’d never touch the stuff. But unfortunately the army broke him out of that. And due to his terrible experiences in his army days, he took up drinking hard. He’s hoping the change of scenery might help him stop drinking so much.
  
  
• French things, because like a few very well-known countrymen of his, Ivan has discovered a passion for French literature, art, and music. He began looking into French things after studying 19th Russian history, which was heavily influenced by France, and then it became a bit of an obsession. He can speak French very well because of this.
  
  
• He was never able to take classes in it, but he’s very fond of ballet as well. Both Russian and French due to going on school trips to see performances often. He won’t pass up a chance to see a good company perform some of his favorites, like Tchaikovsky’s Swan Lake.
  
  
• Despite being an Ex-Pat at the moment, and highly disagreeing with the current government in Russia, Ivan loves his country. He loves the nice forests where he went berry-picking with his grandparents, the smell of the countryside in the springtime, the honesty and hard-working nature that he usually finds in his country. There’s no place like home for him, obsession with certain other countries notwithstanding.
  
  
• Ivan does like technology, after all, he went to school for it after finishing his conscription. He’s not very outwardly geeky; but often times when he has spare time he’ll be playing online multiplayer shooters like call of duty.
  
  

Dislikes:

• Ivan tends to be irritable when it is very cold. Of course, being from his part of Russia, his definition of cold is much colder than anyone else’s. He prefers warmer temperatures. However, he does like snow, just not the cold.
  
  
• People being unnecessarily rude to him or his siblings, or even attempting to harm his siblings. Ivan’s not always on the best of terms with them, but he’s very protective of all of them and would do anything for them. Well, except some of Natasha’s demands that freak him out.
  
  
• He's not fond of people quickly judging him. Okay, on the occasions Ivan's truly alright in his mind and isn't lying t himself, he knows he needs serious help. But being treated like he's some sort of monster, simply because he may look a little intimidating and maybe is cruel, but being outright ignored isn't his cup of tea. Or how he's the first person people think of if someone did something terrible.
  
  
• It used to be that Ivan was very trustful of authority figures, besides his father. But then he learned that it was generally good to distrust people in positions of power. He usually dislikes taking orders. He doesn't like being second best.
  
  
• When Ivan turns on the tv and has to see Russia not doing well in sports. This makes him irritated and if asked about it he'll mumble curses under his breath.
  
  
• Ivan thoroughly detests anyone touching his scarf. Ivan's quite sensitive about the scars under it and the scarf itself. He won't hesitate to smack you away if you try to pull it off.

Interests/Hobbies:

• Ivan tends to be more quiet about this interest, but he's quite fond of science. He has many books about famous Russian physicists and computer science.
  
  
• trying out hackingNope, no illegal activity here.
  
  
• Sneaking up on people is obviously an artform Ivan has perfected.
  
  
• Reading and writing is something Ivan enjoys, though he usually ignores the latter hobby and doesn't practice much. He's very fond of long novels like works by Tolstoy, Bulgakov, and Dostoyevsky and poetry by the likes of Lermontov. When asked about French novels he enjoy he enjoys anything by Moliere, Dumas, and the play Figaro.
  

Aspirations:

• Ivan eventually wants to go back to Russia when the government there isn't as crazy and full of corruption. But he's fine living on the beautiful French seaside.
  
  
• Eventually have his own internet start up.
  
  
• Be reunited with his family and start one of his own at some point. Ivan takes family very seriously.
  
  
• Sort of a problem with his mental state, but Ivan wants friends. He's shy among people who aren't his friends and generally uncomfortable. But his mental state's sort of childlikeness has given him that child-like naivety that everyone is his friend.
  
  

Fears:

• Turning out like his father is something Ivan does worry about. He's afraid it's already happened, that he is just is much of an alcoholic mess as his father was.
  
  
• This was probably something Ivan heard often from schoolmates sick of him, but ending up aloneis something like an dull aching fear in the back of Ivan’s mind, always there but not always noticeable. Ivan’s quite frightened of just being lonely forever.
  
  
• Ivan used to think he was very suited to combat but he soon learned that there was nothing nice about war, in the end. He fears combat, and most of his nightmares tend to take place with him back in uniform.
  
  
• Despite years having past since he last saw him, one of his mother's old boyfriends was probably the most frightening person he ever met. Even compared to his real papa, who Ivan dislikes, this man was someone who Ivan fears to this day and he bears his marks underneath his scars everyday.
  
  

Personality:

A discussion of Ivan’s mental state has to look into his present mental state. Now, Ivan, with a very tough childhood and then a traumatizing young adulthood, has a very fragile mental state, with emotional instability. One of the ways his mind defends itself from its own disintegration in putting Ivan himself in a “childlike” mood. When in this state of mind, Ivan is more likely to see many things in a “safe” childlike manner. His usual manner of processing, and as Ivan is quite intelligent, becomes accustomed to see things in a naïve manner, in black and white rather than seeing complexities in situations.

Perhaps this accounts for his cruelty in this state. It is not a complex cruelty with extremely serious motivations, and like a child, Ivan doesn’t understand the consequences of his actions because unlike a child, he is not seriously reprimanded for them. There are also other qualities that this mental state gives to him, unlike him in a stable mood, this Ivan is not at all a pessimist, and might even have idealist feelings.

He’s also childish about his relations to people, possessive and yet insensitive to people. However, he does have a strong idea on friendship, willing to do almost anything for friends and placing enormous amounts of trust in them, as common back home. He gets annoyed when people aren’t willing to do the same. He’s actually shy around people who aren’t his friends, but in his childlike state, perceives almost everyone as a friend. When he’s just a bit more in control of himself he actually tends to silently withdraw from conversations with people he doesn’t feel close to. Of course, Ivan wants friends, but he’s also so used to being left alone by so many people, basically being the kid who got told to play hide and seek and not being sought out, that Ivan knows he can handle loneliness. However, it does very little for his mental or emotional state.

However, Ivan, when in real control of himself, tends to be more moody and withdrawn. He’s contemplative and constantly analyzing something or someone. He’s prone to see people as immoral, though he recognizes their complexities. Whereas his childlike state sees in black and white, Ivan himself understands that nothing is that simple. He lost much of his idealism a few years ago, fresh from the army and just generally angry, as he witnessed the election riots. His childlike state tends to come into play when he goes through periods of extreme stress.

Still, both states of his have things in common. No matter what, Ivan is very forceful when wants something and he will strive to no end to get it. He’s also quite competitive and, this comes from his wolf genes, possessive. Ivan refuses to accept “second best” on most occasions. And due to his territorial nature, simple things can come off as a challenge to him. He’s stubborn and holds grudges for a very long time and patient enough to plan out his vengeance on those who cross him. He’s competitive, considering life a game he has to play better than others, and so it’s almost too easy to get into a confrontation with him.

But Ivan has many good points about himself that perhaps are overshadowed by an intimidating physical appearance and a fragile mental state. He’s an extremely loyal friend and expects the same loyalty from his friends. Family members hold priority over most things in his life as he feels that families in general should be very close. If a friend or family member is in trouble, Ivan is one of the first people to be there to help.

He’s also quite hard-working and unafraid of hard work. In fact, he finds it rude that many people look down on hard labor which he finds noble himself. For all his problems, he’s someone who appreciates and loves good company and times, and tends to bloom when truly in the presence of friends and family who like and accept him. Most of the time he tends to definitely be the alpha male of the pack and try to provide for everyone in his little group. And despite his own anger problems, he’s quick to try and resolve problems between his ‘friends’ quickly.

Despite inwardly being a person who likes science and scientific thinking, Ivan does have superstitions he follows through with.
Things like the wrong number of flowers in a bouquet, someone saying a certain name in vain tend to illicit many superstitious reflexes in Ivan. Sometimes he grabs a pinch of salt and throws it behind his back, or sometimes he makes a spitting sound.

In manners of romance, Ivan’s not exactly experienced (emotionally). Though in the physical aspect, numerous drunken fumblings are not his thing either. He’s experimented enough to know his sexual orientation isn’t what his society deems acceptable and enough to know what he likes. But the emotional aspect of romance is something he knows from books more than real life. He would love to be in a relationship, yes, but his natural possessiveness over people could scare away potential partners. Ivan wants someone he could spend time with and someone who doesn’t make him feel lonely. He also dislikes dishonesty.

Family:

• Elder Sister, Unknown Animal
  
• Younger Sister, Natalya Petrovna Arlovskaya, Asp Viper

[/i]
[/li][li]Father, Pyotr Mikhailovich Braginski, Eurasian Wolf with Tundra Wolf ancestry, Deceased
[/li][li]Mother, Yevgeniya Vladimirovna Arlovskaya, Asp Viper
[/li][li]Paternal Grandmother, Ludmila Petrovna Braginskaya, Tundra wolf
[/li][/ul]

Brief History:


Once upon a time in a mostly industrial and ancient town named Vladimir in the RSFSR, or the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic, there was a family of two. The father, who smelled of cold, wolf fur, and cigarettes worked hard in the industrial factories like many others. The mother was a shop clerk. There was an elder sister and then there was Ivan.

Ivan was born during a time when his country when was undergoing many changes. Gas prices dropped, hurting the Soviet economy. The many reforms of the 80s made by the Soviet government to change the government, more famously known as “Perestroika”, were failing to produce the changes the Soviet people wanted. In the year of Ivan’s birth the satellite states started detaching from the Soviet Union. And in the middle of all this worked Ivan’s parents, hoping to support their two kids.
However, when Ivan was two years old, this changed. Suddenly the Soviet Union disappeared and with it came a decade of trouble for Ivan’s family.

The times were terrible for Eastern Europe in general, but Russia was in a horrible situation. The destruction of the socialized state made many industries that had formerly belonged to the state were now in the process of being privatized. The economy, already in shambles, made it very hard for workers to get paid and many people saw their pensions being cut or stagnating. Living was hard for everyone. And in Ivan’s town, the industrial center of Central Russia, his father lost his job due to restructuring at the factory. With jobs scarce, Ivan’s fathered started depending on odd jobs and tended to drink most of the pay away as he slumped into a depression.Despite his earlier memories of his father tending to be Pyotr knocking back a “bachal Vodki” (A shot of vodka), Ivan didn’t let that make him a surly toddler. His mother was busy keeping the family clothed and fed and so his bigger sister was a replacement mother figure for him. Of course sometimes his father would get extremely angry with him or his sister, but his mother would quickly step in and the two would be sent to the other room to listen to the sounds of raised voices shaking the ceiling and the increasingly familiar sound of slapping and of his mother being pushed against the counter.

Even though the marriage between his parents was on thin ice, when Ivan had just turned three his mother told him to expect another brother or sister. The news sent his father back to the bottle and make him even more irritable. He’d spend little time home, occasionally coming home to start drunkenly interrogating his wife about the baby, and then go back to the bar. On one such occasions little Ivan managed to throw one of his toy soldiers at his father to get him to leave his mother alone and disappear, like always. Despite his son’s age and the relative harmless of soft plastic lightly hitting his leg, the action enraged Ivan’s father so much that he took of his belt and whipped Ivan right there on the table. This memory, the strongest Ivan has of his father, was probably what caused Ivan’s immediate distrust of most authority.

Soon, on an extremely cold late winter night, his father never returned from his nightly intoxicated wanderings of Vladimir. In the morning Ivan remembers his mother opening the door to a member of the police informing them that his father had fallen asleep drunken in the streets and died of hypothermia. Ivan’s mother struggled with the fact that she had to take care of her children and soon asked for help from her late husband’s mother, Ludmila. Ivan loved his “babushka” dearly and grew much closer to her than he ever did to his real mother, who was either trying to support them or outside hoping to find another husband. His grandmother would take the two young children, and once Natalya was born, three children to the countryside where they spent weekends picking berries and exploring the woods.

And so years passed this way, with Ivan entering school at the age. School wasn’t the best environment for Ivan. He was at the age of six already a tall child, but also a painfully shy one. His classmates soon understood that despite being a bigger boy, Ivan would do nothing but stay silent if he was teased or pinched. Once in a while he’d tear up, though Ivan quickly learned that tears usually made the kids tease him harder. In those early years Ivan learned to be alone, left to his books. For a short time home offered a sanctuary to Ivan. He loved his sisters dearly and he loved his grandmother to no end. He’d listen to his grandmother’s French musical records on a very old gramophone, slowly getting an appreciation for that culture.

Ivan’s life changed once more for the worse when he was nine. Before that he’d never paid much attention to his mother’s boyfriends; they came and went and all made his mother miserable. But that year his mother met a man who Ivan found worse than his father. Like his father he was very much an alpha male and that bothered young Ivan almost as much as he treated the family. The man, of Mongolian descent, had charmed Yevgeniya enough that he moved in with them. And while initially Ivan had simply ignored him, the man soon showed that he was not to be disrespected. He’d be rough his mother and be extremely rude to Ludmila, who eventually moved out to a tiny apartment of her own.

But the man took special delight in making Ivan suffer. It’d be simple remarks at first, comments about how the boy would turn out as much as a loser as his father. Ivan, used to such taunting from the kids at school, would just hide somewhere and read his books or work on puzzles. But eventually he had enough and told his mother’s boyfriend to “eff off”, which earned him a mouth washed out with soap. However, realizing that his girlfriend’s son tended to keep rage bottle up, the boyfriend started pushing him even harder, grounding him or making small problems and blaming it on Ivan. Ivan would start to react negatively, arguing instead of hiding. His schoolwork took a dip as well, since Ivan would come to school angry and itching for a fight, which he got. Whereas Ivan when he entered school was practically a gentle giant, a few years of his mother’s boyfriend had turned him into someone looser with his fists. Yevgeniya soon had enough of her son being so undisciplined and eventually let her boyfriend take care of it.

Around the time Ivan was twelve he had enough of his now stepfather’s punishments, which usually left him bruised, and went to live with his grandmother. He had little contact with his sisters for a year and a half, but he was away from his parents. But the years of being harassed and beaten had done their damage and Ivan, while still timid, tended to lose his temper very quickly. During such instances he’d also figured out that remembering memories of his childhood, the happy ones, helped him and so he also started inwardly coping with stressful situations by looking at them through a child’s view.

Though he had little contact with his mother and sisters, not for lack of trying since his stepfather wouldn’t let him see them, that changed when he was almost fourteen years of age. He tried to sneak into the apartment when his stepfather caught him and tried to throw him out. Ivan, who had hit puberty hard, was now almost as tall as him and put a fight. The police was called after a few minutes to separate them.

Luckily, his mother’s boyfriend eventually fled town after an argument with a man connected to some powerful people, leaving the family alone. Ivan moved back in highly resentful of his mother because of all the pain her marriage had caused and mostly stuck by himself.

Though Ivan’s disciplinary record was abysmal, he did well academically and got into a program for teens wanting to learn software development. And so his secondary school years passed until he was out of school. Despite being able to, Ivan delayed his college career so he could join the Russian military. Once deployed, however, he found that it was much harsher than he could have ever imagined and had to witness many instances of corruptions and things that were plain wrong. One of these things happened to be the South Ossetian War of 2008, in which Ivan fought in. The war was small and there weren’t that many casualties, though Ivan lost a friend due to a bullet wound that infected very quickly and turned his blood septic. Ivan came out of the war with PTSD, a cracked mental state, and disillusion with his government in general. Another thing that came out of his time being drafted was his sexual orientation. Now Ivan had grown up in a fairly socially conservative family and his grandmother was especially religious so he was quite aware that his family might not treat him too kindly about it.

Ivan returned home disturbed and retreated mostly into his studies at a technical institute in Vladimir and into a childlike mindset when interacting with people. He took courses in French and English as well as courses relating to programming. After a year he told his family goodbye for the second time as he moved to Moscow to attend school there. In Moscow he had just a tiny bit more freedom to be himself, though he found himself heavily drinking with classmates after class.

But something changed after the elections of 2011. A serious of protests and riots began and Ivan, who believed the ballots had been tampered with, joined the protests. When they became violent, Ivan would often be caught right in the thick of it and earned a scar for it. During these protests he met up with some activists who convinced him to join them in rallies for gay rights. Ivan, still closeted, had misgivings, but caved in enough to attend a few and contribute anonymously to a blog. Eventually the blog was shut down and his friends’ had their apartments searched by the police.

Ivan, fearing the worst, quickly gathered up money and ran off to the Mediterranean Sea, specifically France. He sent his family postcards, though not ever explaining why he ran from Russia or when he would return. Currently he’s trying to settle into Banyuls and save up enough money to eventually create an internet start-up or even send for his family. In the back of his mind the desire to start a pack of his own is also present, though Ivan is so used to being alone that he deep down doesn’t know if he could have his own family. But, as with everything else that life throws Ivan’s way, he’ll plow through it.

OOC

Name/Alias; Rina
Age; 19
Favorite Pairings; RusAme, RusFra, UkraRusBela, I can try out RusPru
Do you want to be Cbox, Thread, or Both?: I’m limiting my thread count here to 2 at a time, so yeah. Cbox is great.
Did you read the rules?


Куда ты тропинка меня привела, (Oh where, grassy road, have you brought me?)
Без милой Принцессы мне жизнь не мила. (Without the sweet princess, there's no sugar in my life)
Ах, если б, ах, если бы славный король (Oh, only, if only, if the glorious King)
Открыл бы мне к сердцу Принцессы пароль. (Gave me the password to the Princess's heart)

Ведь я не боюсь никого, ничего, (For I am not afraid of anyone, anything)
Уж я бы тогда совершил для него. (Oh, what I would accomplish for him!)
Ведь я не боюсь никого, ничего, (Oh, for I am not afraid of anyone, anything)
Я подвиг готов совершить для него. (I am ready to make a feat for him!)

Rus Roleplay from Zirktalia

Truth be told, Ivan didn’t understand what Gilbert had hoped to accomplish with sending him out into the freezing town to help attract spectators to the show. For one thing, it was cold, the muddy cobblestones streets still carrying water from the early fall thunderstorms befalling this area. It was the fact that Ivan did not speak French. In fact his English was better than his French, and he could tell from the expression on more fluent English-speakers that he was terrible. Not that anyone would say it to his face, he was after all a tower of a man covered in furs, muscle, and burns. That was sure to intimidate some, along with some of the rumors of where Ivan had come from as well. But Ivan was sure that in some closed tents he was the brunt of someone’s joke, people mocking him for how he phrased things in English.

The thought was enough for Ivan to feel rage seeping through out his body, his fists clenching and the smile he had firmly plastered on his face twisting into a menacing scowl. The idea of someone laughing at him enraged him so that it was only until his nails dug into his palm that Ivan calmed down. The former slave took a deep breath and resumed holding the papers the little girl (English? American? Ivan had no clue, but she looked rather mischievous) had given him to distribute to potential spectators.

The corner he had placed himself on was empty but he could hear the laughter of a group of pedestrians walking up. The Russian smiled once more, raising one of the flyers in the air and waving it back and forth as they approached. In the back of his mind Ivan decided he must be an odd site for the French to see; a man who towered above them in clothing too heavy for the beginning of fall. Not that he actually minded his appearance much, Ivan thought of himself as quite handsome and masculine, although people were usually too frightened of him to notice his good looks (in his mind). There really was no surprise in Ivan’s eyes as the group of people, young men with a few women (Ivan didn’t want to think of why some men were escorting some women while raucously going doing down the street) stopped to look at him, a man or two dumbfounded while one of the ladies giggled (her dress was absolutely too low cut. Didn’t these French girls have some shame?).

Seeing them stop, Ivan cleared his throat and began to recite the words he had to say.

“Bienvenue au cirque! Cirque du Schmettern Spiegel! Venez au Cirque.”

Ending his little speech, Ivan handed them five flyers with a flourish of his gloved hand and nodded.

“Merci beaucoup.”

Still rather silent, the group of merrymakers took the vibrant flyers and stood for a second, reading them over. One of the ladies, with the low cut dress , peeped in amusement over the top of the flyer at Ivan. Ivan turned his violet eyes away from her gaze, unused to being gawked at this close, especially not by a woman in such dress. One of the males nodded and began walking past Ivan, the other following his lead, quietly chattering in rapid French. Ivan grimaced as he heard sounds of giggles. Well, that was one potential guest, at least. He sighed deeply as soon as they were out of earshot, frustrated with his chore. Why de he have to be one who got the job of passing out flyers? He stomped his felt-boot covered foot in impatience, hoping that someone would come soon to relieve him of his job.

[Carr]