Post by Caleb Branshaw on Apr 8, 2011 13:40:56 GMT -5
Mooshi | 20 | Female | Active | PM
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Caleb Malcom Branshaw
Caleb | 23 | Straight | Good | Guardian | Cam Gigandet
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I may have a lot of strengths,[/color][/font]
but I hide my demons well. [/color][/font][/center]
--One of the main reasons the Powers That Be chose Caleb as a guardian to the slayer is because of his empathic abilities. He can read the emotions of anyone he comes in contact with which can be very helpful when dealing with a slayer. Transforming from a civilian to a slayer can be a difficult challenge. An empath can help get a slayer’s life back on track which can be very challenging for a watcher to do on his or her own.
--As a guardian, Caleb has to be well built. He has studied ti quan do, kung fu, ishin ryu, and ju jitsu. Because of this, he is quite the fighter.
--Caleb has been trained in weaponry. He can use almost anything he is given to fight with. His favorite weapon is the bow though. His aim is not to shabby.
--A guardian is trained to fight evil; however, Caleb spent a lot of his free time, when not being trained, reading intellectual books and sophisticated novels which helped him develop a worldly knowledge.
--Caleb doesn’t like failing. This is why everything he does, he does with determination and perseverance. When he sets his mind to a goal, he doesn’t give up on it until it is won. This is another thing that the Powers That Be drilled into his head. It is very important in his line of duty.
WEAKNESSES
--Although Caleb has been taught how to control his ability, if he looses focus, the emotions of the people around him can overpower him allowing him to feel what they feel. This can be very difficult to deal with as well as annoying.
--Caleb never had a mother or a father, so parental support and care was never given to him. Because of this, he has always felt a sense of loneliness which has hindered his ability to get close to someone.
--Caleb is a fighter, and he knows his duties to the Powers That Be don’t have anything to do with him or his emotions, but the emotions of others to help them. So he doesn’t feel the need to let any part of himself become vulnerable to his cases. Because of this, he keeps his emotions hidden at all times. He feels that sharing his emotions and feelings would just cause problems in his line of duty.
--Although some may think this isn’t a weakness, the fact that Caleb doesn’t trust anyone is a problem. Not trusting people is something the Powers That Be taught him. If you can’t trust anyone, then you have no one.
--Caleb smokes, which can totally be a weakness. It leads to lung cancer and eventually death!
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Do you really want
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PERSONALITY “If it is evil, we kill it. There is no gray area.“ That is a saying Caleb goes by as a guardian to the Powers That Be. This is how he was taught to be. To destroy anything that brings disaster to the world. Even though he was taught multiple things by the Powers That Be, this didn‘t stop him from becoming his own person.
Caleb is very distant and standoffish. If it is a part of his duty, he will interact with you. If not, then it is a good chance that you will never speak to him. Caleb isn‘t a social bird, and often never makes the first move when confronting people unless he has too. Perhaps this has something to do with the fact that he never really had anyone to talk to growing up other than his own trainer who treated him poorly. So he learned to just keep his mouth shut and do what he was told.
Even though he never had the love of his own family, he still developed an understanding of the term ‘love‘ and shared it with one woman in his lifetime so far. Although he is not the type to spill his heart out to someone, it isn’t impossible. Even though he is very standoffish, it is really up to the other person to make him more personable towards them. That is exactly what Mina did. She opened up a side of Caleb that had never been shown, and made him fall in love with her. She tore down the numerous walls around him helping him realize that he can trust people and he doesn’t have to be alone. Although this was a touching experience, once Mina died, things went back to the way they were before. He hasn’t opened up since.
When a goal is set, Caleb pushes himself to reach that goal no matter what obstacles stand in his way. He is very determined in this aspect. If he sees something he wants, he stops at nothing until he receives it. This is just the type of person he is. Part of it has to do with his training and another part has to do with the idea that he must become the best he can possibly be. It is something he is good at. It is something he has control over.
Caleb really doesn‘t know how to have fun. The only fun he really had was when he was with Mina, but now that is over. He lives his life in fighter mode. This is all he cares about. He has nothing and no one else to enjoy life with so fun isn‘t a priority to him.
LIKES
--Smoking
--Reading
--Fighting
--Weapons
--Motorcycles
DISLIKES
--People (Cale, his trainer, in particular)
--Crying (Of course he has done it as a child, but as an adult he has only done it once when Mina, the one person he ever loved, died)
--School (Even though he has never gone to school, he can’t imagine doing homework)
--Pain (Pain just makes him feel weak which is something that Caleb can’t stand)
--Water (When he was younger, Cale would hold Caleb underwater to help him practice holding his breathe. His lungs would ache and burn for numerous seconds. To this day, he still hates water because of this type of training)
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Come on. Being taken care of by the Powers that Be all my life?
[/font]Definitely doesn’t lead up to a very exciting existence.[/color][/font][/center]
“Are you sure he is the one?” One of them asked.
“Yes. I am certain. I can feel his power,” another said.
The one that didn’t speak reached down picking Caleb up gently.
With that, they disappeared from the room with Caleb in their arms and reappeared in an alleyway next to the hospital. Caleb was handed to another man who wore a pair of jeans and a t-shirt and looked quite rough. This was Cale, a trainer of the Powers That Be. He would be Caleb’s mentor throughout his life brought to him to train him in his ability as well as his duty to the Powers That Be. Cale took Caleb to his home in Chicago, Illinois.
The first thing Caleb learned with Cale, well aside from reading, was how to control his empathic abilities. The worst experiences were when Cale dragged Caleb to the grocery store at 4 yrs old and all he could feel was sadness from the mother who just lost her 18 year old son in a car accident, guilt from the 8 year old boy who just stole a pack of gum from the front of the store, anger from the man who just found out his wife was cheating on him, and depression from the woman who just lost her job at a high paying law firm. It was almost to much for Caleb to handle. All those emotions in one. It was hard for him to really understand who he was because all he could feel was everyone around him. This took him quite a long time to master, almost 2 years, but he learned to control his empathic abilities so he wouldn‘t feel the emotions of others. Every once in awhile he would lose focus for just a second and he would get a wash of sadness or depression that wasn’t his which pushed him right back into focus mode.
Cale was not the nicest person to get along with and as Caleb aged, he realized this. Caleb learned quickly that if you can’t do something right the first time, you get beat. Simple as that. There are no second chances in life. You do it right the first time or suffer the consequences. “You think those fuckin’ vampires will give you a second chance when they have your ass pinned down and are ready to eat you!” Cale would say. As much as Caleb tried, he would fail from time to time, and he knew the next day he would be limping because of it. He didn’t understand why Cale was the way he was. Every once in awhile, when Caleb was around Cale, he would lose focus just so he could take a look at what Cale was feeling. It was always anger and guilt which Caleb could never understand.
Even though Caleb knew that there would be hell to pay if he didn’t listen to Cale, when Cale left for work in the morning this was Caleb’s time. Cale would give him all sorts of books to read on fighting, weapons, empathic abilities, and the forces of darkness, but he would always spend this time reading books that he had stole from stores that they had gone too. The books he would read were very interesting. It talked about stories of fairytales and happy families where the children were loved and cared for. Caleb discovered the terms then ‘mother’ and ‘father’ and questions began to slither around in his 10 year old head.
There was one day where Caleb and Cale went to the local pharmacy to pick up a prescription. While Cale was at the pharmacy desk, something caught Caleb’s eyes, and he wandered away from Cale into the candy isle. While he was in this isle a woman came up to him asking him where his mother was, and Caleb really didn’t know what to say. Did he have a mother? If he did, where was she? Cale’s ranting voice didn’t penetrate the thoughts of Caleb at all. As he yelled and screamed at Caleb for running off, Caleb wasn’t even paying attention to him. He was more focused on the woman in front of him who’s face was set in utter disbelief probably horrified at the way Cale was talking to him. All Caleb could think about was the question the woman had asked him. “Where is your mother at?” As Caleb and Cale left the pharmacy, Caleb decided to ask his questions.
“Are you my father?” was the first question Caleb asked Cale. Cale answered his question with a no, and then Caleb continued on. “Where is my mother?” Cale laughed, and it was the first time Caleb saw Cale make any face other than an angry one. “Probably dead! She was stupid enough to bring a baby into this retched world, she must have been stupid enough to get herself killed.” In fear of Caleb rejecting his destiny, Cale lied to Caleb telling him that his mother and father didn’t want him. He told him that the Powers That Be found him as a baby and decided that with his unique ability, he would be a grand guardian. Of course, because Cale was the only person who really took care of Caleb, Caleb believed him and never asked about his parents again.
By the time Caleb was 15, he had gone through most of the books that Cale had for him, and had begun his fighter training by going out patrolling the streets of Chicago for badies. Cale taught him ti quan do, kung fu, ishin ryu, and ju jitsu. Caleb learned how to handle multiple weapons and vehicles as well as learned many water skills. The water skills were definitely the worst for Caleb. The fighting was hard because he had to build muscle before he could endure the beating sessions from Cale. But water was HORRIBLE! Cale would hold his head under the water until Caleb could barely move to help him get better at holding his breathe.
At 19, Cale was called upon by the Powers That Be and was relieved of his position as Caleb’s mentor until the day came where Caleb had an assignment. Caleb was free of Cale finally. Now what was he going to do? For starters, get the hell out of Chicago. Caleb moved to LA, rented an apartment, and got himself a job as a mechanic. The first few days were rough, but he caught on quickly. Those vehicle books Cale made him read really did pay off.
Although Caleb was a great employee, he never made friends at his job. The guys would always ask him to go out with them on Friday nights to the bar, but he really didn’t care to talk to any of them. None of them were really at his level. None of them knew what was happening in the world really which made Caleb believe they weren’t even worth talking too.
His silence didn’t go on forever though, he did meet someone. Someone who changed his view on life for a little while. Her name was Mina. Mina Desernella. He had never seen anyone more beautiful. He had actually saved her from a vampire attack while on patrol downtown one night, and because of this, she had many questions. Caleb was just going to leave after he had saved her, but the tone in her voice and her confused look reminded him a lot of the time when he had asked Cale questions that were haunting him about his past. So that night he walked her home and told her everything he could about the unknown. Surprisingly she took it well. She had heard about murders that didn’t make any sense and disappearances which couldn’t be explained. Plus her great grandmother was wican so she had an idea of the supernatural. As they neared Mina’s door, she had asked him casually if he would like to go out sometime. Caleb really didn’t know what to say. He knew this game, however, he’d never played it before, and he really didn’t want to have anything to do with anyone, but she insisted that she take him out for coffee to show her appreciation. He accepted which was actually a method that surprised himself.
That one date in the coffee shop was the start of something spectacular. Caleb grew to understand this girl more than anything and really enjoyed spending time with her. She genuinely was a good person with a great perception of life. She cared about him which was something he had never felt but always wanted to feel. Although it was like pulling teeth to get any type of emotion out of him, Mina succeeded in opening him up to the good part of the world. Their relationship was very meaningful to Caleb and lasted two years until sorrow struck the couple. Mina began to have pains in her stomach which she had first ignored. As the months passed, the pains got worse. Due to a night of constant throwing up, she went to the emergency room. Many tests were done which in the end concluded that Mina had a rare stomach cancer that was caught to late to be treated. There was nothing anyone could do except wait it out.
Caleb tried to work at the same time as being there for Mina, but he just couldn’t. It was to hard for him to concentrate on work. It was to hard for him to concentrate at all. A lot of times, his head would be filled with the emotions of everyone around him because all he could think about was Mina, focusing wasn’t an option. He finally decided after trying for one month that it would be best to quit his job and stay with Mina until the end.
Mina didn’t want to stay cooped up in the hospital, so she talked to the doctors and they allowed her to be homebound with an occasion visit from Hospice. So Caleb moved all of her stuff in with him and she stayed at his apartment. Caleb spent every waking moment with her feeling her sadness constantly. He barely slept, and when he did, he would fall asleep in a chair resting his head on her hospital bed and his hand in hers. As hard as it was to hear the bile of her stomach hit the bottom of the small tan bucket, he rarely ever left the house unless he had too. Mina insisted that he go out and find something to do, make new friends, anything. But Caleb wouldn’t budge. He had nobody else, and Mina meant the world to him. He wanted to be there for her when the time came.
Mina died in January of 1996. Caleb woke to a bitter cold hand resting in his. He spent the whole day watching, through blurry eyes, her lifeless form and feeling the air for any emotion...but it was gone. Her sadness no longer lingered, but his would last forever.
Caleb spent most of the beginning of that year just wallowing in his sorrow. He had never dealt with anything like this before, and it was harder than any of the training that Cale put him through. His loneliness had returned and so had his standoffish behavior. He promised himself that he would never get close like that to someone again. He was better off alone and silent. However, he knew this wouldn’t be what Mina would want for him. She would want him to get back on track. And this is exactly what Caleb did. He asked for his job back and continued to pay rent on the apartment that Mina died in, until his destiny arrived.
Although Caleb never got over Mina, he learned to move on just like he learned the many skills that were taught to him by Cale. He would patrol, work out, run, and train to keep his mind moving further and further away from his emotions. By the time Cale showed up to prepare him for his case, Caleb was good as new on the outside. Caleb wasn’t to happy about Cale’s return, but he new it was his duty and it was time to fulfill his destiny. It was up to him to help in saving the world, and it started with a small town in California...Sunnydale. His duty? To find the slayer, Faith, help her get her life back together, and protect her from the infamous vampire group including Angelus, Darla, Spike, and Drusilla along with whoever else they recruited. He wasn’t to fond of the idea of being close to this girl, but it was his job. He had to learn to understand her before he could help her. That simple. Had to be done. He just hoped she and her watcher would be the only 2 he would have to deal with.
Caleb trained with Cale for a few weeks before departing to the town. He was pleased when he realized that he was finally good enough to beat Cale. It made him feel like he was able to throw all the hate that he had towards Cale during his childhood in Cale’s face. As he departed, Cale gave Caleb Faith’s file for reference and he was on his way.
Caleb has been in Sunnydale for 3 days and has already found a residence. It’s almost like home...it’s just missing the furniture due to the late arrival of his movers. He is staying at an apartment complex just down the street from the Sunnydale Morgue. It is in the center of everything really, Sunnydale High, The Bronze, The Magic Box, Sunnydale Park, Sunnydale Cemetery, The Docks, and all the other major hang outs in Sunnydale. Caleb figured this would be the perfect place to get to the slayer easily wherever she may be.
CHARACTER DEVELOPMENT Caleb is not a watcher but a guardian to the slayer. He steps in to help on the things that a watcher has difficulty helping with. Faith has gone through much hardship with the death of her watcher and her fear of Kakistos, is new to Sunnydale, and maybe isn’t exactly sure of her place in the world. Caleb is sent to Sunnydale by the Powers That Be to help Faith by guiding her in the right direction along with helping her in the upcoming battles against Angelus, Spike, Drusilla, Darla, and the other demons involved in the taking over of Sunnydale. I’m not exactly sure what I want to happen to Caleb, but it should be interesting to see how he interacts with everyone.
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I can’t remember lol maybe 4 years on and off? | None at the moment | Faith’s Guardian
Caleb sat in a wooden chair right next to Mina’s hospital bed with his head resting on the bed and his hand placed delicately on top of hers. He had finally drifted into a doze which was much needed. He hadn’t been able to sleep the night before at all. He was used to it though, going days without sleeping. It was something he was beginning to feel as normal. There were days when he would just watch her sleep as he sat in that hard wooden chair holding her hand trying to transfer any energy he had into her. And then there were days he would be up and down with her constantly going to get her something to soothe her throat from the acidity of her stomach fluids. Either way, he wouldn’t sleep. Any time he would close his eyes, thoughts would plague his mind. What if she had to say something before that last breathe was exhaled? What if the pain was unbearable, and the presence of someone would make her death more welcoming? Or simply what if she died, and he was never able to be there for that last moment? So he continued to stay awake day and night praying that these moments would last just a little longer, for sleep made him feel failure...failure to her. But not today. When his eyes could take no more. When they just burned from the lack of relaxation. They closed. Not that he had any power over this. The emotional and physical exhaustion finally took over thrusting him into a state of rest...for maybe a half an hour at the most.
The time came to quickly where Mina’s hand slid out from under his and reached for the tan bucket at the side of her bed. Such a simple movement it was, but it was enough to wake Caleb up. He looked at her as she brought the bucket beneath her chin waiting for the episode to begin. As if in routine mode, Caleb stood up walking to his sink. With every step, he could hear the occasional fluid hitting the bottom of the bucket as well as the dry heaving which came much later. He opened the cabinet above his head and pulled out a light thermos with a hole in the top present for a straw. As he turned on the faucet, he stared at the water flowing out of it. The sound blended in with the sound of Mina in the background, and Caleb had to close his eyes and breathe to himself before filling the thermos. If he filled it now, the thermos would just fall into the sink because of his shaking hands. After a moment used to collect himself, Caleb filled the thermos with water, put the cap on, and stuck the straw in. It was easier for someone who was sick to retrieve the water through a straw. It took less effort which was what Caleb was going for.
Caleb turned around and headed back towards Mina. She had already set the bucket back on the small table next to her and was now resting her head on the pillow behind her. As Caleb neared, he noticed how pale she was compared to her usual complexion. She was normally pale, but today she looked almost white. Time was slipping away. She was getting worse. Hospice had lessened their visits down to 3 a week. It was almost as if they were screaming it in Caleb’s face. “Just a few more days!”
Even with the pain and weakness flowing through her body, Mina managed to smile softly at Caleb as he sat down next to her. “That was a bad one this time.” She breathed a few times before continuing. “Shouldn’t be long now.”
Caleb gently took her hand and wrapped her fingers around the thermos. “Don’t say that, Mina. You are doing fine.” Had he said it to convince Mina things were going to be okay? Or had he said it to give himself some sort of reassurance that things would be okay? Either way, it was a lie. Mina wasn’t okay. She was laying on her deathbed in a small corner of Caleb’s apartment. Things were not going to be okay.
“What day is it, Caleb?” Mina asked slowly having a difficult time getting it out.
Caleb shook his head as he helped Mina lift the thermos up to her mouth. “I...I don’t even know anymore.”
Mina took a long sip of the water and set it on the table next to her. “I think...you should go out. Get some fresh air?”
“No,” Caleb answered plainly.
Mina stared at him with her hazy green eyes. “Caleb. There is nothing you can do except live.
Caleb sat back in the wooden chair, his head down and his hands resting in his lap. He shook his head lifting his eyes to hers. He reached for her hand and interlocked their fingers. “I am living. Right here, right now, with you. There is nowhere else i’d rather be.”
Mina closed her eyes tightly and tears trickled down her cheeks.
Caleb touched her face. “Mina, hey, listen. Don’t worry about me. I’m fine. What else am I going to do?” As hard as it was for him, a fake smile spread across his face.
Mina buried her face in his hand letting the tears soak into his skin. She nodded and said okay.
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