o. application
User Name/Nick: Ang
User LJ: angelkaizer
AIM/IM: banditpenchant
E-mail: grayaceofdisturbia@gmail.com
Other Characters: Sylar, Hayley Stark, Billy Costigan, Donnie Darko
Character Name: Neal Caffrey
Series: White Collar
Age: 32 (Oct 11, 1977)
From When?: The end of Season 1, Episode 3: “Book of Hours”, when Neal is shot.
Inmate/Warden: Inmate. While he may be a good person when it suits him, Neal places his own interests above everything and everyone else. He's also a con artist and has absolutely no qualms about lying to people-- or stealing from them, forging their signatures, etc. if it's something he takes an interest in.
Item: N/A
Abilities/Powers: None.
Personality:
Neal is a charming man. He's attractive, charismatic, and smooth talking. The man knows what people want and how to give it to them.. for as long as it suits him or until he gets what he wants. Though he can certainly be personable in his natural state as well, everything is a plan. That's not to say he's never sincere. In fact, he often is; rather, that sincerity will only come when he's able to give it without damaging whatever scheme may be in the works.
Self-involved with low impulse control, the man is a con artist deep into his core. He was accused of everything from forgery to art theft and from currency manufacturing to fleeing arrest. Of course, he was never found guilty for any of these crimes because he's that good. That said, he's arrogant, vain, and has a sense of pride that can be hard to overcome. He enjoys a good game, but has difficulty losing or walking away even if he gets in above his head.
Neal is a social creature. Sometimes he prefers to think on his own, sometimes he enjoys collaborating on projects. Overall, he enjoys the company of loyal friends and, in exchange, is fiercely loyal himself, holding great respect for both integrity and consistency, partially because he lacks it himself. To those who fall outside of that circle, he may or may not be trusting depending upon the person and circumstance, but he will always have a back-up plan or exit strategy anyway. Most of the reason he enjoys working with others is to receive admiration for his knowledge and successes. To the average person, he has absolutely no qualms about lying, regardless of the moral implications.
Buried beneath charm and arrogance is a better man. So long as it fits into his plans, Neal can be a great guy. He will work to help others and to validate the trust placed in him. When both options are entirely equal, he will usually steer toward the right or good choice; when the wrong choice will benefit him, he may choose that instead. Every choice is a chain of events, where betraying a person now may mean losing an opportunity later, and he's extremely aware of this fact and caters to it.
Neal has some fear of relying too much upon others and of being too close to them only to be disappointed. In the people he does become close to, he tends to trust and defend them to the ends of the Earth. He's also afraid of being trapped and unable to exercise his intelligence and his skills. He fears being predictable, readable, and weak. Then again, he's also afraid of being entirely alone or entirely insincere and has to balance the two.
Primarily as a result of his occupation, Neal is well educated and well-versed in subjects such as history, art, alcohol, crime, forensics, politics, and currencies. Basically anything related to finer living and advanced security technology will fall into the realm of at least some understanding. He is cunning and manipulative, able to calculate plans out to several moves further than the average person tends to think and thrives on being a step ahead. He is opinionated when it suits him, rebellious, and not particularly accepting of authority. More of a Type-A personality, Neal prefers to work hard and to get things done than to complain about them without results.
Extroverted, observant, and extremely outgoing, there is absolutely no fear of speaking his mind to anyone at any time (he may strategically choose not to, but there's never fear there). There are a few things that Neal is fervent about, including not using a gun. To these select few things, he will do his best not to waver, but may be reasonably swayed from lesser concerns such as his preference for suits or not wanting to rob a church.
Coming to the Barge, Neal will be disoriented. He will begin by conning people as best as he can, then slowly adapt. Unless he finds reason not to, he will also be relatively considerate and helpful. An adverse reaction will come when he realizes the extent to which he is trapped, but he spends most of the show trapped as well and reacts alright so long as he can find a goal/purpose to keep himself occupied. After all, it will still be better than jail (or death, as the case may be).
Path to Redemption:
Kate, Moz, Peter, and Elizabeth will all be points of interest, especially Kate (his girlfriend who he believed was trying to get a hold of him and didn't actually choose to leave him). People who are honest and consistent OR impressive in what they do will both command respect from him. Cases/mysteries are always good work for him and may get him to open up. Being shown that he can make a life doing good work would help him to change his ways. Knowing when he's lying and the ability to see around his games will help make a warden with him successful; of course, one has to limit that ability to some extent so as not to wound his pride. Neal will probably not fair as well with a female warden as with a man and will utterly fail with anyone significantly younger.
History:
Ehh, not great, but: White Collar wiki
Neal has an ambiguous background where he has been left alone in New York and both of his parents are deceased; he had no siblings. He met Kate out of college, from a mutual friend. They dated for a few years and then moved in together. At the time, both were rather poor and struggling to make ends meet, despite the small-time jobs Neal had been fencing for years. In an attempt to make a better life for them, he stepped it up and got into some of the hardest and most impressive work in the White Collar Crime division. He was arrested by Peter Burke and incarcerated for bond forgery, though he had been suspected of counterfeiting, securities fraud, art theft, and racketeering.
Sentenced to 4 years in prison, Kate came to visit him every week. Three years and nine months into his sentence, the love of his life went out of her way to tell him it was over. Desperate to understand why she had left him, Neal escaped within a couple weeks to find her and, instead, found an empty bottle that was a signal of the end of their relationship; Agent Burke was pulled from his present case to catch Neal again. It was much easier this time, when the con man wasn't running.
Afraid of facing another four years in prison with no one and nothing waiting for him, Neal talked Burke into a meeting and then into being contracted to work as a consultant for the FBI (after some debate). He worked a few cases and proved his merit to the agency, but was shot during his fourth case when he went to retrieve a missing Bible. After this, he woke up on the Barge.
Sample Journal Entry:
[Private to the Admiral]
I admit, I was actually excited about getting away for awhile. I was assuming the healing Bible had saved my life, but I'm getting the feeling that's not the case..
[Public]
Wow. You people sure know how to throw a party. Really. I'm overwhelmed with the sheer amount of joy on this ship. It's kind of hard to sort out between the dramatic narratives and the plots for world the Barge's domination, but I feel like it's there if you know where to look. So, anyone interested in a game of cards?
Oh, yeah. The name's Nicholas Halden, FBI.
(More first-person here @ Dear_Mun.)
Sample RP:
The back door had been ajar for precisely one minute and twenty-eight seconds, just long enough for the guard to round the corner on the smoke break he wasn't meant to be taking. It was such an easy weakness to exploit and it took no time at all to slip beneath the security camera's vision on the dock and into the door with no physical sign that anyone had been there at all. The hallway leading from the back door to the basement's elevator was empty, filled with concrete and the subtle ambiance noises provided by the plethora of pipes running overhead. It made two turns to round in on itself where the freight elevator shaft waited. This elevator required no key card to progress to the ground level and took only twelve seconds to travel between floors. A quick press of the basement button to return the elevator to its starting location and, again, all signs of presence were erased. On this floor, the rattling cage-like doors were separated by a basic, wooden door from the main pair of elevators that extended to the higher levels.
Neal was clad in a worn, brown jumpsuit, as was the uniform for the behind-the-scenes workers of the hotel. Twisting away from the elevators that would take him to the penthouse suite, he instead moved down the short, white hall and lifted a hand to distress his hair before he pulled easily at the door and moved through it into the small security office here an oversized, middle-aged man sat eying the present game of hockey on one of the additional screens. With the other man's arrival, the guard quickly sat up in his chair and clicked the game off, turning on Neal with a suspicious furrowing of his brow, obviously displeased that his enjoyment of the Penguins had been interrupted. Before he could speak, the younger man launched into his tirade, slipping into a thick, Boston accent like it was his natural way to speak. "Yous guys want me to do my goddamn job? You need to let me into the fahking supply closet. What, I'm not speakin' plain enough English for you? I need the fahkin' guahd to let me into the fahkin'--"
"He should be out there," the man replied gruffly, defensive at the accusation that he wasn't doing his job. Boston and New York always had a subtle rivalry and the guard couldn't help but already want to be rid of the jerk.
"Well, he's not."
"Well. I'm not allowed to leave this room."
"You know what? Fahk it." Neal snatched the card from the desk in front of the man, holding it up and giving the man a pointed stare. After a feigned moment of consideration, his voice softened a hint. "I get it. You'ah just doin' yoah goddamn job, but I need to do mine. Fahget it. I'll let myself into the room and then bring this back when I'm done. That alright with you? Oh, and you bettah tuhn that game back on, I heah the Penguins ah goin' t' make a killin'."
The guard responded in kind, smiling a bit and turning the TV back on just in time to watch the Penguins near-scoring. He waved Neal away. "Yeah, kid. Just hurry back."
Neal might have offered him an amicable expression of parting if the older man had still been paying any attention. Instead, he pushed back into the hallway toward the main elevators. Unzipping the jumpsuit, he stepped out of the garment as he walked and deposited it into the trash can nearby before pressing out into the main hotel lobby. His right hand lifted to run through his hair and push it back to look presentable again, simultaneously sliding the card into the breast pocket of his suit. When he reached toward the button to call for the elevator, he was interrupted by a feminine hand. Following it up, he offered the curved form in a short dress a wide smile; they stepped side-by-side into the elevator. She clicked a floor in the tens before he flashed the key card to press up to the 36th floor. Needless to say, it was a good ride.
Special Notes: Trade-in for Danny Archer.