APPLICATION;
[nick / name]: riko
[personal LJ name]: riko
[e-mail]: riko.tropes@gmail.com
[AIM / messenger]: rikotropes
[series]: Lois McMaster Bujold's Vorkosigan Saga
[character]: Gregor Vorbarra
[character history / background]: Gregor was born to Princess Kareen and Crown Prince Serg Vorbarra, the grandson of Emperor Ezar Vorbarra of the planet Barrayar. Barrayar itself is something of an amalgam of Star Wars and tzarist Russia, a society that had, until the recent past, clung to isolationist policies that kept it closed off from the other intergalactic powers, that prizes military services over almost all else, and that, in keeping many of its traditional ways of life, has kept a lot of the bad with the good. While Barrayarans tend to be fiercely proud and loyal to their home, most other people see it as kind of a backwater.
This is the society that Gregor was born into, though as third in line from the throne he was protected from much of the ugliness in Barrayaran society as a child. Not to say that his childhood to the age of five was entirely happy; there was always clear tension between his mother and father, which resulted in a semi-separation of the two, as much as propriety and public opinion could allow.
Around the age of five, Gregor's father died during Barrayar's attempt to take over the nearby planet of Komarr. The campaign was ultimately successful but in one of the final battles, the Crown Prince's ship was blown up. Gregor's grandfather died shortly thereafter, leaving five-year-old Gregor the emperor of a multi-planet empire.
Before his death, Gregor's grandfather had named Aral Vorkosigan, who would go down in history as having won the battle for Komarr almost single-handedly, as Gregor's regent until he reached the age of majority. Others in the court had designs on the throne, however, and one man, Vordarian, began a plan to deplace Vorkosigan and Gregor by getting close to Princess Kareen. When he had gained what he thought was enough control over her, Vordarian staged a secret coup, sending men to assassinate Gregor. With help, however, Gregor was able to escape, though Kareen, thinking Gregor was dead, remained Vordarian's somewhat-willing prisoner.
Gregor was found by Vorkosigan and his wife, Cordelia, who escaped with him into the countryside to keep him safe from further assissination attempts. The planet descended into civil war as Vordarian took control of the government, and Vorkosigan fought back to restore Gregor to the throne. Eventually, Cordelia and others snuck back into the capital city and confronted Kareen with the news that her boy was still alive. She turned against Vordarian and helped the others to end his reign, but she was killed in the process. Peace of a sort returned to Barrayar, and Gregor, orphaned entirely in a matter of months, took his position as emperor.
Vorkosigan and his family moved in with Gregor to serve as surrogate family as well as political regent. Gregor grew up with their son Miles, a close-in-age cousin Ivan, and the daughter of Miles's bodyguard, Elena. These were fairly happy times, but Gregor, significantly older than the rest and under a great deal of pressure due to his position, eventually grew more removed from the others.
Like everyone in his family, Gregor entered the military academy around age 16. He was far from a normal student as he was constantly being pulled out of class to attend meetings of the Council of Counts or to sign documents, but he made friends and received top-notch military training. After his graduation, he was assigned to do one tour on a spaceship as the norm-space navigator, but he founded it to be mostly a joke as the crew spent more time worrying about his wellbeing than actually doing their jobs.
Eventually, Gregor reached the age of majority and took over control of Barrayar himself. There were rumours at the time that Vorkosigan, now a hugely popular politician, would stage a coup to retain power for himself, but it never happened. Other rumours then surfaced, inevitably, that Vorkosigan planned to use his sway over Gregor to keep him as puppet for as long as possible instead. Gregor heard these rumour, of course, and doubts began to creep in. These doubts provided enough of a foothold for another politician, Vordrozda, to gain influence with Gregor and attempt to turn him against Vorkosigan.
As part of this attempt, Vordrozda accused Vorkosigan's son Miles of treason. When Miles challenged this allegation and unravelled the entire of web of actually treasonous deeds that Vordrozda had engaged in to set him up, Gregor realized that it was Vordrozda who was attempting to use him as a puppet, not Vorkosigan. Ashamed and betrayed, Gregor cleared the charges against Miles. The incident left him unhappy, however, though it would take years before that happiness resulted in anything.
At age 25, Gregor took a trip to Komarr for a conference on wormhole travel. During the conference he hears a a recounting of the war with Komarr from a Komarran point of view. Among other things, he hears about the many crimes of Gregor's father, Serg, which included the capture and sadistic rape of many Komarran women during the war.
(It should be noted at this point that Barrayar's ruling aristocratic class, called the Vor after the prefix in their family names, has always had a habit of inbreeding. As a result, a level of madness had cropped up in Gregor's family from time to time, starting with his great-uncle "Mad" Yuri Vorbarra. In addition to shattering Gregor's image of his father, this event would start a lifelong paranoia about what terrible things his genetics might contain.)
Gregor proceeded to get very, very drunk that night and began to contemplate suicide by jumping off the suite balcony. In the end, he did jump but managed to catch himself at the last moment. He discovered that he could safely climb down to the ground and, assuming that at any moment his guards would stop him, he began to walk. He walked right off the compound without being halted and found his way onto a ship leaving the planet.
After travelling for a while, he was dumped on the spacestation of Jackson's Whole where he was promptly arrested for vagrancy. He was given a press-gang-like sentence to work maintenance on the station until his time is up and before too long, he runs into Miles, now working as a spy for Barrayar, who has also been arrested. As any Barrayaran would, Miles freaks out over the fact that 1) the Emperor has run away, 2) the Emperor has no security guard, and 3) the Emperor's life is now entirely in Miles's hands. He begins to plan ways to escape and get Gregor home, and Gregor, mostly passively, goes along with it.
Miles attempted to get in contact with people he knew in a mercenary fleet in order to stage a escape/rescue. But the situation has changed since Miles was last in contact with the fleet, and the man in charge now doesn't like Miles very much. They end up captured instead but manage to fight their way free. They meet up with Miles's old contacts who beg for his help in taking the fleet back. With Gregor in tow, Miles has to decline and instead arranges for them to be smuggled through to a planet where they can seek help and passage back to Barrayar.
Things aren't that simple, of course. In transit, they're captured by another mercenary fleet headed by a woman named Cavilo. And even less fortunately, she's working with a former Barrayaran officer, disgraced and with a substantial grudge against Miles. He recognizes first Miles and then Gregor and convices Cavilo to hold them hostage for ransom. Cavilo throws Miles in the brig, but Gregor is given the most comfortable visitor's quarters.
Her plan is fairly simple: to keep them separated and seduce Gregor into being a willing prisoner. Gregor plays along, telling Cavilo about Barrayar and planting the idea in her head that if she were to take him back, he'd make her Emperess.
Cavilo makes a deal with Miles to return him to his mercenary fleet where he'll retake power and clear the way for her and Gregor to escape to Barrayar. With little other choice, Miles agrees and hopes he can turn the tactical advantage to his side. He's successful and with a little assistance from Gregor, they manage to capture Cavilo and free Gregor. Gregor later tells Miles that fooling Cavilo into thinking he was in love was easy: "All that was required was that I have no personal honour at all."
But despite this, Cavilo's actions have started a war brewing. Gregor leaves Miles to take care of the military aspects and quickly heads to the nearby planet of Vervain to talk politics with the heads of state there, prepare them for hosting an intergalactic battle in the airspace, and hopefully draw up a treaty that would allow him to call in the Barrayaran fleet for back-up.
Finally, things go smoothly. Gregor gets his treaties and hops a ride with the Barrayaran fleet to stop an invasion (which requires firmly ordering Aral Vorkosigan to let him take the risk, the first time he ever took such a stand), making himself something of a hero on Vervain in the process. They win, and Gregor finally returns home (where his disappearance had been covered up with a lie about an illness and a retreat to the countryside). Although still not entirely settled and weighed down with what he now knows about his history, Gregor has to admit that he is pretty good at his job and that he can do far more good as emperor than as a janitor on Jackson's Whole.
[character abilities]: Nothing beyond military training and miscellaneous political skills.
[character personality]: Morose, glum, and depressive are the words most often used by others to describe Gregor as he is in his mid-twenties. But while there's some truth in that, it isn't the whole picture. Gregor is certainly quiet and reserved. He keeps his own counsel most of the time and has learned careful control such that it is often hard to figure out what he is thinking or how he is feeling unless he chooses to share. In other circumstances, Gregor might have grown up shy, but his position as emperor wouldn't allow that. Instead, he grew up with almost zero privacy and as a result, he learned to keep things very close to his chest.
Which isn't to say that Gregor is unfriendly. At heart, he is a very good politician and particularly good at handling people. When a situation calls for it, he can be socially charming, and the same is true when he's surrounded only by people he trusts. Trust, in general, isn't something that comes easily to Gregor. Too many people who have sought to befriend him have done it only for political benefit, and he has learned the hard way that it's better for him and better for Barrayar if he stays wary.
Among friends, Gregor actually has a fairly sharp sense of humour. He tends toward the dry and acerbic, the sarcastic over the silly, but in a subtle hint at his often low self-esteem, his jokes are more of at his own expense than others. He is an adept of self-deprecating humour which, when matched with his often sardonic outlook on life, means he can be quite funny to people who get his sense of humour -- and possibly comes of even glummer to those who don't.
Gregor is intelligent, well-read, and well-cultured, not that he had much of a choice in any of that. But he additionally possesses an inherently curious and philosophical interest in the world around. Part of what left him so disatisfied with being stuck as emperor was the sense that he would always be confined to knowing only a very small part of the world and a very small experience. Following his misadventure, as described above, he learns to take a great deal more interest in the complicated and often challenging work that comes from being a multi-planetary emperor in more than name alone.
By his thirties, Gregor will have become quite a capable ruler. He learns to carry his power with grace, fairness, and insight and as a result, he commands the respect and loyalty of his people as much for who he is as for his title. At 25, there are already shades of that man visible in him, but Gregor is still susceptible to self-doubt, cheif among them being the worry that he will do more harm for Barrayar in the long run than good. He also worries that someday he'll discover that, like his father and great-uncle before, he actually likes inflicting harm. But as Miles observes when Gregor confesses to this particular concern, it's not something that seems very likely to anyone who knows him.
[point in timeline you're picking your character from]: Following The Vor Game. Gregor is 25.
[personal LJ name]: riko
[e-mail]: riko.tropes@gmail.com
[AIM / messenger]: rikotropes
[series]: Lois McMaster Bujold's Vorkosigan Saga
[character]: Gregor Vorbarra
[character history / background]: Gregor was born to Princess Kareen and Crown Prince Serg Vorbarra, the grandson of Emperor Ezar Vorbarra of the planet Barrayar. Barrayar itself is something of an amalgam of Star Wars and tzarist Russia, a society that had, until the recent past, clung to isolationist policies that kept it closed off from the other intergalactic powers, that prizes military services over almost all else, and that, in keeping many of its traditional ways of life, has kept a lot of the bad with the good. While Barrayarans tend to be fiercely proud and loyal to their home, most other people see it as kind of a backwater.
This is the society that Gregor was born into, though as third in line from the throne he was protected from much of the ugliness in Barrayaran society as a child. Not to say that his childhood to the age of five was entirely happy; there was always clear tension between his mother and father, which resulted in a semi-separation of the two, as much as propriety and public opinion could allow.
Around the age of five, Gregor's father died during Barrayar's attempt to take over the nearby planet of Komarr. The campaign was ultimately successful but in one of the final battles, the Crown Prince's ship was blown up. Gregor's grandfather died shortly thereafter, leaving five-year-old Gregor the emperor of a multi-planet empire.
Before his death, Gregor's grandfather had named Aral Vorkosigan, who would go down in history as having won the battle for Komarr almost single-handedly, as Gregor's regent until he reached the age of majority. Others in the court had designs on the throne, however, and one man, Vordarian, began a plan to deplace Vorkosigan and Gregor by getting close to Princess Kareen. When he had gained what he thought was enough control over her, Vordarian staged a secret coup, sending men to assassinate Gregor. With help, however, Gregor was able to escape, though Kareen, thinking Gregor was dead, remained Vordarian's somewhat-willing prisoner.
Gregor was found by Vorkosigan and his wife, Cordelia, who escaped with him into the countryside to keep him safe from further assissination attempts. The planet descended into civil war as Vordarian took control of the government, and Vorkosigan fought back to restore Gregor to the throne. Eventually, Cordelia and others snuck back into the capital city and confronted Kareen with the news that her boy was still alive. She turned against Vordarian and helped the others to end his reign, but she was killed in the process. Peace of a sort returned to Barrayar, and Gregor, orphaned entirely in a matter of months, took his position as emperor.
Vorkosigan and his family moved in with Gregor to serve as surrogate family as well as political regent. Gregor grew up with their son Miles, a close-in-age cousin Ivan, and the daughter of Miles's bodyguard, Elena. These were fairly happy times, but Gregor, significantly older than the rest and under a great deal of pressure due to his position, eventually grew more removed from the others.
Like everyone in his family, Gregor entered the military academy around age 16. He was far from a normal student as he was constantly being pulled out of class to attend meetings of the Council of Counts or to sign documents, but he made friends and received top-notch military training. After his graduation, he was assigned to do one tour on a spaceship as the norm-space navigator, but he founded it to be mostly a joke as the crew spent more time worrying about his wellbeing than actually doing their jobs.
Eventually, Gregor reached the age of majority and took over control of Barrayar himself. There were rumours at the time that Vorkosigan, now a hugely popular politician, would stage a coup to retain power for himself, but it never happened. Other rumours then surfaced, inevitably, that Vorkosigan planned to use his sway over Gregor to keep him as puppet for as long as possible instead. Gregor heard these rumour, of course, and doubts began to creep in. These doubts provided enough of a foothold for another politician, Vordrozda, to gain influence with Gregor and attempt to turn him against Vorkosigan.
As part of this attempt, Vordrozda accused Vorkosigan's son Miles of treason. When Miles challenged this allegation and unravelled the entire of web of actually treasonous deeds that Vordrozda had engaged in to set him up, Gregor realized that it was Vordrozda who was attempting to use him as a puppet, not Vorkosigan. Ashamed and betrayed, Gregor cleared the charges against Miles. The incident left him unhappy, however, though it would take years before that happiness resulted in anything.
At age 25, Gregor took a trip to Komarr for a conference on wormhole travel. During the conference he hears a a recounting of the war with Komarr from a Komarran point of view. Among other things, he hears about the many crimes of Gregor's father, Serg, which included the capture and sadistic rape of many Komarran women during the war.
(It should be noted at this point that Barrayar's ruling aristocratic class, called the Vor after the prefix in their family names, has always had a habit of inbreeding. As a result, a level of madness had cropped up in Gregor's family from time to time, starting with his great-uncle "Mad" Yuri Vorbarra. In addition to shattering Gregor's image of his father, this event would start a lifelong paranoia about what terrible things his genetics might contain.)
Gregor proceeded to get very, very drunk that night and began to contemplate suicide by jumping off the suite balcony. In the end, he did jump but managed to catch himself at the last moment. He discovered that he could safely climb down to the ground and, assuming that at any moment his guards would stop him, he began to walk. He walked right off the compound without being halted and found his way onto a ship leaving the planet.
After travelling for a while, he was dumped on the spacestation of Jackson's Whole where he was promptly arrested for vagrancy. He was given a press-gang-like sentence to work maintenance on the station until his time is up and before too long, he runs into Miles, now working as a spy for Barrayar, who has also been arrested. As any Barrayaran would, Miles freaks out over the fact that 1) the Emperor has run away, 2) the Emperor has no security guard, and 3) the Emperor's life is now entirely in Miles's hands. He begins to plan ways to escape and get Gregor home, and Gregor, mostly passively, goes along with it.
Miles attempted to get in contact with people he knew in a mercenary fleet in order to stage a escape/rescue. But the situation has changed since Miles was last in contact with the fleet, and the man in charge now doesn't like Miles very much. They end up captured instead but manage to fight their way free. They meet up with Miles's old contacts who beg for his help in taking the fleet back. With Gregor in tow, Miles has to decline and instead arranges for them to be smuggled through to a planet where they can seek help and passage back to Barrayar.
Things aren't that simple, of course. In transit, they're captured by another mercenary fleet headed by a woman named Cavilo. And even less fortunately, she's working with a former Barrayaran officer, disgraced and with a substantial grudge against Miles. He recognizes first Miles and then Gregor and convices Cavilo to hold them hostage for ransom. Cavilo throws Miles in the brig, but Gregor is given the most comfortable visitor's quarters.
Her plan is fairly simple: to keep them separated and seduce Gregor into being a willing prisoner. Gregor plays along, telling Cavilo about Barrayar and planting the idea in her head that if she were to take him back, he'd make her Emperess.
Cavilo makes a deal with Miles to return him to his mercenary fleet where he'll retake power and clear the way for her and Gregor to escape to Barrayar. With little other choice, Miles agrees and hopes he can turn the tactical advantage to his side. He's successful and with a little assistance from Gregor, they manage to capture Cavilo and free Gregor. Gregor later tells Miles that fooling Cavilo into thinking he was in love was easy: "All that was required was that I have no personal honour at all."
But despite this, Cavilo's actions have started a war brewing. Gregor leaves Miles to take care of the military aspects and quickly heads to the nearby planet of Vervain to talk politics with the heads of state there, prepare them for hosting an intergalactic battle in the airspace, and hopefully draw up a treaty that would allow him to call in the Barrayaran fleet for back-up.
Finally, things go smoothly. Gregor gets his treaties and hops a ride with the Barrayaran fleet to stop an invasion (which requires firmly ordering Aral Vorkosigan to let him take the risk, the first time he ever took such a stand), making himself something of a hero on Vervain in the process. They win, and Gregor finally returns home (where his disappearance had been covered up with a lie about an illness and a retreat to the countryside). Although still not entirely settled and weighed down with what he now knows about his history, Gregor has to admit that he is pretty good at his job and that he can do far more good as emperor than as a janitor on Jackson's Whole.
[character abilities]: Nothing beyond military training and miscellaneous political skills.
[character personality]: Morose, glum, and depressive are the words most often used by others to describe Gregor as he is in his mid-twenties. But while there's some truth in that, it isn't the whole picture. Gregor is certainly quiet and reserved. He keeps his own counsel most of the time and has learned careful control such that it is often hard to figure out what he is thinking or how he is feeling unless he chooses to share. In other circumstances, Gregor might have grown up shy, but his position as emperor wouldn't allow that. Instead, he grew up with almost zero privacy and as a result, he learned to keep things very close to his chest.
Which isn't to say that Gregor is unfriendly. At heart, he is a very good politician and particularly good at handling people. When a situation calls for it, he can be socially charming, and the same is true when he's surrounded only by people he trusts. Trust, in general, isn't something that comes easily to Gregor. Too many people who have sought to befriend him have done it only for political benefit, and he has learned the hard way that it's better for him and better for Barrayar if he stays wary.
Among friends, Gregor actually has a fairly sharp sense of humour. He tends toward the dry and acerbic, the sarcastic over the silly, but in a subtle hint at his often low self-esteem, his jokes are more of at his own expense than others. He is an adept of self-deprecating humour which, when matched with his often sardonic outlook on life, means he can be quite funny to people who get his sense of humour -- and possibly comes of even glummer to those who don't.
Gregor is intelligent, well-read, and well-cultured, not that he had much of a choice in any of that. But he additionally possesses an inherently curious and philosophical interest in the world around. Part of what left him so disatisfied with being stuck as emperor was the sense that he would always be confined to knowing only a very small part of the world and a very small experience. Following his misadventure, as described above, he learns to take a great deal more interest in the complicated and often challenging work that comes from being a multi-planetary emperor in more than name alone.
By his thirties, Gregor will have become quite a capable ruler. He learns to carry his power with grace, fairness, and insight and as a result, he commands the respect and loyalty of his people as much for who he is as for his title. At 25, there are already shades of that man visible in him, but Gregor is still susceptible to self-doubt, cheif among them being the worry that he will do more harm for Barrayar in the long run than good. He also worries that someday he'll discover that, like his father and great-uncle before, he actually likes inflicting harm. But as Miles observes when Gregor confesses to this particular concern, it's not something that seems very likely to anyone who knows him.
[point in timeline you're picking your character from]: Following The Vor Game. Gregor is 25.