OOC: Application
Name/Handle: Tsuki, any other variations, or most recently Yomi. I also go by Wolfmoon, WM, Tsukiyo, etc. Heck, just call me whatever you want, so long as I know you’re referring to me. xD
Timezone: PST; GMT -8
Is English your primary language?: Yes, though I must say that it is not my first language so I may be less proficient in it than others, seeing as I speak a different language with my family and many of my friends, and I am not regularly exposed to the culture within the English language, which makes recognizing some of the colloquial sayings difficult for me sometimes. I’ve been known to not recognize the implications in what I read and say sometimes, which occasionally causes for much Awkward and Fail in RP. So just in case I do something very stupid… yeah. /makes excuses for English!fail
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Series: Baccano!
Series' Medium: Light novel, anime, manga, DS game based on anime. To my understanding, within all mediums, his character is pretty much the same, although one of the DS game endings, depending on how it is interpreted, can provide insight into the character’s sexuality and thoughts when regarding said issue. … I can’t believe I actually said that seriously for a crack ending.
Character: Birth name is Claire Stanfield, although he regularly decides to change his name or go by nicknames such as Vino and Rail Tracer.
Age: Around 20, from the point in the timeline of the series that I am choosing to take him from. In the canon timeline, he has appeared as old as 90.
Sex/Gender: Male
Canon Role: With a series that has no one main character and, in fact, rotates protagonists every novel, it is hard to say what role Claire would fit into in terms of the series since his role depends on whomever is the protagonist at what specified time, as he operates on his own rules as he sees fit and could at one time be working for one side and another time, working for another. For the sake of simplicity, let’s name Claire a neutral side character (most of the time) and a catalyst - meaning he has a way of greatly impacting the way events play out whenever he becomes involved in anything. The creator of the series, Narita, even said that the only reason everyone didn’t die originally as he had planned when he first wrote the Flying Pussyfoot arc of the series (the arc during which Claire was introduced) was because Claire came into being, which proves just how influential Claire’s character is. Similarly, Narita says that Claire is not allowed to be a protagonist with his own plotline in any of the light novels because he could so easily “overtake the whole series,” no doubt because his presence causes such huge effects. (Source: Wikipedia article - Baccano!)
"Real" Name: Felix Walken (the name of a retired assassin that Claire takes on later as part of a job and as his official registered name in order for him to get married, though the Claire in the timeline I am taking him from has not adopted this name yet)
Personal History:
Claire’s history is vague at best, but there are enough tidbits fed through the light novels and the anime series’ episode 9 to piece together some aspects of back-story that play a part in his character.
Claire’s childhood was not the worst fate a child could come to in early 20th century America. As a child growing up during the conflict-ridden Progressive Era, by the time Claire was old enough to really be exposed to any of the horrors of the time, such as child labor or other labor union or political issues of the time, most of these horrors were already banned or dealt with to some degree. I assume Claire’s family was in the middle-class due to the fact that, according to canon, the Stanfield family were neighbors and of the Gandors, who made a living later on in bootlegging and speakeasies, which was the sort of business owned mostly by the middle-class or lower-class immigrants. The fact that the Stanfields, with a very Anglo-Saxon surname, were neighbors to the Italian-originated Gandors is also perhaps an indication of social class level. (Aside note: I intend no racism or offense with anything I’m saying here; I’m just putting out some historical analysis into some of my speculations. I’m sorry, please don’t hurt me. D: ) In any case, it is assumed that the Stanfields were friendly acquaintances of the Gandors, or they perhaps even worked for the Gandors. This is perhaps a reason for why Claire was adopted as the fourth Gandor brother after he was orphaned at a young age, as opposed to simply being taken under-wing, as is the case with Tick (Chic), another character who was sold by his father to the Gandors as a child, but is not considered a part of the family as Claire is. It should be noted that the Gandors consider all their subordinates and any other people who work under the Gandor family name highly and see them as valuable parts of a giant family, if you will, though not as part of their nuclear family. Hence, don’t kill the Gandors’ men if you don’t want to get your ass handed to you on a silver plate. Therefore, the fact that Claire is added into their nuclear family indicates a good relationship between the Stanfields and the Gandors. As such, the Gandors, and especially the three Gandor brothers, are what Claire considers family and they are one of the few constants in his life. Since he changes stances all the time, this is significant because the Gandors may very well be the only allegiance he is willing to give to anything in his world.
Judging by photographs shown in episode 9 of the anime, Claire as a child is very different from Claire as an adult. In these photographs, he seems almost sullen and antisocial, which is a far cry from the upbeat and confident Claire at 20-years-old. It is therefore a valid assumption that Claire gained and developed his viewpoint of the world after he ran away with the circus. The Baccano! Wiki states that he ran away at around fourteen, though I have no idea how credible that information is. In any case, when he is growing into his teens, the world is facing the Great War, later to be known as World War I. The anime’s photographs indicate that Claire stayed with the circus troupe until he became an adult, so the Great War probably didn’t have much of an effect on him. In the circus, however, was where he gained all of the abilities and characteristics that make him what he is now. Episode 9 states that the secrets to Claire’s great success in the circus were his iron will and self-control. This becomes a major characteristic for the rest of his life. Through rigorous training, Claire gained his physical strength and abilities, which probably also had a part in helping him develop his solipsist mindset while growing from a boy into a man. Being able to achieve whatever he strove for was directly related to how much will he had to do things, and by achieving whatever he wanted, Claire was able to achieve the confidence needed for him to become who is now. As it is, whatever Claire wants to do, he will accomplish.
How he maintains contact with the Gandors during this time is unknown, as is how he eventually left the circus and how he came to becoming an assassin and a train conductor. By the time Claire is out of the circus, the world around him has changed and it is the Roaring Twenties, Prohibition-Era America that greets him and his newly-developed view of the world at large. The Gandors have established their speakeasy and their crime family by then and it is unknown how Claire fits into any of this. Meh, blame the canon for the lack of back-story. Somehow, Claire started killing people and somehow he left the circus and somehow he became a train conductor and somehow he managed to stay on good terms with his foster-brothers or else they wouldn’t have been able to ask him for a favor in their turf war in 1932. I wave my hands and magically it happened somehow. Whatever.
Fast-forwarding onwards towards 1931, when the Flying Pussyfoot incident occurs, Claire has become a train conductor under the guidance of an elderly conductor called Tony and has already established a name for himself as the infamous and elusive assassin, Vino, who hits in the most unexpected places, then disappears without a trace, only to hit again in some other unexpected place, courtesy of the Transcontinental Railroad of which he is handily a train conductor, as revealed by Episode 9 of the anime.
The Flying Pussyfoot is an unusually elaborately-adorned train that is set to head from San Francisco to New York. Aboard this train, there is a cast of strange characters who clash during the course of the train’s journey across the continent, making for some five story plots happening at once in just one arc. Among the many notable characters on the train include several immortals (who are essential to the overall Baccano! story), a gang of bootleggers, an black-suited organization called Lemures which is trying to take the train hostage to get the senator to set their leader and idol, Huey Laforet, free from Alcatraz prison, another group in white who’s just in it to kill as many people as they can, and of course, Claire Stanfield.
Claire has been called to New York to assist his adoptive brothers in their turf war with the Runorata, so in late 1931, he boards the Flying Pussyfoot, which will arrive in New York in early 1932. But several incidents happen that cause conflict. The Lemures group, disguised as an orchestra in black suits (of which Claire’s future wife, Chane Laforet, is a part of), boarded the train especially because the senator’s wife and daughter would be on board as well, whom they would be to use as coercion to get the senator to release their leader. At the same time, the white-suits are just in for the fun and the possibility to take advantage of the train company by taking the passengers hostage. This group is led by Ladd Russo, the top hit-man of the Russo family, who is a frightening character in his own right as he sees killing as a sport and his dream is to kill everyone in the world. These two groups clash strongly, catching several other characters in the middle of their struggle.
Claire plays a role in the incidents as well, though he specifically portrays the monster called Rail Tracer, a name and tale he came up with himself. Judging by the reactions of everyone on the train who were unfortunate or fortunate enough to encounter him, Claire was perhaps the most dangerous person on board, despite being only a single person against scores of other, weapon-wielding people. By the middle of the series after Claire reveals himself (to the audience at least) after masquerading as a dead person, he has caused havoc for both the black-suits and white-suits, making up for at least half the body count by the end. His reason for killing this time is to protect the passengers on the train, apparently in accord with his current job as a train conductor. Among the things he gets up to on the train include scaring the living daylights out of countless people, smashing several unfortunate someones against train tracks, saving passengers, getting Ladd Russo, the only other dangerous person who might have been a match against him, to jump off the train, and proposing to Chane. Yeah, atop a speeding train.
After the incidents aboard the train are sorted out to some degree, the passenger cars are hitched onto another engine that takes them into the train station in New York. This is the point from where I plan on taking Claire from canon - before he arrives in New York and after the incidents aboard the Flying Pussyfoot end.
In canon, after the train arrives in New York, Claire quits being a train conductor on account of the fact that he’s supposed to be dead now. At this point, he decides that his name shall be Rail Tracer or Vino from now on and he meets up with his brothers, the Gandors. After Claire goes out as Vino to stir up some trouble to warn the Runoratas off their turf, the Runoratas try to counter back by hiring several assassins, including one Felix Walken, who was now older and retired with a family, who was said to have been the best assassin in his time. After some more scuffling between the warring families, Claire reveals himself as Felix Walken, whose name Claire had bought from the real Felix Walken simply because he needed a legally registered name in order to get married. The Gandors win the turf war and Claire promptly disappears afterwards to Manhatten to search for Chane as she had said she’d wait for him there. Eventually, he finds her with the bootleggers, Jacuzzi Splot and company, who had been on the train with him. At this point, he asks her again if she will marry him and if she still says no, will she be willing to let him convince her, to which she says yes. After this, there is no more material in the light novels or the anime that tells about Claire, as far as I know.
In a 2001 light novel, Claire is briefly mentioned to be 90-years-old, with a family (his wife Chane, his daughter who takes very much after him, and his son, who looks exactly like his mother and his grandfather, Huey Laforet), and off treasure hunting, currently having the means to do so because he hijacked a ship, pirate-style.
What point in time are you taking your character from when he/she appears at Landel's and why?:
I am taking this character from 1931-1932 in the series timeline, right before the Flying Pussyfoot train is supposed to arrive with Claire onboard in New York and right after the conflicts aboard the train are resolved rather violently between several groups of people. This is before Claire joins his adoptive brothers as a recruit on their side of the turf war that is going on between their mafia family, the Gandors, and another group nearby, the Runoratas.
I chose this point for a number of reasons. Not only is this part of the story the section in which Claire is introduced and in which he plays a big part, but it also happens to be the highlight of the anime storyline, which is the storyline that I am most familiar and comfortable with. Taking him from a point in canon that I am familiar with would mean that there would be less of a possibility, on my part, of making blunders with his character and/or speculating on light-novel material that has not yet been translated or that has vague translations and descriptions of events that I would rather not guess at the meaning of. Taking him from further along in the timeline would have inevitably led to at least some mention of events and relationships between characters that Claire interacts with later on, which I do not want to run the risk of messing up on.
A lesser reason for choosing this point: Heck, Claire’s twenty-years-old here! Perfect age! I don’t think I really want to bring in 90-year-old Claire, despite being the badass grandpa he is then, which is the only other time he has appeared in canon. I have no idea what he’s doing between 20 and 90 besides getting married and having kids and having fun on trains.
Please give us a detailed description of your character's personality:
Hoooo’ boy. Claire has a very… unique personality that is a source of admiration, annoyance, and downright disbelief at times, both from fellow characters and readers/interpreters alike. It is easy to see that Claire is excessively over-the-top when on the job, which earned him the nickname, ‘Vino,’ “wine” in Italian, as he leaves no trace of himself behind, but his work is clearly marked as HIS work because his victims are so torn apart and bloodied that it looks like the crime scene was drenched in wine. Yet despite his brutally violent nature, he is equally able to be compassionate and even chivalrous (if you ignore his general insensitivity to everything). Then again, the only reason he’s compassionate is because according to him, only strong people can afford to be compassionate and merciful.
One of the most characteristic parts of his personality is his belief in solipsism, that is, he believes he is the only person who exists and that everything else is just an illusion, a show put on for him. This belief also plays into why he believes that nothing can kill him. The fact that he believes this gives him the laidback, “it’s just a game” attitude he has towards life.
Although he seems to be an arrogant type of person, this is not the case all the time. Just as he can be compassionate and work in the name of (his own) justice, Claire has instances when he shows that he doesn’t just consider the rest of world to be beneath him. For example, Claire takes what his adoptive brothers say to heart. When one of the brothers reproaches him for underestimating and mocking the assassins who had been hired by the Runorata, Claire apologizes and steps down. Additionally, when he discovers that Chane couldn’t speak after he demanded her to apologize after nearly catching him in the ear with her knife on accident, he also apologizes. Claire also doesn’t always underestimate people, which is seen in the light novel series after he reveals himself to be Vino. One of his opponents is a woman assassin who swears to kill him and Claire states that he does not underestimate her just because she’s a woman because he’d seen women who were just as capable as men (though he also said afterwards that she was not comparable at all to these women).
Claire tends to be upbeat, full of energy, and somewhat strange in a funny sort of way, which is decidedly weird when you realize this man is a feared assassin. He makes liberal use of large, sweeping gestures and dramatic monologues, which his adoptive brothers have learned to ignore in exasperation. A specific thing to note is the fact that he takes all conversations very seriously, for he’s not one to joke around. Hence, every single marriage proposal he’s ever made, yes, every single one, was made completely seriously. It also perhaps isn’t a surprise to state that Claire also takes love very seriously, cheesiness and everything. And yet, while he takes words at face-value most of the time, he is also rarely fazed by anything. It is terribly hard to surprise him for real or for long.
On or off the job, his thought processes can be pretty hard to follow for normal people although he thinks he makes perfect sense. Included in this category would be his skewed sense of justice. Claire has no trouble pulling a few strings to get what he wants, but he also has lines that he draws for himself in the name of justice. For example, Claire saves Isaac and Miria from falling off the train on account of them being good customers, and he decides to kill Czeslaw Meyer, an immortal who looks like a 10-year-old kid, because he had been planning on killing all the people in the passenger car. Afterwards, a few days later after everyone gets off the train, Claire encounters Czeslaw again, but apparently has no intention of harming him anymore because the passengers all got off the train safely. Claire also has a sense of duty and affection towards people who helped him despite being the wild card he is. When Claire finds out that the old conductor, Tony, who had taught him everything he knew about being a conductor, had been killed by one of the white-suit members, he wastes no time doling out his punishment.
Physical Characteristics:
Claire is of averagely-tall height - the canon never really says anything about this, but that matters little since Claire thinks he’s the center of the universe, no matter what height - and physically fit in a way that only someone trained from a young age as a circus performer and an infamous, freelance assassin could be. If I had to estimate his height, I’d say around 5’7-8”, or about 172-173 cm, this to me being tall enough to be average, but not too tall that it seems unreasonable for an acrobat. The fact that he is able to navigate a speeding train from the outside with only his body strength is proof enough of his mobility and strength. He is still lightweight enough to move quickly though, and not at all at the sacrifice of manpower. Other defining features include his characteristic red hair, which is worth mentioning because not only does it stand out in a crowd, it makes him a literal red-headed stepchild of the Gandors, something TVTropes really enjoys mentioning and heck, he named the trope!
In the canon, he has been depicted wearing a tan-colored train conductor’s suit during the Flying Pussyfoot arc, but for his usual dress, he wears a whole lot of black, consisting of black shirt, black pants, and a black trench coat.
At first glance, depending on when you see him, Claire looks friendly and nice-looking (Episode 2), but this belies the brutal assassin in him. Completely. The difference is jarring. It’s “Beware the Nice Ones” like never before.
What kinds of otherworldly abilities does your character have, if any?:
N/A, unless believing that one is basically God and subsequently owning anyone that tries to prove them otherwise - unfailingly, every single time - is a special ability. It’s almost magical how he manages to avoid death and injury all the time. I suppose you could attribute this to some sense of his that alerts him to any coming dangers, though this is not any official ability that the character is officially meant to have. Dude, I don’t know. Claire’s just special. How about I attribute this to quantum and we call it a day?
If present, how do you plan to tweak these powers to make your character appropriately hindered in the setting of Landel's?:
N/A, as I think that Claire’s special ability is his utter certainty that he rules the world, there is no need for me to tweak any powers of his, except perhaps take away his self-given permission to overkill whatever things he sees fit since that would be unpleasant for Landel’s janitorial personnel to have to clean up.
I suppose if I had to tweak something, I guess it would be his “luck”. In his own universe, everything just seems to bend backwards for him so that essentially, he’s operating on god-mode 24/7. Obstacles in his life just seem to jump out of way or coincidentally miss him. In the Baccano! Universe, Claire literally could have the world do what he wants, but in the world of Landel’s, this will definitely not be the case. Also, his freaky ability to snap bones with his bare hands is going to be limited to nightshift use only, not that he’d want to use it during the day anyway because he’d find a whole bunch of nurses sedating him if he ever decided to terrorize anyone.
And, well. I have to keep in mind also that it’s pretty much canon for him to be good at everything he wants to be good at, except maybe getting girls. Hmm… how to do that without godmodding and without being out of character, hmm… tricky.
Does your character have any non-otherworldly abilities/training that surpass the norm?:
Claire ran away from his adoptive family at a young age (the Baccano! Wiki says around fourteen, though I am not sure if this is an actual statement in the light novels) to join the circus, which is where he developed great flexibility and mobility that later will play such a huge part in his line of profession. It keeps him from being killed (i.e.: avoiding certain death; canon example: dodging bullets, one person against multiple adversaries) and it also gives him the means to perform death-defying stunts, which does nothing for his God-complex and everyone else’s wellbeing.
I consider his greatest ability to be his self-confidence and his ability to keep up with his confidence. Claire is arrogant and can, at times, be demeaning to others who are less capable than he is, but he is able to keep his confidence on par with his abilities. He believes he can do anything and not die because his abilities are great enough that they can keep him alive. That sort of conviction in mindset and subsequently the perfect match in abilities makes Claire one of the most potent characters in the series.
As for specific abilities, Claire was a former trapeze artist when he was with the circus, so he has excellent navigational skills across the most unlikely and downright dangerous places (the outside of a speeding train… o_o complete with flips and everything). In tandem, heights seem to pose no problem for him at all.
Claire may not be one of those plotting, calculating types, but he has the capability to play with the best of them. In the light novels, he managed to trick the Runorata into thinking he was one of their own hired assassins. Additionally, Claire’s very quick on his feet, especially when it comes to dangerous situations - or at least dangerous situations to anyone but him. He has been known to improvise weapons - scissors, knives, railroad tracks, his teeth. Apparently he has great hand-eye coordination too because he can throw a giant monkey wrench with such precision (seen in episode 16 and in a special light novel taking place in 1932), it’s like he’s practiced it before. Except he hasn’t. Which also shows his ability to adapt unbelievably well to whatever situation he’s faced with.
References/Bibliography (I feel like I’m writing a report…):
The Baccano! Article on Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baccano!
The Baccano! Wiki: http://baccano.wikia.com/wiki/Baccano!_Wiki
Baka-Tsuki, which fan-translates the light novels: http://www.baka-tsuki.org/project/index.php?title=Baccano
Third-Person Sample:
From: http://community.livejournal.com/fountainofcod/28946.html?thread=14756370#t14756370
Claire had the tendency to rant on for longer than most people could follow, which was probably the reason why his brothers, Luck and the rest of them, tuned him out more often than not. Not that Claire particularly minded - there was nothing much that could irk him except when something overstepped his warped sense of justice. His was a way of speaking as if others could see his thoughts just as vividly as he saw them himself. He never took it upon himself to explain anything.
Strange as it was, it made a lot of sense in this way that Claire's complement would be someone who would listen, accept, move on unquestioningly. For with as much conviction as he believed that he was the only person existing in this world, Claire supposed it may be a weakness of his, one of his very few, that having some other presence, illusion or not, listen to him could create such feelings in him that made him consider for just a moment, what it would be like for the world to be not just for show. 'This must be what it is like to fall in love,' Claire thought.
But Claire was not one for thinking things too far. Albedo was an illusion real enough to share his world with, but he was still that - an illusion. Just like everyone else was an illusion, the girls he proposed to, his adoptive brothers, his mortal death. It was why he had no need for Luck's brand of immortality, Albedo's brand of immortality.
Claire glanced down at the dark head that the other had been holding prior to his entry, frowning slightly. A girl too familiar to his liking... Claire could not be bothered to fully understand all of what Albedo had said, but he understood enough to know that his spouse had not liked the girl, which meant that he, Claire, did not like the girl either. Looking at the girl's remains now, the head was still intact. Perhaps, on the way out, he could...
Claire laughed lightly in reply. "Once again, that's too bad, though you should be happy at least that you could get rid of whatever was displeasing you."
The fingers that played with his blood-soaked coat were light, a teasing dissonance to the utter chaos that those same fingers must have wreaked on the room around them. The fleeting grin that Albedo gave him was sudden enough that his breath came short when the other man accepted his offer.
When the other leaned into him, Claire naturally leaned back to meet him. He tugged the other gently forward so that their lips could meet. Claire tasted blood and he couldn't be sure whether it was from his partner or himself. After a few moments, he pulled away, teeth flashing white against the dried blood on his face as he smiled brightly.
"Then it's settled! I can get the job as early as tomorrow, if you want. Now, shall we be off? I think the police may be arriving soon and we can't be teasing them too much, can we? They'll start to think they can actually catch us then. Where to?~"
First-Person Sample:
[Claire might write a couple journal entries just because he can, but given his impulsive personality, he isn’t very likely to write much else. He would much rather be doing things than writing his thoughts down. Additionally, don’t expect any thoughtful pondering or philosophical rants on his outlook on life here. He’s more likely to write down what woman he is currently after and how he got rejected again, or whatever interesting thing happened while he was on the job, such as encountering a particularly interesting person or killing said interesting person. Lovely]
[In wild, messy, all-over-the-place handwriting]
So I thought I might try keeping a journal because Chane thinks I should take on a quiet sort of practice that would perhaps help us settle down. I don’t particularly see why, really. But if Chane thinks I should, then I should, because that’s what people do for the people they love!~ … Still, I’m not quite sure where she wants me to go with this though. What’s the point of writing down what you think if you could just do them? For example, what’s the point of writing down that I loooove Chane when I could just tell her? Or show her? … In fact...
[Later]
... So I convinced Chane to forget the journal idea and instead, we’ve decided to take a train ride to New York. See? Much more interesting than writing it all down!
Timezone: PST; GMT -8
Is English your primary language?: Yes, though I must say that it is not my first language so I may be less proficient in it than others, seeing as I speak a different language with my family and many of my friends, and I am not regularly exposed to the culture within the English language, which makes recognizing some of the colloquial sayings difficult for me sometimes. I’ve been known to not recognize the implications in what I read and say sometimes, which occasionally causes for much Awkward and Fail in RP. So just in case I do something very stupid… yeah. /makes excuses for English!fail
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Series: Baccano!
Series' Medium: Light novel, anime, manga, DS game based on anime. To my understanding, within all mediums, his character is pretty much the same, although one of the DS game endings, depending on how it is interpreted, can provide insight into the character’s sexuality and thoughts when regarding said issue. … I can’t believe I actually said that seriously for a crack ending.
Character: Birth name is Claire Stanfield, although he regularly decides to change his name or go by nicknames such as Vino and Rail Tracer.
Age: Around 20, from the point in the timeline of the series that I am choosing to take him from. In the canon timeline, he has appeared as old as 90.
Sex/Gender: Male
Canon Role: With a series that has no one main character and, in fact, rotates protagonists every novel, it is hard to say what role Claire would fit into in terms of the series since his role depends on whomever is the protagonist at what specified time, as he operates on his own rules as he sees fit and could at one time be working for one side and another time, working for another. For the sake of simplicity, let’s name Claire a neutral side character (most of the time) and a catalyst - meaning he has a way of greatly impacting the way events play out whenever he becomes involved in anything. The creator of the series, Narita, even said that the only reason everyone didn’t die originally as he had planned when he first wrote the Flying Pussyfoot arc of the series (the arc during which Claire was introduced) was because Claire came into being, which proves just how influential Claire’s character is. Similarly, Narita says that Claire is not allowed to be a protagonist with his own plotline in any of the light novels because he could so easily “overtake the whole series,” no doubt because his presence causes such huge effects. (Source: Wikipedia article - Baccano!)
"Real" Name: Felix Walken (the name of a retired assassin that Claire takes on later as part of a job and as his official registered name in order for him to get married, though the Claire in the timeline I am taking him from has not adopted this name yet)
Personal History:
Claire’s history is vague at best, but there are enough tidbits fed through the light novels and the anime series’ episode 9 to piece together some aspects of back-story that play a part in his character.
Claire’s childhood was not the worst fate a child could come to in early 20th century America. As a child growing up during the conflict-ridden Progressive Era, by the time Claire was old enough to really be exposed to any of the horrors of the time, such as child labor or other labor union or political issues of the time, most of these horrors were already banned or dealt with to some degree. I assume Claire’s family was in the middle-class due to the fact that, according to canon, the Stanfield family were neighbors and of the Gandors, who made a living later on in bootlegging and speakeasies, which was the sort of business owned mostly by the middle-class or lower-class immigrants. The fact that the Stanfields, with a very Anglo-Saxon surname, were neighbors to the Italian-originated Gandors is also perhaps an indication of social class level. (Aside note: I intend no racism or offense with anything I’m saying here; I’m just putting out some historical analysis into some of my speculations. I’m sorry, please don’t hurt me. D: ) In any case, it is assumed that the Stanfields were friendly acquaintances of the Gandors, or they perhaps even worked for the Gandors. This is perhaps a reason for why Claire was adopted as the fourth Gandor brother after he was orphaned at a young age, as opposed to simply being taken under-wing, as is the case with Tick (Chic), another character who was sold by his father to the Gandors as a child, but is not considered a part of the family as Claire is. It should be noted that the Gandors consider all their subordinates and any other people who work under the Gandor family name highly and see them as valuable parts of a giant family, if you will, though not as part of their nuclear family. Hence, don’t kill the Gandors’ men if you don’t want to get your ass handed to you on a silver plate. Therefore, the fact that Claire is added into their nuclear family indicates a good relationship between the Stanfields and the Gandors. As such, the Gandors, and especially the three Gandor brothers, are what Claire considers family and they are one of the few constants in his life. Since he changes stances all the time, this is significant because the Gandors may very well be the only allegiance he is willing to give to anything in his world.
Judging by photographs shown in episode 9 of the anime, Claire as a child is very different from Claire as an adult. In these photographs, he seems almost sullen and antisocial, which is a far cry from the upbeat and confident Claire at 20-years-old. It is therefore a valid assumption that Claire gained and developed his viewpoint of the world after he ran away with the circus. The Baccano! Wiki states that he ran away at around fourteen, though I have no idea how credible that information is. In any case, when he is growing into his teens, the world is facing the Great War, later to be known as World War I. The anime’s photographs indicate that Claire stayed with the circus troupe until he became an adult, so the Great War probably didn’t have much of an effect on him. In the circus, however, was where he gained all of the abilities and characteristics that make him what he is now. Episode 9 states that the secrets to Claire’s great success in the circus were his iron will and self-control. This becomes a major characteristic for the rest of his life. Through rigorous training, Claire gained his physical strength and abilities, which probably also had a part in helping him develop his solipsist mindset while growing from a boy into a man. Being able to achieve whatever he strove for was directly related to how much will he had to do things, and by achieving whatever he wanted, Claire was able to achieve the confidence needed for him to become who is now. As it is, whatever Claire wants to do, he will accomplish.
How he maintains contact with the Gandors during this time is unknown, as is how he eventually left the circus and how he came to becoming an assassin and a train conductor. By the time Claire is out of the circus, the world around him has changed and it is the Roaring Twenties, Prohibition-Era America that greets him and his newly-developed view of the world at large. The Gandors have established their speakeasy and their crime family by then and it is unknown how Claire fits into any of this. Meh, blame the canon for the lack of back-story. Somehow, Claire started killing people and somehow he left the circus and somehow he became a train conductor and somehow he managed to stay on good terms with his foster-brothers or else they wouldn’t have been able to ask him for a favor in their turf war in 1932. I wave my hands and magically it happened somehow. Whatever.
Fast-forwarding onwards towards 1931, when the Flying Pussyfoot incident occurs, Claire has become a train conductor under the guidance of an elderly conductor called Tony and has already established a name for himself as the infamous and elusive assassin, Vino, who hits in the most unexpected places, then disappears without a trace, only to hit again in some other unexpected place, courtesy of the Transcontinental Railroad of which he is handily a train conductor, as revealed by Episode 9 of the anime.
The Flying Pussyfoot is an unusually elaborately-adorned train that is set to head from San Francisco to New York. Aboard this train, there is a cast of strange characters who clash during the course of the train’s journey across the continent, making for some five story plots happening at once in just one arc. Among the many notable characters on the train include several immortals (who are essential to the overall Baccano! story), a gang of bootleggers, an black-suited organization called Lemures which is trying to take the train hostage to get the senator to set their leader and idol, Huey Laforet, free from Alcatraz prison, another group in white who’s just in it to kill as many people as they can, and of course, Claire Stanfield.
Claire has been called to New York to assist his adoptive brothers in their turf war with the Runorata, so in late 1931, he boards the Flying Pussyfoot, which will arrive in New York in early 1932. But several incidents happen that cause conflict. The Lemures group, disguised as an orchestra in black suits (of which Claire’s future wife, Chane Laforet, is a part of), boarded the train especially because the senator’s wife and daughter would be on board as well, whom they would be to use as coercion to get the senator to release their leader. At the same time, the white-suits are just in for the fun and the possibility to take advantage of the train company by taking the passengers hostage. This group is led by Ladd Russo, the top hit-man of the Russo family, who is a frightening character in his own right as he sees killing as a sport and his dream is to kill everyone in the world. These two groups clash strongly, catching several other characters in the middle of their struggle.
Claire plays a role in the incidents as well, though he specifically portrays the monster called Rail Tracer, a name and tale he came up with himself. Judging by the reactions of everyone on the train who were unfortunate or fortunate enough to encounter him, Claire was perhaps the most dangerous person on board, despite being only a single person against scores of other, weapon-wielding people. By the middle of the series after Claire reveals himself (to the audience at least) after masquerading as a dead person, he has caused havoc for both the black-suits and white-suits, making up for at least half the body count by the end. His reason for killing this time is to protect the passengers on the train, apparently in accord with his current job as a train conductor. Among the things he gets up to on the train include scaring the living daylights out of countless people, smashing several unfortunate someones against train tracks, saving passengers, getting Ladd Russo, the only other dangerous person who might have been a match against him, to jump off the train, and proposing to Chane. Yeah, atop a speeding train.
After the incidents aboard the train are sorted out to some degree, the passenger cars are hitched onto another engine that takes them into the train station in New York. This is the point from where I plan on taking Claire from canon - before he arrives in New York and after the incidents aboard the Flying Pussyfoot end.
In canon, after the train arrives in New York, Claire quits being a train conductor on account of the fact that he’s supposed to be dead now. At this point, he decides that his name shall be Rail Tracer or Vino from now on and he meets up with his brothers, the Gandors. After Claire goes out as Vino to stir up some trouble to warn the Runoratas off their turf, the Runoratas try to counter back by hiring several assassins, including one Felix Walken, who was now older and retired with a family, who was said to have been the best assassin in his time. After some more scuffling between the warring families, Claire reveals himself as Felix Walken, whose name Claire had bought from the real Felix Walken simply because he needed a legally registered name in order to get married. The Gandors win the turf war and Claire promptly disappears afterwards to Manhatten to search for Chane as she had said she’d wait for him there. Eventually, he finds her with the bootleggers, Jacuzzi Splot and company, who had been on the train with him. At this point, he asks her again if she will marry him and if she still says no, will she be willing to let him convince her, to which she says yes. After this, there is no more material in the light novels or the anime that tells about Claire, as far as I know.
In a 2001 light novel, Claire is briefly mentioned to be 90-years-old, with a family (his wife Chane, his daughter who takes very much after him, and his son, who looks exactly like his mother and his grandfather, Huey Laforet), and off treasure hunting, currently having the means to do so because he hijacked a ship, pirate-style.
What point in time are you taking your character from when he/she appears at Landel's and why?:
I am taking this character from 1931-1932 in the series timeline, right before the Flying Pussyfoot train is supposed to arrive with Claire onboard in New York and right after the conflicts aboard the train are resolved rather violently between several groups of people. This is before Claire joins his adoptive brothers as a recruit on their side of the turf war that is going on between their mafia family, the Gandors, and another group nearby, the Runoratas.
I chose this point for a number of reasons. Not only is this part of the story the section in which Claire is introduced and in which he plays a big part, but it also happens to be the highlight of the anime storyline, which is the storyline that I am most familiar and comfortable with. Taking him from a point in canon that I am familiar with would mean that there would be less of a possibility, on my part, of making blunders with his character and/or speculating on light-novel material that has not yet been translated or that has vague translations and descriptions of events that I would rather not guess at the meaning of. Taking him from further along in the timeline would have inevitably led to at least some mention of events and relationships between characters that Claire interacts with later on, which I do not want to run the risk of messing up on.
A lesser reason for choosing this point: Heck, Claire’s twenty-years-old here! Perfect age! I don’t think I really want to bring in 90-year-old Claire, despite being the badass grandpa he is then, which is the only other time he has appeared in canon. I have no idea what he’s doing between 20 and 90 besides getting married and having kids and having fun on trains.
Please give us a detailed description of your character's personality:
Hoooo’ boy. Claire has a very… unique personality that is a source of admiration, annoyance, and downright disbelief at times, both from fellow characters and readers/interpreters alike. It is easy to see that Claire is excessively over-the-top when on the job, which earned him the nickname, ‘Vino,’ “wine” in Italian, as he leaves no trace of himself behind, but his work is clearly marked as HIS work because his victims are so torn apart and bloodied that it looks like the crime scene was drenched in wine. Yet despite his brutally violent nature, he is equally able to be compassionate and even chivalrous (if you ignore his general insensitivity to everything). Then again, the only reason he’s compassionate is because according to him, only strong people can afford to be compassionate and merciful.
One of the most characteristic parts of his personality is his belief in solipsism, that is, he believes he is the only person who exists and that everything else is just an illusion, a show put on for him. This belief also plays into why he believes that nothing can kill him. The fact that he believes this gives him the laidback, “it’s just a game” attitude he has towards life.
Although he seems to be an arrogant type of person, this is not the case all the time. Just as he can be compassionate and work in the name of (his own) justice, Claire has instances when he shows that he doesn’t just consider the rest of world to be beneath him. For example, Claire takes what his adoptive brothers say to heart. When one of the brothers reproaches him for underestimating and mocking the assassins who had been hired by the Runorata, Claire apologizes and steps down. Additionally, when he discovers that Chane couldn’t speak after he demanded her to apologize after nearly catching him in the ear with her knife on accident, he also apologizes. Claire also doesn’t always underestimate people, which is seen in the light novel series after he reveals himself to be Vino. One of his opponents is a woman assassin who swears to kill him and Claire states that he does not underestimate her just because she’s a woman because he’d seen women who were just as capable as men (though he also said afterwards that she was not comparable at all to these women).
Claire tends to be upbeat, full of energy, and somewhat strange in a funny sort of way, which is decidedly weird when you realize this man is a feared assassin. He makes liberal use of large, sweeping gestures and dramatic monologues, which his adoptive brothers have learned to ignore in exasperation. A specific thing to note is the fact that he takes all conversations very seriously, for he’s not one to joke around. Hence, every single marriage proposal he’s ever made, yes, every single one, was made completely seriously. It also perhaps isn’t a surprise to state that Claire also takes love very seriously, cheesiness and everything. And yet, while he takes words at face-value most of the time, he is also rarely fazed by anything. It is terribly hard to surprise him for real or for long.
On or off the job, his thought processes can be pretty hard to follow for normal people although he thinks he makes perfect sense. Included in this category would be his skewed sense of justice. Claire has no trouble pulling a few strings to get what he wants, but he also has lines that he draws for himself in the name of justice. For example, Claire saves Isaac and Miria from falling off the train on account of them being good customers, and he decides to kill Czeslaw Meyer, an immortal who looks like a 10-year-old kid, because he had been planning on killing all the people in the passenger car. Afterwards, a few days later after everyone gets off the train, Claire encounters Czeslaw again, but apparently has no intention of harming him anymore because the passengers all got off the train safely. Claire also has a sense of duty and affection towards people who helped him despite being the wild card he is. When Claire finds out that the old conductor, Tony, who had taught him everything he knew about being a conductor, had been killed by one of the white-suit members, he wastes no time doling out his punishment.
Physical Characteristics:
Claire is of averagely-tall height - the canon never really says anything about this, but that matters little since Claire thinks he’s the center of the universe, no matter what height - and physically fit in a way that only someone trained from a young age as a circus performer and an infamous, freelance assassin could be. If I had to estimate his height, I’d say around 5’7-8”, or about 172-173 cm, this to me being tall enough to be average, but not too tall that it seems unreasonable for an acrobat. The fact that he is able to navigate a speeding train from the outside with only his body strength is proof enough of his mobility and strength. He is still lightweight enough to move quickly though, and not at all at the sacrifice of manpower. Other defining features include his characteristic red hair, which is worth mentioning because not only does it stand out in a crowd, it makes him a literal red-headed stepchild of the Gandors, something TVTropes really enjoys mentioning and heck, he named the trope!
In the canon, he has been depicted wearing a tan-colored train conductor’s suit during the Flying Pussyfoot arc, but for his usual dress, he wears a whole lot of black, consisting of black shirt, black pants, and a black trench coat.
At first glance, depending on when you see him, Claire looks friendly and nice-looking (Episode 2), but this belies the brutal assassin in him. Completely. The difference is jarring. It’s “Beware the Nice Ones” like never before.
What kinds of otherworldly abilities does your character have, if any?:
N/A, unless believing that one is basically God and subsequently owning anyone that tries to prove them otherwise - unfailingly, every single time - is a special ability. It’s almost magical how he manages to avoid death and injury all the time. I suppose you could attribute this to some sense of his that alerts him to any coming dangers, though this is not any official ability that the character is officially meant to have. Dude, I don’t know. Claire’s just special. How about I attribute this to quantum and we call it a day?
If present, how do you plan to tweak these powers to make your character appropriately hindered in the setting of Landel's?:
N/A, as I think that Claire’s special ability is his utter certainty that he rules the world, there is no need for me to tweak any powers of his, except perhaps take away his self-given permission to overkill whatever things he sees fit since that would be unpleasant for Landel’s janitorial personnel to have to clean up.
I suppose if I had to tweak something, I guess it would be his “luck”. In his own universe, everything just seems to bend backwards for him so that essentially, he’s operating on god-mode 24/7. Obstacles in his life just seem to jump out of way or coincidentally miss him. In the Baccano! Universe, Claire literally could have the world do what he wants, but in the world of Landel’s, this will definitely not be the case. Also, his freaky ability to snap bones with his bare hands is going to be limited to nightshift use only, not that he’d want to use it during the day anyway because he’d find a whole bunch of nurses sedating him if he ever decided to terrorize anyone.
And, well. I have to keep in mind also that it’s pretty much canon for him to be good at everything he wants to be good at, except maybe getting girls. Hmm… how to do that without godmodding and without being out of character, hmm… tricky.
Does your character have any non-otherworldly abilities/training that surpass the norm?:
Claire ran away from his adoptive family at a young age (the Baccano! Wiki says around fourteen, though I am not sure if this is an actual statement in the light novels) to join the circus, which is where he developed great flexibility and mobility that later will play such a huge part in his line of profession. It keeps him from being killed (i.e.: avoiding certain death; canon example: dodging bullets, one person against multiple adversaries) and it also gives him the means to perform death-defying stunts, which does nothing for his God-complex and everyone else’s wellbeing.
I consider his greatest ability to be his self-confidence and his ability to keep up with his confidence. Claire is arrogant and can, at times, be demeaning to others who are less capable than he is, but he is able to keep his confidence on par with his abilities. He believes he can do anything and not die because his abilities are great enough that they can keep him alive. That sort of conviction in mindset and subsequently the perfect match in abilities makes Claire one of the most potent characters in the series.
As for specific abilities, Claire was a former trapeze artist when he was with the circus, so he has excellent navigational skills across the most unlikely and downright dangerous places (the outside of a speeding train… o_o complete with flips and everything). In tandem, heights seem to pose no problem for him at all.
Claire may not be one of those plotting, calculating types, but he has the capability to play with the best of them. In the light novels, he managed to trick the Runorata into thinking he was one of their own hired assassins. Additionally, Claire’s very quick on his feet, especially when it comes to dangerous situations - or at least dangerous situations to anyone but him. He has been known to improvise weapons - scissors, knives, railroad tracks, his teeth. Apparently he has great hand-eye coordination too because he can throw a giant monkey wrench with such precision (seen in episode 16 and in a special light novel taking place in 1932), it’s like he’s practiced it before. Except he hasn’t. Which also shows his ability to adapt unbelievably well to whatever situation he’s faced with.
References/Bibliography (I feel like I’m writing a report…):
The Baccano! Article on Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baccano!
The Baccano! Wiki: http://baccano.wikia.com/wiki/Baccano!_Wiki
Baka-Tsuki, which fan-translates the light novels: http://www.baka-tsuki.org/project/index.php?title=Baccano
Third-Person Sample:
From: http://community.livejournal.com/fountainofcod/28946.html?thread=14756370#t14756370
Claire had the tendency to rant on for longer than most people could follow, which was probably the reason why his brothers, Luck and the rest of them, tuned him out more often than not. Not that Claire particularly minded - there was nothing much that could irk him except when something overstepped his warped sense of justice. His was a way of speaking as if others could see his thoughts just as vividly as he saw them himself. He never took it upon himself to explain anything.
Strange as it was, it made a lot of sense in this way that Claire's complement would be someone who would listen, accept, move on unquestioningly. For with as much conviction as he believed that he was the only person existing in this world, Claire supposed it may be a weakness of his, one of his very few, that having some other presence, illusion or not, listen to him could create such feelings in him that made him consider for just a moment, what it would be like for the world to be not just for show. 'This must be what it is like to fall in love,' Claire thought.
But Claire was not one for thinking things too far. Albedo was an illusion real enough to share his world with, but he was still that - an illusion. Just like everyone else was an illusion, the girls he proposed to, his adoptive brothers, his mortal death. It was why he had no need for Luck's brand of immortality, Albedo's brand of immortality.
Claire glanced down at the dark head that the other had been holding prior to his entry, frowning slightly. A girl too familiar to his liking... Claire could not be bothered to fully understand all of what Albedo had said, but he understood enough to know that his spouse had not liked the girl, which meant that he, Claire, did not like the girl either. Looking at the girl's remains now, the head was still intact. Perhaps, on the way out, he could...
Claire laughed lightly in reply. "Once again, that's too bad, though you should be happy at least that you could get rid of whatever was displeasing you."
The fingers that played with his blood-soaked coat were light, a teasing dissonance to the utter chaos that those same fingers must have wreaked on the room around them. The fleeting grin that Albedo gave him was sudden enough that his breath came short when the other man accepted his offer.
When the other leaned into him, Claire naturally leaned back to meet him. He tugged the other gently forward so that their lips could meet. Claire tasted blood and he couldn't be sure whether it was from his partner or himself. After a few moments, he pulled away, teeth flashing white against the dried blood on his face as he smiled brightly.
"Then it's settled! I can get the job as early as tomorrow, if you want. Now, shall we be off? I think the police may be arriving soon and we can't be teasing them too much, can we? They'll start to think they can actually catch us then. Where to?~"
First-Person Sample:
[Claire might write a couple journal entries just because he can, but given his impulsive personality, he isn’t very likely to write much else. He would much rather be doing things than writing his thoughts down. Additionally, don’t expect any thoughtful pondering or philosophical rants on his outlook on life here. He’s more likely to write down what woman he is currently after and how he got rejected again, or whatever interesting thing happened while he was on the job, such as encountering a particularly interesting person or killing said interesting person. Lovely]
[In wild, messy, all-over-the-place handwriting]
So I thought I might try keeping a journal because Chane thinks I should take on a quiet sort of practice that would perhaps help us settle down. I don’t particularly see why, really. But if Chane thinks I should, then I should, because that’s what people do for the people they love!~ … Still, I’m not quite sure where she wants me to go with this though. What’s the point of writing down what you think if you could just do them? For example, what’s the point of writing down that I loooove Chane when I could just tell her? Or show her? … In fact...
[Later]
... So I convinced Chane to forget the journal idea and instead, we’ve decided to take a train ride to New York. See? Much more interesting than writing it all down!