"Bein’ a soldier is not hard. If it was, soldiers would not be able to do it."
-- Monstrous Regiment, Terry Pratchett
BASICS
NAME: Jackrum
GENDER: Trans Man
PRONOUNS: he/him/his
ORIENTATION: Gay
BIRTHDATE: Spring 2731
AGE: 45 as of Summer 2776
LOCATION: Fort Weyr
OCCUPATION: Brownhandler
WING: Dusk Squad
APPEARANCE
EYES: Blue
HAIR: Brown, short
HEIGHT AND BUILD: 5'6", fat
PLAY-BY: This picrew maker
EXPY SOURCE: Jack Jackrum (Monstrous Regiment by Terry Pratchett)
FULL APPEARANCE:
Jackrum is short and fat, which makes it a little easier to hide the curves he doesn't like as much. He tends to wear layers to further create the shape he wants from his body. He wears his brown hair in a military-esque short style, and it tends to get lighter as he spends more time out in the sun. His skin is worn and leathery from a lot of work outside, and he has a perpetual blush (or possibly sunburn) on his nose and cheeks, and a healthy speckling of freckles all over. He tends to prefer brighter colors when he isn't in his riding leathers, and he keeps all of his possessions in decent condition, although he will wear clothes as long as he can, which makes them look a bit dingy after repeated patching.
He has scars on his right arm and at various points along his torso from various disagreements with Krusk during their wherling turns.
PERSONALITY
PERSONALITY:
Jackrum is a very practical man. He will devote a lot of his time and energy to watching out for the younger, less experienced members of his squad. In an ideal world, he wants everyone to come out of every threadfall alive and well, but he knows this isn't an ideal world. Not everyone is going to make it back home, so he will often very quickly assess people's abilities and mentally rank them based on who he thinks is most likely to survive, and will give particular help to the people he thinks won't croak after two threadfalls.
He is the sort of person who thinks that too much time spent in a leadership role tends to erode people's common sense, or perhaps their sense of perspective, so he tends to be a little disdainful of leaders, a little more critical than the average soldier. He will avoid being given a position of leadership over other, seasoned soldiers. However, he is not out in out defiant, and will try to execute orders given to him in a way that results in minimal casualties. Jackrum is very resourceful and efficient, and when left to his own devices, is very good at making sure everyone in his squad has the resources they need to have the best chance of success. He likes working with newly graduated wherlings, and will often take one under his wing, so to speak. He's good at spotting nonsense and is good at cutting it off quickly. He is a clever man, and there is very little he hasn't seen (or tried to get away with himself). He is a good father and mentor, having a firm hand but clearly caring about anyone under his care.
Despite the fact that he clearly thrives as a wherhandler in a Weyr, he is very jaded about what it means to be a threadfighter. He doesn't consider it a noble calling the way others do, and is quick to mock his fellows en masse, treating the general lack of intelligence of anyone Weyr related as a given. He will also hold his relationships with any mentees over their heads for the rest of their career, and has no qualms about using any secrets against them to get them to do what he wants. Luckily, nothing he would want would be detrimental to the Weyr or solely for his own benefit, but it's still not the sort of thing most people appreciate from former mentors.
HISTORY
FAMILY: Farmers in Telgar territory
- 3 brothers
- several children
SIGNIFICANT OTHER: (optional)
BIRTHPLACE: Small farm in Telgar territory
HISTORY:
CW: Transphobia
Jackrum was born to farmers in Telgar territory. While his family loved him and tried to be supportive when he first told them he felt like a boy, they regularly encouraged him to simply not talk about it, and to accept the 'realities of his body'. Between this and his brothers' bad habit of dumping as much of their work as they could get away with on Jackrum, at fifteen he left to join Telgar Weyr. People there were a bit more open-minded, and readily accepted that he was a man without any significant pushback.
Once there, Jackrum had very little desire to become a dragonrider, finding the attention and prestige of it not something he wanted. For a while, he was content to simply be a member of the weyrfolk. One day, he confided in someone that he liked and admired the clear command structures of the dragonriders, the clear purpose, and the hard work shared by all, and if he could have that without the dragons, he'd be quite content. They suggested he try for a wher egg, as that sounded a lot like what he wanted, so as soon as he was seventeen, he presented himself as a wher candidate. The brown that hatched was a bit unusual, but Jackrum was hardly like the average man, so he took Krusk's appearance very much in stride.
Krusk was a difficult wher for an inexperienced handler, and Jackrum was injured multiple times when he tried to keep Krusk from gorging himself on food. The brown was unrepentant about the damage he caused to Jackrum, but rather than grow to resent or fear the wher, the man simply learned from each mishap, and eventually the two were able to find a way to get the brown fed without him overstuffing himself. Jackrum's firm hand proved in the end that the pair were a good match, and the issues early in their partnership is part of what sparked Jackrum's interest in taking other young handlers under his wing, so they could learn from his own early mistakes.
Jackrum lived and worked fairly happily at Telgar, being an average handler and even having a few kids. He didn't see his pregnancies as invalidating his manhood, and he rather enjoyed being a father in the limited capacity his work allowed him to be. He worked hard to not be like his own parents, who still regularly sent letters to him asking when he was going to come home and "start a real family", as if the kids he'd had as a man didn't count. He told his family that if they couldn't accept his kids, they shouldn't bother writing again, and for a while they didn't.
However, after the death of his parents, his brothers began writing again, wanting to know when he was planning on coming back to the farm. These letters were far more frequent as well as insistent, and seemed immune to any attempt he made to dissuade them. Certain that his brothers just wanted him back to do the heavy lifting on the farm, he put in for a transfer to Fort. He explained the situation to his children, assuring them he'd stay in touch, and offering to take any of his kids who were too young to stand for impression yet if they wanted to, and impressing on the ones who stayed that under no circumstances were they to tell their uncles where he'd gone.
He transferred to Fort in late spring of 2776, and so far he's been enjoying it, in his own cynical way. He misses getting to spend regular time with his kids, so if a wherlingmaster position ever opened up he'd put himself forward, but for now he's content to be a member of the squad and to look after the younger wherhandlers.
UPDATES
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