Darius Jensen

In Brief: Darius Jensen, Ward of the State, now Field Command in the ISA

A nameless ophan, the child was taken in by the Jensen family. Joining the ISA after highschool, Darius gained the personal attention of Director Anderas Kerrik with his performance, and soon found himself in the Director's personal service. Darius has made his living as a professional killer and soldier, and he is being positioned by his mentor, the Director himself, to take over some day.

However, Darius resents the fact that Kerrik is guiding him down a mirror path of the Director's own, and seeks to escape a web he has bound himself into with misuided duty. However, though he wishes to leave the ISA, he takes one last assignment, to test the new ARES System in Geridan. When this goes awry, and Darius is injured, he finds himself at the epicenter of a spinning web of destruction. A web that may lead to Kerrik himself, and is sure to reveal facts, pasts, and futures that Darius does not wish to face.

-=Currently Being Written in "Price of Power" RP=-

Inside of NS Description: Taken from "Price of Power"

As the light filtered onto Kerrik kilometers away, through the oculus in the museum, the orange glow was reflecting into Darius’s room in the hospital. The light cast into the Halo of skyscrapers and bounced through their labyrinth of glass, casting in varying degrees of brightness throughout the sterile room. Darius pulled his shoes on, tucked his old suit into his duffel bag. He grabbed his keys in his pocket, and tapped his wallet to make sure it was there. Ok, I’m all set. Time to roll.

He turned to Maria, who was straightening his bed up. “Hey, they’re paid to do that. You ready to leave?”

“Don’t we have to check out, or pay?” she asked, looking at the empty bed stand.

“Nope.” Darius filled in with an ISA half-truth. “The company will take care of it.”

“That’s some law firm. I didn’t think they employed bouncers either.” She was speaking of Jensen (ed: another soldier with the same last name), who had stopped in with a change of clothes for Darius, and to deliver their cars to the hospital lot. “He’s not your brother, no matter what you say.”

Darius grinned at the old joke, turning to her with an impish look. “What? We look so alike!”

At that, she rolled her eyes. “I’ll bet you two have been pulling that joke for years.”

“You have no idea.” He smiled, but inside, he winced at yet another casual illusion. “I’ll walk you to your car.” He stated as he held the door open.

She stopped dead, raising her eyebrows, “You’ll walk me? I think you’re the invalid, here.”

Darius shrugged. “Touché. How about a non-chauvinistic dual-walk?”

“Oh, shut up.” She laughed slightly, and accepted his held door without a further complaint. “You’re a real Boy Scout, you know that?”

“Who, me?” It was true; he had a charming, almost boy-like grin and an easy nature. That was why the ISA loved him so much, for his ability to wine and dine before he killed, like a cat toying with prey. It made him sick, knowing that his disarming nature and chivalric behaviors were now tools, his natural kindness hijacked into a lethal game. He felt a fist clench at a stolen innocence, though he knew it was foolish, as he had chosen this life. Did I choose this? Images of destruction and death flooded his mind for a moment, before he locked them back into the cage.

It was worst at night, when the shadows stretched from the glowing lights of the city, casting the corridors of darkness in which his visions lived. In the lonesome standing pole lay the CEO of Demeter Industries; his head cleaved open by a thresher accident. In the strands of light filtering from a window was the family of a Geridian warlord, children and all, burnt to cinders by a White Phosphorous grenade. Under the sewers were the bodies of a disposal effort in Transnapastain. In the roar of a starting car was the blast that had consumed Chancellor Fenris. The rattle of a maglev was the dragging corpse of the railroad tycoon Shadix, who had tried to blackmail the ISA on Chimera shipments. Forty-two ghosts stared at him in the windows of buildings, people he had killed, face to face, staring them in the eyes. Hundreds more flitted in the shadows at the edge of his vision, their mourning intensified by their untold names and stories.

He could not sleep some nights, when the rattle of the furnace and the tremor of the passing cars mimicked the death calls of so many men and women. I do it all for the good of the state. It’s for the greater good. It’s my duty! But his assertions didn’t stifle the cries of those he had killed, and they watched him, tugging at his sanity. Section Chief Trask always said, “If you ever get comfortable with your job, you’re not human. If that happens, I’ll kill you myself.” So, at least I’m still human. But, oh, to be inhuman, if for a moment. He bit his lip slightly, and heard the words shattering his tormented thoughts.

“You alright?” Maria asked. “You got pale all of a sudden.” They were standing in the parking lot, and the lights of Corsingard were just coming alive, turning the metal halo into a true ring of light.

“Yeah… just thinking about today.” Darius lied again, turning to observe the rise of the Capital City, its monolithic imperial glory against the lights of the modern city. “Just look at this city. I’ll never get over how it looks at night.” His voice was admiring, humbled by the life around him. Without thinking, he put out his arm, around Maria. She did not run, which relieved the Agent, once he realized what he had done.

“It’s beautiful, isn’t it?” Her question was rhetorical, for even a blind man could hear and feel the glory of Corsingard. “I’ve heard the River Delta is glorious at this time of year.”

Darius replied innocently, calling up his array of knowledge. His memory was excellent, which furthered his cause with the Director. “With the tide as it is, it should be. The low tide exposes the erosion patterns-”

She cut him off with a jab in the ribs. “Christ, how thick can you be? Invite me down to the river!”

“Oh.” Darius felt as though he had been smacked in the face with the big stick of stupid. “Why didn’t you say so?”

She rolled her eyes and exhaled again, aghast at the blindness of her companion. Before she could point out that she already had said so, Darius reacted. “You want to go down there?”

“That’d be great!” she exclaimed, as though nothing had been mentioned before.

Darius grinned dumbly. Amazing! I can cut through webs of deception, but I can’t figure out when to go for a date? Gotta analyze- Shut up, Darius. He smirked at himself and led her towards the river. She actually finds me amusing? And I’m not pretending to be someone? He felt a slight bubble inside, one that popped as the first ghost slipped through the shadows. You are pretending. You are pretending to be a good person. You are a killer. He drove those thoughts from his mind as they walked up to the surface maglev.

The comfortable magnetic tram rested inside of a bowl shaped track, hovering on magnetic fields. As they walked through the red lined interior, Maria took a seat, while Darius elected to give up his to an elderly man. Maria smiled at him, and mouthed, “Boy Scout.” Darius felt his own face breaking into a grin, and he smacked away the guilt that rose with it.