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PLAYER
PLAYER NAME: Alison
PRONOUNS: She/her
CONTACT: clickboom, PM
OVER 18?: Y
CURRENT CHARACTERS: N/A

CHARACTER (CANON)
CHARACTER NAME: Levi Ackerman
CANON: Attack on Titan

CANON SPECIES: Human
CANON AGE: Mid to late 30's

APPEARANCE: Link! (Badtz-maru unfortunately not included)

CANON BACKGROUND: Link!

PERSONALITY:

• Loyal: There's probably nothing more baked into the premise of this character overall than loyalty, and the AU version of him is no different. In canon, the Ackerman bloodline predisposes one to forming a strong bond with one (and only one) other person, sometimes referred to as a 'liege'. Though largely unbeknownst to the characters themselves, the pattern shows an intensely protective instinct and an unrivaled sense of loyalty towards this one person, who in Levi's case is Erwin Smith. Even though the bloodline fuckery may or may not be something that can be regained in-game, he will still be deeply loyal to Erwin on an instinctual level. Levi always functions under the assumption that Erwin knows best, no matter the situation; he trusts Erwin implicitly, and it's a mutual faith.
  
• Neurotic: Owing to the filth of the slums he was born in and the death of his mother to an infectious disease, Levi is extremely fastidious—that's the nice way of putting it, anyway. Levi is the definition of a clean freak: it's something he's notorious for in canon, and any soldier who's worked under him for more than an hour knows they're going to be doing a lot of cleaning, even if that's not really a part of the mission at hand. That said, in canon he's also in a position of authority and thus able to order his subordinates to clean; here, obviously, there'll be no such luck. He has basically zero tolerance for a dirty environment and an aversion to blood—even titan blood, which evaporates on its own after a short time. That said, it's worth noting that he is able to set this neurosis aside when the situation is dire enough to call for it.
  
• Warmhearted: This one's a little bit harder to see. It's often hidden under layers and layers of blunt language, an unapproachable demeanor, and a tendency to solve ("solve") most of his problems with violence (see below). It's true that Levi comes off as cold and standoffish, but believe it or not, there's a heart of gold down in there somewhere. In canon, according to Erwin, no one cares as much about their comrades' lives as Levi does. Every loss hits him hard, even if he rarely lets it show. He may not be the best leader (a series guidebook gave him a teamwork score of 2/10), but his squad never has to second-guess whether their captain has their best interests at heart, and more than once he's been shown giving them an order to simply stay alive. Even if it's less about sweeping displays of good will and more about small gestures of warmth, anyone who thinks he's just an asshole is deeply mistaken. The details here are different because his life hasn't followed the exact same path, but the end result is the same: he is, at the very least, a decent human being.
  
• Violent: This might seem contradictory to the previous trait, but 'cruel' would not be applicable here—not really. The thing is, in canon, Levi was raised (for some definition of 'raised') by his serial killer uncle Kenny, and Kenny taught him to survive; unfortunately, in their dangerous underground world, that meant he taught Levi how to fight. By this point, his mother was long dead, and it's not like he was able to go to school like a normal kid, so rather than learning to read and write and be one of those normal kids, he learned how to use a knife. His lessons were on how to beat someone within an inch of their life. The problem-solving method he learned was literally just "do violence until it's not a problem anymore". As he leaves the underground, joins the military, and grows (figuratively, of course) as a person, this evens out a little, but to a certain extent it seems to be pretty ingrained. At one point he has a member of the Military Police captured, and when the MP taunts him with the alleged possibility that Erwin could be executed, Levi just casually breaks the guy's arm. It's fine, though. He totally deserved it.
  
  For the purposes of this game, at least initially, this won't be anything notable: there was no Kenny in this version, for one, and he hasn't been exposed to the same amount of horror and cruelty in this life that he did in canon. As he gradually regains more and more of his previous self in-game, though, he will become significantly more dangerous and more inclined to solve his problems by stabbing them.

POWERS & ABILITIES:
Levi’s stats are a bit ridiculous. The combat rating is based primarily on proficiency with the vertical maneuvering equipment, which is the somewhat complicated contraption used to fight titans. (Here's a detailed explanation on what it is and how it works.) The main thing to report here is that Levi is pretty much universally considered to be the best at using this equipment, and thus the best at killing titans. He's very quick, and his small stature lends itself well to this particular kind of combat. Beyond being exceptionally skilled with the vertical maneuvering gear (and quite proficient at using knives and hand-to-hand combat as well), Levi does not have any extra-human abilities - the only explanation we're given is that as an Ackerman he has somewhat extraordinary combat capabilities because the bloodline is "a byproduct of titan science". He’s just really good at killing stuff. It runs in the family.

CHARACTER (AU)
CHARACTER NAME: N/A

SPECIES: Human
AGE: 33

APPEARANCE: N/A
MODS: None

BACKGROUND:

• With Tellus being a significantly better place to live than his canon world, Levi doesn't have the same level of tragic and harrowing childhood he did in canon; Universal Basic Income means he never would have been in such profound poverty. He grew up with his mother, with whom he was very close. He has never known his father.
  
• As a young teen, his mother was robbed at gunpoint one day on her way home. This ended up scaring him far more than it scared her; it festers into an intense fear of losing his mother, and a feeling of helplessness to prevent it from happening.
  
• Somehow (possibly illegitimately), he gets his hands on a phaser gun, and he teaches himself to use it. Virtually all his free time is spent honing his skills—provided their apartment is already sparkling clean, of course. This continues well into his adult life, and he decides to aim for an eventual in law enforcement.
  
• Ten years later, something he wasn't prepared for happens: his mother falls ill. He spends the next couple of years taking care of her and trying to ensure she gets the best possible treatment, but there are things even all the science and technology in the universe can't fix, and after a couple of years she passes away.
  
• The loss is devastating, and he falls into a deep depression. With no one left, he quietly gives up on his career aspirations, dropping out of training and settling for a job doing custodial work at a hospital. This lasts well into his 30s.
  
• One day, purely by chance, he witnesses a crime from his balcony—one not unlike his mother experienced all those years ago. The culprit is pursued by a few security officers, but it rapidly becomes clear to Levi the man is going to get away. But isn't this what he spent all those years working to prevent?
  
• He grabs his old phaser (set to stun, of course) from inside and waits for the exact moment he can make a difference, and he takes the shot. It hits, the man goes down, is arrested, and that's the end of that.
  
• Or is it? Turns out one of the officers saw him hit the shot and was deeply impressed. Later that night, the officer shows up at his apartment wanting to talk. His name is Erwin Smith.
  
• The culmination of this talk is an offer: Erwin wants Levi to join him. Having long abandoned that calling, he initially turns him down, but there's something he can't quite place about Erwin that makes Levi want to believe in him. So, while he has complicated feelings about it, he decides to place his trust in Erwin and follow him into law enforcement, and then eventually onto a starship. It's largely the same decision he makes in canon, except rather than joining the military to fight man-eating giants he's becoming a space cop. The crux is Erwin all the same.

CREW DIVISION: Security (backup: operations, though this would involve a major rework of my AU)
DIVISION APTITUDE: Levi (AU flavor) is really good at two things: shooting and cleaning. The latter is more something he does during his free time (perhaps a bit compulsively), and while he is indeed very thorough he wasn't noticed and recruited for his housekeeping aptitude. In canon he's a soldier exceptionally skilled at killing both giant people and regular-sized people; here, he may never have killed a person, but it's still tough to picture him anywhere else.
SUBDIVISION: In canon he leads his own Special Operations squad, and while I have no plans to put him in a leadership position, it just makes the most sense. If this is not available, Security Officers would be my second choice.

SAMPLES
AU WORKSHOP: N/A

SAMPLES: TDM thread

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