Sorry, sorry!  I was travelling for a couple days and, honestly, seeing all the other awesome applicants made me almost sure I wouldn't be picked, so it took me a bit to check back.  Thanks for picking me, btw!<br/><br/>Here's the character sheet, answers to your questions and first post in the IC thread forthcoming shortly.<br/><br/><div class="floatright">(http://blogs.villagevoice.com/runninscared/Leatherman.jpg)</div><div align="center"><span class="bbc_size" style="font-size: 13pt;">Jacopo Torrhen (http://www.myth-weavers.com/sheetview.php?sheetid=882445)</span><br/>CG male Human Cryptic 3</div><br/><div class="spoiler_container"><div class="spoiler_header" onclick="hideSecond (this);" role="button">Background</div><div class="spoiler_body">The city of Old Scipian is the reigning superpower of its neck of the world, or at least, so its citizens believe.  Ruled by the Governor, or by the Council Populous depending on the day, its mercantile arms stretch hundreds of miles in every direction,  the wheels of its industry ever turning, smog covering the sky and making the sunsets over the city's tall towers glorious, even if it is a bit hard to breathe.  In the name of progress, its navy steams out, carrying the latest technology researched at the Caricossal Institute to enlighten the world.<br/><br/>Professor Torrhen, Jacopo to his friends, was a gentleman scholar and inventor, a sometime teacher of execrable skill, and a dabbler in one of the less flashy forms of the thaumaturgy that the city ran on.  One-time mutilations of his flesh in exchange for minor changes to his anatomy at will, a welcome bargain to him, and helpful as he tinkered on new and improved mousetraps for the university's backers, or really for anyone who would give him a research grant.  His wife was an unassuming painter of not inconsiderable skill from one of the poorer districts, their children destined to be the city's next bohemians.  All in all, he and his family were the picture of the up and coming Scipianer middle class.<br/><div class="floatleft">(http://i83.photobucket.com/albums/j305/GreatHackster/symbol.jpg)</div><br/>The day he came home and found it simply gone, the building now a slaughterhouse, the space where his flat had been an oven, and no sign that he or his family had ever even existed in this place, was the day Jacopo Torrhen lost his mind.  Peering into the oven yielded his first glimpse of the Symbol, etched in burning coals underneath the massive grille.  He had become persona non grata; none knew him, no sign of his existence lingered.  His inventions were credited to others; his office was now a mail room; his former friends greeted him as though they had never met in their lives.  Jacopo was reduced to a wanderer, traversing the city for days, then weeks, then months, searching for any sign of his family or, indeed, even himself.  The time stretched to years as he made his way through garbage strewn streets, sleeping in gutters and dodging cutthroats and guardsmen alike, surviving on refuse.  And always, everywhere he looked, the Symbol.<br/><br/>It appeared everywhere, in the clouds, in the ripples of the water, in the layout of streets, in the puddles of unspeakable fluid dripping out of abattoirs ... and everywhere as graffiti, in all the colors of the rainbow, many of them put there by his own hand as he made his slow circuit.  The only method to his madness, as the years stretched into over a decade, was finding a place, even a single street, where the Symbol was not.  He stumbled through multiple administrations, staggered through gang wars and demolition crews, bedded down with the city's rejects in sewers and landfills.<br/><br/>Finally, a little over a week ago, he stumbled onto Weaver Street, a back alley between a condemned bar and a railway warehouse, and it was here that the Symbol showed up only in one spot: as an ornate doorknob.  Entering the door, Jacopo's perceptions seemed clearer than ever, but ringed with stars, whirling about his retinas.  He was greeted by name; he was welcomed inside, arms thrown about his shoulders, comradely laughter.  And then ... the door of his flat.  Exactly as he had left it, the sound of his children playing inside, his wife's voice as she scolded them.  He was pushed through and met blackness.  Void.  Before a new world took shape around him ... </div></div><br/><div class="spoiler_container"><div class="spoiler_header" onclick="hideSecond (this);" role="button">Personality</div><div class="spoiler_body">Stumbling into the wide world of the planes has disoriented Jacopo, but surprisingly seems to have jarred his wits back into place, allowing his former persona to mostly emerge once more.  Erudite and analytical, he prides himself on knowing a smattering of everything, and delights in applying what he knows to help himself and others.  He remains ill at ease around people, though, either lapsing into uncomfortable silence or blurting out stream of consciousness rants.  He retains an unhealthy fixation on symbology and an insatiable curiosity, and is liable to hare off after some interesting bit of information, but takes care to escape most peoples' notice while doing so.  Fundamentally, Jacopo wants to discover the entity behind his ruination if he can, but there are lines he will not cross in his quest.</div></div><br/><div class="spoiler_container"><div class="spoiler_header" onclick="hideSecond (this);" role="button">Appearance</div><div class="spoiler_body">Old before his time, Jacopo is middle-aged and relatively lithe, but his malnourished frame and years of street living have given his craggy face lines and greyed his thinning black hair, his brown eyes furtive yet piercing like a wild animal's.  His nose has been broken many times over, but miraculously he's only lost two teeth.  His clothes are ragged and layered, but practical and warm, scavenged and stitched as they are from multiple sources.</div></div><br/><div class="spoiler_container"><div class="spoiler_header" onclick="hideSecond (this);" role="button">Sexuality</div><div class="spoiler_body">Jacopo, when in possession of his wits, maintains that he is a married man and believes himself strictly heterosexual.  However, his memories of years spent lonely on the streets have not left him, and during that time he had liaisons with other destitute members of both genders, and even the few "sub"-human species that Old Scipian allows to scrabble around in its alleyways.  He is confused and in doubt as to where this leaves him, but his recent regaining of senses has left him traumatized in many ways, one of them rendering him uncomfortable with sexual overtures.</div></div><br/><div class="spoiler_container"><div class="spoiler_header" onclick="hideSecond (this);" role="button">Character Sheet</div><div class="spoiler_body">Human Cryptic 3<br/>CG medium humanoid (human)<br/><strong>Init</strong> +4; <strong>Senses</strong> Perception +7<br/><br/>DEFENSE<br/><strong>AC</strong> 13, touch 13, flat-footed 10 (+2 Dex, +1 dodge) [+4 vs. AoO's provoked by movement]<br/><strong>HP</strong> 19 (3d8+3)<br/><strong>Fort</strong> +3, <strong>Ref</strong> +6 (evasion), <strong>Will</strong> +6 (+2 vs. divinations)<br/><strong>Defense Options</strong> Altered Defense 1, 9 rds/day (DR/-, dodge AC, or as bonus on retaliatory atk roll)<br/><br/>OFFENSE<br/><strong>Speed</strong> 30 ft<br/><strong>Melee</strong> +1 Dagger (1d4-1, 19-20/x2)<br/><strong>Ranged</strong> +4 vs. touch, Disrupt Pattern (2d6+5), dmg halved vs. non-active creature type, 30 ft.<br/><br/>Cryptic Powers (ML 3rd, Concentration +8, 11 pp/day)<br/>1st (DC 16): minor metamorphosis, defensive precognition, inevitable strike<br/>Talents (DC 15): detect psionics, my light<br/><br/>STATISTICS<br/><strong>Str</strong> 9 <strong>Dex</strong> 14 <strong>Con</strong> 12 <strong>Int</strong> 20 <strong>Wis</strong> 12 <strong>Cha</strong> 8<br/><strong>Base Atk</strong> +2; <strong>CMB</strong> +1; <strong>CMD</strong> 14<br/><strong>Feats</strong> Skill Focus (Stealth) [Human, Focused Study], Scribe Tattoo, Dodge, Mobility<br/><strong>Skills</strong> Acrobatics +8, Autohypnosis +7, Craft (tattoo) +9, Craft (trap) +12, Disable Device +9, Disguise +3, Knowledge (arcana, dungeoneering, engineering, geography, history, local, nature, planes, psionics, religion) +9, Perception +7, Sense Motive +7, Sleight of Hand +8, Spellcraft +10, Stealth +13<br/><strong>Languages</strong> Common, Elven, Dwarven, Draconic, Undercommon, Abyssal<br/><strong>Traits</strong> Reactionary (+2 Init), Carefully Hidden (+1 will, +2 vs. divination school)<br/><strong>Special Qualities</strong> Trapfinding (+1 to Perception vs traps and Disable Device; may use Disable Device to disarm magic traps), Trapmaker (+3 Craft [traps]), Hidden Pattern (+2 Stealth), Pattern Designs (powers known appear as tattoos), Enhanced Disruption +1d6, evasion<br/><strong>Cryptic Insights</strong> Enhance Tattoo 5/day (psionic tattoos function at user's ML, pp augmented)<br/><strong>Psionic Tattoos</strong> Inertial Armor (5), Kinetic Ledgerdemain (1), Natural Healing (5), Elfsight (1)<br/><strong>Possessions</strong> Cloak of Resistance +1, Robe of Infinite Twine, Sack, Common Survival Kit, MW Thieves' Tools (+2 Disable Device), Traveler's Any-Tool, 42 gold, 9 silver</div></div>