Member
Marik
GrizzlybeardLawrence Long
Character Summary
Name:Lawrence Chun-Lin Long, PhD
Aliases:Lao-Shi, Professor Long, "Little Yip Man"
Age: 43
Birthday: January 7th
Ethnicity: Chinese-American
Birth Place: Seattle
Location At time of outbreak: Seattle
Gender: Male
Major/Minor: English/Political Science
Occupation Before The Outbreak: Teacher
Languages: English (fluent), Mandarin (fluent)
Appearance
Height: 5'11"
Weight: 150 lbs
Build: slim, fit
Eyes: dark brown
Hair: black
Skin Tone: slightly tan
Tattoos/Scars/Piercings: Chinese demon tattoo on his back, scars on his back and arms
Psychology
Calm-Headed * Distrustful * Perceptive * Addictive Personality
Sexuality:Straight
Relationship Status: Widowed
Personality:
Lawrence is a man with a history of self-isolation. He refuses to get close to those around him, and has extreme difficulty trusting anyone. He does this due to a recent history of hardship, and the loss of loved ones, that has left him very scarred as a person. Rather than face the world, and put trust in other people, he finds a deep sense of peace when he is alone. The only time he opens up to those around him is when he works. Before the breakout, Lawrence's life was occupied entirely by work, and by a drive to succeed.
Now, his purpose in life comes from a drive to thrive in this post-apocalyptic world, as well as love of long silences and periods of meditation. He meditates to escape the world around him, and he works to escape his own mind. Somehow, by balancing the two, he is able to maintain an uncommon level of peace and satisfaction, even when surrounded by death. The dead do not concern him anymore, because he refuses to get attached to them. All he has is himself, and his memories, and these are the only two things that matter to him.
Habits: Smoking and Prayer
In a world without electricity, without real recreation and community, Lawrence's habits are his entire life. He's constantly searching for remaining packs of cigarettes, or anything else he can smoke to hold off the cravings. He dedicates time every evening, to meditation and self-reflection. When he doesn't have necessary tasks occupying his time, he spends long hours staring into nothingness, looking back on the life he once had.
He carries a bracelet of Buddhist prayer-beads with him at all times, that he often plays with. These were a gift to him, long ago, and he believes them to be very sacred. He works them over in his hands, to keep them shiny and smooth.
Hobbies: Music
Lawrence has a deep love of music, and hums, whistles, and sings to himself when alone. His favourites are Chinese pop-songs from the 1980's and 1990's. In truth, he knows every word to hundreds of them, and was known locally as a decent singer in Shanghai. Unfortunately, they're very ethnic, and aren't well appreciated in America, so he's never shared them with others. He dreams of discovering an unlooted music-store one day, and uncovering an intact violin, but he knows how unlikely this is.
Fears: Slithers, Swarms, and Spirits
Lawrence has a deep fear of snakes and crowds. Snakes send him into a panic, and refuses to approach any one that he sees. Needless to say, this leads to a great many frustrations, when attempting to survive in the woods. His fear of crowds developed after the death of his wife, when he shut himself off from the world.
Lawrence is also a deeply spiritual man. Talk of ghosts, spirits, and bad luck genuinely upset him. He will not sleep in a place he believes to be haunted, or otherwise cursed with bad luck. Like his fear of crowds, this difficulty came only after the death of his wife. The anxiety from his loss mixed with his faith, and turned his spiritual beliefs into crippling superstitions.
- Snakes
- Crowds
- Ghosts
Likes:
- All Food
- Working/Being Productive
- Hiking
- Silence/Calm Music
- All Traditional Forms of Art
- Kung-Fu
Dislikes:
- Optimists
- Large Groups
- Lazy People
- East Indians
- African-Americans
- Snoring
Cards On The Table
Pre Outbreak Skills:
- Kung-Fu
- Ability to play string instruments
- Teaching
- Public-speaking/projecting his voice
- Herbalism/Traditional Medicine
Post Outbreak Skills:
- Knife-wielding
- Hunting
- Fishing
- Trapping
- Scaling/Climbing things (trees/walls/rock-faces)
Current Supplies:
- Current Clothing - White (well, not anymore) dress-shirt, black suit-pants, hiking boots, underwear, women's straw-hat, Buddhist bead-bracelet
- Hunting Knife
- Scissors
- Roll of medical gauze
- Bottle of cleaning alcohol
- Pack of cigarettes
- Second pack of cigarettes
- Lighter
- Locket-Necklace
- Copy of Chairman Mao's "Little Red Book"
History
Your First Walker Encounter:
Lawrence encountered his first walker while visiting his senile mother in Seattle. One of the nurses at the retirement home turned, and began ravaging the seniors. He killed the walker before the carnage was too severe, and stayed to protect his mother. It was only a few days before more appeared, and he knew he wouldn't be able to keep her safe. As the walkers began bashing through the door to her room, he smothered her with a pillow so she wouldn't suffer from being eaten alive, and then he escaped through the window.
History Before Outbreak:
A former English teacher, raised in America, employed in Shanghai, was on vacation in the states when the outbreak began.
Lawrence was born in Seattle, to two Chinese immigrants. They raised him to uphold traditional Chinese values, and to settle for nothing less than a traditionalist Chinese wife. Thanks to family connections, they had him attend a Hong-Kong style Kung-Fu school in the city, to help him learn discipline. They had him take music lessons as well, when affordable. His parents were deeply stern people, with some racist beliefs that unfortunately rubbed off on him. They weren't wealthy enough to send him to a high-end university, but he studied hard at the college they could afford, and became a successful English teacher. He worked at a small school for a number of years, as he continued his education, eventually gaining his PHD. Upon graduation, he was able to secure a high-paying job in Shanghai, where English teachers were desperately needed.
It was at this time that he began gambling, looking to make extra money to send back to his parents. His job already paid wonderfully, but he wanted more. Coming from a poor family, he saw money as the answer to all his problems. Over a couple years, he discovered new gambling dens across the city, with higher stakes, and more prestigious clients. Of course he knew that all these establishments were run by the Triads, but he didn't expect it would present a problem, so long as he made his money and left. He was sorely mistaken, and found himself at the wrong end of a gun after winning a few too many games, and being accused of cheating. As was common practice for the Triads, they blackmailed him, and indebted him into their service. Before long, he was running errands, and helping with smuggling. Once he was in the organization, he started partaking in other money-making schemes. He entered fighting dens. Even though he lost the majority of his fights, he walked away with a profit. They started calling him "Little Yip Man", after the Hong-Kong martial artist.
On top of living this double-life, he continued teaching. The fighting made him more fit, and more confident. Eventually, he charmed and married one of his students. Her name was Fan-Bing, and she was a decade younger than him, but neither of them cared. While they were dating, she saw the tattoos that the Triads were forcing him to get, and his secret became their secret. As he reached the age of 37, he was ready to get out of organized crime and settle down. He tried to escape back to America, but they refused to let his wife immigrate, so he kept both careers going, sucking away all his time. He became severely overworked, and his addictions only grew stronger. Then the Avian Flu reached China. His wife fell sick while he was away from home, on a trip for the Triads, importing smuggled cars. By the time he returned, she was too far gone.
The day after the funeral, he fled the country. He moved back to Seattle, to care for his mother, and to hide from the Triads. Only a year later, the real outbreak started.
History Since Outbreak:
Lawrence stayed in Seattle for a while, holding up in an apartment complex with his cousin. They were largely able to avoid and distract the walkers, sneaking into convenience stores to steal food. On one such raid, his cousin was grabbed and overwhelmed by the horde. Lawrence made a genuine effort to fend them off and recover his body, but it was no use. With nothing else tying him to Seattle, he raided their apartment for supplies, and left.
He traveled through the woods of Washington state, making his way inland. In this time he learned how to hunt, fish, and trap for food. His parents had taught him various traditional Chines medicinal recipes. This, coupled with his university education that included so biology electives, helped him identify and utilize some local plant-life, to stave off sickness.
Traveling alone, further into America, Lawrence was left to his own thoughts. The grief of his wife's death, that he was able to ignore through work and walker-evading, finally began to catch up to him. He prayed often, but his prayers became tainted with sadness and regret. His dreams became nightmares. The darker his thoughts became, the more he buried himself in them. Thankfully, as the days turned into weeks, and the weeks into months, and the months into a year, the pain became less and less. He found he could escape the pain by focusing on religion, and by escaping into the traditions he had been taught so long ago. He had also kept his father's old Little Red Book, a parting gift before he passed away. Lawrence didn't particularly care for Mao's philosophy, but reading it over helped pass the time, and distract his mind. Oddly enough, it reminded him of happier days.
Eventually he reached civilization again, a small ghost-town, seemingly untouched by walkers. By this point, he didn't know how far he had traveled, or even what state he was in. Nonetheless, he housed himself there for a time, and tried to feel at home again. One night, while staying there, another couple survivors broke in, and threatened to kill him if he didn't hand over his supplies. Thankfully for him, they were far more malnourished than he was, and he was able to overpower them. He tried to beat them into running away, but they were too desperate. They kept fighting. Finally, as he had one of them pinned down, the other grabbed him from behind and attempted to strangle him. Fearing for his own life now, he pulled his knife out and stabbed over his shoulder. The knife buried itself in the man's throat, and he fell backward, choking to death on his own blood. In a vengeful rage, the other man rose up and charged Lawrence, only to be stabbed in the chest. With a dead man on either side of him, panic overtook Lawrence. He grabbed his supplies and ran back into the woods.
The next morning, he awoke to another man rummaging through his supplies. He didn't know if he was in the same group as the other two, but he knew that he was stealing his precious food. Noticing that Lawrence was awake, the man made a run for it, Lawrence's bag under his arm. Lawrence chased after him, knife in hand, and caught the man by stabbing him in the back. Now in a state of pure adrenaline and primal survival, Lawrence reclaimed his bag, and rummaged through the man's pockets. Finding nothing of value, he again fled, further into the woods. Lawrence had killed three men in less than 24 hours, this haunted him.
Thankfully, he had his solitude to return to. Weeks of hunting, sleeping, and praying, and he found himself again. He continued traveling, killing the occasional walker along the way. Raiding small towns wherever he could find them, looking for food, water, and cigarettes. Sprinting back into the woods, at the first sign of other human life. He even found a pair of scissors, to keep his hair somewhat tidy. He was happy, and civilized, in his solitude. He found that walkers no longer frightened him, that it was easy enough to sleep in a tree, and feel safe at night.
Extras
Character Quote: "I don't like smiling. People look less intelligent when they smile. Easier to trick."
Theme Song:
How Many Walkers Have You Killed: Twenty
How Many People Have You Killed: Four
Why: Two of them tried to kill him first, one of them was out of mercy, and one of them stole his food.
Anything Else: roleplayerguild.com/topics/88853-times..
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