Bio

Dostoevsky (B678673-A) is one of the few Imperial Client States in Dpres Subsector in the Trojan Reach Sector, two subsectors Rimward of District 268. Dpres is the Borderlands – a Subsector that has been in constant fear of getting assimilated by one of the major power blocks surrounding this patch of currently independent worls. The Aslan ihatei, both from the Hierate and the Glorious Empire, are constantly trying to seize land of all habitable worlds while pocket empires of Humaniti such as the Florian League and Belgardian Sojourn are always trying to add other worlds to their domains that rise and fall over the centuries. The result is a Subsector which is in a state of almost constant war.

Dostoevsky is a valuable prize for all of the rival powers, a beautiful and temperate agricultural garden world that provides food to many of the friendlier worlds in the Subsector. Although still balkanized, the nations of Dostoevsky have mostly put aside their differences in order to concentrate on threats off-world rather from neighbouring countries, although each nation is fiercely proud of their heritage. With a population of only 7 million, the nations of Dostoevsky know that they cannot stand alone against any of the multi-world empires active in the region and so the world’s Union of Dostoevskian Republics decided that becoming an Imperial Client State was the lesser of the many evils facing the world.

Chernorus, with a population of around one million, is the third largest nation on Dostoevsky and is more fiercely independent than most. They voted against becoming an Imperial Client State, but were outvoted by the world’ two larger and more populous nations, so begrudgingly had to accept the decision of the UDR.

Vassily was born into a middle-class family in the capital of Chernorus, Mayakovsky. His father was a Polkovnik (Colonel) in the Cavalry, commanding a regiment of tanks – back in the day when they still laid tracks. With the only other activity on offer in Chernorus being farming, it was a fairly obvious decision for Vassily that he would also join the cavalry too.

After his basic training, he was assigned to the command unit as sensors operator. Vassily found it quite dull – he wanted his own tank, kurva! However, he came to realize that his father was pulling strings on his behalf – fast-tracking him to become an officer and, after three years, he was promoted to Leytenant.

A year later and his unit was part of a Dostoevsky Expeditionary Force sent to Dpres to combat increasingly violent incursions by Aslan ihatei.

In his second term, he got his wish, commanding his own platoon of four grav/tanks. For most of his time, his unit was deployed as support for a Dpres infantry battalion, equipped with only ground vehicles. Without much in the way of support, Vassily had to become a bit of a jack-of-all-trades with his GT-88 tanks, learning how to drive, fire the Plasma-A guns and even perform basic maintenance when the simple, ugly, but brutally effective, Imperial-built, fighting vehicles broke down. Vassily’s unit fought well and – maybe on his merits, maybe on his family name – he was promoted to Kapitan where he was in command of 3rd Squadron.

However, because Vassily was neither particularly bright nor well-educated, word got around that Vassily only achieved his position through his father’s connections. This infuriated Vassily, who was determined to show that he could make it on his own without his father pulling strings. As a result, he quit to join the Spetsnaz, the elite commando regiment of the Dostoevsky Expeditionary Force.

His service with the Spetsnaz didn’t go quite the way that Vassily had hoped for, however. His dreams of becoming a hero leading lightning commando raids never really panned out. His superiors believed that he was of more use in a support role and he was assigned to the combat engineering company rather than the crack frontline troops. He learned a lot of skills here, but rarely saw the frontline action that he was hoping for. He was usually kept back in the garrison or preparing defensive positions while other companies were getting all of the glory.

During the long time that he spent in the barracks, he thought that he found the love of his life, Rebecca Aldario. They had planned to get married, but Rebecca was wooed away from him by a highly decorated Dpres commando, Lieutenant Kurt Spencer. Vassily was devastated by this and hit the bottle badly as a way of escaping from his problems. As a result of this, it was decided that it would be better for everyone if he mustered out at this point. He received a good payout, together with upgraded reflexes and endurance, but Vassily still felt hard done by from his time with the Spetsnaz.

If he can’t make it in the regular forces, he’ll make it as a merc, and tried to put as much space he could from Dpres and the bad memories of his time there. Not having much in the way of hand-to-hand fighting experience he was of little use to the smaller merc companies though while, being an outsider with no contacts on the Imperium, he found himself getting constantly rejected by the larger, better-funded merc operations that could afford to employ grav/tanks and needed his combat engineering skills.

Vassily is initially distrustful of people he meets. He loathes Aslan with a passion, particularly those of the Glorious Empire due to their practice of capturing humans and using them as slave labour. Dostoevsky lost a lot of its citizens to slavers from the Glorious Empire. He is not terribly keen on the Imperium either, although he is here because that’s where the work is. Once he gets to know someone well though, he is fiercely loyal to them.

His best friend and worst enemy is vodka or any other hard liquor he can get his hands on. After his first bottle of the day, he’s the life and soul of the party – highly gregarious. After his second though, he is boorish, arrogant and belligerent. After his third, he can usually be found lying in a gutter with a holophoto of Rebecca in his hand, crying his eyes out until he falls into a coma.

He has a bit of a chip on his shoulder about his lack of face-to-face combat experience. Although he is of much more use in a supporting role, he is out to prove that he can make it in a firefight with the rest of the gang. The truth of the matter though is that he has never actually killed anyone in close-up combat. Although the Plasma A’s of his grav/tank platoon and minefields that he laid during his time were responsible for hundreds – probably thousands – of deaths, he’s only ever witnessed carnage from a detached position over a vidscreen. How he reacts when he goes mano-a-mano with an enemy remains to be seen.

By Dostoevskian standards, Vassily is a fairly ordinary individual. But compared to most of Humaniti, he’s a bit of a brute, though not particularly bright. He stands a little over 2m tall and so towers over most people. He’s not particularly brawny, however, but has lightning-fast reactions. He is quite handsome with piercing blue eyes that hint at the sadness that he has seen during his life.

Vassily doesn’t trust anything that he didn’t use in active service on Dostoevsky and Dpres (i.e. anything over TL: 10)