Ashton Charles Wilson- 24 years old
Ashton is smart, cunning, highly skilled and talented vigilante. He's a hero who wants to do good and identifies so much with victims that he is enraged beyond belief on their behalf when they are hurt.
Tall and handsome, Ashton has the appeal of the bad boy next door. Slicked back, black hair, and wild blue eyes complete a muscular and powerful form. His body's tip top shape, hides a seriously conflicted mind. He is angry, but there is more to him than anger and foul language. If you dig a little deeper there is a hurt person, someone who was victimized, and feels betrayed by those he loved most. All his life Ashton had wanted nothing more than a family and he got it but he feels like in his ineptitude he lost it. Inside him there’s someone who both loves and hates his family. Who is jealous of his siblings and desperate for attention from them. Ashton lies to himself that he is fine, but in truth he is anything but. He is bipolar and he tries to keep it a secret from those around him. He is highly suicidal and at times when he's left alone he wants nothing more than to kill himself. Ashton's father was violent and his mother was negligent but that wasn't the worst abuse he went through. With the exception of Trip, the family always assumes Ashton is crazy when he talks Johnathan's treatment of him. (In fact Ashton has told Trip that he's more of a father to him than his biological father or Jonathan) The truth is Jonathan's coping mechanism (his silence, anger, and emotional ineptitude) made him incapable of reaching out and helping Ashton. It instead drove him to self-loathing and anger spawning into violent tenancies that persist to this day. On the outside he is arrogant, sarcastic, snarky, cheeky and can even be quite cruel and on the inside he's self-loathing. No matter how much someone hates him, Ashton hates himself even more. Often times he will spend time helping others because it is one of the few ways that he can feel good about himself. He wants to protect citizens from the horrors inflicted upon him by saving them from criminals. He believes it’s his responsibility to protect people and make their city a better place. He would die to save an innocent life. However, Ashton has no qualms with killing those he deems guilty. He admits he is a killer, but claims he isn't a murderer because he doesn't take the lives of innocent people. He isn't going to stop a mugger and then shoot him in the head. In fact, as long as the criminal hasn't actually hurt anyone he won't kill them. However, for; pedophiles, people who sell bad drugs and sell drugs to kids, rapists, murderers, etc he doesn't have any sympathy. Ashton's moral code is to protect the families of Vlostock (something he never had) and keep the criminals in line. Yeah, Ashton kills people, but he reasons that he's a good enough detective to prove they're guilty. Killing is a final solution. At least he can solve something. |
"If you don't want a sarcastic answer don't ask stupid questions. Seriously, it's like you're begging me to shoot you."
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- Gun enthusiast
- Curses like a sailor - Has a distinct "downtown" accent that is found in the run down districts of Vlostock. Johnathan had one of these accents also, as he grew up downtown but spent years covering up his accent. Ashton keeps his so everyone knows where he comes from - Very sarcastic - His relationship with Rosetta really never got off the ground when they first met because she reminded him too much of his sister Ellis. He loathes her, currently - As Venger he patrols downtown, the most crime ridden parts of Vlostock. - He has a soft spot for children - Is beyond angry when people hurt children - Some call Venger the "Children's Vigilante" because he hands out the number to one of his burner phones to children. He tells them to call if they ever need help. Very rarely does he not pick up and he always answers with some quippy remark like it's a business, "Venger's Home Furnishings! Providing quality chairs made from the finest oaks, guaranteed not to shatter until you break them over someone's head." or "Venger's Dinner serving quality food for over ten years. Are you in the mood for some justice with a side of explosions?" - Favorite color is anything muted, flashy colors are a no go. - Really actually likes pop music, though his siblings tease him about it. - He loves anything you can cook on the grill. - Can cook quite well - Can drink almost anyone under the table - He thinks he's a horrible person - Loves video games, but unlike some would think, he prefers the puzzle based ones. - Out of all his siblings he is closest to Trip, actually enjoys Malcolm's presence although he won't tell a soul, goes to Nathaniel if he needs intellectual help, and on good days stays away from Rosetta and on not so good days straight up wants to murder her. - Is the tallest member of the family - When he was still petty and revengey against his family and asked what he liked to do in his spare time: I like creating disappointment. You know that little moment when people's hopes die? I feed on that. - Used to, before Rosetta's adoption, volunteer every weekend at one of Vlostock's orphanages with Trip. It was there where he first met Nathaniel, but he hardly remembers it. - Ashton: I have a plan. Trip: Is it a good one? Will we not die? Ashton: We may need a new plan. - Has nightmares where everyone he loves comes and forms a line to tell him what a disappointing failure he is. His sister and Trip are always first while Jonathan is last. - Is not an early riser, hates being woken up before noon - Works at a local mechanic shop. He actually enjoys working on cars, there is something comforting to him about being able to fix things. - When he first came to the family he was nearly illiterate, and when Trip discovered this he taught him how to read. - Is kindof a nerdy little bookworm, which clashes with his bad boy persona. He can tear through books like no one's business and it is one of his favorite past times. His favorite book is The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck. - Really enjoys movie night - When Jonathan took away Vigil, but before he got himself kidnapped, he was so hurt and confused he cried for two hours straight before Trip found him. - Whenever someone attempts to torture him now he just manically laughs. - Is highly claustrophobic - Loves the dark, and shies away from brightly lit rooms as it remind him of his cell Parliament put him in. - Hates pins when fighting, they cause his claustrophobia to go haywire and he freaks out. - Dislikes physical contact and always tense up - His most prized possession is a locket of his sisters that has a picture of her at six, Ashton at eight, and Quinn at eighteen. They are sitting on their couch and smiling. It is the only picture he has of Quinn and one of the three he has of Ellis. - If you where to go into his room you would find it is neatly organized and rather barren. He just has a desk, a bed, and various weapons. However he has a scrapbook (if you could call it that, it's really just a folder with some pictures in it) with various images of him and his family. There is one picture with his mother, a treasured few with Ellis, the locket photo, and his favorite is a picture taken about a year ago of him and the rest of the family (Trip, Rosetta, Nathaniel, and Malcolm) all together smiling, but what he holds dearest is a picture of him and Johnathan after their first patrol as Reckoning and Vigil. Trip took the photo and there is a slight smile on Jonathan's face while he is outright grinning. If he is having a particularly bad day he will take out that photo and think, "I was loved. I was someone's son, once." - Uses anger to hide his often turbulent emotions. |
The second Vigil could have easily become one of Reckoning 's many jailbirds. Infact there are many ways in which Ashton relates to the dark instead of the light.
Ashton was both conceived and born in an alley. His parents hated each other and argued non stop. His mother suffered from depression and was a drug addict. His father was an alcoholic and a theft, as well as being abusive towards Ashton and his mother. Ashton's first memory is not one of a happy home, but his mother being beaten unconscious by his drunk father. If not for his sisters (his half sister Quinn, six years his elder, and a younger full blooded sister Eleanor whom he called Ellis, two years his junior whom suffered from Asperger's) Ashton would have forsaken the people who he was unfortunate to be born to. As he grew older, Ashton would take the blows in defense of his mother and eventually he, at the age of seven, called the police on the only source of income the family had. Distraught and without a way to feed her family, Ashton's mother abandoned them at the doorstep of Quinn’s father’s house. However the man took one look at his bastard daughter and closed the door. Eventually Ashton and his sisters wandered off. For all intents they were now orphans. They lived on the streets, and Quinn at the measly age of fourteen dove into prostitution to support her siblings. Ashton and Ellis begged during the day, as he grew older he began to run for the local drug cartel - Heaven's Door, though he never permitted Ellis to do so. For years this is how they continued on, Quinn dropping out of school while Ashton and Ellis never attended at all. Between the three of them they were able to rent a one bedroom - though in the rundown, crime ridden heart of downtown. When Ashton was eleven and Ellis nine, Quinn began using and abusing drugs. Anything she could get her hands on, but mostly opium based drugs to relieve her pain and mental suffering. She soon became addicted and Ashton had to take care of both his sisters. He took to robbing people, it began when he slipped a loaf of cooling bread out of a bakery and continued on until he was blatantly breaking car windows to get to purses. His years on the streets, running and thieving lead him into becoming a great fighter although he tried to never hurt anyone. In fact he was adamantly against violence, recalling how Quinn's "boyfriends" would often beat her - once one had even pulled a gun. All his efforts prolonged the group's stay in their home for two years. When Ashton was twelve and Ellis ten, Quinn at eighteen suffered from a drug overdose and died. Without his eldest sister's income Ashton and Ellis were soon evicted from their home and had to once more reside on the streets. The two eventually began living in the tunnels underneath the city - the ones that Reckoning and the current Vigil used to lead to their home base. For almost a year, Ashton and Ellis managed on the streets with him stealing and running and her begging they were able to feed themselves every few days. But eventually the sibling's luck ran out. When Ashton was thirteen and Ellis eleven, she caught pneumonia in the depths of what was the coldest winter Vlostock had ever seen. Despite Ashton's best efforts she just kept getting sicker. Seeking warmth, the two had trudged deeper into the tunnels hoping to find a place warmer than where they were. Instead they stumbled into Reckoning and Vigil's Base, and were greeted with the face of one bewildered and unmasked Vigil. Fifteen year old Trip Lawrence, tried to help Ashton and his sister but Ellis, already malnourished before the illness died before Trip and Ashton made it to the hospital. Trip, horrified at what had happened dragged a very reluctant Ashton back to Jonathan Rowland's house. There Ashton stayed as a ward of Rowland's for about a year, wallowing in anger and sadness, until Trip announced his desire to pass Vigil onto him. Instilled with a new sense of purpose, to help those in Vlostock who were in need, Ashton trained relentlessly and at the age of fourteen took the mantle of Vigil from Trip who then became Euchre. Trip was ecstatic to add a new member to their crime fighting family, in Ashton he saw the little brother he alway wanted, but Jonathan was a whole different story. Around the same time Trip handed Vigil to Ashton was when he began to attend college, and although he did so at Vlostock University he had moved out of the house and into a dorm on campus. This was when Ashton felt the relationship between him and Jonathan shift. His relationship with his adoptive father had always been cordial - strained even - with Trip being the one who allowed them to relax with one another. With Trip gone, Rowland wanted Ashton to fill his shoes. However, Ashton and Trip were profoundly different which didn't bode well with Jonathan, who insisted Ashton be more like his brother. Ashton was not like Trip physically or socially he was quiet where Trip was talkative, he was angry while his older brother kind, he had a short fuse, and countless other things that weren't "Trip" enough for Jonathan. The man's crushing disappointment with Ashton spewed over onto their Reckoning/Vigil relationship as the way the boys handled Vigil where different as well. While Ashton did plan things out to a greater degree than Trip his plans were much bolder and almost suicidal at times. He also severely injured criminals. Their fighting styles varied also whereas Trip used his natural agility and speed, Ashton developed a style similar to Jonathan's all out assault, yet more violent and dirty. For three years, Ashton dotted by Jonathan's side wanting no more than his father's love and approval but it never came. Instead a little after Ashton turned seventeen, Jonathan took in another child, this one a daughter of two of criminals. The thirteen year old Rosetta showed an interest in the Vigil mantle, Ashton and her got off on the wrong foot. Jonathan, however is enamored with the girl, and Ashton could see his chances of proving himself to his mentor slipping away. Angry and desperate to prove himself, he responded with more force than necessary on patrol one night. He killed a man and in the following argument with his mentor, had his Vigil mantle revoked. His place at the vigilante family was at stake, with Vigil gone what kept Jonathan from throwing him out on the streets? Vigil was the one thing that meant the most to him in the world and with it gone, Ashton didn't know what to do. Rosetta was not yet Vigil, so he still had a chance to earn it back. He needed something big, something that would if not earn him Jonathan's love it would at least get him his suit back. Often he had heard Trip reminisce about a Malcolm, and with a little search he had come to find that Malcolm Rowland was Jonathan's nephew that had been kidnapped by Heaven's Door. Parliament, the boy's father and leader of the cartel, had taken him to raise to be his heir. This was it! If he was able to bring back Malcolm, Jonathan would be proud and Vigil would be his once more. Ashton took his suit and set out to steal back the boy. However, it proved easier thought than done and he wound up being the kidnapped instead of the rescuer. Now in Parliament's hands, Ashton's life was on the line as the drug lord and Reckoning bartered for his return. To his dismay Reckoning gave up on him fairly easily, and in a few months he cut off contact with Parliament. Ashton had been abandoned by his blood father and now was abandoned by his adoptive father.. Trip through, Trip kept up hope. The optimistic, cheerful man Ashton knew transformed in front of his eyes into a man struggling to keep it together. Jonathan knew this and as his adoptive father told his brother that Parliament had killed him. It was devastating to Ashton who blamed himself for his ineptitude that had caused his capture and why Jonathan seemed to hate him so. To make matters worse, Jonathan named Rosetta Vigil only four months after his ‘death’. Another year passed before he managed to escape. He was changed, due to his imprisonment with Parliament and the fact that most of his family had abandoned him. Left him for dead. Reeling and hurt, Ashton smuggled himself off of the colony he had called home, not yet ready to return to his "family". He spent the next few years training with various instructors learning different styles of martial arts, bomb building, firearms training, swordsmanship and countless other skills. His rage was fueled every time he looked at himself and saw a face that was such a disappointment Jonathan would want it dead. At twenty one he returned home, deciding to wage his own war against crime - one without Reckoning’s rules. His return caused some major rifts with the family which had swelled to include Nathaniel and a Rosetta on the brink of creating Phoenix. Trip welcomed him home with tears and cries of "It's a miracle!" while Jonathan blanched at seeing his failure come back. Ashton contradicted Jonathan when he said his intel had pointed to his death, he didn't want to further push his elder brother away from their father. He did however take out years of rage on Rosetta for taking Vigil from him. He stayed at a distance from his family, observing as Malcolm came home and became the new Vigil. He has only recently begun to come home and work out of Base, his wounds - if not healed than properly hidden. It's true that Vlostock has gone to hell since the old man died, but Ashton can't really find any sorrow within himself. |
Jonathan Rowland AKA “Reckoning ” - “ I wish the old man was half as good at fucking parenting as he was at keeping the city safe. What's the good in having a safe city if you're kids are fucked up in the head?” Johnathan never really understood the son he never planned on having. He was uncomfortable around the boy and wanted him to be more like Trip. The boys were very different, unique in their own ways but Jonathan failed to see this and was constantly upset he didn't act like Trip. It may not be considered abuse by many but while he was alive Jonathan didn't answer his calls, but always called when he needs Ashton's help or dirty work done. There is an outright loathing on Ashton's part towards his former mentor.
Howard “Trip” Lawrence the third AKA “Euchre” - “Honestly, I love Trip. He's just always been there, always been the one I can count on when things get rough. There hasn't or ever will be a better brother. ” Trip is the only one out of the whole family that Ashton unconditionally loves. It is a love that was earned though great work on Trip's part, and without his older brother Ashton would've succumbed to his demons long ago. Though he doesn't show it often, Ashton would be utterly destroyed if anything were to happen to his polar opposite. Ashton is always there when Trip needs him even if nobody else wants him to be there, and the same is true likewise. No matter how hard Ashton pushes Trip away he'll always be there, right at his younger brother’s side. Rosetta Reynolds AKA “Phoenix” - “ I suppose I could say congratulations. You took everything that was mine. My chance of having a father, Vigil, hell you could've taken Trip with a little more effort. So, you conceited bitch I would kill you if it wouldn't make Trip so goddamn upset.” Rosetta hates Ashton because of reason no one but she knows. It's okay because Ashton hates Rosetta too. Ashton hates Rosetta because everyone loves her, for the same reasons they hated him. Rosetta kills people and it's okay. Ashton kills people and it's an abomination. Rosetta isn't as acrobatic as Trip and it's great. Aston isn't as acrobatic as Trip and he needs change his fighting style. Nathaniel Larsonn AKA “Matrix” - “A good kid, he needs to toughen up because I won't always be there. I sure as hell will protect him while I can.” Nathaniel and Ashton's relationship is a strange one. The boy wasn't part of the family when he was kidnapped, yet when Ashton came back he was there. At first he entirety avoided him and often thought of him as a liability to the team because of his disability. However they've come to a mutual understanding. Ashton's realized that Nathaniel is a great detective and wicked smart but wants to toughen him up so he doesn't die. Nate knows Ashton wants the best for him. As a result when Ashton's detective skills aren't up to par he will contact Nate and if Nate needs a strategy or more muscle he'll call Ashton. Malcolm Rowland AKA “Vigil” - “The little brat's got a mouth on him. He's too much like me for his own good, can fight like a caged beast though. Plus Trip loves him, so I suppose he's okay. ” The youngest member of the family reminds Ashton of himself, all deadly rage and anger. They respect one another and Ashton wants to make sure that Malcolm never experiences what he did growing up. |
VENGER - Venger is the identity Ashton donned after returning to Vlostock after his travels. At first he was operating alone without the rest of the family, but after a while he returned to them.
Venger was developed so that he could fight crime without Reckoning's rules or influence. Venger kills, maims, and blackmails things that Reckoning thinks himself above. Overall Ashton likes to say that Venger works alone, and that is true to some degree. He works best alone, without having to protect an ally, he is reckless but usually has a plan - no matter how faulty. He uses guns, unlike the rest of the family who follow Reckoning (who believes them to be messy and not precise enough), and loves explosions. Unlike the rest of the family which cling to darkness and silence, he likes to make his presence known when he fights and never stops to conceal his footsteps. His burner phone numbers are given out to those who need them - those that need protection, mostly children. He strives to protect the poor of Vlostock more than the rest of his family and can always be relied on when called. His suit is comprised rather simply. The underlying grey Kevlar is an armored shirt and pants, a gun holstered on each leg, two on his waist, and two strapped on the back of his waist. He wears a leather jacket to store whatever else he needs. In it he has more weapons, candy for the children, a first aid kit, and some other miscellaneous items including a picture of the family (in their suits of course) The \/ shaped white mask was recently added replacing his old ski mask when he was welcomed back into the family. His jacket allows him to store all of his needed weapons, and the suit's underlying Kevlar protects from bullets. The boot's contain thrusters that allow easier rooftop chases and his mask has a built in comm system so he can hear Matrix's orders back from base and communicate with the rest of the family. |