Nathaniel
Appearance: Has short brown hair and dark brown almost black eyes. Apparent age mid
thirties. Often has a stubble, depending if he has remembered to shave recently. His face can be
best described as looking similar to Harrison Ford in Blade Runner' but probably not as
handsome. He tends to wear heavy functional clothing, tending towards darker colours, and a
heavy overcoat when out. Also has been known to wear shades, even at night!
As befitting one of the darkest choir, Nathaniel has a personality to match, for he is grim
and deadly serious virtually all the time. He does not allow himself much in the way of frivolity
or even a sense of humour. Anything humorous he might say is despite the fact that he was
probably being serious at the time. This coupled with an intensity of purpose and determination
to serve Gabriel's Word means that he is not a fun or easy person to get on with.
It is also true he doesn't try hard to get along with people or even other angels, although
he has to work with them, he believes there's no rule that says you have to like them just because
you are on the same side. Besides, Nathaniel believes that friendship has to be earned, not given
away a freebie. Hence Nathaniel probably has few true friends, but the ones he has, will find him
as loyal as one could be. Out of his current companions, probably only Case could be counted as
one.
Anyway, as an angel who has clearly has specialised in the arts of combat, it is also true
that he hasn't picked up many of the social niceties that more refined angelic types have, but then
again in the circles that he usually has to deal' with, where a nice cup of tea wouldn't cut much
ice. Also taking into account that he has no role to fulfil this current assignment, this situation is
unlikely to improve. So as a result, he tends to be blunt with his criticism and can be crude and
sometimes rude.
In terms of age, he is only around eighty or so years old and he has not spent all that time
on Earth. However in that period neither contact with humans nor conflict with the Infernal has
diminished the flames that burn within Nathaniel. If anything they burn a little brighter!
Many of his past assignments have been soldier-type roles', so he understands the need
and respects the chain of command, which in his case is either from Gabriel herself or more likely
Soldekai, both whom he obeys often without hesitation or comment. So when Lucas was assigned
to assist him, although something of a surprise as Nathaniel hadn't requested any help, he didn't
question the judgement of his superiors. Obviously, they have their reasons.
As regards to Gabriel, he has perhaps an unusual viewpoint towards her. First, he does
not fear her one iota, since she was responsible for his being, therefore if it is her will to destroy
him, then so be it. As mentioned previous he follows her Word with a passion and will obey her
will without question, but to the vexed question of how he views her, particularly her apparent
madness, he will state that on that subject he has no option on the subject, citing the reason that
as she refused to be judged by the likes of Dominic, so how can he, a lowly Malakite, in her
service be worthy to judge her? However he shares a deep suspicion of those who served
Dominic, partly they are the ones who are likely to raise the issue in the first place and also the
ones most likely to question things like his honour.
He tends to concentrate on his duties and often refrains from such tasks as eating, sleeping
and drinking. Again this is partly from having no role, so he isn't expected to indulge such things
to protect a role and mainly due to his belief that the forces of the Heavenly Host must be
constantly vigilant to guard against the schemes of the Infernal. Needless to say he takes the War
very seriously and wishes sometimes that some of his angelic companions would do likewise.
Also, largely because his previous assignments and the fact they are at War, he will only
tell others what they need to know, rather than giving full and unguarded information, including
any details concerning himself, particularly his angelic name. This is through a combination of not
knowing who might be listening at any given time or who might Fall in the future. Information
is important weapon in any conflict. It also annoys servants of Dominic no end!
While he tries to keep his emotions under check, through the necessity of keeping a clear
mind to cope with the unexpected and often dangerous situations, he can be guilty of losing his
cool and can be provoked into becoming annoyed. Invariably, this tends to happen either when
someone questions his honour or attempts to stop Nathaniel carrying out his duty.
Also, he is not really one to either indulge in or tolerant the inter-Heaven politics that goes
on from time to time. After all, he is a warrior, not a politician and all this bickering diverts the
energy of Heaven away from the main business of dealing with the War. If such events occur on
his patch', Nathaniel will either attempt to sort out the situation as quickly as possible or if hegets
annoyed, he will sort out those involved.
However since the arrival of Lucas on the scene, Nathaniel is slowly but surely developing
a degree of patience that he probably didn't have before. All this said though, he has only truly
lose his temper once and felt the Righteous Anger course through every fibre of his being.
That was in his last long term assignment, back in the Vietnam war, where he had the role
of an American soldier. During that time, he made the acquaintance of another soldier in his unit,
who was also a soldier of God, and they became close friends. Anyway it was while Nathaniel was
on manoeuvres up country', that a plot was hatched by a number of demons to get the soldier
of God hooked on drugs and destroy his will and turn him into their creature.
Things came to a head when on a mission several months later, the soldier of God started
firing on innocent women and children in a village, leaving Nathaniel no choice but to kill his
friend to stop the carnage. Before the soldier died, he told Nathaniel that he was forgiven as he
had freed the soldier's soul and was able to name his supplier before he died in Nathaniel's arms.
To imagine any servant of Fire angry is a scary enough prospect but an angry Malakite of
Fire is doubly so. When Nathaniel found the nest of demons who were responsible for the whole
scheme, many demons lost the use of their vessels that day. Nathaniel's vessel also died, but in
a last act of vengeance detonated the entire drugs factory, taking a number of demons and their
servants with him. It was because of this, Gabriel awarded him the use of the Ofanite attunement
of Fire, again without explanation, except that he had served the Word of Fire well that day.
In combat he is well versed in hand-to hand techniques, which he uses to good effect with
the flaming hand's gift of a Malakite of Fire. He is also adept with sword and pistol, as well
getting out of the way of incoming attacks. If he has a weakness, then it would lie in the fact that
he can become too focused on a single target in combat rather than assessing the whole picture
and only has one Song that he can use.
Out of the current group, Nathaniel is only likely to have had any previous contact with
Case, and this was during one of his first missions in the First World War in the trenches in
France, it seems that they developed a good working relationship. They have probably briefly
crossed paths on a few occasions since then, so the idea of them sharing a flat was a natural
one.
---
Player Characters