Torska Holsaar

[Elvorn]

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Name: Torska Holsaar
Age: 22
Gender: Male
Race: Human
Allegiance: Empire
Occupation: Imperial Assassin
Other: His training program was a top-secret project named operation Spearshadow.
Important Plot Points: An Old Comrade

Appearance:

~ Torska Holsaar ~

Torska’s build is taller than usual for an assassin trained to blend in with a crowd, brushing the maximum height requirement at 6’1”. The Spearshadow program was not looking for anyone who would call attention to themselves when stalking a target through a crowd, and definitely not someone whose height was a distinguishing feature. He is quite agile and flexible, more so than most of the other Spearshadow soldiers, with the build of a runner, slim and fit due to constant endurance training. He runs the Imperial training facility’s obstacle course as a matter of habit, straining to keep in shape for the slightly less than conventional modes of entering a building used by the Empire’s human weapons. As is standard with the Spearshadow-trained assassins, he often needs to disguise his gait, assuming one of the personas that he has taken to using to avoid being recognized. His eyes are a hard, flinty gray; set in an impassive, sharp-featured profile. A mat of close-cropped black hair crowns his clean shaven face, cut short to keep it out of his eyes. Tan, well-toned skin gives the impression of an active life, an understatement for the daily strain caused by almost constant reassignment. His hands are toughened and calloused and fingerless leather gloves protect them from being cut or bruised when fighting or climbing. Well defined cheekbones, a high forehead, strong jaw and angled eyebrows give Torska’s visage a hard set. Though his stony countenance betrays next to nothing, his mind is always calculating ranges and gauging distances, gathering information that might prove useful later on.

The assassin clothes himself in a standard issue slate-gray, leather tunic and pants covered by a flexible, black armorweave jerkin. Armorweave is the invention of a group of Imperial magicians tasked with creating equipment and arms for the army and S.O. brigades. It is made to be near impenetrable to bladed weapons, while retaining the light, pliability of steel-woven leather; though it is still vulnerable to serious impacts and most magic. Torska wears light, padded leather boots designed to make virtually no noise when stealing through hard, stone hallways while infiltrating buildings harboring enemies or a target. Fingerless leather gloves with a molded grip give his hands traction on otherwise difficult to scale surfaces such as smooth stone or woodwork. Over all, he often dons a worn, dark-colored cloak to conceal any extra weapons he might be carrying on that operation; shed precipitation; and camouflage his silhouette. A compact yew shortbow is commonly found in his arsenal, adding a deadly element of range to his armament. It is made of dark wood in a recurved shape, designed to maximize power without sacrificing the diminutive length of the weapon. A very small leather quiver full of arrows is slung diagonally across his back, the gray fletched shafts rising over his right shoulder for an easy draw. The bow is less than three feet in length and is made to be slung alongside the quiver, secured with leather straps on both limbs for stability while climbing or fighting. Torska has also trained for years to hone his small amount of magical ability to the point where he can command simple spells like: ‘Dasadr’, ‘Jeirda’ and ‘Thrysta’; all useful spells in an occupation like to that of the assassin. This talent comes into its own when he needs to incapacitate a target or distract a group of guards when entering a closely watched facility. Though he has a good deal of control of his skill, it still exhausts him to use it and he prefers to accomplish an assignment without the help of magic.

He also always wears two armorweave vambraces equipped with a cunningly contrived mechanism that will eject a double-edged, twenty centimeter blade from the top of the gauntlet. The blades are made of truesteel, a substance found near the southern regions of the spine and tempered into a reinforced, nearly unbreakable metal. These low profile weapons have saved his life on more occasions than bear thinking about when his bow, or other armament, has been rendered useless. The blades is protected by a number of wards and defensive spells preventing breakage, rust and bloodstains, a common occurrence that can destroy an oft-used weapon in a matter of months. He is quite capable with his wrist knives, as they were made exactly to his specifications by a master weapon craftsman employed only by those who wanted the very best arms money could buy. His fighting method does not involve much parrying of blows or utilize raw power to stop enemy weapons, relying much more on the assassin’s innate ability to see the strike coming and avoid it; taking his opponent off balance and driving his blade home. He usually fights only with his vambraces, using the inconspicuous blades to turn a staggering punch into a deadly stabbing blow. This allows him to travel light, minimizing his weapon profile and therefore the chance of him being stopped by a checkpoint or guard. He carries a small satchel at his waist containing a number of compact essentials useful in his dark trade, such as a smoke canister that will explode on contact with a hard surface, a thin, sturdy rope and grappling hook, a container of Seithr oil and a few different lockpicks. Torska also has unlimited access to all Imperial armory vaults and can choose any amount of deadly implements to accomplish his tasks.

Personality:

Torska has a sharp and calculating mind that can assess details in a split second, and is prepared for almost any situation that he might encounter on a mission. He usually puts forth a façade of professional aloofness, giving a cold front to those who come in contact with him. This facet of his persona is a sardonic and oft times indifferent, presenting an unapproachable front. He is in an almost constant state of high tension, balancing on a knife edge of perpetual readiness. Heightened senses were touted as being worth a thousand pre-operation layout and background checks in Spearshadow and Torska has mastered this viewpoint to an art, as have most Spearshadow graduates; knowing the value of improvisation caused by new intel. This is also known as ‘winging it’. This invariable gathering of information and statistics around him has been an invaluable asset when on assignment; but when in friendly territory, he finds it quickly becomes wearying. Suspicious by nature, he has learned the lesson of never underestimating his enemy the hard way; and he prefers to gauge a situation carefully before making any rash moves. Rash moves have saved him more than once though, and he never passes a foolish idea if it has a chance of success. He keeps himself very fit, almost obsessively, running, working out and doing flexibility exercises every day he can. He likes taking the difficult way into a building, ‘After all,’ he says, ‘the main entrance is also the most watched. They don’t post guards to make sure no one is scaling the drainpipes’.

He utilizes many differing combinations of deadly attacks and counter-attacks on anyone unfortunate enough to make themselves his opponent, and recalls all of the lethal training techniques taught to him by his instructor, Ferial Baric. He is often angry that he did nothing when his training sergeant brutally killed some of his fellow assassins in exercises; boys who were the closest things to friends the Empire let him have. One of the other trainees, a boy named Taraak, befriended him, and they helped each other as much as they could through the difficult course. When Taraak defected, he started thinking about what the Empire was using him for. He harbored doubts about what he was doing, though decided it wasn’t the time to have split loyalties. Not during the war.

One of the most painful losses hidden behind Torska’s cold efficiency is that of his family. After being mind scrubbed, he had no recollection of who he was before being enlisted into the Imperial training program. This haunts him, the knowledge that he could pass his family on the street on any one of his assignments and never know it. It’s a pain that dogs him every day; a wound that he tries to cover up by the drills and covert jobs he does constantly. Looking into other people’s lives has hardened him, making him throw up barriers to defend himself against the normal citizen's lives. The only thing that he ever begrudged Taraak was his eidetic memory. Nothing hurts Torska more than trying to bring back images of his mother and father and finding no recollection of them. He reads extensively, taking good advantage of the large Imperial library, most of which is used in gathering information about potential targets. Reading is one of the few things he can do without thinking too much about his past. He has attempted to look through the records of the Spearshadow complex, but for obvious reasons, the lists of assassin’s personal information are in a highly guarded record center in Uru’baen.

History:

Torska remembers none of his past before his extensive training regimen and often wonders who he was and what he did before becoming an Imperial assassin. The Empire mind-wiped their trainees with magic when they were introduced to the program to eradicate the influence of anything they may have learned before entering the program. The Spearshadow program was a brutal, high-priority, assassin training project commissioned by the Emperor, one more of his plans to keep the Empire and Varden populace in check. The program searched through most of the large Imperial cities for promising youths to enlist, with or without their consent. Eight was the maximum age for new trainees. The Empire took the boys early so as to fully indoctrinate them into the ruthless Imperial mindset, teaching them total obedience to higher command. Torska’s earliest memory was of scaling the side of a training structure built in the Spearshadow complex for instructional infiltration purposes and staging a mock-assassination in one of the higher rooms. He was nine at the time.

He was a part of a program of fifteen young boys under the tutorage of a heartless training sergeant called Ferial Baric. Baric was a cruel, violent man prone to go into fits of rage when any of his students displeased him. Torska lived in constant fear of Baric, knowing that if he didn’t think a trainee was tough enough, he would make them fight him until they couldn’t get back up. More than one of his students died in this way. The trainees feared him, and obeyed his orders without question. Severe consequences were meted out to anyone who disobeyed or showed compassion in drills. If they showed any signs of independence or deviancy, Baric would beat them until he decided they were suitably chastened. Only nine of his comrades survived the program.

One of the men that finished the program with him was another assassin named Taraak. He developed a close companionship with Taraak, working together on many stealth and assassination type ops. They were an exceptional team, each of them had strengths and weaknesses which complimented the other; a finely tuned killing machine for the Empire to command at its leisure. Taraak seemed the model assassin to Torska, the best in his division, never failing an operation, calm under pressure and efficient to the point of never leaving any trace behind him even in training. Torska was appalled then, when his only friend disobeyed a direct order from their sergeant, freed a Varden prisoner and fled to the Varden to offer his services to their leader Nasuada. This gave him serious second thoughts about the Empire; though he never gave any inclination of them. The Empire had a distinct way of dealing with malcontents. He has encountered his old comrade on a few occasions, renewing his old doubts about the Imperial doctrine that were formed when Taraak escaped the program.

He has since then been assigned to many first strike operations, incapacitating command and control personnel; rendering siege weapons useless; sabotaging ships and supply depots and generally wreaking havoc behind the Varden lines. Lately he has been working mainly in Surda, but still carries on missions in Farthen Dur and other dwarven cities, along with assassinations and Varden underground extermination operations inside the Empire. Spearshadow Command has been taking an offensive front through the war, sending disguised operatives into Surda or Tronjhiem to carry out undercover work that almost imperceptively retards the Varden war machine. This is extremely dangerous work, if they are captured they face interrogation, imprisonment, torture or death at the hands of vengeful soldiers who lost comrades and officers to the Imperial military.

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