[Spirit Class 5] Calliope R. Schwarzmann

» Name: Calliope R. Schwarzmann
» Callsign: Norn One
» Age: 29* [self-proclaimed, actual age is somewhere between 30 and 60)
» Gender: Female
» Association: Vandenreich, Director of the Albedochiffren
» Appearance Written: Calliope is best remembered by her retro circular sunglasses. If she's not wearing them properly, they're used to accentuate her hair. It is perhaps the part of her that stands out. Her overall style can be described as chic-gothique. Lace, sheer sleeves, floral damask-style patterns, frills, and even the occasional ruffle all appear in her standard wardrobe. Most of her outfits have some sort of cross either in the form of embroidery or matched accessories. If those same outfits didn't usually have plunging necklines, one might mistake Calliope for someone highly religious. Her main outfit is something between a federal agent, a pirate-themed masquerade party, and a fashion show. Through sheer effort, she makes it work.


» Personality:
Calliope doesn't mince words. She slices, dices, mashes, refries, and juliennes them. Doublespeak is her native tongue. That isn't to say she can't be trusted. Calliope rarely outright lies. In fact, one of the only things she does lie on is her age. She's definitely not 29. She's more the type to misdirect—it's especially evident in her Spirit Weapon.

Calliope isn't what people thing of when they think of "internal affairs" or "interrogation" or even "black ops." In some ways, that's what makes her good (at least in her mind) when it comes to the job. Calliope is a mixed bag of leniency and strictness. Some things aren't worth a second glance, others are worthy of the old meme of "straight to jail." For the most part, there are three categories that determine the seriousness of an offense: how it affects the day-to-day operations of the Vandenreich, how it affects the public perception of the Vandenreich, and how it affects the current operation the offender is working on or towards. Public opinion is the one she's most vocal about when it is a high-ranking offense. She wants to show that she does care and that something will be done—even if it is just lip service to the media.

Surprisingly, Calliope is very much about her "Quincy Pride." Her pride, along with the misdirection angle, is why she wears so many cross-shaped ornaments. To others, however, she doesn't seem like she has much pride. "Of course we lost, we didn't have x or y." Calliope looks at the ways the Quincy have failed over the years—and she tries to work toward making sure that modern Quincy don't have the same deficiencies.

That isn't to say there aren't deficiencies. In fact, Calliope is a smorgasbord of deficiencies outside of her public life. She doesn't have many visitors to her own quarters, but when she does it's always after she's had time to clean. This is because Calliope is a walking disaster when it comes to tidiness. She has an organized chaos to her paperwork—which is always in unkempt stacks until they're ready to be filed. Aside from her "work outfits," which are laundered by an assistant, her clothes are kept into three piles: dirty, clean, and somewhere in-between. She'd rather eat out or have instant food than go through the effort of cooking. She isn't a bad cook either. She just has other, more important things to do. The list just goes on from there...

» Dislikes: Having to legally confirm her age.


» History: The Schwarzmann family is not one found in many pureblood histories, and that's because they largely stayed out of the major conflicts. Rarely having more than one child, the family's isolationist views garnered it much disdain for most of the Quincy's reign. Since the fall of the various Quincy regimes, the family has acted as unofficial observers. Their focus is on what could have been done—what the enemy had and what the Quincy lacked. Calliope Schwarzman was the first to say "fuck it, let's apply this."

Born in rural Pennsylvania, Calliope was determined for success. She hated hearing why her proud and great race was always on the losing end. As the heir to the family, she was trained hard and young to at least know what a Quincy should be capable of. Calliope's first spirit weapon was not the bow or sword like her father wanted—it was shaped like a duckfoot flintlock. It was from this young age that her talent for misdirection started to sprout. That first weapon had a trick—each barrel could fire independently, and as far as she could tell there was no way to determine which barrel was to fire.

Calliope went to a rather exclusive private school for most of her schooling. She graduated and went on to attain a Masters in some sort of aerodynamics—the degree and university burned to the ground during World War IV, so she doesn't remember the specifics. With the mass-spiritual awakening of humans, there were many openings within the government for those that were truly spiritually awakened. This lead her to DARPA.

Calliope's work at DARPA was mostly in unmanned weapon systems, and her work there further inspired her Spirit Weapon. Calliope worked for many years for the agency, but her work was hitting stalemates. Simply put, there wasn't enough research material on integrating spiritual matter into common—let alone highly complex—weapons and devices at that time. With her research hitting a wall, Calliope turned back to some basics. Or at least she tried to.

Calliope's birthday is when the demons first attacked. Due to the extremely sensitive nature of her works, what couldn't be immediately deployed was destroyed. However, she'd take her notes and go into hiding. For the duration of WWIV, Calliope mounted multiple targeted campaigns against the invaders. She couldn't do anything major—she was alone, and she didn't want to gain the attention of any of the truly powerful beings walking around America. Most of her operations were sabotage or rescue of previously-important people.

Rarely did Calliope participate directly; she was not a "boots on the ground" type of combatant. Instead, she provided overhead support. In current-day terminology, she was a one-man ISTAR (intelligence, surveillance, target acquisition, and reconnaissance). She was coordinating various assets to work together and confirming target information. This lasted until America was liberated.

Calliope was truly flabbergasted by the fact that it was Quincy that liberated America from the demons. The Vandenreich was more than a welcome sight. During the temporary Vandenreich occupation, Calliope volunteered her services. For many months, she was an outside contractor tasked with jobs that the Vandenreich didn't have the specialized personnel for. This effectively meant that her previous occupations continued—just that she now had external support.

After the demons had been firmly thrown out, Calliope worked alongside the Vandenreich and remnants of the U.S. government as a technical advisor on classified material. She oversaw both the recovery and destruction of various projects that existed pre-invasion. Many of which, Calliope was able to convince the governmental bodies to hand over to the Vandenreich. After years of service, Calliope was not a household name, and she was OK with that. In recent months, her position as liaison grew tenuous. With the U.S. stabilizing, her presence was needed less and less. Making a career move, Calliope shifted her allegience away from the middle-ground and started to work directly for the Vandenreich.



» Natural Abilities:

Tactical Acumen: Calliope was a guerilla fighter during World War IV. She led a variety of bands of local fighters against the demonic menace. She is battle-tested. She is not a battlefield commander—she isn't skilled in the leading of variety of troops into or across battle. She is, however, very talented with overseeing small, specialized operations such as the guerilla tactics she used in WWIV. If she ever were in a large-scale battle, her skills would mostly be used for focused operations and high-value target acquisition (and potentially overseeing the elimination of said target).

WWIV Veteran: Overall, Calliope's body is more trained than average due to her participation in WWIV. Although she may not have wanted to be a frontline fighter, she was forced to fight more than once to cover for missions gone wrong.

Enhanced Spatial Awareness: Because of the complicated nature of Kreuzträger, Calliope has developed an enhanced spatial awareness. She uses this to control the complicated mechanics of Kreuzträger. Calliope's focus in the area around her doesn't allow her precognition, but she is able to accurately and swiftly respond to threats from various angles and speeds. This also ties into her above skill as a tactician. She can do the work of multiple real-time analysts at once. During WWIV, there were several of her operations (including the near-disastrous rescue of a few members of the Joint Chiefs of Staff) where she was the only analyst on the team.


» Racial Abilities:
Blut: Calliope did not gain her skill in Blut during or after WWIV. Blut was the first thing her father (occasionally literally) beat into her. His reasoning was simple. She can fight all she wants, but if she crumples the moment she's hit then she's worthless in a fight. She specializes in Blut Vene. She has crashed through doors and even a few interior office walls (drywall, obviously) without much damage. It wasn't until she was forced to fight near the end the war that she attained Blut Arterie. Due to her lack of overall combat aptitude, it was difficult to learn. It is notable that currently, she adds one additional post to her her downtime of switching between the two due to her inexperience with Blut Arterie.

Gebet: Calliope is quite skilled with Gebet, but most of this skill isn't actually the various spells. Instead, it's working with silver tubes themselves. The only exception to this is Ransōtengai, as she used the general principle of the threads to create her Spirit Weapon. Calliope's focus while working for DARPA was integration of spiritual components with modern technology. This took the form, mostly, of working with silver tubes. The shape of silver tubes became a topic of study for her, and she focused on various shapes and sizes, as well as other ways of deploying them. She's lead the development of smaller silver tubes that can be used as ammunition (see MAC-110Q in equipment) that are roughly equivalent to .45ACP in size. These do not have enough reiryoku in them to power any spell, but are instead used as a propellant that spiritually charges the projectile.

Calliope doesn't usually use the silver tubes to actually cast spells—although she most certainly can. Instead, she makes tubes that are naturally unstable or can be made to be unstable. The idea is that once the reiryoku inside is disturbed, it bursts outward with explosive force—effectively turning liquid reiryoku into nitroglycerin. Calliope favors octagonal or hexagonal silver tubes because while they can roll, it isn't something they tend to do without effort.

Kreuzen: Calliope has developed an altogether complicated Spirit Weapon. The cost of this is that while others at her skill level may have three secondary spirit weapons, Calliope could only have one. Her bond with her Spirit Weapon is similar to that of a pre-Shikai Shinigami and their Zanpakutō, and she always has it close in one form or another. For further information on what her skill has developed, see the Spirit Weapon section below.

Steigen: Calliope's skill in Steigen mostly comes from having to escape failed missions and abandoning safe-houses. She doesn't have any special variations, aside from being able to create multiple, smaller reishi platforms rather than one massive platform.


» Spirit Weapon Name: Kreuzträger [Cross-bearer]

» Spirit Weapon Appearance: Kreuzträger is a cross about 6 feet tall and 4 feet wide. On each arm, Kreuzträger has five (for a total of ten) softball-sized orbs with two flattened sides. Each of them bulbs out from the body of the arm. These are called Irrlicht (will-o'-the-wisp). These are the main attack function of Kreuzträger—and they are attached to the main body via a light blue reiryoku cable similar to the threads used in Ransōtengai. These cables are much larger (around the thickness of a finger) and have a pupose described below in the abilities section.

» Spirit Weapon Abilities: Kreuzträger is a remote-weapon type Spirit Weapon with ten of the above-mentioned Irrlichte. The Irrlichte each have a moveable hole that acts as a barrel to fire Reishi-based attacks like a "normal" spirit weapon. Each of these is connected to the body of Kreuzträger by a taut cable made of bundles of reishi threads. Every ten feet, the cable can change direction to any direction besides where it just came from (it cannot double back). This leads to what may seem as impossible angles of attack.

The cable feeds energy from Calliope into the Irrlichte. Calliope has a total length of cable equal to the maximum range of her Spirit Class (rounded down to the nearest 10ft). This cable can be divided up between the ten Irrlichte in increments of 10 ft. For example, she can have one deployed at the full distance away from her, or she can send all 10 an equal distance.

In order for Kreuzträger to work, Calliope must remain within five feet of the cross. When deployed, it moves at 2 ranks lower than her speed and can not move via Steigen. If the area she is in is teleported, then so long as Kreuzträger is within the affected range, it will be teleported too. The main drawback for the variety of range and angle is that she can only fire about half as quickly as other Quincy using traditional means. The other drawback is that it is reliant on Calliope's own senses to target and control. For example, if she is unable to understand that a building has an odd corner, the Irrlicht may just collide with a wall and not continue to her target.

(OOC Note: these are basically INCOMs from Gundam, if you haven't guessed it already)



» Vollständig Name: Cybele

» Vollständig Appearance: Cybele takes the form of two matching armpieces. To call them simply gauntlets or pauldrons isn't doing it justice. Cybele covers Calliope's arms in armor that extends well past her normal arm's girth. Her hands are protected by long-fingered gauntlets. The largest portion of Cybele are the "wings." Two sets of bisected beetle-like wings extend from her shoulders. They can fold downward to act as "capes" for her arms. Inside of each are four (for a total of sixteen) upgraded Irrlichte known as Zwerg (Gnome). The Zwerge appear like a bulb with a long, conical end that ends in an opening. Multiple small holes are along the circular portion of the body. These provide propulsion


» Abilities: Cybele is not a complete Vollständig. Overall, it doesn't particularly add any new abilities. It simply enhances Kreuzträger's main ability. The Zwerge not have the cable limitation that the Irrlichte did. They are able to freely move about at Calliope's speed as semi-autonomous weapons. Calliope can direct them to follow and attack someone, and they will attack. Their usual method of attack is to swarm around a target and move from position to position between firings. As with the Irrlichte from her Spirit Weapon, she requires understanding of the target. She can not sense through the Zwerg. If a Zwerg is destroyed, it remains destroyed until she releases Cybele once more. After three posts of being deployed, the Zwerg need to return to Calliope for one post to recharge. (ooc note: we went from INCOMs to Funnels)


» Equipment:
MAC-110Q: Not a computer, but the modern-day version of the now-ancient MAC-10 SMG. Although only a prototype, the weapon is something Calliope loves using. The Q variant is developed by the Vandenreich for use by Quincy. The barrel and action have both been reinforced with the same silver used in silver tubes. The main purpose of that is to allow for reiryoku-based propulsion of projectiles—as, you may have guessed, the main ammunition is effectively silver tube bullets. There is not enough liquid reiryoku in these micro-tubes to power the various gebet Quincy are capable of performing. These silver bullets produce significantly more recoil, and sustained firing will warp the barrel, bolt, and action.



General Skills
» Durability: C
» Speed: C
» Strength: D
» Soul: A

Will Skills
» Willpower: Adept
» Deduction: Adept
» Focus: Elite

Quincy Skills
» Blut: Adept
» Gebet: Advanced
» Kreuzen: Elite
» Steigen: Adept


8/14: Skill System Update