Cain Bernard

> "*I guess you're the lucky one.*"
> ― Cain Bernard
>
>

Born to the Bernard family, owners of Aves International. At a young age he lost both of his parents in a shuttle accident. As the younger of two brothers, he was not set to inherit the family business, and instead opted to make something out of his life. Driven by a desire to put himself to work, he joined an anti-terrorism unit as a sniper before an incident caused him to focus on experimental ZGA piloting. Although serious and hard-working, he has no clear goals for the future.

## Appearance

Stands at around 5’10 with a fit, toned build. It’s clear that he stays fit and works out, but places more effort and remaining well-rounded over focusing on any particular area. Does seem to slightly prefer aerobics, though. His skin is somewhat fair and slightly tanned, years of travel and being at sea in the sun taking a toll on his original complexion. Cain’s hair is a dark blue-ish black, and is usually combed to the side or put up in a short ponytail. Brown eyes frame an otherwise serious face, the pilot often attempting to look as professional as he can be.

When not in uniform, Cain’s taste differs on what he happens to be doing at the time. When performing maintenance work or working out, he prefers to wear boots, long pants, and a tank-top. When in a more casual situation, he prefers to wear a loose shirt and a thick jacket instead of a tank top. Regardless of his situation, he prefers keeping his hands free, or when absolutely necessary, he may wear something like fingerless gloves.

## Personality & Interests

Cain’s personality depends largely on who you are- how long you’ve known him, and how you’ve known him.

To his brother and family, he was known as a flirt, a casanova- a playboy. Someone who didn’t take his life too seriously, riding on the coattails of his family’s success and without a care in the world. Slick, flirty- but not particularly overbearing. Just an heir with nothing to do.

After joining the military, or perhaps before that, his attitude sharpened. His exposure to tragedy perhaps hardened him, to where he began taking his job as a soldier seriously. Cain is pretty straight-laced in that regard; takes orders, works well with others despite differences, keeps quiet when dealing with management. The only sore spot with him might be in that he finds it difficult to stay quiet when orders conflict with his morality. His occasionally ‘maverick outburst’ has made an otherwise spotless record look undesirable, making it difficult for him to climb the ladder any higher than he is. For the most part, climbing rank doesn’t interest him: as someone who’s lived a fairly good life already, his concern is more on what’s right. Cain is still approachable, to an extent, but he’s far more about his work than he was prior. That doesn’t mean he doesn’t like a conversation and a drink, but he’s more picky about the when and where.

His position in life and how he’s handled his ‘past’ has made him wary, or perhaps just not as interested in pursuing personal relationships. While he’s not against treating his squadmates right and being friendly, it seems that he’s hesitant at becoming any closer than work friends. Whether that means he’s lonely, or simply a fool, remains to be seen.

### Interests

Cain is an avid consumer of Jazz music, also being quite the fan of mid 70s/80s J-Pop. He plays bass guitar when he gets a chance, and isn’t half bad if he can get into the groove of it. As a pilot, he’s made it a habit to play his music during operations, finding it calming to listen to during long sorties or when he needs to operate by himself.

Outside of music, he’s an avid marksman, having honed his skills through clay shooting, paintball, and hunting when he was much younger. His frequent trips have him a big fan of camping and hiking, which he unfortunately can’t do very often. Although he was also a practicing falconer, he had to drop that upon joining the military, leaving his birds to the care of his older brother.

Cain smokes every so often, initially cigars, but has picked up cigarettes and e-cigs on occasion. He frequently smokes to de-stress or pass time, preferring to do it alone rather than in company. Likewise, he isn’t afraid of an occasional drink.

## Skills & Abilities

* **Marksmanship:** As a sniper, his first skill is his aim. Cain is a skilled marksman, having operated as a sniper prior to becoming a ZGA pilot. He doesn’t just excel in the physical act of sniping, but also is quite good at scouting, picking vantage points, and hiding. Beyond simply taking the shot, he can move between locations and stay off the radar while acting. His tenacity and resourcefulness makes him a frightening foe.
* **Piloting:** His time spent as a test pilot for ZGAs and past flying experience has placed him in a unique position. Cain is a fairly good pilot, his focus primarily dealing with high speed maneuvers and the ability to adapt to different machines and situations. Having to fly an assortment of different prototypes, he’s confident in his abilities to pick up the control scheme of a machine on the fly and to pilot with the same level of competence he generally has.
* **Mechanics:** Being a son of Bernard means that he knows his way around machines. Cain has the skills and innate talent someone of his lineage would possess, but frequently underplays and devalues his own expertise. He’s more comfortable allowing someone else to do this job for him, rather than flex his engineering muscles.

## History

### Prior to the Menaulion

#### The Young Casanova

The second son of Cyril and Noelle Bernard, Cain quickly became both the problem child and the family favorite. He grew up in both France and Phoenicia along his family’s estates. As a son of the Bernard family, Cain grew up with access to mostly whatever he could desire. His parents did attempt to establish limits for their children, but regardless of that, the two grew up much more privileged and with far less to worry about in the world.

This was the case up until the untimely deaths of Cyril and Noelle Bernard. During the christening of a brand new interplanetary rocket transport, machine failures caused it to explode mid flight. Both Cyril and Noelle had been on board to celebrate the success, and both were lost in the explosion. They were survived by Cain and his older brother, Gaspard. While his older brother went into the family business, becoming his uncle’s protege as he had taken over the family business temporarily. Cain, meanwhile, fell into a bout of uncertainty. He danced between playing the role of the younger Bernard family heir, a casanova and party boy without a care in the world; and the role of the Bernard prodigy- the one that one take over as head designer, as his mother once had.

#### The Maverick Pilot

Ultimately, Cain decided to take his own path, joining the ESU military. A combination of skill, potential, and connections allowed him to be more selective with where he ended up joining. After a brief stint as a private in the ESU land division, he quickly moved on to joining an ESU anti-terrorism squad, enlisting as a sniper specialist. This period of his life would do the most in terms of allowing the young Bernard to figure out where he wanted to go in life. It was then that his maverick tendencies picked up, and he occasionally clashed with others when his morals conflicted with the job at hand.

These outbursts made an otherwise spotless record look bad in the eyes of management, and his chances at promotion became more or less shot. To him- this wasn’t that important. At this point in his life, prestige had come second to actually accomplishing something worthwhile. Protecting people- punishing those that did wrong, those were things worth pursuing. Cain’s ‘focus’ remained on that- doing real, tangible things that made people better off.

#### Testing Division and First Engagement

Cain was eventually discharged after a particular outburst off mission. Instead of remaining on Earth, Cain decided that he would transfer to Luna, where he joined up with a testing division of the ESU. Up until transferring to the Menaulion, he spent about a year there on the moon, testing prototypes for the ESU with a group of others. During a test run, his flight happened to be one of the few to encounter the Martian fleet. While Cain’s machine was disabled during the encounter, the rest of his flight engaged.

After the encounter, he was transferred to the Menaulion to act as a test pilot for the captured Martian machines.