Yaaren

Names:
     Usually, Ren. Real name “Yaaren”, aka (infrequently, now!) “Gorgeous”.

Appearance:
     Ren is another of the giants on board Dauntless, taller even than Slate, at an intimidating eight feet tall, and while he and Slate are similar in height, Ren is far more impressive in stature. An ex-Gladiator, he has a predatory gait earned through long years in the Ring, and while never so vastly muscular as some of his old colleagues he is an imposing figure to look upon. His elegant looks earned him the nickname “Gorgeous” in his gladiatorial days.

     A hybrid of numerous species, created to be a better soldier by the labs he originated in, Ren has the digitigrade gait shared by most of his shipmates; his legs are straight and strong, with slightly splayed four-toed feet. His features are blunt, his nose rather snub and misleadingly soft-looking, but crisscrossed with old scars which readily betray his heritage. His skin is green and hairless but otherwise not dissimilar to human skin, and roughly countershaded, as all his ‘relatives’ are, with darker barring down his back and across his shoulders. His hands and arms are long and slim, but their apparent delicacy belies a powerful grip. His scarlet crest is of feathers, not hair, although they are soft and fluffy and rather hair-like, somewhat closer to ostrich feathers. They were once long, and flowing, but they were clipped once and now never grow properly, instead growing in fairly haphazard directions. His tail is prehensile and slim, but blunt, the terminal foot or so having been amputated.

     As well as the biological features, Ren has a considerable number of surgical alterations. His upper fangs are both false and slightly longer than normal – knocked out in a very early fight he was given two-inch gold ones as replacements, but they prevented him from closing his mouth properly and hindered chewing. They were replaced by “normal” colour, sensible-length polymer-enamel ones when in Khufa, but even they are a fraction longer than normal. His toes and tail still bear the hallmarks of his Gladiatorial days, though. The natural claws in his feet were surgically removed early on in his career and replaced by surgical steel implants, but the surgery was done so shoddily and ruined so many of the bones there was no option of replacing them again, once finished. (The option of corrective surgery has once again been raised, since encountering better surgeons on Coalition member worlds, but so far he has not taken up the offer.) A foot of his tail is also missing; it once bore two surgically implanted barbs, for use as a weapon in the Ring, but a duel with a bitter rival took the last half-foot of his tail off.

History and Persona:

     Yaaren was “born” in a test-tube. An experimental genetic hybrid, he was the first “sapient mongrel” his creators had got to survive, but aside from that he was spectacularly unremarkable, no stronger, faster or smarter than any of the creatures that occurred naturally on his homeworld. He was treated as a specimen for the bulk of his early life – at least, what he remembers of it – subjected to a barrage of biochemical testing and assays to determine his health and stability, but eventually it became clear he wasn’t going to simply collapse and die like all his “siblings” had.
     Ren’s adopted “parent” was a tired, middle-aged Yen-toh researcher by the name of Siroli, in the employment of the infamous genetics expert Doctor Setro. Siroli was far more conscientious than his colleague (who by contrast was driven solely by profits), and invested a great deal of effort in actually giving Ren an education and teaching him some basic morality.
     Ultimately, Setro decided that Siroli was expending far too much time and effort on their “failed” experiment, especially while Ren continually refused to help improve his own value. They wanted him to take steroid supplements to improve his muscle mass and make himself a worthwhile purchase as a guard, but he dug his heels in and refused, saying they made him sick but really not wanting to become “just another piece of meat”. And a product that no-one is interested in investing in is not a product worth keeping; Setro was keen on selling the youngster to the mines… until the Arena approached him.
     The Arena was a large “sporting” complex specialising in gladiatorial combat. Setro didn’t imagine for one minute that the youngster would last more than a few hours once he finally got into the Ring, but he agreed on a loan until then, the Arena paying “rental”, and after that a portion of the takings – royalties, you could say – from any fight in which Ren succeeded in staying alive.
     The Arena became Ren’s home for many years of his early life. After a year or two of menial labour – cooking, cleaning, selling tickets, tending the livestock – he was taken onto the gladiatorial teams. By some miracle, Ren survived his first few bouts, and the crowds seemed to like the “pretty mongrel” and were willing to pay higher ticket prices to watch him. Setro enjoyed both the monetary gains and the right to say “told you so” to Siroli, who was growing ever more despondent at his “child”s increasingly violent tendencies.
     Still, Ren studied diligently, using his ability to read (a rarity among his peers) to learn about other fighting styles, and he matured into something of a loner, thoughtful and considered but skilled, powerful, and lethal in a fight. He quickly climbed the ladder to become the Arena’s Head Gladiator, unusually popular with the crowds, grudgingly respected and greatly feared. He very quickly learned to hate both his unwanted notoriety – “he can kill anything that breathes” was the rhetoric – and his “employers”, who still saw him as nothing less than property and tended to do exactly what they liked to him. For instance, once under anaesthetic for a rather routine set of a broken bone, they (without his permission) pulled his fangs and replaced them with longer metal replicas. They would also regularly change his medication without his agreement – it was not uncommon for him to be drugged up to the eyeballs before a big fight, to make him less clinical and hone his senses, and they changed the stimulant they used as and when they saw fit, rarely warning him beforehand. (Their tendency to do what they liked, when they liked, left him more than a little claustrophobic, and scared of doctors and operating theatres, which to his shame are fears he still hasn’t got over.)
     Ultimately, the Arena was destroyed by “terrorist activity” (see “Fools’ Errands”) and Ren, feeling no particular loyalty to his forced employers, made a run for it. He ultimately fetched up in Khufa, where he met Aileena.

     Since joining Dauntless, Ren seems to have earned himself the unenviable title of Ship’s Grouch, although it is probably an unfair nickname. This is partially down to his tendency to be suspicious of anything and anyone he doesn’t know – long years needing to do it to stay alive at the Arena have made it a ground-in habit that is difficult to kick. Partly, however, his prickly nature is down to no small amount of fear – assuming that by merit of his past he is a weapons expert, his shipmates have nominated him as their chief of defence and security. He feels highly unsuited to the role, his so-called “expertise” extending solely as far as hand-to-hand combat with non-projectile weapons like sticks and swords, although he is an excellent natural tactician, a fact which never crosses his mind when pondering his responsibility. Although he would never admit it to anyone, the sudden shift to responsibility for all their safety has left him scared, and out of his depth.
     His habitual demeanour is quiet and serious – never so grim as Slate, but rarely so evenly placid as Ivy. He doesn’t often smile, and is often a little blunt in manner even towards his shipmates, but he isn’t intrinsically nasty – under the emotional armour he wears is a gentleman’s heart, and he is a quietly devoted friend.

Notes and Mirrorverse Duplicates:
     Lena has Ren very firmly around her little finger, and is often the one to tame his temper if needed. For his part, he is powerfully loyal to her, trusts her absolutely, and does whatever she asks of him.

     Like most of the main cast Ren has a “Mirror Universe”/”Mirrorverse” duplicate (or two!), who he has met just the once, after an accident in Infraspace took Dauntless and all her crew through into a parallel version of the “normal” universe. While together, the “normal” universe version goes by Yaaren, allowing his “Mirrorverse” duplicate to use the name “Ren”, purely in order to tell the two apart. This parallel individual is rather more nervous, and tired and sad after Lena died shortly into their journey away from their world; he now lives on Vul Prime, sharing a flat with the parallel Slate (who has also parted from Onyx, but theirs was a more amicable split, the bisexual Onyx joining the ICP and choosing instead to run with a Vulline.)
     The other duplicate, who I have also briefly written about, had a very different history; rather than being bought by the Arena to be a gladiator, he was purchased by a rather different department – “Sensual Recreation”, where he was employed as a member of the mixed-sex “harem” of prostitutes. He is a very different person to the “normal” universe Yaaren – gentle and sweet-natured, and amicable about his situation. He has shared something of a friendship with the Ivy from that universe (who is effectively in his place, a giant hulking brute of a gladiator), although that friendship has put a strain on both their situations.

     Yaaren was “born” in 2002, which means that he’s one of my oldest characters. He was initially just a “bit part” character – designed to walk on, add a bit of an air of menace and impress on the reader that it was a dangerous, unpleasant place, and then walk out, never to be seen again. As happened with a great many of my characters, though, he struck a chord with me, and remained more firmly fixed in my mind.

First met in: Ren was first met in “Fools Errands”, although he very rapidly came out as an important “presence” in my cast and earned his place on Dauntless. “Gladiator” is his and Lena’s early story.

Art:
I used to draw this character a lot - although not so much lately. There's probably some more pictures on the archive.
The very, very first image of him - when I kept misspelling his name as "Jaaren".
Yaaren the Younger - before he became a gladiator. Well, you have to start somewhere, right?
Hello, ladies...
Love - Yaaren and Aileena, smoochy.
Ren and Pel - (no, that isn't Aileena). A scene from Gladiator
New Look - If someone finds Ren's lower jaw, please replace it? Thanks
Renni, shocked - a short-lived idea that very quickly got ditched; Yaaren turned female, unexpectedly.
Reluctant mermaid - ...and even LESS expectedly, here.
Togetherness - ...mind you, Renni seemed to get more than Ren ever did. Maybe she's kinder, or gentler, or fluffier, or something. Or maybe it's to do with her norks.
Long-nosed - I'm not sure WHAT happened here... poor Ren. Probably a case of "she has biros, she has a pad, and she's waiting for her lecturer to arrive... again."
Portrait - Another attempt at a "realistic" portrait that just went wrong. Far too heavy in the nose. Gr.
...and again... - another attempt, and another failure, although it's better than the one above.
Romans - well, Ren WAS a gladiator, so why not? (Incidentally, I used this picture for the respective characters' profiles for some time.)
Old Profile image - one I still like, and for some reason I went crazy with details on it.
Armour - modelling the Arena outfit, even if he only ever wore bits of it (the chestplate and bracers, mainly).
Ren and Ivy heights - comparing their heights, as Ren is the tallest on ship, and Ivy the smallest.
"You say it like it's a BAD thing..." - Parallel Ren, espousing a different opinion to "real"-universe Ren.
Working portrait - my most recent (unfinished) attempt at a portrait image for him. Why can I never catch what I see in my brain for this guy?