mask or menace | application & trivia.

[obediences]

APPLICATION | LOGS | NETWORK
PERMISSIONS | IC CONTACT | HMD

〈 PLAYER INFO 〉
NAME: Julie
PLURK: quadrille
DISCORD: Feel free to ask for it!
RETURNING: Nope, brand-new!

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〈 CHARACTER INFO 〉
CHARACTER NAME: Luther Hargreeves, alias "Space" (formerly Spaceboy)
CHARACTER AGE: 29 30 31 | b. October 1st, 1989
SERIES: The Umbrella Academy (Netflix)
CHRONOLOGY:

• From August 2020 onwards: At the end of S2E10
  
• April 2019 - August 2020: At the end of S1E10

CLASS: Hero. He tries.
HOUSING:

• Nonah Independent Housing (New Hargreeves House) (May 1, 2020 - present)
  
• Formerly: Nonah Independent Housing (Old Hargreeves Mansion) (May 27, 2019 - May 1, 2020)
  
• Formerly: De Chima #004 with Anton Roudin & Fern (April 3, 2019 - May 27, 2019)

JOB:

• General Staff at Joe's Movers (April 2019 - present)
  
• Occasional unpaid volunteer at SELF (September 2019 - present) *

BACKGROUND: Luther & the series

Season 2 canon update:

During the course of season 2, Luther found himself dropped unexpectedly into Dallas, Texas in 1962, stranded out-of-time without his family and assuming they were all dead. Grieving and at a loss, he tracked down the younger version of their father to ask for help, only to be resoundingly rejected and have the last remnants of his pride ripped to shreds.

For the next year, he settled into normal, unheroic life. Like in Mask or Menace, he became more accustomed to daily existence, socialising with strangers, paying bills, and holding down a job — in this case, fighting as a boxer in rigged matches, and as a bodyman working for the nightclub owner / gangster Jack Ruby (another example of Luther having piss-poor judgment in surrogate father figures). His trajectory actually remains very similar to his first year in MoM, although with an undercurrent of listless apathy, depression, and grief which prevented him from finding much satisfaction in it. (He's started wearing better-fitted clothing, but still wears gloves and covers himself from neck to toe, so he still has issues with his ape-like body.)

This continued until November 1963, when Number Five finally returned and tried to recruit Luther to avert the new oncoming apocalypse. Luther tried staying out of it at first, but finding out the rest of his family was actually still alive was the impetus for getting on board and getting the gang back together. Having now experienced being ripped away from each other through accident rather than choice, the family had a renewed appreciation for each other and they were finally able to be less antagonistic, more supportive of each other. Having spent the past year wholly humbled and guilt-ridden and with the time to ruminate on his mistakes, Luther wholeheartedly owned up to his role in destroying the world the first time, especially apologising to Vanya for what he'd done to her and how he'd let her down.

Reunited, the family tried to save the world from themselves... again. And they technically, sort of, succeeded this time around, and then tried to jump back to their rightful place in 2019 — only to be dumped back in MoM once more, not knowing exactly how badly they've mucked up their original timeline.

PERSONALITY: Luther, aka Number One, was the first among Sir Reginald Hargreeves' adopted and purchased children: a mantle he took on gladly as the best-groomed team leader of a group of child soldiers-slash-superheroes. They were ruthlessly trained since birth to fight and kill, to save civilians, to keep the world safe, to put their lives on the line for the public, raised by a mysterious billionaire who treated them more like weapons than offspring.

While the others eventually rankled at their abusive childhood, being actively broken and hammered into shape and thrown into harm's way over and over, Luther tilted too far in the opposite direction: he was desperate to keep the peace, to appease and impress their father, to keep the team together. When they all left, he stayed behind and kept swallowing that poison, taking too much responsibility on his broad shoulders. Dutifulness and obedience has been hardwired into him, along with a loyalty to authority figures and a reluctance to deviate from instructions. He adheres to some strict rules of engagement: he doesn't mind snapping a criminal's neck, sure, but civilians need to be protected. Civilians are what they're all here for.

His stubborn self-centeredness and rigid convictions can be immensely frustrating at times — it's what happens when you've grown too used to bossing others around — and it's given him a tendency to steamroll over others when he's convinced that he's right. But for all that he's hard-working, driven, and brave in the face of battle, he's also hopelessly awkward and blundering in social interactions. Thanks to their reclusive childhood hidden away from the world and out of society, then four years spent on a solitary moon base with no other human company, Luther has absolutely no idea how to relate to society at large. His siblings went out into the real world, but he never did, and as a result never picked up the art of social finesse or small talk or flirtation or paying bills or, well, hardly anything. He knows death-defying missions and combat and piloting, but that won't get you far in the real world. He spent years in a lonely house where his only real company was a talking butler-ape named Pogo and the programmed Stepford robot who raised them. He never stood a chance.

Luther's self-confidence and comfort in his own skin has taken a massive hit, too; a few years ago, an experiment-gone-wrong made him essentially half-ape, with impossibly broad shoulders and a leathery chest and huge hairy arms, so he covers himself in baggy layers to try to hide away from view. He's still trying to come to terms with it. He's a gentle giant these days, prone to protecting others and flinging himself between them and harm's way — but when riled up, he also has deep-rooted issues with violent anger, prone to lashing out and instinctively using his strength against others (because it's what he's been taught to do, of course, and supposedly the best thing he's good for).

Hot off the heels of the cataclysmic things that happened to his estranged family within the span of one week, and thrust into a new and unfamiliar setting — now he's back in the spotlight again, this time as an imPort, at a time when he's more uncomfortable with public press than ever. The only life he's known was jumping through hoops and missions for Sir Reginald Hargreeves, and so now, disillusioned with that parental figure, he's seeking another safety net and trying to figure out who he is for the first time.

POWER:

Super strength: Luther possesses immense strength; even as a child, he could easily lift and throw a fully grown adult across a room and through a window. It was then further enhanced by the experimental serum that gave him his larger body.

Enhanced durability: An extremely durable body due to his ape-like physiology. He is able to shrug off most physical impacts during combat, and could even take the full weight of a falling chandelier without injury. Luther is not invulnerable, however, as Diego managed to cut him with a knife and draw blood, and he is shown to hide from bullets.

Televator: A new power in this universe, as of June 11, 2019. Almost like a variant of his brother Five's ability to teleport, Luther is able to step into any elevator, press a button, and then have the doors re-open on a different location anywhere on the planet (or within orbit, if it's near enough) — as long as there are elevator doors on the other side too. He doesn't need to have been there before. He can take others with him so long as they can physically fit within the elevator car. (To keep this a bit restricted, too: he can't open the doors to any private/secure location that uses keycards or keys to get between floors, etc, so he can't just break into government bases or what-have-you.)

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〈 CHARACTER SAMPLES 〉

COMMUNITY POST (VOICE) SAMPLE:

[ When the camera cuts in, the very first thing you see is... spinning, as the device slips out of its user's hands and goes flipping through the air. ]

Dammit!

[ Luther catches it, clumsily, his hands too big and awkward for this small piece of tech. He frowns down at it, blue eyes and furrowed brow too close to the screen before he pulls back. ]

Uh. Hello. My name is— [ a beat, he almost says Space, or Number One, but he should stop using codenames huh ] —Luther Hargreeves. And I'd like some more information on the moon base. I hear that anyone can go there? What's it like? How easy is it to get there and back?

... That's all for now. Thanks.

[ He jabs at the screen. Manages to mute it, first, before finally finding the off button. The communicator really is a very small device. ]

LOGS POST (PROSE) SAMPLE: A TDM thread!

FINAL NOTES: Luther was already a strapping fella at 6'5" and muscular, but the messed-up serum has thrown his proportions completely, conspicuously off. He is really big. He can pass as a regular non-enhanced human as long as he keeps his torso covered up, though.

Comments

trivia & headcanons.

[obediences]

• Allison was the last person to leave the house, and when she was preparing to move out, she asked Luther to leave with her; he initially said yes, but when the eventual day came, he panicked and turned her down.


• On hobbies:
  
  • Growing up, he liked reading (he's a voracious reader of both fiction & nonfiction, and has stacks of books around his living space at all times), and assembling and painting miniatures. After everyone left, he did a lot of jigsaw puzzles and played pool.
  
  
  • He has a nigh-encyclopediac knowledge of music — collecting records being one of the only 'hobbies' he could really indulge in, under their father's thumb — and was really good at selecting specific records for specific siblings.
  
  
  • Luther can get ultra competitive during board games. He broke a table once when losing at Monopoly.
  
  
  • Loves reading poetry, and his favourite poet is Walt Whitman. He started writing some of his own poetry while he was up on the moon, although it is terrible.
  
  
• Each morning, Luther starts his day with a dawn workout and a shower. He likes to read while working out in general, because of the efficient multitasking and because secretly he's more of a nerd than a gym rat.


• On food and vices:
  
  • One of the few treats for the Umbrella Academy after a job well-done was for all the kids to be allowed some ice cream. Luther's favourite flavour is plain chocolate.
  
  
  • Luther's metabolism runs naturally high, which may or may not be related to his natural superpower. Back home and in the past, in lieu of any other vices, the only thing he could do was snack on things as comfort food. Grace's cooking was a source of serious comfort as well (cf. the smiley face pancakes).
  
  
  • Related to the above: when depressed, he's at risk of bingeing and over-eating.
  
  
  • After their father's death, and caffeine thus no longer being banned in the house, he started drinking coffee. He likes it with cinnamon.
  
  
  • He's also incorporated some alcohol into his coping mechanisms and as a common social lubricant, though he's still more austere than not. He only drinks enough to ease his social anxiety a bit, never enough to lose control of himself. Very exceptionally bad circumstances might lead him to drink heavily; recreational drugs remain a No 99.9% of the time. (Although he should probably blaze up in order to chill out, lbr.)
  
  
• He blames himself for Ben's death; mostly because Reginald told him so at the time. (A team leader's job is to be responsible for your team; their faults fall on your shoulders.)


• While still learning his own strength, he once accidentally broke Klaus’ arm while rough-housing.


• Luther's not exactly canny enough to be a proper perfect leader — but he's actually really good at keeping his temper in a high-stakes situation and working to calm down the others on his team. His patience was one of his most valuable traits as Number One (although Diego was the best one at winding him up, and sometimes succeeded). Thanks to trying to keep Sir Reginald appeased, Luther developed a walking-on-eggshells type of wary personality, hyper-aware of conflict within the house, and ever-desperate to tamp it down at all costs and keep the peace.
  
  • Sidebar: When he does lose his temper, he doesn't lash out with words; it's all physical, and losing his tight rein of control over his strength for once.
  
  
• Luther knew about Allison's secret spot at the attic window, and they used to sit there together. During his solitary years in the house, he used to go sit there by himself when he was upset, too.


• The kids would sneak out to the diner together sometimes for midnight snacks. Luther once ate so many donuts that he puked.


• About the lounge space in the basement:
  

  Can you talk to me about the kids’ lounge space? I’ve read that it used to be a butcher shop that they took it over.
  
  The Academy is built into a tenement block. The adjacent buildings would have had half-basement businesses in them like the West or East Village. The idea is that if you go down some steps, here’s an old butcher shop that’s been closed awhile.
  
  The kids busted a wall out from the main Academy into this space and said, “Hey, this is cool. We’ll convert this into our own space away from dad. This is the one space where we can be free to be who we are.”
  
  We talked about a number of what kind of business could it have been: Chinese restaurant or dry cleaner or whatever, things that were common in places like the East Village. But we settled on an old butcher shop. *
  
  

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  “We were thinking that this shop just closed down after Hargreeves bought the building,” Worthington says. “The kids discovered it, busted through a wall, and turned it into their own lounge, because they wanted something that Hargreeves wasn't a part of, where he wouldn't check on them because they're so restricted otherwise. They wanted a space to be free.” *



• Of the off-limits objects in their father's study: Luther named a skull 'Yorick', and the kids stole one of the cursed idols and kept hiding it in each others' rooms. *


• Still doesn’t talk much during meals, having been taught to eat in complete obedient silence while listening to their father's lessons. Old habits die hard. (Nowadays, though, he might vary it up a bit by listening to podcasts over breakfast. His favourite is the MoM-equivalent of Stuff You Should Know.)


• Big fan of astronauts & polar explorers, thanks to their unique combination of meticulous preparation and planning, but also bravery, scientific research, and derring-do. His childhood hero was an astronaut codenamed St. Zero, who vanished on a mission to Mars.


• His three biggest regrets, in no particular order: Saying no to leaving with Allison. Going on the solo mission that almost killed him. Locking Vanya up.


• Luther and Five are twins, though they don't know it themselves yet.


• CW: SELF-HARM & SUICIDAL IDEATION: In his four years of social isolation on the moon, Luther would receive regular weekly calls from Reginald for status updates. The schedule started slipping, however, and eventually became monthly; Reginald got distracted, increasingly forgot about him, and forgot to send up enough food. These years were the worst of Luther's life. He was depressed and suicidal, and occasionally hallucinating (per research into long-term social isolation) as his mind tried to interrupt the endless monotony. He also self-harmed in an attempt to get his skin off, but it always grew back the same; hence the strange jagged scars all over his body.
  

  "We figured, over time, that Luther would have tried to remove the skin, or patched it with other skin, but it didn't work. He hates the way he looks, and he's severely depressed about it. In my head, there were times on the moon when Luther thought about ending it all, because he’s so torn up after the accident." *



• Unlike some of the other Hargreeves, Luther never uses nicknames ('Di', 'Vee', etc). He always refers to them by their proper first name or, in a combat situation or emergency or when he needs them to take him seriously, their numbers and codenames.


• Visual reference: Moon Station 01. Set design.