P Vasilios

Paula / Pavlos Vasilios

Seamus' best friend, who killed him

Gender: Female Current Quality: Good

In Game

Bluesheets: Decameron Enterprises, Board and Stock

Character Hint

You are Paula Vasilios, a young engineer at Decameron Enterprises, and you are trying to convince yourself that you had no choice. A couple of hours ago, your close friend Seamus apparently flipped out and started shooting people. Nobody was doing anything, so you dashed into the CEO's office, grabbed his gun, and shot Seamus. Everyone's calling you a "hero", but you mostly feel dirty and shocked.

Costuming: office casual.

Character Sheet

You are Paula Vasilios, and you aren't sure who you are any more. That can't have been you; you aren't a violent person.

You are 22, about a year out of college. You joined Decameron Enterprises pretty much right after graduating, along with several recent grads -- Roger Cameron had decided that the company was growing, and he wanted to rejuvenate his research and development group. You were glad to be getting a job: everyone might say that the economy is in good shape, but you have too many friends who wound up moving back in with their parents to completely believe that. Yeah, they told you that you'd be working on government projects, but you've always believed that the government can be a force for good. You didn't expect to be working on guns.

The contract for Project Sureshot had apparently been in the works for a while, but the actual design started not long after you started. You were kind of startled when you were told about it, with all the heavy NDAs and security checks -- you're a programmer, for God's sake, not a weapons designer! But this thing is halfway between a gun and a rocket, with fancy microcontrollers in the "bullet" itself -- actually a self-guided rocket with sensors designed to aim accurately.

They like to talk about it eventually being used in warfare, with rocket-sized versions using complex programming to find the weak spots on tanks and stuff, but this first proof of concept is basically just a supergun. Oh, yeah, they make a big deal about how fancy it is, being able to take down terrorists reliably by always finding the right kill zone, but you know the reality: the thing is just plain dumber than their grand schemes, and it's easier to use heat sensors to find center of mass than to do the kind of deep image processing they had envisioned.

So you've been working on it, feeling kind of dirty about it but it's your job and your folks always taught you to do your work to the best of your ability, and keep your politics for your private time. Which you've done, although your "private time" is mostly hanging out at work.

Ainsley calls your group of friends "the Gang", which is kind of cute; you think it helps her feel like she's part of something grown-up and special, but really it's just the post-college engineers hanging out together. Roger was actually kind of clever: hiring the bunch of you together helped you knit into your own little social circle.

Originally, it was just three of you, really. There's Shrivatsa Kiran, an Indian immigrant who came to the US for school and stayed for the nightlife and food. He is the mechanical engineer doing most of the real work on the Sureshot, building the actual "gun" by printing out and assembling new prototypes every week or so on the 3D printer. (The latest was pretty good, although everyone agreed that the trigger action is too light.) There is -- was, God -- Seamus O'Malley, who was designing and building those little rockets you call "bullets" for this thing. And you were doing the programming in the bullets to make them fly, not to mention acting as the de facto IT person for the department. (Decameron has an official IT department, of course, but they are bureaucratic jerks who work out of the factory across town and mostly slow everything down. You talked them into making you a sysadmin six months ago, on the grounds that they wouldn't have to deal with all of your requests any more, and you've just quietly run things in the lab since then.)

The group were friends almost since you started. You were from out of town, and Shrivatsa was always a little too reserved to really get to know the city well, so Seamus wound up the native guide, teaching you the ins and outs of Violet City. You always kind of wondered how he wound up as an engineer -- he clearly wanted to be an artist, with what they call a "sensitive soul", always a little nervous and embarrassed about being perpetually single. How could someone so gentle do something so wrong?

Things really sparked when Jonathan arrived, though. He's a bit younger than the rest of you, a senior over at Violet City U -- officially majoring in journalism, but leaving his options open. Roger hired him a couple of months ago, as an intern assisting Samuel Antonino, the company's office manager. (And probably the most sensible of the older staff, the only one you all get along with well.) He's charismatic and fun, and wanted to know everything about the company; you've joked once or twice that he's actually some kind of industrial spy out for your secrets, but he's the only one of the bunch of you who doesn't actually do the engineering. And he officially doesn't know about Sureshot -- he's under NDA, but that's seriously government-confidential stuff. Of course, Seamus went and told him about it anyway, which made you a little uncomfortable, but you figured that wasn't your problem.

Around that same time, Ainsley also started hanging around with the bunch of you. She is Roger's daughter, a high-school senior, and you were a little skeptical at first, but she's turned out to be pretty cool -- smarter and more involved with the world than most kids her age. You eventually figured out that her parents gave her some stock last year, and she decided that she should take an interest in the company and its people. Not that management ever actually talks to junior employees like you, but you haven't pointed that out to her.

So the bunch of you have been hanging out a lot lately. There was some tension there for a while, which finally broke a few weeks ago when Jonathan convinced Seamus to admit to his own sexuality (everybody else had long since known he was gay), and they started dating. That was probably the happiest you've ever seen Seamus, these past couple of weeks, at least until a few days ago.

Of course, you've been pretty happy yourself lately. Not long after you started at Decameron, you struck up a friendship with Carla Lennart, the VP of Sales and Marketing. She isn't the sort of person you'd ever expect to be hanging out with -- a bit older, so terribly professional and sexy. But she liked you, and started mentoring you in corporate life, helping you understand its ins and outs, talking you down every time you would get pissed off at the bureaucracy, putting things into perspective. She was sensible and adult in a way that your friends just couldn't be, and you admired her from the start.

It kind of floored your when she propositioned you a couple of months ago -- she actually looked shy and awkward for the first time since you'd met her, and it was so cute. You were thrilled, really -- yeah, she was older, but not that much older, and she proved that, well, experience really does matter in bed.

It's been kind of fantastic, but sometimes kind of annoying -- she is very insistent that you have to keep quiet about it, because workplaces frown on relationships between more senior and more junior employees. Which you kind of understand -- the power dynamics could get weird -- but it still frustrates you: you want to be able to burble at everyone about being in love, the way Seamus and Jonathan do to you.

You don't know quite what happened, but Seamus came into work at the beginning of the week with steam pretty much coming out of his ears. He needed a lot of comforting from Jonathan, but wouldn't tell anyone what happened, aside from vague mutterings about family. You have a nasty feeling that the fact that his brother is a priest had something to do with it.

But while he was angry about that, it still doesn't explain his actions this morning. You saw him leaving the office yesterday, practically in tears over something, but you don't know what -- you heard rumors about some kind of argument, but haven't found out anything more yet. He was so pissed off he tried to slam the door behind him, only to be foiled by the pneumatics, and pretty much ran away from the building. You thought about going after him -- now, you wish you had.

This morning -- God, it's horrible. You were sitting in the lunchroom, having coffee with Shrivatsa and Ainsley (who was there for Bring Your Daughter to Work Day -- her idea that she sold her father on, and was really proud about), along with, what, Isaiah Zubin (an older engineer, who works on a bunch of the other projects), his daughter Amy (? or something like that), and Robert Gervasio, a local vet who the company has kind of made into a mascot.

Everything was normal until you heard a bang from somewhere, which startled all of you. While you were all shrugging it off, you heard another one, much closer, and realized it was the distinctive bang-hiss of the Sureshot. You were all on your feet by then when you saw Seamus walk past with the damned thing in his hand. While most of you were diving under the tables, Amy screamed and threw herself towards Seamus -- to protect her dad, you figure -- and he shot her, then ran off screaming something you couldn't understand.

At that point, somebody had to do something, and some kind of reflex took over -- your parents are a little nutty and paranoid sometimes, but they always said that you would need a gun to protect yourself in the city. So you ran for the nearest gun you could think of -- Roger's gun cabinet in his office, that he always bragged about. You found Carla standing outside his office, and were almost sick (if not quite entirely surprised) to find him lying there dead, the cabinet already opened. You just grabbed the first one that came to hand there, knocking another one off the shelf. (In retrospect, it was just dumb luck that the thing was loaded. Stupid of Roger, but kind of typical.)

You ran down the hallways after Seamus, and saw him near the copiers, with the Sureshot up, and Jonathan backed against a wall. You didn't even think about it -- it was all those teenage nightmares of violence come to life -- you just raised the gun you'd taken, and shot Seamus in the head at point-blank range.

After that -- you just kind of stood there in shock for a while. At some point, you must have dropped the gun, probably around when you started crying, but you don't remember much until Carla came along, talking so gently, saying that you needed to go to the lobby and leave the crime scene for the police. You and Jonathan fell into one of the couches at the front, and just held each other and cried until the police showed up.

Since then, it's just been a lot of answering questions, and getting angrier and shakier. They keep asking about your experience with guns, and you keep having to explain that your Dad taught you how to use them, and you hate this. You've prided yourself as progressive ever since you got to college, and have taken part in all sorts of anti-gun protests and petitions, supporting the Mayor's moves to reduce gun violence in the streets. You never thought you'd be a killer yourself, and it makes you feel nauseous just thinking about it...

Who You Know

Carla Lennart: Whenever you think of her, a part of you goes "squee!". You try to be mature about the whole thing, but she is so strong and mature andandand. She is being the calm one in the middle of this disaster; you should probably see what you can do to help.
Seamus O'Malley: A good guy, who you've known for a year, but now you keep flashing on seeing him dead. What made him flip out like that?
Shrivatsa Kiran: One of your engineer friends at Decameron.
Jonathan Sheena: Seamus' boyfriend, who must be devastated right now.
Roger Cameron: The CEO. Thinking about having to step over his body to get to his gun cabinet keeps giving you chills.
Ainsley Cameron: Roger's 17-year-old daughter. She's a nice kid, and more mature than most her age. But she was as much in the middle of all this as anyone -- is she okay?
Millie Cameron: Ainsley's mother -- you've seen her around the office from time to time, but don't particularly know her.
Samuel Antonino: The company's office manager since forever, and Jonathan's boss. You've always liked him, and everyone respects him, but he doesn't have quite the strength that Carla does.
Robert Gervasio: The homeless vet who hangs around the office. As you've gotten to know him over recent months, you've found that he is actually a really decent woman, who has just gotten the short end of the stick since leaving the military.
Christina Nikolaus: A blogger friend of Jonathan's. Really intense, and sometimes a bit out there, but she seems like a good sort, really passionate about making sure that everyone knows the truth about modern society, warts and all.
Isaiah Zubin: One of the older engineers at the company, who has apparently been around since the beginning. He's always struck you as kind of grumpy, but you've heard that he lost him wife a few years ago, so you can kind of understand that. Plus, now losing his daughter, your heart really goes out -- is there anything you can do to help?

GM Notes

Longtime blogger with a mildly lefty bent, who has been outspokenly pro-gun-control for many years. Has been uncomfortable with Project Sureshot, and is now deeply conflicted about having saved the day using a gun hirself.

Is being mentored by C Lennart, and that has recently turned into a sexual relationship. She is puppy-dogging around C Lennart a good deal.

Member of: Decameron Employees