The Journal of Otto Octavius

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Other Characters Currently In-Game: Franky Cook

Character Name: Otto Octavius
Series: Spider-Man II (2004)
Age: Unstated, probably late 30s to early 40s.
From When?: At the point of his death in the film, sinking into the East River at New York City.

Inmate Justification: At the end of his life, Octavius was determined he would not die a monster, sacrificing himself to destroy his own rum-amok machine. That being said, this leaves him with many unresolved issues both about his own life and how he arrived at that moment. For one, he carries the guilt of his wife's death - an accident owing to a miscalculation, but which he views as his personal fault. That in turn drove his desire to solve the problem, proving it was not his life's work that caused his wife's death. The complication is he isn't the only mind involved - the arms that are now inextricably bonded to his spine have their own, separate intelligences - a base but growing sentience that views Octavius succeeding his experiments as paramount.

In canon, the arms were even willing - with the inhibitor chip that limited them gone - to press to control Octavius' dominant mind. Though he is now once again the controlling mind, that control is recent and of untested strength - and the arms may well prove willing to continue on the previous path.

So outside intervention is absolutely required - to deal with not one mind but one central one with four smaller ones.

Arrival: Given he was drowning in the river and likely beyond consciousness at the point he was drawn to the Barge, he would not have come by choice. Given his willingness to die, this would be true in any circumstances.

Abilities/Powers: The accident that bonded the arms to him seems to have either given him some enhanced ability to resist pain, or merely deadened him to some of it - enabling him to take punches from Spider-Man without immediately collapsing. Other than that, he is an entirely normal human being - though of significantly higher intelligence.

The abilities all come from the arms, arms that are permanently bonded to his spine. The arms are resistant to heat and magnetism, being designed to hold back and mold the power of an artificial sun. They are also extremely strong and at least one of them has a hidden, blade-like appendage within. Their overall strength can be limited, but they'll be dangerous in any circumstances. The limiting factor there is Octavius himself, who is not inherently a violent person. The arms, however, are very much ends-justify-the-means beings.

Inmate Information: The central event in Octavius' life is the death of his wife, Rosie. Everything else orbits around this central moment. Prior to it, he was a well-known scientist. Afterwards, a wanted criminal and a man convinced that he himself was a monster.

Her death not only sent Octavius into a spiral of grief and denial, it also was the accident which caused the inhibitor chip that kept the arms' artificial intelligence at bay to be destroyed. Suddenly, a grieving, good man had to contend with very real voices in his head telling him the accident couldn't have been his fault, that they just needed to try harder to make the experiment succeed.

He began a spree of crimes - mainly thefts - in order to acquire the supplies he needed to build a bigger version of his initial machine. Bystanders were threatened and used as hostages in the course of these events. The worst harm he did to others was caused by the arms, however - when initially in the hospital, unconscious, the arms tore through a medical team tasked with removing them from Octavius, an action Octavius also undoubtedly wears as his own fault.

Ultimately, the experiment put the entire city of New York at risk, given that it produced an artificial sun that started to pull in objects via gravity, becoming self-sustaining.

Personality-wise, there is a big split between Octavius under normal circumstances, and the man when influenced by the arms. That influence waxes and wanes based on circumstances and how convincing the logic is the arms can provide to justify actions. The normal Octavius can be charming, witty, urbane - he's well-read, a strong believer not just in science but also the arts (especially poetry). Good-humoured, a natural role model, confident. But when the arms get their way, these things are turned to darker resolve - he becomes paranoid, mercurial, arrogant, and coldly determined to pursue his ends.


Path to Redemption: The first critical stage is asserting permanent control over the arms. So long as they retain the capacity to speak with equal authority in the now sort of gestalt consciousness that he has, they have an ability to drive him, not the way it's supposed to be - wherein the arms are controlled tools.

The wild card here is that these were designed as limited-term tools; the continued operation, with the necessary growth and accumulated code, will result in changes to how the arms operate themselves - with unpredictable consequences.

That done, the problem becomes one of convincing him that he is in fact not a monster - that the deaths he holds against himself, and the actions of the arms, are not a permanent stain on him and his soul. That he can find redemption for what he has done, and above all that the accident was just what it was - an accident.

A final step would be rebuilding the inhibitor chip, to cement his progress.

History: Here.

Sample Network Entry:

[The image that filters on is of a calm man, leaned back in a chair. It would be perfectly normal if it weren't for the metal arms what occasionally make their presence known, their writhing roots tied to his back. Even in that initial moment, a red sensor eye orbits into view, tines around it moving spasmodically, as if waiting for employment.]

So here we are.

[One of the arms makes a chittering sound, and his eyes flick to it for a moment, as if listening to actual speech.]

No, not now. Not yet.

[He sighs, addressing the camera again.]

I'd appreciate unbiased, accurate information about this place and its purpose. Information being the key factor in determining what actions to take next. Who can help, who to avoid...and whom one should avoid all together.

[The last seems very displeasing to the four - four! visible now- mechanical arms.]

Patience. [Words spoken to the arms, not the audience.] Our time will come.

Sample RP: The amount of people he has to deal with on a daily basis is...not ideal to him, really. The very nature of the Barge grates at him, really - no sun, no sky, no view of a world outside. Just the walls, just space beyond. No reality to it, not in the way he defines it; everything is artificial, possibly held together only by the will of this mysterious Admiral.

It could drive a man mad. Well, madder in his case. There were plenty of days when he wondered just how much of him was left. The arms constantly whispered, talked, planned, plotted. Because this place was even worse for them - rules enforced by means they could not understand or know, very little to do for employment. It ate at all of their minds.

So he did what work he could. He sat, hunched over a notebook, sketching. Here and there one of the arms snatched up another pencil, scribbling precise notations and suggestions. One by one, designs for theoretical machines, marvels of physics that would never see the light of day rolled forth.

So he worked. If he could do that, at least, he could keep the arms at bay, keep the thoughts at bay that he needed to get out, and to tear this place apart to do so.

He didn't look up at the approach of the other person - one of the arms spotted them long before and let him know.

"I'm not in the mood for company," he remarked, curtly.

Special Notes: None!

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