Crick, Valter

[Yukari]

"There has to be something I can do."

NAME

Valter Crick

AGE

41

GENDER

Male

BIRTH DATE

8th June

OCCUPATION

Assistant Librarian (References)

LIKES

• His favourite fruits are pears and guavas. The softer, the better.
• One pan meals; easy cooking, easy clean-up
  
• Solitude. It helps him think
  
• Autumn. The chill encourages him to stay home, and simply do things for himself, but at the same time, it isn’t cold enough to prevent him from going out for a stroll once in a while
  
• Coffee. Though he no longer really needs it, there is something about bitter coffee that reminds him of an old familiarity
• Teaching, in a sense
  
• Reading, especially in a quiet little café down the road, overlooking the slow everyday lives of a small town
  
• Memoirs and reflective pieces. There is something insightful about reading an author’s thoughts about a singular topic, be it a travel location, or even at the workplace
  

DISLIKES

• Absolutely hates apples and squash. He’ll still eat it if it’s the last edible thing available, but he’ll still wrinkle his nose at the idea
  
• Summer. Too hot for his liking, and also when children come out to play
  
• Desserts. He’s not really into sweets
  
• Social media. He begrudgingly got a Twitter in the end so that he could have updates from the library, but otherwise he rarely uses it
  
• Late nights. He can stay up if he wants, but recently he came to appreciate the concept of an early riser and early to bed
  
• Parties and loud music. Kids can have fun, but leave him out of them please
  
• Memoirs about chronic illnesses in children. It reminds him too much of his son
  

PERSONALITY

Quiet | Reflective | Reserved | Indifferent | Fairly helpful | Non-confrontational | Flexible



To summarize, Valter is a quiet and reserved man, who spends most of his time simply enjoying the small quint town of Phlox, as little as there is to offer. It doesn’t mean that he dislikes company; rather there is something calming and tranquil about spending time with himself, when he rarely did have the time to do that earlier in his life. The slow pace and routine life that he had built for himself has proven ideal to allow him to reflect on everything that happens around him; on the past, on the people he met, on the conversations he just had, and perhaps on the books that he had read.

That being said, he is not someone who shares his opinions easily, preferring to keep them to himself lest he offends someone. He is a man who would rather avoid conflict, so as not to disrupt the peaceful life that he had created for himself when he moved to Printy County. While he doesn’t dislike interactions (they are a source of deep conversations, even though he rarely instigates them), more often than not, he is mostly the listener rather than the converser, and has a habit of providing prompts to spur the conversation to its natural conclusion. He has the obstinate tendency, however, to answer everything with a question, and the annoying quirk of leaving the conversation with a philosophical query that stuns people long enough for him to leave. It’s one of those irritating things that even his late wife complained about.

Valter is rather secretive about his life before moving to Printy Country, effortlessly steering the conversation away from his past in order not to talk about it. The events of his past has turned him into a fairly cynical man, but without the obnoxious loud-mouth trait that most people associate such individuals with. Even then, he has chosen to remain indifferent to most issues that plague the country (and he remains quiet about any mention of healthcare) as he sees little point in petty arguments over such things. Though almost six years have passed since the death of his son, he is still reluctant to share his innermost thoughts, and thus a part of him is still stuck in the past, grieving for the deaths of the ones closest to him.

Despite that however, Valter has a hard time shedding the habits of his old past. He is so used to helping people that it is almost a knee-jerk reaction; whether it is to help carry books, or stabilize a ladder, or even to give some form of medical advice (though always with a dismissive attitude of “I just read it somewhere” when questioned). He is no stranger to sudden emergencies that force him to take on more work or to work more hours, and he rarely ever refuses because he never did have a reason to say no. It is even reflected in his regular routine; he still drinks coffee in the morning and wears ties whenever he works in the library, though he doesn’t actually need to.

BIOGRAPHY

• Born to Ananya Crick and Elldrich Crick, a urologist
  
• He has an older brother, who is a software engineer, and a younger sister who is a veterinarian
  
• Raised in Stanford, went to high school there, and did his undergraduate at Stanford university, majoring in Biology
  
• Graduated from Yale University with a Doctor of Medicine (around 25), and started on his surgical residency programme when he was 28
  
• Valter proposed to his girlfriend of three years, Lucina, the day after being accepted into the Surgical Residency programme. They married 5 months after.
• Lucina gave birth to their son, Theodore Crick when he was 29
  
• Lucina died when he was 31. Theodore died at 8 years of age, when he was 36
  
• He took a few months off from work, but couldn’t go back to it, and spent the next 3 years travelling aimlessly
  
• Moved to Phlox Town about 3 years ago (39), and applied for a position at the library because he firstly needed a source of income for himself, and secondly, it seemed like a quiet place to work in. He ended up putting more effort into it than he thought

PERSONAL HISTORY

Just only a year old when his family emigrated from India to the US, Valter has little memory of his birthplace. Raised in a household of mixed parenting styles and temperaments – his mother, a somewhat traditional Indian with emphasis on strict rules and studies, his father calm and free-spirited, who would rather fill the boy’s head with philosophical questions rather than answers – Valter ended up as a fairly quiet but studious child that had a penchant for all things science, particularly that of biology. His mother would continuously encourage him to go down a science route, as to her it was the most respected profession, but ultimately it was not his mother but his father who inspired him to go into Medicine. Since young, he and his sister would play in his office (his father had begun a private practice at the time), full of medical books and research papers and rubber models of kidneys, picking up the little cards that the patients left, reading them and asking questions – and hiding behind the chair when a patient dropped in for an unexpected visit. His father treated them all with kindness, and, to the young Valter at the time, like a wise old sage, who knew what to do with the problem right in front of him. His patients would thank him for his time – and ruffle Valter’s hair on their way out – smiling, content with the other’s answers. Despite all of this, his father still remained humble and inquisitive, talking abstractly about life and death, of the patients that impacted him, of the continuous advancement of medical care – and of his hope for the future.

Valter was fascinated. And it was no wonder he ended up on the same path as his father had, graduating at the age of 25 with a medical degree, bright-eyed and bushy-tailed as he started his internship at the hospital

…He nearly had a heart attack on his first day when a young brash nurse named Lucina scolded him for taking the wrong medicine off the shelf. She eventually became his girlfriend.

Since then his life had been pretty much as he had expected. Both he and Lucina had their own goals – his, to become a surgeon, hers, to work as an ER nurse – both working tirelessly and supporting each other on their difficult routes, being there for each other every step of the way. Lucina applied to be in the ER during her floating; he took her out for dinner the moment she was accepted. And she was there for him when he was accepted into the surgical residency programme; - he proposed to her the day after. A year after their marriage, their happy little bundle of joy was born; a son, whom they both showered with love as much as their busy schedules allowed.

It was one of those regular days. Valter had returned home late at night, after yet another full day stuck in the operating theater. His wife was supposed to be home too, but an unexpected emergency came up. Lucina had to fill in for a colleague whose grandmother had fallen gravely ill. Although she was tired from her own shift, and from her family commitments at home, she had accepted to be her coworker’s replacement, taking on the night shift while her colleague flew home. Like any other ER day, it was unpredictable and filled with case after case after case; but the night team survived until the next morning, when another nurse arrived to take over for the next shift. Lucina gave her a tired smile and left.

But she never reached home.

Valter was in the emergency OT attending to yet another case of appendicitis when he received the call. In a quiet voice, his ER colleague broke the news – his wife had met with a terrible accident, and she was bleeding profusely in her brain; she was going to need emergency surgery. Valter left the OT to his younger coworker. Lucina was sent to the ICU directly after the surgery, strapped to the ventilator and various monitoring of her vitals. His ICU colleague had sat him down and told him the news; that the bleed had been so bad that it had destroyed the part of the brain that controlled all of Lucina’s bodily functions and that she could never live without a ventilator. Valter knew what it meant.

It meant Lucina could never wake up.

So when his ICU colleague quietly asked him if he wished for continued medical care, Valter shook his head and agreed for a Do Not Resuscitate. A week later, Lucina died from multiorgan failure. Valter broke down during the funeral.

Now a single father with a 3-year-old son, Valter vowed to do all he can for his and Lucina’s child. Even if he was a surgeon with so many responsibilities, he was going to do his best, caring for their son. Theodore was young, and cheery and happy; that was more than he ever ask for. And all he wanted now was to see his son grow up just as happy as he was now.

But at the age of five, Theodore began to become more fatigued than usual. He became uncharacteristically pale, and nearly fainted in school. Valter rushed him to see the Paediatrician he worked with. Theodore was admitted to hospital, and had a series of investigations ran on him – in a week, they had a diagnosis. Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia (ALL). Valter was devastated.

But he had hope. ALL in children had the highest rates of remission – that is, basically, they could be cured. All he had to do was comply with the chemotherapy and manage the complications of the chemo. What else could go wrong?

But the 3 week check showed that his son’s cancer wasn’t receding.

A further test. In 3 months he got his answer. Philadelphia chromosome positive ALL. An uncommon mutation of leukemia that affects only few of the children. But that dropped his son’s remission rate to 20-30%.

Translated; it meant his son could die.

They changed his chemotherapy regime then, and placed him on the bone marrow transplant list. But his bright and bubbly son became ill and cachexic, and was becoming more tired day by day. His hospital admissions became more and more frequent, and each time he left, he left even weaker than he was before. Valter knew the chemotherapy wasn’t working. And the longer he waited, the bleaker the future became. Soon, the paediatric oncologist – a thin, unmarried lady, but with the soft smile of a mother – sat him down, and quietly told him that his son was unlikely to survive.

Valter knew. And he took two weeks’ worth of leave to stay by his son.

Four days afterwards, Theodore stopped breathing.

Valter cried for a long time.

His HR allowed him further weeks of leave. He took them. But even at the end of his leave, he couldn’t go back.

He just couldn’t.

So he went away – away from the town that he was raised in, away from the hospital where he worked, away from the home that he had shared with his late wife and son – somewhere just not near the painful memories of his past. He started to travel; first to nearby towns, then further and further away, until he stumbled upon Printy County. Far away from the towns and cities that reminded him of his home, Valter decided to move here to nurse his grieving heart, and to forget all that had happened. He applied for a job at the library and though he had some…occasional…stares from his coworker, he settled easily into the routine and slow-pace life he built for himself.

It was a peaceful three years.

But then the Gru arrived.

And now his quiet routine life was promptly turned upside down.

EXTRAS

• Half Indian, half Caucasian
  
• Has a tendency to help students out with biology and medical related topics, though he never stays long enough or delve deep enough lest they eventually figure out his past profession
  
• Had short hair when he worked as a doctor, for practical reasons. Over time he simply let it grow it because he had no real reason to cut it.
  
• …It’s a pain in the ass in the summer though
  
• Likes to bicycle to work. In summer, he drives his car.
  
• A stress smoker; a habit he picked up after his wife died. Nurses have scolded him for using the treatment rooms as his smoking reserve, but he still sneaked a cigarette here and there. Nowadays he rarely smokes
  
• Social drinker; used to drink beer when out at social gatherings, but he doesn’t do it as often as he does now. He may accept invitations though
  
• Is actually a really good cook, more so now with his ability.
  
• Has a few occasional prehypertensive readings, but hey he can take care of himself okay, he doesn’t need to see a doctor for that
  
• He requires reading glasses now, much to his dismay. He doesn’t quite like wearing them, but he begrudgingly does so if the print is just too small
  
• Ties his hair into a ponytail for work. Sometimes ties it into a braid too, if he’s feeling a little indulgent
  
• Valter was previously a general surgeon, and had he continued on, he would have eventually subspecialized into colorectal surgery
  
• Valter is no longer legally a doctor, as he has not renewed his license to practice since the death of his son
  
• He hasn’t been in contact with his family for over 2-3 years, around the time he moved to Printy County
• Part of MediCru (Medical Emergency Dispatch Initiative)
• Extra:- sta.sh/02a9memfm935

COMPLICATIONS

PVP: Yep
Injury: Yuppers!
Death:

---



[Yukari]

[PTabbedContent]
[PTab=Level 1]

“The important molecules in the body are as follows; Carbohydrates, Lipids, Nucleic acids, and Proteins. Carbohydrates give the body energy, lipids a secondary source of energy, and nucleic acids make up the DNA – the genetic material that make us who we are. Proteins however are part of the many complex processes that ensured the body’s continued survival (such as metabolism, repair and replication of DNA and cellular functions); without them, the body’s functions would go haywire.”

Discovered while he was trying to boil an egg for himself, he found that he was able to sense when it was half-boiled or fully-boiled, leading to a surprise culinary talent that he didn’t think he would have. This doesn’t just limit itself to eggs; rather it seems that he was able to extend his abilities to all forms of meat, as long as they are proteins in some sense. He’s rather perplexed by this ability, but it does give him a nice way to sense whenever a meat is thoroughly well-prepared

[/PTab]
[PTab=Level 2]

Proteins are complex molecules; they are all made up of chains upon chains of smaller subunits called amino acids that when placed in a certain arrangement, allowed for the protein to collapse naturally into its pre-determined shape, so that it would continue to facilitate in many of the body’s functions. It’s almost amazingly magical how it all comes together – and so crucial are these arrangements that a singular subunit out of place renders the protein completely inert

Though he had only been able to sense the proteins vaguely before, he is now able to sense the chains of amino acids that make up a singular protein molecule. If he concentrates long enough, he is able to detect the changes in the amino acid chains when something is done to it (usually when heat is applied, such as in cooking), creating conformational changes to the protein that ended up either altering the proteins’ function, or rendering it completely unusable. It still does little else except pique his curiosity a little.
[/PTab]
[PTab=Level 3]

Thus, it comes as no surprise that disturbance of that arrangement – or it’s subunits – creates proteins that do not work as they are intended to – and when they do not work as they are intended to, they cause problems for the body, as without them, the normal functions of the body are disrupted, causing disorders and diseases that makes one ill. These altered proteins are often the cause of mutations within the DNA, making them work in ways that they shouldn’t be. Most proteins however simply become inert, and they do not cause any harm to the body – but the few that do end up creating illnesses that take lifetimes of medications to treat.

Even though a change of a single subunit can switch off a protein, the more one plays with the arrangement, the more possibilities that one can attain. The more one understands the structure of proteins, and its possible forms, the more likely one is able to create proteins that can perform functions that it could not previously. One could change a protein’s structure to allow it to perform additional tasks – or even, change its original function entirely. Of course, that’s all very much science fiction, and in real life we often need the help of other molecules and micro-organisms in order to even change a small fraction of the protein’s functions, so there would never be such a thing as complete control

As the months passed by, he becomes even more acutely aware of the bonds that tie the whole proteins together, and he began to wonder what other forms that these proteins could become. It never really came to the forefront of his mind though, and he never really thought about what he could do with that kind of useless ability – until that fateful day in the lab, where a single emotional incident had set off a chain reaction so beyond what he thought possible that it had changed his life forever.

He does know, however, that activating it comes with painful rashes over his hands that eventually peel off to reveal raw skin underneath; similar to a second-degree burn, so he ends up having to bandage it often to prevent it from becoming infected. He speculates it had something to do with accidentally destroying his own skin cells as he mutates the cells of others – but he honestly doesn’t want to think too much about that.

His eyes are no longer his original cool greens, but a menacing red – a visual reminder of how much of a threat his own abilities have become.

[/PTab]
[PTab=Level 4]

LEVEL 4 - LOCKED
[/PTab]
[PTab=Level 5]

LEVEL 5 - LOCKED
[/PTab]
[PTab=Level 6]

LEVEL 6 - LOCKED
[/PTab]
[/PTabbedContent]

[Yukari]

Relationship Tracker

 - Placeholder

CHARACTER NAME DESCRIPTION

[Yukari]

Threads

Plotting

• Do you need some help? - Plotting Thread

Interactions

• OMG Are you a Chef? [Hope]
• Empty Shelves [Lilith]
• On a Roll [Marcus]
  
• I went to medical school [Vivian]
  
• Storytime for Three [Ethan]
  
• Won't you read to me? [Will]
  
• Ice cold floodwaters [Riku]
  
• A world beyond [Ursula]
  
• Superheros of a kind [Shane]
  

---

• I'm looking for confusion [Amelia][DONE]

Personal Conversations

• There's more to you, dammit [Elliot]
• Chit Chat [Marcus]
  
• Coffee, Books and a Dream [Anastasia]

• Can I get a Trim? [Tenor]
• The Librarian and the Biology Major [Violet]
  
• A Calming Breath [Amber]
  
• The Calm and the Storm [Ethan]
  
• Medical Mayhem [Vivian]
  
• Do you like Waffles [Hope]
  
• The Sun and The Moon [Riku]
  
• Drawings, Books and a Luna [Will]
  

Bonding RPs

• Star Date [Marcus] - An act of Trust (1 Heart)
  
• Cooking by the Book [Anastasia] (1 Heart)
  
• Discovery [Ethan] - An act of Trust (1 Heart)
  
• Amidst it all, Will you Talk to me? [Tenor] - An act of Communication (1 Heart)
  
• Thoughts of the Soul [Anastasia] - An act of Compassion (1 Heart)
  
• Library Invasion [Amber] - An Act of Alliance (1 Heart)
  
• Words of Your Resolve [Tenor] - An act of Determination (1 Heart)
  

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• Fishing for Something? [Tenor] - An act of Alliance (1 Heart) [DONE]
  
• Stars in the Midnight [Anastasia] - An act of Friendship (1 Heart) [DONE]
  
• Flickering of the Flame [Vivian] - An act of Alliance (1 Heart) [DONE]
  
• A Talking Start [Amber] - An act of Reflection (1 Heart) [DONE]
  
• Trust [Vivian] - An act of Bitterness Trust (1 Heart) [DONE]