Editing Character:Martin Appleby (section)

==History==
"If you gonna survive, you gotta keep your head. No matter who you talkin' to, no matter what sort of #@^% be going on, the moment you fly off the handle, you are dead."

This was the one piece of information that Martin's father taught him that meant a lick of anything. Martin grew up like most of the other children in his neighborhood-- on the wrong edge of poverty with no way out. School is a joke. Work is a sucker's game, because all that means you do is get married to someone you knocked up and become forced to slave away to someone else's dance, someone else's rhythm, and someone else's profit. It was almost inevitable that Martin joined a gang of like-minded deviants (as nearly all boys in his neighborhood did before they turned sixteen). What set him apart was that Martin was unusually cool-headed and capable of seeing the big score, and this patience allowed him to make his mark far more decisively... without getting caught.  His patience kept him from being arrested even once, and his talent for improvised violence allowed him to attain and retain a leadership position (never acting rashly, and always acting conclusively).  Though he retired from the thug lifestyle at twenty-three, he continued to actively police his neighborhood when police wouldn't-- enforcing order with a few like-minded adults and recruits, doing his damndest to keep the crime-minded's attention out of their own neighborhood ("Do not profit on the backs of your neighbor" was a cardinal rule), both local and larger-scale. He was liked, he was alive, and though he traded in vice he was always aware that he handled snakes. The neighborhood's prospects were almost looking up.

Then came the bloodsuckers, and everything went to pot.

It was a losing battle from the start. They were never entirely subtle, but they were rich, and they shared that wealth-- and people who would have refused a dose of heroin did not say no to a shot of blood. Martin led the counterattack as they brought the old ways of vice and strife back, but they were better armed and trained, and the will of his people faltered when they saw friends and family drawn into their net as well. Even as his allies were falling away, Martin continued onwards-- dragging the police into the fight until they were brought under the spell, working in threes and fours to avoid being pinned down as possible. He had sworn he would keep outsiders out; he was going to stick to his word. This was HIS neighborhood.

While Martin was clever, and never stayed for long in any given place, it was inevitable that his enemies would find him. When they came for him, they did so with truly overwhelming force-- Blood-fattened rival gangers, thugs from larger organized syndicates, and even a vampire or two directing the assault. Escape was impossible. No mortal man had the power to stand against all of them them-- defeat was inevitable and unavoidable.  Knowing that he was standing across the aisle from death, Martin strode forth anyway... and much to everyone's surprise, the power of the Unconquered Sun stood with him as well. He was Chosen, made radiant, and no mere scrap of darkness can stand against the Exalted.

The vampires don't come to his neighborhood in Parkside anymore-- and Martin has found the breathing room to make a big decision. He doesn't know quite what he's become, but he knows he's been given the power to make things right.  He will no longer be content with resisting the oppression of the White man-- when that time comes, he will speak, and they will heed him, in that they have no choice.  Now, he has been given the power to take night and day back from shadows and worse. Too long has he satisfied himself with fighting a holding battle; now, it is time to go on the offensive, one inexorable step at a time, and God help anyone who steps in his way.