#constantin lupei

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𝐂𝐑𝐀𝐒𝐇 𝐋𝐀𝐍𝐃𝐈𝐍𝐆; made of stardust and ash. 

❝ — are you not afraid of the universe and its infinite expanse? ❞

                                     ❝ i am the unfathomable cosmos. i contain multitudes. ❞

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OUTCOME - CYCLE 1, ROUND 2

ACTION CHOSEN: [EVADE]

Warned by fellow teammate, CONSTANTIN LUPEI, in a lookout formation via Telepathy, CLOVE is able to fall behind the cover of some trees. But what he doesn’t know is that CAMBIE was leading him into a trap—literally. Clove steps into a springing net trap, yanked into the air in a tangle of rope, dropping his weapon. Cambie approaches him to try to steal his key but luckily, LORENZO SALAZAR arrives just in time and takes a shot at Cambie. He misses, and Cambie shoots back, hitting Lorenzo in the leg and then running away. Lorenzo cuts Clove down, but Cambie has escaped.

POINTS LOST: [50]

This concludes ROUND 2. Thank you to TORREN Representative, CLOVE MODIUS!

UP NEXT: ROUND 3 - DELMA - PERSEPHONE EVANS

[the-colony-roleplay]

Constantin Lupei | Thirty Six;  Survivor

House: Torren Security Class: 2 Status: Infected - Telepathy

History

Constantin suspects he might have been one of the first people to see the asteroids coming in 2157. There were five of them on the International Space Station at the time: Constantin Lupei, Romanian, ISS systems engineer. Zander Koch, American, ISS mission commander. Fan Shi Hui, Chinese, ISS medical officer. Anaya Dolmen, English, botanist. And finally, Dostovalova Natalia Mikhailovna, Russian, ISS Navigator. When the asteroids came, Constantin had been there the shortest time, at only two months, and he was struggling to connect with the other astronauts as the only common language between them was English, and Costin’s grasp of the language had always been shaky. He was just a small-town Romanian boy, really, that had studied hard, worked his way through the ranks of the air force,  and achieved his goals. Every kid wants to be an astronaut; most grow out of it, but Costin never did. The difficulty he had communicating didn’t stop him from alerting everyone to the anomaly he saw from one of the windows, and the crew immediately jumped into action to alert those on the ground that an asteroid shower was heading directly for earth.

Their message got through, but there hadn’t been enough time for it to make any difference. Costin and the rest of the crew watched in numb horror as their home was buried in fire. They kept talking to those on the ground, gathered around the communications device until it was cut off. The other four soon left to mourn in private; that would turn out to be their greatest mistake, as the node containing the crew sleeping quarters would be struck by an asteroid shortly after.

Zander, Natalia, and Shi Hui were killed immediately. Anaya’s room was spared, but the passageway connecting her node to the Cupola module where Costin was was badly damaged. She was trapped, the connecting tube too badly compromised for them to be able to risk opening the doors, and their communications were down. The only mercy was that emergency rations were stored in each astronauts quarters, enough to supply them a month - more, if they were careful.

They kept busy; it wasn’t difficult, particularly for Costin with the whole station to roam. The ISS was badly damaged, and if they valued their lives then he would have to keep working on repairing it. He worked through his mourning, and at first Costin assumed the near-unbearable headaches were a grief response. They grew worse, making concentrating more and more difficult as his ears began to ring. And then after two months, something changed. He was sitting at the window through which he could still see Anaya, holding up notes to let her know that he was trying to work something out. Anaya was growing increasingly thin, eating only a third of the recommended rations each day, and nearly mad with loneliness as she was trapped between four small walls. As Costin was thinking how horrific it must be for her to be there, she sat bolt upright, and even from such a great distance, he could see how wide her eyes had gone. I CAN HEAR YOU, she wrote, and so it was that the Infections first began to manifest - they realise now that when the ship had been damaged, the strange orange gas that seeped through the cracks had affected them.

Over the next few weeks, Costin worked at his telepathy, ‘talking’ to Anaya as often as he could, while at the same time her telekinesis presented itself. After months of work and tentative planning, Costin began to teach her how she might repair the airlock and make it safe for her to cross. She didn’t have a spacesuit with her, but using her telekinesis she might be able to repair it enough that it wouldn’t matter. She was terrified, because one wrong move could be fatal, but she was also desperate as her rations ran frighteningly thin. Six months after D-Day, she finally managed it under Costin’s careful instruction. She hadn’t eaten for a week by then, and when she fell into Constin’s arms he knew she weighed next to nothing, even in zero gravity.

They both wept. And now that they were reunited, they discussed trying to return to earth in one of the emergency vessels. Having not seen any sign of life since the asteroids hit, and they weren’t sure if they could bear returning to a dead planet. So they tried to live, fixing up what parts of the ship they could, calculating how long the rations would last (a long time, between just the two of them), and what the point of it all was. They honed their Infections, Anaya’s being particularly interesting in zero-grav. For want of anything else to do, they began to experiment, taking extensive notes and writing papers just for their own satisfaction.

They were almost happy, for a time. The months turned into years, and somehow they learned to live. Sometimes they even laughed. That changed in July, 2162, when another shower of asteroids shot past. The ISS was spared any further damage, but the planet was once more aflame. The sight of it spurred Costin into action; he wasn’t sure what had changed in his perception, except for the fact that even if every single person on Earth had died, he and Anaya had survived. They wouldn’t be able to live up here forever, but if they returned to Earth, maybe they could salvage a life that would last beyond the next couple of years that their rations would allow.

If they died, Costin said, it was better to die in pursuit of a better life than to waste away up here when the food ran out. The emergency vessels had sustained only minimal damage, and he worked on one for several weeks until he was satisfied that it would be safe. They spent a day walking around, saying goodbye to the station that had been their home for the past four years, and packing as much research and rations into their return ship as they could fit.

And then, they left. Both sending out prayers that they would make it back, both white-knuckled with nerves, both absolutely silent until they re-entered the atmosphere. They came crashing down in the Atlantic, miraculously both alive and unharmed. Shortly after they were picked up by a merchant vessel who took them to shore.

Costin Today

After so many years in space, Costin and Anaya struggled to adjust to life back on earth, with the gravity wreaking havoc on their systems. They were taken first to Colony 4, until they had recovered their strength enough to travel a little further. Both of them were transported to Colony 22 in December, where it was hoped that they could provide assistance with the lab research thanks to their experience, both with lab work and their own Infections. It was soon ascertained however, after a few conversations with the CISM team, that neither of them were in any state to be working on sensitive material or be given too much responsibility.

Costin is by far the more outgoing of the two. Although his English skills are still lacking, he learned a lot with Anaya over the years, and he is keen to talk to people. He can seem gruff at first, thanks to his eastern European upbringing and years of near-isolation, but he means well and likes to be surrounded by people. In fact, he can be needy at times, desperate to stay close to anyone that will let him stick around. He is also, unfortunately, highly emotional. So much trauma has left him fragile, and he can be laughing loudly one moment, only to dissolve into tears the next. Open as he is with his emotions, they can be unpredictable, and until he gets a better grip on that it’s been made clear that he won’t be permitted to be around the research.

That’s fine by him, as he and Anaya have their little secret - all the research they conducted on the ISS. They had planned on sharing it, but seeing the NWRF in action made them reconsider. All of their work is handwritten, hidden in slits that they put in their mattresses, because they don’t want to help those in power. When it comes to training and the Games, Costin is a hard worker, but not the most proficient. His body is still weak from being in space for years longer than anticipated, so he tires easily. He does, however, have an aptitude for long range weaponry thanks to his training from the air force, and is finding it very therapeutic. He has excellent control over his telepathy, and although he doesn’t often use it during AP training, he uses it daily with Anaya. For all of his outgoing nature, Costin is struggling to fully trust anyone but her. He thought that the Infections were an incredible gift, but the NWRF clearly have other ideas, and so he is wary of saying too much: the physical proximity to other people feels like it is healing him, but the emotional proximity terrifies him.

RELATED BIOS: ANAYA DOLMEN

TAKEN; Original Character

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SNOWED IN AU / CONSTANTIN & MEI ZHU

There was a terrible rumour among the peasant girls. Rumours, of women awakening with peculiar marks on their neck, memories gone and skin pale. They looked to the strange Count, a foreign man who watched from his isolated castle but was rarely seen, and said it was him. Dr. Fitrei knew better. The marks on those silly girls’ necks were just bites from stray insects, and she would prove it. As the first frost of winter lays a sparkling blanket upon the Transylvanian countryside, the doctor travels to the castle, determined to prove him a man, not a monster. But as she is welcomed into the vast, echoing halls of the Count’s home, a heavy snow begins to fall. What was supposed to be a visit of only a few nights will see her trapped there for the winter, and she may soon learn that she has  b i t t e n  off more than she can chew...

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ASTRAEUS ⁂ constantin lupei, titan of stars and astrology

Old Astraeus heard it and arose; he had covered the surface of a table with dark dust, where he was describing in traced lines a circle with the tooth of his rounding tool, within which he inscribed a square in the dark ashes, and another figure with three equal sides and angles.

—nonnus, dionysiaca 6. 1 | @cvnstantin

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CONSTANTIN LUPEI  ⚔️ DRUNK MAN’S CHEST

Constantin doesn’t have much – when he and Ana returned to Earth there wasn’t room in the pod for many items, so his wardrobe is largely comprised of what he was given on arrival at the Colony. He’s not been worried lately about dressing up nicely so he’s not bought much to pad out his wardrobe, but it’s clear how important this party is to Fee so he wants to put some effort in. He buys himself a nice white shirt at the Hub, which is a little too big for him but when left half-undone actually lends to the pirate theme. He pairs it with some black corduroy trousers he already owned, as well as a chunky black belt with a silver buckle and the ubiquitous Black Boots that every post apocalyptic survivor owns. Owning no jewelry of his own, Koda very generously allows Costin to raid his stash and pick a few bits out to bling up his outfit. He’d not had any particular plans for his hair, but Felix styles it for him in a half-up bun that he ends up really liking the look of.

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POSTCARD AU // The 2157 crew from the ISS return safely to Earth, landing in England. The crew’s engineer, Constantin Lupei, decides to take the scenic route back to Romania, and travels through Europe by train. He sends postcards to the person he’d grown closest to on the station, but as the miles between them grow, he realises he might have left something important behind…

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           ❝She’s whisky in a teacup.❞

◆ member since: nov. 10th 2014 ◆ longest character: dante carrington ◆

@dante-carrington;  I know for a fact I’ve said this before, but Maddie, I will never forget the day you applied to Belvedere.  You were the original ‘diamond in the rough’, ‘appeared from the wilds of the RPC’, ‘where has this person been all my life’ kind of applicant. I was elated by your depth of imagination, how thoroughly you understood your characters, how beautifully you wrote, and how serendipitously we connected on a level of character, muse and understanding one another. Needless to say, you did not disappoint as you lived out the remaining days of Belvedere. 

But what was more surprising than even the quality of enthusiasm and joy you brought to the group, was what you came to mean to me. I never in a million years imagined to get such a life-long and true friend out of a place like Belvedere, which had happened almost entirely on accident, nor out of RP in general (of course, little did I know, that years down the road the majority of my best friends and family would be RP born, haha). 

I think very fondly on those long Belvedere nights that you, me, Cassie and Olly or Tabby would stay up until the birds were chirping just laughing and plotting and shooting the shit. You brought an earnest joy and friendliness to the RP then, and it’s the same one you bring now, to Colony 22. Lottie and I are so grateful for your absolutely outstanding RP etiquette. You have found a remarkable balance between having the flexibility and easy-going attitude to keep the whole thing fun, and the commitment, diligence, reliability and attention to detail to keep the experience exciting, motivating and fair for everyone. 

Our friendship aside, your activity, ‘work’ ethic and RP etiquette make it impossible for me to be biased about you if I tried. While you know your limitations, you always put the feelings of others before your own. You are unfailingly considerate of your RP partners, emotionally supportive of the community, and you always, always follow through. Without fail, we know we can count on you to be there when you say you will, to communicate when you can’t be, and to approach your time and place here with enthusiasm, patience, maturity and an extraordinarily kind heart.

Thank you, Maddie, for the humble and positive attitude you have brought to this community all these years, for making Lottie and I’s jobs so much easier and enjoyable, and for helping to foster the supportive and welcoming environment in which Colony 22 so prides itself. ❤

-Love Rory & Lottie

             —-     Happy Colony 6th Anniversary      —-