Captain Baxton Dratiir

Perfectionist. Alert. Protective. Adaptable. Observant AF.

"Don't you dare take advantage of my crew. They don't work for nothing, and they definitely don't work for YOU."

Captain is a human man who stands at 6'2" with a strong stance and a muscular build. He has a stern but friendly demeanor and carries himself with confidence. Gives the impression that he's got everything under control, even as he overworks himself to do more than his share of making sure things are indeed under control. He has thick, cropped brown hair that is buzzed on the sides, a trimmed beard over a stubborn chin, and always-alert hazel eyes. His hair is tousled when his sleep is disturbed but otherwise he takes care to keep it and his facial hair neat and trimmed.
In each ear, he has a gold daith piercing. His nose is crooked from being broken when he was younger, the consequence of doing poorly on a test. It did not have the desire impact on his studies, so his parents switched tactics after that and moved into more effective manipulation instead of physical punishments. He has a scar on his right cheek from a farming incident when he was 19, an accident which redoubled his efforts to learn fast and stay on alert.

Past

Born into a middle class family on a planet known for feeding the Galactic Security ranks, Captain had a father with ambitions and a mother who expected her whims met at every turn. His life was mapped to the stars from the day he took his first breath of oxygen and his education and extracurriculars were suited to his parents' view of his future. They just knew their "Captain" would rise through the ranks of the security forces, sending back his paychecks from space to give them a life on easy street. It might have happened that way, too. He was loyal, obedient, hard-working, and entirely focused on following the path laid before him. Any interest he had beyond that was summarily crushed until he lived by rote, organized and perfectionistic, alert and preemptively ready for anything his parents demanded or needed.
And then on the night of his 18th birthday, the ONE time he wasn't prepared for everything life had to throw at him, the ONE time he let his guard down to relax and allow himself a small celebration......well, instead of stepping into the Galactic Security Academy with his peers the next morning, Captain woke up inside a rickety metal space bucket belonging to, not pirates, but farmers. Desperate farmers in need of hands on their ranch. His fingerprints were in the process of being seared off with the very laser tools they used to brand their cattle, in the first step of several intended to obliterate his bioID. The second step involved a painful injection of nanobots.
He blamed himself, and still believes that if something goes wrong it's his fault because he wasn't prepared.
During his unwilling tenure on the planet Captain met people from many species and from many cultures, listened to their stories, and learned that the narrow life he had lived, and the destined path he'd been walking, was but a tiny thread in the vast tapestry of space. His parents had made him believe he wasn't worthy of anything but the path they'd laid before him to the extent of punishing any and every slight deviation or interest. He could have had many, many different opportunities, and as a result of these new stories, he began to imagine and long for a new future among the stars.

The Euphorion

Euphorion was a ship in the farm fleet, decommissioned for repairs and ultimately slated for scrap when the cost was deemed too high. Captain discovered mechanic and rodentia farmer Landon Hayes tinkering with the gutted ship, planning to steal the discarded hulk and fly away from his family's home on his own after he fixed it. Quickly taking control of the situation, Captain took over planning, acquisition of materials, and arranged for one other conspirator, an engineer-turned-unwilling-farmer and Ursakynd named Boltclaw. The three of them swore each other to secrecy. They boosted the Euphorion off-world and began a harrowing flight to...anywhere.
None of them could navigate, nor pilot the ship. However, Hayes could keep it running, Boltclaw could speak to the computer systems, and Captain had thorough education in Port protocol and station etiquette. More than enough skill to access the starmaps, get the ship to steer itself on a course to a starport, and successfully dock. The journey would prove to be merely the start of their adventures.

New Outlooks

Being kidnapped with half the incoming freshman class of the Academy didn't instill much faith in the Galactic Security institution he'd been meant to join. Captain's opinion only worsened when rescue never came. And it soured utterly when, 15 years later, he escaped and discovered that no one--not even his family--bothered to look for (much less hire someone to look for!) those taken in the first place. Upon return to the galaxy at large he also discovered that his parents simply discarded him as a loss. They shifted their unrealistic expectations onto his younger brother, who was attending the Academy with honors and who actually thrived on it. When his parents attempted to thrust him into immediate service and deliver him to Galactic Security to increase their paychecks, Captain cut off communication.
By extension, he also mistrusts Galactic Security and blames them in part for the way he was forced to grow up...which could lead to some complications with space protocols that are manned by Security forces, should they push him too far. Once he may have questioned his desire for independence. Once, he had allowed that desire to be crushed under strict protocols of obedience. This callous disregard for his life and individual lives by his parents and Galactic Security--ultimately disposable children and workers--has blasted those doubts to pieces.
He has grown into a strong distaste for people who use others to accomplish their goals and believes that all people in power who do no labor of their own don't deserve trust nor respect.

Captain, the Workaholic

Unfortunately, his ease of replacement from his former life has given him a bit of a self-worth issue: if anyone could do the job he was literally born and raised to do, he has to be perfect and then some moving forward so he can't be replaced so easily again.
He works. Constantly. He's unable to relax or rely on others to the point where he skips sleep, meals, and generally overworks himself. This can lead to times where he's unable to function well, which feeds self-loathing and feelings of failure as others take over for him. He considers this using others--the same way one in power would use/abuse their inferiors, and he hates himself for it. Nevermind that being able to rely on one's crew to support the whole of the ship is part and parcel of his position--it is this very reliance that he sees as taking people for granted, which he can't abide. Add to that the training beaten into him growing up that things going wrong would be his fault, that things must be perfect and never go wrong, and his mindset leads to him triple-checking behind others' work, taking extra extra time to complete tasks, and acting at times as if he Is the whole crew all by himself.
It should be noted that at no point does he criticize his crew's work nor become aggressive with them for working below his standards. He knows things are screwed up in his priorities and that his logic doesn't hold when others have expertise in areas he doesn't. So he doesn't hold them to the same standard. In fact, his alertness and ease of reading people is something he's grudgingly thankful to his upbringing for, because it allows him to know what his crew members need, often before they do, and he's a very considerate Captain in that regard. Still, he can't seem to stop himself from overworking and overpreparing.
For his own good his crew takes creative action to bypass his micromanagement as well as to remove him from the deck when they need to ensure he takes necessary breaks.

Owned Vehicles

• Euphorion