Ahmal ibn Rawaid

B.E.Zieger's Childer

Appearance: A careworn man in his early or mid-twenties, Ahmal could pass for someone twice his age at times. He stands 5'9" tall, capped with curly black hair flecked with premature hints of gray. His deep-set eyes, when not obscured by shadow, are almost the black of his pupils. He is equally comfortable wearing western garb, his native Arabic dress, and military camouflage and body armor. He usually wears tech-glasses, with the external tint turned up enough to hide his eyes.

Behavior: Ahmal is usually a soft-spoken man, careful not to judge, or at least expose his inner dialogue to the outside world. When called on to make a judgment, he often imposes harsh punishments for relatively minor infractions: Hard experience has taught him that mercenaries and ghouls will simply laugh off any justice that does not truly sting, and be all the quicker to err again.

History: Born scant years before the Towers in New York came down, Ahmal never knew the earlier, more peaceful age of his homeland: His people were at war, and have been at war ever since. They are at war with invaders, at war with the world, at war with their beliefs, and most of all, they are at war with themselves. At the tender age of 9, he was all-but-kidnapped to help fight that war. One of his school teachers decided that impoverished Rawaid would not miss his bright, young and easily impressionable son.

Ahmal's new family taught him much: They taught him how to shoot a gun, how to recite phrases from the Quran, how to pass unnoticed among adults, and how to win their sympathy. Unfortunately, he had already learned to read, and had a voracious appetite for the wisdom he found in the only reading material available: the holy book of Islam. As he was being prepared to become a martyr, he began to think too much. It bothered him that his mentors cared more about teaching Islam than about living by it. He was beaten more than once for quoting the wrong verses of the Quran. The final straw came when he learned that he was to carry a bomb into a Saudi government building rather than striking at what he saw as the true infidel. As soon as he was out of sight of his handlers, fourteen year old Ahmal removed the radio receiver from the detonator, headed down a side street, and went home.

Soon, members of his family started turning up dead, and he knew he had to get out of town. His father claimed that he had been killed to redeem the family's honor, and put him on a ship to Tanzania. With no skills other than the ability to kill and discuss religion, Ahmal found that his only option was to enlist with one of the many mercenary recruiters that haunt African port cities looking for hard-luck cases just like him. He detested the kind of men he worked with, and the kind of fun they had. His only solace was that more often than not, the companies he served with fought others of their own ilk, giving him the chance to kill the kind of men he despised.

Of course, Ahmal's attitude did not go unnoticed. He was the first to be laid off or left behind when work became scarce. Despite his intelligence and aptitude, he was never promoted: Instead, he drifted from company to company, an unemployed mercenary, more often than not.

So it was that he signed up to do guard duty for an odd secret assignment in war-torn northern Greece. While he ...

• -- Ahmal ibn Rawaid's Statistics