Sylvia Farkas

Sylvia Farkas (: 18390-81743-SF), nicknamed Poet by her peers, is a skilled pilot who served in the  throughout the late insurrection and the entire. Although born too late to distinguish herself during, she has participated in nearly all major battles of the Human-Covenant War. Although she originally showed promise with atmospheric VTOLs such as, Farkas would find her talents best used as an interceptor and dropship pilot, even as her record was littered with complaints about her lack of discipline and chattiness.

Early Life
Born on Reach in early, Sylvia Farkas was raised by her father Arisztid Farkas, a handyman who worked as a stay-at-home dad and occasionally a self-employed electrician. A middle-class family living on a in the, the Farkas family had maintained the farm for generations, tracing their lineage down from the original colonists of the world. Her mother, Marica Graner, was a respected officer in the UNSC Navy. She was rarely around much in Sylvia's childhood, with each deployment sending her away for years at a time without any word of contact. This fact, along with the continued draconian stance she took, would see the young girl never fully appreciating her mother, so distant in fact that she would eventually treat her no differently to anyone else she knew.

Despite having a healthy relationship with the neighbours' children, often ignoring the commands of her father to play in the local wilderness, Sylvia was never content to fulfil her destiny as a farmer. While she was just as tomboyish as her sisters, enjoying to hunt with her parents, she stood out from them as being a dreamer. She was always the girl who looked up to the stars, thinking about the entire worlds that might be visible in Reach's night skies or the strange animals she could hunt there. Perhaps because of her desire to leave, Sylvia grew interested in aircraft and how to fly them. This lead to her pestering her father to establish what would be called the "Farkasok Elrejtve (Wolf's Hide)", a large virtual-reality game-room housed in a disused shed on her property. Although terrible at first, constant trial and error over her childhood allowed her to becoming familiar enough to beat even more skilled adults in competitive matches. Seeing her innate talents and desire to learn, after her thirteenth birthday her father arranged her to meet one of his friends, an old civilian pilot by the name of Indra Abbey. He allowed her to pilot one of his old hobby planes; after a short scuffle with fighting its controls, she would save the craft and land it on its belly safely.

In school, Farkas' unusual obsession did not make her a loner among the other kids. Rather, she managed to gather a large circle of people she knew as friends, staying clear of the posh crowd thanks to their tomboy qualities. Often rough-housing or play-fighting with the others, she never did any major rebellions here, sticking for the most part to the rules. However, there was plenty she was teased about by her friends, with her hobbies for art and memorising Shakespearean plays being the easiest to taunt her over. These were always seen as little running gags, rarely ever getting mad at the others for this.

However, in just weeks after her fourteenth birthday, Farkas received word that she would be enrolled into the  (CAMS) on. Informed too late to make any attempts at rebelling, Farkas found it difficult to adapt to the regimented, highly controlled environment there. Although she found motivation to excel in academics, with her test scores mirroring the very best in her class, she did not extend this to anywhere else. She performed poorly in field exercises, suffering some of the lowest survival, close-combat and shooting scores in the past few years, with only her skill with a pistol being considered average. Her lack of respect towards instructors and inability to heed discipline protocols saw her unit being frequently charged with additional responsibilities. All this saw Farkas being despised by most of her unit, who saw her as a spoilt brat. Her small stature also saw her become something of a punching bag for her class, being barely able to defend herself.

Being isolated as a target, Farkas' self-esteem struggled, yet would get an opportunity to finally impress at least some of her peers. Joining the Air Force elective to be assigned to pilot training, Farkas would quickly show off her skills to the others, instantly becoming uncontested as the best pilot in her class. Her ability to coordinate with her cabin crew had started to build up respect with a small group of people. One of these was Samantha Blake, a fellow pilot who at first competed with Farkas. Impressed by her skills in a simulation, Blake would actually be the first to befriend Farkas, finding the courage to see past her rebellious exterior. Supporting her when she was pitted against the instructors and her, she would bring Farkas back out from her developing depression and pull her into her own circle of friends. The two would eventually become partners in crime, and over the years their friendship would turn into a proper relationship. This would ultimately inspire Farkas to drop her efforts at getting expelled, eventually making it through with an Officer's commission. While her mother urged her to join the Navy as a shipboard officer, she struck a deal to ensure she can see service as a pilot before switching branches out of the field. This would be a ruse, as Farkas had no intention to follow through on the deal, which did not bother her in the least when Marica died before she could follow through with it.

Battle of Ffyniannus
"We aren't on some quiet Inner Colony - we're on a world in foxtrottin' open rebellion! I want to go home to my kids, but with you routinely ignoring whatever the hotel I say, I don't think I'll be around much longer. So I'll say this once, just once: next time you disobey me, I'm shipping you off to some rock you'll never be able to escape. Or... I might let ONI have their way with you if its severe enough. We clear?"

- Commander Lynwood's threat to Farkas, immediately following her arrival back to Alpha Base.

Enlisting into the UNSC's Naval Aviation branch immediately after graduating from CAMS, Farkas and her peers would be assigned into the 172nd Naval Escort Squadron, an unit that's stationed on the  UNSC Gibraltar. Falling under the authority of the lethargic Commander Marwin Lynwood, the squadron was known for operating safely on friendly colonies; this allowed her mother to conveniently stonewall her career. As a result of this meddling, for the first two years Farkas would be reluctantly posted to escort supply convoys heading to escort logistical convoys taking supplies to. She would request transfer numerous times, all being denied, and the lack of action would see her frequently argue with Lynwood over their lack of action.

Finally, in the Gibraltar was called upon to assist in the pacification of Ffyniannus. A strong opponent who formed a union with the other Gaelic colonies, Ffyniannus fought the UNSC to in a dangerous conventional war for the better part of seven years. With its orbital fleet shattered after years of attrition and its complement of anti-ship defences being depleted from bombing runs, the UNSC believed that now is the time to begin the ground invasion. Having identified an ideal staging site in the form of an Insurrectionist air field flanked by a mountain range, Sylvia's squadron coordinated with a flight of GA-TL1 Longswords to pacify the installation. This worked perfectly; the Longsword strategic-bombing quickly destroyed the rebel interceptors being prepared for launch, with the hornets carefully clearing out the hostile vehicles and infantry in conjunction with. Having secured the only military base in its region, Lynwood ordered Sylvia's flight to patrol the nearby region for hidden anti-aircraft guns. Once secured, the Gibraltar ferried down its entire complement of troops, prefabricated turrets and structures down using its dropships. Later reinforced with a self-sufficient, this outpost, codenamed Alpha Base, would become central to the UNSC's initial attempts at subjugating the rogue colony.

To Farkas' delight they were given more active assignments. As one of the few air units permanently stationed in the region, Farkas would remain on-station to intercept isolated tank columns and protect logistical craft heading to the frontlines. However, only a fortnight into her deployment, she and Blake would be called to support a platoon of marines engaging a Falkirian guerrilla force. Taking slight damage while being unable to effectively fight the soldiers, her foes would suddenly turn tail and head towards an open road on the mountain range. While the rest of her flight pulled back, Farkas defied orders and pressed on to intercept them, with Blake backing reluctantly backing her up. It was then that an unidentified dual-rotor gunship suddenly ambushed them. Gripped with panic, she tried to pull back, exposing her rotors to the gunship's machine guns and sending her crashing to the ground. She would be knocked out on impact, being saved and treated by the very marine platoon she was sent to help. Forced to spend time in recovery, she would be visited in the field hospital by Lynwood, who gave her a stern lecture about disobeying orders. However, she was horrified to learn that all but two other pilots were killed by the gunship's weapons.

She would return to active duty weeks later, given a new Hornet to assist in the renewed offensive. Cautious after her last crash, she would be part of an force heading to the city of Rei Fervenzas, who were responsible for clearing the roads to ensure the next battalions can arrive safely. To Lynwood's surprise, she continued to grow more aggressive, seeking revenge against the unidentified aircraft that almost killed her and entire squadron. It was this aggression that she started to distinguish herself, being responsible for a number of lightning raids on Falkirian outposts and refuelling bases deep within enemy territory. Blake would watch her every move, using her recently-discovered knack for stealth detection to launch surprise raids on rebel VTOLs that responded to their call for help. It wasn't until they were setting up the last refuelling site before Fervenzas that she received reports of the mysterious gunship sighted approaching an UNSC artillery unit. She would get there in time to see the craft flee, though would be denied the order to pursuit, resulting in the gunship blowing up the very refuelling site she was just at. Because of this, tensions between Farkas and Lynwood would remain high until their final mission together in the following fortnight.

Despite their attempt to delay the UNSC, the order was given to Farkas' squadron to support the 231st Armoured Battalion and 26th Infantry Regiment in their objective to take the city. Protected by massive walls with anti-armour and anti-air turrets lining the top, the city were an immediate problem to the UNSC armies. While the time waiting for the frigates was taken up with preparations for a siege, there was still time for banter and shenanigans; it was during this period that Blake would give Farkas her lifelong nickname of 'Poet', when in a drunken haze she badly misquoted and misrepresented a number of Shakespearian plays to hilarious results. Finally, when the frigates finally descended down on the city, her squadron were sent in alongside the Vanguard. Ordered specifically to stay behind the forward platoons, she would only loosely follow them, with her vengefulness seeing her diverge slightly to destroy incoming tanks and bomb what she thought were ideal ambush positions. This was tolerable, until finally she spotted the gunship which was responsible for so many embarrassments to both her squadron and the UNSC. She broke off from her squadron, charging forward to fight the gunship herself. In spite of its superiority she performed well, using the buildings to evade its heavy missiles and supporting fire with the gunship skilfully evading her own rockets in turn. Chasing it into the heart of the city, she managed to force it down and annihilated its crash site to ensure there were no survivors. Turning back towards her squadron, and receiving an angry transmission from Lynwood, she would suddenly be ambushed by a Falkirian missile squad. They forced her down, although she was able to bail from it onto a nearby tower. Running from any rebel squads she saw, at the end of the day she was able to link back up with UNSC forces. Unfortunately, once returning to Lynwood, she learnt she was immediately grounded until she could be either court-marshalled or reassigned out of her unit.

Appearance
Clocking in at a rather short five foot three, Farkas can be described as stocky and looking surprisingly young despite her age. She appears healthy for her size, with a lean muscle build with little fat across her body that pales in comparison to other military personnel. Her European ancestry is readily noticeable through her fair skin, with only her hands and to a point her face showing any signs of tanning. She is light on wrinkles and other kinds of complexion, with only a few age lines visible across her face, a gift from flash-cloned skin treatment being applied after the war. Other defining traits that are natural are her green eyes and her nearly black hair, which was kept in a pony-tail. Overall, she appears average if shorter than most people, with only a few stray grey streaks revealing her true age. She does have a number of tattoos, the most prominent one being an image of a pale-skinned raptor holding the number nine on her forearm, identical to the war paint that was on the nose of her beloved pelican.

In terms of uniform, Farkas prefers to wear practical clothing that'll keep her comfortable while not sacrificing pocket space, with a dark-green jumpsuit. While most pilots have moved on to wearing a fully-sealed spacesuit with a bulky helmet, Farkas rejects that if she can, although her clothes meet the most basic vacuum- and fire-proof requirements needed for military deployment. Instead, she normally an opened atmospheric helmet, leaving her mouth and jaw open, with an adjustable microphone extending down the left side. The RayBan glasses are tinted against the glare of the nearby star, and while they support smart-linking and a heads-up display, she normally leaves it off unless she absolutely needs it. She also occasionally wears a light-green bomber jacket when it gets cooler. A survival vest which is compatible with all emergency parafoil and parachute models is also a favourite, with pockets for ammunition and other necessary equipment lining the front. Like most pilots, she removes most armoured components for the sake of comfort, going so far as removing even her shoulder-guards. A neck-gaiter is also part of her usual loadout to protect her face in case of fire, with the same reasoning going for her gloves. The only other thing that she normally wears is a canteen on her belt and her pistol, with the appropriate holsters on either side, and a simple first-aid kit in case of injuries.

Off-duty, she wears one of two sets. Never one for fashion, she was content to simply wear her flight suit and black leather boots, sometimes not even bothering to keep herself groomed. If she is expecting to head out, then her clothing is much more variable, normally being her fur-collared flight jacket with a leather exterior, loose jeans and the same boots mentioned before. The shirt in either variants is not set, although she usually defaults to one with a solid colour and her assigned ship's logo printed on it, with a dark belt featuring a belt buckle styled in the shape of the UNSC's insignia, a golden eagle.

Personality
"Nah mate, don't think of Poet as your typical military woman - think hot-headed teenager on a constant adrenaline high. Just a little bloody ball of energy and positivity, she is."

- Edmond Dahm, describing Farkas in.

Throughout most of her career, Farkas has become known for her long list of discipline issues which would have had her discharged had she not been so good at flying. Indeed, the first thing anyone would recognise is her chattiness, as she found it easy to communicate with others or making snarky comments on any situation around her. While this was not an issue, it did manifest in her habit of letting out loud remarks on her situation, even taking it a step further by mocking her opponents on an encrypted communications channel. She played fast-and-loose with protocol and sometimes the chain of command, largely conforming to orders but occasionally refusing them when they conflicted with her personal beliefs. For example, she had a reputation of mouthing off superiors and refusing to run until she had gotten confirmation that the Marines were either on-board or cut down dead in their tracks. On other occasions she would fly into highly-contested territory or continue to press her attack on a hunch - one that would often turn out to be right on Farkas' part. Her slight addiction to alcohol and her status as a smoker is another reason many look down on her at first. Often seen having a schooner of Dreher Classic beer or vodka, she has developed a fair amount of tolerance to the substance. The worst case of this is her increasing consumption of a moonshine called Jetfuel, which she sculls down when she begins to fall into depression or grief - an unfortunately common case as she lost more friends to Covenant attacks. This has become so bad that many of her fellow pilots have turned it into a running joke, stating that if a new recruit couldn't survive their initiation with Jetfuel, they didn't deserve a place as her wingman.

Despite those issues, she was no rebellious prick, in fact she's often said to be the opposite. She's casual and friendly, never being one to make fun of her peers out of spite. She is eager and confident with all things flying, yet while she'll often remark how often or how good she is at flying, she'll never brag about her greater accomplishments. She was fun-loving and always ready to crack a joke, never regretting any stunts that she did in her off-hours. She does have a set moral compass and is rarely intimidated to submit to peer pressure. As a result, she can be considered trusted not to make the wrong decision by her subordinates. A key example is her continued refusal to accept any higher ranks, which she fears would take her out of active combat roles. She is also incredibly proud of making her own way in life, ignoring any help her ranking mother offered. Finally, she feels hugely responsible for her subordinates, going to courageous lengths to ensure their survival. For this reason, she will never show obvious signs of panic, remaining cool and collected even under fire.

However, when the War ended she found it increasingly difficult to manage her guilt for her fallen wingmen. This would result in post-traumatic stress disorder arising in her later career, only adding to her dependency on alcohol. She would constantly blame herself for their deaths, even when its obvious that there was nothing she could've done to save them. This is one of the only reasons that she began taking increasing time away the front lines, such as when she was brought on to assist in the development of the D79H-TC(S) Stealth and G80H-TC Siege Pelicans. Another change was her fading idealism; when she first enlisted, she wanted to bring peace to all mankind, though as the Human-Covenant War raged on and her constant headbutting with her superiors, she found herself abandoning this in favour of getting on with her life. In preparation for the day when she retires, she has a bottle of Viery Vodka, which was retrieved from a bottle store during the Fall of Reach.

Another drug she was also addicted to was a potent stimulant known simply as Stim. Taken in small capsules, the drug is engineered to allow a person to keep awake for at least eight hours, with full responsiveness for at least six. As the horrors of the war meant that military personnel like Farkas often had to work well past the time they'd be asleep, there was no doubt she became addicted to it. It was through this addiction that she became known for her characteristic energy and gung-ho attitude, as well as emphasizing her willingness to talk before thinking. In fact, many people she works with cannot remember any time she sat completely still, with a twitch always present in her stature. Her dependency meant that she was never able to completely recover from it, though support by her colleges on Jaeter meant that she was able to manage it enough that it would never again dominate her life.

Farkas speaks in a faint Hungarian speech pattern common to the inhabitants of Reach, which was somewhat difficult to pick up if one was not actively listening to the cues. This accent was contrasted by her insistence on quips, although she does speak in a very informal tone. Puzzling, her phrasing was awkward, continuing to add on to sentences even when it's not necessary, leading to her cutting parts of words and speaking very quickly. This was due to her stimulants and lack of sleep.

Skills
As is obvious with any pilot, Farkas is incredibly skilled in the skies. Displaying a natural talent for flying, she has proven to be capable of performing any maneuver possible, even pulling off extremely-risky stunts that were sure to end in death for any other. She has a higher reaction time compared to any other unaugmented human, which allowed her to evade missiles and stray shots; in fact, the first time she was shot down since her first campaign was during the. Before that, she only suffered minor damage that did not affect the integrity of her dropship. While specializing with dropships, she wasn't that much worse with any other craft. Her ability to be quick to learn the quirks of different aircraft meant that she could use everything from right up to Sloop-class prowlers with a minimal amount of training. So skilled was she that she was considered as a candidate for Project JAVELIN, and was successfully brought on to fly the elite in the final years of the war.

While no stranger with a gun, she was a significant disadvantage compared to soldiers and marines which had been training with them for virtually their entire career. The only class of firearms she excels at are handguns. Although she struggles with managing their recoil thanks to a lack of practice, she is a skilled shot capable of hitting a bullseye beyond 150 metres before having to switch to her smart-linked scope. This accuracy is why she rarely wields rifles, as she is deadlier with only her sidearms.

Farkas' distinct personality and lack of discipline does have its merits. If she changes her usual shirt and belt-buckle, Farkas finds it easy to blend into crowds with none of the awkwardness typically displayed by military personnel. It's made harder to pick her out because of her ability to easily strike up a conversation with most civilians, with her looks making it look far younger than she actually is. As a result, she could be inserted into crowds to spy on people and events, although she can often be seen being distracted by the attractions around her. During her time in ONI, this was only improved, receiving training on how to best stalk people without being detected. If discovered, however, her lack of competent firearm skills means that she's more likely to be overwhelmed and captured. To stop her from revealing information through torture, she has been trained extensively in counter-torture techniques. However, the most reliable method is to either have her tailed by an armed operative, watching her around every corner, or to have a squad of Marines stationed nearby in case things go wrong.

Vehicles
Unlike most pilots, Farkas has been called upon to fulfil a number of pilot positions across a wide variety of other craft. While most of these share standardised controls, their unique quirks in flight and requirement to use different tactics to make the most out of them ensure that she is one of the elite few certified to handle every aircraft in service.

Remarks
"'Cause fuck regs, I'm special forces."

- Farkas' defense when questioned about her discipline issues.

Appearances

 * RP:Jaeter's Protectors