Drift (Ties That Bind)

An enduring enigma to his team mates from both sides of the battlefield, Dai Takahiro does his best to make amends for a bloody past, even if no one save a few put any stock into his sincerity about turning away from the life of a mercenary.

Which suits him absolutely fine, he’ll tell anyone suggesting otherwise—-he isn’t doing it for them, he knows he’s hurt people and doesn’t expect acceptance.

Early Life
Dai started out his life in Japan as an orphan after he was given away by a father too young for the responsibility and grew up in foster homes for most of his childhood. While these humble beginnings might have relegated unwanted children to a future life as faceless manual workers at the bottom of the hierarchy, he proved to be an athletically-gifted child who excelled on the track, a talent government scouts couldn’t ignore. He was drafted as an ‘early pick’ to be trained in a sports academy to represent the country in the Olympics when he came of age, and he built all of his dreams for his future on that prospect.

He blazed the track and was given the name ‘Drift’ by his coach, Goro Katsuo, due to his skill at navigating bends as though he was drifting past them, winning race after race in his home country.

Triumph to tragedy
Determination and dedication however, were no match for a hit and run incident a year before he was slated to take part in the Olympic Games, which badly damaged his left leg. While reconstructive surgery gave him back the ability to walk, he could no longer run.

Goro, having seen Dai as his adopted son by this point elected to help the teen get treatment to allow him to run once more, as Dai had nothing else. The search for said treatment took an emotional and monetary toll on the two of them and as the Olympics loomed close, Dai saw his spot replaced by another athlete.

Promising Dai that he would be able to join the next Olympics in four years, Goro took him to England to further pursue treatment there; When his money ran out, he found menial work in the Dead End for them to live on and save up for an experimental treatment.

Dai also took on whatever odd jobs were available given his lack of a formal education; however, he had become disillusioned and heavily dependent on painkillers to function in a daily basis.

He took to petty theft to feed the growing addiction without Goro’s knowledge, not wanting to burden his mentor and father figure further nor admit weakness, and would often be found roaming the streets.

Into darkness
On one such occasion, he was saved by Omar Parvez (Orion Pax) from thugs who had beat him senseless and tried to steal his wages when he overdosed on a particularly bad day. It was only a trip to Ronan Chase’s (Ratchet) free clinic that saved him, and after he told Ratchet of his background, the doctor remarked that he was special, whether or whether not he could run—-just because one dream had been robbed from him didn’t mean it was too late to chase another, and that his dedication and determination were far more valuable assets than skill alone.

Finding hope in the doctor’s words, he returned to the Dead End to look for Goro, who he found attempting to stop two policemen from brutalizing a petty thief.

When Goro was accidentally shot by one the cops who immediately tried to cover their tracks rather than call for help (leading to Goro’s death), he killed them. Their partner escaped however, and he knew this made him a wanted man, which forced him to go underground to stay off the radar.

Here, he formed bonds with low and mid-level criminals whom paid him to become their scout, then their runner, then a guard, and when he had gotten into enough fights to learn how to win them and made it clear that he hated cops more than he feared them, a hitman for hire.

It was about this time that ‘Towards Peace’ by Morgan Trayton (Megatron) began to spread through the underground publishing network and while now jaded and cynical to the world, for a moment Dai felt that hope for a better world flash again and remembered the doctor that had saved his life for free in the clinic ages ago. Remembered what was said about how his determination and dedication were his real assets.

What better place to put those assets to use than in a rising revolution?