NIKOLAI, GYM LEADER

LUX: NIKOLAI SURGE

Lightning strikes inside my chest to keep me up at night

NIKOLAI: a name traditionally reserved for old military buddies and his mother. Not Nick. Not Nicolas.
The media got hold of his old nickname from when he was in the army, and for a while he was simply known as THE LIGHTNING UNOVIAN. Since the Pro-Isshu movement kicked off, however, most Lux news sources were smart enough to drop the name in lieu of referring to him simply as LIEUTENANT SURGE.
As a subordinate officer, you’ll use his proper title of LIEUTENANT or SIR if you don’t want to spend the night polishing his impressive collection of guns and boots.



Born THIRTY-SEVEN years ago in a small cottage in DRIFTVEIL CITY, Nikolai was the first and only son of a renowned young sea captain and an elementary school teacher. In his mind, he had a rather “normal” childhood, though of course that word is entirely relative.

From a young age, Nikolai proved himself to be a rowdy boy. He had no fear, much to the chagrin of his fretful mother. His earliest memories date back to waddling down the pier and trying to play with the small aquatic Pokemon that lived in the harbor’s shallows. His father taught him to swim one day by throwing young Nikolai off the side of his boat without a lifejacket. He learned. In fact, from that day forward barely a day went by when the little boy wasn’t running home to his mother with his fair hair plastered to his forehead, dripping water all over the hardwood floors. He had a rather free childhood – his father was often on sailing trips, carrying people or cargo to the far regions, while his mother (who retired from her teacher career when Nikolai was born) was often stuck in the house as a private tutor. This free reign would normally lead to all kinds of mischief for little boys, but Nikolai grew up very much on the straight and narrow. You see, when Nikolai misbehaved, he was beaten with his father’s belt – soon, Nikolai stopped misbehaving. Nikolai never despised his father. Quite the opposite, actually; he revered him.

When he was eight, Nikolai began to join his father on his sailing journeys. While he was often limited to short fishing trips during the school year (his father, normally quite an intimidating man, was not nearly as frightening his mother when she got on one of her “importance of education” rants), he spent his summers on long journeys with his father, seeing the land formations of Kanto, Johto, and Sinnoh from the safety of his father’s old boat. In school, he was a bright if distracted boy, doing well in Math and Physics (in the case of the latter, by sheer will alone) while performing poorly in English and foreign languages. His poor grades in these subjects earned him the sting of his father’s belt a few times, but it was impossible to convince the boy anything else mattered once he was in sight of the sea.

When he was ten, Nikolai received his first Pokemon from his father. The Pikachu was not a plaything to be thrown into battles by an inexperienced child, his father had told him quite sternly. No, this Pikachu was a gift that had been brought into their lives – the clever little girl could sense a storm from a day away. Nikolai loved the Pikachu, and the Pikachu loved him back. They shared a mutual fearlessness for the sea and lived off of the smell of the ocean air. It wasn’t much long after that Nikolai learned to command a vessel himself, which he knew for a fact made his father immensely proud, even if the older man would never say.

By the time he was a teenager, Nikolai had matured enough to see that not everything was bright and beautiful in the Surge household. His father had been receiving steadily less and less commissions over the years. While Nikolai’s grandfather may have been able to make a comfortable living ferrying passengers and leading fishing tours, the small sailing boats in the harbor these days were dwarfed by the sleek cruise liners and trawling ships, which had forced Nikolai's father to rely mainly on tourists who found his old, wooden ship more “quaint” than useful. His mother hadn’t made much as a teacher either, and made even less working as a part-time tutor. His parents had hidden their financial struggles from him for much of his childhood, but as a teenager Nikolai found himself spending his summers not out at sea, but taking up any odd jobs that would hire him. The moment Nikolai turned eighteen, he signed himself up for the Unova standing military, hoping to ease his parent’s financial burden.

The military was a hard transition for all of his unit, but Nikolai's strict upbringing helped him through it. He knew how to keep a clean bunk and followed orders immediately without hesitation; the rest was taught through a hellish regime of physical training and weapons practice. “Weapons practice,” he soon learned, also involved learning how to optimize Pokemon as weapons, in addition to using the mechanical ones. These lessons clashed drastically with his father’s opinion of Pokemon, but Nikolai knew it was not his place to question authority – putting his father’s teaching temporarily aside - though not forgotten - he practiced commanding groups of Pokemon as he would a group of soldiers.

At the age of nineteen, Nikolai had finished his basic training and was ready to be shipped off to a specific branch of the military. Much to his surprise, Private Surge was not assigned to the Marines, however, but to the Air Force. He had performed decently on the flight simulations, but not nearly well enough to earn distinction. However, his commanding officer had believed that Surge had the “right instincts” to pilot one of the small aircraft - instincts that would be wasted if he was assigned to a job of simply taking orders on a huge battleship. “Even if Private Surge does not prove to have the proper instinct for the flight academy,” the recommendation had read, “his damn Pikachu sure does.” Though Nikolai and his father had never questioned the science behind the abilities of his Pikachu, a sensitivity to brewing storms was merely a symptom the Pikachu’s highly sensitive inner-ear, excellent for detecting changes in atmospheric pressure which, as it were, was kind of the whole reason those big metal birds could get in the sky.

Though initially nervous, Private Surge soon acquired a love for the air almost as strong as his taste for water. While he was serious and methodical in his mannerisms, get him and his Pikachu into a one-seater plane and suddenly nineteen years of suppressed risk-taking made themselves known. He was first to volunteer for airshows, where the military would send out a small fleet to entertain the masses with dangerous displays of aerial skill using small planes and big trails of white smoke. This was perhaps the most dangerous thing he ever had to do in the military – it wasn’t as if there was a war going on. Through these airshows, the rather cocky young pilot earned his name, “The Lightning Unovian,” both for the dangerous speeds he pushed his planes and the Pikachu that accompanied him on every flight. During his time as a pilot, he also acquired a Rufflet. The fearless yet young avian showed no fear of the big metal bird in the sky, mirroring The Lightning Unovian’s maneuvers move for move and willfully joining Nikolai’s team once he landed.

Private Surge did not remain a private for long; slowly but surely he began to rise through the ranks. Ironically, he epitomized the qualities of a perfect follower – he stuck to his orders, worked well with routine, and didn’t ask too many questions – yet these qualities were what the higher-ups saw as his qualifications for leadership. By the time Nikolai was twenty-one, he was elected to second lieutenant; by his twenty-third birthday, he was first.

Unfortunately, the standing military had its own slew of financial troubles. There was little interest in the army these days; most kids were too obsessed with becoming Pokemon trainers to consider a military career. There was little conflict, and the conflict that did arise with Team Plasma was not resolved with swat teams and military action but by young Pokedex holders, humiliating their reputation further. When Lieutenant Surge was only twenty-five, the military program was significantly downsized, all but eliminating the Air Force and Marine Corps programs. If children were the true defenders of the region, the public saw little point to have so many airplanes and battleships laying about.

Nikolai willingly took a leave of absence from his post, full aware that it was unlikely he would ever be called back. At twenty-five, he was at what many people considered the prime of his life, yet he felt completely at a loss for where to go next. His father had passed away two years prior from cancer, and his mother had moved in with her sister. He had been left his father’s ship – that was a start. He took the ship and, with his Pikachu alert on the prow and his Rufflet high in the air, sailed to start a new life in the other regions.

At twenty-five, Nikolai began the journey that most children had started fifteen years earlier; that of a Pokemon trainer. Together with his Pikachu, Rufflet, and a Squirtle he caught on the seas of Kanto, the party traveled through bits and pieces of Kanto, Hoenn, and Johto through their respective coastal cities. His team grew with his battling skills – Nikolai’s seven years in the military had taught him a thing or two about strategy, and he was a methodical but effective trainer. His Pokemon team grew stronger and stronger, albeit with an unbalanced preference for electric types.

They always say that love works in mysterious ways. At the peak of Nikolai’s Pokemon training career, he fell in love with a woman he met in Pewter city. At the age of twenty-eight, Nikolai fell hard and fast for this women, and she the same. At twenty-nine, he was married and his wife was expecting their first child. He settled in Pewter, convinced that he would spend the rest of his life there. He even took up a job at the local Power plant, where his electric Pokemon could be put to good use.

When his daughter was born, Nikolai was only further convinced of his decision. Lara Surge had grabbed her father’s heart from the moment her tiny hand curled around his single finger. Nikolai and his wife were deeply in love with each other, and their new child. Had things not turned south so suddenly, they may have lived a long and happy life together. One day, Nikolai returned home from a day of work at the Power plant to find his wife in hysterics, his daughter unmoving in her crib. They never knew why Lara died – Sudden Infant Death Syndrome, the doctor said, which meant that he didn't fucking know either – but the tragedy tore their young family apart. Nikolai and his wife divorced six months later; most couples that lose a child do not stay together, after all, and the sudden nature of the death was too much stress for their relationship to handle.

At age thirty, the ex-Lieutenant was no longer very interested in a life of constant travel. When a position opened up at the Vermillion Gym, Nikolai immediately applied – both the proximity to the ocean and the request for an electric type Pokemon specialist made the position sound as though it were made for him. He got the job, and took up residence in Vermilion. Though he is well-respected by the inhabitants of the port city, he is known for keeping to himself, only interacting with his Pokemon and the small studio of trainers he oversees at his gym. Though he was kept rather busy by his students and the seemingly endless stream of challengers, his thoughts seemed only able to return to his daughter – would Lara have looked like that girl when she got older? Would Lara have enjoyed the sea? The sky?

At age thirty-two, a distraction from his growing depression arose in the form of the Lux versus Nox conflict. He was supportive of Lux from the beginning – as a recently established gym leader with a military history sympathized with their goals. He did not expect the bloody and protracted war that followed, however. Though he sees the war as a great tragedy, any doubts he had about his decision of loyalty were soon banished by the fall of Olivine City Lighthouse. He finds Nox’s means to be utterly inappropriate and, should they succeed, conducive only to anarchy. His thoughts on the more recently-formed Republic of Isshu are a little more confused, however...


He has been the resident VERMILLION CITY GYM LEADER for the past seven years.


Lux. He is a firm supporter of their ideals, though of course it’s hard for anyone to be particularly happy about the resulting war. When there were only two sides to the war, the Lieutenant was happy to commit himself to the side he believed was truly the lesser of two evils. The Republic of Isshu complicated this – nevertheless, Surge wants to believe that he is doing the right thing by applying his military experience to the Lux cause, where at least his contribution might make a difference in the outcome of the war.

▪ Experienced
▪ Orderly
▪ Tactical
▪ Not afraid to take charge and make the tough decisions.
▪ Calm under pressure
▪ Expert weapons technician

▪ Set in his ways
▪ Underestimates Nox (though recent Nox victories have curbed this somewhat)
▪ Harsh
▪ Never reaches out.
▪ Needs to get a life.
▪ Struggles with ongoing depression, but refuses to see anyone or say anything about it

▪ Rules and regulations
▪ Cleanliness
▪ Tactics
▪ Planes
▪ Boats
▪ Boots
▪ Guns
▪ Children
▪ Electric Pokemon
▪ His home region, Unova

▪ Chaos
▪ Insubordination
▪ Weaknesss
▪ Spies
▪ His ex-wife
▪ Spontaneity
▪ Nox

SECRETS:

▪ He never mentions his daughter. Ever.
▪ He cares more for that damn Raichu than he’d care to admit.
▪ His favorite type of Pokemon is electric because they dominate both creatures of the air and creatures of the sea.
▪ He’s just a little bit sexist.
▪ He has a soft spot for children.
▪ He sympathizes with the Pro-Isshu movement, though he has yet to untangle his feelings about it enough to determine whether it is truly resonating with their ideals or simply natural nostalgia for his home region. He is no spy.

POKEMON

WHO ELSE DO YOU PLAY?

Lynne.

[b]POKEMON[/b], lt. surge as NIKOLAI SURGE made by SIV for PRE.