| Character Name Here! | |
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| Portrayed By | Nathan Fillion |
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| Gender | Male |
| Date of Birth | August 1st, 1962 |
| Age | 48 |
| Zodiac Sign | Leo |
| Aliases | Index |
| Place of Birth | New York |
| Current Location | New York |
| Occupation | Drama teacher |
| Known Relatives | Yes |
| Significant Other | No |
| Identity | Classified |
| Known Abilities | Inventory management |
| First Appearance | Original Character |
Remember: Organization and planning is the key to victory.
History
Clancy Sparks was born at a very young age, like most newborns are. His father was a director and his mother an actress. They fell in love doing a production of West Side Story. It was very romantic. Let’s move on. Their story is not important here, let’s focus on little baby Clancy. As a baby, Clancy was unexceptional, unable to do anything but the simplest of tasks, and even these were done with poor coordination, but as he grew he became better and better at doing things.
Almost before he could speak, he could sing, having mimicked his mother’s singing with wailing cries. They were off tune, certainly, but he was just a beginner. He would get better. In fact, he did get better. By the time he was five years old, he could not only carry out a tune, but he could bring tears to the eyes of grown-ups with his beautiful childlike (certainly childlike, being that he was a child) voice. This ability was appreciated by his peers as he entered primary school.
Mostly because they had a high pitched singing prancy little boy to pick on in the all-boys school, and there were so few other children in their classroom worthy of being picked on. Most, in fact, were the types to pick on others and thus got along famously. Clancy was a uniting influence among this coalition of bullies, giving them a cause to work together. One of these bullies was named Rudy Masselow. The relationship between Clancy and Rudy was a little bit complicated, though only complicated because of Clancy’s ever-adamant insistence that they be best friends. Otherwise, it would have been very uncomplicated: just a kid getting beat up. Simple.
One day, in grade four, when Clancy and Rudy were playing (or, to be more honest about the situation, Rudy was just chasing Clancy through the woods to eventually conclude the ‘play’ session with beating the smaller boy up), the boys ran into a man in the woods. He was probably a magician, Clancy had long decided, because he has wizardly robes and a cone-shaped hat. Also because of the magic. That influenced his reasoning too. The mage looked at the two boys for a moment and said, “You boys, your fated threads are all tangled up.” Rudy said it was ridiculous because his shoes were firmly tied, and properly yet, but still with mage went on. “Please, come with me, and I will give you something.” Clancy reminded the gentleman in the woods that going with a stranger in a forest would be a poor resolution. The magician conceded this point, and said that he would be right back.
Both boys waited silently, unsure of what to do. The magician didn’t go far, only perhaps ten feet away and then into a hole under the ground before he emerged with two magical items. He offered the children magical items, because he felt that they were destined to have them. It would be impossible to keep them out of their grasps, so he may as well give them to the children. (As it happens, because this is the only possible action the wizard was fated to do, of course the children were fated to gain the items.)
Rudy received a circlet, which he thought would make him look like a homosexual, though he expressed this concern in far more colourful terms. Clancy received two rectangular stones. The artifacts became attuned to the two boys as soon as they contacted their skin. Rudy gained the abilities of flight, super strength, fire breath and super speed, which he thought was pretty awesome. That would make Rudy’s position at the top of the schoolyard food chain all the more secure.
Clancy, on the other hand, got a more subdued gift. In fact, it was so subdued that he barely even saw the use of it. Basically, it was a mystical storage system, a way to take items big and small and carry them around with less difficulty. When most children receive superpowers, any superpowers, it’s usually a pretty exciting event. Clancy questioned the man if that was it, especially after seeing how totally awesome Rudy’s powers were. The magician assured the boy that these gifts would put the boys on even footing before vanishing (or climbing down into his hole).
The boys returned to their homes, but not before Rudy handily beat the crap out of Clancy to make sure his superpowers work. They did. Clancy’s did, too, but he did not get to try them out at the time. He was busy getting battered. When he got home, though, he phoned Rudy to propose that they become superheroes. Rudy decided this was a good idea, because he would get lots of glory. Also, his powers were much cooler than Clancy’s, so he’d be the main hero and the smaller boy would end up a sidekick.
The boys did this for the next two years, having designed their costumes out of floral print bed sheets and underwear worn outside of the pants. Even though they looked ridiculous, most criminals did not want to cross paths with the boys. Mostly for fear of being humiliated by little kids who can’t even dress themselves properly. Rudy took on the name Awesome Victory Boy, while Clancy took the (as usual, more subdued) name, ‘Index’. Index mostly just followed Awesome Victory Boy around and carried things for him with his magical inventory system. It was kind of complex, but he grew comfortable with it.
When Rudy started to act more self-servingly, though, Index tried to part ways with him. This led to the first major battle between Rudy and Clancy. With more practice with his inventory system and superior intellect, Clancy managed to put up a fight, but Rudy’s array of powers was more than enough to overcome him. At the last moment, Clancy captured Rudy’s outfit into his inventory system, humiliating the boy and sending him back home.
This was the last time the boys would see each other for a few years, since Clancy transferred schools. When Clancy entered junior high, he was glad to be able to have more choice in the classes he took. Of course, he took drama options, wanting to follow in the footsteps of his parents. His acting was excellent, and his peers admired his skill. Towards the end of his junior high career, there was a drama competition. This marked the second fated confrontation between Rudy and Clancy, this time in a completely different setting. Rudy had joined an opposing drama team to put on a performance, and since he bribed the judges with his ill-gotten goods, the odds were skewed heavily in his favour. Despite trying his hardest, Clancy lost this second battle as lead of his drama team, Rudy taking the upper hand once again.
Through high school, he continued acting not only in his option classes but in extra-curricular clubs. The boy wanted to become so good that even a swayed judge would be on his side the next time. But towards the end of his high school career, Rudy twisted fate a third time, using his speed to place tacks on Clancy’s drama teacher’s seat and starting a rumour that Clancy did it to stir up trouble and become more popular with his peers. As a result, his teacher passed over him as the lead in the end of year play, destroying his chances at the theatre scholarship that he had his eyes on, stating, “You will never have what it takes to be on Broadway, anyways.” By which she really meant, “You did me harm and I will crush your dreams, child.” Again, Rudy’s school took the competition due to Clancy’s school poor organization and lack of a particularly engaging lead.
Because of his lack of a scholarship, and his parents’ insistence that he pay for everything out of pocket in order to gain an appreciation of the hard work going into school, Clancy had to get a job to save up the money to go to school. Because he wanted to toughen up next time he encountered Rudy, he decided to join the US army. In his training, he was exceptional, always working hard and struggling to be the very best that he can be. Upon completion of his training, he was deployed to do several missions in far off lands, using his magical system to keep and carry a large amount of supplies.
He knew there was trouble, though, when he found out one of his fellow soldiers in one of the missions was going to be Rudy. At first, there were no problems, not until the two men were alone in a jungle. Rudy donned his circlet and declared the beginning of their next confrontation. This time, Index took the advantage, using his newfound combat knowledge and learned adaptation of his inventory system to become an effective weapon. Merciful, he helped the other man to safety and joked to Rudy that just because their fates were intertwined doesn’t mean they have to me nemeses. It could just mean they were meant to be married or something!
Clancy was ejected from the military on suspicion that he was gay, Rudy citing this ‘joke’ as evidence.
In 1984, SHIELD took an interest in his admirable military service and, perhaps more importantly, his excellent acting ability. They gave him an offer, which he accepted, to gain training in espionage and help them gather information about potential threats out there. That he had superpowers himself (however odd) was also a boon for the organization. He spent the next twenty five years working under SHIELD, gathering information and gaining a reputation within the organization of being very reliable and highly skilled, only getting more and more fine tuned to the work. In 2009, he went on a mission with a masked partner. They had to investigate a magical disturbance in Russia and bring back any information that they could find, gaining the trust of officials there to gain access. His name became classified, and the only name he was known by was his aliases and his codename: Index.
As Index managed to charm his way into the hearts (and the magical castle that appeared) of the Russians, he and his partner started the exploration mission. As they arrived at the heart of the castle, his partner unmasked, revealing himself as Rudy. He still wore his circlet, but also several other mystic items to give additional powers. The wizard in the castle tried to intervene, the same wizard that had given the two their magical gifts in their childhood. Using his practiced organization, military skill and inventory management, once again Index overcame Rudy. The beaten man, though, in his defeat sent information about Index’s identity, genetics and appearance acquired by SHIELD to several intelligence organizations so that using him as a spy ever again would be an extra risky endeavour all with the click of a button, as if planning it all along, before using his last bit of power to spit a plume of fire towards Index. Index ejected an explosive device from his inventory, right into the fire, causing it to blow up in Rudy’s face, but it also sent a vial plummeting to the ground.
This was an experimental temporal potion that the wizard was trying to make, making it so that the wizard move back a day every time he goes to sleep at night, so that this would be the first time he met Rudy and Index, and the time he gave them their items would be the last. Index didn’t really care about the wizard, though. His career was ruined even though his nemesis was thoroughly defeated. SHIELD could not use him as a spy, so for a little while they had him finish off the paperwork he had accumulated. That was, until another offer was on the table. He could be a drama teacher at the Barnes Academy. Sure, it wasn’t as exciting, but he could provide both insights on the art of acting as well as the art of espionage. For such a high profile spy to pass down his knowledge seemed indispensable. A little reluctantly, Index agreed. It would be better than paperwork, and at least he would kind of get to focus more on his passion. So now he’s a schoolteacher.
Great.
Timeline
- What's happened since you've been approved?
Quotes
- "I said it!"
Trivia
- Amazing thing!
- Amazing thing!
- Amazing thing!
- Amazing thing!
