Geier von Engelmacher

"Vot you looking at?"

– Geier von Engelmacher

Runaway prince. Spoiled brat. Obnoxious man-chaser. Stalker With A Crush.

Geier von Engelmacher has been called many things in his time, few of them complimentary, but one title none of the members (writers and characters alike) of Orderly Chaos ever dreamed of bestowing upon him at his introduction in the Drakhen Adventure would have to be "most entertaining member of the cast."

A year later, they're still wondering what happened.

Appearance
At six feet tall, Geier is the tallest of the central Chaos players. His stereotypically Germanic straight light blond hair (usually worn long and pulled back in a ponytail with black ribbons, except for a short period of mourning after Pan's death), prominent bone structure and bright blue eyes have prompted certain members of the cast to nickname him "Prince Charming", sometimes twisted to "Charmless".

Geier is notable for wearing the same outfit continuously: brown boots, white trousers and waistcoat with a high-collared black shirt and red necktie. Considering his erratic approach to personal tidiness, most of these may even be the very same items of clothing he wore in his first appearance, although the waistcoat(s) have been destroyed/abandoned several times (most recently in Roundworld, when at his request Cassandra poured acid on one of them).

Enemies
Pan From:

"I ztay viz him vecoz he's dangerous"

to:

"You could have told me any time you wanted. You hid everything from me. Your life, my life-- the life I could've had if I hadn't been so busy trying to scrape and bow and toady to you-- For what? So I can end up like them? So you can lick my blood off your hands and mark me off on the list? So you can waste the life you saved, just because you don't feel like leaving properly? You bastard--"

The most defining relationship of Geier's life was – unsurprisingly – a mess. Pan (accompanied, though not for long, by Stefan) happened across him on the third night of his life outside the castle, after he had been robbed, beaten and abandoned by a group of highwaymen; after Stefan protested Pan's callous ignoring of the dying youth Pan took another look, decided well-dressed, physically attractive, helpless Geier was a lot more interesting than inconveniently intelligent Stefan and took a moment to slaughter his former consort before biting Geier, turning him into a vampire. This act of selfish "charity" endeared Geier to his new guardian almost immediately, as did Pan's uninhibited attitude to life, and he quickly became desperately, clingily enamored of the other vampire. Especially after Pan personally introduced the socially untutored prince to an amusing and low-cost hobby called "sexual intercourse".

"Und you stab a man vhen he iz down? Bravo, Cassandra. I begin to see why Lord Pan does not discount you so easily..."

Cassandra

Ironically Geier's first contact with the Chaosers was with a vampire his idol had chosen as a one-night stand: Cassandra Larimar, b-total alchemist extraordinaire. Although Cass was blissfully unaware of his existence, Geier knew only too well who she was, and initiated a brawl that mostly ended when both of them were hit on the head with rocks. This set the tone for the rest of their relationship, which has ranged from open, violent, slightly psychosexual hostility to wary, uneasy truce. It has been speculated that Geier actually harbors sublimated attraction toward her, which is entirely possible, considering he seems to be hot on some level for almost everyone he meets at some point.

This category could technically extend to anyone who isn't classified as a friend or a lover.

Friends
Theodore

Teddy, as Geier calls him, is quite possibly the only one of Geier's friends who isn't dead, otherwise no longer a part of his life or in transition from one relationship category to another (see Phoenix). They met before the beginning of the first adventure, when each was in the company of the Drakhenians, and initially didn't pay much attention to each other, although Ted did take note of Geier's reckless determination. They met again in The Teatime Adventure: Teddy beat him severely for mistreating Phoenix, which gained him Geier's undying admiration, even though Geier ended up winning the actual fight. Geier then won Ted's gratitude for bringing him an ant farm to take his mind off his craving for blood. They trust each other, despite recognizing each other's faults (Ted recognizes Geier's faults, at least; Geier treats Teddy like an admired older brother, so may not have noticed that he has any faults) and enjoy a shared taste for a bit of mayhem and wildness now and then. Teddy usually calls Geier by his birth name, Erik.

Stefan

Surprisingly, considering Stefan was Geier's immediate predecessor in Pan's affections, their relationship was never particularly hostile. Of course, this was mostly due to the fact that Geier didn't consider mild, mousy Stefan much competition. Things were very briefly tense in Roundworld thanks to an emotionally strung-out Geier taking advantage of Stefan's attempts at comfort to grab him and kiss him, leading to a mutually enjoyable but also mutually embarrassing few minutes that ended abruptly with Phoenix walking on them and nearly passing out. Since then they've silently agreed to keep their hands off each other; since the return to the Disc they saw each other infrequently, although Geier did write him a few letters. Geier holds Stefan in mild awe for being much more logical than he is (and also because he found Stefan a surprisingly good kisser).

Phoenix

This one is tricky.

From the beginning there were sparks* between these two; in one of his first appearances Geier kidnapped Phoenix to impress Pan, and they fought several times over the course of The Teatime Adventure. His feelings toward her were always rather ambiguous, but eventually he decided he liked the spunky girl despite her sex and tendency to spout flame, and they agreed to be friends. Geier may actually consider Phoenix a closer friend than Theodore.

Recently, however, Geier has been struggling with the twin revelations that Phoenix has romantic feelings for him, and that his own feelings toward her may have begun to alter again.

____


 * Oh, sorry.

History
Geier was born Prince Erik von Heidegger of the small Uberwaldian kingdom Lagerdorf (which was later incorporated into Grünwaldstadt-- see The Grünwaldstadt Adventure), to Queen Lucia and King Karl von Heidegger. His father, a clairvoyant as well as a hospitable ruler, was killed on a diplomatic mission, which drove Geier's mother mad with grief. The kingdom fell into the joint hands of her despotic sisters, who kept young Erik a veritable prisoner inside his own castle, neglecting and abusing him by turns until he ran away at the age of nineteen. He lasted three days on the road before running afoul of a band of highwaymen who left him for dead. Fortunately (or perhaps unfortunately, in some senses) Lord Pan ran rather literally across him, decided he looked interesting enough to take home with him and vampirize, and thus began Chapter II in the newly self-rechristened Geier's life.

He spent two years living with, having crazy mad sex with and idolizing Pan, near the end of which they formed a loose partnership with the Drakhenians, a band of eccentric vampires who held residence near the border of Lancre and plotted to block out the sun by magical means. Then a ragtag team showed up to put a stop to aforementioned scheme-- including a few who had ties to vampires Geier was familiar with (quite familiar, in the case of Pan and Cassandra)-- and an entirely new level of weird was added to his life.

It got weirder in The Teatime Adventure, when Geier was summoned by the gods along with the rest of the Chaosers, as well as his previously deceased master, to take down a certain preternaturally creepy assassin. Over this thread, the longest in Orderly Chaos's history, his personality went through notable development: thanks to the generally positive influences of the other characters (and the occasional hard lesson intensely painfully learnt), Geier's uncontrollably aggressive, egocentric worldview slowly began to ease. He gained social and moral insight-- enough, tragically, to gain understanding what a monster his idol Pan truly was, and to react the only way he knew how: violently and, for Pan, fatally.

With Pan's death came the ending of another chapter and a resolve to make up for his previous misdoings. Unfortunately the unexpected trip to Earth (see The Roundworld Adventure) put a slight crimp in this plan, but currently the plight of his birth country has called him to take up the quest again with a vengeance. Somewhat literally.

Universe Crossover Qualities
Prince Charmless has apparently joined the digital age.