Bastion Crowley

Bastion Crowley, known among friends by the nickname Bass, is a former slacker turned private investigator, and the main character of Chatbox Shamus.

Profile

• Full Name: Bastion Arthur Crowley
• Nicknames: Bass (as in the fish), Basil, Baz
• Birth Date: January 10, 1960 (age 24)
• Sign: Capricorn
• Occupation: Self-proclaimed "modern detective"
• Race: "93.75% Pure-blooded American" (one-sixteenth English)
• Hair: Unkempt, brown, not long enough to be a mullet but not short enough to be a crew-cut
• Build: Misshapen but not portly, 5'10" and 180 lbs.
• Preferred clothing: Bomber jacket with Vietnam "Wild Weasel/YGBSM" jacket patch (memento from biological father), T-shirt, blue jeans (naturally faded, with small hole in right knee from bicycle accident).
• Personality: Moody, sullen, serious-looking but knows how to take a joke. Keeps his wits about him.
• Misc: Computer geek. Frequent user of PSE InterChange BBS's "The Chatbox" section.

Family

Bastion is the middle child and only son of Richard Crowley and Julia Crowley (née Raleigh). His older sister, Tamsin Crowley, and younger sister Tera Crowley, were also the product of Richard and Julia - Tera had only been conceived shortly before Richard's departure to fight in Vietnam, so is technically Richard's daughter, but was raised by Julia and her second husband, Steven Marshall.

As the middle child and only boy, Bastion is subject to a "sibling sandwich" that draws most of the positive attention away from him. Since he lost his father, there has been little significant male influence for Bastion (despite Steven's earnest attempt to play a larger role in his life, Bastion resents him), seemingly further alienating him from the rest of the family and leading him to his rash decision to move out on his own before securing stable employment.

There is a remote possibility that Bastion Crowley is, on his father's side, a very distant relative of Aleister Crowley.

Living Situation

Bastion has never been in a romantic relationship. He lives by himself in a small apartment under the landlordship of Arthur Blitzney, who is willing to forgive small portions of back-rent for odd jobs, while he gets by on food stamps, unemployment, and an accidental no-interest student loan that, due to a deliberately unfixed system error, is not due for repayment until the year 9999. Sadly, the loan isn't for that much money, so he is occasionally sent "care packages" by younger sister Tera.

Friends and Relationships

Bastion's best friend since middle school is Ruby Travaglia. He had lost contact with her after their first year together in high school, as she had been sent to the Atlantic coast to live with her father. They reconnect by chance, after Bastion sees her name on the Pacific Daily News police blotter column.

Another frequent confidant of Bastion's is the diner owner, Irma, whose 24-hour restaurant is a frequent dinner stop for Bastion.

Career and Education

Bastion graduated from Pacific High School with the Class of 1978 and immediately entered the work force. After a brief stint in retail at a local superstore, Bastion swore off customer service work and consigned himself to temporary work and odd jobs for the next year as he tried to get accepted into Pacific Southeast Community College. While he was initially accepted, he did not qualify to be assigned a class schedule, but was still awarded his financial aid grant and given a computer account with the PSE Interchange BBS. His temporary jobs built up his skill with typing and computing in general, but he was unable to do anything useful with those skills until he was given a slightly-old MechTronic Systems home computer for Christmas by his stepfather, who assumed that Bastion liked them from hearing second-hand about his temp jobs.

By 1984, the well of jobs had dried up. Still unable to get into college, and now in a spot of debt, Bastion is too stubborn to go back to live with his mother and stepfather. In A Mask and a Mood Swing, Bastion finally puts his MechTronic computer to use by posting a service ad on the PSE Interchange, getting him his first client as a private investigator: Marcus Tosh. Though the case was solved, Bastion was fined for practicing private investigation without a license, forcing him to spend money and resources studying and taking a written test to get an official Investigator's License under the authority of Pacific County. From then on, his career as a private detective had solidified.

Things Bastion is likely to do

• He is likely to try out Phillip Marlowe's coffee-and-bourbon, from The Long Goodbye. Except because he can't afford bourbon, he'd use cola instead. Which works about as well as one would expect.
• Accidentally learns how BASIC works by trying to make a blatantly-rigged computer blackjack game less blatantly rigged.
• Causes a minor traffic collision by lockpicking an abandoned delivery van and unsetting the parking brake.