Belisarius Series/Characters: Difference between revisions
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* [[Giving Radio to the Romans|Giving Radio To The Malwa]]
* [[Scary Dogmatic Aliens|Scary Dogmatic Alien]]
* [[The Spock]]: Well yeah, [[You Should Know This Already|it's a ''computer'']]. And
== Romans ==
=== Romans In General ===
* [[Asskicking Equals Authority]]: Justinian and Theodora rule not because they are aristocrats but because they are a peasant and a prostitute who happened to have enough genius, ambition, and ruthlessness to claw their way to the top
* [[Badass Army]]: (They are Romans after all)
* [[Byzantine Empire]]
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* [[The Empire]]
* [[Gadgeteer Genius]]
* [[Punch Clock Hero]]: It is
* [[Lightning Bruiser]]: When Belisarius' Cataphracts (heavy cavalry) are in the neighborhood, it is best for the enemy to be elsewhere.
=== Abbu ===
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Roman General and Title Character
* [[Battle Couple]]: with Antonia. Though only rarely do they appear on the same battlefield, they coordinate strategy together, and Rana Sanga<ref>Prompted by Narses, who evidently realized it '''first'''.</ref> once speculates that Antonia was assigned to the African theater because [[The Power of Trust|he knew]] that [[The Power of Love|she would]] relieve him on time.
* [[Berserk Button]]: All of Belisarius' soldiers know that they had better not commit atrocities while he is in command.
* [[But I Read a Book About It]]: He is up on history, like many generals.
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* [[The Big Guy]]
* [[The Philosopher]]
* [[World's Strongest Man|Rome's Strongest Man]]: Anastasius is the most physically powerful character in the book, rivaled only by Ousanas and Rana Sanga. He easily overpowers Link's specially-bred giant guards, hits so hard that any opponent he has ever landed a solid blow on in battle was crushed to death on the spot, and uses a longbow with such a powerful draw that he routinely shoots arrows into one side of a fully-armored man's torso and out the other.
* [[Warrior Poet]]
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* [[Heterosexual Life Partners]] : to Antonina
* [[Lady of War]]: Especially toward the end when she is actually commanding troops when Kungas is away at war.
* [[Overt Operative]]: Her first cover was as [[The Mistress]] to a Roman
* [[Ruling Couple]] : With Kungas
* [[Spirited Young Lady]]: Indeed she once confides to Antonina that she was likely to remain unmarried because too many men dislike being [[Overshadowed by Awesome]].
* [[The Spymaster]]: She is more amiable than the typical example of this trope, many of whom are a dour sort.
=== Sittas ===
Long-time friend of Belisarius, and an accomplished cataphract general in his own right.<ref>Incidentally, the Real Life Sittas married Empress Theodora's older sister Comito around the time that he's introduced in this story, and may have fathered the wife of Justinian's real-world successor -- she's known to have been Theodora's niece, but Theodora had another sister.</ref> He introduced Irene to Belisarius and Antonina; she was '''his''' so-called mistress.
* [[Animal Motifs]]: When, in the first book, he demands that Belisarius tell him the details of a battle:
{{Quote|Most people, upon meeting Sittas, were struck by his resemblance to a hog. The same girth, the same heavy limbs, the same pinkish hide—unusually fair for a Greek—the same jowls, blunt snoutish nose, beady little eyes. Belisarius, gazing back at his best friend, thought the resemblance wasn't inappropriate. So long as you remembered that there are hogs, and then there are hogs. There is the slothful domestic hog in his wallow, a figure of fun and feast. And then, there is the great wild boar of the forest, whose gaze makes bowels turn to water. Whose tusks make widows and orphans.
"The battle," commanded the boar.}}
* [[Attack! Attack! Attack!]]: Described as "the most aggressive commander in the Roman army ... prone to recklessness." He '''likes''' headlong cavalry charges. But he's not stupid, and can recognize — reluctantly — if it isn't a good time for one.
* [[Brilliant But Lazy]]: Despite his thoroughgoing military competence and devotion to duty, he is widely regarded as the laziest man in the Roman Empire. Even ''[[Properly Paranoid|Justinian]]'', who obsessed about the possibility of being overthrown by one of his successful generals, didn't hesitate to put Sittas in charge of the capital city garrison because it was impossible to suspect Sittas of anything requiring actual ''work'', such as ambition.
** Sittas himself uses his own laziness as a metaphor for [[Beyond the Impossible]].
{{Quote|'''Sittas''': Worry about something else, Your Majesty. Worry that the sun will start rising in the west. Worry that fish will sing and birds will grow scales. *snorts* If you really insist on fretting over fantasy, worry that I'll start drinking water and do calisthenics early in the morning.}}
* [[Obfuscating Stupidity]]: And drunkenness; he often likes to pretend he's drunk.
=== John of Rhodes ===
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=== Justinian ===
Emperor before he was excluded due to
* [[The Atoner]]
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* [[Spirited Young Lady]]
* [[Spoiled Sweet]]: Being a rich noblewoman did not stop her from being decent and compassionate. Or from [[Hidden Depths|surviving in a war zone.]]
=== Agathius ===
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* [[Badass in Distress]].
* [[Battle Couple]]: With Rao
* [[Beware the Nice Ones]]: She is a charismatic, but kind and likable girl ... who can kill men with her bare hands.
* [[Celibate Hero]] : Until she marries Rao.
* [[Chastity Couple]]: With Rao. Until they were kind of [[They Do|not.]] Then they were [[Good People Have Good Sex|something else]].
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* [[Perfectly Arranged Marriage]]
* [[Rebel Leader]]
* [[Rousing Speech]]: She does this to convince the Kushans to change sides. The fact that she is a more likable employer then Venandekatra (not that '''that''' is difficult) helped quite a bit.
* [[Ruling Couple]]: with Rao
* [[Spirited Young Lady]]
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* [[Honor Before Reason]]
* [[I Gave My Word]]
* [[Improbable Aiming Skills]]: In addition to being one of India's strongest and fastest swordsmen he is also its best archer. On one legendary occasion he kills a Mahaveda priest with a textbook-perfect shot to the breastbone... at a distance of almost ''five hundred yards''. (The world's record for a longbow shot that actually hit anywhere on a standard archery target, let alone hit a bullseye, is less than three hundred.)
* [[World's Strongest Man|India's Strongest Man]]: He once cut an armored man in half ''vertically''. He also broke a reinforced Roman shield in half with one sword blow, has twice won hard-fought duels by parrying an opponent's blade so hard that ''their'' sword broke in half, and on one occasion almost snapped a bamboo pole by crushing it in his grip.
* [[Let's Fight Like Gentlemen]]
* [[Lightning Bruiser]]: In addition to being incredibly strong Rana Sanga is also ''blindingly'' fast, to the point that Valentinian - the single quickest swordsman in the entire Roman army, and one of the two greatest blademasters in the world - is only barely able to stay ahead of him.
* [[The Patriarch]]
* [[Proud Warrior Race Guy]]
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* [[Housewife]]
* [[My Girl Back Home]]
* [[No Accounting for Taste]]
** After a few hours around her, Valentinian thinks Rana Sanga's taste in this matter is perfectly good.
* [[Trademark Favorite Food]]: onions▼
* [[Proper Lady]]
* [[When She Smiles]]: Seeing her happy smile and the genuine warmth behind that smile is the reason Rana fell in (and still is) madly in love with her.▼
* [[Silk Hiding Steel]]: She does not get frightened easily by crises or bloodshed despite being a [[Proper Lady]]. She also has no stereotypical feminine squeemish reactions to her son learning to fight although she is a bit shocked at how good a fighter he turns out to be. She is a [[Proud Warrior Race|Rajput]] lady.
▲* [[When She Smiles]]: Seeing her happy smile and the genuine warmth behind that smile is the reason Rana fell
=== Rajiv Sanga ===
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Eldest Son of Rana Sanga
* [[Beware the Nice Ones]]: He really is a very nice boy, just someone you want your daughter marrying. He also is a very scary warrior and even frightens his father a little.
**To put it another way, he is the kind of boy you want taking your daughter to a party especially if the way to the party goes through a bad part of town.
* [[Big Brother Instinct]]
* [[Combat Pragmatist]]: Valentinian has to teach him to be this. His instinct is of course [[Let's Fight Like Gentlemen|different.]] But when he gets the hang of it he is a murderous killing machine.
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* [[Dirty Coward]]
* [[Evil Is Hammy]]
* [[Evil Cannot Comprehend Good]]: Belisarius manipulates this. He is able to, as a distraction, convince him that Eon is an entitled pervert who absolutely ''loves'' raping slave-girls (somewhat like Venandakatra in other words). As the main part of the plot he is able to convince him that Kushans, despite the fact that they were ordered to guard Shakuntala's virginity, were absolutely certain to try to seduce her. The idea that they might be honorable soldiers who would never do such a thing (when they do defect it is out of politics and simply because they like Shakuntala better as a person, not out of their own lust) never occurs to him, because of course Venandakatra does not really believe there is a such thing as honor. As a result the Kushans are replaced as guards by celibate priests who are supremely qualified as [[Cannon Fodder|garrote-fodder]] for Rao. Basically Belisarius [[Guile Hero|manipulates]] Venandakatra's assumption that [[Laser-Guided Karma|everyone is like him.]]
* [[For the Evulz]]:
* [[General Failure]]
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* [[Rape, Pillage and Burn]]: His favorite hobbies. As long as it doesn't require him to do any actual fighting.
* [[Royal Brat]]
* [[Sex Slave]]: He [[Kick the Dog|tortures them in the process]] until they are completely traumatized even though he has enough power to have the minimal decency to just order them to have sex with him, or enough wealth to hire any amount of women of negotiable virtue either on short or long-term contract, rather then
* [[The Sociopath]]
* [[Stupid Evil]]
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