Derek Boon's Questionnaire

Derek lives in a one-story suburban home on the outskirts of Detroit. By technicality the deed is singed in his name and he has legally owned the property for several years now. In truth, Derek has only lived there for about a month now, replacing the previous version of himself after a temporal drug raid went off the rails. The inside of his home is typical for a single bachelor, with mostly non-perishable freezer meals or canned goods for food. The decoration is very spartan, with a completely empty guest bedroom and office space. The two-car garage has half reserved for an array of workout equipment, while the other half serves as storage for a 1980 Toyota SR5.

Derek gets his money from working night shift at a nearby quarry. He's the third shift foreman, picking up the slack that first and second shifts leave behind and getting the real work done around the jobsite. It doesn't have ludicrous pay or many insurance benefits but it's enough to cover the bills and then some. All of the excess funds typically go towards electronic components for passion projects, hard liquor for when the passion projects get a little too passionate, construction equipment for a big project he plans for the future, groceries, cable, and several streaming services which he largely doesn't use.

Before Derek was enlisted to be a PMC for Chronocorp, he spent nearly all of his time collecting rare or precious minerals, obsessing over the collection more than anything in the world, sometimes coming close to reckless self endangerment in the process of acquiring them. Military contracting for a corporation that does and doesn't exist, wrapping up security leaks that haven't happened, and other pointless busywork drew him far away from his hobby. Now that he's slipped the terms of his contract by dying in every reality the Chronocorp exists in, he's been afforded the opportunity to once again pursue his obsession, this time with the knowledge of the supernatural and prior experience on the job. Derek won't rest until he's secured every rare mineral to exist, mundane, alien, or paranormal.

The major turning point for Derek's life before his first Contract was when he accepted an offer from Chronocorp's PMC recruiter at the age of eighteen, signifying the start of a long period of monotonous busy work tying up loose ends for the temporal super corporation. Every moment spent working for the corporation was torture for the young man, and he spent twelve years doing so. Every day coming in to a passive aggressive supervisor that seemed like they would stop at nothing to make him look bad, a draining work environment with constant "morale briefings" and "workplace etiquette" meetings every other day.

Stanley Brash is Derek's right hand man, and might as well be the foreman some days at the quarry. Stan's a stand-up, respectable guy who doesn't ask questions and typically keeps his head down when it comes to receiving recognition. Derek's always happy to have Stan over for a barbeque or just to throw back a couple of drinks and talk about life.

Linda Thatcher is the regional representative for the corporation that owns the quarry where Derek works, an overbearing, oblivious boss insistent on micromanaging a perfectly functional jobsite. Has openly advocated for a ban on personal music devices as it may "detract from a healthy working standard".

Brad is the owner of the liquor store that Derek goes to for his monthly supply of booze and is a passing acquaintance. Brad is overly friendly to Derek while he tries to keep the overenthusiastic kid at arm's length. Derek could do without the headache of talking to someone like him for longer than ten minutes.

Derek's mother split from the family and lost custody due to excessive drug use while he was young, after which point he was raised by a single absentee father who taught him the basics of how to survive and nearly nothing else. Derek looked out for himself, pushing around the smaller kids in school to get grades good enough to satisfy his father whenever he was home. The kids and teachers all thought Derek was a bit of a freak, obsessing over precious minerals and gushing about them in conversation but not showing any interest in pursuing a degree in geology. Derek's father didn't really mind his son's eccentric hobby, supporting it in the few hours that he had to spend with his son. Right around the end of high school Derek was approached by his dad's employers and offered a long-term position in addition to a substantial sign on bonus.

Derek's never had any love for anything but his father and his rock collection. Most label him as a deviant but he just sees it as him not having the time to put the work into a dedicated relationship. He'll happily spend time with others platonically but he will always prioritize his collection over such relationships if sees an opportunity to acquire a particularly hard to acquire rock. Sometimes he'll completely drop communication with everyone as he obsesses over his collection, even spending days going over what's in his possession, writing extensive notes on even minute changes to the materials.

Derek's worst fear is that Chronocorp is aware that he faked his death, and will come hunt him down in order to force him back into the dull, monotonous life that he was in before doing so. He fears that they'll draw him away from his rocks, not giving him time to spend with them like his dad didn't have time to spend with him. He cherishes every moment he spends with his rocks and hates spending time away from them. Ann even greater fear Derek has is that his collection will be stolen, wasting all of his time and research that he has put into it thus far. Derek applies social constructs to the hunks of sediment that he acquires, seeing them as kindred spirits more so that the actual people surrounding him. He obsesses over his collection, reacting to the absence of a rock similar to a helicopter parent when they lose sight of their child. He's set nearly every free waking moment assembling this collection of minerals, and to lose such a thing would be far worse than any fate that Derek can imagine himself in. Even dying would not top the feeling of anguish he would experience should he lose his collection.

Derek's set of prized possessions is a guitar case full of small chunks of rare gems and minerals, the result of a lifetime spent pursuing such objects. He treats them like beloved children and remarkable research specimens, and spends most of his idle time observing them for any properties he may have missed previously. The extreme lengths that Derek has taken to acquire each and every rock and crystal inside the guitar case places an immense value on them that far exceeds anything one might receive in return if such a collection were to be turned in to a pawn shop or similar establishment. Each and every stone in the case has it's own story to Derek, and he harbors an obsessive love for each one that borders on questionable sanity. Should the case ever be lost, Derek will stop at nothing to have it return to his possession, hunting down each and every stone to the ends of the earth if needed, as well as the parties responsible.

Derek's biggest, most pressing issue is the lack of security around his home outside of a silent alarm system and good old stand your ground laws. His valuables are locked in a safe hidden under his bed as a red herring for any burglars looking to pilfer his rock collection, which lies under a loose floorboard of a locked toolshed in his backyard whenever he isn't at home. He doesn't trust the white-bread neighbors that surround his home, believing that they are conspiring against him in some way. They surely aren't just well-meaning neighbors coming over to offer baked goods when he gets home from his shift. What if they get inside and start snooping around, seeing all of the personal aspects of his life, what if they find his rock collection. They'd get rich by pawning most of it off to various buyers, causing Derek a massive headache when he goes to retrieve each and every item from the collection.

Derek's typical "morning" starts at 7pm, at which point he wakes up and prepares a couple of sausage-egg sandwiches for his breakfast and day at work. His shift starts at 10pm and runs until 6am, with a lunch break at 2am for the entire jobsite. He doesn't shower until he gets home from work, preferring to sleep clean than covered in sweat and dirt from a long day at work. After making food for the day, he checks on his rock collection before stashing it in the shed out back, at which point he changes into his work uniform. Ratty boot cut jeans, scuffed steel toed boots, a t-shirt with the company logo on it, and a worn jacket make up his daily attire, complemented by a safety orange vest, earplugs, and safety glasses when he is on-site. Derek packs his egg sandwiches into a brown paper bag before he drives to work.

Whenever Christmas dinners are provided by the company, Derek gets dressed up by putting on a golf polo and khaki pants along with a pair of sneakers instead of his coyote browns. He'd take a shower beforehand, shaving off most of his perpetual stubble and brushing out his unruly hair before tying it back into a ponytail. He'd then do his typical "leaving the house" ritual of locking the windows and doors and stashing away his rock collection before hopping in his truck and driving to the event. The entire process from start to finish would take roughly thirty minutes to an hour from start to finish. Being a simple man with simple standards, Derek doesn't go out of his way to show off to other people, and doesn't expect other people to go out of their way to show off to him. The main difference between a day at work and a formal dinner to Derek is what he wears for it.

Drink. Derek gets completely trashed on the 5th of April every year as a way of spiting his mother who told him to never touch alcohol. Anyone that wants to be over for the event is welcome but he won't be sending out invitations or anything out of the ordinary. His close friends will probably show up for the excuse to get trashed on a weekday but he won't go out of his way to tell everyone to come to his place to get drunk. Derek prefers drinking alone, not appreciating when he can't ignore his thoughts when others are around that he hasn't known for an extended period of time.

Derek's greatest regret is signing the Chronocorp PMC contract on his eighteenth birthday, which doomed a good portion of his life to monotonous busywork. He thought that he'd get to see new places, meet new people who may share his interests, and learn new useful life skills. All that he got to see were the inside of endless office buildings, all he met were pencil-pushers, and all he learned how to do was paperwork. A vast majority of the tasks assigned to Derek while he was under contract for Chronocorp could have been easily automated, and Derek could have even been the one to automate it. He even tried pitching the automation policy to the company executives as a way to free up work hours for their employees to accomplish more pressing tasks but was shot down as it would make Chronocorp look like they hire more people than they have positions for, giving them a bad rep in the eyes of other big corporations.

Derek's gifts are a combination of personal potential, company augmentations and equipment, and Derek's personal technological know how with some nudges from harbingers. Derek's adrenal grafting is a company standard for Chronocorp squad leads, allowing them to directly lead assaults on hostile bases of operation. In addition to the adrenal grafting, squad leads are allowed a choice of weaponry that is provided by the company, most in Derek's position choose a CQB firearm such as a shotgun or submachine gun but Derek, with his eccentric tastes and aspirations, instead chose a collapsible pickaxe, which he has since further upgraded with additional functionality. Company standards excluded, Derek's unstable continuity allows him to bend and break the rules of what does, doesn't, should, or shouldn't exist, enabling access his pickaxe whenever he would need it, or even channeling his instability outward into a single devastating strike that usually completely wipes inanimate objects from the timeline.