Background

Michael Bandura was born 1 November 2064 to Timothy Iwassa and Michelle Bandura both employees of Shibata Construction & Engineering. Michelle was Caucasian who specialized in Spaceframe Construction while Timothy had a doctorate in Propulsion Systems Engineering. Two years later, his sister Carol was born.

Michael and Carol often faced discrimination due to their mixed heritage which forced them to work harder to prove they were equal to the pure-bred. While Carol excelled, Michael did not. He just wasn’t intellectually inclined and he really didn’t manage people well but he did excel in physical activities. Other children often called Michael cream, it used to be because of the color of his skin but later it was because of how he would often beat up the bullies who teased the two of them.

Eventually, his use of violence lead to him being sent for discipline training and eventually on a path focused on what he did excel at. It is where he learned to live by his Code. By the age of seventeen he was a member of Shibata’s Security. He managed to complete his High School Equivalency but with only average grades. Nonetheless, he excelled in security. His sister chose to study Construction Engineering in her post-secondary after graduating high school three years later. Around the same time, Michael was sponsored by his team leader to attend special operations training to see if he could complete the course. He did, as once again discrimination drove him. His natural aptitude was recognized by one of the trainers which also helped. By 21 years of age, Michael Iwassa became a member of Shibata Major Assets Recovery Teams (SMART).

For the next three years, Michael continued to excel in the teams but he kept getting passed over. Until an opportunity arose last year, Shibata earned a construction contract in Toronto through a bid placed by their local office. His sister, having recently graduated, was transferred to Toronto to gain experience. A SMART team was also transferred to that office and Michael was reassigned to that team as the team’s second due to his language proficiency. He accepted the assignment as was his duty but he was secretly relieved to be able to keep an eye on his sister. She had been struggling of late and was becoming more introverted. Their parents were concerned by this development and what it may lead to under the pressure of this new assignment. Though Michael believed transferring to Toronto would lead to less discrimination for them both.

Part of the reason for his reassignment had to do with an internal matter that left Michael one of two survivors of his original team that left him with a deep rooted fear of Monads.

As part of their cover, each member of SMART was given a Fake ID. Michael’s was Mark Yeung, a bodyguard specializing in wilderness travel. His entire team, in fact, belonged to a small private company that specialized in this…of course it was owned via multiple shell companies by Shibata. The reason for this soon became apparent, Shibata was the lead runner for the AAA JapanaCorps to thwart S-K’s move to exploit Ontario’s natural resources. So under the cover of the construction project, Shibata would have various assets travel out into the province to make contact with various natives attempting to leverage them into if not signing with various Japanese interests at least rejecting Saeder-Krupp.

The team would escort these assets to meet with these tribals, with varying degrees of protection ranging from one member of their SMART team to the entire team. This is how Michael/Mark met Phillip Cardinal. During another operation, Michael met Dr. Ericks. Trying to recon an off-books S-K operation that Michael had stumbled upon, Michael got jumped by a gang. He managed to fight them off but not without being badly injured. He couldn’t get to a hospital without blowing his cover and potentially letting S-K know they had been discovered. His commlink had been destroyed in the fight and he had heard of a street clinic nearby. He managed to find it and convince the Carl Ericks to patch him up. From that day forward, Michael as Mark cultivated the man known on the street as Clamps. He even arranged for that clinic to occasional get much needed supplies while being able to use it as an off-books site for medical treatments.

Unfortunately, Michael’s battle with the gang drew some interesting attention from the Street Shaman known as Chesire. She began trying to learn more about this man as she had a vendetta against the gang and his handling of the small group of them gained her curiosity. Knowing someone kept following him, forced Michael to avoid Shibata and the team’s business front until he finally managed to confirm than confront Chesire. After a tense standoff, Michael realized that he did not need to kill her and instead they had a brief fling fueled by Chesire’s whims or ongoing curiosity. After that leveled out, they maintained a cool but beneficial relationship, each trying to decide if they wanted to develop it further. Chesire introduced him to the music group, Birds of a Feather, which lead to a side job of added security for one of their concerts in Toronto for part of the team but Michael aka Mark Yeung was the lead so got to know Screech the best.

Life was good…Michael Iwassa was finally having his merit recognized and he was moving up toward promotion, the discrimination was less, and his sister seemed to be better settled here. A week ago, he was assigned a mission to deliver supplies to Phillip Cardinal’s tribe. As part of his cover, he was sent out to check out a new trail and possible camping spots for a new client. It was supposed to be a two week job but two nights ago, Phillip brought him news that Toronto had gone dark. The two of them drove back as this aborted the mission given SMART protocols.

It took them a day to get close enough to the GTA to recon it. It didn’t look good. Nothing was moving, comms were done, and driving in with what appeared to be the only working vehicle would draw possible undue attention given that they had no real intel on what happened. So Michael Iwassa known as Mark Yeung to most everyone in Toronto decided to walk in and let Phillip take the jeep back to alert his elders in the tribe. He turned off his comms, tucked them away, once again to avoid undue attention and as he walked into the city, he decided for the time being he would use a street name while he gathered intel and worked his way toward making contact with his superiors. He smirked as he considered it, and laughed, Cream it is … most would assume he was a runner. Taking the Ares Alpha out of the duffel, he slung on the tactical sling. At this point with the obvious signs of rioting, overt threat and being prepared would be best if stealth failed.