Hotch's bio

[Samira]

"You know there’s got to be a faster way to do this. How about we just change the first question to ‘have you recently dated a homicidal pyromaniac?’"
-Derek Morgan, "Compulsion"

Your Name: Sami
How many years roleplaying?: Five? Six? I forget.

French poet Jacques Rigaut said, "Don't forget that I cannot see myself. My role is limited to being the one who looks in the mirror."

Jason Gideon, "Plain Sight"

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Please put a picture of your character. No larger than 300 x 200

Character Name: Aaron Hotchner
Age: 37
Date of Birth: 21 March, 1974
Residence: Quantico, VA
Profession: Unit Chief and Profiler for the BAU

Appearance:
Tall and lean, Hotch stands just over 6' but appears even taller due to his habitual manner of carrying himself. He holds himself erect, an almost tangible dignity and self-assurance built up like a fortress around him. He tends to appear rather formidable and unapproachable, all business and no amiability. His demeanour is serious; he seldom smiles, especially since Haley's murder. The times he smiles now are limited almost exclusively to the times he's with his son. His team jokes that his glare is known to be deadly in forty-nine states and the fiftieth is denial.

He wears his dark hair a little long, in a style that Jessica sometimes tells him looks like a lawyer from the 90's – to which he usually reminds her rather acerbically that he was a lawyer, thank you very much. He maintains an impassively stoic expression most of the time, the same look whether he's handcuffing a serial killer or watching JJ tease Reid. His dark eyes are his one truly expressive feature, when he allows them to be, but even then it's not a simple task to read Hotch.

He dresses almost exclusively in business attire these days – black slacks and collared shirts, with his suit coat usually near at hand. The style is oddly flattering, accentuating his long arms and legs and only adding to the deadly serious impression he makes. At home he dresses down for his son, but there have been those who speculated that by now Hotch is more at home in a suit than jeans anyway. The blue bullet-proof vest he wears in the field has become almost like a second skin to him by now, more a natural extension of himself than a cumbersome accessory of his job. In short, while Hotch may be no more and no less than a man, he has all the appearance of an FBI agent who's hardly anything else anymore.

Personality:
Perhaps the most accurate word to describe Hotch is driven. The man never seems to take – or need – a break. Almost always the first one into the office in the morning, almost always the last one to leave in the evenings, he seems to thrive on work. At the same time, there is no doubt that the horrors he sees every day get to him, reach deeply into his soul. When home with Jack, he struggles to clear his mind of the gory images and the painful scenes, struggles to focus his whole being entirely on his son for that moment, to see the light in the world and forget the dark. Despite his stoic facade, he feels deeply. He once in a while has the disconcerting conviction that his own soul has been somehow darkened by the shadows through which he passes daily.

He's said himself that he has no sense of humour, but that is not strictly true. As a matter of fact, he has a sense of humour that used to show itself quite frequently. There was nothing in the world he enjoyed more than to make Haley laugh, which he used to do frequently. That, of course, was back when Haley was there, back before he'd given up smiling altogether. His sense of humour sometimes shows still, when he's with his son, but it's a different laugh these days. There's something of the old sparkle laughing – he laughs now for Jack, not for himself.

Hotch is selfless, loyal, and almost ridiculously honest. His sense of integrity is something he's known for – he doesn't cut corners, doesn't change facts, and doesn't go the easy route. He's long ago come to grips with the fact that this job could kill him, and he's prepared to jeopardize himself every day for the sake of his team. He'll never admit just how deeply he cares about each member of his team, but they all know. He's a good leader – confident and strong, unmoving – but he's also a good team worker, taking input, ready to admit when he's wrong, and willing to ask for help when he needs it.
He lives with deep grief every moment of every day. It doesn't go away, but it gets easier to bear as time passes. These days he lives for two things – his time with Jack, and the knowledge that every time they finish a case well another scumbag like the one who killed Haley has been taken care of.

History:
Born and raised in Winchester, Virginia, Aaron Hotchner had what's probably best termed a “normal childhood.” His father was a lawyer who worked long hours and was seldom home, his younger brother tagged along behind him everywhere and made a general pest of himself, and his mother made cookies, picked up dirty socks, and tucked them in at night with a kiss. Growing up he always planned to follow his father into prosecution, but he was never quite serious enough about school to please his father. Though Robert Hotchner was seldom home, when he was in the house he seemed to be always criticizing his sons. Sean should quit spending so much time in the kitchen and do more manly things. Aaron should leave off fooling around with sports and concentrate on studying. Somewhere along the line Aaron silently swore that if he ever had a family, he would be home more than his father was and he would leave off criticizing them.

He met Haley Brooks toward the end of his junior year in high school. Upon stumbling into the wrong rehearsal room and meeting her, he looked her up in the yearbook and felt certain, somehow, that he would marry her. In an attempt to get to know her, he joined the theatre club, where he was cast as “the worst fourth pirate in history” for the school's rendition of The Pirates of Penznce. Despite his complete lack of talent, he threw himself wholeheartedly into the part, charming Haley as much by his enthusiasm as by his personality in general. It wasn't long after high school that they married, blithely intending to live happily ever after.

Hotch was always trying to impress his father, though when he thought about it he couldn't sort out just why the man's approval mattered so much to him – he was never there anyway. Even after his father died before Aaron had finished high school and before Sean had even started it, he still struggled to live up to his father's standards. Somehow the man seemed to be there from the grave, never quite satisfied with his son's performance. As a result of this constant striving, Hotch graduated at the top of his high school class and went on to excel in law school. He became a prosecutor, as he'd always planned. It was only a couple of years before he left prosecution to join the LAPD's SWAT team, increasingly frustrated that he could only take care of the offenders after they'd been caught, but had no ability to stop crime. After a while in the field with SWAT, he joined the FBI in Seattle and began working his way upward, lecturing and holding classes on negotiation techniques and hostage scenario handling. When he received an offer of a transfer to the Behavioural Analysis Unit in Quantico, it was just what he'd been hoping for. He and Haley packed up and moved to Quantico. It was a year or so before he was promoted to unit chief, where he's been ever since.

Jack made his appearance about a year after that, a bundle of joy to both Hotch and Haley. There was nothing in the world Hotch loved more than his wife and son, but there began to be tension between work and home. Haley didn't like how often he was gone, and how long he was gone – to be honest, neither did he. But this job was something he just couldn't walk away from. The victims, the unsubs – there was so much of it. Always another case. Always another promise that ended up broken. He thought his heart had been torn out when Haley left and took Jack. He threw himself into work with renewed vigour, and then discovered that there was still a heart inside him to be torn out again, this time a million times more painfully than before, when George Foyette murdered Haley. The relief he felt at Jack's survival was rivalled by the horrific pain over Haley's death. For a while he actually considered leaving the BAU, or at least leaving field work. Jack, though, knew that he caught bad guys and there was nothing Hotch would do to disillusion his son. His team stepped in, each in their own way, to help him out, give him more time at home, make sure he was handling everything alright. He'd never been more grateful for them. There's still a tug-of-war between work and home – there probably always will be – but he hopes he'll always be first a father to his son, and secondly the hero who catches the bad guys.

Likes:
Strong coffee
Spending time with Jack
Early mornings
Loyalty of the team
Quiet plane rides back to Quantico
Coaching Jack's soccer team
The Pirates of Penzance – it's a sentimental thing
Knowing he has a loaded gun on him – just in case
Big dogs

Dislikes:
Loud explosions
Deceptions
Serial killers, abductors, sex offenders – pretty much all the 'bad guys' he catches.
Having to be away from his son
Mustard
Politicians' crap
Knowing who the unsub is but not having evidence to pin them
Country music
The sound of women crying

Strengths:
Brilliant aim with his handgun
Very persuasive, whether it's talking an unsub off a cliff, nailing the defendant at the stand, or talking his team into doing what he thinks they should
Compartmentalizes well
Huge ability to handle pain – externally, anyway
Good at getting through the bureaucratic red tape
Tends to know just what to say to members of the team who are having a hard time
Intensely loyal and fiercely, sacrificially protective

Weaknesses:
Struggles to trust people – a common difficulty among agents, apparently
Struggles to balance his professional life and his personal life
Takes him a long time to forgive or let go when someone screws up
Pushes himself too hard – won't take a break even when he needs it
Hero complex – he's sure he can solve every case
His hearing – ever since the explosion he's had occasional trouble with one ear

Parents:
Robert and Susan Hotchner (deceased)

Siblings:
Sean Hotchner
Sister-in-law Jessica Brooks

Spouse:
Haley Hotchner (deceased)

Children:
Jack Hotchner

Anything Else?
He carries a Glock17 on his hip and a Glock27 at his ankle.

Roleplay Sample:
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