Julius Chryston

Dr. Julius Chryston is an English-born citizen of Rapture, born in 1886.

Early Life
Julius was born in Blackpool in October 1886 to a Edgar Chryston and a Mary Chryston. They lived in a large house with a small crew of servants. He was a charismatic and affable kid yet selfish and sometimes cold-hearted and outright sadistic. Julius was by no means unpopular at school, he had a circle of friends and a decent social life, yet was not one of the popular kids and was no stranger to bullying, both receiving it and handing it out. Spoiled from an early age, Julius was given an inflated feeling of self-importance by his parents, whose view of parenting was mostly leaving him in the care of overworked hired labour only stopping in every now and again to praise him and shout at the servants. Other than that, his life was fairly average for an upper-middle class kid of his age, with virtues and flaws.

Julius started studying medicine at Oxford University at the age of 18 after getting good marks in his final school exams. He began pursuing a career in medicine, showing strong interests in medical research and new, untested forms of medicine, like medical genetics. He was devoted to his studies and mostly ignored extracurricular activities or the social aspect of universities. He was however a keen participant in the debating club, well-known for his objectivist views and frequent attempts at justifying exploitation or inhumane experiments for the "greater good". He made many enemies and made few friends while at the club.

After graduation
Julius graduated with full honours and high marks and went on to start work as a GP in Blackpool in 1909 (after medical school and training). He built a disdain and lack of respect for many of the patients (or customers, as he insisted on calling them) under his care, never going beyond what he was being paid to do and frequently performing small experiments, tests and studies on them without their knowledge, for example tweaking an occasional prescription here and there and seeing the results. He was hated by his patients, but he got the job done.

One night in 1911, his mentor and friend, the quinquagenarian doctor Dr. Barnabus Mattson, revealed to Julius he had killed several of his ill elderly patients by slipping them poison. The two agreed on several issues such as ethics, race, psychology and euthanasia, yet Julius was not sure he could tolerate the killings of elderly patients. After a brief argument, Mattson managed to convince Julius to accept what had happened and to help him escape the country before he was found out. With a heavy heart, Julius agreed, as long as in his final act before fleeing Mattson made sure a couple of his papers got published in a scientific journal. Mattson agreed, and then fled to Munich, where he became an avid scientific supporter of the Nazi party following the Great War.

One of the papers that was published with the help of Mattson detailed the small impact a certain drug had on the health of patients. He had administered the drug, closely related to opium, to his patients without their knowing and compared it to others who weren't given it. He had observed the affects and wrote them down. While the content of the paper itself was nothing to write home about, a rich, successful, opportunistic entrepreneur and businessman named Cornelius Birkenstock noticed his talents and his efficiency and hired him as his family doctor. He also allowed him free rein to conduct almost any experiments he wanted to, and got a private labs in the grounds of Cornelius's estate to do so. He conducted many experiments and wrote many papers in his time working for Birkenstock, overall doing a good job, including curing (or temporarily covering up the symptoms of) his son's fatal blood condition and making a few inventions and innovations for Birkenstock's business interests, including a new engine system (admittedly more of a variation of a current engine at the time than a totally new invention, however it's banned today due to high pollution outlet, but was out of use some time before that as more efficient and cheaper alternatives were out) and a new system of automatically reloading bullets (unfortunately too clunky and expensive for mass production.)

However, in 1915, Julius was getting bored and impatient with the growing limitations and ethical restrictions of working for the stuffy old Birkenstock family and desired more, and following a massive argument, he resigned from his post, taking his work with him. One of the main issues in the argument were growing rumours that Julius was selling trade secrets to other companies, and suspicions were arising that he was sleeping with Cornelius's daughter as well. He then got a job working as a medic at a field hospital in Europe.

World War I
Julius was neutral regarding war, having studied it somewhat intensely. He didn't think it was morally wrong, instead thinking it profitable and natural, however he did acknowledge its downsides. When working at the field hospital, Julius took any opportunity to make money or further his own interests, no matter how "wrong" or illegal it was, and no matter how much it involved neglecting his duties as a doctor. He gained a reputation in the villages near the war zones of being a good business partner and sometime customer for both more "proper" businesses and institutions like cafes and theatres, as well as more shady ones such as black market dealers, whores or gambling rings. He also picked up a bit of a reputation of being a bit of a lout and a drunk.

His workload increased dramatically in June 1916, much to his annoyance. A bomb struck the field hospital when he was out, and many doctors and patients were killed and wounded, and his own private quarters were damaged as well destroying and damaging many of his possessions and papers. He not only had to care for many of his colleagues who were wounded by the blast, but also had to take on some of their patients. In frustration, he did sloppy jobs and abused several of his patients who he didn't like. He still continued writing papers and messing around, despite the war. He never faced justice or proper consequences for his actions and his negligence.

In between the wars
Julius returned home after the war ended, and used his impressive CV (he had done stints as a GP, as a private company doctor and as a field hospital medic) to secure a job in London, working as a medical researcher. Playing with relatively new technology like x-rays, Julius made several minor discoveries and wrote several insignificant papers. His colleagues remembered him as a thieving, annoying, arrogant arsehole at best, and his new neighbours had an even worse view of him. As his landlord put it, he was an "arrogant, nasty man who had no respect and very few virtues in his dark soul." Julius did however begin investing in the growing financial sector, including trading stocks on the London Stock Exchange. Julius had no qualms about playing with figures, manipulating businesses or breaking moral and legal regulations to get a quick penny, and had no problem in investing in more morally dubious companies too.

In 1925, Julius decided to make his own private clinic in North London, using both his business and his medical skills to set up. The Chryston Medical Clinic was overpriced and relatively low-quality, yet due to overcompetitive business techniques and good use of his connections and charisma, Julius managed to make it into a successful business. Life went swimmingly for Julius, until 1929. The Wall Street Crash ruined his financial investments and ruined him. Many of his friends, business partners and others he knew also went down. He had to sell off many of his possessions and in the confusion, was forced to sell the CMC in 1931. He was forced to take up a job as a GP in a small, danky, lower-class suburb. During this time, Chryston became even more cynical and depressed, concocting several more plans including starting to write a somewhat lengthy revenge list, and grew an addiction to cocaine and opium. He also travelled around somewhat, including trips to mainland Europe (including Nazi Germany, where he probably met up with the now wealthy Mattson and had a chat), Africa and Asia. These trips did nothing to change his bigoted, self-centred view of the world.

WWII
The Second World War had little direct impact on Chryston. For the most part, he continued living like he had always been living. Things like rationing and the black out obviously affected and disgruntled him, and he continued to make his views about politics and war known to anyone within earshot. He continued to serve as a GP, though did eventually get given a job at a hospital, mainly working on diagnosis and administration. He did treat several returning soldiers and bombing victims, and he became desensitised and developed a strange interest in violence. Following the war, Chryston received an invitation to Rapture. He gladly accepted, sick of the surface world and its limits.

Early years in Rapture
Julius was one of the first doctors to arrive in Rapture, arriving in 1946. He did provide some medical support to workers finishing up construction on Rapture (paid for handsomely by Ryan) and did serve as one of Ryan's early medical and scientific advisers, but soon started his own private clinic and research lab in Medical Pavilion, named Chryston Clinics. It provided a variety of services, ranging from diagnosis and prescription to less socially acceptable ones like impromptu abortions (while more orthodox, safe, acceptable abortion services were available elsewhere, they were often expensive and some had strict moral codes) and drug supplies. Unlike on the surface, he tended to treat his patients well; he was happy with his life, he was earning lots of money (enough to make other business interests and afford various luxuries, consumer goods and decorative objects) and his customers tended to be similarly-minded people ideologically and politically. Despite being a bad writer, he decided to begin writing his memoirs to help further inflate his ego. He also rented out some of the Medical Pavilion property he owned to others, like a couple of apartments and research labs for more unscrupulous residents of Rapture (including a deranged doctor who was later found guilty of serial killing and malpractice), a hospice (The Rapture First Hospice, a small yet comfortable establishment even during the civil war) and a psychiatrist's office.

Chryston's employees
Chryston employed various Rapturians during his time in Rapture. Here is a list of notable employees:


 * Flavio Pescuddu: A young, idealistic Italian-born doctor.
 * Laurence Bernard: An older and more egotistic, yet equally idealistic, Canadian-born doctor.
 * Kwong Wei: A Chinese-born bureaucrat and best friend of Chryston, despite their contrasting personalities. Officially in charge of managing the company finances on top of his other bureaucratic work, his maths were so bad Sergei ended up taking over the finances.
 * Sergei Kuznetsov: A grouchy, moralistic Russian who eventually ended up opposing Chryston, "disappeared" in late 1957/early 1958.
 * Anita Patel: In charge of humans resources and the boss of the "manual" workers at the company, like cleaners and porters.
 * Alfred Holmes: A fellow Englishman and a doctor, fairly bland, unassuming and obedient.
 * Joey Gravelli: A doctor at the company, somewhat unorthodox in his practices yet gets the job done. The most experienced doctor under Chryston's employ.
 * Charlie Landers: Arrogant and obnoxious, Charlie is a boastful "ladies man" (really an abusive, bullying dick) and in charge of the research department.
 * Lara Parker: A fairly simple-minded, short-tempered doctor, she was initially idealistic and moralistic, but became more like Chryston as time went on.

He got on well with some of his employees, especially those who served as "yes-men" and cronies. Others, like Flavio, Laurence and Sergei, were greeted less enthusiastically, having confrontations from petty debates to pay disputes to important moral issues. While some left, many of them who had serious disagreements with Julius stayed on due to the fact they had friends there and were being paid well.

Deal with Sinclair
As ADAM became more and more popular, Julius took advantage, despite the strong protests of some of his least favourite employees, who were opposed to the growing use of ADAM for various reasons, such as moral opposition, health concerns or even envy at not being the one who discovered it. For example, he helped write a series of tests called "What Plasmid/tonic/etc. is right for you?", and offered several ADAM-based services at the clinic. He also began conducting some small ADAM-based research projects on the sly. One day in 1954, he was approached by a representative of Sinclair Solutions, who offered him supplies, money and influence in return for being a business partner and ally of the company. He immediately accepted.

While several employees, as usual, protested at the growing presence of ADAM in the company and the impact it was having, Julius took full advantage, offering a variety of ADAM-based services to his demanding clientèle, often at the expense of non-ADAM services. He also had an even larger supply of ADAM with which to conduct his twisted experiments, and he enjoyed every second of it. Julius was riding high on the ADAM business, profiting at every turn and every new innovation and even offering official medical endorsement for ADAM products on Sinclair adverts. He was living the high life, his clinic became one of the most respected and successful in town despite the disagreements of several doctors and employees, he got a job writing a column (no doubt a biased and egotistic column) for a highly respected Rapture medical journal, all his other interests were going great as well and he became an almost permanent fixture of Rapture business meetings or high-class parties, often leaving with a gold-digger on each arm. He was high on ADAM and high on life. None of the other problems Rapture faced could stop him. While not taking over Rapture, he was doing very well for himself, in contrast to the decaying livelihoods of several of his more outspoken employees.

Sarah Dickinson
Despite his success with Sinclair and helping popularise their products, he was a freelance mercenary at the end of the day and did do some work with people like Tenenbaum, and thus had insider knowledge of the Gatherer programme despite not working on it himself. He received insider knowledge about the possibility of little girls being good gatherers way before the rest of Rapture did. One of his friends, Dr. Max Smithers, one of the workers on the Little Sister programme and a part-time doctor at Persephone, while they were talking over lunch at the luxurious Central Square Bistro during the middle of the 1950s, brought up the possibility of inserting the slug in a newly born girl and seeing how it developed with her. Julius thought it was a great foundation for an experiment, and immediately went to the Clinic's newly acquired pregnancy ward.

There he met Sarah Dickinson, the wife of Flavio, one of his most troublesome, obnoxious employees. In contrast to her husband, she was a lot less outspoken and anti-ADAM, and also was not as uptight and obnoxious as he was. She was midway through pregnancy, and suitably excited. Using Rapture technology, Julius was able to work out that her new child was a girl. Deciding that the little child was a perfect test subject due to the health of her parents, and also a perfect way at shutting up Flavio and crushing him further, he used his charisma, his wealth, his power and his position of trust as a doctor to get Sarah to go out with him. He played her into leaving Flavio.

She gave birth in late 1955, and while Sarah was unconscious and then rather mentally unstable for a couple of weeks afterwards, it otherwise all went well and without a hitch. Both Sarah and the baby were healthy, and nothing bad like Flavio or Laurence seeing what was going on happened. Julius managed to convince her that the girl had a serious health problem, and he slipped the baby girl (named Rosa, after Flavio's mother) into the care of Dr. Smithers, who implanted the girl with an ADAM slug successfully. Eventually, Sarah recovered and began asking awkward questions and making threats. So, to make sure nothing was found out and everything went well, Max gave Rosa to the private care of Julius as his own private science experiment, and Julius gave Sarah to the "care" of Max and the other doctors at Persephone. They disappeared from Rapture without a trace, and business continued as normal. Julius kept Rosa as his own personal science experiment, seeing the affects ADAM had on a developing baby body for his own amusement and interest. Flavio was aware that Julius had "stolen" Sarah from him, yet had no idea what happened to her or their child.

Experiments on Persephone prisoners
While he continued his private experiments, Sinclair began funding more ADAM-based experiments for Chryston Clinics, as well as other SS partners, to conduct. Ignoring the protests of some his employees and bullying them into working with him, Chryston set to work. His main objective was to help dispel common "myths" about Sinclair Solutions products, including rumours that the products, and ADAM as a whole, caused mutations and insanity. The experiments involved subjecting Persephone prisoners (provided by Sinclair and Smithers) to various types (from refined Plasmids to ADAM-based health treatments to just pure unrefined ADAM) and quantities of ADAM from various sources, and watching results over various lengths of time. The results were, with a few exceptions, overwhelmingly negative. The more ADAM, the stronger the ADAM and the longer time period they consumed it, the more severe the affects. Chryston was displeased with these negative results. Not only was he a Splicer himself, and didn't want the thought on his mind that he may be heading for a life as a crazy mutated freak, but the results would be bad for business from all angles and cause a public scare.

To the protests of some of his employees, he covered up the results, focusing on and exaggerating the few ones that were initially positive. Sinclair Solutions published a paper written by Dr. Chryston with these half-truths in it. Upon seeing this, employees like Flavio and Laurence were annoyed to say the least. They thought the experiments might finally reveal ADAM as what it really was, before it was too late. They tried getting the genuine results public, but few would listen. Julius, worried that this scaremongering might succeed, used his influence to try and get as many people as possible to outright ignore them. Eventually, they gave up, being ignored and threatened. The experiments for the most part continued uninterrupted. Chryston Clinics became a premier example of a business in the Medical Pavilion evolving with and prospering with ADAM. A couple of the troublesome employees (like Sergei, who was becoming a rather big business and publicity threat to Julius) even "disappeared" in the confusion. The Civil War was also profitable for Julius.

The ultimatum and the downfall of Chryston Clinics
Julius decided to cement his position as a good customer and partner of Sinclair Solutions, as well as send a final mission to his more troublesome, annoying employees, in particular those who opposed ADAM yet were still with him. After spending a couple of days off work in 1959 writing, relaxing, reading and performing a few intelligence tests on the 4-year old Rosa Pescuddu, he came back, gathered up all his remaining employees, from loyal researchers to dissenting doctors and from humble porters to stressed-out cleaners, and offered those who hadn't yet Spliced yet an ultimatum; get at least one gene enhancement or lose your job.

While one, Flavio Pescuddu, immediately denied and protested, the others either accepted or asked for a few days to consider. He quickly fired Flavio, and allowed the other workers a few days to decide. Those who Spliced the most on the whole became better workers due to some Tonics increasing efficiency, and Julius thought that having more Splicers in the company was good for publicity and business, so those who Spliced the most ended up getting promoted and favoured by Julius. Eventually, the last employee, Laurence, having bowed to the pressure, agreed to get a token Tonic to keep his job.

While on paper business was going great, Julius was rapidly degenerating mentally and physically, along with the rest of Rapture. Rapture was falling, and Julius was oblivious, despite all the gossip on the air and all the rubble and corpses in the streets. Until business began to take a dip. Then he abandoned ship, leaving Chryston Clinics in the care of his friend Kwong Wei, leaving him to deal with all the problems the business had, and took up a job at Outer Persephone, deciding it would be safer to watch the downfall of Rapture and attend to his own interests and experiments down there. He got an apartment in a small housing area near Fontaine Futuristics, close to the entrance to Persephone so he had an easy commute. He thought life would be easy. He was wrong.

Karma
It was a cold night in early 1960, a day off from conducting experiments and keeping the peace in Persephone. Julius had taken a break from writing, reading and being idle, and had decided to see how Rosa reacted to various tortures like thumb-screws. However, outside a Big Daddy was having a fight with some rebels, probably Atlas goons or independent thugs or mercenaries. The Rosie model threw a proximity mine; however, he missed, and it landed in the window of Chryston's apartment. As he was carrying his prized bonsai plant from one end of the room to the other to make room for a torture rack, he triggered it. His apartment got blown in two, all his possessions being blown to smithereens and his bonsai plant tragically dying instantly.

Julius was left half-dead, most of his lower body blown clean off, and him having landed uncomfortably in a pile of trash and rubble and in a growing pool of his own bodily fluids. He lay like that for hours, in excruciating pain, unable to move, occasionally being struck by a stray bullet or Big Daddy stomp, with only his thoughts and the dripping of water for company. However, his friend, Max Smithers found him on his way to work. Unfortunately for Julius, Max had completely lost it, much like the rest of Rapture, and while he kept Julius alive for a few months in a Persephone test chamber, the last few months of his life were excruciating and either spent lying bored and alone or being subjected to horrific experiments and mindgames, much like those he used to put people through, only worse. Eventually, in November 1960, Julius, weak, decrepit and depressed, died.

No one knows what happened to Rosa.

Personality
Julius is a cultured, intelligent, charismatic man and he is very affable and friendly when he wants to be. He has strong respect for traditions and a good head for business. He also has a reputation of a ladies' man, and when drunk often boasts (truthfully or otherwise) of the notches on his bed post despite his flaws. However, he is impatient, uptight, aggressive (losing his temper in particular if you questioned his morals or political views) and lacks empathy for and often shows outright sadism to most others. Everything he does is either for his own amusement, his wallet or his ego. When younger, he was spoiled and praised constantly by his aloof parents, and he often treated the servants around his house like rubbish. He is however a very clumsy and forgetful person, never remembering names, phone numbers or life lessons.

He was very competitive, trying to damage the careers of other doctors and potential rivals at every opportunity, even when he stood nothing significant to gain from their downfall. This included supplying false answers to a medical exam to a trainee doctor and even making another Blackpool GP be found guilty of wrongdoings and losing his job by clever application of false and exaggerated evidence. He always went for cheaper drugs and supplies when he could, yet if you made a business deal or contract with him, you could expect him to keep his word. He also took advantage and exploited any situation or dilemma, even if it was another person's problem, for his own gain.

Family
The Chryston family were one of the more influential families in Blackpool, despite their nepotism, cronyism and unorthodox business and political practices. Many times did Julius get let off from wrongdoings and given special privileges in school and work due to the influence his elder relatives had (for example, his maternal uncle was a Liberal town councilman and his dad's cousin was an important local businessman). The Chryston family donated large sums to local institutions, and both men and women had important roles and jobs in the local community. Unusually for the Chryston surname, Julius was an only child.

His parents were Edgar Chryston (1849-1921), a former retired colonial administrator and one of the more vital pillars in the local community, and Mary Chryston (1845-1925), the head nurse at the local hospital. Both were aloof, outspoken, prudish, stuck-up and self-centred, traits which rubbed off of them onto their son. Edgar died in 1921 (when Julius was 35 and he was 72) from lung cancer and Mary died in 1925 (when Julius was 38 and she was 80) from a fall which broke her hip. Julius mourned their deaths, but enjoyed his inheritance more than enough to make up for the suffering. Like the rest of his family, they helped large numbers of local institutions, charities, community events and research projects, and Edgar, as his "magnum opus", built a large library in 1915 (with a statue of himself out front) named after the Chryston family. The statue was destroyed in 1942 by a military lorry crashing, and the scrap metal was used for the war effort. The library itself was burnt down by an IRA firebomb in 1980. Luckily most of the books and such were in a storehouse as the library was being renovated at the time, and they were sold to other libraries, museums and private collectors.

Julius never married. He never had the time nor the love to return any real feelings, and he was too much of a self-appointed ladies man to ever "tie himself down to one pair of breasts", as he put it, in a rather sexist way.