Ezra Pax

Description
Ezra is in his early 50s, with the weathered face of a man who spent many years exposed to the salt and sun of seafaring.

Personal History
Acting Director of the Brightwell Institute, Ezra Pax is a well-renown investigative journalist committing his life to uncovering corruption and human rights violations.

Ezra has a strong moral compass, holding himself to be the catalyst for the difference he wants to see in the world, and he is talented at inspiring that spark in others. People are often enamored and overwhelmed by his personality when initially meeting, but struggle to ever grow close to him. He pours so much into his ambitions and work, that he tends to neglect the day to day aspects of maintaining relationships. He also tends to trivialize more mundane problems, for afterall who has time to address something so minor, when his success can literally be life or death to some?

Ezra was born in Puerto Rico, and spent his early years in the U.S. Coast Guard performing rescue operations, providing humanitarian aid, and thwarting drug cartels in the Caribbean. It was in the latter efforts that he found his calling: a natural affinity for getting in the head of his targets, anticipating their moves and staying ahead of their plans. His success tracing and anticipating smuggling operations resulted in a quick rising in the enlisted ranks. Success was short lived, however, as he was inexplicably reassigned, followed shortly by renewed criminal activity in quadrants he had effectively shut down. Any attempts to get clarification or rectify the "mistake" were met with hostility within the chain of command.

Thwarting smugglers and playing the hero was enthralling for young Ezra, but he found himself reflecting on his impact. Seeing how readily his own command structure bent to the will of external forces in lieu of their mission, and keeping up with the latest news reports of troubling American Government interventionalism throughout Latin America, he decided his efforts were better applied outside the system. Corruption couldn't be fought from within with good intentions. Only with evidence and the illuminating truth that linked public figures and shadowy institutional puppeteers with their criminal counterparts could force accountability.

Rather than re-enlist, he chose to leave the Coast Guard to study at the University of Miami, majoring in Journalism and Criminology. Armed with new skills as well as the hubris and idealism of a young man in his 20s with an axe to grind against an evil institution, he set out to break his first major expose. It took three years, and countless hours developing contacts, hiring informants, and interviewing witnesses across a dozen countries, but he finally did it. Ezra found the smoking gun linking C.I.A. operatives to cocaine cartels and U.S. Coast Guard collaborators.

His story shattered the international news cycle when it broke, resulting in a circus of interviews and testimony. In the end, most of the implicated officials skirted justice as they let their black sheep take the fall. While waiting to testify, he was the target of an assassination attempt, nearly being killed after being shot multiple times outside the courthouse. Once he recovered, incensed by the depth of the conspiracy he had uncovered, he took a position as a journalist for a major network kicking off a storied career.

Ezra's fame, charisma, and tenacity led to him being lucky in lust, but he was quickly exposed as incapable of maintaining any semblance of a work-life balance once a relationship kindled. He was thrice married resulting in messy divorces, alienating his children in the process.

Now in the twilight of his career, Ezra took the position at the Institute in Hamilton, pulling back from international intrigue to focus on the mysterious web of criminality and systemic coverups that were plaguing the metropolis. He tells himself that staying local will allow him the time to settle down and reconnect with his estranged children. Only time will tell what kind of a toll the rabbit hole of Hamilton's underbelly will take on his intentions.

Ezra lives alone on the Bayside of South Hamilton, coasting on his book royalties and a modest salary from the institute. He's an avid cigar officianado, and passionate baseball fan, maintaining season club-level tickets to the Hamilton games. On Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday nights, he can be found at Liberty Lanes, bowling with his semi-professional team where he averages a 220 score and they hope to finally take first place this year.

Character Sheet: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1ZeMmfOm8j_ocvtg4Pf0Nh8rzDhnTpG0A/view?usp=sharing