Random facts about Chloe Armstrong
Feb. 18th, 2012 08:35 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
joyfulfeatherExplanation and facts about Huntress are here.
So I also did this for Chloe Armstrong (SGU), in part because I've resumed obsessively thinking about her and Rush and in part because if ever manage to get to a point where I'm easily making reqs in TR, Chloe is a very strong candidate for my next app. Because it turns out I have a lot of thoughts about her. She's kinda loud in my head, in a way that I have to work on for Huntress. (Possibly helped by the fact that there are two seasons of episodes with Chloe and there are only a handful of episodes where Huntress even appeared, and she's different enough from her comics incarnations that I can't just pull things wholesale. But I digress.)
1) Chloe always assumed she'd go into politics. It was what her parents wanted, and it was what she wanted. It was what she had lived, growing up an Armstrong. Everything they did was done with an eye towards how it would play in the press or how it would help her father's career. Even vacation spots and times were chosen that way – to make a statement, or to allow for a meet-and-greet with someone important. Chloe'd roll her eyes about it sometimes when she was a kid or teen, but honestly, it wasn't much of a bother. They did actual vacation stuff, too. Plus, she got to meet a lot of kids like her. When she got older, she started working more deliberately towards her father's goals, both from her mother's pushing and of her own free will. It was a given that her path would take her into politics, either following her father's footsteps or her mother's – be a politician herself, or at least the aide to a powerful politician (namely him), or become the wife of a powerful politician.
2) She's done a lot of community service throughout high school, college, and beyond, mostly in support of her father's goals. She doesn't have any personal “pet” projects, but women's rights were starting to become a passion for her.
3) She's always had a bit of a thing for older men. Growing up in politics, she was frequently surrounded by men of power, most of them a couple decades or more older than her. As she grew into a beautiful young woman, they noticed. She realized quickly that she could use that to her advantage, subtly influencing them with attention and flirtation. Her father encouraged her, but made damn sure that it never went beyond innocent flirtation. That was fine with her, for the most part, but a few of the men brought out something... a little less than innocent in her. She never crossed the line, though she may have toed it a time or two. Given a few more years, that would have changed. Her father would even have approved, in the right circumstances. Being romantically linked to a powerful man was good for everyone involved. Being the wife of such a man was even better.
4) Her own social group consisted of a lot of people around her age who were from families like hers – wealthy, politically powerful. Everyone was aiming for politics or law. That came with the attendant personality types: ambitious, party hard and play hard, and never to be completely trusted. It wasn't until Destiny that she really got to know anyone who wasn't that way. That night in the club with her old “friends” really brought that home. She knows that she's much more like the people she hung out with back then than she is like Matt or Eli.
5) She did her share of dating back home, within her social group. It was a group that liked to party hard. Chloe was never a fan of “pharm” parties, but just about anything else went. She started drinking socially when she was 15, and lost her v-card at 16. She's done a lot more experimenting with both substances and sex than either of her parents would imagine.
6) Self-medicating is an Armstrong family tradition. For her mother, it's booze and pills; for Chloe, it's just the alcohol. An average night got her pleasantly buzzed, but she binged often enough that someone probably should have noticed. No one did, of course, being caught up in their own problems; they were all as messed up as she was. Since getting to Destiny, she hasn't indulged like that even once.
7) She's not the type to think about the past in terms of “what if?” So she's never really given a lot of thought to what things might have been like on the ship if her father had survived. He'd have been part of the power struggle, obviously. Whether that would have been for the better or worse, there's no way to know. He died and that still hurts, but she has to live in the reality of now, rather than spending her time thinking about things that can't be undone.
8) Matt is without a doubt the best, most amazing guy she's ever dated. Possibly the best guy she's ever even met, though Eli gives him a run for his money. And she loves him for that, even as she wonders if someday it's going to drive them apart. There are a lot of differences between them, ones she doesn't think he realizes or is willing to see. Maybe on the ship they'll manage. If they were back on Earth, though... She's not sure who would end up walking away first. She really and truly loves him, but under different circumstances that might not be enough.
9) Chloe can't bring herself to be grateful for what happened on Icarus and them all being stranded on Destiny, but she can admit that some good has come out of it. There's Matt, of course, and Eli, and the fact that she's learning to be a better person because of them. Then there's the entire galaxy their alternate-timeline-selves had populated. Whole lives were lived, an entire civilization had existed, because they came here.
10) She is not the person she was when she went to Icarus that day. Everything that's happened since has changed her, irrevocably. She's endured things the old Chloe Armstrong could never have imagined. She's seen truly amazing things, and unbelievably horrible ones. And she personally, physically, was changed – the leftover effects of the alien infection, for lack of a better word, will never leave her. She knows things and can do things that literally no one else can. She, who was never all that good at math, can work with Rush on elaborate equations that would have been nonsense to her a year ago – and she enjoys it.
11) She's incredibly grateful to Rush for a lot of things. For rescuing her from that ship, for getting the blue aliens to cure her, but also for simply making her useful while she was “sick.” The others say he “used” her, and that's obviously true. But why shouldn't he have? She had the knowledge and skills that he needed, and he put them to use. Which meant that instead of rotting inside her room going bored out of her mind, she was able to do things like figure out how to turn the ship around. She might not have understood what was going on with her body, but she learned to use the knowledge put into her head, and that was because of Rush. The others might not get it, but she's incredibly grateful.
12) If they went home right now, today, she's not sure what she'd do with her life. Again, she's not the same person she used to be; she couldn't be happy going back to that life at this point. What would make her happiest would be to get a position with the SGC or Homeworld Security, either doing research with Rush and the science team or advocating for the program in a political capacity. Ideally, she'd do both.
13) She had come to terms with the fact that she was going to die, and that Ronald was going to do it. Obviously, she's very, very glad it didn't come to that. She doesn't want to die. But knowing that she can come to terms with her own death is a kernel of strength and serenity in her heart.
14) She believes in Rush's mission. She believes because he believes. She believes because she has seen so much that was beyond her worldview in the last two years that the idea that there is so much more out there is obvious, and she wants to see it. When the other Rush claimed that she was one of the ones to stay behind with him, she knew he was telling the truth. She didn't choose this ride and never would have, but being here, being changed by it, it's a part of her and she isn't getting off until it's over.
15) She likes Colonel Young and respects him for being the good man that he is. The men who best fit with her experiences of men with power, though, are Telford and Rush. Both of them have the attitude of “the ends justify the means” that she herself is more drawn to. That's part of why she and Rush get along as well as they do – she understands him without negatively judging him. That similarity seems to be why he respects her in return.
So I also did this for Chloe Armstrong (SGU), in part because I've resumed obsessively thinking about her and Rush and in part because if ever manage to get to a point where I'm easily making reqs in TR, Chloe is a very strong candidate for my next app. Because it turns out I have a lot of thoughts about her. She's kinda loud in my head, in a way that I have to work on for Huntress. (Possibly helped by the fact that there are two seasons of episodes with Chloe and there are only a handful of episodes where Huntress even appeared, and she's different enough from her comics incarnations that I can't just pull things wholesale. But I digress.)
1) Chloe always assumed she'd go into politics. It was what her parents wanted, and it was what she wanted. It was what she had lived, growing up an Armstrong. Everything they did was done with an eye towards how it would play in the press or how it would help her father's career. Even vacation spots and times were chosen that way – to make a statement, or to allow for a meet-and-greet with someone important. Chloe'd roll her eyes about it sometimes when she was a kid or teen, but honestly, it wasn't much of a bother. They did actual vacation stuff, too. Plus, she got to meet a lot of kids like her. When she got older, she started working more deliberately towards her father's goals, both from her mother's pushing and of her own free will. It was a given that her path would take her into politics, either following her father's footsteps or her mother's – be a politician herself, or at least the aide to a powerful politician (namely him), or become the wife of a powerful politician.
2) She's done a lot of community service throughout high school, college, and beyond, mostly in support of her father's goals. She doesn't have any personal “pet” projects, but women's rights were starting to become a passion for her.
3) She's always had a bit of a thing for older men. Growing up in politics, she was frequently surrounded by men of power, most of them a couple decades or more older than her. As she grew into a beautiful young woman, they noticed. She realized quickly that she could use that to her advantage, subtly influencing them with attention and flirtation. Her father encouraged her, but made damn sure that it never went beyond innocent flirtation. That was fine with her, for the most part, but a few of the men brought out something... a little less than innocent in her. She never crossed the line, though she may have toed it a time or two. Given a few more years, that would have changed. Her father would even have approved, in the right circumstances. Being romantically linked to a powerful man was good for everyone involved. Being the wife of such a man was even better.
4) Her own social group consisted of a lot of people around her age who were from families like hers – wealthy, politically powerful. Everyone was aiming for politics or law. That came with the attendant personality types: ambitious, party hard and play hard, and never to be completely trusted. It wasn't until Destiny that she really got to know anyone who wasn't that way. That night in the club with her old “friends” really brought that home. She knows that she's much more like the people she hung out with back then than she is like Matt or Eli.
5) She did her share of dating back home, within her social group. It was a group that liked to party hard. Chloe was never a fan of “pharm” parties, but just about anything else went. She started drinking socially when she was 15, and lost her v-card at 16. She's done a lot more experimenting with both substances and sex than either of her parents would imagine.
6) Self-medicating is an Armstrong family tradition. For her mother, it's booze and pills; for Chloe, it's just the alcohol. An average night got her pleasantly buzzed, but she binged often enough that someone probably should have noticed. No one did, of course, being caught up in their own problems; they were all as messed up as she was. Since getting to Destiny, she hasn't indulged like that even once.
7) She's not the type to think about the past in terms of “what if?” So she's never really given a lot of thought to what things might have been like on the ship if her father had survived. He'd have been part of the power struggle, obviously. Whether that would have been for the better or worse, there's no way to know. He died and that still hurts, but she has to live in the reality of now, rather than spending her time thinking about things that can't be undone.
8) Matt is without a doubt the best, most amazing guy she's ever dated. Possibly the best guy she's ever even met, though Eli gives him a run for his money. And she loves him for that, even as she wonders if someday it's going to drive them apart. There are a lot of differences between them, ones she doesn't think he realizes or is willing to see. Maybe on the ship they'll manage. If they were back on Earth, though... She's not sure who would end up walking away first. She really and truly loves him, but under different circumstances that might not be enough.
9) Chloe can't bring herself to be grateful for what happened on Icarus and them all being stranded on Destiny, but she can admit that some good has come out of it. There's Matt, of course, and Eli, and the fact that she's learning to be a better person because of them. Then there's the entire galaxy their alternate-timeline-selves had populated. Whole lives were lived, an entire civilization had existed, because they came here.
10) She is not the person she was when she went to Icarus that day. Everything that's happened since has changed her, irrevocably. She's endured things the old Chloe Armstrong could never have imagined. She's seen truly amazing things, and unbelievably horrible ones. And she personally, physically, was changed – the leftover effects of the alien infection, for lack of a better word, will never leave her. She knows things and can do things that literally no one else can. She, who was never all that good at math, can work with Rush on elaborate equations that would have been nonsense to her a year ago – and she enjoys it.
11) She's incredibly grateful to Rush for a lot of things. For rescuing her from that ship, for getting the blue aliens to cure her, but also for simply making her useful while she was “sick.” The others say he “used” her, and that's obviously true. But why shouldn't he have? She had the knowledge and skills that he needed, and he put them to use. Which meant that instead of rotting inside her room going bored out of her mind, she was able to do things like figure out how to turn the ship around. She might not have understood what was going on with her body, but she learned to use the knowledge put into her head, and that was because of Rush. The others might not get it, but she's incredibly grateful.
12) If they went home right now, today, she's not sure what she'd do with her life. Again, she's not the same person she used to be; she couldn't be happy going back to that life at this point. What would make her happiest would be to get a position with the SGC or Homeworld Security, either doing research with Rush and the science team or advocating for the program in a political capacity. Ideally, she'd do both.
13) She had come to terms with the fact that she was going to die, and that Ronald was going to do it. Obviously, she's very, very glad it didn't come to that. She doesn't want to die. But knowing that she can come to terms with her own death is a kernel of strength and serenity in her heart.
14) She believes in Rush's mission. She believes because he believes. She believes because she has seen so much that was beyond her worldview in the last two years that the idea that there is so much more out there is obvious, and she wants to see it. When the other Rush claimed that she was one of the ones to stay behind with him, she knew he was telling the truth. She didn't choose this ride and never would have, but being here, being changed by it, it's a part of her and she isn't getting off until it's over.
15) She likes Colonel Young and respects him for being the good man that he is. The men who best fit with her experiences of men with power, though, are Telford and Rush. Both of them have the attitude of “the ends justify the means” that she herself is more drawn to. That's part of why she and Rush get along as well as they do – she understands him without negatively judging him. That similarity seems to be why he respects her in return.
