Characters / Disco Elysium - The Dockworkers Union

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The Dockworkers' Union

The Claire Brothers

Evrart and Edgar Claire

Evrart Claire

Voiced by: Tariq Khan

"Don't mention it. But also don't forget it... I'm just kidding, of course."

Current Union boss Evrart, along with his unseen brother Edgar. After seizing control of the Débardeurs' Union twenty years ago, the brothers have molded it into the only authority in Martinaise, their criminal ties, popularity with workers, and ruthless politicking making them a force to be reckoned with.

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• Anti-Villain: Despite their sketchy behavior, Evrart and Edgar could be viewed as this. They genuinely want to free Revachol from the control of foreign corporations and the deeply-corrupt Moralintern. Their end goal is commendable even if their methods of reaching it are morally dubious. Amusingly, a Communist Harry can guess this before even meeting Evrart, dismissing corruption as an "aesthetic category" and correctly deducing that they have to take extreme and often shady measures to ensure the protection of the workers they represent.
• Always Identical Twins: Evrart and Edgar are apparently identical in every way including weight, apart from Evrart's lazy eye.
• The Bad Guy Wins: If "the Return" alluded to by Klaasje and Shivers is indeed the Union starting a second communist revolution and declaring independence, it's implied that it commences not long after the game's conclusion. Of course, seeing how Revachol has been mistreated by the Moralintern, and will probably continue to be mistreated if nothing is done, it is at the very least somewhat ambiguous if they can truly be considered "the bad guys".
• Batman Gambit: Evrart openly shares his and his brother's plan to perform a forcible takeover of the habor with you, including the fact that the Union is refusing to back down, no matter how much violent force Wild Pines is going to bring down upon them if they try to do this. What Evrart doesn't tell you, however, is that he and Edgar are actually banking on you to still be a good cop at heart, despite all your personal defects and problems, and that you therefore are going to be appropriately horrified of the idea of how many lives could be lost in a bloody confrontation, so that you will be motivated to warn Joyce about it. Joyce, in turn, is a by-and-large Honest Corporate Executive and overall Reasonable Authority Figure and will therefore be similarly unwilling to throw a lot of lives away over profit, leading her to decide to cut her losses and backing down without a fight, thereby leaving the Union to take over the harbor without firing a shot. Ultimately though, it is unknown whether or not the brothers had accounted for the Krenel Mercenaries going rogue and instigating violence on their own. You never get a chance to ask him, because the harbor goes on lockdown after the Tribunal.
• Big Brother Is Watching: Evrart has the entirety of Martinaise bugged, tapped, and under surveillance. Anyone and everyone are potentially feeding him information. That includes Joyce's yacht. After the Tribunal he'll even scramble all your attempts to report the shootout to your HQ, not wanting the RCM to intrude on his attempt to consolidate power.
• Break His Heart to Save Him: Platonic example with the former negotiator, if you read between the lines. Evrart actually did like the guy, who had been nothing but reasonable in previous negotiations (to the point Joyce dismissively thinks he was too soft) but the issue was the Claire Brothers didn't want a reasonable, successful negotiation with Wild Pines this time. They wanted a shitstorm, possibly including civilian deaths, and Evrart knew that the blame would be laid at the feet of whoever was in charge of negotiations. By so cruelly and arbitrarily betraying the guy, he made sure his friend would go down as that poor guy who Evrart betrayed, rather than that idiot who lost the dockyard. The blame could instead then go towards a replacement he had no such respect for, like Joyce.
• Bully Hunter: Easy Leo recounts a tale back from his school days, where Evrart and Edgar ganged up on the local school bully Noel Becker and gave him a beating, after which Noel never bothered anyone again. Depending on when Leo tells this story, it can be your first serious hint of Evrart and Edgar's morally grey Modus Operandi; namely, they are sincerely dedicated to protecting the weak against those who would prey on them, but they are also not afraid to use both violent force and dirty methods to accomplish this.
• The Chessmaster: It's possibly to discover that the situation in the harbor is playing out exactly as Evrart hoped: he wants a war with Wild Pines, knowing the bad publicity it will garner the company. It goes even deeper than that — if you solve the Secret Task to break the deadlock by relaying information back and forth between Evrart and Joyce since Evrart won't meet her in person, it turns out that this too is exactly what Evrart truly wanted: for Joyce to give in of her own accord, thus avoiding a bloody war while still forcing the company to retreat with their tails between their legs, with the Union keeping all the gains they'd made over the course of the strike.
• Chummy Commies: The Claires are eager to build themselves up this way and inspire seemingly genuine loyalty among the Union while being corrupt capitalists in reality. It turns out it's not an act, and the loyalty they inspire is geniune.
• Dirty Communists: A common perspective on the Claire Brothers and the Union as a whole is that they're simply using communism as a prop and are actually closer to a crime syndicate. A closer examination of Evrart, and by extension Edgar's motivations, seems to indicate that he genuinely does hold at least some socialist ideals, especially when it comes to harboring a massive grudge against the wealthy liberal elite for what they did to Revachol and its people. Played Straight, ironically, with the fact that their devotion to socialist ideals can hurt the working man. The Claire Brothers "Special Borscht" is loaded with vodka to get the workers drunk and angry enough to start a riot with the scabs. Like various communist nations IRL, he heavily relies on surveiling everyone, even civilians. They also plan to demolish a horribly impoverished village to build a new community on its ruins using very capitalist gentrification, though it's implied they actually want to help the residents.
• Even Evil Has Standards: Neither of them were very fond of René, but Evrart will express mild horror at seeing you strut around in his uniform after presumably raiding the recently dead man’s guard outpost.
• Fat Bastard: Both brothers are incredibly fat and entirely corrupt.
  You: Why *are* you so fat?
  Evrart: I'm glad you asked. I've got Type 2 diabetes because sugar and fat was all my mother had to give me and my brother Edgar when we were kids.
• Faux Affably Evil: Zig-Zagged. Evrart never loses his chummy tone, even when straight-out asked why he's so fat or when calling Harry a son of a bitch, but it's also used to break Harry down, whether it be implying he's got information on him or that his gun is both loaded and on the loose. It's hard to tell what is genuine and what is an act. This also seems to purely apply to Harry and Kim; his workers respect him and deep down he's a die-hard leftist.
• The Ghost: Edgar is never seen in the game, only mentioned. He was apparently the one who first convinced the Deserter to do the Union's dirty work.
• Gonk: Evrart is one of the more physically grotesque characters in the game, being morbidly obese and wall-eyed as well as having glasses that make his eyes look much larger than they are.
• Good All Along: As it turns out, the brothers aren't cynical opportunists but rather devoted leftists who want the best for Revachol. "Good" isn't exactly the right word for it because they're still very morally sketchy, but they're sincerely committed to their socialist ideals even if they sometimes do unethical things in pursuit of their goals.
• Hidden Depths: Evrart's own cynical motives turn out toe be a double bluff; he sincerely believes in the communist ideal and his fury towards the Moralintern and its elites for exploiting Revachol and its people is completely genuine and deep-seated, and he throws up the Straw Hypocrite act as a cover. You and Kim are officially representatives of the Moralintern after all, and it is in his and Edgar's interest that you both underestimate them.
• I Did What I Had to Do: A large part of his corruption is framed as unfortunately having to play by capitalism's rules to force change; if he tried to be a peace-loving communist hippie, Wild Pines's mercenaries would have broken the strike with anti-communist MoralIntern support, and given many of the mercs are war criminals, there'd still be plenty of dead at best. His corrupt facade and deliberate drug-running instead makes Wild Pines believe they're dealing with a well-entrenched crime boss capitalist who will start a bloody war, and they successfully back off for him to start planning a proper revolution. Beyond that, things like using eminent domain to seize land to build proper housing for a delapitated village, mob enforcers to actually maintain peace where the police refuse to enter, taking over the drug trade to regulate drug abuse because you can't completely get rid of drugs coming in, and deliberately spiking soup rations to make the workers angry enough to try and fight the scabs are all in service to a revolution.
• "Just Joking" Justification: One of Evrart's go-to moves: confirm what you're already thinking about his motives and crimes, then claim he's only kidding.
• Karma Houdini: Depending on how they do things, the player can be completely hoodwinked in to convincing Wild Pines to concede to the Union's terms and get the brothers all they wanted with minimal resistance, with the player not being able to do anything about it. You can possibly subvert this by gaining Iosef's full testimony, as it turns out that he has quite a lot of dirt on the brothers as well as forging the signature for the land deal, which could potentially cause some headache-inducing red tape down the line.
• Klingon Promotion: They had the previous leader of the Union assassinated by Iosef so they could take over.
• Leitmotif: Has his own musical theme that only plays in his container when you approach him, but the track is not present on the official soundtrack.
• Neighbourhood-Friendly Gangsters: Evrart wants the citizens of Martinaise to view the Union as this despite their their morally-sketchy behavior. For what it's worth, the Claires genuinely have done a lot of good work on Martinaise's behalf. They've bargained for better wages and benefits for the local workers, they established a community watch in the form of the Hardie Boys to make up for the RCM's decades-long absence, and they have big plans to renovate the poorer parts of town (although they're willing to expel people in the fishing village to make this happen). Even their involvement in the drug trade has had a net positive effect on Martinaise, as they ensured that it stays regulated as much as they can. Manana says as much: he may be corrupt, but his corruption has benefits.
• Obfuscating Stupidity: Evrart doesn't present himself as stupid, but he's a cynical manipulator with the subtlety of a truck. About the only true part of that is the "manipulator" part; the cynicism is him being subtle and careful, so he doesn't come off as an actual revolutionary.
• Only in It for the Money: It's very obvious that Evrart's concerns are less about the welfare of the Union workers or social democracy as a political project, and more about keeping his pockets lined. Subverted in that this is exactly what Evrart wants you to think, as being underestimated both in terms of his ambitions and intelligence are key to what he and Edgar are trying to build — he's actually a diehard communist who would be only too happy to draw the blood of the bourgeoisie, and more importantly, he and his brother actually care about Martinaise and genuinely want to lift the neighborhood out of poverty, even if they are willing to screw over some of its inhabitants in the process.
• Pet the Dog:
  • If you manage to quit drinking, Claire, in a rare moment of sincerity, commends you for having the strength of character to overcome your alcoholism.
  • Evrart also seems to genuinely care about Elizabeth, his lawyer, to the point of sending his personal surgeon to tend to her if she's shot during the tribunal. Though it's entirely possible this is mainly due to him funding her law school education.
  • In a twisted version, it's implied he deliberately allowed The Pigs, a very senile woman who thinks she's a trigger-happy cop, to obtain Harry's gun, albeit without ammo, in order to show Harry and Kim exactly how bad things are in Martinaise without any government support. In extension, a nice Harry will alert the Hardie Boys, who will try to help The Pigs as best as they can.
• Politically Incorrect Villain: Evrart will call you an ableist slur if you claim to be an ultraliberal, and also allegedly called the negotiator prior to Joyce a "midget".
• Precision F-Strike: Evrart's whole shtick is being superficially polite and courteous (with a heavy undercurrent of barely hidden condescension and aggression) towards you and Kim, as a result he barely ever uses profanity or raises his voice when talking with you. However, there are a few occasions when this mask slips:
  • If you claim to be a ultraliberal to his face, he very frankly tells you to "get the fuck out" and that he doesn't believe for a second that is what you actually are, and adds you should quit trying to joke around with him and acting like a "retard".
  • When he describes his and Edgar's plan of having the Union taking over the harbor, he says that the Union is going to "fuck Wild Pines". Perception goes as far as to compare it to a gunshot, pointing out that using swears isn't something he does often.
• Red Right Hand: Evrart's lazy eye adds to his inscrutable and unsettling demeanor.
• Refuge in Audacity: He's happy to speak at length about all the illegal activities he and the Union are engaged in — purely hypothetically, of course. He'll only tell you the truth once he's sure he's won, when you're in as deep as he is. Interestingly, the motives he conceals are far more selfless than the shallow greed he displays when you first meet. You would likely be far more suspicious if you thought he was a true believer rather than a simple opportunist.
• Sarcasm Failure:
  • Normally, Evrart will cheerfully respond to your prodding with deflection, sarcasm and plausible deniability. However, calling yourself an ultraliberal while discussing Krenel causes him to break character and call Harry an idiot for believing that.
  • If you fail several checks while sitting on his deliberately uncomfortable chair, you have a mental breakdown and do your best mental impression of melting ice cream as you flop onto the floor in silent sobs. Evrart legitimately gets concerned to the point of calling you by your real name.
  • If you report that you got Joyce to leave with the information you 'gleaned' from Evrart, he completely drops his jolly, sarcastic manner and becomes geniunely furious and disgusted - not at you, but at Joyce and the capitalism she represents. Half-Light reports it's the release of decades of sheer hatred.
• Self-Deprecation: If you directly ask Evrart if he ordered the death of the Hanged Man in any way, he replies that if he had actually wanted someone dead, he would have done them in himself, and adds that since he is obviously too fat to be physically capable of hanging someone on his own, he had nothing to do with it.
• Shame If Something Happened: Whenever he speaks with the protagonist, Evrart makes a point of mentioning how unfortunate it is that his gun has gone missing, and that perhaps he could use some help finding it. Subverted in that Evrart really is having his men track down your gun in exchange for a few errands, and isn't holding it hostage at the time you first speak. It's also totally your fault it's missing in the first place; he had nothing to do with it.
• The Shut-In: Evrart apparently never leaves the two fused cargo containers which make up his office, and which are shuffled around as needed by the harbour cranes.
• Smug Snake: It's hard to believe anyone could be taken in by a Fat Bastard as smarmy and blatantly disingenuous as Evrart. Downplayed, in that he's actually playing up his persona to get your guard down. The act is for the RCM — you never actually get to see Evrart alone with his men, but it's quite possible that the entirety of his crude, money-grubbing persona was concocted for you, Kim, and especially Joyce.
• Straight Edge Evil: Evrart drinks non-alcoholic beer when he's off the clock. Although he is not above pretending he likes to kick back a drink with the boys when asked about the drug trade he allows in Martinaise.
• Straw Hypocrite: If you say that communism is meaningless and that only the pursuit of power matters, Evrart will come right out and agree with you. Subverted if you follow through the hidden task to basically carry Joyce and Evrart's negotiation back and forth between them, as it turns out that while Evrart very much understands the allure of power, he also genuinely hates the wealthy ultraliberal elite and wants to give Revachol, starting with the harbor, back to her people. Preferably while having his revenge on the upper class along the way.
• The Teetotaler: Evrart is quite proud of the fact that he doesn't drink alcohol, boasting that it is what really allows him to run in mental circles around the "wine-sipping" upper class. If you decide to quit drinking yourself, he will express some genuine admiration for you managing to beat the bottle.
• Visionary Villain: He's an avowed socialist who has big ambitions for the union, which seem to be a smoke-screen for his greed and lust for power. This of course turns out not to be the case: Evrart and Edgar's plans are far bigger in scope than finding ways to line their own pockets. "The Return" alluded to by various characters is implied to be the union starting a second revolution to drive out the corporations and the Moralintern, thus turning Martinaise (and perhaps the rest of Revachol later on) into a independent socialist republic.
• Walking Spoiler: Evrart is stringing you along, liberally mixing truth and lies, making it hard to discuss his plans in any detail without giving away the brothers' true agenda.
• Wake-Up Call Boss: The first meeting with Evrart is the first truly difficult encounter in the game, as Evrart is an extremely skilled manipulator and button-presser. If you aren't prepared, you won't get through it alive (especially if your skills aren't good enough to see through some of his arguments). To sum up: sitting in the chair he offers you can kill you.
• We Have Reserves: Not that he doesn't care about his workers dying but he is about to start a class war and numbers are their main advantage. He even says that he went in Big Time mode and doesn't care that much about the Hardies now.
  • If the player solves the strike deadlock and returns to talk to Evrart before the Tribunal, he'll drop a lot of his pretenses and reveal he doesn't think too highly of the Hardie Boys, considering them Dumb Muscle who'd screw up if he gave them any real work to do. Evrart doesn't much care if they get mowed down by the Krenel mercs and — if you ask him why he doesn't mind losing some of his best men — he'll counter that his actual best men don't spend all day getting drunk.
• Well-Intentioned Extremist: At first glance, Evrart appears to be completely cynical and self-serving. It initially seems like his talk of uplifting Martinaise out of poverty is just that: empty words he uses to disguise his amoral behavior. But as the story progresses, it turns out that he really does care about what he's saying. He and Edgar want to found a socialist democracy run by and for Martinaise's citizens while expelling the ultraliberal elites who've let the city fall into ruin. It is just that, even here, the brothers are willing to resort to despicable methods, such as assassinations and drug running, and their main gambit is trying to provoke Wild Pines into to respond to their strike with violence, as they figure it will get the public over their side, even if said violence will probably cost the life of a few of the Union's own people.
• Xanatos Gambit: Even if you fail to play your part in the brothers' Batman Gambit to convince Joyce to give up and withdraw without a fight, the two of them have made sure that the cards are ultimately still heavily stacked in the Union's favor. Wild Pines would likely still have decided to eventually give up the harbor at some point to avoid having a PR nightmare on their hands, perhaps only taking slightly longer without your unwitting cooperation. No matter what you do, the aforementioned PR clusterfuck inevitably comes to pass in the form of the Tribunal.
• Xanatos Speed Chess: Everything indicates that Evrart and Edgar were caught as much off guard by the sudden murder of Lely as anyone. Nevertheless, they quickly managed to recalibrate their plans to accommodate the hanging, taking advantage of the likelihood that his mentally unstable squadmates would avenge their commander's death in blood to engineer the PR nightmare (for Wild Pines) the brothers had been waiting for — thus giving the Union the excuse to take control of the harbor. Of course, your own drunken three-day bender, where you did pretty much everything but trying to solve the case, gave them an ample headstart on gathering intel, and even more time to move things along without the RCM's interference.

The Gardener

Elizabeth "Lizzie" Beaufort, "The Gardener"

*This* is what I studied law for?

Voiced by: Rebecca Korang (original), Adi Alfa (Final Cut)

"Twenty fat men in the Occident are stealing it all — and you're their bodyguards."

A young woman who had her law degree paid for by the Claire brothers, and now acts as the Union lawyer. The very fact she has a law degree at all is something that is guarded, though not heavily, from outsiders, and so she spends much of her time disguised as a gardener.

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• Amoral Attorney: Zigzagged. She had her education paid for by the Union, which many people believe is a crime syndicate, and she has no respect for local law enforcement. On the other hand, the RCM does operate in a legal grey area, only possessing whatever nominal authority the Moralintern and citizens of Revachol see fit to grant it. Lizzie is, from her own perspective, deeply principled, and she doesn't believe the RCM are an actual police force. It's certainly undeniable that the RCM hasn't bothered to police Martinaise in years, not until a corporate mercenary was killed in the district.
• Crusading Lawyer: She is not impartial at all. She's completely devoted to the vision that the Claire Brothers have, and is just using her law degree to help make it come true.
• Don't Answer That: When confronting the Hardie Boys, her job is to prevent them from saying anything that would incriminate themselves. With the right prompts, it's possible to goad Titus into overruling her and getting him to blurt out things he really should not say.
• Hello, Attorney!: Her portrait is noticeably less distorted and abstract than other characters, making her look like a downright cute twentysomething. Of course, it's probably just a way to get people to lower their guard.
• Jerkass Has a Point: She's correct when she accuses the RCM of being corrupt lapdogs for the equally-corrupt Moralintern, neither of whom have done anything to uplift Martinaise from its poverty. Her hostility towards the detectives is justified (to a certain extent) given that the RCM has declined to enforce the law in Martinaise for some years now.
• Nerves of Steel: Even as she lays dying of a gunshot wound in a botched Tribunal encounter, she puts up a brave face so that the Hardie Boys don't make the situation worse by either fleeing or blindly charging to avenge her.
• Obfuscating Stupidity: She pretends to be a worn out, spacey gardener so she can keep tabs on outsiders.
• Omnidisciplinary Lawyer: What she's trying to be, considering she's taken on defending suspects in a murder while her day job is the very different discipline of managing union legal affairs.
• Only Shop in Town: There apparently weren't any other lawyers in the neighborhood. Edgar and Evrart basically created one out of whole cloth through her, and so she's the only one who factors into the story.
• The Resenter: She can be seen grumbling about how the murder investigation has all but welded her to the Hardie Boys so she can talk them out of trouble, who are crude, loud, hard to control, and obliviously sexist in how they talk about women and to her. She mostly takes it out on you.
• Screw This, I'm Outta Here: Gets increasingly more frustrated as you pick apart the Hardies' story, and they keep talking instead of just shutting up. Once you get Titus to admit the victim was shot, and the hanging staged as a cover up, she'll storm off telling Titus that whatever happens is now on him and his gang, not the union. However despite that, she does return during the Tribunal to try to defuse the situation and protect the Hardies, albeit unsuccessfully.
• Smug Snake: Being the head attorney and the heir apparent of the Union at the very heart of its controlled territory helps, allowing her to talk down to the detectives whenever they try to engage her. Not that this stops them from potentially puncturing the conspiracy around the Hanged Man. And more tragically, it doesn't save her from Krenel if the climax goes badly.
• Suicidal Overconfidence: Though not to the same degree as Titus, who was trying to fight them, she still thinks she's clever and persuasive enough that she can talk down the Krenel Mercenaries despite all evidence to the contrary. Her condescending attempts to deescalate the situation result in her being the first person Kortenaer will try to shoot should the player make the wrong dialogue choices (that, and he's racist).
  • This might be averted given that there's not much else she could have done under those circumstances. She's unarmed and the mercs have their guns trained on her should she try to make a break for it. All she can really do is stay calm and try to deescalate the situation using the skills that are available to her, namely her logic and legal expertise. It may not be a case of overconfidence as much as that being the only realistic move she can make even if the odds of it paying off are slim. She presumably thought it was worth a shot as long as it had even a small chance of delaying the firefight.
• Tiny Tyrannical Girl: Downplayed. While certainly given special treatment by the Claire Brothers, she's not a Spoiled Brat and earned her place through her intelligence. She does, however, manage to keep the physically much larger Titus and the other Hardies in check, sometimes with a single word. Even Evrart claims to be intimidated by her zeal.

Call Me Mañana

Call Me Mañana

Olá, wandering man.

Voiced by: Mark Holcomb

"Imagine — you cops going on a strike, but then another cop comes in and says: 'Let us cop! For less money.'"

The lookout posted on the outer harbour wall.

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• Cowboy: A self-proclaimed boiadeiro, he wears cowboy boots and embraces an individualist philosophy of wandering through life — metaphorically or otherwise.
• The Cynic: He knows the Claires are corrupt, but their corruption benefits him, so he's fine with it.
• Lazy Mexican: Deliberately playing on the stereotype. Call Me Mañana means "Call me tomorrow," and Mañana never moves from his post throughout the entire game. Subverted in that watching, waiting, and not moving from his post is his job, and he seems to be well-liked among his fellow Union members — and Evrart seems to put some trust his insights and observations.
  • Was instructed by Evrart to track down the mercenary's lost armor, and when Cuno told him he chucked it all in the ocean Mañana took him at his word as an excuse to stop looking for it and go back to his usual post. He'll even outright tell you he knows Cuno's story is a lie, but was happy for the easy out.
• Mellow Fellow: He's quietly easygoing, providing the Union with a friendly face on the wall. The only thing that seems to upset him at all are the scabs.
• Mr. Exposition: He loves to talk, and while he's under orders to keep quiet until you've spoken to Evrart, he's your first direct source of information about the Union and the only one to remain (other than the Hardie Boys) after the tribunal.
• Obfuscating Stupidity: While he does have a Mellow Fellow streak, he’s nowhere near as apathetic and lazy as he comes off as. He seems to exaggerate his apathy to be Beneath Notice, allowing him to be mere feet away from a horde of angry scabs and have absolutely no violence directed against him. After the harbor goes on lockdown post-Tribunal, he willingly stays outside to keep watch, an incredibly dangerous position to be in with tensions sky high and definitely not something someone who didn’t care would choose to do.
• Only in It for the Money: Is attached to the union mostly because he's guaranteed more money (which would give him more free time, which he is possessive of) than out of any larger political ideals.
• Only Known by Their Nickname: Call Me Mañana, or just Mañana for short.
• Poirot Speak: He will occasionally say words in his native Mesque, a combination of Spanish and Portuguese.
• Shout-Out: "Call Me Mañana" is a song by Scooter, an early reference before you encounter the anodic dance kids out on the ice.
• Troll: In the Communist Vision Quest, he can potentially point you towards a secret communist underground movement. Much to your in-universe disappointment, it's just a pretentious and overly exclusive reading club consisting of champaign socialist students Steban and Ulixes, but with your help, you can turn it into a proper club.

Measurehead

Jean-Luc Measurehead

YOUR BODY BETRAYS YOUR DEGENERACY.

Voiced by: Dizzy Dros

"RACISTS ARE GENERALLY NOT VERY GOOD EXAMPLES OF THEIR RACE... I AM NOT LIKE THEM."

A musclebound tattooed Semenese supremacist, currently standing watch over the gates, and between you and Evrart Claire. He won't let you into the harbour unless you either internalize his elaborate 'advanced racial theory' to the point you can parrot it back at him or best him in a fight.

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• Bald of Evil: He is shaved bald so he can show off what he believes to be his perfectly proportional skull shape as well as the tattoos to "prove" it.
• Bigot with a Crush: One of Measurehead's "babes", and seemingly the one he's closest to, is of Kojko descent. Measurehead shrugs it off — the heart wants what it wants ("THE HEART THAT PUMPS THE HAEMOGLOBIN IS MYSTERIOUS, AND SO IS ITS DARK WILL."). Believing he's superior to other races doesn't have to mean he hates them personally, apparently.
• Boomerang Bigot: A complicated and bizarre case. He's a black man who believes in ludicrous "scientific racism" theories that he himself admits were invented by white supremacists, but through the power of Insane Troll Logic he's convinced himself that this pseudoscience actually proves that black people are the Master Race.
• The Brute: Even more than the Hardies, Measurehead is muscle for the Union, a giant of a man and so tough that even hardened mercenaries hesitate to take him on one-on-one. Which makes it all the more impressive if you can fight him and win by knocking him out with a spinning kick to the head.
• Chick Magnet: He has his own trio of fawning fangirls.
• Chivalrous Pervert: He has a warped respect for women that the other racists you encounter noticeably lack.
• Cold Ham: Even though Measurehead is calm and measured when he speaks, he has a penchant for poetic and grandiose language. Additionally, all of his dialogue is delivered in ALL CAPS, implying that despite the flat delivery, he speaks with a loud, booming voice.
• Dare to Be Badass: Simultaneously believes in unshakeable racial qualities and handicaps and that individuals have the potential to fall short of or exceed them.
• The Dragon: Explicitly identified as Evrart's dragon by Easy Leo (the little old man painting cargo containers), though at the point you meet him Jean-Luc is little more than a glorified door guard.
• Elite Mook: Invoked — Measurehead says himself that the Hardie Boys are merely the Union's first line of defense. He is the last.
• Even Bad Men Love Their Mamas: He considers his mother to be "the greatest" and adores her. Inversely, he just respects and appreciates his father while expressing no affection when the thought of him comes up.
• Genius Bruiser: He certainly tries to present himself this way. While he makes a few insightful observations, most of his beliefs about how the world works are just as idiotic as the drivel you hear from the other racists.
• Giant Mook: The largest character in the game other than Fat Bastard Evrart, able to essentially hold off an entire crowd of scabs unarmed and without any backup. If he goes to get the Hanged Man's corpse from the tree, he does so by ripping off the entire limb he was hanging from.
• Heroic Build: He's incredibly strong and muscular.
• Hidden Depths: Despite his comically terrible beliefs, he's more self-aware than the other racists you meet; during the fascist vision quest, he surprises Kim by giving genuinely useful advice, telling you that the desire to turn back the wheels of time is harmful and that people must continue to look forwards.
• Incoming Ham: Measurehead first greets you by dramatically proclaiming that "YOUR BODY BETRAYS YOUR DEGENERACY."
• Insane Troll Logic: To say that his understanding of history and culture is very jumbled and the way that he uses it to "support" his theories has several gaps in it is a massive understatement. Then there is the complicated mental gymnastics he does to justify stuff like being a mook for the Claire Brothers, despite him believing his race to be superior to theirs and his ostensible hatred for left-wing ideology. Poking holes in his logic will actually count as a positive modifier for taking him on physically.
  Measurehead: PINKNESS IS A RACIAL QUALITY THAT HAS TO BE EARNED THROUGH CENTURIES OF BALLISTIC WARFARE AND CULTURAL DOMINATION THAT THE GRAAD PEOPLE HAVE UNDERGONE FOR DRINKING AL GUL AND SMOKING THE DEGENERATE *TABAC* HERB... AND FOR EATING *POTATO*...
• Insistent Terminology: AL GUL (alcohol^noteA play off the older Arabic word for the substance, 'al-khul', 'body-eating spirit', which shares a root with the English 'ghoul') is at the root of the decline of the HAM SANDWICH RACE (white people). Measurehead himself is the pinnacle of HAPLOGROUP A4A (people from the Semenine Isles), who will replace them as the master race... according to him, anyway.
  Measurehead: THERE ARE THREE CATEGORIES OF RACE: TYPE A — THE HEROIC RACES — TYPE B — THE SERVILE RACES — AND THE VILE C-F RACE CAULDRON OF PEDERASTY.
• Jerkass Has a Point:
  • He's correct in pointing out that alcohol has made you a less effective detective and is slowly destroying your life. To Measurehead's credit, he's one of out two characters who gives you access to the "Wasteland of Reality" thought that lets you quit drinking.
  • In the fascist vision quest he also claims that your (and by extension that of fascism itself) desire to "turn back time" is harmful and that one should face the challenges of the future head-on. Even Kim expresses surprise that you managed to get good advice out of him.
  • While he doesn't think Kim is physically impressive, his own eyeballed measurements of Kim's head leads to the estimation that Kim is an intelligent detective, and advises you to keep Kim by your side.
• Leitmotif: "Your Body Betrays Your Degeneracy".
• Like Father, Like Son: During the fascism vision quest, we learn that Measurehead's dad is just as over-the-top macho as he is. A Shivers flash shows him shaving with the blade of an axe.
• The Loins Sleep Tonight: Another part of his bizarre philosophical beachheads is that men should only reproduce "spiritually" as mentor figures for the next generation (who would produce it, if not the men, he declines to think about beyond a mention of Semenese women somehow waiting on immaculate conception from the pale). To that end, he has joined a community of promiscuous males who nonetheless train their bodies to not ejaculate while inside a woman. And if he should slip up, he knows where all the abortion clinics are.
• Meaningful Name: His name is a reference to the discredited science of phrenology (which his tattoos reference as well), indicating his fixation on "scientific" racism.
• No Indoor Voice: All his dialogue is rendered in CAPS LOCK, to communicate his booming monotone.
• No-Sell: Failing the checks to fight him results in punching him in the stomach and hurting your own hand, and him grabbing your fist in mid-punch and crushing it.
• Politically Incorrect Villain: He's a black supremacist. Played for Laughs in that his description of various races sound more like races you'd read about in a fantasy novel (and are based on both real-world slurs and various arguments commonly espoused by white supremacists, like phrenology, the idea of a master race, etc.).
• Punch Catch: One of the ways he defends against your failed attacks against him is by catching your hand mid-punch and bending your arm backwards until you beg for mercy.
• Scary Black Man: Leans into the stereotype as a huge, bald, musclebound, heavily tattooed tough guy working as muscle for what amounts to the local crime syndicate.
• Smug Snake: Measurehead has a tendency to underestimate people from the "lesser" haplogroups, which can lead to you besting him in a physical fight.
• Smug Straight Edge: Doesn't pollute his body with drugs, tobacco, or "AL GUL" (alcohol), although he does have lots of sex with his women. Also possibly Straight Edge Evil depending on how 'evil' you find him, given that he is an unrepentant fascist but otherwise not involved in the murder.
  • Notably, he is one of only two characters in the game (the other being Tiago, the Crab Man) whose criticism of your destructive substance abuse will give you the "Waste Land of Reality" thought, which, when fully internalized, puts you on the path of completely abstaining from alcohol.
• So Proud of You: He expresses stoic acknowledgment and approval if you lay off the AL GUL as he advised.
• Sub-Par Supremacist: Zigzagged as he is aware that most racists are usually poor representation of their race, so he built himself to fit his ideology of the superior Semenese. However, like the other racists in the game, his Insane Troll Logic and hypocrisy makes him look like a simpleton, no matter how eloquent he tries to be. His rant on potatoes in particular is difficult to take seriously. Plus for all his muscles he can still be laid out in an average skill check followed by a spin kick, as if to show his physique can never make up for his attitude.
• Tattooed Crook: His whole body is tattooed, including his head being covered in phrenological diagrams (hence 'Measurehead').
• Testosterone Poisoning: In addition to being a huge racist, he's also a Stay in the Kitchen chauvinist who sees any man who isn't a musclebound hulk as a puny weakling.
• Übermensch: By his own definition, he is the perfect specimen of the master race, and their eventual ascendance is inevitable.
• Unexplained Accent: Downplayed, since several other characters have French accents due to Revachol being a former colony of Sur-La-Clef, which is a Culture Chop Suey of England and France. Measurehead's accent, however, is very strong for some unknown reason, to the point that he pronounces certain English cognates with the equivalent word in French (i.e. pronouncing eletricity as électricité). The only characters with accents almost as strong as his are René and Gaston, who are older citizens.
• Villain Respect: Knocking him down will have him regard you and Kim with a measure of respect, and even "Ham Sandwich" and "Pupa" become warmer in tone, bordering on Insult of Endearment.
• Walking Shirtless Scene: Wears pants and that's all, rain or snow, even in the tail end of winter.
• Warrior Poet: It seems like he puts a lot of thought into the florid language he uses to articulate his philosophy of race realism.
• You Are a Credit to Your Race: The Claire Brothers have won him over with their vision, despite being white, and despite Measurehead viewing communism as a failed ideology. If you best him physically, he will begrudgingly admit that while he still views you as a prime example of your race's decay, you have at least managed to temporarily stop your personal decline.

Easy Leo

Leonard Bellec / "Easy Leo"

Plants are happy, boots are shining, every man is fed!

Voiced by: Jonny Hage

"Container, container, I'll turn you nice and red..."

Leo is a nice old man who works at the harbor, but he clearly is not all there mentally. He seems to be something of a personal assistant to the Claire Brothers.

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• Captain Oblivious: Leo has no real understanding of what the strike is about, what a scab is, that the Hardie Boys are openly boasting about killing a man, or how anyone could see the Claire Brothers as anything other than the kindly benefactors they've always been to him — even when they've got him repainting Wild Pines cargo containers Union red. He seems to struggle to even grasp the concept if you point out that this is theft on a grand scale.
• Dumb, but Diligent: He’s not the brightest, but he happily tries his hardest at whatever task is given to him and his long tenure in the union seems to be evidence that this has worked out just fine.
• Dumb Is Good: The friendliest man you encounter in the game, completely harmless and utterly lacking in hidden motives.
• Everyone Went to School Together: Was in the same class as the Claire Brothers in school, and all three were in Gaston Martin's history and human studies classes together.
• Innocent Blue Eyes: His clear blue eyes are noted to give him an extremely friendly look and it underscores his Manchild-like nature.
• Kindhearted Simpleton: He is a very friendly and excitable guy who wouldn't hurt a fly, almost childlike in his naivete and more than a little spacey.
• Motor Mouth: When he first gets going, it is rather hard to stop from speaking again. After you talk to him for the second time, the Detective can ask him to cut his wordy greeting short the next time around...only for his apology about his talkativeness ending up just as long as his initial greeting.
• Musical Chores: Sings silly little made-up songs as he works. The songs don't necessarily rhyme or follow any particular tune but are oddly catchy all the same.
  Easy Leo: (singing) Evrart, Evrart, Evrart! He looks after everyone.
• Saying Too Much: His mouth tends to run away with him. His employers are quite aware of it.
  Easy Leo: Mr. Evrart doesn't tell me all the big things. Says I go and tell them to everyone.

The Instigator (spoilers)

Ruby, The Instigator

Revachol's a bitch.

Voiced by: Amber Janelle Putnam

"If this is what happens to people whom people like... how the fuck do the rest of you get by?"

A mysterious lorry driver. While not a dockworker or part of the Union, she's close enough with the Hardie Boys that they're considering her for membership.

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• Actually Pretty Funny: If Harry asks her if she is a "girl-liker" she'll chuckle saying she has been called worse.
• Alas, Poor Villain: She's a career criminal but she also is a lonely and scared woman with a hard life who wanted to help the person she loves, only to wind up entangled in a murder plot out of her hands and thrown under the bus by her crush. Failing to stop her suicide feels really bad — in-game it causes Morale damage.
• Ate His Gun: If you fail to talk her out of it, Ruby commits suicide by shooting herself in the mouth.
• The Bad Guys Are Cops: Absolutely convinced you are working for major gang leader La Puta Madre, hence her going into panic mode the very moment you arrive on the scene.
  Ruby: One corrupt motherfucker with the disco pants and the funny tie.
• Better to Die than Be Killed: Her hatred of cops, fear of you in particular, and the feeling that everyone she cared about and trusted has turned on her can lead her to shoot herself rather than be arrested or killed by you, if you can't persuade her to walk away instead.
• Brown Note: The high-frequency pale emitter she manages to construct in her hideout, configured to blast you with sound/radio/pale emissions. She ambushes you with it the second you enter its range, and it's painful to the point of being completely debilitating, and potentially lethal.
• Bruiser with a Soft Centre: She's tough enough that Klaasje seems to assume she is the real leader of the Hardie Boys, rather than Titus. The old washerwoman in the fishing village calls her a good girl, however, and when you finally track her down, she takes the reveal that Hardie, Klaasje, and her fellow lorry drivers all sold her out particularly hard. She seems to have a long history of losing friends and being betrayed, which she compensates for by acting as tough as she can. Telling her that the people you questioned didn't betray her makes it easier to talk her down from suicide. She will also turn down the pale emitter because she feels sorry for you, which can be her undoing.
• Butch Lesbian: Enough that she's One of the Boys with the manly-man Hardie Boys. She has a boyish haircut, wears man's clothes, works as a truck driver, and has posters of female movie stars hung the cab of her truck. She's also nursing a crush on Klaasje. All of the Hardies (except Glen, who has a crush on Ruby in turn) seem to know it. Klaasje, for her part, is willing to fool around with her, but she's not looking for anything deeper.
• Chekhov's Gun: Her interest in radio signals doesn't seem all that important at first... then she finds a way to weaponize it, giving her the chance to interrogate you when you finally find her hiding place under the Feld building.
• The Chessmaster: She's the ringleader of a fairly major drug smuggling operation, running the whole thing through the radio in her lorry cab. Subverted within the game itself, however: at first it appears that she devised the plan to lynch Lely's corpse with Titus suspiciously quickly, but it's actually Klaasje who came up with it in the spur of the moment.
• Disk-One Final Boss: You spend a good chunk of the game tracking her down. And while she's not responsible for the murder of Lely, the eventual confrontation with her serves as a major turning point in the game's story.
• Driven to Suicide: Should you manage to break her radio-wave machine, she says "fuck it" and puts her gun in her mouth. If you fail to talk her out of it, Ruby shoots herself through the brain and dies instantly.
• Even Evil Has Standards: While she starts her engagement locking you and Kim down with a sonic weapon she takes no joy in it; seeing you both in distress long enough will convince her to shut it off.
• Expy: Of Ravel Puzzlewell, the enigmatic witch featured in the game's main inspiration, Planescape: Torment. Both characters are mysterious figures with shady pasts that have hidden/been hidden away from the player character's sight. In both games, the player character spends a good chunk of the narrative tracking them down, leading to a confrontation that serves as a Point of No Return in their journey.
• Fiery Redhead: She's a tough, hot-headed lorry driver and career criminal.
• Green-Eyed Monster: Klaasje claims this must have been her motive for killing Lely. Subverted in that while Ruby was moderately jealous and felt a little led on, she didn't kill Lely, and her motive for helping with the cover up seems to be as much loyalty to the Hardies and fear of the Killer Cop who just breezed into town as anything.
• Improperly Paranoid: She's gone to ground and devised an elaborate trap for you because she's convinced you're some sort of murder-cop. She heard the nickname "human can-opener" and thought it was literal rather than referring to your ability to crack cases and stubborn witnesses. She also thinks all her buddies must have betrayed her and/or been killed by you by now. Apparently she didn't hear the part about how you went on a three-day alcoholic bender howling at the moon and trashing your car instead of investigating the case. If she had, things might have gone different.
• Irony: The primary reason Ruby is so terrified of the player is that she's convinced that he and his squad are actually part of a police hit squad under the control of crime lord La Puta Madre. Even if the player does play the game as a corrupt cop, your squad will tell you in the ending that you are definitely not a Killer Cop, if only because you're too crazy to be used in that way.
• Lampshade Hanging: Ruby the redhead hiding on the coast is... a red herring.
• One of the Boys: She is a very good friend of the Hardie Boys, and she often both helps them out in their work and hangs out and drinks with them in their free time. As a result, they see her as the honorary eighth "Boy" of the group and have even considered making her a full member.
• Only Known by Their Nickname: At first, your code for her is "Odd-Sole," if you've got good enough Visual Calculus to examine all the footprints at the crime scene. The last one has one shoe with a flat foot, indicating someone who uses that one shoe repetitively, like a lorry driver.
• Punny Name: A ruby is a red jewel. Ruby, in turn, is a Red Herring.
• Red Herring: She isn't the killer. She isn't even the one who organized the fake lynching. She's purely Klaasje's last-ditch attempt to draw the detectives out of town so she can make her escape. But Klaasje really isn't involved in the killing either, it's just that any involvement with the RCM is going to blow her cover and likely get her killed.
• Uncertain Doom: It's not specified what comes of her if you convince her not shoot herself. Where she goes isn't specified. Kim notes that she'll be living a difficult fugitive's life from now on, so it's possible she'll eventually die on the road (perhaps her own hand if the loneliness gets to her). It's possible she'll eventually return to Martinaise once the heat dies down, especially if "the Return" (IE, the Union successfully taking over the city) succeeds, as she'd presumably no longer be wanted.
• Walking Spoiler: Realizing there even was an eighth person at the lynching or a drug smuggling operation in the harbour can be a major reveal, and the fact that she's a Red Herring inevitably spoils a major portion of the investigation.
• What the Hell, Hero?: While asking about the investigation and her relation to Klaasje, you can dwell way too long on her sexuality and ask immature questions about being a lesbian while the Pale machine is frying your brain; both Ruby and Kim are audible in their shared disappointment with you. The game punishes you with extra damage for doing this.

The Hardie Boys

The Group as a whole

The Hardie Boys

"If we didn't take care of the people who end up here, this place would just be a couple of ruins and some cargo containers."

Seven harbour workers — Titus Hardie, Theo, Glen, Alain, "Shanky" (Dennis), Eugene, and Fat Angus — that were spotted by multiple witnesses lynching a mercenary, kicking off the plot of the game.

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• Anti-Villain: For all of their rowdy behavior, the Hardie Boys serve an important role as Martinaise's de facto police force. They're a community-organized citizen's watch who maintain a degree of order in the city (despite their involvement in certain illegal activities). Given that the RCM has allowed the community to go unpoliced for years, it's hard to fault the Union for founding their own paramilitary force.
• Buxom Beauty Standard: They will often talk about a prostitute called Monica, and compliment her on her apparently enormous "milkers".
• Equal-Opportunity Evil: The "evil" part is downplayed as they're more Anti Villains who aren't even guilty of the crime they're confessing to, but the Hardie Boys are still a group of openly violent thugs who are gangsters in all but name who boast of having lynched a man. They're also an extremely diverse group; besides Titus, Shanky, and Fat Angus (who are all white and straight) they also include two black men (Eugene, Theo); a Mesque (Alain); and a gay man (Glen). Prospectives for membership include Ruby, a Butch Lesbian woman, and potentially Harry himself, an Ambiguously Bi man with some very clear mental health issues.
• A Fool for a Client: If you play it right, then Titus conversationally overpowers his own lawyer, only for him and his boys to promptly dig their own grave.
• Jurisdiction Friction: The Hardies are all the security Martinaise needs, thank you very much. They didn't need the RCM before, and you're not welcome now. Titus considers himself the local sheriff, which puts you in the position of the big city/FBI interlopers. You can eventually make peace if you can convince Titus that Klaasje has been playing all of you this whole time, and earn his grudging respect.
• Neighbourhood-Friendly Gangsters: They're in charge of several illegal activities in Martinaise, including the drug trade, but according to themselves, they do this so they can control crime around the city and make sure things don't get out of control. According to Eugene, things used to be much worse in the city before they took charge.
• "Not So Different" Remark: The Hardie Boys are very similar to the average squad of cops in their group dynamic, which the Detective can use to relate to them and start getting answers from them. Telling them you remind them of the very archetype of cops they hate, not taking victims seriously and dicking around is a possible argument you can use, and it does hit home.
• Shaming the Mob: They've already done the lynching, but the hanged man was already dead, and accusing the Hardies of being the kind of lazy, corrupt cops they think you are is one way you can get through to them and start to convince them you're on the same side.
• Suicidal Overconfidence: They seriously do not appreciate how much shit they've gotten themselves in by openly boasting about lynching the hanged man, even if you spell out to them that a team of sociopathic, highly armed and armored mercenaries are now preparing to murder them and anyone else they deem even remotely responsible for his death. In the end, the only way they can survive the ensuing confrontation is through your intervention, and even then Glen, Theo and Angus all end up dying no matter what you do.
• To Absent Friends: Will always get together to drink and remember the fallen after the Tribunal. The way you handle said event will determine whether they are drinking in a suicidal funk or remembering the fallen while optimistically hoping their sacrifice meant something.
• Vigilante Militia: They style themselves as this, but they're closer to Neighborhood-Friendly Gangsters — nonetheless, they're considered the "proper authorities" by most of Martinaise's locals and do their level best to keep the community safe.

Titus Hardie

Titus Hardie

Titus, the Boss

Voiced by: Matt Christman (original), Mack McGuire (Final Cut)

"Looks like the circus left town, but the clowns are still here."

Titus Hardie, the leader of the Hardie Boys, whom he named after himself.

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• Affectionate Nickname: Starts out calling you with those as part of him warming up to you. At first, when you just met him, he'll call you and Kim clowns and equivalents. Uncover their lie about the lynching and he'll start just calling you "cop". Prove you didn't get your reputation as a "human can-opener cop" for nothing, and he'll actually start calling you things like "The Coppernado", or "Copperman", which are spoken in a friendly, sincere voice.
• Berserk Button: He already has a bad temper but a sure way for him to lose his composure is to say the real leader of the Hardie boys is Ruby. Judging by Glen's reaction, it is not the first time someone has thought that.
• Bully Hunter: Zigzagged. While he goes out of his way to act the part of the beer-swilling local tough who is more than a match for an old drunk and a binoclard, he's quick to come to the defense of Angus and clearly dislikes Shanky's slurs. This is revealed to be something of an act, as he believes the RCM are bullies, Dirty Cops who abuse their power and are only interested in finding an easy target to pin the crime on, not actual justice.
• The Captain: Titus is a natural-born leader, and this is the rank sewn onto his vest. Subverted, as with enough Perception you can actually see that it says T. Hardie, captain of the rowing club. Rowing club members are among the eager volunteers Evrart mentions when speaking about the troops the Union could call on.
  • Take into account that rowing is often the go-to local sport in maritime Europe, can be a major part of high-scool phys ed. and something most male kids get signed up for to bulk up and develop physiques. Titus is pretty much the local star quarterback, or was in his youth. So it's doubly subverted: he's effectively a captain to his men, but reading closely reveals... that he's also The Ace.
• The Face: He's the charismatic leader of the Hardie Boys, and the one that will do most of the talking. He even named the team after himself.
• Family Theme Naming: Titus's brother is named Tibbs... short for Tiberius. Titus and Tiberius were both Roman emperors in the real world; it's not clear what the significance would be In-Universe. Encyclopedia jokes that they might have a sister named Lucretia, the woman whose rape fired the rebellion that overthrew the last Roman king and led to the founding of the Republic.
• "Facing the Bullets" One-Liner: During the Tribunal, he will try to escalate the situation to a peaceful agreement while he will try to calm down everyone to stand their ground. Then Authority says that he is facing overwhelmingly superior firepower.
  Titus Hardie: "Easy, Lizzie..." His voice is almost gentle. "Let me handle it. I know guys like this. I'm sure we can come to a peaceful agreement. Ain't that right, fellas?"
  Authority: He is facing overwhelmingly superior firepower, and he knows it.
• Fire-Forged Friends: Should Titus survive the Tribunal, he goes from begrudgingly respecting you and Kim to considering you true comrades, grateful for the back-up you provided to him and his men against the mercenaries. He'll even offer you a position in the Hardie Boys in case you ever decide to leave the RCM. You can in turn tell him that you believe he will make for a good officer in the RCM, and he earnestly promises that he will consider it.
• Good Ol' Boy: Have aspects of this, though Martinaise is just an outlying part of the city, not actually the country. But Titus has a somewhat rural American Southern accent, the hostility to a couple of city cops, and his ball cap and the puffy vest he wears as part of his Union uniform fit the look.
• Green-Eyed Monster: He hooked up with Klaasje and it's heavily implied he still carries a torch for her, which makes her relationship with the victim a sore point for him. Part of the deal with him insisting on confronting her with the tape with the victim talking about raping her is to get her to admit he was a piece of shit and when you tell him she waved it off he snaps.
• Hand Cannon: If you manage to sufficiently provoke Titus, he will attempt to intimidate you and Kim into backing off by showing that he is carrying a gun under his vest. If high enough, Hand-Eye Coordination can potentially recognize it as an Ister 50. It further comments, with no shortage of awe, that it is a "Zsiemsk-made monstrosity" that is easily capable of blowing your head clean off.
• Hidden Depths: Titus is smarter than he pretends, went over a lot of the same suspicions you will end up having before you and can poke holes in your arguments just fine, is a natural leader, and picks his men very carefully. The Union actually have a much more professional security outfit than they want you to think. The game also remarks that Titus has what it takes to be an excellent cop, and if you bring that up to him after the tribunal, he says he'll sincerely consider it.
• The Leader: Of the Hardie Boys, which he named after himself after he took over the group from Old Theo. He doesn't look like it at first, but it's quickly made clear he's actually quite good at leading.
• The Sheriff: Never stated and his official rank is Captain of the rowing team, but Titus's role as local law enforcement and his territorial reaction to the RCM muscling in on his jurisdiction place him firmly within the trope.
• Still the Leader: One of the ways you can piss him off is by questioning his authority as The Leader of the Hardie Boys. It won't affect him much, unless you suggest it's the "8th member" Ruby, in which case he will snap and go on a rant.
• Torches and Pitchforks: They're downright proud to tell you how they lynched the hanged man after he raped Klaasje, and even prouder to say they all acted as one man, so there's no single killer for the RCM to arrest. Except they didn't kill him, and he didn't rape her, and the whole thing has been elaborately staged to draw attention away from the fact that he was shot in the head by an unknown party, to protect Klaasje from being processed by the RCM which would expose her to her pursuers from back in Oranje.

Theo

Theo

Old Theo

Voiced by: Jorel Paul

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• Beware the Quiet Ones: He's The Quiet One of the group and interacts the least with the detective, but he's the one who kills the detective if you screw up while trying to press Angus for info.
• Do Not Go Gentle: He's a seasoned and formidable combatant despite his old age. It's said after the tribunal that he went down fighting despite his age.
• Elder Employee: He's far too old for how rough of his job is, but clearly too stubborn to quit. After his death, Titus mentions he likely got the death in combat he wanted.
• A Good Way to Die: After his death, Titus mentions Theo loathed the idea of dying of old age in a bed, and it's said he charged at the mercs fearlessly during the tribunal.
• Hidden Depths: He may not talk much, but he's lived a long, hard life and is very good at reading people. Should you wind up shoving a gun in your mouth to try and make the Hardies respect you, he's the only one who realizes that it's not just a bad joke or a cry for attention and you're genuinely suicidal.
• Killed Offscreen: He's one of the three unavoidable casualties of the mercenary tribunal, along with Glen, who dies before the detective passes out, and Angus. Unlike Angus, we never get details on how he died.
• The Mentor: He used to lead the Hardie Boys before Titus took over, and seems to have become something of a mentor to him. When Titus is considering giving up Ruby, he looks at Theo for support, showing Theo is likely the one that Titus respects the most when it comes to making hard decisions.
• Old Soldier: Old Theo used to run the group before Titus took over, and has stayed on in something of a support role.
• Scary Black Man: Theo falls into this role. He rarely speaks, but your skills can clue you in that Theo is feared by the rest of the group sans Titus, and that he is the most dangerous and willing to kill of the bunch.

Glen

Glen

Glen

Voiced by: Tariq Khan

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• Armored Closet Gay: Your initial evaluation of him makes note of how hard he works to project a working-class macho image, and (depending upon how much attention you pay to his dialog) your first clue that he's actually gay may come from Titus' eulogy for him after the tribunal. Technically he might be a case of "Armored Closet Bi," given that he has a crush on Ruby (which could be platonic or a cover, although it's not clarified one way or the other).
  • Seeing how Ruby is a tomboy Butch Lesbian, Glen being attracted to her might have more to do with him being gay, than her being a woman.
• Best Friend: Titus describes Glen as the best friend he's ever had. If Titus survives, he takes Glen's death particularly bad.
• Casanova Wannabe: Titus mentions he's extremely bad at picking up guys.
• Character Death: He's one of the three unavoidable casualties of the mercenary tribunal, along with Theo and Angus. Unlike the other two, he dies before the Detective gets shot, when he's hit in the spine by a bullet shot by Phillis de Paule that was meant for Kim.
• Dumb Muscle: He's clearly the dumbest member of the Hardie Boys, and most of his contribution to the team is physical.
• Gun Nut: He's mentioned to like guns several times and even uses it as an excuse if you press them about the bullet found in the victim's corpse, claiming he shot the hanged corpse while he was drunk, since he likes shooting things.
• Manly Gay: Is revealed to be gay, but is described as being "overbearingly masculine" in both appearance and attitude.
• Open Mouth, Insert Foot: It's often the one who ends up unintentionally revealing information to the Detective, such as confirming the existence of an eighth Hardie Boy.
• Undying Loyalty: Fiercly loyal to the Hardies. When Ruby is being investigated, Glen is the loudest voice defending them even as Titus admits his suspiscions.

Alain

Alain

Alain

Voiced by: Coco Prada

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• Affectionate Nickname: He'll start calling you "Coppo loco" by the end of the game, if you manage to gain his respect with your actions during the Tribunal.
• Consummate Liar: With high enough skills, your brain recognizes him as the most skilled liar of the group, as his lies are often short and without any unnecessary details.
• Drowning My Sorrows: You can find him extremely drunk in the Whirling after the tribunal, in case he and Eugene were the only survivors.
• Macho Latino: Has a very macho and antagonistic attitude, and he's identified as being either Mesque or Saramirizian.
• Nerves of Steel: He noticeably keeps his cool better than any of the Hardie Boys during questioning, likely because as an ex-con, he's dealt with RCM cops several times before. Ironically, he will completely fall apart with Survivor's Guilt if he and Eugene are the only survivors of the tribunal.
• Number Two: Esprit de Corps gets the distinct impression that Alain is Titus's second-in-command, the quickest to chime in and the least likely to give the RCM anything to work with.
• Recruiting the Criminal: Alain is an ex-con turned Hardie Boy, and his experience with cops obviously comes to use when dealing with the detectives.
• Reformed Criminal: Pain Threshold can notice that he has a burn on his neck, which is a failed attempt at destroying a tattoo from the gang he belonged too, suggesting he's trying to leave that part of his life behind him.
• Sole Survivor: Along with Eugene, he will always survive the Tribunal. If he and Eugene are the only survivors, however, Alain comes out with a bad case of Survivor Guilt.
• Survivor Guilt: He will hit the bottle hard in the event that he and Eugene are the only survivors of the Tribunal. Eugene explains that Alain wasn't even scratched during the entire ordeal, which only added salt to the wound.
• Tattooed Crook: Your brain identifies him as a past criminal due to the several tattoos he has on his arm, which your brain recognizes as being connected to a gang in Villalobos.

Shanky

Dennis "Shanky"

Dennis

Voiced by: Jonathon West

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• Abhorrent Admirer: Openly lusted after Ruby, who found him disgusting.
• Basement-Dweller: At one point Titus mocks him for being a 40-year old man who still lives with his mom.
• Boisterous Weakling: He's a cowardly little man who goes out of his way to bully others verbally, but is neither liked nor trusted by his fellow Hardie Boys. If he has any skills other than hurling insults, the game doesn't show them.
• The Bully: The first to mock any sign of weakness, including belittling Angus for his weight or Ruby when he finds out she's gay.
• Dirty Coward: Keep the mercenary tribunal talking long enough and Shanky gets antsy and runs off. The survivors swear to track him down and make an example of him.
• Do Not Call Me "Paul": His real name is Dennis, which the other members use whenever they're trying to reprimand him.
• The Friend Nobody Likes: None of the Hardies seem particularly fond of him — Angus, Theo, and Titus are all quite open in their disdain. It's not entirely clear how he joined the Hardie Boys or what he does for them. If he dies at the Tribunal, Titus will feel somewhat guilty about disliking him, as he assumed Shanky would be the type to run in that situation.
• Killed Offscreen: Possibly. He's killed during the tribunal after the detective passes out, if the dialogue option that triggers him running away isn't picked.
• Lean and Mean: A Jerkass with a very thin appearance.
• My Friends... and Zoidberg: As The Friend Nobody Likes there's a bit of distance between him and the other Hardies. If Shanky dies at the Tribunal, Titus will openly grieve for Theo, Angus, and Glen but won't mention Shanky's death unless the Detective asks about him. That said in the event that Shanky did die, Titus does praise his bravery.
• Properly Paranoid: While abandoning his comrades during the tribunal makes him a Dirty Coward, he's completely correct that he won't survive the fight, as he always dies if he doesn't have the chance to run.
• Politically Incorrect Villain: He uses more boorish and insensitive language than the other Hardies.
• Token Evil Teammate: By far the most unlikable of the Hardie Boys, and the only one without any redeeming qualities that we see.
• Uncertain Doom: If he runs away during the tribunal, the surviving Hardie Boys promise to track him down and punish him for his cowardice. Nothing further is revealed about his fate, but his odds don't look good.
  Titus: "Dennis? You *saw* him run. He's a mean little shit and I never trusted him." He shakes his head. "He better run real fast now — *real* fast."
• You Dirty Rat!: As an Animal Motif. Skinny and scrawny and prominently missing several front teeth, he's described as "rat-faced" several times by the narration, your brain, and even Titus.

Eugene

Eugene

The Musician

Voiced by: Benji Webbe

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• The Bard: He carries a guitar with him, and both your brain and Kim refer to him as "the musician". If Titus dies, he actually admits Titus only recruited him because he played the guitar and figured the team could use the morale boost.
• Drink-Based Characterization: He doesn't drink alcohol, and is instead always drinking tomato juice, which sets him apart from all the other drunk members, showing Eugene is far more responsible than he first appears.
• Nice Guy: While he still doesn't respect cops, he's the only one who doesn't go out of his way to antagonize the Detectives. He's also the one that values the good work the Hardie Boys have done for the Martinaise community the most.
• Pastimes Prove Personality: Eugene is relatively laidback and easygoing. He wears a guitar pick (also known as a plectrum) on a string around his neck, and your skills dub him 'the musician.'
• The Smart Guy: Aside from Titus, he's the only one who has actual deductive abilities in the group. If Titus dies, you can convince Eugene to become the next leader by pointing this out to him.
• Sole Survivor: Along with Alain, he will always survive the Tribunal. Unlike Alain, he also takes the near Total Party Kill of the Hardie Boys much better, and can even be convinced to become the next leader and start recruiting a new team.
• The Teetotaler: He's the only one of the Hardie Boys who doesn't drink alcohol, sticking to tomato juice instead.
• You Are in Command Now: If Titus dies, Alain falls apart, and you can convince Eugene to take charge of a new batch of Hardie Boys.

Fat Angus

Angus

Angus

Voiced by: Jonathon West

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• Affectionate Nickname: Angie for short, mostly by Titus, who goes out of his way to build up his confidence.
• Bully Magnet: Due to his weight and asthma, some of the other Hardie Boys enjoy taking potshots at him, especially Shanky. Liz the lawyer doesn't like him much either.
• Geek Physiques: A shy and nerdy guy who's very overweight.
• Genius Bruiser: Despite his insecurities and asthma, Fat Angus is easily the biggest, strongest, and most technically savvy of the Hardies, acting as both The Big Guy and The Smart Guy.
• Gentle Giant: Despite his appearance, he's actually quite gentle and sensitive, which you mercilessly take advantage of by targeting him during your interrogation.
• Hidden Depths: Angus is quite tech-savvy, in addition to being enormously strong and tough in spite of his apparent asthma.
• Kevlard: During the Tribunal, it's mentioned to take quite a lot of bullets to take him down.
• Killed Offscreen: He's one of the three unavoidable casualties of the mercenary tribunal, along with Theo and Glen, dying trying to protect the rest of the gang after the detective got shot and passed out.
• Morality Pet: For Titus, who clearly looks out for him, and gets pissed at Shanky and the detective when they start harassing him. He even tries to comfort Angus about his weight by saying he's actually all muscle. When Angus gets killed at the Tribunal and Titus survives, Angus's death clearly takes a toll on him.
• New Meat: The team rookie, younger and less confident than the other Hardies. Titus is quick to try and build him up, making his weight and nerdiness (he's massively strong and better with machines than the other Hardies) something to be proud of. If Titus lives through the tribunal, he regrets getting the poor "dumb kid" in over his head.
• The So-Called Coward: Despite being Weak-Willed, he stays his ground during the tribunal, and charges at the mercenaries fearlessly when the fighting start, in sharp contrast with his bully, Shanky, who runs away when given the chance.
• Stout Strength: He's quite overweight and sensitive about it, for all that Titus tries to tell him he's "all muscle". It's not just empty words, however — Angus really did carry the Hanged Man-to-be to the hanging, and during the final shootout he apparently charged the remaining mercenaries, taking several shots before he went down.
• Weak-Willed: When confronting them, your skills can work together to help pinpoint Fat Angus as the weak link of the group and the easiest to break. Targeting him for questioning will ruffle the feathers of the other members of the gang and cause them to start unraveling.

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