AI's Take on Hillside's MC (Patreon)

The MC — Character Summary

Who He Is

MC is a quiet, disciplined man in his prime — physically capable, professionally competent, and emotionally guarded. He's the kind of person who notices the exits in every room, who stands a little apart at gatherings, and who answers personal questions with practical ones. To strangers, he seems calm and self-contained. To those who know him, he seems like a man carrying something heavy he refuses to set down.

He is fundamentally a protector. It's the thread running through every chapter of his life — from throwing his abusive stepfather out of the house as a teenager, to leading men in combat, to standing watch over strangers for a living. Protecting others is how he makes sense of himself. It's both his profession and his identity, and he has never really known who he would be without it.

Where He Comes From

MC's childhood was defined by absence and violence. He never knew his father. His stepfather was a drunk who beat his mother and sometimes him. His two older brothers escaped the house and left him behind, and as the only child remaining, he absorbed more than his share of the abuse. When MC finally grew big enough to throw the stepfather out himself, he expected gratitude — but his mother was furious, and let the man back in. MC left home after that, searching for brothers he would never find.

He lived on the streets as a teenager and was slowly pulled toward gangs and crime he hated but couldn't seem to avoid. He escaped that life by lying about his age and forging his way into the army. The military gave him structure, purpose, and a family of sorts. He rose to the rank of captain and saw heavy combat in various countries around the world.

The Wounds He Carries

Three great losses define the man he is today. The first is his mother, now dead, with whom he never reconciled — the last meaningful thing she ever did was choose her abuser over her son, and that door is closed forever. The second is the group of young men who died under his command in an ambush he led them into. He fought heroically that day, turned the tide of the battle, and was awarded a medal for it — but some of his soldiers didn't come home, and he has blamed himself ever since, even though he was not at fault. He was hospitalised during their funerals and has never been able to bring himself to visit their graves. He refuses to wear the medal or the uniform. The third is a young supermodel he was hired to protect. He grew emotionally close to her, never crossing any physical line, but coming to care for her deeply. He suspected her boyfriend was abusing her, confronted the man, and was fired for it. Shortly afterwards, she died of a drug overdose, and MC watched it happen from the outside, powerless.

Each of these losses taught him the same quiet lie: that when people depend on him, they suffer, and that his love and his protection are never quite enough.

How He Moves Through the World

He is loyal to a fault. He has exactly one close friend — his former army sergeant, now a bar owner — who pulled him out of a depressive spiral after his discharge by asking him to mind the door of the bar as a favour, then quietly turning it into real work. That favour saved MC's life, though neither man would say so in those words. MC would do anything for him, and the feeling is mutual.

He is not a promiscuous man and never has been. He wants serious, committed relationships and always has. But several girlfriends cheated on him during his long deployments overseas, and this — combined with his childhood — has slowly convinced him that he is somehow unworthy of love, even when he does everything right. The cruel irony is that the very career that gave him meaning is also what made him absent, and being absent is what seems to have cost him the women he tried to build a life with.

He is emotionally closed off. Not cold, not unkind — just walled. He listens more than he speaks. He deflects personal questions. He gives practical help instead of emotional support because he doesn't really know how to offer the latter. When feelings get too close, he tends to leave the room, or reach for a drink.

And there is always a drink within reach. MC has a relationship with alcohol that echoes his stepfather's, an irony that likely haunts him more than he would ever admit. He has fallen into depression and heavy drinking twice in his life: once after the ambush, and once after the supermodel's death. Both times, his friend pulled him back. He functions, he works, he carries on — but the bottle is always nearby, and he knows it.

After the supermodel, he deliberately stepped away from the celebrity world. But he didn't seek out easier or quieter work. He took lower-profile jobs where the threats were more real — protecting ordinary people from genuine, serious dangers rather than standing decoratively behind famous ones. There is something telling in that choice. A man at peace with himself doesn't gravitate toward real danger. A man punishing himself, or testing himself, or trying to feel something sharp enough to cut through the numbness — he might.

What He Looks Like From the Outside

To people meeting him for the first time, MC seems calm, observant, and professional. He is polite but distant, physically imposing but controlled, and somehow older than his years. Those who get closer find something different underneath — a surprisingly gentle and principled man, quick to take blame and slow to take credit, deeply lonely beneath the composure, and quietly terrified of caring about anyone new.

What He Wants (Even If He Won't Admit It)

On the surface, MC wants very little. He wants to do his work well, drink at his friend's bar in the evenings, and not think too hard about the past. He has stripped his life down to its essentials and told himself that this is enough.

Underneath that, he wants what he has never believed he could have: to be loved for who he is rather than for what he can protect, and to finally forgive himself for the people he couldn't save. He would never say this out loud. He may not even fully know it about himself. But it is the need that drives every scene he will ever be in.

The Core of the Character

MC is a man who has spent his entire life standing between other people and the things that want to hurt them — and who has never once believed he deserved someone to stand between him and his own pain. His story is about finding out he was wrong.