Post by Frankie Guidicini on Jun 13, 2013 19:10:28 GMT -7
FRANCESCA GUIDICINI
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◊ FULL NAME: Francesca "Frankie" Guidicini
◊ CODENAME: Bones
◊ GENDER: Female
◊ RACE: Immortal
◊ AGE: 136
◊ APPEARANCE: Frankie has always been of average height and androgynous in figure. She comes in around 5'7 and possesses the slight build of a person who has spent their life undernourished and hard worked. She doesn't have much in the way of her chest and can be aptly described as a bean-pole. Pallid skin clings to her skeletal frame, almost never possessing any pigment and always giving the impression that Frankie is ill. She wears her chestnut hair never longer than her shoulders and tries to keep it pulled back in the most practical style available. Hooded eyes the color of copper give their owner a fierce gaze at the best of times, likened to that of a bird of prey. An angular and square jaw frames her face and is accentuated by pouty lips, often set firmly into a line of indifference. Her skin and features wear no signs of age or the long life she has lived.
In aggressive situations out in the field, thorn-shaped bones line the sides of Frankie's arms, the front of her legs, and a single one protrudes separately on the back of her hands and the back of her feet. The bones are smooth, pristine white, and wickedly curved with fine edges that have thus far cleanly cut through anything that Frankie has come up against. There is the odd situation in everyday life where Frankie wears her bones on the outside, but she tries not to. Frankie's found that doing so creates an aggressive atmosphere and she strives to be more professional than that.
◊ ATTIRE: In years past Frankie preferred long gowns and mute colors. She still prefers mute colors but at present she generally wears trousers (usually black slacks) with a modest blouse on top in a dark hue. She prefers sensible and practical shoes with good arch support for the days where she's on her feet going from one place or another. She almost never "dresses down" and presents herself as formal and rigid often in the most casual of environments. When out in the field, she prefers a form-fitting black full body utility suit with reinforced slots along her arms and legs for her bones to escape. The material is waterproof so that blood can be sluiced away and the cut is fitting so that Frankie doesn't snag on anything. Finally, when all is said and done and Frankie's turning into bed for the night., she dons a gray and white paisley bathrobe over a silky black nightgown and stocking feet.
◊ FACE CLAIM: Keira Knightley
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◊ AFFILIATION: BPRD
◊ PROFESSION: Co-Director and Field Agent of the Bureau for Paranormal Research and Defense
◊ PERSONALITY: The Frankie Guidicini most people know is that of a cold and heartless bitch who makes the hard decisions without even a hint of mercy for those affected. Frankie is happy of this. It's a wonderful mask that she's been wearing for the better part of a century and it enables her to get things done. "You can never be friends with your subordinates" is her motto and, while she calls Abe and few others 'friend,' it is not a word she uses liberally. The less friends she has, the better she can think with her head instead of her heart to make the best decisions for the Bureau and those within its boundaries.
But behind this shield of an imperious and frigid director is a woman who has lived far longer than she ever desired to and has done many things she is not proud of. Guilt is her constant companion and her reason for being unable to sleep at night. Accompanied by her guilt is her hatred towards herself for being weak, for being unable to kill Nuada and thus helping to damn the world to what it has become. Every time she sees Maggie or Trevor, she is haunted by the fact that if she had done her duty the twins would not be orphans and the world would be a much better place. And while she knows that many suspect her of being a turncloak who only rejoined the BPRD when their victory was imminent, these rumors and falsehoods do not bother her as much as the truth would if it ever got out.
One thing she cannot regret and cannot feel guilt about is her son, Riordan. Without him, guilt and self-hatred would have consumed her, but Riordan breathed life back into her from the day he was born. Frankie doted on the boy, but never spoiled him; instead, she encouraged him to be independent and explore new things that she wouldn't necessarily have approved of. Frankie is doing her best to come to terms with the fact that he is a man grown and has been for a few years, but she still frets when he goes out in the field or nags him gently about when his hair becomes too long for her taste. Since she left Stella when she was younger than Riordan, Frankie is determined not to make the same mistake again with Riordan and will be there for him as long as he needs her.
◊ ABILITIES: Frankie has been blessed with a healing factor that immediately heals any wound and prevents any illness. Within seconds of being cut, shot, stabbed, or having anything happen to her that breaks the skin, Frankie's body heals itself but produces a by-product of an acidic compound that is expelled via the mouth. This acidic compound is black and easily diluted in water; if it is not, the acid eats away whatever it touches save for Frankie herself. This healing factor froze Frankie's appearance in her twenties and has prevented her from aging or dying a natural death. It is thought that Frankie could be killed by drowning or dismemberment or being burned alive, but that theory has not been put to the test, for obvious reasons.
Frankie's natural weapons are thorn-shaped bones that line the sides of her arms, front of her legs, back of her hands, and the heels of her feet when she wants them to. These bones can be released from or retracted into her body and, while Frankie often released them when she was younger due to anger, she tries to keep them retracted unless she needs them. Her healing factor works hand-in-hand with this ability, as she must always heal the incisions the bones make once the bones have been retracted. These bones are incredibly dense and have thus far been able to cut through any obstacle they've faced. Most of Frankie's weight comes from these dense bones.
◊ SKILLS: Fluent speaker of English, French, German, Italian, and Russian; conversationally skilled in Mandarin Chinese; knows how to embroider, sew, and mend clothing; possesses extensive training in the art of espionage; knows how to play the pianoforte; is a passable marksman; master of hand-to-hand combat; can brew the perfect cup of tea.
◊ WEAKNESSES: Riordan is Frankie's first and foremost weakness. Though she has encouraged her son to be independent, he will always be her little boy and she can not bear the thought of him coming to harm. She knows that she has duties and responsibilities that are larger than herself, but her son is all she has in the world for family and she will always possess the maternal instinct to protect him.
Were anything to happen to her healing factor, Frankie's immune system is non-existent and she could easily be felled by something as simple as the common cold. Swimming proves somewhat difficult, as Frankie's dense bones tend to want to sink whereas Frankie wants to float. She does her best to avoid water, since it is theorized that drowning could end her long life once and for all.
◊ EQUIPMENT: Since Frankie's weapons are always with her, she tries to avoid carrying excess gear. She, of course, wears the standard issue BPRD belt with a sidearm, ear communicator, night vision goggles, flares, and Tabby's specially formulated smoke grenades.
◊ RESIDENCE: Frankie and Riordan both live in a small house on the grounds of the base. When Riordan was born, Frankie realized she didn't want her son growing up in the confines of the Bureau. It's a simple house with two cramped bedrooms, an ancient bathroom, and a combined kitchen and living area. Frankie has done what she could with it over the years and it isn't too shabby. The kitchen and living area sport a low coffee table perched between two armchairs and a sofa, all scavenged and reupholstered and refinished personally by Frankie. It took her years of weekends to scavenge the stainless steel oven, stove, and refrigerator in the kitchen area. She and Riordan spent a weekend refinishing the counters with childhood drawings and scavenged pictures and magazine clippings to add some color to the place. The floors are wooden and in need of a good refinishing, but threadbare green rugs and runners cover the floors in spots. A kitchen table with room enough for six sits in the middle of the living area. An ancient radio sit against one wall, rewired and refurbished by Tabby and usually flicked on to the Bureau Broadcasting Network.
The bathroom possesses the original porcelain tub, toilet, and sink, all scrubbed and bleached to blinding white. The medicine cabinet's mirror has a few cracks spiderwebbed across the bottom, but nothing too serious. Riordan jury-rigged a hose up to the roof with an old shower head, and when the hose is connected to the faucet it makes a passable shower.
Frankie lets Riordan do whatever he wishes with his room, but hers is one of elegant simplicity. A reupholstered queen bed takes up most of the space and is topped with a scavenged down comforter. Frankie uses a cracked and water-stained old wardrobe for her clothes, giving up the closets for storage. Only one nightstand sits beside her bed with an old-fashioned green lamp on it and, more often than not, stacks of Bureau paperwork and the odd classical novel layered in between the pages.
◊ FAMILY: Pietro Guidicini (Father, Deceased), Eleanor Blackett-Guidicini (Mother, Deceased), George Guidicini (Brother, Deceased), Henry Hyde (Husband, Deceased), Stella Hyde-Parker (Daughter, Deceased), a few grandchildren and great-grandchildren and possibly great-nieces and nephews (Names and living status unknown), Riordan Silverlance (Son)
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◊ HISTORY: Pietro Guidicini did not travel to Britain in the 1890s to fall in love. He was in his early thirties and newly appointed diplomat to Great Britain with a fiancee left at home in Assisi. Nevertheless, within a week of arriving in London, he had fallen head-over-heels for Eleanor Blackett, the daughter of a baronet from Northumberland. The woman had caught his eye at the opera one evening as she mouthed along to the words of the songs, and Pietro found himself enraptured.
Within a year the pair were married and within two a son was born, George. Their life was one of perfect contentment: a loving family with a healthy son, warm winters in Italy, and comfortable living. A couple years later, Eleanor found herself expecting once more, and she and Pietro were thrilled to welcome their second child into the world.
Weeks before her due date, Eleanor began experiencing pains that were unlike those she had experienced giving birth to George. It felt as though the child were trying to claw its way from inside of the mother in an effort to escape the womb. A doctor was brought and internal bleeding was discovered. A surgeon was called for immediately to deliver the baby via cesarean section in an attempt to save the child before trying to find the reason for the internal bleeding.
However, the cause was found upon the delivery of the child. The surgeon thought he was imagining things when he opened Eleanor up and found that her womb had tiny thorn-shaped pieces of bone protruding from it. But when he breached the uterus, he found that those pieces of bone were actually coming from the baby. The bones lined the child from its shoulders down to its wrists, the front of its legs from the knee down, and a single bone protruded from the back of its hands and feet. The cesarean section turned into a hysterectomy, for Eleanor's womb was so severely lacerated by the child that there was no hope to save the organ. Any other internal bleeding was staunched, Eleanor was sewed back up, and the baby pulled through the procedure healthy, save for its defect.
The baby turned out to be a girl, and while the surgeon learned that the bones were razor sharp by almost losing a finger to them, after the child was cleaned off, had her umbilical cord cut, and was soothed, the bones slithered back underneath her flesh, leaving the appearance of a perfectly normal baby.
When the surgeon stammered out the events, Pietro wanted the child smothered. He thought the child to be a demon or some other monster that stole into his wife's womb and killed their true child. Eleanor's kinder heart and maternal instinct prevailed, however. They paid the surgeon well for him to keep his mouth shut and, after a few weeks and some destroyed clothing and bedding, it was found that as long as the babe was kept calm and content, the bones did not reappear.
The child was named Francesca and grew up kept from the world in the Guidicinis' Northumberland home. While her mother and father and brother would go to London or overseas, Frankie would be kept out of sight and out of mind in the north, tended to by the household butler and a governess who was also paid well for her silence about her unusual charge. For most of Frankie's early life, she was encouraged to mature right this instant and keep her emotions in check to prevent her bones from coming out. George was her only friend, but Francesca also resented her brother for being normal and for having the opportunity to travel and see London and Rome and all the places that she had never seen and would never see, if her parents had anything to do with it.
It was a boring and dull childhood, but Francesca's isolation enabled her to learn to speak French and Italian, one from her governess and the other from her father. Her gift for tongues made itself known when she was five and and she asked a question to her father in Italian, having picked up phrases that he murmured under his breath and exclaimed when reading the newspaper. Learning Italian from her father strengthened what had been, at best, a resentful and suspicious relationship into one of trust and love. When it came time to pick out a governess, one fluent in French was selected to continue Francesca's education of foreign languages.
Francesca matured into a an adolescent lady that was, from outward appearances, perfect. Her demeanor was calm and demure and she never raised her voice or argued with her parents. Inside, she felt as though she was being smothered -- but she could not let those emotions rule her, as her parents had constantly reminded her. But, in reward for Francesca's consistence and the fact that she hadn't had a bone incident in years, Pietro and Eleanor agreed to take her to London with them the year she turned fourteen.
London was a large metropolis full of spectacles and wonders that Francesca had only ever read about in books and newspapers. Francesca was careful to govern her emotions in spite of the beauty and excitement that surrounded her every day. Her parents even took her to a couple of operas, where Francesca witnessed more people than she had met in her entire life and discovered a passionate love for opera and fine music.
Everything went spectacularly well that spring, and the Guidicinis were slated to return to Northumberland just before the end of May. George was planning on visiting Queen Mary's University to see if he preferred it to Oxford. At George's insistence and their daughter's request, Pietro and Eleanor agreed to allow Francesca to accompany her brother. En route, George stopped to ask for directions at Piccadilly Circus, turned away from Francesca for just a moment, and found her missing when he looked back to her.
Screams drew his attention as well as that of a constable and the two males found the adolescent girl covered in blood and her damned bones with the body of some petty criminal twitching at her feet and a knife sticking out of her chest. Francesca ignored the constable and George's cries of warning and pulled the knife out anyway. By the time the blood-slicked blade clattered against the pavement, Francesca's wound had healed and, save for vomiting up some black liquid that smoked and bubbled on the pavement as soon as it touched the ground, Francesca was fine.
Due to the situation, Scotland Yard was brought in to investigate, and they were soon replaced by members of the Crown's Secret Service. They offered the Guidicinis a simple solution: turn Francesca over to them for training or watch as their family's big secret was splashed across the newspapers when Francesca would be put on trial for the death of the criminal she slew. The choice was easy, and Francesca was put into a government program for people like her. While there was no single person with her bones or a way to heal themselves, everyone did have something unique, peculiar, or even extraordinary about them. Francesca, who had never before had a proper friend in her life, suddenly found herself surrounded by friends and comrades in arms that didn't think of her as a freak or a monster. One Cockney bloke who could make fire with his hands soon nicknamed the girl "Frankie" and the name quickly stuck.
Due to Frankie's skill at remaining composed even when distressed, she was selected for training in espionage. Most of her adolescence passed with her spending sixteen hour days where she was given a cover story and then locked in a room with two agents who did their damnedest to make the girl crack or blow her cover, or betray any emotion with a single expression. Other days, she would learn to blend in to a crowd, to hear but not be seen, and above all, to know when was the right time for her to kill. In between that, she was well-versed and drilled in communicating in codes and learning smatterings of the languages of Europe. For the longest time, all that Frankie did was train. She became an expert of espionage in theory, but there was never a chance for her to practice what she had learned.
The rumblings of a world war began when Frankie was eighteen, however, and she was quickly given a crash course in the German language and shipped off to Germany in the guise of a housemaid to watch and listen. When the Great War finally did begin in 1914, Frankie had been in the country long enough to avoid most suspicion and was able to find herself a place in the household of Major-General Erich Ludendorff. By keeping her head down and remaining silent, as well as flirting with some of the footmen, Frankie was able to learn about German troop movements and report them to Britain. Her position, however, was compromised in 1916 when Ludendorff became Quartermaster General and found Frankie replacing confidential papers she had copied in his study. It was at this time that Frankie experienced her first of many brushes with death. She was questioned brutally of what she knew, and Frankie did not release a single secret. She was shot execution style and buried in a shallow grave outside of Munich. And while the shot to the head had been excruciatingly painful, Frankie was able to remember her training and feigned death. She was astoundingly successful masquerading as a corpse and climbed out of her grave once the German soldiers had left. She was able to get to a safe-house in Switzerland and then transferred back to Britain for a full-debrief.
She was only given two weeks to rest and see her family before she was sent to Russia. King George was concerned for his cousins, the Tsar and Tsarina, and thought that such a unique agent could come in handy, should the murmurs of rebellion prove true. Frankie was sent to the Romanov court, again as a housemaid, but with the objective of protecting the royal family and, if necessary, evacuating them from Russia should there be a people's revolution.
Frankie failed in both of these. The day that the Romanovs were moved from Tsarskoe Selo to Tobolsk, the woman attempted to overpower the drivers of the motorcar carrying the royal family. She succeeded, only to be swarmed by their comrades. She was played off as one of the revolutionaries wishing to harm the Romanovs and shot execution-style once more. By that time, King George had rescinded his plans to help his cousins, and Frankie was sent to join the Italian Campaign until the end of the war.
When Frankie returned to Britain, she was a changed woman in many ways. She blamed herself for the deaths of the Romanovs and thought that, were she not so clumsy in Germany, perhaps she could have been useful and prevented the war from dragging on for two more years. The British government shelved her, so to speak, once the war was over. Instead of returning home to Northumberland, Frankie rented a flat in London and met a young British doctor named Henry Hyde. The first time she saw him, she thought he was the most handsome man she had ever seen with his red hair and crystal blue eyes. He had been attending medical school when the war broke out and, instead of waiting to be called up, he enrolled in a place in the army medical corps. With the war over, however, he was finally able to join a small practice in Harlowe Street.
Frankie would have never thought that any man, much less her handsome neighbor, would want to marry her. She was, after all, something of a monster, but Henry paid calls frequently and invited her over to dinner when she had no one else to dine with. Slowly, Frankie fell in love with the man, but resisted it as much as she could. This kind and gentle-hearted man would never love a creature like her. Happily, she was proved wrong. After a year of friendship, Henry asked if he might court her. Frankie agreed and another year passed before Henry proposed. When he did, Frankie revealed her bones to the man and, instead of being disgusted or horrified, Henry was fascinated and completely accepting of Frankie's fantastic abilities. He did disagree with what her profession was, however, but there was not much they could do about it. Henry and Frankie married in 1922 and welcomed a redheaded little girl named Stella into the world the following year.
For the first time in Frankie's life, she was utterly happy and content. Her affiliation with the British government continued, albeit sporadically, but her job never got in the way of her family. She had a man she loved, a healthy and beautiful daughter, and everything she had ever wanted in life. Years passed, and while Henry got silver in his hair and wrinkles on his face, Frankie didn't age a day. She spoke of perhaps powdering her hair in attempt to mirror her husband's age, but he put an end to that.
Frankie's parents passed away just months apart in 1936, just before Germany began to rumble. Frankie was sent to the continent several times to gauge the German threat. She advised Neville Chamberlain against signing the Munich Agreement in 1938, but Chamberlain desperately wanted to avoid another Great War. Despite this, the Second World War reared its ugly head in 1939.
The Blitz began in 1940 and Henry and Frankie sent Stella to live with George in Northumberland to keep her safe from the waves of bombing. Henry put his years of medical expertise to use attending those hurt in the bombings and, in particular, helping the firefighters tasked to keep St. Paul's Cathedral standing. Frankie begged him not to, asked that he stay in the basement of his practice and have the wounded brought to him, but Henry wouldn't hear of it.
On December 29th, 1940, Henry was killed in the bombings. And Frankie shattered. She disappeared completely, eluding the British government, her family, and anyone else who might have cared about her. The fact was, Frankie's grief was so overwhelming at the loss of the only man who had ever loved her that she could no longer handle living. Frankie tried to end her existence several times, but whether she jumped off a cliff or hung herself or poisoned herself, she continued to live. Blaming the Third Reich for Henry's death, she made her way to Germany and slaughtered any man or woman that she found in a Nazi uniform while taking refuge in the Black Forest.
When the war ended, she stayed gone. She roamed Europe like a feral beast, picking fights and being generally aggressive and stupid. In all of this, the idea of finding out why she was this way occurred to her and Frankie began studying in odd libraries to see if she could find a solution. Libraries proved to be useless, but the Occult did not. All signs pointed to witchcraft for her present state, and Frankie heard murmurs that the power that could cause such a thing might be based in the Mediterranean.
Frankie tracked down the most likely source of capable magic during the 1970s to Assisi, Italy, the hometown of her deceased father. It was painful beyond measure for her to visit this city that she had sometimes dreamed of exploring with her father long ago. She longed to hear his voice and chat with him about what it was like to live so close to St. Francis' tomb and church. But he was dead and Frankie had a job to do, so she traced the source of odd stories to an weathered old beggar woman named Costanza.
This woman had actually been her father's fiancee when he first went to England to serve, but Pietro jilted her in favor of Eleanor. To get even with both of them, Frankie learned that Costanza turned to blood magic. Pietro's former fiancee visited England when Frankie was little more than a cellular growth in Eleanor's womb. She called on the Guidicinis with a mask of friendly civility and, when Eleanor left the room to answer a question from the housekeeper and Pietro went to retrieve George for Costanza's inspection, the woman poured a vial of potion into Eleanor's tea. It was supposed to have been a poison, brewed with Costanza's own vengeful blood, that would have caused a growth within Eleanor's stomach that could not be eradicated and could only end up disemboweling the woman. Somehow, the magic translated into the fetus within Eleanor's womb, imbuing the child it would become with the sinister capabilities.
When this came out, Frankie just lost control and would have slaughtered the old witch right then and there -- if Costanza hadn't been expecting it. The fight between the two was large enough and caused enough damage to Assisi that the BPRD was called to put an end to it. Frankie finally slit the woman's throat just as the Bureau agents had them surrounded and, exhausted and sad, she surrendered peacefully. Thirty years of loneliness had culminated in this battle, and Frankie was just so damn tired. She cooperated fully with the BPRD and thought that maybe, once everything was resolved, she might find her daughter again and beg any forgiveness that might be given. Frankie voiced her wishes to Trevor Bruttenholm, who returned with the sad news that Stella had died of cancer when she was just a young mother, and Frankie's brother George was gone too. Frankie had no one left in the world, but Professor Bruttenholm asked for her to join the Bureau. Not knowing what else to do, Frankie accepted.
The Bureau sent her to Russia. There, Frankie's grief froze into bitterness and self-loathing. She grew to hate the predominantly frozen country and its people. Vodka didn't numb the pain; her healing factor almost immediately healed whatever damage she attempted to do to herself. She existed in Russia, doing her job and little else.
It wasn't until 2008 that she was called to the Bureau headquarters in America to deal with the threat of Prince Nuada and his Golden Army. Since Frankie had a talent for not dying, she was sent to join Nuada's forces as a mole. Her objective was to infiltrate and sabotage the Golden Army if she could. If not, Frankie was tasked with assassinating the king, even though his death would also mean the death of Nuala. Frankie successfully joined Nuada by killing two BPRD agents. Those deaths have haunted her, but those are nothing compared to what would come.
Frankie swiftly gained the companionship, if not trust, of the king. As the months wore on, Frankie found herself attracted to the elven king. His deadly physique, his enchanting yellow eyes, and his regal voice were all physical attributes that greatly appealed to Frankie. But most of all, he was immortal. Frankie thought that if heaven and earth could be moved, perhaps if something could change, Frankie could love him and he could love her and she wouldn't have to be alone. She knew that he was threatening the world with its end, she knew that he would be ruthless with her friends. And still, Frankie let herself fall into his bed with no regrets.
The Golden Army wiped out the east coast the and the Bureau in New Jersey. The sight of the corpses of Tom Manning and Kate Corrigan as well as agents Frankie didn't know or had fleeting memories of were burned forever in her mind when she surveyed the damage. And even so, Frankie could not help but find herself caring for the elf that made this all possible. She knew she was weak and foolish and Frankie still could not resist.
But then everything changed when Hellboy turned into Anung un Rama and unleashed the Ogdru Jahad upon the world. Earth's end had finally come, and Frankie found that at the end of all of this, she and Nuada had created life. She was pregnant with his child, and she knew then that she could no longer play the spy. The morning of the battle for Earth's soul came, and Frankie revealed herself to the king. She told him that she was carrying his child and left him with the words, "I hope I do not find you on the battlefield." Frankie joined the forces of the BPRD, determined that she would live and die with those who had brought her in from a life of exile.
Hellboy defeated the Golden Army and the Ogdru Jahad, giving his life in doing so. The tattered remains of the Bureau returned with the bodies of their dead to their new home in Colorado. Frankie learned that if she had only done what she had been sent to do, if she had only killed the elven king, none of this would have happened and Maggie and Trevor Bruttenholm, Hellboy and Liz's twins, would not have been orphaned. Her official story, to prevent herself from becoming a pariah (though she knew she would have deserved it) was that she never had an opportunity to kill Nuada. If she did, she couldn't bring herself to end Nuala's life too. And when Frankie's pregnancy began to show, she defended herself by saying that the child growing in her womb was insurance in case the elven monarchs were killed -- this way the Bureau would have an heir of royal blood that could possibly unite the two kingdoms under a single BPRD controlled rule. The only person who knew of her guilt was Abe, who accidentally learned of all that happened through a fleeting touch. Surprisingly, the icthyosapien was understanding of Frankie's situation and she found in him a confidant that she didn't know she needed.
Nuada and Frankie's son was born in 2010. Possessing ashen skin, the eyes, ears, and royal markings of his father, and the hair of his mother, it wasn't too difficult for people of the BPRD who hadn't heard Frankie's cover story to deduce the paternity of the child. Even so, Frankie has never publicized or even confirmed the identity her son's father to anyone outside of her closest circle. This garnered the woman the general dislike and suspicion of many, but she paid as little heed to it as she could. Frankie named the child Riordan and, together with Abe, set herself to the task of rebuilding the Bureau, protecting the people it sheltered, and raising her son.
It wasn't easy, but it was a marvelous distraction that Frankie tackled with gusto. Nuada went to the back of her mind, but always lurked there. Frankie did her best to raise Riordan to be independent. When he befriended the Bruttenholm twins, Frankie watched them play with a pang of guilt. But no matter how wretched Frankie felt, life would go on and there were things to do.
Frankie gave her unwavering support to everything Riordan wanted to do, and when he finally decided on pursuing a career as a Bureau field agent with his friends, Frankie was cautiously happy for her son. Though she frets for his safety, she does her best not to breathe a word of it to anyone. He does not need to be coddled and Frankie is determined to interfere as little as possible in his life.
Even so, Riordan still lives with her and she continues to find fulfillment as Abe's co-director of the BPRD. Things have settled down in recent years as the BPRD continues to take steps back to some semblance of normal. Even so, her son's father is never far from her mind these days.
