Michael Brangwen[1] was a bio-Engineer and worked along side Darcy Vance to assist Damon Eddington in the composition of his Symphony of Hate.
Biography[]
After hearing of Damon's desire to use an Alien for music, Brangwen took the job in order to stay in Synsound employment for a few more months, as he was already past the corporation's retirement age. The only reason Synsound had not forced him into retirement was that he was the only one to volunteer to work with Eddington.
Alongside Darcy Vance, Michael meets with Damon Eddington to begin Eddington's project and present to him the Xenomorph egg that Ahiro and his men had procured. Michael introduces himself to Damon, expressing his appreciation for his music.
Darcy tells Damon that there is no more funds for a clone use as a host, concluding that they would need to use a live human host. Damon was reluctant given the ethical issues of it but Michael reassured him that there are cultists that would volunteer to be impregnated by a Facehugger.
Soon after, a former guitarist and associate of Damon's, Ken Petrillo was brought in by Ahiro and impregnated by a facehugger, much to Brangwen's horror. The resulting Xenomorph is dubbed Mozart by the composer.
In Damon's absence, Darcy begins discussing the possibility of "attachment" with Xenomorphs to Brangwen; she talked about "the woman" who originally discovered the Xenomorphs had claimed that she and her crew were responding to a beacon sent by a derelict ship, suggesting that the creatures may have possibly built the spaceship. Michael is hesitant about the attachment suggestion but denies Darcy's story, regarding the woman as being merely a myth and that it was never proven.
Brangwen brings a cat and a dog to be slaughtered at the hands of Mozart, to which Damon was unsatisfied with. Leading Ahiro to later deliver a sheep, a cow, a bull and even a panther to Damon for Mozart to fight with. Although Mozart began producing the sounds he desired with the bull and panther when the Xenomorph became injured by them, the battles were too short-lived, with Damon demanding something even greater for Mozart to fight.
Before Ahiro had revealed to Damon the panther, Darcy expressed her concern for Damon with Brangwen, whom she thinks is addicted to Xeno-Zip. This proves to be true, to which Brangwen shrugs off, believing that it was his choice. When Darcy continues to be stubborn, expressing that she doesn't "want to work with a junkie", Brangwen becomes serious, contrasting his usual optimistic personality and reminds her what she signed up to, also bringing up that they all had a hand in the death of Ken.
Ahiro later brings an increasingly unstable Damon a group of humans brought from the street to be used as specimens, armed with electrostun rifles. Brangwen, enraged with the idea, objects to it with Darcy remaining neutral. Ahrio brings up the fact Brangwen was less than hesitant to have a cultist impregnated, but Michael retorts, saying that it was Ken's freedom of choice to be a host.
After Damon had obtained the sounds he desired, Brangwen bought tickets to a concert of the Helltones upstairs in the main concert hall and requests Damon and Darcy to come with him. Both reject his offer, with Damon refusing to go out of hatred towards the band and Darcy preferring to stay with Mozart. Brangwen, initially disappointment, stays optimistic and leaves for the concert, to which he enjoys.
During the concert, Damon had knocked Darcy out and forced her to fight with Mozart. Darcy had escaped through secret tunnels and Damon had been killed by Mozart who had escaped from his cell.
Mozart suddenly appeared in the concert and begun a mass slaughter of the band and crowd. Michael tried desperately to try to encourage the spectators to leave but most were too high on Xeno-Zip to realize that it wasn't an act.
After Mozart was killed by Chief Philip Rice and his MedTech security team who were tasked with finding the egg that Ahiro had stolen, Rice had shot Ahiro and warned Brangwen not to interfere with MedTech again unless they wanted a war.
Michael was later able to find Darcy, who had lost a lot of blood and give her medical attention.
Three months later, Brangwen performs Eddington's piece, which he has completed posthumously himself, to a lackluster crowd in a small concert venue. With the piece's poor reception, Michael begins crying, realizing that all his, Damon's and Darcy's work had been for nothing and that he was able relate to Damon's feelings of loneliness and uselessness that partly contributed to his mental breakdown.
Personality[]
Michael was generally an easygoing and kind individual who enjoyed music. He seemed to get along well with Darcy and tried his hardest to be friends with Damon, whom he was a big fan of. He was consistently seen as the voice of reason out of the three, compared to the increasingly unhinged Damon and the observant Darcy, speaking out against the use of human specimens and even standing up to Ahiro. Having no friends or family and being beyond the Synsound retirement age, Brangwen's optimism was tested and he constantly worried with what he was going to do after the Symphony of Hate project was finished.
Initially, after finding out that Damon was addicted to Xeno-Zip, Brangwen did not mind, but as he became more unstable, his respect for the composer began diminishing. Darcy's fascination with Mozart also began to bemuse the bioengineer, and he soon became tired of the project altogether, purchasing tickets to a concert just to escape it for a while.
Appearances[]
References[]
- ↑ Yvonne Navarro. Aliens: Music of the Spears, p. 60 (1996), Bantam Spectra.