Southern Cross Who's Who - Jack "Brains" Burns

Background

Jack was born to an English family living in Leeds around the beginning of the First Robotech War. The family survived the Zentraedi planetary bombardment of 2011 and were among the flood of refugees to flee the British Isles for mainland Europe. The family made it to Denmark just as the Army of the Southern Cross was sealing the borders. Unable to get a seat on the last transport to the Scandinavia Quadrant, Jack's parents literally shoved he and his older sister Sara into the arms of a refugee on the boat.

Jack grew up in the refugee camps near Copenhagen, with Sara taking care of him and making sure they were not separated. Sara worked odd jobs to make sure she and Jack had enough food and when Jack was old enough he also began finding work. Jack showed an aptitude for fixing things and managed to always find work repairing things around the camps. As he grew older he began to travel to other camps to help fix things there. He often worked with another refugee, Russell Everett, and the two became (and remain) good friends.

Eventually Jack's desire for travel led him to apply to the United Earth Defense Forces and he was accepted at the Robotech Academy in Lillehammer. He jumped between several disciplines before finally settling on mechanical engineering. Because he showed an aptitude for mecha and Veritech systems Jack was sent to the Alpha Tactical Armored Corps. While at the Academy Jack "adopted" a pair of younger cadets, Jeffrey Gutierrez and Charlie Doran. The two were having trouble in first year so Jack helped out his "little brothers", earning their gratitude and friendship. Jeff and Charlie have both been accepted into the Tactical Armored Space Corps for their specialization training.

During his training Jack impressed his teachers and his engineering instructor, Capt. Erin Burke, recommended him to the Robotech Research Center in Tokyo. The Robotech engineers there were impressed by Jack's skills and he was transferred to the 474th Armored Squadron, based in Tokyo. Once he completes his tour of duty with the 474th he expects to be transferred to the Research Center.

Even during the short time he has been at Tokyo Base Jack has managed to make friends. Kimiyo Yamaoka and Allison Doherty (who studied engineering with Jack at the academy) are mechanics assigned to the Civil Defense Base in Tokyo and Jack helped them out with some mecha repairs. The three now meet regularly to discuss engineering and mechanics.

Jack values knowledge above all else, and is frequently taking things apart to see how they work. He always carries his Swiss Army knife with him, an early gift from his sister Sara when he first started fixing things around the refugee camp. Jack had been sending a portion of his pay to his sister so she would be able to move out of the refuge camp and start going to school. Instead, Sara took the money and had herself smuggled into the Eastern Bloc Soviet Independent State in an effort to bring back their parents, trapped behind the new Iron Curtain for almost 14 years. Jack has begun receiving letters from his sister, smuggled to him via various black market channels. The letters say Sara has found their parents and they are living happily in the EBSIS. The letters also implore Jack to defect and come join them. Jack is extremely suspicious of the authenticity of these letters and fears for his family's safety. Still, he has yet to inform the Southern Cross authorities that he is receiving these letters.

Call Sign: Once the rest of the squadron saw that he was a genius they started to call Jack by the name Brains, to the point that many of them have probably forgotten his real name.

Recent History

Jack's tenure with the 474th was supposed to be short, but fate had something else in store. When the squadron stumbled across clues pointing to a conspiracy behind the apparent EBSIS attacks on Japan, Jack's technical ability helped them dig up some initial evidence. Unfortunately the team's curiosity attracted the wrong kind of attention and to keep them from learning more the conspirators arranged for the 474th ATAC to be sent on a suicide mission to Indochina. ONly the timely intervention of the 21st ATAC saved Jack and a few others from certain death.

After the rescue Jack and the other survivors were reassigned to their rescuers, the 21st, and transferred to the Blackjack's base in Australia. Captain Mace, the 21st's C.O., allowed and even encouraged Jack, who by this point had been nicknamed Brains by his teammates, in his engineering endeavors. Over the course of World War IV Brains would come up with several different inventions, ranging from the secure on-board computer systems and automated missile countermeasures he designed for the hovertanks to the portable (with gyro-mount) railgun he built for Tank Girl and the jump-jet boots used by Punchout and Shark. Brains' most notable creation, finished after the defeat of the NWO, was a sensor system capable of detecting and tracking active Protoculture reactors. Brains was infuriated when Dr. Lazlo Zand, head of the Robotech Research Facility, claimed the Protoculture Sensor as his own invention and filed several complaints in an effort to get his proper credit.

When the EBSIS turned out to have a version of the Protoculture Sensor, Brains was arrested on suspicion of treason. His case was not helped by the letters he had been receiving, something he thought he had kept secret but that the GMP were somehow aware of (Brains did not know that one of his teammates was actually an undercover operative for the GMP). The real traitor turned out to be the base's chief intelligence officer who tried to kidnap Brains and deliver him to his Soviet handlers. Luckily the rest of the 21st discovered the truth and thwarted the plot, clearing Brains of the charges in the process.

During the Second Robotech War Brains was frequently frustrated by the lack of information available on the enemy. The GMP were militant about confiscating any salvage from the battlefield and very little about their scientists discovered was being made available to the troops on the front lines, denying them valuable information that could potentially save lives. In defiance of this policy the 21st would bring in salvage from a battle and hide it from the GMP for as long as possible, giving Brains time to examine it himself. This led to more friction between the squadron and the GMP, not to mention more than a little jail time for the members of the 21st. He was able to learn some of the enemy's technology, and when the squadron went out to capture a Bioroid (being piloted by a teammate who had been captured and converted into an enemy pilot) Brains built a mecha-sized shock stick designed to temporarily stun a Bioroid.

Brains was one of the few members of the 21st to survive the final battle with the Robotech Masters. His improvisational engineering skills came in handy during the group's flight to safety, including the creation of a jury-rigged hover platform to transport refugees and getting a decommissioned naval frigate seaworthy again in only a few days, a feat that allowed the squadron and the refugees with them to make the crossing from southern Australia to the safety of New Zealand. Brains also devised several simple but effective defensive technologies that the local New Zealand military could implement quickly in their efforts to shore up the island nation's defenses.

Brains and the rest of the 21st have now left New Zealand and are accompanying the submersible mecha carrier SLV Ulysses on its mission to track down other surviving Southern Cross and UEG assets.

United Earth Forces Service Record

Assignment History

Honors and Awards

Mission/Conflict Summary

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