Ignacio "Nacho" Varga

Ignacio "Nacho" Varga NAME
Cis Male SEX/GENDER
Better Call Saul (Breaking Bad) CANON
6x3 - Rock and Hard Place CANONPOINT

Nacho worked under a man named Tuco Salamanca, a cartel drug dealer whose behavior when he's using is dangerous and unpredictable. On one such occasion when he was high, Tuco took a sawed-off shotgun to a business associate of theirs named Dog Paulson, who he suspected of thievery. Nacho was standing behind Dog at the time, and ended up with a piece of Dog's skull embedded just under his collarbone, too deep to dig out. Because it was a cartel-related wound, he never attempted to have it removed by medical professionals, and now lives with the reminder that his boss is capricious and violent, ready to kill his associates and underlings for the smallest perceived slights. Because of this, Nacho would go on to attempt to figure out a way to kill or otherwise get rid of Tuco to save his own skin.

After successfully getting Tuco locked up, Nacho wound up under the supervision of Tuco's uncle, Hector. Hector was a vile and disgusting man who had no qualms with killing people "not in the game" (that is, people outside of the drug-dealing/cartel life) if it suited his purposes. He also attempted to force Nacho's father to use his business as a front for his drug shipments. Taking issue with that, Nacho switched Hector's heart pills with identical capsules filled with ibuprofen, causing him to have a stroke with Nacho present. However, a fellow cartel distributor, Gustavo Fring, gave Hector CPR and saved his life, leaving Hector paralyzed. Gus found out Nacho was responsible for the attempt on Hector's life and, because Gus was not a fan of anyone else deciding Hector's fate, forced Nacho to become his informant on the Salamanca family. Rather than get out of the game like Nacho had been intending, this thrust him further into it, much to Nacho's dismay.

After the arrival of Lalo Salamanca, the newest thorn in Nacho's side, Gus woke Nacho in the middle of the night and brought him to the parking lot of a building in which Nacho's father was residing. With Nacho looking on, Gus sent in one of his enforcers to linger behind Nacho's father, a very clear threat on his dad's life. He instructed Nacho to gain Lalo's trust and feed information on his plans back to him. Nacho, terrified for his father's safety, instantly agreed. However, this only made things harder on him, as he had to work to make Lalo see him as someone worth spilling all his plans to, thus growing closer to the family he was desperate to extract himself from.

Gus's final order for Nacho was to allow assassins into Lalo's compound in Mexico so that they could take him out without Gus falling under suspicion of the other dons. Nacho agreed, knowing his father's life was on the line if he didn't. His efforts were all rewarded with him being branded an instant outlaw in Mexico, hunted by the cartel and the feds alike. Nacho held out hope that he might be rescued, right up until he realized that Gus never intended for him to make it out of Mexico alive. Knowing that Gus had a vested interest in keeping his involvement in the plan a secret, though, he struck up a bargain: he would tell the Salamancas he was paid off by a rival gang if his father's safety would be guaranteed, thus signing his own death warrant.

At long last, Nacho allowed himself to be "captured" by Gus and his men, and brought to the Salamancas and another don to be interrogated and killed. The plan was for him to reveal the information he was fed before attempting to flee, when he would be shot by one of Gus's men before he could be tortured to death. However, Nacho veered slightly off-script to tell Hector and the Salamancas that he was responsible for Hector's stroke, and make his hatred of the entire family very well-known. After a speech decrying the cartel, the Salamancas, and Gus, he broke free of his bindings with a pilfered piece of glass. Stabbing the closest man, he took his gun and shot himself in the head, going out on his own terms rather than let someone else put him down like a dog.

In his beastly form, Nacho looks like a cross between several animals: chiefly, a coyote and a hyena, but he also has some traits from the mythological chupacabra. Covered in brown spotted fur, he has a dripping muzzle shaped like a hyena's, with the ears of a coyote. His fur gets patchier near his spine and gives way to scales, a row of spikes erupting from the ridges of his spine (ref). In several areas, his fur has rotted away enough to expose his bones, but this doesn't seem to hinder his movement. He has a large hunched-over form, able to walk on two legs as well as run on four (ref). His elbows are spiked, and his muzzle is dotted with scales as well as fur.

SIT, BOY | His hyena half makes him susceptible to commands from women. He'll be submissive to them if they show even the slightest hint of dominance.
GUAU GUAU | He can make a variety of sounds, including some that sound like human screams and some that sound like weird hyena chuckling. These sounds can induce emotions in people such as terror and lust.
LARGE AND IN CHARGE | Nacho will be able to bite through bone like toothpicks and rend flesh with ease. Completely feral when not being ordered around by women.

Nacho, thanks to his hyena side, will find himself vulnerable to women in his transformed state, far more willing to roll over and listen to commands from anyone who identifies as female. Otherwise, he's a dominating force, scarred-up and mangy, but with strong limbs and a stronger desire to prove himself. He'll target anyone in his monster form, not smart and calculating, but rather, feral and mostly mindless. He can overcome his instincts with much effort, but he'd rather give in once he's past a certain point.