Gabriel Santiago

Gabriel Santiago, also known as The Old Man, is a recurring character in the sixth season. He is portrayed by Ian Pala and Chuku Modu, and debuts in "Red Sun Rising".

He was an original member of Mission Team Alpha and the former thirteenth Prime. After a moral awakening, Gabriel defected from the Primes and formed the Children of Gabriel to take down the Primes. His current host is Xavier.

Early life
Gabriel was born on Earth and eventually joined the Eligius Corporation. Before the first Nuclear Apocalypse, Gabriel was selected to join Mission Team Alpha to explore life and human survival on Alpha.

Shortly after arriving on Alpha, Gabriel's girlfriend, Josie was killed by her father, Russell Lightbourne who was under the influence of the eclipsed-induced psychosis. Following Josie's death, Gabriel started working with Russell to figure out how to bring her back using their Mind Drives which already stored her consciousness. He incubated some of the Nightblood embryos they brought from Earth so that he can upload the Mind Drives on the children, but the children always ended up dying because their minds weren't developed enough to hold an entire consciousness. After 25 years of experiments, Gabriel eventually figured out that they needed to use a fully developed brain and erase the host's mind completely in order to upload the entire consciousness from the Mind Drive. This worked successfully and brought Josie back.

By the time that Josephine was brought back, Gabriel was dying of cancer. Unwilling to lose him, Josephine resurrected Gabriel through his Mind Drive which he hadn't wanted to happen. After his first resurrection, the two shared a dance and Josephine promised to love Gabriel forever.

Following, Gabriel's breakthrough, the Primes started using the Mind Drives to bring themselves back by uploading their consciousness into Nightblood hosts. The Primes at some point started experimenting with the Red Sun toxin with Simone trying to weaponize it while Gabriel focused on creating an anti-toxin. Gabriel discovered a way to use the toxin to create a waking dream as part of "a happy accident." At some point, he and Russell experimented using Gabriel's variant of the toxin to see if anything of their hosts survived. The experiment showed that nothing of the host survived, but gave them a revelation about their purposes: Russell's was to make them into gods while Gabriel's was to stop it from happening.

Eventually, in 2211, Gabriel started feeling guilty and started to rebel against the Primes. To stop the resurrections, Gabriel destroyed the remaining embryos which had been genetically engineered with Nightblood. Simone Lightbourne intended to burn Gabriel at the stake for his actions, but he was helped to escape from Sanctum by Ryker Desai who left his cell door open. He formed the Children of Gabriel group to help take down the Primes.

Gabriel trained an null named Eduardo, who was left in the Offering Grove as an infant. He taught him how to remove the Mind Drive so that he won't be brought back. However, as Gabriel was about to die of age, an infant Nightblood named Xavier was born. Eduardo saw this as a sign to bring Gabriel back. Gabriel became close with Xavier who was also like a son to him and rejected Eduardo's idea that they use Xavier to resurrect him and believed that he had talked Eduardo out of it. After Gabriel died, Eduardo went against his wishes and used Xavier as a host to resurrect Gabriel. Gabriel was so upset at Eduardo for bringing him back that he killed him out of anger. He was left with no one to remove the Mind Drive.

Since no one else knew about it, Gabriel decided to pose as Xavier among the Children of Gabriel. They assumed that either the Old Man Gabriel had died or abandoned them. Gabriel posed as Xavier for ten years while the Children of Gabriel believed that Eduardo had been killed by the Sanctum Guards around the same time that Gabriel disappeared.

Gabriel was also extremely interested in the temporal anomaly on Sanctum. Its implied that he visited it often to see hallucinations of Josephine who he never stopped loving. According to a comment Gabriel made, he spent at least 150 years studying it by the time the people from Earth arrived though Gabriel apparently couldn't uncover anything about the anomaly and how it worked.

Throughout the Series

 * -|Season Six=

In Red Sun Rising, Gabriel is seen in a flashback, 236 years ago. It was a few days after the Mission Team Alpha had arrived on the Moon Alpha. Gabriel was taking photos while his girlfriend, Josie kept interrupting him. As Josie tried to make out with him, they were interrupted by the sound of a swarm of bugs as the red sun eclipse approached. They went back to the outpost only to find Josie's father, Russell Lightbourne killing people because he was under the influence of the eclipse-induced psychosis. After Russell killed Josie, Gabriel ran and became one of the few survivors.

In The Children of Gabriel, Gabriel is posing as his host, Xavier. He is a member of the Children of Gabriel group that wants to bring an end to the Primes. While some of the members attack the Gagarin to steal the weapons and behead the dead Primes, Gabriel organizes to kidnap the remaining Royal Bloods - Delilah and Rose - from Sanctum before they're turned into hosts for the Primes. Delilah is rescued by Clarke but the Children of Gabriel manage to keep Rose. In the woods, they run into Octavia who dares them to fight her. Gabriel puts on a mask and uses his knowledge of the forest as a weapon by spraying her with paralyzing spores from the ground. As Octavia collapses, he tells her it won't hurt long. He asks his group to carry Octavia with them.

In The Face Behind the Glass, Gabriel, Tosh and the other Children of Gabriel are interrogating Octavia to figure out how many others from Earth have the blood alternation. When Octavia refuses to comply, Tosh suggests killing both Octavia and Rose but Xavier (Gabriel in disguise) disagrees, arguing that The Old Man won't appreciate murder. Tosh argues that what matters is stopping another naming ceremony instead of trying to impress The Old Man they've never seen and don't know if he's even alive. Xavier and Tosh call for the remaining members to help settle the argument.

While the rest are arguing, Gabriel goes to where Octavia and Rose are tied up and offers them food but they refuse. He packs his goods and walks away but intentionally leaves a backpack with a knife right next to them. Octavia uses the knife to escape with Rose. The rest of the Children of Gabriel chase after them but are killed by Diyoza when she comes to rescue Rose. Tosh kills Rose before dying, causing Octavia and Diyoza to go on a mission to hunt down the remaining Children of Gabriel - Xavier and The Old Man.

In The Gospel of Josephine, Diyoza and Octavia are chasing Xavier in the woods. He leads them to a swamp-like ground called "the crucible", where they get stuck and begin to sink. He offers to save them if they tell him who else among their people have blood alternation. Octavia asks Diyoza to tell him nothing. Xavier (Gabriel in disguise) tells them that he has a lot more time than they. He advises Octavia them to be calm because the more they struggle, the faster they sink. However, Octavia refuses to listen. Just as she is about to completely sink, they notice a bright flare in the sky. Gabriel says that it is a temporal flare and it's very dangerous. He throws them a rope to escape and run to safety.

Back in Sanctum, Jordan, Bellamy, and Gaia find a secret lab and a computer with video logs. In one of the video logs, Gabriel had just figured out how to bring Josephine back using her Mind Drive after 25 years of failed experiments. In order to successfully upload an entire consciousness into a new host, not only did they need to wipe out the host's brain but they needed to upload the Mind Drive to a host with a fully developed mind. They video shows how Gabriel successfully brought Josephine back to her first host, a young woman named Brooke. After that, the Primes started using Gabriel's discovery to bring their loved ones back, and essentially live forever.

In Memento Mori, Gabriel, still posing as Xavier, watches from a distance as Octavia and Diyoza strategize on how to find The Old Man. After noticing that Octavia's hand is burned after being exposed to the temporal flare, Gabriel joins them and offers to help. On their way to retrieve cure for Octavia, he tells Diyoza that The Old Man is actually Gabriel. He explains that Gabriel had a moral awakening and decided to turn against the Primes. He asks Diyoza to join their cause but Diyoza refuses because she has an offer to raise her baby in Sanctum. He says that Diyoza's child would be treated as a "Null" since she won't have the black blood. However, Diyoza does not change her mind.

After retrieving the tree sap which is supposed to be the cure, it fails to work on Octavia. Instead Octavia's arm starts spiraling. After noticing the pattern, Gabriel gives her a rock to let the hand draw freely on the ground. She draws a logarithmic spiral, which he recognizes as the shape of "the anomaly" where the temporal flare came from. He says that the temporal flare was a message for Octavia that The Anomaly is calling her. After revealing that he has a similar spiral too, Diyoza also confirms the anomaly call by showing her book full of spirals. They agree to go together to the anomaly.

In The Old Man and the Anomaly, Gabriel still posing as Xavier, takes Octavia and Diyoza to the anomaly. As they get close, he takes them to his secret hiding place to disarm before they go to the anomaly. In the room, there's a photo of Josephine. After seeing the Mind Drive scar on the back of his neck, Diyoza realizes that Xavier is in fact Gabriel himself in a new host. Gabriel admits it and says that he only has the Mind Drive because he has no one to remove it. He explains to them how he had trained Eduardo to remove the Mind Drive but Eduardo betrayed him by bringing him back through Xavier as a host. Since then, he's been posing as Xavier and letting his own Children of Gabriel think that he abandoned them.

After coming clean to them, Gabriel leads Diyoza and Octavia to the anomaly to cure Octavia and figure out why the anomaly is calling Diyoza. On the way, Gabriel keeps getting hallucinations in which he sees Josephine. At the anomaly, Diyoza starts getting hallucinations of her future daughter, Hope. When Diyoza tries to follow Hope, Gabriel cautions her against it because no one has ever returned after entering the anomaly. However, Diyoza goes against Gabriel and Octavia's warnings and enters into the anomaly. When Octavia gets close to the anomaly, Gabriel pulls her out. As they lie side by side, Gabriel looks at Octavia's arm, confirming that she's been healed.

In What You Take With You, Gabriel takes Octavia back to the Verge from the Anomaly where Octavia insists that she doesn't remember anything and points out that she was only in the anomaly for a few seconds. However, as Octavia returned clean and healed, Gabriel thinks it was probably much longer. She had also come out at a run as if Octavia had been running from something. Gabriel decides to use red sun toxin to help Octavia remember.

After awakening, Octavia tells Gabriel that now she has a renewal of purpose and prepares to take off, only to hear a message from Clarke stating that she is the host of Josephine Lightbourne. Gabriel warns that it means that Clarke is in trouble which Octavia realizes means all of her friends are in trouble too. Before she can take off to help them, Gabriel reminds Octavia that Clarke's message said that she was coming to them and states that things are about to get weirder.

In Matryoshka, Clarke and Josephine watch a memory of Gabriel and Josephine dancing after their respective first resurrections. Josephine watches the memory in fondness and promises to love Gabriel forever. Instead of floating the memory, Clarke tells Josephine that she can keep it, but they have to move if she wants to survive to see Gabriel again.

In the present, Gabriel and Octavia find Clarke's body at the old blind Gabriel and Josephine spent time at together. The two save her from the vines and Josephine reveals herself to be in control and is reunited with Gabriel for the first time in 70 years. However, the reunion is interrupted by the arrival of Jade and five Sanctum guards to whom Josephine reveals Gabriel's identity, orders his capture and the execution of Octavia. However, Josephine's condition gets worse and Gabriel insists that he must operate immediately if he is to save her and Clarke. One of the guards suddenly shoots the others and reveals himself to be Octavia's brother Bellamy. Bellamy sends Jade back to Sanctum with a warning for Russell and Gabriel leads the group back to the Verge.

At the Verge, Gabriel explains that he must temporarily stop Clarke's heart in order to get Josephine to download back into her Mind Drive so that it can be removed. While Bellamy wants to trade it to Russell, Josephine recognizes that Gabriel doesn't want that as it will mean another resurrection. Josephine tearfully begs Gabriel to save her so that they can be together for good, but Gabriel, in tears himself, stops Clarke's heart and removes the Mind Drive. However, Gabriel can't revive Clarke as Josephine's mind managed to hang on inside of her. Gabriel believes that it's over and Clarke's body just can't handle the strain of holding two minds anymore. Bellamy desperately tries to revive Clarke despite Gabriel's beliefs and she suddenly regains consciousness in Bellamy's arms. Sorrowfully, Gabriel watches as Josephine's brain wave pattern flatlines on his EEG, her mind having been destroyed by Clarke.

In Ashes to Ashes, Gabriel works with Clarke, Bellamy and Octavia to try to come up with a plan to save their friends and defeat the Primes. Gabriel urges Bellamy to forgive Octavia and reveals her experiences with the anomaly. When the Children of Gabriel arrive, Gabriel reveals his true identity to them, to the anger of Layla, Xavier's sister. Clarke convince Gabriel's followers to spare him so that Gabriel can help them weaponize Red Sun toxin to invade Sanctum.

While Octavia and Bellamy are gone, Gabriel and Clarke discuss their plans for using the toxin against Sanctum with Gabriel expressing reluctance to harm the citizens. As they discuss the toxin further, Clarke and Gabriel come up with a plan to use a lesser dose to simulate a Red Sun eclipse to trigger Sanctum's evacuation alarms so as to spare as many innocent people as possible. As Gabriel no longer knows the code to lower the radiation shield, Clarke discusses posing as Josephine to infiltrate Sanctum and do it herself so that they can launch their attack.

Soon after Octavia and Bellamy return with the toxin, Sanctum guards led by Jade and John Murphy attack. Clarke poses as Josephine to them, claiming that Clarke is really dead. Once they are out of the tent, Clarke pretends to kill Layla and releases her friends to continue with their plan. After seeing Clarke's actions, Layla finally accepts that Clarke really isn't Josephine anymore.

Personality
Gabriel seems to be a hardworking scientist. He also had caring feelings for Josephine, but their relationship ended when he disagreed with the Primes' own ways and defected from Sanctum. He implies that Josephine is both his darkest fear and greatest desire.

By the time his last host was dying over old age, Gabriel was ready to die for good, but adopted a boy he rescued named Eduardo who he taught to remove the Mind Drive. Though Eduardo wanted to bring him back again through a new free-born host, Gabriel was ready for his life to end and enraged to the point of killing Eduardo for resurrecting him again when he was brought back against his will. It's shown that he never wanted to be resurrected the first time either but Josephine couldn't bear to lose him.

After his latest resurrection, Gabriel became ashamed of what he had become to the point that he chose to hide amongst his followers as his host Xavier. Gabriel states that he dedicated himself to bringing down a system of worship of false gods, but instead became a false god all over again.

Physical Appearance
He was tall and slender with brown eyes, brown hair and light tan skin.

Relationships
He was in a romantic relationship with Josephine Lightbourne, but their relationship ended when he disagreed with the Primes' own ways and defected from Sanctum. He implies that Josephine is both his darkest fear and his greatest desire. A hallucination of Josephine suggests that Gabriel keeps going to the anomaly to see her which he doesn't deny beyond the last timepp as he had gonppe to help Diyoza and Octavia. When reunited with Josephine, Gabriel was happy to see her, but tearfully refused the idea of saving her so they could be together. He was visibly upset after her EEG flatlined.

At some point, after abandoning Sanctum, Gabriel developed a father-son bond with a boy named Eduardo he'd rescued. Though Gabriel wished to die with his last host, Eduardo loved him too much to let Gabriel go, though Gabriel thought he'd talked Eduardo out of his plan to resurrect Gabriel through Xavier by the time he passed away. In his anger at his resurrection, Gabriel killed Eduardo, something he showed remorse for while explaining the story to Diyoza and Octavia. When confronted by Xavier's sister Layla, Gabriel stated that he also loved Xavier like a son.

Quotes

 * Josephine Lightbourne: "What do you say, Gabriel? You ready for phase two?"
 * Gabriel Santiago: "That's what the embryos are for."
 * -- Red Sun Rising


 * Gabriel Santiago: "The key is a fully developed brain. Once the adult host's consciousness is gone, the mind stored in the drive uploads with ease. Now, we still have loads of tests to run, but so far, Josie's consciousness, herself, appears to be whole. In other words, Eureka. More soon."
 * -- The Gospel of Josephine


 * Gabriel : "The forest is my weapon."
 * -- The Children of Gabriel.


 * Tosh: "You're gonna shoot me now?"
 * Gabriel: "I'd really rather not. The rest of our unit is expecting you."


 * Gabriel : "The harder you fight - the faster you die."
 * -- The Gospel of Josephine.
 * Gabriel : "I can wait longer than you can."
 * -- The Gospel of Josephine.
 * -- The Gospel of Josephine.


 * Gabriel : "Did Russell tell you your child will be considered worthless? You don't have the blood, and neither will she. They'll call her a null. She won't be able to bear children. She'll clean toilets or volunteer to die as a guard or attend to the dead."
 * -- Memento Mori.


 * Gabriel : "It's not just a tremor. It's a message. The anomaly's calling you... just like it called me."
 * -- Memento Mori.

Killed Victims

 * Brooke
 * Eduardo
 * Clarke Griffin

Notes and Trivia

 * According to Russell Lightbourne, he was a demon. Gabriel himself implies that he is considered one not only for his rebellion, but for destroying the embryos in particular.
 * He and Russell jail-broke the Mind Drive.
 * In the script, Russell also mentions that Gabriel created the serum used on the hosts before they implant the Mind Drive and that it took him over twenty years.
 * He founded the Children of Gabriel.
 * He wrote a book chronicling the effects of the Red Sun called "The Double Helix Under the Double Suns."
 * Back in 2275, Josephine Lightbourne mentioned that his last host must be at 95 years old.
 * That host is confirmed dead and he currently has a new host that he has had for ten years. This means that his host was in his 80s when he died.
 * He is the only Prime that came alone. The others had a family member(s) come with them.
 * His original body died of cancer. His previous host died of old age.
 * Unlike the other Primes, it is unknown how many hosts Gabriel has had but it's at least two. Given the old age of his previous host, he likely hasn't gone through as many hosts as the other Primes who have each had upwards of six. However, he is likely to have had more than two hosts given the over two centuries that have passed since he first arrived on Sanctum, even accounting for his hosts living to old age.
 * At the end of the episode, "Matryoshka," Gabriel spoke in Spanish saying "death is life".
 * Both of Gabriel's known resurrections were because someone he loved couldn't let him go.