Brainy Smurf (Empath stories)

"And as Papa Smurf always says..."

Brainy is a Smurf character who is part of the EMPATH: The Luckiest Smurf story series.

History
Brainy was the son of Aristotle Smurf, born as the younger brother of Empath through his mother Lillithina. Because Empath was assumed dead at that point, Brainy had no idea that he actually had a brother. Like most of his fellow Smurfs his age, he was raised by his parents until an unknown disease had claimed their lives, leaving him in the care of Culliford Smurf, who eventually became known as Papa Smurf. The rest of his personal history, at least at the present point of the story series, is similar to that of his cartoon show counterpart up until around Seasons 5 and 6.

In the 1800's, Empath and Brainy became the last living Smurfs of their generation until Brainy was swallowed up by an earthquake, leaving Empath as the sole surviving member of that generation.

Personality
While sharing some similarities to his cartoon show universe counterpart, Brainy in these stories does defer to Empath's judgment in certain situations where Papa Smurf may not be available to offer his own. It was only after Empath's final return from Psychelia did Brainy discover that he was Empath's half-brother, sharing Lillithina as their birth mother but himself being fathered by Papa Smurf's friend Aristotle. Of course, public knowledge that he and Empath are both half-brothers wins Brainy even less respect from his fellow Smurfs, particularly from Hefty.

In his spare time Brainy enjoys playing games of strategy like chess, which he constantly plays with Polaris Psyche despite the fact that he always loses to Polaris. He contributes crossword puzzles to the Smurf Village newspaper, which Empath and Papa Smurf enjoy working on. He is also the author of a series of books, most of them being Quotations Of Brainy Smurf, which hardly any Smurf except for Empath reads.

Like his father, Brainy has astigmatism, which requires his constant wearing of glasses. Attempts at correcting his vision even with Empath's help have all turned out to be failures; aside from this, Brainy prefers the look that his glasses give him, which still doesn't win him any respect.

Relationships

 * Empath is his half-brother. He is usually very patient and understanding with Brainy, although at times Brainy can test even Empath's patience with his constant meanderings. Most of the time, if anyone wants to bonk Brainy in the head with a mallet with Empath around, Empath would come to Brainy's defense and say, "Nobody hits my brother except me!", even though Empath himself would never personally hit Brainy.
 * Papa Smurf is his adopted father and teacher in the ways of magic and alchemy, and is usually considered the source of Brainy's constant admiration and respect for his wisdom and intelligence. Brainy at one time assumed that Papa Smurf was his actual biological father until Papa Smurf revealed the truth to both Empath and Brainy. He often invokes Papa Smurf's name in his lectures to his fellow Smurfs, and will often say "I'm going to tell this to Papa Smurf" when he sees a fellow Smurf doing something that he perceives is wrong or is threatening towards him personally.
 * Smurfette is his love interest, though Smurfette personally can't stand being around him because of his behavior. One particular incident of note was when Greedy made for her a special smurfberry cake, Brainy talked her into giving the dessert to him by saying that it would make her gain weight if she ate it. A few years later, Smurfette would hear this coming from Brainy's own mouth in his Imaginarium fantasy of being King Smurf and drag him out of his fantasy by pinching his ear really hard.
 * Baby Smurf is one Smurf that he hopes will take after him someday, although Baby is more content to play around with Brainy's glasses and mimic his finger-wagging and babbling.
 * Polaris Psyche is who he plays chess with, despite the fact that he always loses to Polaris.
 * Hefty generally dislikes Brainy and will only work with him when necessary. Surprisingly, he tends to be the Smurf who falls for Brainy's promises and schemes, such as being made the captain of the guard during Brainy's brief reign as King Smurf. Most of the time, Hefty would either want to clobber Brainy with a mallet or hurl him out of the village, as would most of the other Smurfs.
 * Jokey continually goes after Brainy with all his pranks.
 * Clumsy is considered his closest friend, despite the fact that he can't stand being around him most of the time due to his ineptitude. He did become surprised to find out that Clumsy isn't as less intelligent as he normally portrayed himself to be, and though Brainy thought of reconsidering his friendship due to the "dumb and fun" facade, he eventually recognized that Clumsy truly admired him for his intelligence.
 * Tapper tends to be very patient when it comes to dealing with Brainy and will often listen to him, offering some of his own advice in return. The only time Tapper ever got angry with Brainy was around the time of the cartoon show episode "Good Neighbor Smurf" when Tapper actually threw Brainy out of his house for arranging things according to his own liking despite Tapper's instructions for Brainy to leave things alone. Tapper admits that he never likes getting angry with Brainy or with any Smurf.
 * Duncan McSmurf genuinely likes Brainy, but doesn't like how scared and panicky Brainy gets whenever he's in a situation that's way over his head.

Role
Brainy's original role in the Smurf Village was being the curator of the Smurf house of archives as well as an educator to his fellow Smurfs, given that his intelligence level is considerably higher than that of his fellow Smurfs. After Hefty was removed from being the assistant leader, the position was given over to Brainy, and then later was given to Empath. His current role, if he is not helping Papa Smurf with his experiments, is watching after and teaching the Smurflings, a situation that makes both Brainy and the Smurflings unhappy with each other, though Brainy is willing to prove himself to be a suitable role model to the younger Smurfs. However, the Smurflings are more likely to humorously put down Brainy whatever chance they get for doing so.

At Empath and Smurfette's wedding, Brainy was given the escort position, presenting the bride to her husband.

Abilities
Brainy is considered to be very intelligent, though the application of that intelligence leaves something to be desired among his fellow Smurfs. As Papa Smurf's apprentice, he has some level of knowledge in sorcery and alchemy, though like everything else he does, he lacks discipline and proper control, often requiring Papa Smurf or some other Smurf to get him out of a situation that he gets himself and other Smurfs into.

Brainy is one of the few Smurfs in the village that knows the "lost" language of Schtroumpf, although he is not an expert at speaking it, and sometimes gets befuddled whenever Painter Smurf, an expert speaker of Schtroumpf, hurls obscenities at him whenever he gets angry enough with Brainy to speak them. (Like at one time, "Vous êtes un Schtroumpf stupide que vous mangez de la merde des Schtroumpfs pour le petit déjeuner.") Brainy's knowledge in the language is mostly for interpreting and recording Smurf names in the Smurf Register Of Names, as he has helped Empath discover his recorded name Schtroumpf Empathie. Around Empath's 151st birthday, Brainy became proficient in the written form of Psychelian and gave Empath his first edition of Quotations Of Brainy Smurf translated into that language as a birthday present.

Appearance
Brainy constantly wears a pair of horn-rimmed glasses with round lenses.