Cillian Byrne

The Basics

Name: Cillian Byrne
Age: 35
Element: Time
Classification: Citizen
Birth Kingdom: Unda
Home Kingdom: Ventus

Appearance

Playby: Michael Fassbender

Personality

Personality: Cillian is not a warm man. In fact, people have dubbed him downright frigid. He rarely smiles and when he does, it is usually a slight curve of his lips than a true facial expression. The assumption that he is completely without a sense of humor is incorrect, though he is so dry and straight-faced that people misunderstand his attempts at joking with his being a complete asshole. He enjoys irony and subtle humor and finds other sorts to be too silly for his taste.

In addition to his serious nature, Cill is extremely blunt and almost excessively honest. When it comes to his doings, he naturally allows for a few lies of omission, but in his opinions of people, he completely lacks tact. If he does not like a person and they are in no way beneficial to him or his needs, he will not fail to let the person know. He is just as harsh to himself, harboring no illusions as to his unlikable demeanor. He knows he is unpopular - he simply doesn't care.

Unfortunately, this social ineptitude has made him very difficult to work with, despite his talents. Having lived in relative seclusion for most of his life, he completely lacks empathy. The motivations and emotions of normal people annoy him at best and confuse him at worst. With the exceptions of unsettling dreams and uncomfortable feelings, he doesn't care for women. Earthly temptations have never meant much to him and he has nothing but contempt and disrespect for those who have betrayed their oaths and acted on baser instincts.

Cillian never acts on impulse or whim. It is unlikely that he has ever had a gut feeling in his life. Instead, he assesses every option from every angle before choosing a decision. He is a strategist at heart and is able to prioritize and map situations quickly from years of experience and training. Logic is his bread and butter. He has no time for frivolities or hobbies and spends most of his free time training, reading, or gathering information.

All this would seem to point to a very dispassionate man, but this is quite untrue. Cillian is extremely passionate about specific things. He is extremely loyal to the Brotherhood and each Brother within it, whether or not he personally likes him (more than likely, he doesn't). He enjoys every aspect of his work, from the stealth assassinations to the uneventful patrols, but especially likes violence. Bloodshed is his release and he revels in it, sometimes to the horror of his comrades.

Likes:

• VIOLENCE As someone with very few outlets, he has learned to take pleasure in killing and battle. It invigorates him and allows him to release tension. He has been known to lose control in heated confrontations, though for the most part, he is able to keep his bloodlust under his thumb.
  
• PUZZLES Cillian is a very analytical man. Logic puzzles and riddles entertain him greatly. He likes to test himself intellectually. He also makes watches as a hobby, as he rather likes the intricacies of it.
  
• MEAT Though he adheres to the vegetarian diet enforced within the Disciplines, Cillian has taste for red meat. He indulges in it whenever possible abroad, despite how it upsets his stomach. The less cooked the meat, the better.
  
• NATURE The wilds make much more sense to him than urban settings. When traveling, he usually insists on sleeping in a separate camp without a tent, no matter what the weather, so he may watch the stars. He likes and respects animals, feeling a greater kinship with them than his fellow man.
  
• SOLITUDE People generally prefer not to be around him and Cillian happens to like it that way. Being surrounded by people and noise distract him. Especially loud noises can trigger migraines, so he avoids festivals and celebrations like the plague.

Dislikes:

• WOMEN AND CHILDREN While he observes the Brotherhood tradition of never harming women and children, he doesn't particularly like either. His misanthropy extends into misogyny and he has yet to meet a woman who he hasn't found exhausting and irritating. He feels the same about children. Perhaps all this distaste is resentment for what he will never have?
  
• CROWDS As far as work goes, crowds are excellent. They allow him to slink around with little notice. Outside of work? He despises them. As stated before, if he is not absolutely concentrated on the task at hand - or if there is no task at hand - he becomes distracted by crowds and gets migraines.
  
• TOUCHING Cillian is an extremely private man and absolutely detests being touched by most people. There may be a few (very few) old friends or acquaintances that he will allow a pat on the back from, but no more. He also has a rather wide personal bubble.
  
• IMPULSE Even in the most hectic of situations, Cillian can make a crucial decision by quickly assessing the situation. He expects the same of everyone else. People who fly by the seat of their pants annoy the hell out of him. Why use your gut when you have a perfectly good brain?
  
• FAILURE Cillian doesn't bask in success so much as he abhors failure. The importance of the task matters little; if he is the one to do it, it must be done well. No one is harder on him than himself and he will not accept anything less than perfection.
  
• GLACIENS Though brothers are expected to be impartial in matters of state and loyal only to their duties and one another, Cillian has a burning hatred toward Glaciens. He volunteered to go to Valetudo in the hopes of exacting revenge.

Elemental Strengths

• TIME SLOWING For up to three or four seconds, Cillian can slow time in a ten foot radius, extending it to fifteen while his personal being moves at the same speed it did previously. That's enough for him to do what needs doing.
  

Elemental Weaknesses

• EVERYTHING ELSE He has heard tales about the monstrous powers held by the Time Blessed of old. As a citizen classification, he doesn't have access to any of that. Beyond time slowing, there's not much he can do besides make watches.
  

Background

Family:
Mother - Charlotte Deveaux-Byrne, Time Apprentice
Father - Ioan Byrne, Wind Citizen
Siblings - Catriona (32, Health Consular), Siobhan (30, Health Apprentice)
Other - Assorted aunts and uncles.


History:
Ioan Byrne was once a wealthy merchant originally from Ventus who spent most of his business life importing and exporting foodstuffs to and from Unda. It was while in Wakdarming some thirty-six years ago that he met Charlotte Deveaux, a lower rung noble. They fell in love quickly, but there was a problem. Charlotte was already betrothed. She was also pregnant by Ioan.

The two eloped. Ioan was considerably older than Charlotte and had already amassed a small fortune that was more than comfortable for them to live on. They settled on one of the smaller southern isles of Unda and lived peacefully, with Ioan continuing his import/export business on a much, much smaller scale between islands. This allowed him to be present when his son, Cillian, was born and then his first daughter, Catriona, three years later.

Life was good for the small family. They had all they could ever want. But, as often happens in these stories, there was a tragedy. When Cillian was five, the Glaciens had split from Unda. That mattered little to him physically. The only difference was that now, the isles just a few miles south of them were considered another country. That was until the fighting began.

Charlotte was a fierce nationalist and when the secession started, his mother drilled into his head the despicable, traitorous nature of the Glaciens and the many evils they had done to the Undan economy. When their small island began getting caught in the crossfire between the defending Glaciens and the offending Undans, Charlotte made sure that her two children knew that it was the Glaciens at fault.

They lost everything. Their house was destroyed by the powerful volleys thrown from both sides. Their fortune was pillaged by one group or another; they all looked the same to Cillian. Worst of all, they were all alone. There was no one to help.

Met with no other options, the Byrne family decided to move to Ventus, where Ioan's parents had left him a small house that he had been renting out. At this point, Charlotte was once again pregnant. After a hard journey, they landed on Ventus shores and moved their growing family into the one-room home that Ioan had spent his childhood in.

Life was difficult. Ioan was having to start his business from scratch and he was starting to reach the twilight of his life. Few people wanted to invest in an old man who had been out of the business for nine years. They had three mouths to feed and little food to feed them with.

On one especially windy night, there was a knock at their door. They answered it to find two men in black coats so dark they seemed to eat the lantern light. Ioan and Charlotte left the house to speak with them outside and when they returned, they both embraced their only son before the Brothers took Cillian by either arm and escorted him out. He was nine.

He was taken to a Discipline near the capital of Ventus, especially for those outside the Wind system. Cillian had never known what element he carried within him - though he knew Catriona was of Health - until he donned his Initiate browns and began his studies. He was of the rare Time System, just like his mother had been. The knowledge was bittersweet and he chose not to concentrate too hard on his studies in that area, as they reminded him too much of Charlotte.

Of course, he missed his family. The first year was exceptionally hard. While he had always been a quiet child, he drew into himself even more, fitting splendidly into the Brotherhood's mold. He became a Young Brother at ten and a half.

The physical training began and Cillian excelled in it. It was so easy to throw the whole of his being into the practice of daggers, the flurry of hand-to-hand combat, and when his modest skills in Time manipulation were added, he set himself apart from the rest. He also did very well in book studies, especially anatomy. It fascinated him and satisfied his need for logic and puzzles to see how every piece of the body fit together and where it could be taken apart.

Cillian did not get along very well with his Brothers. While there were a few who understood him and that he did not mind being around, for the most part, Cillian avoided the company of others. If he was forced into some sort of group activity, he always seemed to anger at least one of his team members. Eventually, he stopped trying to make friends - not that he had been trying very hard in the first place. Though all the Brothers kept a tight reign on their emotions, Cillian was considered especially cold.

At nineteen, Cillian was considered eligible to take his final test. He traveled alone into the Heart of Winds, able to use his powers to slow some of the especially hard gusts down. He meditated and returned two days later, instead of the alotted one. When asked why he had taken so long, he replied that he had a lot to meditate over. In reality, he had traveled out of the way to see his family's home - which, really, was a sort of meditation for him. He did not show himself to them, but it gave him peace to see that they were comfortable, healthy, and had expanded upon their previously tiny home.

From then on, he was a full brother. He became notorious for insisting on taking missions alone and when in a group, separating himself from them. His staunch resistance to teamwork prevented him from becoming a Loner. His reputation among the Brothers is not a good one, despite his abilities.

When problems in Valetudo began and Cillian learned of the Glacien presence, he volunteered himself immediately. Though Cillian was getting along in age, the Master Brothers agreed to his request, hoping that the war would force him into cooperation with his fellow Brothers.

OOC

RP Sample:

Quote :

He set down his artwork just as he heard the creak signaling the opening of his door. Right on time then, he supposed. No one ever came to his little neck of the woods - not without having been sent by the castle proper. Once every few months, when weather permitted, he would receive visitors from the Vale. Servants, mostly. Sometimes his mother, when it was less frigid than usual. They brought with them victuals, supplies, news, and most importantly, company.

It had been two months since he had spoken to another living soul. Ioan was quite excited. The only thing better than a guest was a surprise guest.

"Please, be comfortable!" He shouted from his bedroom toward the small living area as he stepped out of his bed. He wrapped a ragged old robe around him and pushed his feet into slippers. "I will be with you shortly."

There was no use in wondering how he looked. He didn't have to deal with the displeasure of seeing himself. He had not shaven since his last visitor and he had last cut his hair a week ago - though it had been less a hair cut and more a hair hacking. Dragging his hand over his face told him that he had a full beard on his face and bags under his eyes. Beneath his robe, he could feel his own ribs. He did clean himself regularly as he could not stand his own stench and his nails were trimmed to avoid scratching himself in his sleep, but he was in no way presentable.

He opened the door to his living room and stepped out. He knew his home was neat and it had to be. Otherwise, he would not be able to find a thing. He had his own system of filing the many pieces of parchment and books lain about on his tables and shelves, but the system mostly consisted of what pleased him at that moment. His books were all organized from smallest to largest, his pots and pans hung at strange but precise angles, his drawings were pinned all over the walls, some grouped by art style and others by subject matter. Pieces of parchment were stacked everywhere, usually in ornate patterns.

"Close the door, would you? It's bloody fuck cold out there. Hello, how are you? I wasn't expecting you tonight, except I was, but I didn't have much notice, you see. Would you like some tea? How many of you are there? I can only hear one person breathing, but I assume there are more of you. Outside, perhaps. Funny, I don't think you're a bear at all. At any rate, tea?" Ioan rambled, some of his words barely audible, all of it slurred.

Alias: milksteak

Cillian has been blessed as a...

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