EVERYONE BLED THE SAME. Thatâs why it didnât make a damn bit of difference who wound up on her doorstep, both sides came out red in the end. It didnât change anything though, not her opinions, which had plenty experience with the devils in both doorways. Currently, it was her doorway, or more specifically front porch, that was occupied by someone. It didnât matter the hour, day and night she made herself available to fix everyone elseâs problems with avoiding her own. So, the door pulled open, smaller stature barely managing to fill her side of the frame as she shifted weight from one side to the other. âSocial call, or should I start by asking how bad is it?âÂ
This was a really, really bad day. It started shitty, went crazy and ended up fucked. If there was ever any evidence today was meant to be spent in his bed, this was pretty much it. Bloody nose, cut up lips, a serious case of I-canât-stand-straight-because-my-left-side-might-just-abandon-me. It hurt. Breathing, walking, knocking at that door. Rory was inclined to say there was something broken in him. Or some things, actually. âSo, I have a story for you,â he said as a way of greeting, one hand permanently attached to his left ribs as he spat blood to the left of her doorstep. âYou might not have noticed this yet, but I woke up today as a proper fucking ray of sunshine. Real pleasure, all disposition and shit. So despite my very, very bad day, I went to fix some unfinished business because... well, I had to do it at some point, right?â he frowned, the idea he mightâve just let it go sounding quite tempting after the fact. The day of really, really bad choices. âTurns out I was wrong. I shouldâve stayed in bed. Been the fucking ray of misery in the comfort of heavy drugs and self-pity. But as you can see, I ended up here... and itâs not the worst I ever had, you know? It just feels like paper cut in between your fingers times one thousand-- I hate this fucking day,â Rory spilled out all at once, the exasperated breath that followed added more for emphasis than actual oxygen. To be fair, it was hard to breath with those ribs at the moment.
âHey! Hey, you!â Coraline emerged from behind the ruined wall of what was once a house, waving her arms frantically at the passing figure who, unknowingly, was walking right into dangerâs path. âNot a good idea to go that way! At least, not for another-,â she stopped, looking down at the battered watch on her wrist and giving half a shrug, â-two minutes? Give or take? Unless you want to have your socks blown off, in which case, be my guest.â
It started on someone elseâs house in Soteria. A nice bottle of something he shouldnât have. A little line of illegal amusement. Pretty people. Plural. From what he could gather, it had been the perfect night out. The only way it could ever end was with him wandering, alone, senseless, in Salus? It was a bit much, really. Rory could easily realize that. But his head was pounding, the wind was too loud and frankly, he felt like he had been walking in circles. Where the fuck was Soteria? Hide and seek was definitely not his ideal morning after. Nor was the even louder voice promising blown up socks and time stamps. Was he still asleep? âIt wouldnât be a nice day for that, no. I have... stuff to do before going confetti,â he raised both his eyebrows, the slightly too big of a smile lending a touch of crazy to his words as he stopped and looked down. âTwo minutes here it is then. Just donât plan on robbing me senseless in the mean time, please? I have a serious case of shitty hangover at the moment...â between other things.
[ alex høgh andersen, 28, he/him/his ] RORY TIBERIUS OSBORNE showed up right on time for the end of the world. Even now, word is that they are MAGNETIC, but still get OBSESSIVE at the mention of how things used to be. They have been living in SOTERIA for THEIR WHOLE LIFE. If you go looking for them, you can usually find ARSONIST`S LULLABYE by HOZIER playing, or use THE TENDENCY TO SEE LIFE AS A GRAND PERFORMANCE & THE INABILITY TO TUNE DOWN HIS INTENSITY to narrow it down.
NAME: Rory Tiberius Osborne.
NICKNAMES: Ty, Oz.
AGE: Twenty-Eight.
BIRTHDATE: July 23.
BIRTHPLACE: Soteria.
GENDER: Cis-male.
PRONOUNS: He/Him/His.
SEXUALITY: Pansexual.
FACECLAIM: Alex Høgh Andersen.
OCCUPATION: Performer Salesman.
POSITIVE PERSONALITY TRAITS: Creative, resourceful, charming, strategist and magnetic.
NEGATIVE PERSONALITY TRAITS: Violent, obsessive, self-centered, unreliable and self-destructive.
Act I. In another universe, his story wouldâve started on a stage. The reverence of a standing audience, applause causing a shiver to go down his spine, adrenaline making it hard to shake off the remnants of who he had been for the night. An actor. Taking a bow on a famous theatre, drugging himself senseless to find the way back to sanity. The unbecoming of Rory Osborne, he would've called it. The end of his own play unravelling before his eyes. Grand, self-destructive, obsessive, intriguing, violent, magnetic. The words he would've conjured. The proof he wasn't only alive, but had left a permanent mark on that world. A kind of drug, really. To be able to imagine it all so vividly; to want something so much, the unreality of it was barely noticeable.
Act II. Mother used to tell him this would be his death someday. The creation of narratives, their embodiment. This is a dangerous world to people who think outside their boundaries, she had said. But when Rory asked who were they, she had only smiled. Like it was a secret, as if he was never meant to ask, only to know. It exhausted him. This feeling that he was eternally about to grasp onto something important, just to fall short seconds before. After all, in this corner of his own universe, to understand looked like urgency. Specially when Rory learned to perform on a different scale, outside a theatre. And once the applause was only in his mind, he realized his perspective of the world was almost a self-congratulatory trick, offering a sadistic kind of pleasure when he was the only one in the room to realize it was always an act. A complicated, savage, unbound, act. His favorite kind. The one his mother warned him about and he never really understood.
Act III. In every way that mattered, mother was always the brightest, quickest, of the two Osbornes. The woman bred in Salus who decided to make a life for herself in the very heart of Soteria. To whomever asked, Clarissa would say she was a performer. One who could offer a brand new kind of experience. It wasn't only sex. It came with enacted memories, with virtual reality, with the best combination technology, crime and physical desire could offer. To Rory, she was an artist, if there was ever one. And the modest fortune she built was nothing but proof of that. Money, prototypes, contacts, secrets, latest tech, favors; it all came as gifts or payment, promises or threats. She was the queen of everything sordid. The embodiment of a narrative herself. To the point where, one night, her art became too dangerous; her price, too high; her existence, an impossibility. To the point where she never made it home.
Act IV. If there was ever a turning point, a moment where his mind went quiet, it was in the morning after. The strange woman declaring herself Clarissa's safety policy. The delivery of money, secrets, memories, passwords, codes, safe houses, gadgets. At fifteen, Rory was alone for the very first time. At fifteen, there was no standing audience overwhelming him with applause as he performed the screams and the tears and the violence. There was only silence and a decision: he would not leave this world the same way she did. He would not perform quietly, secretly. He would be the king of sordid and chaos. Regardless of the cost. Pointless if this would be the death of him too.
Act V. And so he took on the mantle with a twist. The new Osborne would sell the valuables, not be the product himself. If anything, Clarissa's death taught him there had to be another kind of safety policy. Another perspective. And Rory made sure to turn it into an entirely different experience. A form of art in itself. Contraband, sex, memories, tech, identities, prototypes, secrets, drugs, experiences, services, debts, contracts, knowledge, weapons. If the price was right, so was the sale. They came in private if needed, or they were performed in grand, underground, expositions that changed locations every time, functioned with an invite-only audience, had each a particular theme. Rich and poor, Soteria and Salus, moral and imoral; nothing was beyond his limit. As long as it was loud, unforgettable, one of a kind, Rory was in. As long as his mind didn't go quiet again, he would perform whatever needed. Savagely. If ever.
HEADCANONS:
Rory has a not so secret obsession with the end of the world as it was. Between theories and wild ideas, he has been known to buy relics, conduct unorthodox research and spiral into whatever reading material he can find about it. If asked, he'll say it's a fun hobby to have, the sort of riddle no one can solve, the mystery left forgotten. A challenge, maybe. Eccentricity, if not. But the truth is, no matter how many dismissive laughters follow that statement, he still feels like there's more to learn. How can an entire civilization, a way of life, disappear like that? And how can he not be a victim?
He doesn't appreciate guns. Yes, he sells them. And sure, he knows the basics of handling them. But at the end of the day, Rory still see a gun as a rather impolite way of hurting, threatening or killing anyone. The performer in him always favors the physical side of violence. The grand opening and the grand finale. It has to be worth it. It has to get his hands dirty and blur his limits. Otherwise, it's just pointless.
