________________________________________ Sir Tyler Morris
Male | 25 | Estora
Former Templar of Time _______________________________________________"He has a lot of nerve looking so smug after such a colossal failure. The Commander should have him discharged- or worse."________________________________________ | "Theo prayed for peace and it killed him. Rest assured, heretic dog, I will not make the same mistake."
Minor Holy Sigil Location
On his back, between his shoulder blades.
Appearance
Standing at a modest 5'10", Tyler cuts a lean, athletic figure as expected of a knight. His choice in clothing is very urban and modern, the look of a man who knows he stands in the midst of the magitechnical revolution and wouldn't dare to be behind the times. He's also notoriously unfond of formal wear, to the point where any event that requires him to be in uniform is expected to include at least one dressing down by Commander Fyodor about his outfit not being up to standards.
Personality
On the surface, Tyler is far from the chivalric ideal. He carries himself with a blasé, devil-may-care attitude that speaks to either arrogance or laziness. He's competent when he deigns to act - as any Templar should be, though ideally this should be all the time - but his conduct leaves a bit to be desired and his outward displays of piety are lacking. He revels fully in the celebrity status he has, even if it's only leeched off the Scion he used to serve, and has been rumored to engage in vices completely unbecoming of a man of the Church. Still, he holds a tension in his frame that wasn't there before his infamous failure, and every set of eyes on his new charge has him coiled tight like a cobra ready to strike.
Truthfully, he holds a deep-seated anger - at Kaudus, at the world, at himself. He blames himself for his previous Scion's death, believes that, had he not been so lax, he could've prevented his disappearance despite the circumstances of it being completely out of his hands. The only reason he hasn't relinquished his knighthood in shame is the thought that the killers might still be out there, laughing at his failure. To that end, he's grown reckless, and now moves with something of a deathwish, believing that he will atone for his dishonor with either his own life or that of his Scion's killers.
The only thing he will abide less than allowing an enemy to live is allowing another Scion to come to harm, and he takes his charge deathly serious after graciously being allowed a second chance, even if he may not show it. Likewise, the casual irreverence Tyler shows to others does not extend to Scions, whether his own charge or others, seeing them as precious gifts from the Mother that need be cherished and protected, not babysat as has become the norm for Templars of this age.
Biography
Tyler's story did not begin glamorously. He had no storied pedigree, no family fortune to inherit; his father was an adulterous drunk and his mother suffered his neglect for the sake of her family. He was a troubled youth, one that misbehaved and got into fights, petulantly lashing out against a world he believed had wronged him by the circumstances of his birth. His salvation was found in the form of a kindly minister in his community who suggested he seek a new life in the Church if his current one was so intolerable. Tyler took him up on it.
But he was still young, and could not grasp what it meant to serve the Mother. He wanted to be cool, to be strong, to be a knight. So, Tyler was assigned as a page to a middling clergyman in Veradis. The work was tedious and boring, but the environment was certainly an improvement and, more importantly, he got to train with the squires sometimes. It was a relief when he reached squirehood himself and could cast aside such busywork to devote himself fully to more physical pursuits, though with his assignment to a true knight - an Estoran man by the name of Sir Robert Farrington - came more chores, to his chagrin. Sir Robert was a grueling taskmaster, one that shaped Tyler into a capable combatant but ensured there was no love lost between them, at least from Tyler's perspective.
In a way, Tyler felt cheated. Knighthood wasn't the chivalric ideal he'd imagined as a boy; he got to gallivant around the Estoran countryside at last, but it was dirty and terrifying, and he had to stand at a safe distance with a rifle in his hands and hope Sir Robert handled whatever beasts they'd been tasked to slay before something else leapt out of the woods to eat him. Sword drills consisted of him being smacked around until his bruises had bruises, never being allowed to feel success. Even the pitiful stipend he was allowed as a squire was denied to him, as he sent it home to his mother out of whatever lingering sense of filial obligation he possessed. It was the powerlessness of back home with all the danger of the frontier. Sir Robert, doubtlessly better at training soldiers than raising children, simply had the boy channel this frustration into his training.
By the time Tyler was knighted, he had been honed into a weapon as bitter as it was effective. Yet whenever he was pitted against other knights in friendly bouts, he could only begrudgingly give credit where it was due; Sir Robert had given him what he asked for. He was the powerful knight of his dreams at last. It made him cocky. When he was nominated for the position of Templar, it only made his head bigger. Duty and piety had no hold on him, Tyler wished only to relish in his success. He felt he deserved to relax and enjoy the luxuries of his new life at last after such an arduous path, and the task of babysitting a powerful figure would surely let him do just that. After all, what danger could befall a Scion?
When he was introduced to his new charge, however, he was captivated. The new Scion of Time, a relative of Estoran royalty by the name of Theodore Dainn Estora, was a charming young man with a natural magnetism that lent itself well to his position. They were introduced, went through all the pomp and ceremony, and then he reached down and touched the kneeling Tyler's back, as if willing an angel's wings to sprout then and there. In a way, they did; he took flight on the wings of time, elevating him to that ephemeral space beyond man but below the divine that Theodore occupied. He truly felt the call of the Mother there for the first time, he thinks.
The Scion was not the disciplinarian Tyler had grown accustomed to serving; he asked for little, and interested himself not in acts of war but in peaceful overtures that might prevent them. Had they not been peers, Theodore might've been the role model Tyler had sorely lacked in his life. He was good company, clearly meant for great things yet willing to let Tyler play at the fame and wealth he'd ever dreamed of as Theo pulled him into the whirl of his existence on a path to change the world for the better. Theo was a blinding star, and Tyler was content merely to be caught in his orbit; he would've followed him to the ends of the earth with only mild complaining.
Without him even realizing, it had made him dangerously complacent. Their shared story ended on an innocent trip; Theodore had wished to visit the previous Scion of Time's Templar, since retired, and dragged Tyler along on a trip through dreary Doumerc. Careless as he was, he entertained Theo's foolish idea to go on ahead, and despite assurances that Theo would most certainly be back in a half hour, the proposed time rolled around without a Scion in sight. Naturally, Tyler set out in search of him and, upon finding Theo's transport abandoned, called for a full contingent of knights to investigate. They never did find Theodore.
They assured Tyler that it wasn't his fault. That hurt far worse than any reprimand he'd ever received. He tried to bury his guilt by throwing himself into the search for their missing Scion, in cries for blood, in earnest pleas to unleash him upon the enemies of the Goddess like the sword of Time that he was. Given their proximity to the border, Tyler thought it obvious who the culprits were; Theo had wanted nothing but peace with Kaudus, yet those godless savages dared to spit in his face for it.
His grief came to a head months later, in the instant he felt his blessing fade. His friend and charge was no longer missing. He was dead. The only thing that stopped Tyler from marching across the border and cutting a swathe through every Kaudian he could find was the group of Church knights who stopped him and reminded him - violently - that he no longer held the borrowed power of the Goddess, and he'd be cutting no swaths through anything before dying a pointless death.
To make matters worse, he was never punished for it. People talked, of course, but the Commander saw his devotion to his Scion after Theo's disappearance as proof of his honor and not the guilty flailings of a failure. It was early in his career, and he was informed that he was to remain a Templar for a new Scion, in the event such a tragedy was attempted again. It was a kinder act of penance than he deserved, but it was his nonetheless.
Weapon of Choice
Though Tyler is a competent marksman, the speed previously afforded to him by his Scion's blessing led to him favoring a Rodion mana saber in most engagements. Since Theo's presumed death and loss of his magic, Tyler has reverted to toting a semi-automatic carbine, regardless of how appropriate it might be for the situation, and a concealed handgun as a backup.
Misc.
- Prior to Theodore's disappearance, Tyler was very active on social media and was one of the public's most consistent sources of information on the Scion along with unflattering pictures of the both of them. He also notoriously responds to any hate comment with some variation of "send location, i'll pull up".
- Historically, he's never been one for scripture beyond going through the motions as a knight is expected to, though he's recently taken more of an interest in the word of the Mother, particularly those passages dealing with forgiveness and death.
- He still sends money back to his family, though he keeps his contact otherwise minimal.
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