Personality

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Vines is talked about as rash, energetic, reactive, receptive, hard-headed and a bit cold-blooded.

He can get very fixated on the smallest of things such as a random rock he found cool on the ground, or a big stick that looks like a sword. He still keeps his childish wonder from his younger years, though it doesn't resurface all that often and he does so when fully alone, regressing to this sort of child-like mentality in a desperate attempt from his own brain to try and redeem his childhood which wasn't the best, as he longs for a childhood with a normal life where nothing bad happened to him, reaching for a utopian view of his past.

He is observant and receptive to other people's actions, behaviour, body language and speech patterns. He has a bit of a silver tongue at times while trying to be persuasive to others, finding himself attempting to copy other people's mannerisms in a way to seem more approachable and more convincing. Though, he has to force himself to do so and finds himself agreeing to the stupidest of things or talking to people he really doesn't care about and is only here to pick some info out of them or get along with them for profit.

He is quite stubborn when it comes to trying to be reasoned with or trying to be given apologies. His mind is usually focused on a certain idea of one person based on their first few interactions and it refused to move from that perception of them. It also causes him to remember things people have done wrong to him very well and he keeps grudges for an absurdly long time. It takes him a lot of effort to forgive someone, due to trust issues.

He tends to be very dismissive about issues and tries to deny a lot of things about his past and even his current job, which he often finds himself feeling guilty about. People have remarked to him that he's following his own father's footsteps, whom he despises and it usually has a great effect on him when brought up, so he avoids the topic entirely. He hates reflecting upon himself for those reasons.

He's grown thicker skin over the time and can stand working under pressure, not for a very long time but he tries to take the damage in.

When he's done something wrong, he'll start heavily isolating himself and shutting himself off in front of people, almost showing no emotion and taking all of the remarks towards himself in. That causes problems with his anger management and in general social skills, as it causes him to be explosive, harsh and rude to other people after that due to bottling his thoughts up and not being able to handle them in anymore. Though, when he gets into internal conflict with other people, he tries not to shut himself down and tries for once in his life to reflect on what he might've done wrong. Though, it is difficult for him to apologize.

He tries to justify his choice of work due to the fact it was to financially support his loved one, and he finds himself repeating that multiple times a day just to not feel guilty about anything. But, it doesn't really help him take anything off his conscience. In fact, it makes him feel worse.

History

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Entering such a dangerous business (assassin and blood work) at such a young age has led him through complications, not only moral but also personal. A lot of the people he knows are also related in some way to other military organizations, which can cause some tension between him and his acquaintances. Most notably his boyfriend, Noah, his best friend, Flynn, and a friend of his, Hans.

His involvement in combat dates a while back when he was still a young boy, being brought out on criminal battlefields for fun by his father, Jürgen. His father had no real intention behind it other than maybe getting rid of likely built-up frustration from his own chronic pain he's been experiencing in his eye after a bullet lodged itself in there, and possibly even simply generational trauma.

He's changed drastically towards everybody as soon as he got into his current workplace, going from a usually stubborn and harsh guy trying to get better and not follow his father's bloodthirsty steps, to doing so out of his own will, trying to financially support his boyfriend. Which is one of the reasons why he hates reflecting upon himself. He needs to live with the guilty conscience of all the people he's killed, which is very tough for him to handle after seeing it happen to other people under his father's hands for years. He is often very dismissive about this part of his life, and hates thinking back to anything relating to his dad, as it reminds him of his own work.

He often finds himself thinking back to the countless people he's harmed and killed, purely due to his work when he's alone with his own thoughts.

Childhood

Vines was born in France on May 12th. He comes from a more than broken family, being raised by his adoptive dad, Jürgen, and was a mostly rowdy kid, being known as a troublemaker by other people. He never really got a good education and it's known that he doesn't know how to cook.

Adulthood

Still living in his father's home until the year he turned 21, he's witnessed the desperate attempts made by his father to medicate himself to a better person, still suffering from different forms of abuse through his stay. These attempts were always rather short-lived, making him feel a distrust towards his father, feeling as though he was only keeping a facade on. He left the house somewhere in december before holidays and stayed his boyfriend's home, Noah, for a little over two weeks. The two of them started growing closer, and basically entering an actual relationship from there on.

Jürgen, who was in the middle of a relationship with his own boyfriend at the time, figured Vines was avoiding coming home and helped him pack boxes to leave off for Noah's house and move there. He felt a mix of emotions at the realization, as he wasn't feeling exactly ready to let go of the past yet, but did think about his lack of presence at home which would be understandable for Jürgen to think that way. He didn't try to object, rather accepting his brain's subconscious attempts at getting away finally working.

He stayed with Noah, the two of them leading a rather normal life until Noah's brother, Michael, disappeared for a reason that is still unknown to them. Noah, desperately trying to find tracks of his brother, is in a sort of voluntary unpaid part-time job position with the BloodHound Unit in Occator, as that used to be where Michael worked. Vines later met Estelle, a saboteur which worked for an underground organization called "The Obsidian Network", when he was simply hanging out at night. The two of them bonded quite easily, Vines expressing his anxiety and worries for his boyfriend. Estelle offered him a position at her work place, which Vines came to reluctantly accept for the money to support Noah.

In Storyline

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January 17th, 2024

Estelle and Vines meet for the first time at a Café down a street in Northern England. He's tired and slips out his problems and everything on his mind about the disappearance of Noah's brother, financial problems, his father etc. As a result, Estelle invites him to consider joining the Obsidian Network as she sees a lot of fighting and smart potential within him. She says that she'll be giving him time to think it over. Estelle buys Vines another coffee and the two part on a good note, though Vines feels conflicted.

January 19th, 2024

Estelle reaches out to Vines over the phone and wants to hear his input on joining the Obsidian Network 2 days later. He says he could go on missions but wouldn't join them.

March 12th, 2024

Vines' first "major" solo mission as an operative: infiltrated a Global Unity Alliance base and inputting spyware into their local servers to gather information and data about them.

April 28th, 2024

Vines officially joins the Obsidian Network under the initial codename "Poison Ivy", soon shortened by people to just "Ivy". This codename is mostly due to his earthly abilities, but also has some funny origins.

January 22nd, 2025

Estelle and Vines go on a big sabotage mission at a Czech Chaos Insurgency base, in which they cut off communication and power lines and were also secretly able to steal a laptop of theirs. Estelle passes off this mission as a "test run" after being questioned about why specifically this base, since it wasn't a big concern. She gets released after the interrogation.

July 10th-11th, 2025

After the disappearance of Daniel being taken into a state of force recruiting by the Chaos Insurgency, Vines makes multiple attempts at sabotage of their bases in the following days. He plans out an infiltration plan with Estelle, but it doesn't go too well—though, the Obsidian Network collects information about the Chaos Insurgency: freeing 5 forced recruits, terminating 8 active personel, getting training info and phone numbers as well as frequencies and radio decryption keys.

On July 11th, Vines tracks down Daniel and Radko's position as they were out fishing thanks to coordinates, takes Radko out temporarily and brings Daniel with him.

August 2nd, 2025

Vines works in close affiliation to the BloodHound Unit during the month of July, and proposes himself for a distraction mission on the Free Nations Confederation as a cover-up for the planned assassination of one of their financial backers by specialised marksman, Andrea.

August 4th, 2025

Vines is hired to assassinate ex-BloodHound Unit member Jacob Daley following leaks of BloodHound Unit information and plans to the Global Unity Alliance. The mission is a success.

Relationships

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Noah

Noah and Vines started out as rivals on opposite teams of, essentially, a neighborhood gang war. Vines had been pulled into the fields by his father in the past and still went there for a bit of adrenaline, a little kick to continue his days, and keep talking to the people he knew on his team as he didn't have much else. They met eachother in a common ambush on one-another, both of them mutually stepping away slightly scathed. They kept crossing eachother and seeing eachother, throwing remarks at the other's way, with the occasional fighting.

Once, Vines had gotten into a fight where he'd been rather majorly injured, Noah instinctively stepping in and dragging him out of it. He didn't exactly know why he did so, his reasoning being that he wanted to be the only one fighting in that way with Vines as to feel somewhat unique. He briefly tended to him before escaping the place, leaving Vines in confusion. He shrugged it off, not thinking much.
Vines went on to tease and taunt Noah about the interaction countless times, in an attempt to maybe get some clarification, which he never got.

Vines and Noah continued acting a bit friendly with eachother after that interaction. Vines hung out at Noah's place for a few days at a time, both of them having fun with eachother's presence, playing a bit together, and they started acting a bit more flirtatious towards one another. Though they didn't have all that many similar interests aside from video games, Vines enjoyed listening to Noah rambling on about marine biology, and Noah liked listening to Vines talking about his True Crime documentaries.
Once Vines had officially moved in, they considered themselves to be in an official relationship, sometimes jokingly referring to eachother as "married", even having matching rings (though they're not wedding rings).

Though, with Vines's recent choice of work, Noah has felt a bit more guilty and tense around Vines, as he believes he's essentially the reason Vines is working as an assassin; to support him in the search of his brother, Michael. That weighs on his mind sometimes. They still do see eachother often, and still live together.

Estelle

Estelle first found Vines while he was hanging out in the winter night in January, while Vines was having a little smoke break somewhere near a bar. She felt a bit sympathetic and could feel he wasn't doing well, it was visible on his face. Offering him a job at the place she worked at, she wanted to give him a chance at resolving some of the problems on his mind. He kind of reluctantly accepted, wanting to help his boyfriend but he wasn't too interested in the whole bloodwork aspect of it.

The two get along quite nicely, going on missions frequently together, even requesting to be part of the same teams when on common objectives. They see eachother regularily, though Estelle is a bit frustrated by Vines's guilty conscience, trying to persuade him into continuing work as is. Vines's thoughts of being like his father still weigh on him a considerable amount.

They both have common enemies even among their workplace, and like talking about anything and nothing. Estelle prefers talking about things like different tactics she found that she could put to work and weaponry, which Vines doesn't mind but he prefers discussing other things like gemstones, sometimes video games, true crime stories he found through documentaries and videos, sociology and things of the sort. His work has shaped his interests into something different, meanwhile Estelle's always had a passion for the things she currently likes.

Pérez

With Pérez being a 2nd Lieutenant in the BloodHound Unit who's also working closely with Noah in the search for Michael, the two have met in the past both as occasional reluctant friends and more-often enemies. Vines committed acts of sabotage towards the BloodHound Unit base in Bosnia where Pérez works at, which is where Pérez's "hatred" towards Vines come from. But, Pérez also has some form of interest towards Vines's motives, he also finds some sort of rebellious charm within Vines's personality.

Michael

Despite Michael and Vines never knowing each other, Vines has heard a lot about Michael from Noah and are still tied to each other through mutual familial connection, since Vines is Noah's boyfriend and Michael is Noah's brother. The two will eventually be destined to meet once this whole case would be solved.

Idiosyncrasies

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Habits

• He bites his fingernails frequently
• He has a hard time keeping eye contact when talking to people he either: cares about deeply/doesn't want to disappoint, or when talking to strangers
• He cracks his fingers frequently
• He heats his food up for too long and tends to burn his fingers when trying to take it out too fast

Pet peeves

• Slow walkers in busy streets
• The sound of forks scraping against teeth or plates
• Historical inaccuracies in books, TV shows and movies
• Unsolicited advice
• Not being able to use self-checkout
• Being told "you look tired" whether or not he's tired

Quirks

• Is usually seen in his uniforms and not in casual clothes
• Likes keeping his room as a mess. Likes decorating his walls with posters
• Always carrying random ass papers with numbers scribbled on them. He even forgets about why he has them
• When he's running, he tends to put an arm across his chest to make sure his coat doesn't open, or he holds his chest at his heart's level.

Speech

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He has a more deep but young voice which he retained since 16.

Laughter - Sometimes he laughs more dryly, for example when he's being sarcastic with someone he dislikes, but oftentimes his laughter is genuine. He really laughs from his chest, usually just sounds like hahaha and whatnot.
Swearing - He swears a lot, but he tries to make an effort to avoid doing so in front of children or younger people. The exception being teenagers, because he knows they've heard worse. He also uses a more crude/honest language. He abbreviates a lot when texting.
Languages - Vines speaks primarily English with the slightest bit of a Scottish accent. He also knows French due to his ethnicity, since he was taught by his parents until he was four and they spoke both French and English.

Traits

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Positive	Neutral	Negative
Energetic Independent Determined Observant Receptive Descriptive Reactive	Overconfident Cold-blooded Dismissive Chaotic Persuasive	Stubborn Hard-headed Hypocritical Emotionally rash Distant, closed off Violent Compulsive liar Avoidant

Weaponry

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Vines's weapon of choice is his trusty revolver; an authentic Smith & Wesson Model 3 which dates back to 1915, shortly before it's manufacturing was discontinued. He tends to like using older weapons for their style, and he feels as though he manages them better than modern rifles or guns in general. He often uses daggers for anything related to his job. He sometimes likes using the Spencer repeating rifle, a rifle dating back from 19th century America, with it's last manufacturing year being 1869. He finds an odd charm in older weapons, though they're not the most useful to use in modern day society.

For his most efficient picks, he likes taking his Winchester Model 94 lever-action repeating rifle, and as for revolvers (though he doesn't like switching out his revolver for another one), he uses a Ruger GP100 22LR 5.5″.

Abilities

As comes with the fact he's been experimented on when younger (and he later decided to take an attempt at an injection granting him minor shapeshifting powers), he's got more than just guns up his sleeve. Also not to mention his analytic skills already give him good abilities on that.

He is able to grow vegetation from soil and control it for brief instants, most of the things he grows being thick jungle-like vines, some of them having spikes on them for a better hold and more damage caused. He also likes growing out poison ivy when in forests and in combat.

Though he himself doesn't figure as very strong, he is swift and can get out of situations rather easily. He's sneaky, as that's basically what his whole job is about.

He's a shapeshifter though that's not very commonly depicted, which helps him much more with his job of being an assassin or saboteur. He also sometimes goes on some undercover missions to snoop in and get info. His shapeshifting ability grants him a better chance at hiding amongst people and escaping his chases easily, though there's some errors in the people he copies which gives away his use of shapeshifting. This ability of his isn't entirely explainable, though one thing that is known is that it could be related to contact with blood in a way. A hypothesis being that his body is capable of absorbing other's DNA for an extended period of time, effectively being able to shift into them whenever desired.

Thanks to his job, he knows a thing or two about cable technology. Not that it'd be too useful for him, but still. He's also quite good at psychological manipulation as a method of persuasion.

He has a more auditory memory, and keeps stuff in mind when he's told about them. He works best with actual examples or things that interest him in any way.

Tactics and proficiency

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Melee combat

He uses a dagger in close combat, or otherwise uses knives. He prefers bladed weapons over blunt ones, as he's more swift with them. In combat, he's more about precision than going in head-first.

Ranged combat

Vines's weapon of choice is his trusty revolver; an authentic Smith & Wesson Model 3 which dates back to 1915, shortly before it's manufacturing was discontinued. He tends to like using older weapons for their style, and he feels as though he manages them better than modern rifles or guns in general. He otherwise uses the Spencer repeating rifle from 19th century America.

Tactics

He's good at predicting and reading his opponent, often trying to get them off-guard by doing something unexpected like when someone is running towards him, just standing still for a while and stepping aside last second, or pulling out his revolver while they're running. He doesn't overcomplicate himself with it. He can be very stealthy, considering the nature of his job. His only sensitive point is his wings and tail, which he just retracts in during fighting.

Support

Although he's not made for it, Vines is able to support or take a backing role during fights. He just has a hard time refraining himself from partaking in more intense fighting, out of worry for his colleagues. He's not really morally supportive but he tries to cheer people on to keep pushing. He does not have healing abilities.

Criminal record

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Murder - Assassination, Homicide, Human sacrifice, Euthanasia/Mercy killing, Contract killing, Targeted killing
Possession of illegally-classed weapons, Impersonation, Arson, War crime (Breaking the Geneva Convention by the targeted killing of an on-duty medical personnel)

Appearance

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Vines is a rather masculine-looking adult with white skin and blue-greenish eyes. He has spiky, though fluffy, shoulder-length clover green hair which fades to jewel green as it goes lower, and at the swoop over one of his eyes. He has two sets of small black horns; one set at the top of his head above his forehead, and another smaller set on the sides of his face along his jaw bones. He also has black demon wings which stretch out from his shoulder plates. He has a demon tail which acts as an extension of his spine.

His main outfit consists of a buttoned-up brown trenchcoat with a black belt going around the waist of it, opened at the lower part with a darker brown open collar above to let his turtleneck show. He wears black pants and a pair of dark brown boots. He wears cyan square goggles and a slightly darker, opaque aquamarine visor from which his horns can be seen popping through. He sometimes wears a little cerulean blue lace on his left horn and a ring of the same color on his left hand's ring finger, those things both given to him by his partner.

In his work uniform, he wears a black trenchcoat with a few silver accents at the edge of the collar and at the bottom of the trenchcoat, which is fully buttoned up from top to bottom, the only thing open being the collar, showing his turtleneck. He wears a black belt with a dark-grey buckle. He wears slightly lighter pants and black boots. He still wears his cyan goggles and aquamarine visor. Though, he does not wear the blue lace and ring. He has a knife strapped to his left shoulder and a rifle slinged on his back. He tends to wear black fingerless leather gloves.

In more casual outfits, he'd likely be seen with a black unzipped jacket with some sort of design on the back and rolled up sleeves above his elbows, some sort of rock or punk band t-shirt underneath, beige cargo pants and black doc marten boots. He'd also likely still keep on the visor and goggles, being too used to them to take it off at times, and he just feels odd without them. He usually wears the ring, and occasionally the lace on his horn. He wears brown fingerless leather gloves and spiked bracelets on both his wrists.

Trivia

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• He was supposed to be a PHIGHTING! fandom sona, but he started becoming his own character! He used to be inspired by the Phighter Rocket (as seen by the presence of his goggles, second set of horns, and he had prosthetics on his design).
• He has a playlist about songs that represent him which currently has 159 songs. (And counting!) You can listen to it here.
• He is best represented by the songs Brutus by The Buttress, fantastic bastards by Death Spells, Beachboy by McCafferty, We All Fall Down by STOMACH BOOK, Michelle by Sir Chloe, Lotta True Crime by Penelope Scott, Dreamcatcher by McCafferty, Bust Your Knee Caps by Pomplamoose, Over & Over by Rio Romeo Want You Gone by Aperture Science Psychoacoustic Laboratories, Animals by STOMACH BOOK, Reneducation by Okilly Dokilly, and Psycho Killer by Talking Heads.
• If you dare lay a hand on his revolver, he will get back to you and snap your neck.
• He is incredibly secretive about his work and barely tells anybody what he does.
• He's able to grow some forms of vegetation on the ground if it's soil, like thick jungle-like vines and poison ivy in forest environments. Though, they're rather easy to cut through if you're not completely caught in them.
• He has very good aim with rifles and his revolvers.
• While researching for his weaponry, I picked Vines's revolver choice based on Dutch's revolver from Red Dead Redemption 2.
• He very likely listened to Mindless Self Indulgence back when he was a teenager.
• He used to play video games when he had the time. Can't say the same now.

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