Nate Faulker

Motion-Regal

A character for Evil_Friends

Nate Faulker was a typical young man, a bit bookish perhaps, and a history major at a decent state university. While facing graduation and the question of what to do next, he found out his younger brother was joining the Army. There's a list of reasons why he decided to do the same, ranging from a healthy dose of sibling rivalry, a desire to get out of a rut, a genuine desire to serve others, and the looming of specter of student loans.

Look, that history degree wasn't going to pay for itself anytime soon.

It turned out he liked it, the adventure and the comradery and the sense of being part of something greater. He liked being good at what he did, and being praised for it. He liked the little looks and whispered words and stolen moments when no one else was looking. He hadn't internalized what the cost could be until it was too late. Having spent a year and a day wandering the country trying to find himself again, he's taken up a new cause, answering the call of The Lonely Serpent.

Skills

Skill: Infantry Officer 3
Skill: Historian 2
Skill: Paperwork 2
Passion: Travel 1

Attributes

Aspect 0 (5 AMP)
Domain 5 (5 DMP)
Persona 0 (5 PMP)
Treasure 3 (5 TMP)

Gifts

Fast as Lightning
(Aspect 5: Kung-Fu, Automatic, Self-Only, One Trick, Uncommon)
Nate always had a reputation for being quick on his feet. Bolstered by his divine power, he's practically untouchable, able to dodge around danger like he's the hero of a wuxia movie. Maybe later he'll figure out how to punch people too.

Bonds & Afflictions

Bond: These boots were made for walking. (1) Anchor: Hiking Boots.
Bond: My aim is true and sure. (3) - Anchor: A selection of firearms.
Bond: I've got a book on that here somewhere… (2) - Anchor: A Library of Many Things.
Bond: My faithful hound is a true friend and a Good Boy. (1) - Anchor: Rex
Bond: My Leatherman has all the tools. All of them. (1) Anchor: a multi-tool.
Bond: If violence isn't your last resort, you're not using enough. (2)

Affliction: People think I look younger than I am. (1)
Affliction: I'm always neat and clean. (1)
Affliction: I have an air of authority and respectability. (2)

Free Bond Points: 2

Anchors

Hiking Boots (Wondrous)
- One of his first anchors.
- Let you safely walk anywhere, even places like the ceiling, lava fields, or bottom of the ocean.

A Library of Many Things (Wondrous)
- Started out as a personal book and DVD collection.
- Now vastly larger.
- If it's been published and moved from the author's possession out into the world, there's probably a copy in there.
- Maybe doesn't have unique items, unless pushed to miraculous?
- There are librarians but he mostly does his own lookup.

The Ultimate Multi-Tool (Wondrous)
- A handy Leatherman
- If you think 21 tools is a lot, you should see this thing.
- Seriously, these things are crazy transformer machines even without magic.

A Selection of Firearms (Mundane, at the moment)
- The sidearm and rifle he carried in his last war, plus more
- Good for putting holes in things at a distance
- He's looking into making specialized ammo, like silver bullets and incendiaries
- Possibly redundant for the Power of Motion, but they have sentimental value

Captain Rex, a Very Good Boy (Wondrous)
- A retired military working dog who went on a road trip with him.
- He sniffs!
- He bites!
- He cuddles!

Motion...

... has speed and direction. (2)
... changes your position and view. (2)
... is relative to other things. (2)
... remains constant unless acted upon. (1)

Lifepath

II Vervain - Key of Something Powerful

Motion is really important to existence! It can't be anything but powerful and outgoing, and a huge duty beside that. It reflects one part of Nate's mortal life. As an army officer, he was also in a position of both power and duty, set apart from most of those around him.

IV Clematis - The Key of Something Give Gifts

He knows he's been given a gift here. It's a chance to see an entire new side of reality, something to observe and record and theorize about. But there's this doubt there: he's done that before, left his comfortable surrounds to seek out adventure. He may have been better off staying home..

More Than Anything Else, You Are… Epic, Inhuman, and Powerful.

Being the Noble of Motion is extraordinary. It's exciting. It opens up a broad horizon of possibilities, unchecked by all but a few peers. He's not entirely comfortable with this. Power comes at a cost to someone, and if he's not paying it, who is?

Motion is From... the Beautiful Side of the World

Motion isn't specific to humans. It's also not painful, at least not inherently. It can be as a side effect, pulling people apart (literally or figuratively) or resulting in all manner of physical mayhem. But Motion by itself tends to be beautiful, whether it's the rotation of the sky, the swirl of falling snowflakes, or the intricacies of an assembly line. At a personal level it lets him see new places, people, and things.

Motion is... Something You Can Describe

Motion is not something you can point at, but it absolutely can be described. Indeed, description is in many ways what motion is, because it is a quality that things have - how fast, what direction, is it repeating, and compared to what? Motion is relative to other things, at least in the Prosaic World, and even in the Mythic with its fixed frames of reference it can be relative to that too. It's also a universal experience, which is something that fascinates Nate. Every physical object has moved at some point in its existence, and many immaterial things as well.

I Lived a.. Troubled Life

Nate had a comfortable enough life until he joined the army, as much to test himself as any other reason, even if he talked a good game about brotherly love and national service. It actually went pretty well. It wasn't easy, by any means, but he got to see the world, experience adventure and be part of something greater than himself, fall in love. He got a little too full of himself, a little too confident, and it all crashed down. As the old proverb says, pride goes before a fall.

It Inspired Me

He finished his term and left the army, and spent some time travelling the country on a bike. He could have sat down and returned to the safety of academia, but he wanted to keep moving. It was during this time his commencement happened. He's decided that he won't waste this second chance.

Contact: Legacy

Once upon a time, Nate was a captain of men, trusted and admired and skilled in the arts of lore and war. He forged lifelong bonds with those around him. He had a career ahead, planned and mapped out in detail. Then he made some mistake, subtle like the start of an avalanche and just as devastating in result, that left people he cared about dead or wounded. Fairly or unfairly, he blames himself for failing those who trusted him. He owes it to them to make this second chance count, and look out for those left behind.

Contact: Followers

There are still people who look up to him, who say they would follow him into hell and might even still mean it if told Hell is a place. More have turned up since he became a power. He doesn't understand it. What do they see in him?

Affiliation: The Song of Heaven

He's not a fan of Heaven's decision to lock up the gates and exclude everyone else. There's nothing beautiful or just about it. But the mission of going out to make the world a better place, that he can get behind.

Miracle Charts

Domain Miracles:
0: Know when Motion is in danger.
1: Cause some tiny motion, or stop something that's already barely moving.
2: Speak with the Motion of a particular object. Know where it's been and where it's going, and for how long.
3: Make it harder to change something's motion.
4: Cause Motion to occur, or change existing Motion, on a local scale. Change the trajectory of a baseball or a bullet, speed up a train, turn a wheel.
5: Stop a car. Stop someone's blood. Time stop. This can hit the breaks entirely, potentially instantly.
5: Speak with Motion on a grand scale to interrogate the movement of cargo through a country or memes through the internet.
6: Change how something moves, like moving a bunny's hop to a bike, or a wheel's rotation to a building. Change the natural endpoint of a motion. Make someone a ramblin' man, or doom him to always get stopped by red lights.
6: Preserve the motion of things on a grand scale, ie make an engine or dam turbine into a perpetual motion machine.
7: Alter continental drift. Change the speed and direction of a hurricane. Spin the Earth backwards really fast, possibly reversing time in the process.
8: Hold it right there, Sun! You won't escape over the horizon this time! (This is a bad idea for many reasons, not least of which is that people are always trying to shoot down the sun or otherwise harass it.)
9: Adjust the direction a city moves in time. Make a nation motionless between dusk and dawn. Transcend usual definitions of Motion.

Persona Miracles:
0: Use the Sight. See when something is connected to Motion.
1: Make something slightly more constant, or slightly more relative.
2: Incarnate as a particular Motion.
3: Carry things more easily. Maintain a constant course and speed.
4: Make it harder to something to change itself without outside action. Make a moral relative. Give a speech the ability to move someone's position.
5: Strip away something's constancy. Take away direction or speed from a person or an activity. Make something no longer relative, although not necessarily absolute.
5: Incarnate as Motion on global scale.
6: Change how someone relates to Motion, so that Motion will never harm them, or they are a guardian of moving things.
6: Emulate motion with a truly massive Affliction
7: Greater enchantments.
8: Greater Sacrifices
9: (Out of reach)

Domain Miracle Thoughts

Motion, despite being something that happens physically (mostly), is not something with its own substance. It's a property other things have, or a description of how they're acting. This can make a little odd compared to object-oriented estates. It can affect a lot of things, but in a fairly narrow and specific way that doesn't inherently change their substance otherwise. I can't burn something directly, but I can Create Motion so it's now rolling into a fire. (Well, heat's motion from a prosaic standpoint.)

A Conversation or Divination with Motion is lets you investigate the motion of particular thing, but only about its motion. You can determine things like current velocity, whether it's sped up or slowed down, maybe even where it's been recently. This isn't necessarily single objects, but it could be the motion of pop bottles through a factory line, blood through veins, traffic through an intersection, or a wheel spinning. A Greater Divination applies to vast systems, like rivers, ocean currents, the weather, electrical grids, etc.

Preservation of Motion is basically super momentum, making it harder to change. A wheel will keep spinning despite friction or a car will keep going despite brakes. (And possibly despite a wall.) Greater Preservations can keep that going indefinitely - a turbine might keep spinning long after its fuel is gone, making a perpetual motion machine - or do it on a vastly larger scale.

A Creation of Motion is fairly straightforward - it takes something where there's no motion and gets it going, or adding more motion to something to increase the speed. Animation is more about changing Motion, so that it's got a different direction or path that it follows. This could extend to slowing things, but not stopping them. At this level it still needs to be 'natural' movement to an extent. You can make a pig fly, but once the miracle stops it's going to resume a natural trajectory and the logical end thereof. Don't make pigs fly without bringing them to a graceful stop first. Greater Creations and Animations apply this on a huge scale. You can't make a proper, dharmic sharknado, but you can make the air and water spin really fast and hurl sealife around with it.

Destructions can be slowing down, but are also full stops. It can be sudden and instantaneous. This wouldn't necessarily come with the side-effects such a halt would cause if done mundanely, though. The motion just stops without the physical processed done to this. A Greater Destruction will pin celestial bodies to the sky, halt a hurricane, and so forth.

A Motion of Motion lets you more gracefully alter how things move when they're not being actively miracled at. This is where you can help porcine aviation, or change how people interact with motion. You might turn a photograph or painting into a moving picture. Greater Motions lets you do really crazy stuff like change how entire nations move. Maybe you can never make a left turn and have to make three rights instead, or a river flows from the ocean up to its sources.

One question that may come up is immaterial things. Prosaic reality claims heat and sound are movement of particles, but this may not apply outside of Earth. Ideas or memes 'move' through the Internet, or are conveyed from person to person by conversation. This is probably something to experiment with as he explores the extent of Motion and his powers.