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Leave all mail for Rin here.

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Leave all phone calls for Rin here.

Somehow, it's the worst thing that could possibly happen.

If he'd thought differently a few hours ago, Rin doesn't anymore. The fantasy of normalcy had been more appealing than the hard truth of it, and the panic of not knowing.

His feet take him across town to Yukio's apartment, churning the ground beneath them with quick strides. No longer effortless, by the time he gets to the building, he can't even think to take the elevator. His knees feel like jelly. It scares the shit out of him.

He slams himself against the door to Yukio's apartment when he gets there, sliding the key into the hole with desperate hands and clawing at the knob until he can get it open and flood inside.

"Yukio!" He searches the apartment, tearing into it with Kurikara's warm weight a fleeting comfort against his shoulder. Wherever his power's gone, that heart's still in there, beating away. Beating for someone. He knows that his voice is shaky, almost tearful. He hates himself for it, but he cries for his brother again.

"Yukio!"

Rin had been there for Nuriko when she'd woken up. He doesn't regret it, though it had meant that Yukio had gone out on his own, at the end, to try to approach the spirit that had caused all of this. Maybe he should, but ... he really doesn't regret it. In the end, Rin knows that he would probably have been minimally helpful.

And in the end, he knows that Yukio was safe, mostly unhurt. That Koh, the spirit, was forced to release the faces he had stolen.

Rin refuses to leave Nuriko's side, even now that she's gotten back to her apartment. He thinks, after so long with only her own company, maybe she wouldn't want to be left alone. And in any case, he just ... can't imagine stepping away right now.

Even while she settles in and decides to take a shower to get the hospital off of her, Rin puts together a light meal that isn't hospital food (he'd been told by her doctor that her stomach would be touchy after being empty for as long as it had.) By the time he's done, Nuriko still isn't finished, and after a moment of pacing back and forth outside the bathroom trying and failing to think anything over and actually drag together his thoughts, the sound of the soft hiss of the shower water draws him into the bathroom.

Stepping inside to the billow of steam, he considers, maybe, just sitting on the toilet and talking to her. He can't get enough of her voice right now. She'd been without it for far too long But even that idea just doesn't seem close enough, won't give him as much of Nuriko as he wants.

So instead he unbuttons his shirt, slides it off and leaves it hung messily over the sink, before adding his jeans, his socks and underwear, all of his clothing there joined in a pile, before working up the nerve to step inside the shower without any real permission. Brushing past the curtain, he gives a soft intake of surprise at the heat of the water before it quickly plasters his dark hair to his forehead.

Reaching out, he pulls Nuriko's own dark hair together to settle it neatly down the length of her long, pale back. Finding a freckle on her shoulder, he leans forward to press his mouth against it.

"Couldn't wait any longer. Didn't know what else to do until you were done."

Rin remembers some of it. In fits and starts. He remembers that Nuriko had been working a late shift, and wouldn't be getting off for a few hours. That Yukio was off researching in the library of a Darrow church with a fairly extensive collection of records. That everybody else was busy with their own thing.

So he'd been alone, when curiosity had driven him to open the door at the knock.

Rin remembers a chain looped around his throat, burning and digging into his flesh, until the pain was bad enough that any struggle had quickly drained, and pain had dimmed his breaths to the smallest, harshest little things that tried too hard for too little. Then they'd rolled him up in fabric and tied a hood around his head. After that, Rin doesn't know.

He has no memory of what was between then and now; no sight, no sound, no scent. He could be anywhere. All he knows is the little room he's in now.

He doesn't need much light to see, but all that he can tell are that the walls are metal, that they look rusted and corroded, and covered in little snowflake patterns, like they might be frosty, but it's not cold enough where he is It's salt, probably. It doesn't bother him to handle it when he's cooking, but he wonders about the way it's used now.

It isn't random violence that's brought him here. He's here because he's who they were after. He finds himself unsurprised. It's a tired sort of unsurprise. Sort of a confirmation of what he's thought before. Of what he already knows. A tired feeling, like he sort of maybe deserves for this to have happened, in the end.

He struggles to stand, trying to balance himself as he presses himself off the ground with an elbow, pulling himself to his wobbling feet. There are manacles keeping his hands struck together at the wrists. Whatever they're made of, there's an intricate script imprinted into the metal. "Shit," he murmurs, trying to force his arms apart. It shouldn't be a problem for his strength, but something about the manacles is still draining the fight out of him. Like he can't even make himself want to resist enough to tear them off.

It's really disgusting.

A light flashes on above, yellow, bright and unforgiving, and Rin lifts his head with a low, startled growl as the dark pupils of his eyes quickly receed to thin upright slivers as they meet a woman. She looks like any other woman. Middle-aged, dressed in denim pants and a button-down shirt. Modest, medium-haired, wrinkle-faced, like she could be any old soccer mom. Maybe that's what hurts him the most. He narrows his eyes, bright cerulean. They aren't his happy eyes.

He's not happy to be here.

The woman laughs, almost sweetly, but unmoved. She crosses the room without worry, before snapping an arm out and threading fingers through Rin's thick black hair. She tugs mercilessly, shaking his head above his shoulders like he were an unwanted stray cat. Before he can complain, her free hand slams a silver hammer into his upper jaw, just to the side of his nose. When he gives a shout of frightened pain, she holds his mouth apart, thumbing one of his long eyeteeth before applying just enough pressure. After the damage of the weapon, it pops out easily, leaving a bleeding hole in his gums.

Another figure from behind her, just as ordinary, holds what looks like a simple silver goblet beneath his face as she holds him still above it, fightless and limp where he hangs from his hair. White light still springs and fades in his vision from the earlier blow.

"Good doggy," she says. "You don't have a lot of good qualities, but at least you bleed well."

As if to punctuate, a cough flies between Rin's chapped lips and he spits into the filling cup waiting below, his nose bleeding down the back of his throat. It's hot, and sticky, and his head is filled with the smell of it, just a shade darker and danker than purely human blood.

"What a bitch," he tells her, though his voice is meek and rough from maltreatment.

She laughs sweetly again. He's starting to truly hate the sound of that laugh.

A second later, he yowls, pain shooting up from his jaw to stab into his temple. Wincing away from the light again, he writhes in her grip, until she dumps him to the hard, gritty floor again. Rin only distantly realizes what's causing it - the tooth is growing back in. The wound isn't as fast to heal as it normally would be, nerves slowly growing to replace themselves as a long, sharp tooth slides back in to replace the lost one.

"I've got two of these now," the woman says, turning to leave the room with her partner. "We'll see if we can't get enough to remember you by. I'm sure they've got their uses. After all, it's not like we're ignorant to your importance. Even if you are pathetic. Well ... even if you are pathetic, you're still a little chip off of something special. Something worth respect. So thank you," she finishes, as she closes the door behind her quietly. The lights flicker off again in her wake. Rin curls around himself, ear digging into the bare, dirty ground.

"Thank you, kid, for doing one useful thing in your time crawling the earth."

After the cold of the last couple of days, the warming weather feels practically like a heat wave to Rin, dressed in his layers with sweat dripping from the tip of his nose as he stares across the distance at his brother, face pulled into a grimace of a smile, all sharp teeth and tired, but bright, eyes. As much as he's been practicing with a sword with the teachers he's managed to pick up along the way, none of it compares quite to standing across from Yukio, to being put against his style, so different from Rin's own. His guns.

The idea of blocking bullets with a katana is cool as hell, but Rin's quickly learning that, though he may indeed have improved, he's still living in real life, and not Rurouni fucking Kenshin.

He pants for breath again. What Yukio's giving him isn't a brief reprieve to catch his breath. Rin knows that much. After Rin had gotten hit with the first couple rounds of rubber bullets, he'd realized that they stung like a bitch Somehow, the minor irritation pissed him off more than a major wound in an actual fight. Suffice to say, he'd quickly picked up his pace enough to avoid the last few volleys.

Which meant Yukio was just figuring out a new plan to deal with him, from behind the glare of his glasses.

Rin lifts his shoulders again, shuffling his feet on the dusty floor of the empty and abandoned gymnasium they'd gotten a tip to use for this assessment. His tennis shoes squeak on the wood flooring.

He wonders if Yukio's learned what he needed to through this yet. His endurance isn't worn thin, but his patience is getting there. Rin isn't the type that can just throw himself into training for hours at a time or anything. He's not only stupid, but lazy; he's keenly aware of both flaws.

"Oi," he challenges, wiping at his forehead with the back of a hand. He tries to remember how many bullets Yukio keeps in his clips. He knows, from working with Rukia, that figuring that out might be his only chance to get close enough in for a good strike. As far as that goes, he only needs one against Yukio. In matters of speed, Yukio's isn't overwhelmingly greater than Rin's, though reaction time is different entirely. Rin just needs to get in close enough to make a last burst faster than Yukio's reload speed.

Rin stares between the scrawled address in his hand and the number on the door in front of him, lifting a hand to scratch uncertainly at the back of his neck. Somehow, it'd all seemed like a better idea a couple hours ago, when he'd decided on it, and now that he's there, he wonders if he's not just going to be sent away like some weird, irritating kid with issues. Which he is.

But there's really nobody else to talk to; not like he knows he needs to. Rukia and Nuriko are both great and all, and he knows some people his own age, but he can't really talk to them honestly (the kids at school) and he's just starting to feel weird about constantly spending all of his time around girls, when he'd spent the first fifteen years of his life essentially without.

Lifting the little empty baby food jar with the bullet he'd saved out of the pocket of his hooded sweatshirt, he tips it in circles in his hand, watching the stained piece of wood roll around the edge. It's sort of a bribe, or at least, a foot in the door, for Rin to get inside and talk with Dean. He feels less guilty about it than he does frustrated that he even needs something like this, and in any case, whatever he is feeling is just that - a feeling. Logically, this is the last place his feet should have taken him. As far as Rin's heard, Dean Winchester is the best demon hunter in Darrow. And Okumura Rin is the stupidest demon with the highest profile. Not exactly a love match for the ages.

With a growl, he swallows down his last reservations and reaches out to rap loudly on the door.

The soup broth in the pot steams heavily as Rin turns down the temperature before adding the last few ingredients, the noodles that just need cooked through, and the fresh vegetables that just need wilted, more than anything. He gives it a few stirs, before checking the large digital clock magnet stuck to the door of the fridge. It smells perfect, which is just as well. It is, more or less, an offering to appease the other person in Rin's little apartment, though he's far from consciously realizing it.

It's just cold out, and InuYasha is just arrived, and he needs a good meal if he plans on sleeping outside, and for that matter, up a tree.

Rin doesn't really get it, but you can't really argue with InuYasha. He's already figured that one out.

He'd let him wander and do whatever he wanted in the apartment when they'd first arrived, and it's only now, when the food is just on the edge of being done, that he decides he can start asking the questions that are really on his mind. He doesn't really know how to cut in, or even what to ask first, so he just gets the bowls out of the cupboard and gives InuYasha a long, strangled look of insecurity. He wishes he could come up with any kind of reasonable gameplan.

"You really didn't like it when that train station attendant knew your name," he says, almost wincingly. He's pretty sure he'll get a sarcastic answer back, but it's the only place he knows to start with.

Rin had finally worked his way through all of the cheap candy he'd ended up with in the wake of Halloween, trusting in his ability to eat whatever he wanted without Yukio around to monitor over him. He's doubtful that there would ever be too much, the way he was now; it would never hurt him. But Yukio still would never have tolerated a diet quite so full of candy and popcorn balls as Rin's had been.

Problem was, the more often he had sweets, the more often he upturned the apartment looking for more when his sweet tooth came back for a vengeance. Finding nothing of interest and in no mood to leave the apartment when he had Nuriko over and to himself, he turned to the idea that would let him leave his shoes off and his nose warm.

Make it yourself.

Twenty minutes later found him in the kitchen, face over a steaming skillet full of slowly boiling sugar and water. He stirred it attentively with a wooden spoon, waiting for it to turn the right golden color the recipe from the internet had instructed.

"Nuriko," he called out after her, wherever she'd gone off to in the apartment. "Come do me a favor! I need the cream from the refrigerator."

Rin had felt it calling to him the night before, but hadn't made it avross the city to the train station in enough time to catch it before the sense of something huge and demonic had drifted out of his sixth sense. The night after, he'd been waiting for it, and watched it from a distance long enough to start putting shit together. It was a ghost train.

A type of possession that affects a whole vehicle, a spectral thing that only appears under certain conditions. The stories were slightly different, depending on where in the world they'd come from, but standard trains were most common back in Japan, so he had a clue. He'd fought a thing like it, once or twice, as an Ex-wire.

On the third night, he abandons everything else on his schedule for the time being, moving across the city in the dark of night with his sword strapped to his back and his True Cross uniform on. He may as well look the part, if he's going to try to exorcise the thing himself. The streets are wet when he gets to the station, the black unusually thick and heavy with the clouds in the sky swallowing up the October moon. In the chill, his hot breath comes swirling around his face like a worked horse's, cutting an unfriendly picture of him, eyes bright as he waits in the sulpherous yellow of the streetlights. If it keeps people from lurking, all the better. He'll look as threatening as he can.

There are people on the ghost train. He saw them, the same ones, every night, weird and dim through the glass windows with their fog. Their faces expressionless and indistinct. Twisted up memories of people stamped on reality. Ghosts. He knows that's what they are in there.

And tonight, at 11:11, he's going to save all of them, no matter what.

Rin had gone to pick Nuriko up at work. It wasn't like he could drive a car or anything, and it wasn't like she needed walked home, but he could tell she liked it when he showed up, maybe just because it let her know he'd thought of her, maybe because it made it easier to see how his own day had been. It often seemed like both were true.

They;d stayed at Semele's for a half hour afterward while Rin worked his way through a cheeseburger and french fries, maybe more than he should have been spending money on still in his situation without a steady job, but he'd wanted the celebratory food. It put him in a good mood, one that lasted the entire way to Nuriko's apartment, where he held her hand, swinging them both back and forth in pleased silence while she talked about her day, until she needed her hands again to unlock her door.

"It's been a little while since I've been inside your place," he observes without motive, a sincere realization. "Sorry. Thanks for bringing me home the other night, after the concert. I probably shouldn't have drank anything just because people handed it to me. I might get into trouble that way next time."

"You're a monster," Rin declares, panting for breath as he leans his weight on the handle of the wooden sword Rukia had given him when they'd started practicing. She's insisted on exactly what Shura had -- starting Rin directly at the starting line. He hates it no less now than he did then, but there's not much he can do about it. He can't go shopping for a sensei, and even if he could, Rukia is the most perfect.

Doesn't change the fact that he's soaked from head to tail in sweat, even in the autumn air (he runs hot to begin with,) his t-shirt is sticking and itchy, and if it weren't for his ridiculous beastly healing, he's got no doubts he'd be covered in bruises and suffering through a sprain of every muscle in his body by now.

This was somewhere Rukia and Shura differed. Where Shura believed in skivving as much as possible, Rukia was the definition of hands on. He eyes her warily from across the weedy field they've been treading down for the last hour (after he had biked here from the city), far outside the city proper. There was no place in the city that seemed like a safe choice. Everywhere he could think of was either too public a place, or the necropolis. It was hallowed ground, so that made it a no-go, even in the dead of night. Rin could enter its borders, but that didn't mean he didn't spend the entire time there feeling like he was being watched and breaking into prickles.

"I'm really gonna die. How are you still so fast?"

It's a little late when he arrives, closer to brunch than breakfast, but Rin's never been much of a morning person, always found his body preferred to stay up late and sleep in. It had only occurred to him recently that there was a reason for it. Demons were nocturnal.

It ought to be a sobering thought, but nothing is chipping his hopeless optimism this day, as he follows his directions to a particular apartment number. Standing outside, he hesitates for only a moment before knocking.

He's honestly never gone to visit anyone with an appointment like this before. Not, at least, someone he considered a friend, if a very new one. And a girl.

Rin clears his throat before knocking. "Hell-ooo, Good mo-rning! It's just me."

He catches her out of the corner of his eye, silent in the dark as a moth and racing across the rooftops. He knows it's Rukia only from the silhouette of her sword at her hip. With nothing better to do at night than wander town to avoid sitting on his bed and thinking frustrating thoughts, he's eager to chase after her form.

It isn't easy, though. She's fast, fast enough that he isn't sure he'll be able to catch up, even at his (pretty pathetic) top speed.

But he can jump, better than any lemur, and it's easy to make it up the fire escapes and over enough rooftops for his voice to be heard trailing behind her.

He doesn't consider that someone may here him, or that that someone may not be able to see that he's not just shouting to himself.

"Oi!" He waves one hand in the air lazily as he jogs across the crackling gravel of an apartment building. "Rukia, ooo-i!"

After months in Darrow with no sign at all of a way back - no sudden revelations of insight, no Mephisto appearing, no Yukio - nobody to whisk Rin out of a problem he has no hope of solving himself ... he feels like he's going stir crazy. Like he just wants to scratch until his skin comes off and he can crawl out of it. That jittery feeling of edging hopelessness is enough to take him out on the streets without eating supper. The frown on his face is enough to send him away from the crowds.

e finds himself where he's only been before briefly, the abandoned boardwalk. Normally it might be a sign of a boom economy slowly deflating like a flan in a cupboard, but in Darrow ... he doesn't know. It just makes him wonder.

It makes him jumpy, too. Which is why he turns, hand still outreached for the door to a large building that looks like it might have been an arcade, to scan the street behind him. Despite himself and mental assurances that it's probably his imagination, he cn't shake the feeling someone else is out there. And it has him wound tiht as a startled cat.

"Hello?" he calls, the word in English smoother than it might have been on first arrival. He's made good use of it in Darrow.

"I think that Hell is a fable."

"Ay," says Mephistopheles, "think so still, 'til experience change thy mind."

Your name: Lysandra
Your personal journal: lysandra
Who do you currently play at the City?

SPOCK
Feb 26 x01
Feb 27 x03
March 4 x01
March 11 x01
March 18 x01

ROBIN GOODFELLOW
Feb 07 x01
Feb 09 x01
Feb 10 x01
Feb 12 x01
Feb 16 x01
Mar 06 x07
Mar 18 x02

SPIKE SPIEGEL
Feb 26 x01
Feb 27 x03
Mar 05 x01
Mar 06 x01
Mar 18 x02

HOUSE
Feb 01 x01
Feb 12 x01
Feb 23 x02
Mar 04 x01
Mar 10 x01
Mar 14 x01

What month and year is this application for? 3/2013

Your character's name: Okumura Rin
Your character's canon: Ao no Exorcist/Blue Exorcist
Your character's dreamwidth username: phosphor
What name should be used for your character's tag? okumura rin
Is your character living or dead at their time of entry? Living

Please list any canonically pre-existing disabilities of a medical, physical, or psychiatric nature: Rin is prone to bouts of depression and of suicide ideation.

Please list any canonically pre-existing special abilities:

Super-strength | Since childhood, Rin has been physically stronger than normal people. He can easily lift a car and steel support beams. As a young child he was able to punch hard enough to bend metal and break six ribs in a single strike.

Pyrokinesis | Rin is able to manipulate blue flame. These flames can be summoned both in his human and partial demon form, and as such he is impervious to the heat and power of the flames. However, the flames (which are heavily reliant on emotions) are sealed into Kurikara, his sword, which was originally forged to house the demon Garuda. Once unsheathed, the quantity of flames increases exponentially. The blue flames are the key to Rin's demonic nature, and he can be 'consumed' by them, causing him to lose his humanity and ability to think rationally. The blue flame is implied to have some level of sentience. It is supernatural in origin, and once it has caught fire to an object, until it is destroyed it can only be doused with holy water or another blessed liquid (such as blessed wine). With concentration, Rin can choose what the flame destroys and does so by utilizing it as a purifier, able to exorcise a demon from a human this way without injuring the human, or to burn only a person's clothing but not their body.

Regenerative Abilities | Due to his demonic heritage, Rin possesses high-speed regenerative abilities. His healing rate is such that, after getting stabbed in the stomach, the wound was nearly knit together within seconds. He was able to heal from having his foot severed completely from his body at the ankle. He is also immune to the effects of miasma or other energy-draining substances created by demons that would otherwise cause great harm to normal humans.

Telepathy | Rin can telepathically communicate with demons that are incapable of human speech.

Demonic Weaknesses | Though his strengths are many, he also suffers from related weaknesses. He cannot cross any barrier another demon wouldn't be able to cross (such as one formed by salt), and is caused great pain and weakness by holy water and the recitation of appropriate Bible verse or Hindu-Buddhist mantra. He also suffers an unpleasant reaction to preparations of herbs such as fennel, sage, holly, rue and especially asafetida and rowan.

Note on appearance: Rin's appearance can vary wildly between one onlooker and another. Most would see only a normal teenager of asian origin with black hair and navy blue eyes. However, if an individual has ever recieved a Temptaint or 'mashou,' an ancient Buddhist term meaning 'demonic hinderance,' through interaction with the supernatural or 'spirit' world (such as witnessing a haunting, having a near-death experience, receiving a supernatural wound or illness,) then they will be able to see Rin for what he is. To those with a Temptaint, Rin will appear to have notably pointed and slightly elongated lower and upper canines, slightly pointed and elongated ears, and most notably, a black-haired prehensile tail, around six feet in length, ending with thickly tufted fur.

Tell us about your character's background:

On the Blue Night, Rin was born amongst the deaths of many of the world's most powerful holy men. His mother was a half-Japanese woman by the name of Yuri Elgin, and his father, the demon Satan, who claims to have conceived Rin and his twin, Yukio, out of 'boredom,' though he realized later that doing so had been a masterstroke, as Rin's body was of Assiah, the material world, and his spirit of Gehenna, the mirroring immaterial world of demons; this would allow Rin to be the perfect vessel to host Satan, as any body he possessed was quickly destroyed.

Although he was ordered dead by the Vatican, the priest who found him and his brother, Fujimoto Shiro, felt pity for the infant children, and instead made a deal with the demon Samael (who, for his own reasons, is working with the Vatican) to raise the children in secrecy, as a gamble. Rin would grow either to be a bane or a boon for the Vatican and its True Cross Order of exorcists in the fight against Satan.

As a child, Rin was raised relatively normally, as a human son, in Father Fujimoto's Catholic monastary. Though his power had not yet been enough to awaken for years, Rin had a dangerous temper, and would often report having 'blacked out' only to awake again after causing terrible violence, even as a toddler.

When Rin was 16, after having got into a fight with a small gang who were chopping the legs off of pigeons, he started to see small, black floating creatures around town, wondering why nobody else was noticing them. It is after this that he has a second confrontation with the gang, one member of which has been possessed by the demon Astaroth, who was there to produce proof that Rin was Satan's offspring and to bring him back with him. Father Fujimoto arrived suddenly to exorcise Astaroth.

On returning home, in his stress after a harsh argument with Rin, Fujimoto's spirit wavered enough to allow possession by Satan, who explained Rin's ancestry before attempting to drag him to Gehenna. Satan was stopped when Fujimoto was able to gain control of his body again for long enough to stab himself in the heart. This worked, but in the process, Rin fully awakened to his demon nature, and Fujimoto died, leaving Samael (under the name Mephisto Pheles) to become legal guardian of Rin and Yukio.

After Fujimoto's funeral, Rin stayed behind at his grave. When calling a phone number he was instructed to by the priest, the corresponding ring was nearby. Mephisto arrived and gave Rin three choices: to commit suicide, to be killed, or to kill the exorcists surrounding him and flee. Rin chose none of those options and instead decided to become an exorcist as Fujimoto had. Hearing that Satan's child desired to become an exorcist, Mephisto became amused and accepted Rin's existence if he would fight for the Order of the True Cross.

Canon exit point: Chapter 43, Friends

Your character's personality:

Considering himself the 'older brother' of Yukio, despite the mere minutes between their births as fraternal twins, it's unsurprising that Rin's self-ascribed role in life is as a supporter and protector. He possesses an almost shocking ability to connect and empathize with someone else's feelings, and finds himself drawn to those he sees himself in.

Not being particularly good at traditional structured learning or very 'book-smart' (at times downright clueless due to his upbringing in an abbey,) Rin prefers to deal with the world with a sense of intuition, rather than rationality. This intuition can make Rin quite good at reading others. The downside of this is that he is very capable of getting underneath others' skins to get the reaction that he is seeking (usually irritation or anger.) Perhaps it should not be surprising, given his heritage, that sweet and kind-hearted Rin is quite capable of becoming a chameleon-like manipulator, hiding what he is thinking behind an empty smile that is becoming more and more common as he adjusts to his demonic nature.

Better in the company of others, when left to his own devices, Rin's thoughts turn disturbingly dark (he often finds himself wondering why he is allowed to live,) which can become a problem when combined with his crippling self-doubt, poor self-confidence, survivor's guilt, and habit of putting the needs of others before his own. Even with those considered friends, he can often feel quite lonely, as there are parts of himself that he fears he needs to hold back. Despite this poor ability to handle his own shortcomings, Rin prefers to find the silver lining in even the most beggarly perceptions of others. Still, he can come off to the unfamiliar as a jerk or even a thug, with his brutal honesty and abrasive presentation.

He's so focused on the global picture, details tend to fall to the side. Rin's strongest downfall is that he is incapable of dealing with impersonal reasoning, not appreciating or understanding its merit, and becoming unhappy whenever forced to deal with a situation where facts are presented outside of the context of a human element. This is made worse by difficulty making decisions and a poor temper.

A very poor temper. Through no fault of his own, he's inherited an inhuman wrath, and can become violent; dangerous, when combined with a figuratively and literally headstrong nature with little appreciation of ambiguity, and a still-immature understanding of his own impact on others, and his greater place in the world.

But he's a work in progress, like the rest of us.

Why do you want to play this character?

Firstly, I wanted to have more younger characters as most of mine are late twenties or older, and after dropping Ichigo recently because of his introverted nature, I figured I would try to go with another extravert instead. I also wanted to have Rin around for his personality, which is strangely refreshing to me -- he is hopeful and optimistic without losing a sense of realism. I also think that the character could be potentially thought-provoking in threads with others, because he is ... the child of the leader of Hell. The canon itself already does an interesting job addressing how this works out in a world where essentially, every religion is true. It could be interesting to see the character played off of different faiths and beliefs, or conversely, off of individuals who don't believe much at all.

He is also sort of at an age where he's setting off on a bildungsroman, and those usually lead to interesting character development.

Your character's personal inventory upon arrival:

[1] demon-sealing sword, Kurikara
[1] red fabric baseball bat carrier
[1] silver hair clip
[1] pair red leather knee-high boots with faux fur
[1] pair black trousers, skinny-style
[1] belt, fashion, white leather
[1] wallet chain, silver
[1] button-down shirt, white
[1] black suit-coat with white piping and bronze buttons
[1] tie, black with red and bronze stripes
[1] pair boxer-briefs, black with white piping
[1] pair socks, black
[1] Order of the True Cross rosary, lacquered bronze
[1] wallet, red leather
[1] Order of the True Cross identification badge: Rank Esquire (Exorcist Candidate)

Sample post:

If we keep relying on you every time ... what will happen to us when we can't count on you? Do you want us to stay stupid and weak? We have to become strong, too. That's why I want you to be our trump card. The trump card is the strongest card, the one that's used only at the crucial point. Having a trump card makes others feel safer. I want you to be that, Okumura.

Konekomaru's voice.

He hears it in the back of his head, remembers vaguely that he'd been standing in the gallery moments ago, fingers on his sword, waiting for an attack from the Shapeshifter that had been manipulating them. Sizing them up. Playing with them.

Playing with them.

Rin feels his teeth grind together, even in the second that he realizes his hands are empty and panic sets in as he searches around himself blindly for his sword, for Kurikara. He finds it in his groping, still packed away in the baseball bat carrier that he hides it in. Strange having gone to stranger, he sits abruptly up to find himself on a ... train.

Mostly empty but for himself. There are bodies scattered around in the other seats, looking warily at him. Probably from the freak-out he'd had a second ago; still, and maybe partly because he's still so confused, the expressions on their faces piss him off. Some of them stand, to get off. And he follows, head down and hands in pockets.

Just what the Hell is going on?

His first thought is another vision, from the demon. But this isn't anything like that first vision it'd given him. Maybe, he thinks, it was Mephisto. That builds itself up into a certainty in his mind, and he scowls further. Mephisto, who could sneak around and transport Rin's mind to Gehenna itself. Mephisto, who called himself Samael, the King of Time.

Mephisto who was Rin's half-brother. He was clever enough to figure that one out, after eight months.

He scowls further, only stopping when he feels it slipping up his spine like minnows. He's not alone, there's something else out there and nearby. He knows what it is without needing to confirm it. For whatever reason he's been kidnapped somewhere else suddenly, and to wherever it happens to be, he's got a friend out there.

The Shapeshifter.

She's out there. Somewhere. In the crowd.