OOC Information:
Name: Jan
Are you over 15? Yes.
Contact: failtair at gmail / cantito
IC Information:
Name: Reiner Braun/Ryan Brown
Canon: Attack on Titan (Shingeki no Kyojin) Fair warning, Reiner is the subject of some really big spoilers. I have obscured most of them out for the unknowing public, simply highlight to view.
Age: 17(pre!)/24(re!)
Preincarnation Appearance: link
Any differences: No obvious, visible differences besides some scarring on his right arm. Ryan trains, does sports, and works out regularly, so maybe he wouldn't be flying-through-the-air strong, but he's still built like a tank. Of course, the biggest difference is that Ryan is not the Armored Titan, and is 100% human. So he can't regenerate or spontaneously surround himself with a giant, impenetrable meatsuit/mecha that makes him nigh-invincible.
Preincarnated History: wiki, though it's not very in-depth. So here's all the important stuff to do with Reiner.

There's a lot about Reiner's past that we don't actually know. Besides being from the same village as his best friend, Bertolt Hoover, Reiner doesn't really talk about his life before joining the military. In fact, since he and Bertolt are basically inseparable, we end up finding out most of this stuff from Bertolt. When they are first introduced, he and Bertolt explain that they are from a village in the mountains, in the southern section of Wall Maria. Because it was so secluded from the main cities within the wall, they did not receive any warning of the Titan breach, and were therefore caught by surprise the morning of the attack. Bertolt mentions that he heard the loud approach of the Titans, but that by the time he went to open his window, a large, inhuman face was already there staring back at him. He blacked out after that.

THIS IS A LIE. Or if it isn't, it's a half-truth. What we do know is that Reiner and Bertolt are from a village outside the walls. They'd have to be, since they started the Titan attack that ended the century of peace humanity had been enjoying. You see, Bertolt is the Colossal Titan, and Reiner is the Armored Titan; at the age of 11 and 12, they brought about the beginning of humanity's demise. It's unclear under whose orders they did this or why, but these two have been child soldiers for some time.

Unfortunately, we don't know any more about what Bertolt and Reiner's actual village could be like, or what state it could be in. Is it a village of Titan Shifters? Were Bertolt and Reiner some kind of bizarre experiment? All we have is conjecture, and I can't and won't assume anything about that until further canon information comes up, so I wouldn't worry about that.

But anyway, after the attack, Bertolt and Reiner slipped in with the refugees and began their infiltration of humanity, with plans to wipe them all out. Yeah, before they even hit puberty, they were spies sent to destroy the only known human settlement on the planet. You can imagine what that does to a kid. Then again, poor Reiner and Bertolt have good reason to be sorta messed up. As children, they witnessed their closest friend get eaten by a Titan while they could only flee in horror. And then they later... became Titans themselves... Were they Titans before? After? We just don't know. Yet?

What we do know is that Reiner wants to go home to his village. It might have been destroyed, but he strongly believes it's his duty as a warrior to go back one last time. Reiner's drive inspires Eren to give it his best at their training exercises, and the two become close friends and occasional sparring parters. Reiner is the one who reminds Eren that a soldier's duty is to prepare for anything-- and it's Reiner who convinces Eren to avoid neglecting hand-to-hand combat just because it's meant to be used on people, not Titans. He's nice like that.

Once their three-year training was done, Reiner placed second out of all the trainees in the 104 Trainee Squad, making him qualifiable to join the Military Police Division, where he could live out his days in the comfort of the interior walls. Not that he would, of course; a soldier's duty is to be on the front lines protecting people and all that.

Then the Colossal Titan attacked on their graduation day, and all hell broke loose.

With the city in a panic and the Survey Corps away on a mission, Reiner and the other trainees were assigned to join the front squad. Too bad that with their headquarters overrun, everyone ran out of gas too quickly to get anything done. Still, people deferred to him and he did his best to keep morale up, ultimately assisting in the plan that allowed the remaining trainees to refuel and make their way back to safety. Otherwise, Reiner didn't really play a big part in the battle of Trost, besides being one of the advocates for saving Eren-in-Titan-form. He saw plenty of his squadmates die around him, and even witnessed his friend Eren emerge from a Titan's neck.

Needless to say, after the battle he joins the Survey Corps, as they're the people who are on the front lines, fighting Titans on their home turf. It only made sense, after all. It was his duty as a soldier. But not his duty as a warrior, or his duty to The Plan (to destroy all the humans.) After all, if he wanted to destroy humanity, it would have made much more sense to join the Military Police, striking at the heart of civilization where they're least equipped to handle Titans. It's clear at this point (knowing the truth about Reiner) that something was already driving him off the rails. While the assumption would normally be that he became too attached to his friends and started to care about them, or maybe that he changed his mind about going through with The Plan, the truth is a mix of both, and actually kind of worse. Unable to cope with the guilt of his past actions as the Armored Titan, Reiner's mind fractured, triggering dissociative episodes where Reiner forgets all about The Plan and that he's not human. When he joined the Survey Corps, it's safe to say he probably believed it would be for the benefit of humanity, without realizing he... wasn't human. Oh Reiner baby no. (I go into more detail about this in the Personality section.)

But anyway! Reiner joins the Survey Corps, performs admirably in the field and saves Armin and Jean from the Female-Type Titan. hahaha no he doesn't, he betrays them and tells the Female-Type Titan where they're hiding Eren so that she can attempt to kidnap him. The next time we see him is during the second breach, where Titans were reported being spotted within Wall Rose. With the possibility of Titan spies within their ranks (though no one will say it outright,) the rest of the recently-graduated trainees are made to stand by at their base. Once the Titans are spotted however, the remaining senior members split off with the trainees to try and find the breach in the wall, since an attack within Wall Rose would mean devastating casualties for the thousands of people living there.

During this time, Reiner, Bertolt, Christa, Connie and Ymir end up finding Connie's abandoned village, where Connie thinks one of the Titans left behind looks like his mother. (The Titan even seems to whisper 'welcome home...') Reiner insists that's impossible, and asks Connie to drop it. After all, no use worrying, right? With no bodies in the town, they probably all got away! No they didn't, let's be real. With things so dire, they don't have time to be breaking down. It's just as likely that Reiner knew more than he was letting on about the process of becoming a Titan, and was actually silencing Connie to avoid feeling even guiltier about not sharing the truth.

The group holes up in Castle Utgard, an abandoned building from the times before the Titans attacked, if the labels on the rations are anything to show for it. The castle is soon swarmed by Titans, and without their gear, the team ends up having to resort to using whatever they can find to hold the Titans back. Here Reiner continues to fight admirably, protecting his friends and going so far as to risk his life for Connie, despite previously spurning him. Even as a Titan bites down on his arm, Reiner offers to jump out a window-- killing both himself and the Titan, all to protect his friends.

He doesn't, obviously, but the injury is important. Bertolt jumps in to save him and a bunch of really spoilery stuff happens with Ymir where we find out she was the Titan who ate Reiner and Bertolt's friend, and that she can read a dead language, even though Reiner can't and the main good guys show up just in time to keep any of their friends from dying. Which is awesome.

Then THE BIG ONE happens. The big spoiler. For the sake of clarity, I'll be playing Reiner's memories (when they come back to him) up to here, because this is where shit really hits the fan, and there are so many questions after this.

This is the "by the way Eren, I'm the Armored Titan, Bertolt is the Colossal Titan. We were just stupid kids who didn't know anything back when we attacked your hometown, ending the century of peace within the walls, but we'll give up trying to destroy humanity if you'll just come with us to our village." spoiler. That's literally how it happens. It's such a downplayed announcement that Eren actually tries to tell Reiner he must be joking. (Eren knows at this point, or he suspected, but he really didn't want to believe it.) Reiner, with his fractured mind and all but crippled by his guilt, tries to believe it too, for a bit... but in the end, his sense of duty is too strong, and it's too late to turn back. To prove his words and take responsibility for his actions, Reiner tears off his bandages and heals his arm right before Eren's eyes, pleading him to just go with them, or they'll have to take him by force. (He makes this threat while members of the Survey Corps are standing by, discussing the latest breach in the walls. So really, it's obvious he didn't plan ahead when he decided to go through with the whole thing.)

You can imagine what happens after that, and it's not pretty. Mikasa attacks Reiner and Bertolt before they can grab Eren, wounding them really graphically. Reiner gets the brunt of her attack though, as he tried to shield Bertolt from most of Mikasa's fury. The two shift into their Titan forms, and as all hell breaks loose once again, Bertolt and Reiner are able to escape with Ymir and Eren in tow. (This is where Ymir confronts Reiner about his dissociation, and where Reiner tells Eren to kindly shut the fuck up because he's fully aware of how terrible he is without having him to remind them. Now they're on their way back to their village, and.... God, who knows what'll happen next.

Reincarnated History: Ryan Brown grew up in a loving home in your standard suburbia, to a single mom who taught him to always be kind to others, and always help as many people as you can. His father had been a soldier, and was killed in action right around the time Ryan was born. Because of this, his mother wasn't usually home and stayed very busy with work, but even as a child Ryan made lots of friends in the neighborhood and at school so he was never really lonely. His mother was always caring, even when she came home late from the office, she would always find time to tuck her son in at night, read him a bedtime story, or at least pack him his lunch before he went to school the next day. With only pictures and his mom's stories guide him, Ryan grew up admiring his father's bravery, and while his mom frowned on him ever joining the military, Ryan's heart was set on public service. He was an independent sort of kid, and understood even from a young age that it was his duty to help his mom as much as he could, so why not extend that help to everyone else?

In school, Ryan was always the biggest kid in his class. He started playing sports as soon as he could join them, and once he hit puberty (which came somewhat early, at 13) he was so much taller and stronger than the kids his age that he usually had to play with the older kids to keep people's parents from calling him a cheat. He was that kid, but if you took one look at him you'd definitely think twice before trying anything smart. He never had to beat up anyone in terms of bullying and that sort of thing, lucky for him.

Despite his less than docile appearance (and people asking him what he was doing with the 6th graders, when he "obviously" was supposed to be in high school,) the only reputation Ryan ever gained in school was being the nicest, strongest linebacker they'd ever seen. With him on their team, his school's team won the district-championship three years in a row. Oh, and he was prom king too. Sure, he wasn't on the Honor Roll, but academics were never really his thing as much as physical stuff, anyway. Even throughout high school, he had his sights set on something more.

Once he graduated and turned 18, Ryan planned on joining the military like his father before him-- that was the plan anyway, until he told his mom about it. It took weeks of his mother's pleading to change his mind (he's always had a soft spot for her, it's true.) He wanted to help people, sure, but the military wasn't his only option. While he decided what to do with his life, Ryan went to college on a sports scholarship. He got a full ride, so it wasn't a problem.

After finishing his first year in college, Ryan quits. He decides to become a firefighter, and gets transferred to Locke City a few years after he joins.

First Echo: Some conscious healing (very, very minimal)

Ryan's first echo comes to him on his first real rescue mission. A fire had broken out in warehouse out in the middle of nowhere-- it was supposed to be abandoned but it wasn't, and even if the folks living there weren't exactly legal residents, it made no difference. When Ryan's company made it to the scene, the building was already starting to come down, but with people still trapped inside, they went to work.

At first, things were actually going well. They get most of the people out without incident, and paramedics are on call to get any critical cases out where they need to be. Then, just as they're making the last check for any survivors, something (a loose wire, a ruptured pipe, who knows) triggers an explosion and Ryan ends up shielding one of his fellow firefighters from the blaze. As flames pour forth from a door leading to the building's basement, Ryan manages to force it shut, sealing the worst of the flames out, but the fire damages his suit, injuring his arm.

Ryan is able to walk away fine, but as a precaution he's admitted to the hospital with a moderate burn. The suit protected him from most of the damage, but the heat was still substantial.

Between talk of surgeries or skin grafts (which, thankfully, Ryan didn't end up needing,) an injury like his usually lands people in the hospital for about a week. With enough rest, pain medicine and anesthetic, Ryan only stays a few days. The nurses call him lucky-- citing his recovery as one of the fastest they'd ever seen. His friends and family are just glad he's okay. Ryan just has a weird feeling about the whole thing, because he's pretty sure he felt tiny puffs of warmth coming off of his arm when he tried to concentrate on it, but that can't be right, can it?

Preincarnation Personality: There are a lot of really great things about Reiner. He's the Team Dad; he looks after everyone he can, he cares about his friends and is always there to listen to them. He'll gladly take the fall to get his teammates out of trouble, and he's just one of those guys that makes you feel safe. Sure, he's kind of a big, hulking guy, but he has a heart of gold and doesn't shy away from it.

Saying Reiner has a strong sense of duty is an understatement. He takes his training very seriously and tries to make sure everyone else is doing the same. Because of this, his squadmates look up to him and he knows it, so he's always trying to set a good example for them. They might just be kids, but he firmly believes in being a soldier, and fights for humanity with all his strength.

Now, if you don't want to get spoiled, just stop here. The problem with all this is that Reiner isn't really on humanity's side. He's a Titan Shifter, specifically the Armored Titan; the monster that breached the wall and caused the deaths of tens, even hundreds of thousands of people, devastating humanity's way of life forever. How does such a nice guy like Reiner live with himself after that? Is it all a lie?

Yes, kind of. At first, Reiner's fondness for humanity would have indeed been a lie. But eventually, as he gained friends and saw all the suffering he'd caused, Reiner started wishing the lie were true. He started to 'become the mask,' but in the worst way possible.

While it's unclear when it started, likely during their years of training and when he began to truly care about his squadmates, Reiner's mind fractured as he became unable to handle the immeasurable guilt he felt from all his crimes, and being surrounded by those who had suffered for them. This literally drove him to mental instability. His broken psyche triggered dissociative episodes, during which time he is able to forget about the things he'd done, the people he's killed, and even that he is a Titan at all. In these times he calls himself a "soldier," where he fights for humanity, not a "warrior" like he'd been at the start.

Since the severity of the episodes vary, it's unclear exactly how often Reiner's dissociative spells would trigger. He still valiantly served his cause, sticking to the mission of eradicating humanity; later capturing Eren, even when he was obviously done with the 'eradicating humanity' bit-- but were all of his kind gestures from before caused by a delusion? I find it highly unlikely, given that Reiner has been shown to be truly kind toward Bertolt, his oldest friend. And in fact, the degree of his guilt he feels shows that he really did have a gentle heart, it's just been crushed and torn from the trauma of being a child soldier warrior.

I realize this is a a sensitive theme, what with Reiner's mental stability coming into question and the manga still in-progress, but in either case, neither of these things would start to even show until much later in his time at Save The Earth, so the effect it'll have on his reincarnation will depend a lot on his circumstances in the future.

Any differences: Ryan is everything without the spoilers. No dark mysterious past or guilt. Just a nice guy with an intimidating face who likes helping people and keeps lots of friends. He enjoys working out, eating healthy and cooking for himself. Instead of being a soldier, he's a firefighter, but his commitment to helping others hasn't been dampened at all. Thanks to his first Echo, he can heal from very minor wounds at will, or speed up the recovery of major to moderate wounds. For now, doing so only produces tiny puffs of steam. He doesn't know the truth behind this ability so once he grows comfortable with it, he'll use it whenever it's needed. My goal is actually to have him become comfortable with his power before he remembers all the terrible things he did because of them, but we'll see how that plays out in the game.
Abilities: Reiner is ranked 2nd in his squad, losing only to Mikasa Ackerman, who is pretty much the second-strongest character in the show. He's undergone intense military training, and as such Reiner is very well built, but also extremely agile in the air-- and he has to be. To kill Titans with 3DM gear, being light and petite is preferable to being big and strong, so the fact that Reiner ranked 2nd even when he's 6 feet tall and weighs over 200pds (of muscle) tells you a lot about his skill.

Reiner is also a Titan Shifter, meaning he can become the Armored Titan at will, as long as he has enough stamina (and happens to be bleeding, which can also be self-inflicted.) As the Armored Titan, his proportions and physique are much closer to human physiology than a regular Titan's, so he is agile (able to outrun horses,) strong (able to lift house-sized boulders,) and 15m tall. Unlike other Titans, his flesh is covered in hard plates that make him impervious to even direct cannon fire. The back of his neck (the usual Titan weak spot) is plated as well. In this form, his only weakness is the fact that in order to facilitate movement, his joints (knees, ankles, etc) are not heavily plated, and are vulnerable to attack. He can fire off steam to some degree, but it may just be a byproduct of exertion, as he hasn't been shown to use it as a defense mechanism the way the Colossal Titan does.

On top of the abilities while in his Titan form, Reiner, like all the Titan Shifters, is able to regenerate from any wound. Short of cutting off his head (which hasn't been tried in canon yet,) there's no way to kill him. Limbs can be regrown, bleeding wounds stopped and broken bones healed-- though it takes a conscious effort to do so in a short amount of time. Healing like this generates steam, and the speed of it is also tied to Reiner's stamina. While it's not clear whether Reiner was born a shifter (or whether that's possible) or if he awakened to it later like Eren, it's obvious that he's had Titan Shifting abilities for a long time, as he seems to have figured out the ins and outs of the whole process.

Roleplay Sample – Third Person:

Being a firefighter nowadays means you spend a lot of your time waiting for things to go wrong. Compared to the injured people, the occasional forest fire and the ever-annoying pulled fire alarm, a cat in a tree is almost comically simple. Ryan was no fan of pets, but he'd drawn the short straw and well, for old times' sake, this was still the kind of thing they would do. Plus, Ryan loved kids, so that would be good, right? In theory.

That was how Ryan ended up having to climb a tree, and dealing with an irate child and her remarkably fat cat. The girl in question was a cute kid-- except she'd been crying about her cat for at least half an hour before Ryan even arrived. The tree was old. The cat looked like it could roll its way down the tree instead.

"How come you're the only one here?" The girl asked. She was blond, and kinda toothy. She said her mom said not to share her name with strangers. "Berty can't get down! This is serious!"

Ryan nodded sternly, giving her his full attention. He was wearing his jacket over a shirt, so he looked at least a little professional. "Its okay, Miss. I'll have Berty down in no time. I'm a cat rescuing professional. Best in the company."

The little girl pouted, eyeing him suspcious. Okay, so maybe "the best" wasn't exactly true, but Ryan was an excellent climber for his size. The girl stared at him a while longer before nodding. He'd passed the test, as far as he could tell.

"Just help him! He's too dumb and scared!" Ryan tried his best not to chuckle as the girl pointed to her stranded cat. It was a wonder the cat was able to hold on at all, the twig it'd perched on was no thicker than Ryan's thumb.

"Alright, I'm gonna be extra careful, but I need you to catch Berty if he falls, okay?"

The girl's eyes welled up, her voice instantly desperate. "He's gonna fall? But he's scared!"

Ryan backpedaled fast. "Ahhh nono, of course not. Its just a precaution. You won't actually have to do anything-- but if you agree to just keep an eye out, I can make you an honorary cat rescuer just like me!"

"Really?"

"Absolutely."

The girl's face burst into a smile and Ryan gave her a small salute before beginning his trek up the tree. He climbed until he reached a stable point, the tree shaking under his weight, but holding. A big guy like him, it was probably more dangerous to climb the tree than just try and shake the cat off, but he couldn't possibly do that to a kid. His weight was never a problem when it came to heavy lifting around the station, but judging by the creaking coming from the branches and how unsteady the holds seemed-- for climbing a tree... he was starting to think they should've sent Petra instead.

"Are you scared?" The little girl asked, now having to shout for Ryan to hear her.

"I'm fine!" He answered. "I'm a professional!"

Still, he climbed. And climbed. And climbed until he was as high as he could go, clinging to a branch with his right hand, and reaching for the cat with his left. The cat, Berty, had been eyeing him the whole way up.

"Careful, Mister! Don't fall! You'll die!"

That was reassuring. Ryan looked down and sighed. He wasn't afraid of heights or anything, but the girl was right. He could at least break something important if he fell from up here. He'd never live it down at the station, then.

"Alright, Berty. Come on..." Ryan held out his hand, beckoning the cat. From below he could hear the girl was shouting much the same thing, only it sounded a lot more like "go with the big guy or I wont feed you!" Than anything else. Cute kid.

Still, the cat wouldn't budge. Ryan tried stretching his arm out farther, only to get scratched by the cat the moment he was within reach. He drew his arm back, staring at the tiny bleeding claw marks until they vanished in a puff of steam. The cat, seeing the steam, let out a yowl. Ryan had had about enough of that and shook the branch, thrusting his arm out for the cat to grab.

It worked. His arm was covered in tiny bleeding scratches, but it worked. As he made his way down, Ryan heard the little girl cheer.

"Berty!" She shouted gleefully as the cat leapt from Ryan's arm and onto her. Her arms were just as covered in scratches as his were. "Are you okay, Mister?" She asked, seemingly remembering that Ryan was still there.

"I'm fine! He didn't get me." Ryan laughed and showed her his healed hand, the skin scratch-free like it'd been earlier. He didn't question his power anymore, he was just glad to put it to good use.

"Wow, you're lucky! Mom says we have to get Berty declawed, but he got scared and ran away. I keep telling her it's fine! I don't mind getting scratched." Ryan nodded, letting the girl go on about how her cat was just shy, and her mother didn't understand that cats had feelings too.

The life of a fireman. Saving lives and cats from trees. Yeah, just another day.
Roleplay Sample - Network:voice;
Was this someone's phone number? [ That's not quite right... ]

Does anyone...? Uh, well. [ He clears his throat. Time to leave a message using his Authority Voice. ] Hi, I'm Ryan Brown, from the Locke City Fire Department. If you have any sort of emergency, don't hesitate to give us a call.

Just whose phone number is this, though?

Any Questions? I've asked about the fire department in the FAQ, so that should be all set...?