Lear, formerly known as Timothy Burton, is a peasant born conscript to the Stormwind Legion, serving in Northrend, and more recently the commandant of the Black Auxiliary, an associate paramilitary of the Vanguard Party in Stormwind. He is a young human male, but most other details about him are unknown, having wiped his identity to craft a new one after his imprisonment and release.
Timeline![1]
Name and Titles[]
Lear shortened his name to disassociate himself from his former identity as well as rid himself of the notions of family and nationality following the doctrine of his mentor and friend Sinclair. The choice of Lear was completely arbitrary and has no real meaning in any ideological or personal context. Lear feels that it is a name by which he can make his mark on the world unique and outstanding.
Titles[]
Lear's achieved only a meagre rank within the Stormwind Legion, having only served for a year before being dismissed from service. He was a Private and, although popular among his fellow troops, was unable to gain the rank of Corporal because of his bickering with officers. However, after his dismissal, Lear was able to gain more recognition and helped begin the Brothers of Tyr, a short-lived movement in Westfall, vaguely following the ideas set out in 'The Titan's Chosen'. From there, his Sergeant from Northrend, Sinclair, recognised the youth's potential and entrusted him with the necessary paramilitary organisation to Sinclair's budding political party. Lear has entitled himself the self-styled 'Commissioner' of the Black Auxiliaries and attempts to build his influence within the Vanguard and Azeroth.
History[]
Lear was born, year 11, to a freeman, Andrew Burton, and an unidentified peasant woman. His mother and father separated in an unusual and unexplained series of events, which Andrew has never cared to explain to an inquisitive Lear. As a migrant worker, Andrew took off with Lear as soon as he was weaned off of his mother's breast. Andrew would make money working on farms seasonally and would gain extra income from gambling with other freemen and tradesmen. Burton's reputation eventually caught up with him, and Andrew was shunned from most farms for the suspicion of cheating farm owners and other migrant workers out of their money. Denied of labour, the Burton family settled in Redridge, where Andrew enlisted to the Stormwind Legion.
Having to clear up the mess left behind by the orcish Hordes of the Second War, Andrew was often on duty and left Lear in the barracks. Here, Lear was trained to be a soldier from a young age and became accustomed to drills and military practices. Lear learned how to read, write and, most importantly to him, kill. As the other children did not take to Lear very well, the young boy took to nature in a rather dark manner, only further perturbing his peers. The boy began to dissect insects, and then moved up to larger critters and creatures; his father had noted that Lear had a fascination with the "sound bones make". This eventually landed in trouble when one of the officers discovered the head of a dog impaled outside the barracks living quarters. Lear was heavily berated by his father and was kept under detention in the living quarters. There, Lear stewed in his desires and, denied from both his love and social interaction, became bitter towards his father from a young age.
At age ten, Andrew was sent to Lordaeron to assist the Kingdom against the threat of the Scourge. Lear never knew what became of his father, but was transferred to a nearby orphanage from the barracks. At the orphanage, Lear at least managed to make friends. The other children regarded him as reserved and quiet, and noticed that he was always reading books. So much so that the mistress of the orphanage took a shine to Lear, even allowing him to assist her in selling her wares. The mistress owned a local apothecary, and created elixirs and potions to fund her orphanage. Here, the mistress quite innocently taught Lear how to bleach and, later, preserve animal bones. Eventually, however interesting he found his education, Lear began to get bored at the orphanage, and missed the manipulation of life he enjoyed at the barracks. Originally, to stifle this boredom, he would drink alcohol, even at the young age of thirteen. Lear soon became known for his drink and he was punished for trying to introduce it to younger orphans several times. At the age of fourteen, he was expelled from the orphanage after stealing and hiding quantities of acid from the apothecary.
Lear, after some time living under the bridge in Lakeshire, found work as a caravan assistant, and would move boxes of goods for a merchant who was travelling from Lakeshire to Stormwind. It was on this job that Lear performed his first murder. Drinking at a tavern in Elwynn, near the Eastvale Logging Camp, Lear encountered an older woman who propositioned him. Attracted, Lear went to the woman's house in the Logging Camp. There, they drank for several more hours, before Lear began talking animatedly about the animals he had killed on the road. The woman, disturbed by Lear's obsessions, asked the adolescent to leave. Lear did not wish to leave, and instead struck the man twice on the back of the head while the man sat at a table. Then, when the woman was unconscious, he strangled her to death. Paranoid and anxious, he worked fast to enjoy the ultimate dominance and control death had given him. Lear dissected the woman's corpse, paring the flesh from the bones. He then dissolved the flesh in acid and took two finger bones with him as he fled into the night.
Lear's next move, at the age of sixteen, was to join the Stormwind Legion like his father.
Personality[]
Lear is a very ambitious youth and it is something very noticeable about him. He is passionate about his bright future for both him and the Vanguard. In spite of this positive outlook and burning ambition, Lear is known to be anxious, insecure, worried, paranoid and displays a lack of self-confidence. By his description, he would say that he thinks a lot about things and will question himself and his ideals constantly. It is this flow of thought that has caused Lear to pay a lot of attention to detail, often picking apart ideas and tactics and subjecting them to extreme analysis before he makes his move. However this does not mean that he is a hesitant man, as he will often act on youthful impulse, much to his later chagrin, especially if it turns out badly. These traits are something he believes he has inherited from his father, who was known locally to be a successful gambler. Lear himself does not gamble, but feels that he attempts to make his moves in calculated risks.
Socially Lear's insecurity translates itself as a reticent bashfulness and shyness, something which he often has to bottle and curtail when addressing his troops and comrades. It is something that he would not describe as shyness, but rather an extreme and overpowering fear of embarrassment and humiliation. He has little tolerance for those who patronise him about his youth or lack of an education, and will scathingly retort if challenged. Lear prizes his lightning quick wit and ability to riposte in verbal jousts. This is both humorous and an aspect of Lear's passive aggression. The wit Lear possesses is an image of his intellect but lack of knowledge. It is clear that Lear has, or even perhaps had, a lot of unused potential.
Lear is a reserved character and will often not say what he means, but rather what he believes is closest to his ideal character. This creates a strange juxtaposition between the person Lear wishes to be and the person Timothy is. Sometimes this repressed and bottled instinct can overflow and cause him to reveal part of his true character, such as a festering and twisted anger, desire for disturbed dominance or displaying loneliness. Lear himself has even acknowledged this in the transition of his name, drawing the line under the emotionally unstable and lazy Timothy and creating the perfect paragon of 'The Titan's Chosen': Lear is the stoic warrior dedicated to the cause of law and order. Intellectual, but an unselfish man of the people who is sharp-tongued and commanding. Timothy, on the other hand, is a a lazy and disillusioned teenager forced into military service craving the love of his father and the company of others.
To those observant, they will notice something quite off about Lear; something not quite there in a human. In flares of anger and displays of personality unguarded by the overarching mask of 'Lear', his character is revealed as quite a black and dominating one. Lear takes pleasure in dominance and control, and often enjoys when someone is in the palm of his hand. This fascination, discovered by his father, can darkly translate into the ultimate control one has over a corpse or a dead being. Often dissecting animals as a child, Lear was pushed away from most social situations and was denied the early rites of passage, such as loss of virginity or confirmation by peers. This has made Lear reclusive socially and developmentally, but he has admitted privately to being a homosexual. However, in light of Sinclair's teachings and among the ranks of his troops, his sexuality is essentially unnecessary and irrelevant now.