Orion

Mate – Silverslash
Breed – Imperial
Gender – Male
Element – Lightning
Talent – Dual Distinct Personalities
Faction – Archivist
Role – Safeguarding the knowledge of the Unrepentant Clan.
Dark Secret – Actually Optimus Prime.
Traits (Orion) – Soft-spoken, informal diction, intellectual, companionable and affectionate, surprisingly disorganized, pacifistic (seeks compromise whenever possible), weak and clumsy.
Traits (Pax) – Commanding and controlling, excessively formal diction, calculating, emotionally distant, alarmingly rigid, sees combat as the only acceptable solution, highly skilled warrior.
Appearance – The gilded inlays on his wings and scales, along with his elaborate golden armor, only manifest when Orion enters his Pax personality.
Sins – Pride, vengeance, remorseless violence, mass slaughter.
Likes – Reading (for hours on end), the just and fair treatment of criminals, sparring with Silverslash, every kind of sweet treat imaginable.
Dislikes – Losing control of Pax, being ignorant or under-informed, organized religious worship, others rearranging his possessions (or his archives).
Theme Music – Fly On the Wall (Thousand Foot Krutch)

Orion was hatched into slavery, into a clan of humanoid beasts - the selfsame clan as the gladiator Silverslash. Their fates, however, could not possibly have been more different.

Noted for his docile temperament, the hatchling Orion was selected as a subject for the beasts’ religious rituals. Rituals that would, over the course of several decades, transform him into an avatar of war – a powerful weapon under the complete control of his masters.

In his adolescence, the Imperial bore witness to the first of Silverslash’s rebellions. Though ultimately a failure, it inspired Orion, making him aware of the potential for an existence beyond the walls of the beasts’ temple complex. Through an intermediary known as Dusk, the Imperial made contact with Silverslash, now a gladiator of considerable renown.

Together, they began to engineer a second rebellion, a fast friendship forming between them as they plotted and planned. Silverslash devised methods to sabotage the beasts’ rituals, to allow Orion to retain control over his own body and mind – to prevent him from becoming a weapon.

Such sabotage was… ill-advised. At such a late stage in the ritual, the process could not be reversed. Instead, the warlike aspect splintered from the Imperial’s consciousness, becoming a separate entity that referred to itself as Pax. This entity manifested in situations of extreme pain or stress, be it physical or mental, temporarily transforming Orion into the avatar that the beasts had so desired.

Only temporarily, however – the transformation would end once the threat had been eliminated. The remainder of the time, Orion’s mind and body were his own.

He and Silverslash continued to plan their rebellion, down to every meticulous detail. Success seemed all but assured – until their cause was betrayed by one of their own, their plans revealed to the beasts that enslaved them. There was no chance to implement their strategies – their masters would descend upon them in a matter of hours, and the fate of every last conspirator was certain to be execution.

Their only hope was to escape. Chaos ensued, a bloody battle in which the beasts once again overwhelmed and recaptured the majority of their draconic slaves. Silverslash and Dusk escaped, setting a meeting place where Orion was to join them if his own escape was successful.

Orion didn’t escape. Pax did.

Blinded by rage and vengeance, the warlike avatar assumed complete control, forcibly supressing Orion’s personality. Though the Imperial had no concrete memories of his time as Pax, one thing was clear – he had spent quite literally centuries battling against the beasts, leading various insurgent strike forces against his former slavers.

When Orion at last awoke, he was battered, beaten, and exhausted. His clearest memory was of a single location – that fateful meeting place. Following that memory, he discovered the tattered remains of a scroll, instructions that Silverslash had left for him – it was a ritual of communication, one that would connect him to the gladiator anywhere in the realm of Sornieth. Provided, of course, that the Guardian still lived.

The ritual succeeded. Silverslash had never lost faith in his ally, calling the Imperial to his side.

Orion discovered that the gladiator now controlled a clan of his own, that he was raising an army against the beasts. Not merely a single beastclan – his goal was to eliminate every last beastclan from the face of Sornieth, and he had already achieved several major victories. This was not a strike force. This was a complex military operation. Orion, however, wanted no part of it. He was tired of violence, tired of pain, and tired of Pax.

Silverslash wanted him for an entirely different reason - for the peaceful and intelligent dragon he had befriended all those centuries ago. The Imperial would not be a soldier in his army. Rather, he would be the archivist of the clan. It was an offer that Orion eagerly accepted.

Once again at the side of his closest ally, their relationship quickly transitioned from that of companions to that of lovers. Orion happily became the third of the gladiator’s mates.

Though the Clan of Second Chances is monstrous and twisted, the Imperial has found himself perfectly at ease. Silverslash will protect him from harm, as will Pax. Orion is valued and feared by the clan in equal measure. Valued for his archival skill, and feared for Pax’s combat prowess. Only the gladiator is Pax’s equal in combat, and only the gladiator has the ability to calm him, to restore Orion’s control of the Imperial’s mind and body.

Though he does not wage war, Pax often rises up in defense of the Unrepentant Clan, fighting at their leader’s side. The remainder of the time, Orion loses himself in the depths of the archives, studying the knowledge therein even as he attempts to organize it.

This was never the future that the Imperial envisioned for himself, or for Silverslash. As mates, they command a vast army of expendable fodder, while ruling over that army’s powerful and twisted overseers - the dragons of the Unrepentant Clan.

In his true personality, Orion may not be a monster. However, he stands willingly at the right hand of the most powerful monster of them all, with a dark and formidable power lurking below the surface of his own unassuming form.

Orion may not be monster – but Pax is.