CR Chart!
RELATIONSHIPS
Gilbert Nightray
Gillyweed
"What the hell is a cell phone and why does it meow?!"
Gilbert was one of the first people Break met in the mansion. They hit it off as Gilberts and Breaks often do, and during their very first meeting Break wound up recounting the story of how in his world, cigarette smoke had caused the cancer that nearly killed him. A short while later, Break walked in on Gilbert and another Break having sex, and, well -- these two haven't really had a conversation that hasn't been awkward in some way, as of yet.
But Break finds that he's glad Gilbert is around, as things have been even worse with his own Gilbert since he fell ill at home. All the same, though, he'd dearly love to beat some sense into the kid. He feels that Gilbert doesn't know what he's capable of, and badly needs a punt in the right direction.
Shelly Rainsworth
Shelly Shelly Shelly Shelly Shelly <3
"You are incorrigible! Incorrigible!"
All Breaks love their Shellies, and this Break in particular sees his own Shelly as an elder sister; to that end, he latched onto the mansion's local Shelly almost immediately. She is one of the few alternates in the mansion he is truly comfortable with -- it concerns him, however, that this Shelly does not seem as cheerful and vibrant as his own. To that end, he is sure to devote time now and again to dragging Shelly into his shenanigans with him. So far this has included rummaging about for magical things to play with up in the attic, and having a tea party in drag. Most likely, it will only get worse from here as he continues to encourage her to open up to things her own world may not consider proper.
Xerxes Break
Reaper
"Evilly glowing eyes don't actually come with the package, but I suppose I could whip something up on short notice."
Reaper is, hands down, the coolest Break in the mansion, okay. Reaper can make his eyes glow red and do a scary tomb voice and disappear and stuff. It's awesome.
But, more importantly, Reaper is the oldest Break in the mansion, by virtue of his having been dead for about a century or so. He's also downright pleasant to be around, his radiating of coldness notwithstanding. Break spends a lot of time feeling like all the younger Breaks are his younger siblings, and that he's essentially babysitting half the rest of the mansion. Reaper gives him someone that he can look up to himself, and hope that as he continues to grow older, he may someday become as calm and steady as Reaper is -- to say nothing of the greater sense of security in regards to his own mortality. Break knows that if something happens to him here, Reaper will be there to take care of him, and this helps him a great deal.
Elliot Nightray
The Tiny Elliot Wiv the Dog
"But dogs don't use spoons!"
The first time these two met, Break picked him up and threatened to put him in the kitchen sink. Somehow, since then, their relationship has evolved to that of an uncle and his favorite nephew. Quite frankly, Break thinks this kid is a riot, and an excellent target for his teasing. It goes deeper than that, however, because the two have such similar interests, and Break finds Elly's extreme personality oddly refreshing. The dog is cute, too.
Secretly, he very much wants to take the boy home with him, so he can see all the fascinating things the modern world has to offer -- Elly would probably appreciate it more than anyone else in the mansion. Also taking him to Disneyworld and watching him explode would be absolutely hysterical.
Xerxes Break
Stuffy
"Given a few different quirks of fate, a few different choices -- I could have been you, and you could have been me."
Stuffy, so named because Break sort of gets the feeling of "tightly wound stress ball" from him much of the time, has inspired a great deal of conflicting emotions in Break since he's arrived. They started off well enough, until Break walked in on him having sex with a Gil and things got awkward and snippy; then the mansion decided to brainwash them into believing they'd been happily married for some time as an All Fool's joke. After that, the younger Xerxes had an enormous snit, and Break himself went the broody route. It was over a month before they even saw one another again, and when they did, it was in a fake Abyss.
Not the most stable relationship, obviously. And things will likely start to change even further between them since Stuffy was murdered and Break discovered the corpse -- although the feelings he had for the other man during the prank were planted in his head by the mansion, Break also can't deny that he felt them, and they haven't completely gone away since he regained his proper memories of who he really loves. To that end, he still feels an attachment to the other man, and the shock of finding him ripped apart with the ring from the prank there in his pocket has been enough to make him clingy, regardless of how awkward things still are.
Mad Hatter
Hatter \o/
"I'm not a kind creature to those who don't give me reason, Break."
Break loves him some Hatter. Hatter is the best thing. Hatter shares his craft stash and gives awesome cuddles and listens to him whine and boops his nose before he can get into too foul a mood. Now if he could just get him to stop the licking we'd be all set --
-- Break has no idea what he'd do without the Chain. He worried at first that Hatter was only extending his friendship to him because he was a Break, but the Chain has reassured him that every Xerxes in the mansion is an individual to him. Now, Break does not hesitate to rely on Hatter for comfort and companionship -- though he does feel guilty from time to time that he gets so much of the Chain's attention when there are other Breaks in the mansion who probably need him as well.
Gilbertine Nightray
Gillie
"Ice cream? With...what is a 'maple blondie'?"
Break has a soft spot for the local girl-Gil and isn't afraid to admit it -- to himself, anyway. She seems more inclined to actually try to solve the problems that she has than the other Gils around, and the fact that he can fluster her so easily brings him endless entertainment. Gilbertine is another of the mansion's residents that he wishes he could bring home with him -- women in his own world are raised much differently than she was, after all, and he has this notion that she would be a lot more confident with herself had she been brought up in his world.
Since they're stuck in the mansion, however, Break will do his best to just be supportive, occasionally amuse himself at her expense, and try to get her to stop stressing over things so much. He really does worry about that, and prefers to see her bright and happy and laughing whenever possible.
Gilbert and Vincent Nightray
The Boys
"Are you the one I'm supposed to introduce myself to, Mister Break?"
Gilbertine asked Break to help her take care of Gilbert and Vincent when they first met, and after a tense conversation with the Barma who serves as their parental figure, his position as babysitter was formally approved. Now, he does his best to engage the boys whenever he runs across them. His main concern with Gilbert is his insistence that he does not exist outside of his master, and Vincent, well; Vincent needs to not cut things. As of yet, he's not as close to either boy as he is with Elliot. In fact, given all the problems these two have to overcome, he sometimes feels that he's walking on eggshells trying not to trigger either of them, and interacting with them often calls his own insecurities in regards to his abilities as a parent to the front of his mind.
He is determined, however. Break is very firmly of the opinion that if he was given a second chance -- and then a third -- then a pair of children most definitely deserve the same. If someone will be there to put the effort into them, they can surely grow up to live healthy and happy lives, and he is all too happy to step up to the challenge. To some extent, he sees this as repaying life in general for kindness granted to him in the past when he needed it most.
Liam Lunettes
Handsy
"You're not trying to say that you're not my Xerxes, are you? "
What the hell is going on with this Liam, seriously. This one is just as annoying as every other Liam in the mansion by virtue of the fact that he isn't his Liam from home, but Break tries to avoid this one even more because this one is touchy. Break woke up in his bed once when the mansion decided it'd be funny to dump people in for snuggles, getting groped. He's still rather miffed that he actually had to explain to the man that he may be a Break, but that doesn't make him interchangeable with all the other ones.
There is a distinct lack of trust going on here, in other words. But he'll at least attempt to be civil, so long as Liam doesn't try anything.
Knave
Chain-Glen
"...wrong closet, I think."
Break enjoys Knave. He reminds him of his Glen Baskerville from home -- which is to say, not even remotely murderous or insane or inclined to burn large buildings full of many people to the ground -- and that's rather a breath of fresh air, in this place. Add in his honest desire to make Gilbertine happy and his willingness to help Break with the children in an emergency, and Knave is a pretty awesome guy as far as Break is concerned.
Once Break discovers that Knave and Gillyweed do not get along, however, it will also occur to him that he can use Knave to irritate the hell out of Gil by teaching him the most obnoxious tricks he knows. Gilbert had better pray to whatever deity he believes in that this never happens.
Liam Lunettes
Hobbles
"Have you given everyone here a nickname?"
This Liam makes Break crazy. All Liams are points of contention for him, but this one arrived aged 26 and horribly injured -- something that brought up some truly awful memories for Break. He couldn't just leave him alone when no one else in the mansion could care for him properly or teach him how to protect himself, but he couldn't behave naturally around him, either, and the result is an obnoxious and confusing push-and-pull in Break's head.
For quite some time Break hid his marriage to his own Liam from this one, aware that Hobbles has feelings for his own Xerxes. Finally, after a long spell of Break being actively stand-offish and ultimately driving the other man away, Liam found out through a version of Sharon. The two avoided each other for a long time after and when they finally spoke again, it ended in another fight. They may well just be doomed to not getting along.
Jack Vessalius
My Jack
"Well, if I en't English, what else might'n I be?"
Hailing from his beloved London, Jack isn’t the Jack from Break’s world, but that doesn’t stop him from thinking of this one as “his”. Quite frankly, he adores Jack, and if he wasn’t so attached to his Liam he would absolutely be up for a casual fling with this man. Jack is the perfect mix of cheerful, good-natured fun, and a friendly openness that makes it easy for Break to enjoy himself in his company with no strings attached or regard for the past.
As it is, he thinks of their romp in the kissing closet with a great deal of fondness past the vague guilt of it, and sees Jack as someone who can understand him better than most of the other residents of the mansion. It’s also really nice not to be the only one in the house who “talks funny” nowadays.
Rufus Barma
Dad-Barmy
"You'll notice I have neither small children nor frogs in my hair at this point in time?"
Eeeeew, a Barma. The usual distaste applies here, on both sides; but if he had to be absolutely honest about it such that someone he liked would be killed if he didn’t, Break would admit that he finds the presence of this Barma reassuring. Life in the mansion caring for the children has made him very like his own Barma at home, and he gets along with that Barma just fine -- in a “make snide comments all day long” sort of way -- and Break sees him as the proper father figure for the boys. Break himself is only the fun uncle, and it’s good to know there is someone there who can actually handle the more serious issues of child-rearing that Break feels incapable of managing on his own.
But if Barma is the dad and Break is the uncle, does that make them brothers...? Bleh. Best not to think about it.
Xerxes Break
Xerxie
"I've not decided if I'm going to like you or hate you."
This Xerxes is the dragon to Break’s firebird. She is mean in a way that borders on reptilian, and has a nasty habit of sinking her teeth into him; but he very much admires the ferocity running underneath the usual Break facade of smooth-talking charm. Despite finding her frustrating, unnecessarily nasty, and worrisome -- he feels an obnoxious need to fuss over her health in particular, at times -- Break has found himself inexplicably fond of Xerxie, and even quite attracted to her.
He has no intention of pursuing her, however. He thinks they’d be delightfully explosive if they fell in together that way, and he’d secretly love to teach her to be tender with her own heat. But he’s not free to fight for that, and is quite sure that she wouldn’t want him anyway.
Liam Lunettes
Tiny Liam
"I know. Not until puberty."
This child is simultaneously a blessing and Break's worst nightmare. On the one hand, he's a symbol of something Break would love to be able to give his own Liam at home -- a child who looks and behaves like he could be Liam's natural child, something he'll never get so long as he's with Break. On the other, this little Liam has not had his innate sense of precocious curiosity drilled out of him yet, and he wants to know everything in addition to being stupidly perceptive. He provides Break with a rather unique set of challenges -- one of the most recent being a scientific and completely unapologetic investigation of human sexuality, to say nothing of the thing with the frog -- and Break could easily tear all his hair out just trying to keep up with the kid.
He is fond of the tiny Liam, however. He just hopes his curiosity doesn't get him into trouble when Break's back is turned.