Sebastian Timothy Martin

Canon: The Time Machine
Face-claim: Ewan McGregor
Social Status: Middle class. Sebastian lives in Greenwich village so that he’s close to his workplace, and due his years at the school he has a substantial salary.
Occupation: English Professor at NYU
Age: 35
Appearance: When you look at Seb, there’s probably one word that crosses your mind, at least when he’s totally being himself: adorable. Of course he doesn’t mean to be, he just naturally emanates a kind of sweetness and caring not really found in other men. Very much like a woman in fact, but there’s that sort of child-like twinkle in his eye that completes the whole package. Sometimes he looks clueless, and he probably he is, but other times he just sort puts on a happy face when what’s really going on inside his head is too much for him to handle. Even though he tries to hide it, the physical wear and tear shows on his body, and often when he’s depressed (which is usually) he’ll slouch his shoulders, and his whole form will droop with it.

He’s not that muscular, but enough to get him by, and he runs a lot, so his legs are like a runner’s legs. His hair changes with the seasons, lightening in the summer and darkening in the winter. Sometimes he’ll even dye it, depending on how confident he feels about himself at the time. He’s a bit nearsighted, so he wears black rimmed glasses most of the time to compensate for his lack of focus. His eyes will dart behind them, usually focused on some sort of door or exit for a quick escape (when he has a vision). He twitches a lot, fiddling with his fingers and shuffling his feet, typical of any shy nerd one might encounter. He always looks thoughtful, as if he’s thinking beyond the here and now (which he probably is). His attire includes all the things a typical college professor might wear: blazers, sweater-vests, striped ties, the works. When he’s not teaching or being a dork, he wears lots of different scarves. He’s always careful to match, as he feels being tacky is outrageous. The only time he ever thinks about wearing something not well put together is when he’s either extremely depressed or he’s going to save someone, in which case he usually wears more dingy, running clothes that aren’t super expensive.


Overall Personality: Sebastian Martin is not a normal person by any means, but he tries to be, poor dear. He’s a bit eccentric, though not so ridiculously out there. He’s very quiet and shy, and usually only speaks his mind when necessary. Unfortunately, this leads people to often take advantage of him, or at least think they can. Many think him naive and innocent, but that is hardly the case. He prefers to pretend that he is that way, simply because he’s so frightened of the future ahead of him. He sees it all in his head, and he’s not hidden from the fact that the world is going downhill. He just likes to forget about it.

Sebastian is rather smart, though he often doesn’t let it on. Not purposely, he just doesn’t think anything of his small genius, so other people don’t either. Thus even more people take advantage of him, and he lets them because he is a naturally kind person. He cares greatly for people in general, even if people don’t always care for him. However, Sebastian can be resourceful when need be, and is very clever in tough situations. He can mislead people with his cunning and quick wit, and in turn he can take advantage of other people as well, though he doesn’t necessarily like to. As I said, he’s rather thoughtful of most people, but he can be sarcastic and mean on occasion, especially when he’s in a bad mood or speaking to someone he dislikes.

While Sebastian is often mistaken as a rather happy person at first glance, he is rather tormented, and often goes through intense bouts of depression, constantly feeling sorry for himself, the world, and all the people he can’t save. He'll remember his boyfriend, Andrew, and wonder what his life would have been like without the visions, and that makes him even more depressed than before. With this depression comes his tendencies to daydream, speak nonsensically about things no one has ever heard of , drink excessive amounts of coffee (his favorite thing in the world), and hide himself away in his home, reading comic books or watching Star Trek (the little Trekkie that he is), all as a defence mechanism for when he becomes overly upset or distraught.

Due to his constant torments, Sebastian has developed a bit of paranoia and masochism. The paranoia comes in as constant twitching, though he can control it if the need arises. He’ll always look for an exit, and his mind is always on red alert to keep his cool if he has a vision, and to make up stories for why he blacked out, or why he has to leave so suddenly. His masochism has developed due to his constant feeling of superiority, not over other people, but over his visions. He feels like he can control them, and himself, and not let them rule his life, but he’s done so unconsciously. He feels the need to play God all the time, with his visions and all, but honestly, he’s just asking for the pain and suffering that goes along with it. If he just let go of the burden, stopped being so worried about everyone else, he might just get better about that. He can also be a bit of a pessimist, even though he’d like to think he’s an optimist. His sarcasm can stretch miles, especially when someone annoys him, and he’s often described as sassy and egotistical, though that’s never what he’s aiming for.

He’s a naturally subdued person, and that might come from being in the closet most of his young life. His mother did not approve of his sexuality at first. You might think him a sweetheart, really, and with good reason. He is one. When he’s not battling his demons or trying to save people’s lives, he’s a genuinely kind and loving person, even though he’s quick to hate a person if they’ve done him or the human race wrong (ie: murderers and criminals). He’s the sort of person that everyone needs as their friend, as he’s very protective and caring over those he associates with. He loves people in general, as stated before, and really will do anything to protect those closest to him.

Likes:

• Andrew
  
• Coffee
  
• Dogs
  
• Reading
  
• Riding his bike
  
• Nature
  
• Sci-fi movies and television
  
• Humanity/People in general
  
• Teaching
  
• Men
  
• Favorite colors: blue and yellow
  
• Apple Martinis

Dislikes:

• His visions
  
• Smoking/Smokers
  
• Murderers
  
• Being alone
  
• Tea
  
• Cars
  
• Airplanes
  
• Lying to keep his secret
  
• Small-minded people

Goals: He doesn’t have many goals for his life, really, except to make sure he doesn’t waste his ability to see the future, so he saves people as often as he can. All he really wants, however, is someone to fill the void Andy left in his life (however he could never be replaced completely).

Overall History: Sebastian Martin was born in Georgia, to a poor mother and a drunk father. He was rather lonely as a child, and was very shy in school. At an early age, he was fascinated by the magical and fantastic. He would often beg his mother to take him to the latest fantasy and science-fiction movies at the local cinema, even though they could hardly afford such niceties. Also his mother, being a pious woman, discourage her child's fantasies, instead giving him the bible to read. Eventually he grew to accept God as a teenager, but was still skeptical, and would later become agnostic as an adult because of it.

When he started high school, things began to change. More and more expectations were being placed upon him. All he wanted to do was read literature and comic books, however the adults around him kept pushing him to pursue a career, namely in the scientific field, as he was rather good at science. However, Sebastian never really cared about the research part of it, so he tried his hand at drawing comics instead. But he realized he was terrible at it, so then he started writing. He wasn’t very good at that either... It wasn’t until he actually reached college that he realized his calling was to teach. His personal life was really all that mattered to him when he was younger...

Sebastian began to realize that all the girls his mother suggested he date didn't attract him at all, but rather some of the boys at school. He came out to his mother, who did not approve in the slightest. He became miserable, his mother hardly speaking to him, and pretended that he hadn’t come out of the closet at all. He was very hurt, as he looked up to his mother, even though he knew she wasn't always right. He knew she wasn't right now, but it still would have been nice for her to acknowledge her son's preference.

One day, Sebastian was riding his bike home from school, and was caught by surprise when he found a gay pride parade happening in the streets a few blocks from his home. He was so happy that he found people who could relate to him that he dropped his stuff back at home and went back to the parade, trying to make friends and join in festivities. However, a group of religious protesters swarmed the scene an hour later, and attacked those who were in the parade brutally. A few people were killed, and Sebastian was badly injured by a couple of parents of kids he knew. He ran home the moment he could get away. When his mother saw him-- bruised, bleeding and crying-- she realized she was being the same as all the others by ignoring her son's sexuality, and embraced him and all his differences. No one deserves to be beaten for being different, and she accepted who he was, and their relationship strengthened.

Sebastian's father had left them years before, leaving him and his mother to fend for themselves. The boy didn't mind working, so he took a job at a local comic book store, somewhere he fit in. His school life wasn't too great, as when he came out during the parade (as the parents of the kids he knew of course told their children who had been there, unwisely), his reputation dropped to zero. He wasn't beaten, as his school had a zero tolerance policy for violence, but he was indeed called names and ostracized. If there were any other gay kids around his school, they were too afraid to come out for fear of being just like him. Instead of socializing, he focused on his studies. He excelled in english, and was on his way to realizing his destiny as an English teacher.

Things were going pretty great for Sebastian and his mother for a while... but then, his life changed forever. At the beginning of his sophomore year, Sebastian and his mother were in a brutal car accident. He watched his mother die almost as if in slow motion. He'd been horrified and grief stricken all in one blow. He wouldn't eat for days. This really messed him up emotionally, but not as much as mentally. The crash changed him. During the crash, he hit his head as his mother was killed on impact. It triggered something in his brain, and much to his dismay he began seeing things. Sometimes he felt out of his body, like he was seeing an event beyond the here and now. He also began to have these dreams. They were few at first, but they picked up pace. They drove him crazy, his appearance becoming disheveled, and his grades dropped. The battles that plagued him were grand in scope; medieval, colonial, Victorian, and even Modern warfare. While he was studying his textbook in History class, he noticed that some of these battles recorded were exactly the same as in his dreams! This baffled him to no end, for how in the world could he have seen the battles in his head before knowing about them? He thought maybe his mother told him about them when he was young...

After a while, the dreams began varying, some still battles, while some seemed the stuff of the future. There were also murders of young women, men, children and the like. Sebastian wasn't sure if these things he was seeing were real, or if he had developed schizophrenia. He was terrified of both options, but perhaps if it was the former at least he wasn't crazy. Eventually he chalked it up to PTSD, and tried seeing a therapist to ease the stress. It didn't really help, and seemed to increase the amount of "visions" as he called them than before. Of course he didn't tell the therapist that he was seeing things, he had just wanted to learn some techniques to ease his stress and PTSD. Nothing seemed to work. Something drastic happened one day, however, to change his mind about the nature of his visions. One night he dreamed of a brutal killing where the victim, a girl at his school, was skinned alive. About a week later, that same girl was found dead, stripped to the bone, in an alley by the school.

He knew by then that these dreams were visions of the past and foretelling of the future. He could see throughout all time. It saddened him that all he could see was death and despair. He became depressed and subdued, angered that while his dreams showed him the future, he could not prevent the murders themselves, nor go back in time to save those who had been lost. He felt so incredibly guilty that he developed acute depression, focusing all his time in studying to forget about the visions that would come at random times throughout the day.

Without a mother to guide him he had to do things on his own, and he was even worse off financially than before. Tired of staying in small-minded Georgia and in his hometown, he studied and studied until he was able to get a full-ride scholarship to NYU, his dream school. He settled in nicely, but due to his years of being a loner, he had no friends or connections he could depend upon, and soon felt like a little fish in a big pond. To pay his way he got a temporary job as a waiter, and then at a bookstore when that fell through.

He excelled in school, having nothing else to occupy his time, so he graduated rather easily and became a grad student. He'd figured that English majors didn't have much else to do outside of teaching, since he was hardly the next great American novelist, so he decided to pursue a teaching degree. He aspired to be a university professor, as he had more fond memories of college than of high school.

While he was still a grad student, Sebastian stumbled upon an undergraduate named Andrew Johnson. Now he likes to think it was love at first sight, but really Andrew kept him calm. He made him laugh, and he made him forget. Seb still had visions, and it had gotten worse over the years and led to psychic episodes where he might find himself forgetting where he was going after he saw, startling the people around him, and himself. Even after Seb told him about his visions, Andrew still stayed with him, despite the fact Sebastian knew his boyfriend thought him a loon. He felt loved to know that Andy liked him anyway.

After both he and Andrew graduated with their respective degrees, they moved in together in Brooklyn, just above a little shop that Andrew bought and turned into a café. He ran it, and Seb worked at the nearest university. Around this time Seb's visions started getting worse, and one day, as he was walking home from the park, he had one that would happen as soon as he turned the corner onto the next block. He did so, and there it was. Secretly he'd saved a couple of people from death before, but it was ages ago, back before he met Andrew. He couldn't just stand there, though, and not do anything. The woman was being strangled to death in an alleyway, and no one who passed by bothered to help. So he did. He called out to the attempted murderer and stopped him. Unfortunately he ran off, but he was able to help the woman to the hospital, saying that he was merely a passerby.

When he got home after being questioned by the police, Andrew was there. Sebastian told him about what happened, but Andy thought he was messing with fate. They argued for a while, but eventually they settled their differences and decided to talk about it later. But then later became never, and Sebastian continued to have visions that would happen in the near future, and he continued to save them. They kept arguing and arguing, until Sebastian felt he hardly recognized Andrew anymore. Why had he done these things when they hurt his love so much? But he couldn’t just leave people to die, even if Andy accused him of playing God...

Then it happened. Andrew died.

Sebastian had just come home from work, the day after one of their worst arguments to date. Sebastian hadn’t even said goodbye to Andrew as he left that morning. The house now was empty, and it seemed too quiet, too much like death. He made his way over to his typewriter, where he wrote a journal about his and Andrew’s life together. Andy always hated the thing, said it was a waste of money and too big to be considered decent... As he walked... As he walked he began to have a vision. Someone he couldn’t see, though he wished he’d seen, was ripping Andrew apart. As Sebastian cleared the room and stood in front of his typewriter, he had dropped his briefcase, and its contents had fallen open.

In the wastebasket a bunch of crumpled up papers were overflowing, that he hadn’t left. Still in the typewriter, moved up just so he could see, lay the words “I’m sorry - Andy.” Sebastian had been absolutely sure that his vision was one in the far future, that he could most definitely prevent. He had been sure, he had to be sure... But then his cellphone rang, and the vision lept into the past.

At first he had screamed, loud enough that his neighbors thought he himself was being murdered. When the police arrived, he was huddled in a corner, clutching one of Andrew’s favorite sweaters and sobbing. Things seemed to go by in a blur. Sebastian wouldn’t eat, wouldn’t sleep, wouldn’t do anything. He was given a temporary leave of absence from his work, but he quit anyway. Andrew’s family hadn’t liked Sebastian all that much, so he was hardly included in the planning of Andy’s funeral, or considered when it came down to giving away his things. All of Andrew’s belongings were given back to his family, however Sebastian stole his favorite, the one he’d held as sobbed when Andy died, when he was forced to move away from the shop and to Greenwich Village.

He got a job at NYU, after he’d built up some good credentials at his previous school, plus the added bonus of being an alum. Slowly, he began to feel normal, but his heart was still empty after Andrew died. He ended up finding a dog on the street to rid himself of some loneliness in his life, and now he loves Data as if he’d had him since he was small. However, since Andrew died the visions became much worse, and now he doesn’t know what to do with himself.

So, he continued to try and save peoples lives, progressively becoming better at hiding his identity through anonymous tips and fleeing the scene before any victim or perpetrator saw his face. This is what he does with most of his time, and he feels like he’s somehow making up for not being there for Andrew, not being able to save him. It makes him feel better, and he’s somehow, someway, found his own bit of normalcy. What else is he to do with his time, after all? Time is the one thing he cannot waste.

Most Influential Event: There are actually two: The day his mother died, which left a gaping whole in his life AND triggered his visions, and the death of his boyfriend Andrew, which spurned him to save people more often.

Sample Writing:

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