Description 

Devin Gallagher is a man originally born in the area of Sligo, Ireland. Raised on the waters of Ireland with his father and elder brother, Devin arrived in New Alexandria in October of 1904.

Physically speaking, Devin stands at 5’-10” (when he’s standing fully upright and not stooped over as he often is to write in his journal), with light brown hair bleached somewhat blonde by sun exposure, tanned skin, and blue eyes. He typically wears shades of blue, brown, and grey, with his habitual blue wool scarf around his neck at almost all times. He typically keeps his hair short and shaves sparsely, resulting in perpetual stubble.

Early Life 

Devin was born on July 8th, 1878, supposedly in a boat and during a storm. With his mother dying to bring him into the world, he instantly earned his older brother’s resentment and his father’s tenderness. It didn’t help that he gained her hair colour and grew to greatly resemble her as he aged.

Much of his early life was spent on the water. He loved to swim, to sail, and to forage along the water’s edge, and as he grew older, to venture further and further. The only “land” thing that was dear to him was music – he dearly wished to learn and play something, anything, so long as he could carry it over the water. He began to sing and slowly became adept at it, and learned to play the guitar. He used this skill in various ports to earn extra money for his vagrant family when he wasn’t scavenging along the riversides for herbs to use for his father’s many aches and pains. They typically took odd jobs in ports or on ships as hired hands, but refused to settle anywhere – the entire western coast of Ireland became their home.

Tragedy struck on April 3rd, 1904. His family was killed whilst the small sailboat they called home was anchored at a river’s edge near Sligo. Devin returned from a supply run to find them both dead and being picked over for valuables by two unknown figures. Overcome, he stabbed one and beat the other’s head in with a rock, reduced down to rage and horror that manifested in violence. It was put to an end by a blade to his own neck from behind.

He does not recall how, but he was brought to a doctor in Sligo who, picking up on the fact that Devin was a nomad sailor with little to no money or influence, tended to him…but poorly. Devin survived the knife to the throat and was released from the doctor’s care after three weeks. Those three weeks were spent in what he assumes was the man’s cellar, with minimal to no comfort, no pain management, and frequent and invasive procedures to “fix” his throat.

After his release, Devin immediately went to where the sailboat had been anchored. It had been pilfered in the meantime and was in disarray, but his family was nowhere to be seen. He searched and eventually found them. They’d swept downstream and caught on a tree fallen into the river after a spring flood. His failed attempt to fish them out of the water they’d been trapped in for three weeks was the straw that broke the camel’s back. He could not collect enough of them to bury and could only salvage his brother’s scarf and his father’s overcoat from the river’s edge.

These events sent Devin into a drunken, self-destructive spiral. He spent the time from mid-April to September drinking heavily to try and forget what he’d seen and done, to ease his guilt about surviving. He found himself in various bad situations and, though he attempted to work now and then, day-to-day life was nearly impossible. Eventually, something changed in him after he passed out and fell off a ship he was working on and into the water. He was rescued by another sailor and, upon his return to shore, decided he could not linger in the land he so closely associated with his family.

He took a steamboat to America and made his way to New Alexandria via its rivers. He wasn’t hopeful, but he was ready for change. Devin immigrated to the United States of America, and New Alexandria specifically, arriving in state on October 5th, 1904.

Present Life 

Devin lived first in Armadillo, rotating through several sleeping locations, and worked both at the Black Bullet Saloon, the Black Bulletin, and at the La Flor ranch as a ranch hand. He lost his ear after a bad run-in with an individual known as Hades. Said incident resulted in his kidnapping, a night in a locked shed after being tortured, and a long walk to safety after being released. After that incident, he reclaimed his ear – now shrunken and dried – from Hades.

After several events in Armadillo that shook his sense of stability and shattered the family there into smaller pieces, he moved with Cyril, who he’d met through Hank Henderson, to Van Horn. It was there that he spent some time as well, working briefly at the Old Light Saloon and doing general odd jobs to try and earn his place. Multiple incidents there eventually culminated in a schism in Van Horn as well, and he now considers the place and the idea of an “independent Van Horn” a pipe dream.

He mostly rides with his current group focused around Thomasin Cyril, Elijah Hartwood, and Nicholas Brennan, as well as the majority of the old Armadillo group. He jumps between social groups frequently as he loves all of them and sees them all as family despite their moral qualms with each other and his disapproval of some of their decisions.

Affiliations 

Thomasin Cyril
Ivan Harrows (adoptive brother)
Iron Hearth Ranch via Hank Henderson
Bear Paw Ranch via Mabel Moore (adoptive sister), Mato Kawewe, and Bailee Wolffe
Odette Burch
Elijah Hartwood
Nicholas Brennan

Quotes 

Trivia 

- His favourite instruments are the bagpipes, the guitar, and the mouth harp. He only knows how to play the guitar.

- He did not know how to ride a horse upon arriving in New Alexandria.

- He hates that his name is only one letter off “Devil”.

- Devin loves large horses due to how tall he feels riding them. He also appreciates how “sturdy” they feel, and if asked, will compare the saddle to a boat and the horse to water. He also has a strong preference for brown horses.

- He suffers from sleep disturbances and overall poor sleep, heightened paranoia and overall vigilance, outbursts of anger, mood swings, claustrophobia and (minor)iatrophobia, and flashbacks because of his family’s deaths and his time spent with the doctor, as well as various stressors in New Alexandria. His symptoms have been worsening as of late, and others have developed over the course of a few months.

- His family died on April 3rd, 1904.

- His favourite colour is blue.

- He has a keloid scar at the site of his neck wound, a small surgical scar above it, is missing his right ear, and has a burn scar on the right side of his ribcage in the shape of a fox. Due to frequent infections and a debridement of the burn, the scar on his chest is particularly prominent, but his ear has healed mostly and is often hidden under his hair.

- Devin has a tattoo of an anchor on his left hip.

- Devin does not consider himself to be particularly handsome, at least not more than average, but adores dressing up and being complimented, even if he’s too shy to admit it.

- Regularly refers to himself as a fish. He has multiple reasons for this.

- His pet dog, Trout, is a Labrador retriever. Trout is an excellent boy.