Niles

Niles Layken Styne (no neé) is a primary character in Nightmares. He is of German descent, having lived in Hamelin for most of his childhood before a man in colored smocks arrived and hypnotized all the "rats" to drown themselves, including his mother and father. He ran off with his brother for years as a mindless wererat in Germany's black forests until a hunter shot him with a silver-lined bullet. Because he didn't know how to heal himself, he collapsed and was left for dead by Nixon, who would stumble upon a different area in life. When he regained his human consciousness, he was horrified to discover that he was now a young adult and completely alone.

After tracking down the hunter and killing him for his clothes, Niles fled to a ship headed for the mainland and settled in Rennai for some time, doing odd jobs and tasks until he could establish a meager living for himself, when he first noticed Fiona at a party. However, this made his wererat abilities unstable and nearly left him mindless again until he met Fiona in person, who revealed she had powers that could help him with his ordeals. With her help, Niles was able to regain control over his abilities and shifting seemingly for good; the two would later marry and have twins with greater powers than his own.

Human Form
Niles is a male of average height and has a well-proportioned muscular form. His skin is light but faintly pallored and his hair is a dirty shade of brown, with grey eyes that may occasionally turn silver if his mood gets too sour or if he experiences arousal.

His hair is usually unstyled and somewhat messy regardless of what he does with it, and his eyes are described as being "tired but warm." He's seen to have semi-defined cheekbones and thick, dark eyebrows. His younger self generally looked the same as he does in 1865, but his face was not defined as much and he sometimes let his facial hair grow in, nor did he style his hair as elegantly.

After finding Nixon, Niles makes an effort to style his hair and puts it in the same flip as his brother's, but makes himself recognizable still by flipping the hair in the opposite direction.

Wererat Form
As a wererat, Niles is shown to have significantly increased muscle mass and grows a few inches in height--dark grey hair grows over his body but leaves certain areas bare, such as from the elbow to the fingertip and the calf to the toetip; his glutes also seem to lack hair. His front pelvis also lacks hair protection, therefore exposing his genitals. A long tail a few shades darker than his default skin appears just where his pelvic bone begins, though at times it's nothing more than a vestigial feature.

His face is elongated into a canine-like snout with long frontal incisors and sharpened canines, combined with a jaw that's capable of stretching further than normal, and his ears round out and move closer to the top of his head, which is still filled with his human hair. Whiskers are seen on his face as well, and his eyes change to a glowing silver--the sclerae change color depending on his mental state: white for human sentience, grey for half-beast, and black for animalistic.

His feet and hands elongate and stretch into horrid talons capable of tearing flesh and most wooden surfaces and the feet arch but do not totally become paws. Although his form is normally seen as quadrupedal, it's shown that Niles only stands or walks on twos and runs on fours: while on fours, his body shape slightly changes so that he won't irritate his spine.

During the Niles-Nixon clash period, Niles' inhuman traits appear much more as a physical manifestation of his anger towards Wellen: his tail extends by five inches, his claws turn even sharper, his height also changes, and a bushy "mane" of hair develops by his chest and goes down to his back. He also becomes more resistant to any kind of charm and is much stronger; when Vexen is forced to fight him, she remarks that "he was fighting with an unseen fury", and that he was proving difficult even for her.

Personality
Niles is a Rat who is descended from one of Hamelin's own. Due to the fact that both his parents were afflicted, he has great anger towards his family line for "cursing" him, and as a result, despises himself for what he must live with.

During his introduction story, Niles was only seen as being depressed enough to try and end his life by drowning (due to the story in Hamelin, all Rats born there cannot swim) as a way of eliminating any chance of Rathood. It would have been easy, to him, as before the births of the twins, Niles was seemingly the only Rat of Magnolia.

Powers and Skills
For more information, go to Niles/Abilities

Powers
(Note: Niles eventually learns to resist a shift and stay human, at the cost of developing simultaneous haemolacria, nosebleeds, and other orfices or capillaries to burst from instability.) Eventually, Niles gains the ability to retain his intelligence and frame of mind when shifted due to the silver finally leaving his system.
 * Shape-shifting - Niles is able to take on the form of a bipedal rat-like monster, though each shift is not entirely of his own volition. The shift sometimes comes when it chooses to, and each one is incredibly painful, even causing very brief unconsciousness. The human mind is pushed back during this process, and any figment that remains does not have enough power to maintain full control. Niles compares it as being "in a horse-drawn carriage, but someone else has the reins."
 * Strength and Durability - Niles is able to attack others with great force, and in addition, has clawed fingertips that can cause deep gashing scratches. Stamina also applies to this category, with the current idea being that he lasts much longer in fights. The stamina boost also applies to his human state, though to a lesser degree. While defending himself from vagrants during his younger years, it was described that Niles "barely seemed to tire" as his attackers were panting for breath.
 * Enhanced Speed - Niles, while not inhumanly fast, can outrun most humans while in his regular state. In the transformed state, he can outrun male stags and possibly wildcats.
 * Delayed Aging - Due to the fact that Rats and Wolves alike have longer lifespans, they age slower. As a Rat, Niles is an example. He appears to be twenty-eight or thirty-seven, but his true age isn't known. Because the story of The Pied Piper takes place in the year 1284 (allegedly), this would make Niles' true age be near the 600's range. Niles is also descended from Fairytales, who are semi-ageless and don't die unless their story is destroyed. It's also possible, however, that the timeline of the series is closer-knit than it claims, which could imply that The Pied Piper is a recent event. This seems to be the likely answer to ensure that characters aren't 1000+.
 * Healing - Niles, alongside many others, has an enhanced healing factor that causes him to regenerate wounds or recover from illnesses at a more advanced level than normal humans. Scratches and slashes heal the moment they occur without leaving a scar, deep injuries heal within minutes, and bone fractures within hours. Limbs themselves may possibly regrow, but it's not a proven point.

Weaknesses

 * Moonlight - While it remains true that moonlight enhances the abilities of Werecreatures, it is a huge disadvantage at the same time. Moonlight increases one's adrenaline, which is the reason for strength but also the likelihood an unintentional shift will occur: the chance of it being a mindless one is even greater. Moonlight also decreases one's health during that time and prevents a reversion until the very moment of sunrise. For Niles, this is somewhat countered if Fiona uses her Charm to temper his anxiety: he won't be able to revert or resist a shift, but his human memories of his family would remain so that he would see them as packmates and wouldn't attack them.
 * Silver - Niles has commented several times that he can't touch silver, or the affected skin would burn through. Silver wouldn't kill him, but the chemical properties within it would cause damage and greatly inhibit his abilities. Not only would it stop a shift in its tracks or revert him immediately, but Niles' healing factor would also halt until it was entirely out of his system, or if it was removed from the affected area.

Later, it's revealed the instability he suffered during his younger years was caused by a silver bullet that was shot at him by accident--it had apparently not left his system completely nor correctly, which was the reason he shifted randomly and no longer of his free will.


 * Food - Niles shares weaknesses that common houserats have due to being descended from them. He has confided in a few friends that he can't digest lemons or sweets.
 * Emotions - Niles and Nixon are stated to have inherited the worst of their father's temper and emotional control, with Niles being more affected than Nixon. Nixon has better coping mechanisms, such as stopping to think about consequences and constantly drinking chamomile tea.
 * The Pipe of Prance - As with all Rats, Niles is put in a semi-hypnotic state upon hearing the music the pipe creates. The sensations it creates are just described as "shaking," but in reality, it's the same as having an out-of-body experience. It's not clear if this weakness remains, as he suffered from it at the age of six when he still lived in Hamelin.
 * Rat Charm - Because Fiona is the daughter of the Piper, she inherited his Rat Charm, which is an ability to control Rats: it was the reason the Piper could play the pipe. While Fiona's is hybridized and not pure (making her unable to play the pipe at all), it remains strong with seducing and sometimes charming Rats.

Skills

 * Gun-Wielding - Niles is proficient with revolvers and rifles, but he does not have a specific preference. He keeps a revolver in his coat pocket at all times that has been modified to shoot rapidly.
 * Bilinguality - As an original citizen of Hamelin, Niles is fluent in the German language and can speak it without trouble. His accent has since faded a bit, but is still prominent enough to be noticed. Due to the alternate timeline meaning that most of Europe is one area only, Niles has a combined accent, meaning he pronounces "w" as "v" and sometimes pronounces "th" as a "z" (I saw ze vorker ova zere). He sometimes forgets to add other words to sentences so that it makes more sense (rather than "I'll put a marker on the door" Niles may sometimes say "I put marker on door").

For instances when Niles or other characters speak different languages, go to Clarification: Bilingual Moments

History
For more information, go to Niles/History

Relationships
For more information, go to Niles/Relationships

Trivia

 * Niles sleeps very little but is used to it.
 * Before Niles could properly speak, he thought in symbols and pictures and could only communicate through screaming, drawing, and body language.
 * Niles probably doesn't wear underpants most of the time, as they can chafe during a transformation.
 * Niles' appearance in his deguarrotypes look somewhat similar to Varian's in the years 1865-1866.

Gallery
For pictures, go to Niles/Gallery