#that most people dont comb through every mention of this unpopular side character like a lunatic hdasfkdfdsjk

[alagaesia-headcanons]

I will always defend Orrin with my life and I've elaborated on my love of his character many times, but I realize I've failed to point out a particularly foundational detail regarding all that. I suspect that it goes very unnoticed by most people (unsurprisingly since it's only subtly referenced once) that an important aspect of Orrin is how young he is. He's only a little older than the main cast; during the war he's only 23-24. Orrin goes through all that trauma without that much experience behind him and a great deal of uncertainty ahead of him. I think it really sheds a lot of light on his fear of losing everything he cares about to the Empire when considering how much of his life is left in front of him. He really does have so much to lose, and the weight of all the relentless, compounding grief that he wouldn't be accustomed to or prepared for could so easily break him into despair.