Post by lucybishop on Apr 18, 2010 23:53:44 GMT -7
THE HANDLER
NAME: Lucy Bishop
NICKNAME: She is known mostly as Bishop in all the circles she travels in, it’s only close friends who know her as Luc or Lucy
CLASSIFICATION: human/witch
GENDER: female
AGE & BIRTHDAY: 25, June 7th
APPEARANCE: Standing at a whooping 5’3”, and at 107 lbs soaking wet, Lucy wouldn’t intimidate a bunny rabbit. She also happens to be the best example of the phrase ‘looks can be deceiving’. She’s a whirlwind of a person, all wrapped up in a petite, unassuming package. However, she’s definitely not what one would describe as scrawny, her arms and legs are toned with lean muscle, while her body is distinctly feminine. And those muscles aren’t for show, Lucy has earned every one of them, and is definitely capable of using them and her size to her advantage. No one ever assumes that little Lucy packs a killer right hook or a brutal roundhouse kick...but she does.
While her petite size portrays her as more delicate and fragile that she truly is, it is her sweet, gentle face that seals the deal. Large, doe-like honey brown eyes framed in thick lashes, sweet rosebud lips, and long mahogany hair portray Lucy as a genteel young lady. It’s only after she’s clocked you round the head, stolen all your magical possessions and left you tied up while she simply waltzes through your closet door that it might be a good idea to not be distracted by her good looks or un-intimidating size because she’ll use it to her advantage.
ATTIRE: Lucy’s wardrobe doesn’t deviate far from a pair of dark wash jeans, knee-high boots or red Chuck Taylors, t-shirt, her lucky leather bomber jacket, and, of course, her key ring, which always stays on her right wrist. When out on a ‘mission’ or on the search for a magical artifact, the only thing that changes to her attire, is the variations and/or amount of magical objects that she carries on her person. Most often these objects are kept in her handy-dandy utility belt. The old, dark brown leather belt was once her grandfather’s, so even on the last hole, the belt sits rather precariously on her hips. Lucy is also never really ‘off-duty’, and is always prepared to do her job. The most dressed down she gets is when she’s asleep, and that usually constitutes a pair of shorts and an oversized t-shirt and her gun under the pillow.
She’s not one to dress up, though that doesn’t mean she hasn’t, but it’s almost always done when she’s on a ‘job’. Make-up also tends to fall under that category. Although she doesn’t really think about it, Lucy was graced with good looks and doesn’t really need make-up, which is good, because she’d probably forget to put it on anyway. Any jewelry she wears almost always serves another purpose of the magical/mystical variety, whether it’s a necklace of Ghana Aggry beads (capable of telling if someone is lying) or one of the torcs (arm/neck ring) of Cernunnos, a Celtic god that allows the wearer to communicate with wild animals, particularly snakes and stags or the Ring of Gyges, which allows the wearer to become temporarily invisible. She is also always accompanied by a brownie by the name of Pluck. He is very tiny at only about 8 inches tall, wears an acorn cap hat with a rather ratty feather attached to it and his weapon of choice happens to be a spoon.
PLAY BY: Natalie Portman
THE CREATION
NAME: Keys, Bishop, The Finder, and any number of call-signs, it all depends on who is calling on her
POWER LIST:
*Minor Spellwork (simple glamours, scrying, minor elemental magic)
*Ability to open what is closed or locked
*Wield the Keyring, and all that it is capable of
DETAILED POWER:
-Minor Spellwork- This is basically all she knows about being a witch, so the spells are simple. Scrying- the ability, through the use of a crystal (though she’s substituted with anything from a pocketwatch to a paperclip on a string) and a map to find objects or people, minor glamour (hair color or length, eye color, etc) lighting a candle without a match, a spoon continuing to stir after she’s stopped holding it, ability to sense magic and non-humans, nothing that would change her life, but abilities that are useful to have. Most of these rely simply on her natural witch magic, though some, like the glamour, takes a small incantation. In reality, Lucy could be a lot more powerful in terms of spellwork and more ‘common’ witchcraft, but she hasn’t been taught and hasn’t really cared to learn, especially with the majority of her power and time going to her Keyring and finding magical objects.
-To open what is closed, it seems like a rather unassuming ability, but is the basis of Lucy’s magical talent and likely the reason she can wield the Keyring. Simply by laying her hand on a locked door(/window/ safe/ trunk/etc), she can will the door to unlock and open. It doesn’t matter if the door is locked by a key or code or a card, if Lucy ‘asks’ it to open, it will. She also ‘attracts’ keys. If she were in a room and your keys were laying on the counter, by the time she left, they would end up on her person, usually in a pocket, but have been known to show up in her socks, stuck in her hair and on one occasion dangling from her bra strap. This is not really a power Lucy controls(or appreciates having), it’s just by being near keys they become semi-sentient and choose to go with her- how they do it is anyone’s guess, as when Lucy has tried watching keys to see how they make the travel from countertop to her pocket, they always manage to move the second she blinks or turns her head. Her Keyring behaves much the same way, though can travel much greater distances. The Keyring wants to be with Lucy and it is quite difficult to steal or take it away, and will return to her if it is stolen unless held under serious charm or magical containment. Lucy is the wielder of the Keyring and as thus, is the only one capable of using it.
With her Keyring, Lucy’s powers are amplified. With the Keyring, Lucy can open up any door anywhere at any time, and it will open to wherever else in the world she wants. For example, if she were in NYC and was at a door, she could ‘ask’ the Keyring to give her a key to a house in Paris, France. That key would show up on the Keyring, and if she used it on the NY door, it would open up into the house in France. The Keyring normally appears as a simple silver ring that has no noticeable latch to open and no keys on it. The keys will only appear when Lucy calls upon them. With the Keyring amplifying her ‘unlocking’ and ‘door-opening’ abilities, Lucy has also gained the ability to ‘force’ and ‘make’ a door. This is the reason that she always carries chalk with her, though any writing tool would work (she once had to make do with Cherry Mocha lipstick), the more magical it is, the easier it is for her to open a door using it.
By drawing on any surface the shape of a door, she can use her magic and make a door. Given time, and the right runes and symbols, she can have that door open specifically where she wants. If she has only time to draw the door, the destination is completely random. Once she closes the door or the drawing has worn off, the door is no longer useable. ‘Making’ a door, as explained before, is quite different than ‘forcing’ a door. If Lucy were to force a door, she simply needs to lay her hands on a surface (a wall for example) and with a strong use of magic and push, Lucy can force open a door in the wall. In this case however, she does not open the door to another destination, but only to whatever is directly on the other side of the wall/ceiling/floor, etc. Both these power can be quite draining, and Lucy generally tries to avoid using it, as she will be rather if not completely fatigued after using those two abilities.
Her Keyring allows her one more ability, that isn’t really an ability she herself uses, but is one that someone can use in order to reach her. With the power of her Keyring, Lucy could be anywhere at any given time, so often can’t be reached by normal means. If one wants to reach her, one first has to draw the Greek key symbol) or an Ankh(which is often referred to as the Key of the Nile) or the hexagram ( a symbol of witches found in the book, the Key of Solomon) on a door and then knock on it three times. One must also put down their name and if inclined, their reason for calling on her. (BPRD agents need only draw their symbol and their name) In doing so, the key to the door will appear on Lucy’s Keyring and begin to shake. Lucy needs only to use that key to open whatever door is closest to her to wherever the ‘knocker’ is (Her door is also where the symbol and name will appear). If Lucy refuses your call, the key symbol will disappear from your door in a puff of acrid smoke.
THE POTENTIAL
ALIGNMENT/OCCUPATION: Unaffiliated, has been called upon to aid both ‘sides’, who she helps is based purely on her feelings at the moment
WEAPONS: Her key ring can double and become twin falcata-like blades that are attached to the ring on her wrist allowing her to wield them in hand or swing them out at an opponent (ala God of War/Prince of Persia like). To do this she puts her left hand through the Keyring on her right wrist and ‘pulls away’, and in doing so creates another ring. It only takes a flick of each wrist to bring forth the falcatas which are attached by a long thin chain to the rings. She also carries a Dan Wesson PM7 gun that is kept in a holster at the small of her back and a small knife kept secretly in her boot. In terms of her magical artifacts, of which she always carries some, the ones she is never without is a piece of Fae-made chalk, her Keyring, at least one Holy artifact or relic (rosary beads, vial of holy water, cross, star of david, etc), salt and/or crystals so as to invoke a ring of protection, a crystal on a necklace that she uses to scry, and some charm against the ‘evil eye’ or those with mind abilities.
PERSONALITY: Lucy is a funny character. She travels the world to find and retrieve/steal any number of magical artifacts, and will do so for anyone that asks all to the tune of a hefty sum. However, most of that money sits untouched in Swiss banks or offshore accounts in the Caribbean. She does her job because she likes the thrill and danger of it, not because she needs the money- she doesn’t, she actually has little use for money. However most clientele don’t believe your worth your grit unless your price tag is somewhere between crazy and ludicrous. As Lucy has no real use for money, what makes her happiest in life is good coffee and great food. Most of her traveling is done so she can have that great cappuccino from that little place in Italy or have the best ramen from the hole in the wall place in Tokyo. And girl can put away food, for how tiny she is, she eats like someone twice her size. Of course, charities from around the world often receive rather ridiculous donations from an anonymous donor, and Lucy has nothing to say about that.
Lucy is also peculiar in the fact that despite how wild and loose she plays with her life, jumping from cliffs (with a parachute) or scaling down buildings, she is a meticulous planner for all of her jobs. Especially when whatever her artifact she is after must be taken without the knowledge of its owner, she has everything planned down to the minute, and likes to have nearly every contingency planned for. It’s most often her life at risk, and as of right now, she’d rather be alive than dead. She is a professional and takes her job seriously....sort of. She likes to plan for everything, but is never completely flustered when things go wrong, she’s more peeved that things aren’t going her way, but likes the adrenaline rush of figuring things out on the spot and under pressure just as much as when her plans go through unhindered.
She has really no qualms about her job, and will get whatever you want as long as you’re willing to pay, her only rule is that it not be something living, and if it is, it better be portable. (there was one time she had to move a fledgling roc, and not knowing what she was getting into had to make a door the size of a garage in order to get the bird through it...so never again!) Lucy also would rather not kill anyone to get her object, she has before in defense of her own life, but it’s not something she’d like to repeat.
Getting to know Lucy is rather difficult, and there are few people who really know her. They know about her abilities and her reputation, what she is capable of, and how to contact her, but she can count on one hand the number of people who actually know how she takes her coffee or what music she listens to. Absolutely no one knows the Collector is her grandfather, with the exception of Professor Broom, but he took that secret to the grave. Lucy is an out-going, enthusiastic person, but is rather stubbornly closed off on anything that has to with her personally, and has no objection to lying straight to your face about her background. This is one of the reasons she so greatly dislikes those with psychic or mind-related abilities- she’s deeply secretive and doesn’t want anyone to know what she doesn’t explicitly tell them. She is secretly kind of lonely, as she has few deep, close relationships, but would rather shoot herself in the foot than admit to it.
Lucy is not what one would call ‘sweet’ or ‘gentle-hearted’, she’s sarcastic, abrasive and can often be rude. She doesn’t tip-toe about what she feels, and she won’t hold back her sarcastic wit or cynicism when you’re pissing her off. That’s not to say she can’t be gentle, it’s just when there isn’t anyone else around, that she’ll help the fallen child, or talk sweetly to Pluck, but otherwise, she’s rather cynical about the ‘soft emotions’- she does have an image to uphold. What bothers her the most is the wilting flower girls (or guys as the case may be) who are only ‘soft emotions’ and can’t or won’t fight and only complain or stand off to the side while she busts her ass doing all the hard work.
SKILLS: Lucy is a wealth of knowledge when it comes to the magical, the supernatural, and the non-human. It is her job to know about the magical beings and objects of the world and with the Collector as her grandfather, what she doesn’t immediately know she can find quickly.
She reads (well enough to vaguely understand) a number of ancient and otherwise useless languages that assist her in her travels but most are not spoken anymore. She does speak French, Spanish, German, a little Gaelic, a smattering of Russian, and even less Japanese currently, but that’s mainly because those are the places she most often visits for lunch and she only needs to know enough to order off the menu. While she can not speak every language, she’s very good at picking up accents and miming characteristics of different cultures so that when she abruptly shows up in Buenos Aries or Moscow she doesn’t stick out like a sore thumb. As to how useful this is, she also happens to be quite the talent at cursing in just about every language known to man.
She’s no wilting flower, and can definitely hold her own in a fist fight, gun fight, or sword fight. Her fighting style is rather....eccentric, and she seems to just go through fighting styles like one goes through a rolodex. There’s no rhyme or reason, which means she’s never as good as one thoroughly trained in that style, but she’s damn near impossible to predict.
STRENGTHS: Lucy’s greatest strength is without a doubt, her Keyring. Enabling her to go anywhere in the world at a moment’s notice, and making it very difficult for her to be caught (how do you contain someone that can open every window, unlock every door?) She’s quite a talented fighter despite her eclectic, if un-refined range of fighting styles, and can definitely hold her own in a tussle. Although no PHD, (she didn’t go to college...or even a ‘proper’ school) Lucy is smart as a whip, and is just a wealth of knowledge of the magical and supernatural, though she could be accurately categorized as more ‘street-smart’ than ‘book-smart’. She is also well-known and well-traveled in many circles of the supernatural and magical and has many friends and contacts because of it. If you need something, Lucy knows someone (or something as the case may be) who has information about it. While her allegiances can be questionable, if you earn the right to call her friend, she will move heaven and earth to help you. She is very loyal and hard-working, and has been known to be incredibly kind and soft-hearted to children, animals, or those lucky few called friends(as long as she thinks no one is looking).
WEAKNESSES: Lucy is stubborn as a mule, sarcastic, a rule-breaker, a liar, rather eccentric, doesn’t follow orders unless they’re her own, holds a grudge forever, claims no allegiances except to herself and whoever happens to be the highest bidder, and to top it off is an outright daredevil and thrill-seeker, known for putting her and whomever is with her life in danger. While Lucy has more than enough magical items for any number of situations, she’s only as prepared as the ones she has on her at that moment, and even with them, none of them make her impervious to bullets, drowning, or any other ways to die, and she is still as mortal as anyone else.
While she uses her small size to her advantage and has styled a bizarro fighting style to suit her needs, Lucy is not very physically strong and can be easily overpowered. She also is rather weak psychically, and those with telepathy and mind control tend to bother her the most, and she’ll need a lot of supplication to aid someone going against something with those abilities.
Perhaps Lucy’s greatest weakness is an incredibly dangerous, very ‘magical’, so very frightening it’s name shouldn’t be spoken, but is known only to the world as....rope. There is no room in the world that can hold her, but a length of rope and she’ll be just as tied up as anyone else. She can open locked doors with simply a touch, explaining often that she only ‘asks’ the door to open for her and it does. If she speaks the door’s ‘language’, trying to ‘talk’ to the tied rope is like trying to ask someone who not only doesn’t speak your language but also only talks in riddles....and leaves out every third word-impossible.
THE STORY
HISTORY: Lucy Bishop was born early June 7th to parents Mary and Ethan Bishop in what could be a called a hospital in a small town on the even smaller island of Guernsey. Lucy was raised there until she was five in a small cottage. Mary, a witch herself, taught Lucy basically all she knows about witchcraft, so the spells she knows and remembers to this day are rather simple. Using salt for protection, scrying with crystals, which herbs are best for stomachaches or warding off evil spirits, lighting a candle with just a breath, or what flowers are best to attract fae and where to place cream to reward brownies for their help are just a few of the simple things Lucy learned. The family lived modestly and without the frills and luxuries of many others, growing their own fruit and vegetables and raising a small number of livestock and not wanting for much more. It was during this name that Lucy befriended her first fae-folk, a small, rather young brownie named Pluck. After weeks of leaving him cream and honey, Pluck finally revealed himself to her and the two became fast friends, prone to creating mayhem together. Mary always suspected her daughter of stronger magic than what was commonly bestowed to her family, and her suspicions were confirmed when Lucy was able to open the locked front door of their house with simply a touch and would end the day with the keys from about every neighbor in the pockets of her dresses.
However, Mary wasn’t able to explore her daughter’s abilities anymore, for while on a family vacation in London, the family’s car was hit head on by another car whose driver had fallen asleep at the wheel. Both her parents were killed instantly, while five-year-old Lucy remained rather unscathed in the back seat. With no other family to speak of, a shell-shocked young Lucy, accompanied by Pluck, was sent to live with a grandfather she didn’t even know she had. He lived in what could only be described as a castle in the untamed and dark Black Forest of Germany. What Lucy would come to learn is that her grandfather, William Bishop, was more famously known as the Collector, and was called thus because for nearly 2000 years, he had been collecting and safekeeping magical artifacts that would be otherwise dangerous in unknown hands.
And while she calls him grandfather, he is actually closer to her great-great-great-great-great....well you get the idea, grandfather, and is probably so far removed from her actually lineage, she often wonders how he even knew about her. The helmet of Hades and the winged sandals of Hermes, a sword known as Excalibur and another that once belonged to Lu Dongbin, magic carpets and trapped djinns, or the ring of Solomon and much much more, is all catalogued and kept safe from evil hands by the Collector. The items are not all stored at the castle, in fact very few are, and many of the powerful ones are stored in secret locations all over the world, known only to the Collector. It is in return for his duty as Collector, to remain neutral and to keep these items out of the hands of either ‘side’ that he has been given the gift of prolonged life. Who bestowed this gift or responsibility on him, of course he will not divulge, despite Lucy’s constant questioning. In fact, despite living with him for much of her life, Lucy knows little about her grandfather and is background.
Lucy lived and was taught by her grandfather for the next 11 years. While he taught her normal school teachings, like reading, writing, and arithmetic as well as various fighting styles from jujitsu to fencing, the large body of her studies was focused on the magical and the other-wordly. Because of this private tutelage and the obvious location (see:middle of forest) Lucy did not have many friends in terms of other humans. What friends she did have were almost all supernatural- a Pooka(horse) she shared part of her hard-sowed crop of strawberries, Fays that she would wander through the forest with, or the Nibelungen, who gave her a tour of their underwater palace. While Lucy did not exactly live a usual childhood, she was relatively happy with her life if somewhat starved for human attention and a little lonely, and quite loved all of her magical friends.
Always a mischievous and curiously smart child (that’s what happens when your best friends are Fae-folk), Lucy was known to go searching through the castle, touching and looking at the many objects of her grandfather’s collection, almost always against his express wishes. When she was seven and ‘innocently’ looking through a room filled with magical, but not dangerous rings, she came upon a rather ordinary ring that she would later insist was calling to her. It seemed rather plain upon first glance- a ring of silver with no obvious beginning or end that was just big enough to slip over her child-size hand. Pluck was rather concerned with her wearing something that belonged to the Collector, but Lucy maintained that it would only be for a moment. Once putting it on, Lucy noticed that what looked to be plain silver was now actually covered with twisting and constantly moving runes and symbols that now glowed when on her wrist. Startled by the reaction, Lucy immediately took it off and left it where she found it.
It wouldn’t be until she was taking lunch in the observatory with her grandfather that she noticed the ring had returned to her wrist. Horrified, she tried to hide her sudden accessory from the watchful eyes of her grandfather, who of course noticed it rather immediately. He took her wrist in hand, and carefully inspected the ring. His only words were, “Ah, so you’ve found your place.” Now utterly confused, Lucy asked about the seemingly simply ring, and was told a rather short and hardly thorough history and nature of the Keyring. A rather modest beginning quite a few years ago (read: 800) as a simple key ring, it was later charmed and enchanted by a great many number of magical beings, witches, and wizards to imbue it with the ability it has now. Why it was done and by who exactly Lucy has yet to be able to pry from her grandfather. The only drawback being that the Keyring won’t work for everyone and without a wielder, is pretty much nothing more than a common, somewhat plain ring of silver. When with a wielder, the Keyring displays the ever moving runes and symbols, keys will appear at the wielder’s beckon, it allows the wielder to travel anywhere in the world, and can become a weapon to defend its wielder if needed.
Thus began Lucy’s long training to handle and use the Keyring which she achieved mostly on her own through trial and error- though she was helped by quite a few weapon masters in the handling of the Keyring’s weapon state. During this time, she traveled the world, occasionally working with magical beings or even simple humans doing odd jobs, gaining friendships and contacts and amassing her own collection of magical artifacts. At this time, she was not stealing artifacts for a profit and hadn’t quite built her reputation as the Finder. Her homebase was always her grandfather’s castle, but she found a new place to keep her own magical items and call home- concealed in what is all appearances a library, but is actually on the back of a rather small Bahamut( but still about the size of a blue whale) she calls Bubbie. Swimming through the vast and open seas, the only way to enter her Bahamut library is through the single door and the use of her Keyring. It’s how she found it to begin with- though her grandfather had mysteriously hinted to it when she mentioned wanting somewhere to call her own, and without calling for it, the key showed up on her ring. She has no idea where the library had its start or who lived there before she did. The library was full of books and scrolls, of few she can actually read, if rather dusty and unused when she first stepped into it. Lucy likes to believe it’s the last piece of Atlantis, but she has no evidence proving that one way or another.
When she was seventeen, Lucy left the safety of her grandfather’s keep, and began her own ‘business’- if you need it found or stolen, and it usually needs to be stolen, she’ll find it, all for a tidy sum. At first it was only small jobs that folk weren’t too concerned if they were successful or not, but after Lucy began delivering on her promises both quickly and efficiently, her reputation grew. She has never advertised her ability or her profession, and only works by word of mouth. While doing jobs for clients, she is always on the search for dangerous items as well to entrust to her grandfather, and he, in turn, has provided her with little bits of information concerning her Keyring- her new ability to make or force and make a door. Much to her frustration, he often only tells her what the Keyring is capable of, and not how she is supposed to be able to accomplish that task. As her notoriety grew, it was when she was about 20 that she was contacted and met Professor Broom about the relocation of a certain magical artifact that was kept under lock and key and potentially dangerous. Lucy was instantly endeared to Professor Broom, as he reminded her so much of her grandfather, and helped him, even refusing to be paid (though no one but she and Broom know this) Lucy would go on to help Broom whenever he called upon her, but she has also indiscriminately helped whoever else called her, though Broom was often given first choice. She has aided in BPRD missions, but met only a few of the longer lasting agents, and even then, if she could avoid coming face to face with them she would. Girl’s gotta keep her anonymity.
Since then she has been working rather steadily, trying to avoid the nonsense concerning what is undoubtedly going to be a battle royale between Nuada and well....anyone else. So far she’s done a pretty good job side-stepping anything concerning it, but she doesn’t doubt that pretty soon the mess is going to show up on her doorstep one way or another.
