light_mischief | [come sail away] application

PLAYER
Name: Kelly
Age: 34
Contact:

bentsage or PM
Permission Post: here
CHARACTER
Name: Skulduggery Pleasant
True Name: Skulduggery (Unless the ocean wants him to suffer, then it would be Vile. Just saying...)
Canon: Skulduggery Pleasant (From after book 3, The Faceless Ones)
Age: 430+ years (b. 1574)
History: Character Wiki Page & Book-Specific Page

Powers/Abilities:

🜂 Elemental Powers: Skulduggery can use elemental magic to manipulate water, fire, and air in a variety of ways. This includes summoning fire into his hands (and throwing that fire at people), using the air to slow his descent in a fall, and pulling moisture from his clothes so they look nice and clean.
🜁 Necromancy: It's not clear exactly what animates Skulduggery outside of his pure force of will, but his skeletal resurrection left him with some necromantic talent. This only applies if he's wearing specially made armor, though, and he won't be arriving with that.
🜃 Physical: Skulduggery has a variety of physical talents. He was taught to fight by an extremely talented boxer friend and can hold his own in a fistfight. He's also proficient with swords and guns, although he favors the latter.
🜄 The Elephant In the Room: While canon hasn't explicitly told us how to kill Skulduggery, it has told us that it's possible! While dismembering him won't work (not even taking his skull seems to stop him), massive physical trauma would probably do the trick. I'm obviously down to murder the sucker whenever necessary.

Inventory: Skulduggery arrives wearing a nice black suit, complete with gloves and hat, which are magically enchanted, essentially serving as body armor. He also comes equipped with two .38 Smith & Wesson revolvers. He doesn't, however, come equipped with bullets.

Job History:

⮩The War (1700s-1930s): Skulduggery's first "job" so to speak was fighting against the worshippers of faceless eldritch gods bent on the world's destruction. For many years, Skulduggery was a flesh-and-blood rebel fighter, who utilized his elemental magic against the forces of evil. At one point, Skulduggery is murdered after falling victim to a trap; his remains later revive themselves, turning him into the skeletal figure he is today. By his own account, Skulduggery has been a skeleton longer than he was ever fully flesh and blood.
⮩Recent Past (19xx-2008): Skulduggery worked with the Irish Sanctuary of magic after the end of the War. While he was always considered a wildcard, the Sanctuary found him to be a useful ally as a detective consultant. Essentially, for a few decades, Skulduggery is sanctioned by the government, although they tended not to take his warnings about "reformed" villains seriously.
⮩Currently (2009): Skulduggery is a freelance detective, who works to solve crimes in the magical community of Ireland. While his connections with the Irish Sanctuary have been cut, he's still considered the go-to guy for any magical murder mysteries. His critical reasoning skills, along with his tenacity and being a good listener, are all fundamental parts of his day-to-day life.

Suppressions: Skulduggery has a lot of skeletons in his closet, but there are a few who never see the light of day.

⮩ While he's known for his legendary temper, there's possibly only one person in the world who understands just how deep it runs. Skulduggery is, honestly, fueled by a long-burning rage and a desire for revenge that will never be realized.
⮩ The rage that reanimated him after his tortuous death at Serpine's hand also drove him mad. Ressurrected as nothing more than a skeleton, Skulduggery fell into a deep and terrible darkness, one he was totally lost in. He became Lord Vile, a powerful necromancer who served the enemy leader, Mevolent. He murdered millions, including people who had been close to Skulduggery. None of his friends know this about him by this point in canon, and he never intends for them to find out.
⮩ He'd never admit it, but he prefers using his gun over his magic because shooting things feels more satisfying.

Whether or not he's successful at avoiding any of this is... a mixed bag. Skulduggery keeps a tight lid on his past and a close eye on his temper, but running from his problems can be tiring. Unfortunately, every time he stops to catch his breath, he runs the risk of losing his handle on the situation.

Greatest Fear: There may come a day when he slips back into his evil alter ego, and he may never resurface as himself again.

Greatest Desire: He just wants to be at peace for once. To lay down his anger and not feel empty without it.

Greatest Regret: His anger drove him directly into the trap that led to his death. If that hadn't happened, he never would have returned as Lord Vile.

Sample: here at the tdm! ====== Name: Kelly
Character Name: Skulduggery
Canon: Skulduggery Pleasant
New Canon Point: Post Book 4, Dark Days
Have their suppressions, fears, desires, or regrets changed? How so?: minor personality changes aside here are key takeaways for the doom file:
THE BIGGEST FEAR: yep still super terrified of succumbing to his subconscious need for revenge. Increased with the advent of his first regain, and now it's extra spicy because he's heard rumors of a new Death Bringer -- aka, Lord Vile's replacement in the Necromancer religion. His rage, and therefore Vile, is harder to suppress.
ONE FEAR => NO FEAR: Skulduggery no longer is scared of winding up in a Hell Dimension run by the Faceless Ones! This is replaced by a newfound distaste for crowds and loud noises. It's almost like spending a year isolated while being tortured for sport has made him less comfortable with people, who would've thought???
BACK OFF: Skulduggery now is hostile to being followed.
DESIRE: The "be at peace" bit can now be more readily read as to "rest in peace". Just let him rest. Just let him rest. Just let him
I HOPE THIS DOESN'T AWAKEN ANYTHING IN ME: New suppression unlocked! Skulduggery has a newfound affinity for pain and will more readily seek it out. Torture is now a promise, not a threat, because nobody can do it worse than the Faceless Ones.
REGRETS: Lord Vile's still up there, baby, but let's add a few more in: how about the knowledge that his magical ancestors essentially doomed trillions of lives and countless planets to the torturous destruction at the hands of the Faceless Ones? How about abandoning Valkyrie for an entire year, forcing her into the arms of the necromancers who literally want the end of the world? That one's good. And the biggest one of all: he regrets being saved from the Hell dimension. (He should have been left there. It was what he deserved.)
MADNESS METER: More or less a big suppression change: Skulduggery is now unstable. He hallucinates, gets distracted by his thoughts, has paranoid delusions, and will be increasingly more reckless. While he'll be trying not to let anyone notice, it should be pretty recognizable to people who are familiar with madness effects. This may ease as he gets readjusted to the ship, but the "crazy like a fox" aesthetic is kind of getting lost in the "crazy like lovecraft" vibes.
MO POWERS MO PROBLEMS: Skulduggery has spent a year developing some pretty sick Elemental tricks and can now do the following:
---Fly: He kinda just stands there and the air moves around him. Flying "takes a lot out of you" though, so he'll still walk most places. You're more likely to see him use flying to quickly escape from a situation, while floating around will be done more or less for fun.
---Flamethrower: Now, in addition to fireballs, Skulduggery can briefly manipulate streams of fire from his hands, "like flamethrowers." Also takes a lot out of you, and generally can't be sustained for more than 15-30 seconds at a time without immense strain.
---Barrier: Skulduggery can turn air into a solid wall. He uses this to keep people away from himself, and also at one point basically uses the trick to scoop up a vampire and take it outside like a spider in a cup.