Goodfellow

by **Brorschach** December 20th 2012, 5:15 am

GOODFELLOW

"The little robin sings such sweet music. Alas, it is no more, the crow has taken exception"

Basic Biography

Real Name: Robin Hill
Renegade/Hero/Villain Name: GOODFELLOW
Title: N/A
Alignment: TN
Age: 112 (looks about 37 beneath his mask)
Gender: Male
Race: Human, Caucasian
Hair: brown
Eyes: gray
Height: 5'11"
Weight: 166 lbs
Blood type: O+

The Looks

The Legacy

Personality: Robin is rather off-kilt, his world view skewed by a combination of his own lackadaisical mentality, minor dementia, and the curse that has slowed his aging down. This odd cocktail has left him seemingly insane, his statements frequently appearing to be random nonsense or poetic quotations applied to any random occurrence that tickles his fancy. Preferring to lay about in the sun to fighting a war, he generally avoids combat unless his would be-attacker amuses him, in which case he'll 'play' with them. Robin's style of combat is just as insane as he is, resulting in an odd combination of lethal attacks and harmless tricks for Robin's own amusement. Amusement itself is at the core of the man's focus, and if a battle stops being entertaining to him, he may simply use a spell to vanish, leaving behind a bouquet of roses made out of bones and entrails or simply appear to explode into a cloud of confetti before his opponent's very eyes. In an odd twist of events, he can be coaxed into a single minded focus on whatever task he is assigned should the taskmaster provide him with adequate motivation -usually in the form of sweets or some other relatively mundane object that he enjoys-. Robin generally swings between a manic and easily entertained man to a cold, calculative, almost depressive state on a daily -and sometimes hourly- basis. While in his manic state, he acts jovial and warmly towards those around him and seems to lack any concept of personal space. It is in this state that most people know him. However, when he is in his depressive state, he acts with a calm, sophisticated manner, speaking in formal tones and peppering his speech with phrases more at home in the mouth of an aristocrat than a masked lunatic. It is in this mindset that he is truly Goodfellow, dispatching no holds barred attacks against his opponents regardless of their own strength level and attempting to end any battle with single, decisive blows.

History: Born in a small town somewhere in Europe, Robin was raised by a staunchly conservative Christian family who eschewed medicine and other advances in favor of prayer and a borderline Amish lifestyle, leaving Robin to suffer through most illnesses with nary more than a bible to help him through it. Without much to do, Robin spent most of his time reading, studying up on the bible and nearly memorizing the entire new testament. Though his parents didn't approve, he studied several other books, some about herbs, others about the dark ages, anything he could find, he would read. Every day, during his free time he would pick up a book and delve into the world it created. Eventually though, the house ran out of books, leaving the young boy with nothing to do but wander about the area. His parents lived on the edge of town, disdaining the amenities the other townsfolk enjoyed. They did their best to prevent Robin from going into town but they were only human. Every now and again he would slip away and walk the streets, enjoying the wonders of the modern world. He especially enjoyed small wind up things like music boxes, the sheer wonder they brought about in him only topped by the radio. Whenever he could, Robin would sit and listen to radio broadcasts, especially paying attention to the stories they told about fictional heroes. The flying men and the eccentric billionaires who fought crime caused feelings of joy to swell up in him, shunting reality aside and allowing the young man to get lost in the realm of daydreams.

Eventually, the paradise he enjoyed was shattered by the advent of World War I, forcing the young man and his family into hiding in the caves near their village as they watched the German forces ransack their homes. While most people were barely able to manage, Robin's family thrived, having had to do little more than adapt to the change in lighting conditions. As the war progressed, more and more Germans occupied the town, fortifying it and turning what should have been a temporary lodgings into the townsfolk's new home. Though some tried to leave, they were all inevitably stopped and as it became more and more apparent that the Germans weren't going anywhere, people rallied around Robin's mother and father for guidance. The two gladly helped the town through the power of prayer, unintentionally creating a sort of cult within the caves, which honeycombed through the mountainside. One day while Robin was exploring the caves -as he often enjoyed doing- his lantern went out, forcing him to crawl around trying to find his way back to the main chambers. However, at some point he took a wrong turn and stumbled across a large chamber, lit by an eerie blue light just barely bright enough to read by. Robin wandered the chamber -which itself was snaked with pillars and low walls resembling crude bookshelves- until he came upon a single book resting in the center atop an ornate pedestal. The pedestal itself was carved from the same stone as the pillars and shelves, though of much higher quality and was built right into the floor, its base seamlessly flowing into the stone that formed the floor on which he stood. Opening the book, the chamber itself changed, shifting from the grubby and poorly lit rock chamber to a grand library, the crude stone shelves becoming fine marble as the dust that sat upon them formed into great tomes. Robin was in heaven.

Immediately forgetting the book on the pedestal, he grabbed as many books as he could carry and ran back to the main chamber, as though a map had formed in his mind. There he saw his parents and the people, each of them turned to stone, their features carved in dusty granite, their clothes having been reduced to rags and their hair -sculpted as finely as the rest of them- was covered in lichen. Robin dropped the books and ran to the entryway of the caverns, only to find it blocked, the simple stone door they'd used to mask the entrance replaced by a gate that appeared to be made of melted obsidian. Looking back on the tunnels he saw the iron lanterns hung on posts and candles placed in roughly carved holes in the cavern walls shift into finely gilded bronze lamps and expertly carved crevasses each holding a beautiful jade green candle, from which a soft blue light seemed to flow in waves. The chamber where the townsfolk and his parents had been had been transformed as well, the egg shaped cave had morphed into a large ballroom, the blank grey floor had turned into crisscrossing black and white tiles. The flat surface now featured several small raised sections,each made of white marble on which the statues that had once been townsfolk stood. Robin was terrified and bolted, running down the slowly shifting hallway back to the grand library where he had originally opened the book. As soon as he reached it, he ran to the book's pedestal, only to find it gone, a small note left in its place that read 'Caw, Caw went the crow, look at me, stealing trinkets from the hawk's nest. But lo, where are my eggs? I see them! I see them! They are in the Hawk's nest. Do I wish for a wonderful nest, or my chicks to grow once more. Tick-Tock little Crow, time is running out until the eggs hatch and Hawk gobbles them up'.

To one less schooled in literature, this inane rhyme would have meant nothing, but the symbolism was clear. He had taken the books from this place and so it had taken the people from him, trapping him in a beautiful cage devoid of life or love. He turned to grab the missing books, to bring them back, then he saw it. The pedestal was no more, replaced by a large hourglass in which only a few grains remained in the top half. He wouldn't make it, the amount of time was too short. He wanted, nay, he NEEDED more time... then it all stopped. The hourglass melted away and the room took on a distinctly blue tint. A voice came out of nowhere, a strange mix of a deep bass with a woman's voice echoing just behind. It was his father and mother's voice, combined into one by some strange otherworldly beast. The voice laughed and laughed, at first in a pleasant chuckle that slowly evolved into a malicious uproar, only to fall silent, accompanied by the distinct cawing of a crow. The library melted away, the marble and books draining into some unseen hole in the universe. Robin blinked, and he was back in the blue lit chamber, the book still gone but the pedestal stood once more in its proper place. Now there was a piece of parchment there, the paper old and yellowed but the text remained on it, fresh and black as the obsidian door that had barred his exit from the caves. The words upon it were mocking and filled with that same laughter that seemed to nag at the edge of Robin's senses as he read them.

'The little robin sings such sweet music. Alas, it is no more, the crow has taken exception. The song shall turn sour, though only with age, and the crow's cries shall become as a requiem to the silent robin's corpse. The hawk had been fed.' Studying the words over and over, he could not understand their meaning. What was it, had he made some sort of deal when he'd wished for more time? Was he dead? Had someone else died? He didn't know, so he left the chamber, only to find that when he turned to look back at it, there was only a wall. He returned to the main room, his worst fears confirmed. The people remained statues, nearly exactly as they had been in the other world. Only now, there was a single distinct difference. They all wore mocking grins, their teeth made of the whitest marble. It was horrific. Robin tried to leave, only to find the rock was the obsidian gate. Then he saw it. A small clock sitting in his now stone father's hand. The hands didn't move, save one. It was the seconds hand, constantly ticking away. He had asked for more time... and so he had been given it.

Robin spent the next seventy two years in that cave, until eventually the gate that had blocked his escape for so long melted away, allowing the sun to penetrate the absolute darkness to which his eyes had adapted. For the first time in several decades, he felt hungry, he felt thirsty, he felt alive... He looked down at himself, finally able to see in the burning light of the sun that despite stinging his eyes, felt infinitely more pleasant than the oppressive darkness he had been dwelling in for so long. He inspected himself, expecting decrepit limbs, withered beyond recognition, their status as more than gnarled tree branches visible only by the faded pink material that might pass for a long dead man's skin. What he saw however, was the muscled body of man in his twenties, if a pale one, as though he had only spent a few days away from the sun rather than seven decades. He tested his voice, gone unused for almost the entirety of his confinement. While he expected to hear only a dry rasp, a barely audible choking noise no more distinct than a gentle breeze, what he got instead was a deep baritone similar to his father's. So he ran, just like had before. For thirty six years he ran from the world, losing himself in the decadent pleasures of the flesh, trying to forget that cave, what had happened there, and the statues that still stood within the main chamber, their faces still twisted in those horrid grins. It didn't work, the place followed him in his dreams, haunting him even in his waking hours, the world around seemed to have a slight veneer of blue, the buildings coated with nearly transparent layer of rock and the people's faces all seemed to be slowly contorting into the same grins as those that would forever adorn the statues within the cave. Without the influence of drugs to distort his perceptions, Robin fell into a deep depression.

His body had escaped the cave, but his mind was still trapped within, haunted by his memories. As time passed by, Robin found that the cave had given him another thing besides an apparently eternally youthful body and horrid nightmares. A talent in magic, witchcraft, the pagan arts. Robin practiced these over time, using the deep and almost obsessive study of magic as a way to survive his waking hours with what little of his mind remained intact. Every day, from dawn till dusk he would practice, sometimes collapsing from exhaustion, only to be forced awake by the horrific memories that waited on the edge of his consciousness. As the years passed and Robin's training appeared to have hit a brick wall, he began traveling across Europe, hoping to find something else to distract him. Anything at all. He tried to get a normal job, a normal life, but something would always go wrong. He'd freak out at some new technology or nearly assault a customer because they smiled slightly too wide. Barely able to pay for his own survival, Robin stowed away on a series of cargo freighters alongside several other immigrants, eventually winding up in the United States of America, near a place called 'New York'. He had heard about the city through brochures and rumors passed around by the immigrants. Supposedly it was a city of opportunity, where you could find work around every corner and homes of great quality for a mere pittance. The truth however, was far from the paradise the refugees painted it to be. It was in ruins, a city torn apart by a war between those like the heroes and villains he had idolized as a small child. A large portion of the great steel towers had been reduced to scorched rubble and the streets were littered with slag and craters the size of houses. While most of the refugees took this as a sign of good fortune -for there would be many jobs in the manual labor department- it was an omen of doom to Robin.

He wandered the ruins, barely surviving. He grew ill, not knowing how to treat himself and having no money for a physician, it was only the curse keeping him alive some days. One day, while scouring the rubble he met a very special individual. This individual offered him so much in exchange only for his loyalty. Robin eagerly agreed, if only to escape the crushing loneliness that he had been feeling since his escape. The individual schooled him in the ways of the world that he had been so far removed from for so long. Even during his time spent in the constant stupor of narcotics, he had learned very little, preferring to stay on the periphery of society whenever he could. Though the individual gave him many things -including adequate funds for living- Robin was still left alone most of the time, and spent his days searching through the rubble that was New York for anything he might be able to pawn off. It was there, in the ruins of an old shop that he found it. A white mask carved of a material that seemed so much like porcelain, and yet did not break beneath his touch. He donned the mask, feeling a sense of calm and serenity wash over him, as though the events of his life were nothing but a nightmare produced by some sort of high fever.

Behind that mask, he could forget himself. But he needed a name, one that fit how the mask made him feel. Then it came to him, more a feeling than a true thought. Goodfellow. It was a rather mundane and obvious name, but it suited his purposes and felt right somehow. At first, he took it off whenever he wasn't wandering about looking for people to assist -as per his mandate- and stored the mask and a black cloak he purchased in a small box hidden beneath his bed. Then he started to wear the mask even without the cloak, going about his daily business with it on. Though people found him incredibly uncomfortable to be around because of this, they had had enough exposure to the oddities of the world to not begrudge him so long as he paid for what he took. As time went on, he donned the cloak as well, its sleek black fabric enveloping him like a mother's embrace. Robin Hill was being consumed by Goodfellow, his time spent less and less out of the costume which seemed to alleviate his constant nightmares. He almost never takes it off now, even sleeping in it. Only removing the mask and cloak in matters of personal hygiene. He no longer answers to Robin, his mind fragmented and his memories avoided like the plague lest they remind him of his true self. Goodfellow is all that remains.

The Powers

Basic Spells

Little Robin:: Goodfellow's most basic spell, it constructs a small robin with glowing eyes. This bird never tires and is almost constantly twitching. It can record messages with complete accuracy and repeat them in the voice of the speaker. In addition, it can carry items up to twenty pounds within itself by swallowing them, then regurgitating the object at a later point. If this bird is destroyed, the object it is carrying will not be harmed as it is stored in a pocket dimension within the bird's stomach.

Little Flock: Goodfellow summons a flock of robins from his sleeves, each an identical copy of the little robin. These can be used to distract opponents or cause minor wounds (pecking and scratching, generally aiming for the eyes or other sensitive parts). Whenever a robin is destroyed, it disappears in a puff of black smoke that returns to Goodfellow's cloak.

Low Spells

Murder of Crows: Goodfellow casts open his cloak and allows a swarm of crows to fly forth from the darkness. These crows appear to be made out of black smoke and explode when killed, the black smoke returning to Goodefellow's cloak. These crows can shoot a poisonous black liquid from their mouths that stings badly and leaves minor burns once it is washed off. The burning effect generally lasts about ten to fifteen seconds. [max 2 post duration]

Leash of the Barghest: Goodfellow summons either a single large black chain or several smaller black chains from his sleeve, each one of these seeks out his opponent and creates a manacle on the end should it make impact, restraining the opponent. These manacles cause constant pain when attached, amplified by how few chains there are. For example, if an opponent had ten manacles on, the pain would be evenly distributed throughout the restrained areas, but if only a single manacle were produced, the pain would be magnified immensely. This technique cannot kill an opponent and only has the potential to knock them out. [max 3 post duration]

Medium Spells

Baskerville's Chain: A much stronger version of Goodfellow's 'Leash of the Barghest' spell, this summons a single chain from his sleeve made of a much thicker material. Unlike its weaker counterpart, this variant does not track its targets and instead of trapping an opponent in manacles, it leaves intensely painful wounds that appear to have been made by a set of powerful jaws, puncturing the skin in several places in a manner akin to that of a dog's bite. This technique can be kept active until the chain is snapped. [chain is 6 dur, max 5 post duration]

Phantom Step: A technique created to allow Goodfellow to avoid fatal attacks, this technique propels him nearly ten feet in a single direction at high speed, leaving a single afterimage that fades after four seconds, during which time he is cloaked. [1 post duration]

High Spells

Wild Hunt: Goodfellow places his hand facing downwards with an open palm, at which point several chains shoot into the ground, opening small portals in the ground where they impacted. From here, each chain can create a portal on any reasonably flat solid surface with an area of 1" or more. These chains have the same effect on their target as 'Baskerville's chain' and shoot out in a straight line from their portal of origin, ultimately entering yet another portal should they miss. The only way to stop this technique is to snap the chains coming from Goodfellow's wrist. [Chain is 8 dur, max 5 post duration]

Isaac: A more advanced version of 'Phantom Step' that actually creates a clone of Goodfellow while still shooting the original away. This clone lasts only ten seconds maximum and acts like something similar to a black hole, sucking in any attacks before dissipating. [1 post duration, takes attacks up to 8 stat]

Grid
Intelligence: 0
Occult: 3
Strength: 2
Speed: 4
Durability: 3
Ability: 0
Fighting Skills: 5
Magic: 8
Spells: 5
Flight: 0
Wealth: 1

by **Brorschach** December 20th 2012, 6:48 am

Not for use until after Purge arc is done, will be killing Gossamer during said arc.

by **Jack Maroon** December 20th 2012, 6:50 am

Pre-approved.

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