Outer Divide: Application
Jul. 2nd, 2013 09:01 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
anuglyman[- OOC Information -]
Name: Gail
Do you play any other characters in Outer Divide? Do I really need to list them all at this point? :) This is my last one, promise...
[- Character Information -]
Character Name: Rumplestiltskin / Mr. Gold
Fandom: Once Upon a Time
OU, AU, or CR AU: OU
Canon Point: The end of season 2, as he’s heading for Neverland
Journal:anuglyman
Character History:
$ Rumplestiltskin
$ Mr. Gold
Rumplestiltskin was a child before the ogre wars, abandoned by his father and raised by “spinsters”. His father was labeled a coward, and Rumple himself the son of a coward, suspected of being one himself. He greeted being called to war with excitement, as his chance to prove everyone wrong, but on the eve of battle a captive seer told him his wife was pregnant with his son, and that if he went into battle tomorrow he would leave his son fatherless. Not wanting to be like his father, he injured himself to be sent home rather than letting himself be killed, putting his son above his reputation. He returned home in disgrace, and to his wife Milah’s scorn and growing disillusionment with him, but at least his son Baelfire had a father. Milah eventually left him, under the guise of being kidnapped by pirates, leaving Rumple to raise Baelfire alone, after another humiliation by her new lover who challenged him to a duel for her that he could never win and that, in his fear, he refused. He later killed her, when she revealed she was still alive and told him she had never loved him.
The orge wars continued without Rumplestiltskin, up until they started needing to recruit children. Baelfire received his notice, but Rumple tried to flee with him, certain that was the only way to keep him alive, but he was tricked by the previous Dark One-- an extremely powerful user of magic, mostly dark magic-- into killing him and taking on his power and immortality. Rumple used his newfound power to kill the soldiers who came for his son, and then to end the orge wars entirely, but by then it was too late. Having so much power, dark power at that, corrupted him, and the acclaim he earned through ending the wars soon turned into fear and hatred. Though he loved his son, his punishments for anyone who threatened or, god forbid, harmed Baelfire grew steadily worse. Balefire, however, was unhappy. He wanted his old father back, who was gentle and good. Since the only way to end his power in that realm was to kill him, the boy bargained with the Blue Fairy for a magic bean that created a portal to a land without magic. There, Rumplestiltskin could be mortal again without having to die. But when the moment came Rumple was too frightened to be without his magic and let him go without him. He regretted it a moment later-- a moment too late. That became the only deal he ever broke.
For almost three centuries after that, Rumple sought out the way to that other land to find his son, making it his only goal, snatching up powers and artifacts that came into his path, cultivating people into his pawns and collecting items to amass potions and spells, and laying plans with his newly acquired ability to see the future. He first taught Cora, seducing her in the process, but in the end she rejected him and he moved on to Cora’s daughter Regina, who he manipulated at last into casting the curse he needed.
It was during this time that, in a deal where he saved a small kingdom from amassed armies at its doorstep, he took a young woman named Belle to his castle and set her cleaning the place for him. She wasn’t afraid of him, and in fact seemed to want to get to know him. He was intrigued, and a little enchanted by her boldness and her ability to care for even someone like him. She very nearly broke the “curse” of the Dark One on him with “True Love’s Kiss”, but he couldn’t give up his goal of finding Baelfire, so he sent her away, even though she had become important enough to him that he kept the cup that she broke as a memento. Later, he was told she had died-- but Regina merely kept her locked away until the day when she could use her against him.
The day finally came when Rumple managed to lead Regina to cast the curse he needed, the one that would transport all of the magical kingdom(s) into that other land, without magic. He and all the others, including Regina herself, were transported away, leaving behind only a small portion of the kingdom protected by Cora’s magic. He was among those “cursed”, but he had managed to build into the spell a position of power and luxury for himself, both for his own comfort and to give himself the means to seek out Baelfire once the curse was broken. In Storybrooke, Rumplestiltskin became Mr. Gold (no first name is ever mentioned), a pawn shop dealer, a loan broker, a lawyer, and landlord to most of the town. He enjoyed a position of power there for twenty-eight years until the sole member of the town not part of the curse, Regina’s adopted son named Henry, brought back the one person destined to break it: Emma Swan, Snow White and Prince Charming’s grown-up daughter who had escaped the curse, and Henry’s biological mother. Just meeting her was enough to restore his memories, despite the curse, possibly due to a spell he had enacted during his incarceration at Snow’s castle.
With a little help from him, knowing what was needed, Emma Swan broke the curse and reunited him with Belle, who had been transported with the curse and, again, kept prisoner, this time in the psychiatric ward of the hospital. With her in hand, Mr. Gold brought back magic through a potion and the wishing well in the woods outside town, so that he would not be helpless against Regina, so that he could use it to help find his son, and so that he could have again the power he had missed.
The breaking of the curse and the return of magic, however, didn’t mean he could just leave town to search for Baelfire. Crossing the town’s outer limit resulted in losing all of one’s memories of the magic kingdom, at least until the Blue Fairy discovered a cure. Rumple would need more magic to protect himself from the effects. It took him several weeks, a few interruptions in the form of people wanting his help or trying to kill him, and some misunderstandings with Belle over his use of magic and his secrecy, before he managed it. And then, as he was preparing to leave, that someone trying to kill him instead shot Belle, knocking her over the town line and wiping her memories.
Rumple was devastated when she didn’t know him, didn’t trust him, and repeatedly told him to leave-- even hurling his precious chipped teacup against a wall, and smashing it. That was the point where he decided he could do nothing for her yet, and left to find his son, leaving behind a threat that if anything happened to Belle, he will kill everyone involved. He brought Emma Swan with him, and she brought her son Henry. After a harrowing (for Rumple) trip via plane to New York City, they found his apartment building, and Emma found Baelfire: her former fiance, Neal, and Henry’s father.
Neal didn’t want to talk to Rumple, but he granted three minutes. Those three minutes didn’t go very well. Neal refused to listen, and Rumple really didn’t explain himself very well-- and he suggested using magic to just erase the intervening years and start over, which went as well as one might expect. Things might have been unsalvagable, except for Rumplestiltskin’s pirate enemy showing up in New York and stabbing him with a poisoned hook. Neal helped get him home to Storybrooke, helped protect him from Cora, and when they all thought he was dying, even held his hand and cried a little. It probably helped his son’s impression of him that he spent his dying words encouraging Belle to be the better person he knew she could be, and expressing his love for Neal, right after. That whole event resulted in the death of Cora, instead of his own.
Once things with Regina calmed down, he attempted to start again with Belle. He even convinced her to come back home, to leave the hospital, and to maybe try again with him-- up until she disappeared. She turned up in a bar, believing herself named Lacey and seeming to be Belle’s opposite in every way. Rumple’s attempts at winning her back only proved fruitful when he showed her his temper and darkness, rather than the kindness and devotion Belle loved. He spent several days in the company of Lacey, generally enjoying her attention, but when outsiders stole a trigger that would destroy the town, he used the Blue Fairy’s potion to bring back the real Belle, certain that his son was dead and that they would die, as well. It was selfish, and he knew it, but he needed his real, true love back.
Emma and Regina stopped the trigger, but too late for Henry, who was kidnapped and taken to Neverland. Rumple defeated his desire to kill the boy-- prophesied to be his downfall-- with his grief for Baelfire, and instead offered to help them find him and fight to bring him back. He left Belle behind to protect the town, though he doesn’t expect to ever see her again.
Personality:
Most would say Rumplestiltskin’s most enduring trait is his selfishness, his disregard for anyone else, and his nature as evil, but probably more important than that-- the cause of that, in fact-- is his extreme focus, determination, and devotion to a cause. He is single-minded when he has a goal in mind, and patient enough to wait out decades and work out complicated plans to reach that goal, not to mention intelligent enough to make those plans to begin with. Nothing else is important, even the lives and feelings of other people. Everything he did since the loss of Baelfire was designed to seek him out again, in some way, and he never lost that focus, not even in Storybrooke under the curse. Even before his son’s loss, he braved pain and ridicule to make sure he returned to him, and he overcame his fear to steal the Dark One’s dagger, just to save his son from battle and death.
Perhaps his second most enduring trait is cowardice. Not of normal things-- death and pain don’t really frighten him, and never really did-- but of more emotional things. He fears being honest with people, lest they leave him when they find out what he’s truly like-- he fears being rejected. He fears never finding his son again-- and potentially being rejected by him when he does. Even before the events of the ogre wars set the whole set of fairy tales in motion, he cared about what others thought of him: being given a chance to prove his bravery to his home village made him happy, not afraid. His original fear, the one that started it all, was the fear of turning out like his own father and leaving his newborn son alone in the world. That overpowered everything else, not fear of battle or death, and made him injure himself so that he could be sent home.
Rumplestiltskin also fears being powerless, not just lacking in magic but lacking in the ability to stand up for himself and those he cares about. That fear is what became his downfall, for when he had the chance to make Baelfire happy, he couldn’t give up his power to do it. Even later, when he finds Baelfire again, he can’t offer proof of his redemption, just more magic. Power has become a crutch to him, and he’s aware of it, even if he doesn’t have the strength to resist it. Magic power, social power, and the power of his reputation are all too important to him to give up without powerful outside influence.
Also in the top three things to remember about Rumplestiltskin is his penchant for making deals, sticking firmly by them, and then finding the one loophole in them that benefits him most-- generally something he built in specifically when he first made that deal. It’s really no surprise that he included skills as a lawyer in his Storybrooke persona, because he has a lawyer’s skill in finding the shady areas to exploit. At the same time, though, his deals are important to him and he always makes sure he never breaks them, just follows them to the letter rather than the spirit. He may be a trickster at heart, but he is a trickster who at least follows his own code.
Even before given the powers of the Dark One, Rumplestiltskin had a temper, though it didn’t show very often as he rarely had the power to act on it. He shows it in threatening the Seer when she refuses to tell him more about his future, and in shouting at his wife when she calls him a coward. Adding the corruption of the Dark One’s magic, his temper grew to violence. When he can’t use magic-- or when magic would not be satisfying enough-- he resorts to physical attack. Even reactions to his own fear and grief tend to express themselves in violence, whether by destroying parts of his own shop or beating on the side of a bathroom stall. In Storybrooke, that violence tends to be done with his trusty cane.
There are, so far, two people who have been shown to act as a curb the Dark One’s power and Rumplestiltskin’s temper: his son, Baelfire; and his beloved, Belle, the two most important people in his world. How he treats the two of them is different, however. He loves Baelfire deeply, and is devastated and willing to die, himself, when he hears his boy is dead, but at the same time, he acts as if he still has some power over him. He is the father, the protector and authority figure, and thus he tends to overrule or discount his feelings and opinions more often than he does Belle’s. Belle, however, he is more careful with, because there is no bond like parentage between them to fall back on. She loves him and when he’s with her, he wants to be a better person, “the best version of [him]self.” When he feels he is dying, she is the person he calls, not to beg or threaten or even just to say how much he loves her, but to encourage her and make sure she knows she is a good person and a hero in her own right because of her good heart. Her fear of him and her confusion at his attempt to bring back her memories breaks his heart.
With Belle and Baelfire, he still shows some semblance of goodness and honor, to make them happy, to win them back on honorable terms. Even if “honorable” does include winding back time, at least he asked first, and respected Baelfire’s decision not to do it. He didn’t make excuses or even explain himself when he confronted his son, didn’t say he knew how Baelfire felt about being abandoned even when he did, wanting to win his son’s love without what he considered to be tricks. And when he thought Baelfire was dead, he offered his services to help protect his grandson Henry, even though it was prophesied that Henry would be his undoing.
Powers/Abilities:
$ Dark One: Killing the previous Dark One gave Rumplestiltskin all of his original power. He has innate magic that can do nearly anything; he will never grow old and cannot die under most circumstances; and he can collect new power in some circumstances, such as taking the Seer’s ability to see the future. The one sure-fire way to kill him, besides separating him from magic as a whole and thus turning him mortal, is to kill him with the Dark One’s dagger, which now has his name written on the blade. Whoever does so takes the power of the Dark One upon themselves. The powers that generally seem to be innate are those that move things and people (teleportation, summoning, etc) and affect objects only (mending, heating, freezing, etc). Most things that affect people directly require more complicated magic with ingredients and preparation. The only major exceptions we see in canon is transformation and healing, neither of which require preparation. Teleportation is limited to within a mile of his starting location, and is used mostly for avoiding danger and messing with people.
$ Magic: Not all of Rumplestiltskin’s magic is innate and due to the curse of the Dark One. A good chunk of it is learned, through spells and potion recipes, most of which he has memorized and many of which he created himself. He has a large store of magical knowledge in his head that he knows how to put to use, given the right ingredients. Curses are made this way, as are restorative potions, and "the most powerful magic" like that captured in true love.
$ Future sight: A power stolen from a Seer who practically begged him to do so, Rumplestiltskin can see the future to an extent. It’s all a jumble, though, and takes active focus to see anything much less sort it out. He finds it a burden as much as the Seer did, at times, for seeing the immutable future that you can do nothing to change is indeed difficult. This ability will be severely limited in Verdana, to mere minutes before an event happens, to avoid game-breaking, and it will require actively seeking and expending energy to use. In addition, trying to tell the future in, near, or on the ship weakens this further, allowing for plausible but wrong futures to be seen and makes what he does see harder t interpret.
$ Price: All magic beyond simple tricks has a price, whether it be in energy, blood, loss, knowledge of an unavoidable fate, or something more unexpected. Usually he can at least somewhat predict what this will be, but on Verdana he’s quite a bit more limited, which will make him a bit more cautious.
$ Cane attack: His cane is his chosen weapon, good for bashing and extra strong, and he uses it with impunity. He’s not bad with a sword, either (though the limp does tend to get in the way, these days), but he likes blunt force better, anyway.
$ Lock-picking: Among other unsavory skills, in the years without magic, he learned how to pick locks, and owns a set of lockpicks.
$ Lawyering: As Mr. Gold, Rumple made good use of his skill at weaving words and being only as truthful as absolutely necessary. His persona in Storybrooke has the skills of a lawyer, and he is even licensed as such.
Possessions:
$ His cane(/weapon)
$ A nice suit and tie, with a pocket handkerchief and expensive shoes
$ The Dark One’s dagger with his name on it
$ His case of potions, ingredients, and spell goods
$ A small bag of holding (the one he carried Frankenstein’s fortune in; currently empty, and within the spell ingredients case)
$ Lockpicks (also inside the spell case)
$ Baelfire’s old shawl
Arrival:
On the ship.
[- Writing Samples -]
Network Sample:
[The face on the network now is not a happy one. This beaky-nosed older gentleman, with his expensive suit and tie and his lightly feathered hair, looks rather coolly displeased. The background is that of the outside of the ship, since he’s apparently found his way out.]
I’m not sure just who thought it was a good idea to be kidnapping people? But I can assure you, whoever you are, it was a very. Bad. Idea. You have kidnapped entirely the wrong person.
[When he smiles, just one corner of his mouth turning up, it doesn’t look particularly cheerful. It looks a little threatening, actually.]
Whoever is behind this, I have much more important things to do than dealing with you, but believe me, dearie, I will make the time if I have to. I’m assuming, whoever you are, you’re paying attention to things said on this device you left me, so I’m sure you can see this. Send me back where I came from... and I might decide not to make you sorry.
[And he waits, leaning back a little in the camera’s view, both hands resting on the grip of his cane. Somewhat impatiently, and fully expecting someone to say something back-- whether it’s a smart something... or a stupid something. He has places to be, and he’d rather not linger here longer than he has to.]
Log Sample:
Bargaining with a dragon.
Name: Gail
Do you play any other characters in Outer Divide? Do I really need to list them all at this point? :) This is my last one, promise...
[- Character Information -]
Character Name: Rumplestiltskin / Mr. Gold
Fandom: Once Upon a Time
OU, AU, or CR AU: OU
Canon Point: The end of season 2, as he’s heading for Neverland
Journal:
anuglymanCharacter History:
$ Rumplestiltskin
$ Mr. Gold
Rumplestiltskin was a child before the ogre wars, abandoned by his father and raised by “spinsters”. His father was labeled a coward, and Rumple himself the son of a coward, suspected of being one himself. He greeted being called to war with excitement, as his chance to prove everyone wrong, but on the eve of battle a captive seer told him his wife was pregnant with his son, and that if he went into battle tomorrow he would leave his son fatherless. Not wanting to be like his father, he injured himself to be sent home rather than letting himself be killed, putting his son above his reputation. He returned home in disgrace, and to his wife Milah’s scorn and growing disillusionment with him, but at least his son Baelfire had a father. Milah eventually left him, under the guise of being kidnapped by pirates, leaving Rumple to raise Baelfire alone, after another humiliation by her new lover who challenged him to a duel for her that he could never win and that, in his fear, he refused. He later killed her, when she revealed she was still alive and told him she had never loved him.
The orge wars continued without Rumplestiltskin, up until they started needing to recruit children. Baelfire received his notice, but Rumple tried to flee with him, certain that was the only way to keep him alive, but he was tricked by the previous Dark One-- an extremely powerful user of magic, mostly dark magic-- into killing him and taking on his power and immortality. Rumple used his newfound power to kill the soldiers who came for his son, and then to end the orge wars entirely, but by then it was too late. Having so much power, dark power at that, corrupted him, and the acclaim he earned through ending the wars soon turned into fear and hatred. Though he loved his son, his punishments for anyone who threatened or, god forbid, harmed Baelfire grew steadily worse. Balefire, however, was unhappy. He wanted his old father back, who was gentle and good. Since the only way to end his power in that realm was to kill him, the boy bargained with the Blue Fairy for a magic bean that created a portal to a land without magic. There, Rumplestiltskin could be mortal again without having to die. But when the moment came Rumple was too frightened to be without his magic and let him go without him. He regretted it a moment later-- a moment too late. That became the only deal he ever broke.
For almost three centuries after that, Rumple sought out the way to that other land to find his son, making it his only goal, snatching up powers and artifacts that came into his path, cultivating people into his pawns and collecting items to amass potions and spells, and laying plans with his newly acquired ability to see the future. He first taught Cora, seducing her in the process, but in the end she rejected him and he moved on to Cora’s daughter Regina, who he manipulated at last into casting the curse he needed.
It was during this time that, in a deal where he saved a small kingdom from amassed armies at its doorstep, he took a young woman named Belle to his castle and set her cleaning the place for him. She wasn’t afraid of him, and in fact seemed to want to get to know him. He was intrigued, and a little enchanted by her boldness and her ability to care for even someone like him. She very nearly broke the “curse” of the Dark One on him with “True Love’s Kiss”, but he couldn’t give up his goal of finding Baelfire, so he sent her away, even though she had become important enough to him that he kept the cup that she broke as a memento. Later, he was told she had died-- but Regina merely kept her locked away until the day when she could use her against him.
The day finally came when Rumple managed to lead Regina to cast the curse he needed, the one that would transport all of the magical kingdom(s) into that other land, without magic. He and all the others, including Regina herself, were transported away, leaving behind only a small portion of the kingdom protected by Cora’s magic. He was among those “cursed”, but he had managed to build into the spell a position of power and luxury for himself, both for his own comfort and to give himself the means to seek out Baelfire once the curse was broken. In Storybrooke, Rumplestiltskin became Mr. Gold (no first name is ever mentioned), a pawn shop dealer, a loan broker, a lawyer, and landlord to most of the town. He enjoyed a position of power there for twenty-eight years until the sole member of the town not part of the curse, Regina’s adopted son named Henry, brought back the one person destined to break it: Emma Swan, Snow White and Prince Charming’s grown-up daughter who had escaped the curse, and Henry’s biological mother. Just meeting her was enough to restore his memories, despite the curse, possibly due to a spell he had enacted during his incarceration at Snow’s castle.
With a little help from him, knowing what was needed, Emma Swan broke the curse and reunited him with Belle, who had been transported with the curse and, again, kept prisoner, this time in the psychiatric ward of the hospital. With her in hand, Mr. Gold brought back magic through a potion and the wishing well in the woods outside town, so that he would not be helpless against Regina, so that he could use it to help find his son, and so that he could have again the power he had missed.
The breaking of the curse and the return of magic, however, didn’t mean he could just leave town to search for Baelfire. Crossing the town’s outer limit resulted in losing all of one’s memories of the magic kingdom, at least until the Blue Fairy discovered a cure. Rumple would need more magic to protect himself from the effects. It took him several weeks, a few interruptions in the form of people wanting his help or trying to kill him, and some misunderstandings with Belle over his use of magic and his secrecy, before he managed it. And then, as he was preparing to leave, that someone trying to kill him instead shot Belle, knocking her over the town line and wiping her memories.
Rumple was devastated when she didn’t know him, didn’t trust him, and repeatedly told him to leave-- even hurling his precious chipped teacup against a wall, and smashing it. That was the point where he decided he could do nothing for her yet, and left to find his son, leaving behind a threat that if anything happened to Belle, he will kill everyone involved. He brought Emma Swan with him, and she brought her son Henry. After a harrowing (for Rumple) trip via plane to New York City, they found his apartment building, and Emma found Baelfire: her former fiance, Neal, and Henry’s father.
Neal didn’t want to talk to Rumple, but he granted three minutes. Those three minutes didn’t go very well. Neal refused to listen, and Rumple really didn’t explain himself very well-- and he suggested using magic to just erase the intervening years and start over, which went as well as one might expect. Things might have been unsalvagable, except for Rumplestiltskin’s pirate enemy showing up in New York and stabbing him with a poisoned hook. Neal helped get him home to Storybrooke, helped protect him from Cora, and when they all thought he was dying, even held his hand and cried a little. It probably helped his son’s impression of him that he spent his dying words encouraging Belle to be the better person he knew she could be, and expressing his love for Neal, right after. That whole event resulted in the death of Cora, instead of his own.
Once things with Regina calmed down, he attempted to start again with Belle. He even convinced her to come back home, to leave the hospital, and to maybe try again with him-- up until she disappeared. She turned up in a bar, believing herself named Lacey and seeming to be Belle’s opposite in every way. Rumple’s attempts at winning her back only proved fruitful when he showed her his temper and darkness, rather than the kindness and devotion Belle loved. He spent several days in the company of Lacey, generally enjoying her attention, but when outsiders stole a trigger that would destroy the town, he used the Blue Fairy’s potion to bring back the real Belle, certain that his son was dead and that they would die, as well. It was selfish, and he knew it, but he needed his real, true love back.
Emma and Regina stopped the trigger, but too late for Henry, who was kidnapped and taken to Neverland. Rumple defeated his desire to kill the boy-- prophesied to be his downfall-- with his grief for Baelfire, and instead offered to help them find him and fight to bring him back. He left Belle behind to protect the town, though he doesn’t expect to ever see her again.
Personality:
Most would say Rumplestiltskin’s most enduring trait is his selfishness, his disregard for anyone else, and his nature as evil, but probably more important than that-- the cause of that, in fact-- is his extreme focus, determination, and devotion to a cause. He is single-minded when he has a goal in mind, and patient enough to wait out decades and work out complicated plans to reach that goal, not to mention intelligent enough to make those plans to begin with. Nothing else is important, even the lives and feelings of other people. Everything he did since the loss of Baelfire was designed to seek him out again, in some way, and he never lost that focus, not even in Storybrooke under the curse. Even before his son’s loss, he braved pain and ridicule to make sure he returned to him, and he overcame his fear to steal the Dark One’s dagger, just to save his son from battle and death.
Perhaps his second most enduring trait is cowardice. Not of normal things-- death and pain don’t really frighten him, and never really did-- but of more emotional things. He fears being honest with people, lest they leave him when they find out what he’s truly like-- he fears being rejected. He fears never finding his son again-- and potentially being rejected by him when he does. Even before the events of the ogre wars set the whole set of fairy tales in motion, he cared about what others thought of him: being given a chance to prove his bravery to his home village made him happy, not afraid. His original fear, the one that started it all, was the fear of turning out like his own father and leaving his newborn son alone in the world. That overpowered everything else, not fear of battle or death, and made him injure himself so that he could be sent home.
Rumplestiltskin also fears being powerless, not just lacking in magic but lacking in the ability to stand up for himself and those he cares about. That fear is what became his downfall, for when he had the chance to make Baelfire happy, he couldn’t give up his power to do it. Even later, when he finds Baelfire again, he can’t offer proof of his redemption, just more magic. Power has become a crutch to him, and he’s aware of it, even if he doesn’t have the strength to resist it. Magic power, social power, and the power of his reputation are all too important to him to give up without powerful outside influence.
Also in the top three things to remember about Rumplestiltskin is his penchant for making deals, sticking firmly by them, and then finding the one loophole in them that benefits him most-- generally something he built in specifically when he first made that deal. It’s really no surprise that he included skills as a lawyer in his Storybrooke persona, because he has a lawyer’s skill in finding the shady areas to exploit. At the same time, though, his deals are important to him and he always makes sure he never breaks them, just follows them to the letter rather than the spirit. He may be a trickster at heart, but he is a trickster who at least follows his own code.
Even before given the powers of the Dark One, Rumplestiltskin had a temper, though it didn’t show very often as he rarely had the power to act on it. He shows it in threatening the Seer when she refuses to tell him more about his future, and in shouting at his wife when she calls him a coward. Adding the corruption of the Dark One’s magic, his temper grew to violence. When he can’t use magic-- or when magic would not be satisfying enough-- he resorts to physical attack. Even reactions to his own fear and grief tend to express themselves in violence, whether by destroying parts of his own shop or beating on the side of a bathroom stall. In Storybrooke, that violence tends to be done with his trusty cane.
There are, so far, two people who have been shown to act as a curb the Dark One’s power and Rumplestiltskin’s temper: his son, Baelfire; and his beloved, Belle, the two most important people in his world. How he treats the two of them is different, however. He loves Baelfire deeply, and is devastated and willing to die, himself, when he hears his boy is dead, but at the same time, he acts as if he still has some power over him. He is the father, the protector and authority figure, and thus he tends to overrule or discount his feelings and opinions more often than he does Belle’s. Belle, however, he is more careful with, because there is no bond like parentage between them to fall back on. She loves him and when he’s with her, he wants to be a better person, “the best version of [him]self.” When he feels he is dying, she is the person he calls, not to beg or threaten or even just to say how much he loves her, but to encourage her and make sure she knows she is a good person and a hero in her own right because of her good heart. Her fear of him and her confusion at his attempt to bring back her memories breaks his heart.
With Belle and Baelfire, he still shows some semblance of goodness and honor, to make them happy, to win them back on honorable terms. Even if “honorable” does include winding back time, at least he asked first, and respected Baelfire’s decision not to do it. He didn’t make excuses or even explain himself when he confronted his son, didn’t say he knew how Baelfire felt about being abandoned even when he did, wanting to win his son’s love without what he considered to be tricks. And when he thought Baelfire was dead, he offered his services to help protect his grandson Henry, even though it was prophesied that Henry would be his undoing.
Powers/Abilities:
$ Dark One: Killing the previous Dark One gave Rumplestiltskin all of his original power. He has innate magic that can do nearly anything; he will never grow old and cannot die under most circumstances; and he can collect new power in some circumstances, such as taking the Seer’s ability to see the future. The one sure-fire way to kill him, besides separating him from magic as a whole and thus turning him mortal, is to kill him with the Dark One’s dagger, which now has his name written on the blade. Whoever does so takes the power of the Dark One upon themselves. The powers that generally seem to be innate are those that move things and people (teleportation, summoning, etc) and affect objects only (mending, heating, freezing, etc). Most things that affect people directly require more complicated magic with ingredients and preparation. The only major exceptions we see in canon is transformation and healing, neither of which require preparation. Teleportation is limited to within a mile of his starting location, and is used mostly for avoiding danger and messing with people.
$ Magic: Not all of Rumplestiltskin’s magic is innate and due to the curse of the Dark One. A good chunk of it is learned, through spells and potion recipes, most of which he has memorized and many of which he created himself. He has a large store of magical knowledge in his head that he knows how to put to use, given the right ingredients. Curses are made this way, as are restorative potions, and "the most powerful magic" like that captured in true love.
$ Future sight: A power stolen from a Seer who practically begged him to do so, Rumplestiltskin can see the future to an extent. It’s all a jumble, though, and takes active focus to see anything much less sort it out. He finds it a burden as much as the Seer did, at times, for seeing the immutable future that you can do nothing to change is indeed difficult. This ability will be severely limited in Verdana, to mere minutes before an event happens, to avoid game-breaking, and it will require actively seeking and expending energy to use. In addition, trying to tell the future in, near, or on the ship weakens this further, allowing for plausible but wrong futures to be seen and makes what he does see harder t interpret.
$ Price: All magic beyond simple tricks has a price, whether it be in energy, blood, loss, knowledge of an unavoidable fate, or something more unexpected. Usually he can at least somewhat predict what this will be, but on Verdana he’s quite a bit more limited, which will make him a bit more cautious.
$ Cane attack: His cane is his chosen weapon, good for bashing and extra strong, and he uses it with impunity. He’s not bad with a sword, either (though the limp does tend to get in the way, these days), but he likes blunt force better, anyway.
$ Lock-picking: Among other unsavory skills, in the years without magic, he learned how to pick locks, and owns a set of lockpicks.
$ Lawyering: As Mr. Gold, Rumple made good use of his skill at weaving words and being only as truthful as absolutely necessary. His persona in Storybrooke has the skills of a lawyer, and he is even licensed as such.
Possessions:
$ His cane(/weapon)
$ A nice suit and tie, with a pocket handkerchief and expensive shoes
$ The Dark One’s dagger with his name on it
$ His case of potions, ingredients, and spell goods
$ A small bag of holding (the one he carried Frankenstein’s fortune in; currently empty, and within the spell ingredients case)
$ Lockpicks (also inside the spell case)
$ Baelfire’s old shawl
Arrival:
On the ship.
[- Writing Samples -]
Network Sample:
[The face on the network now is not a happy one. This beaky-nosed older gentleman, with his expensive suit and tie and his lightly feathered hair, looks rather coolly displeased. The background is that of the outside of the ship, since he’s apparently found his way out.]
I’m not sure just who thought it was a good idea to be kidnapping people? But I can assure you, whoever you are, it was a very. Bad. Idea. You have kidnapped entirely the wrong person.
[When he smiles, just one corner of his mouth turning up, it doesn’t look particularly cheerful. It looks a little threatening, actually.]
Whoever is behind this, I have much more important things to do than dealing with you, but believe me, dearie, I will make the time if I have to. I’m assuming, whoever you are, you’re paying attention to things said on this device you left me, so I’m sure you can see this. Send me back where I came from... and I might decide not to make you sorry.
[And he waits, leaning back a little in the camera’s view, both hands resting on the grip of his cane. Somewhat impatiently, and fully expecting someone to say something back-- whether it’s a smart something... or a stupid something. He has places to be, and he’d rather not linger here longer than he has to.]
Log Sample:
Bargaining with a dragon.
