Character Info
Oct. 22nd, 2018 02:00 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
themagicpoliceLaura Delaney
original character
At 5'10", Laura is reasonably tall and physically fit. She's got long-ish dark hair and hazel eyes. She's pretty active and has a definite energy about her, fidgeting when she has to sit still. She has bad posture and slouches like, all the time. Tends to spread out and take up the space around her, possibly to keep other people from doing it. Laura's not standoffish, exactly, but she certainly isn't inviting. Other people often find her aggressive, but this isn't by design; it's likely a product of her inability to hold her opinions back. She tends toward tanktops layered under jackets with jeans, and is never without a pair of boots.
Like Michael, Laura is a witch with little knowledge of how to use her abilities and what, exactly, they are. She lives with a lot of survivor's guilt, both from the death of her brother when she was a teenager, and more recently, from the murder of her partner (during the very short time she spent as a cop). She feels responsible for both, believing she's something of a curse on the people she's close to. She's directionless, looking for a place in the world and finding only dead ends.
A former delinquent child, she left home when she got sick of living in the shadow of her sibling's death. She moved states and joined the local police force for like, three months before her partner got killed on a routine call by a now-deceased(?) serial killer. Since then she's worked as a "journalist" for a shady magazine and does urbex stuff on the side, taking photos to sell prints. More recently she's become involved with the hunt for a copycat of the killer who murdered her partner, although she has no legal authority to do so and is kind of making a nuisance of herself.
Michael is Laura's only real friend (and vice versa, at least back home,) despite her personal ban on getting too involved with people. Nothing's happened to him yet, right? It's probably fine.
Death Curse: Through a long series of tragic events, Laura has come to believe that she can curse others, either on purpose or on accident, simply by associating with them. Since she's a witch, her belief shapes her abilities and makes her will reality, so the curse is technically real. If she wills it strongly enough, she can cause an "accident" to befall a certain person, usually to fatal ends. Since she's not a killer by nature, she wouldn't do this willingly. The other form of this "power" is that those close to her have a much higher chance to experience similar freak accidents. To Laura, it feels like she's holding a bow that someone else has pulled the string back on- she just gets to aim it.
Poltergeist: A combination of surivor's guilt and the bond she had with her now-dead brother has created the illusion in Laura's mind that she's slightly haunted by his spirit. Sometimes things happen around her that seem to be the work of a poltergeist: objects move, there are knocks in the walls, sometimes messages appear. Laura has no idea that she's actually doing this herself, subconsciously. Usually the events are helpful to her, and usually they only happen when she's alone. In addition, she has frequent vivid dreams in which her brother gives her important information. This is information she already had, it's just her subconscious putting the pieces together.
Parkour: Okay it's not really parkour, but Laura's very physically active. She's a decent runner, can climb with relative ease, and is able to squeeze into tight spaces if needed. Most of these skills come from her exploration side hustle.
Voice: Laura is originally from small-town Pennsylvania, so she sounds pretty American. She doesn't speak any other languages besides English. Her voice is an alto, and frequently sounds bored unless she's up to something she finds especially interesting.
Scent: Laura keeps a whole host of plants in her small apartment, and probably smells like soil. She also probably smells like dust and old building.
Mental Information: Laura has no particular psychic gifts (unless you count magic?) and no defenses against mental prying.
Biological Information: Might have some latent liver issues due to excessive drinking when she was younger, but Laura's in relatively good health. Her magical abilities are genetic, if it matters.
Magical Information: Laura's a witch, probably on par with Michael in terms of strength, though they're hard to compare considering neither of them really have any clue what they're doing. She's aware there's some sort of ability she has, but she thinks it's more of a curse than a power and treats it as such.
