Player: radionausea
Name: Bernard Mottram
Sex: Male
Age: 33
Occupation: Spiritualist, part-time legal researcher
Birthplace: London, England
Current Residence: London, England
Education: Home schooled by mother, father and tutors
Phobias / Manias: Tomopophobia, the fear of surgical intervention. Bernard's young exposure to polio and the subsequent, fruitless efforts to ameliorate it left him with a fear of surgery and invasive surgery. The sight of a creature feasting on a cadaver has only deepened this.
Encounter with a Strange Entity: As a child Bernard, while wandering a hospital, entered the morgue where he found a rancid smelling creature eating a corpse.
Characteristics:
STR: 45 (22/9)
CON: 50 (25/10)
SIZ: 45 (22/9)
DEX: 30 (15/6)
APP: 65 (32/13)
INT: 50 (50/10)
POW: 85 (42/17)
EDU: 68 (34/13)
Hit Points: 9 / 9
Magic Points: 13 / 13
Sanity: 75 / 80
Luck: 55
Move Rate: 8
Build: 0
Damage Bonus: +0
Accounting (05%)
Animal Handling (05%)
Anthropology (01%)
Appraise (05%)
Archaeology (01%)
Art / Craft (choose specialty) (05%)
Charm (15%) 55%
Climb (20%)
Credit Rating (00%) 30%
Cthulhu Mythos (00%) 5%
Disguise (05%)
Dodge (Half DEX%) 15%
Drive Carriage (20%)
Etiquette (05%)
Fast Talk (05%)
.Fighting (Brawl) (25%) 39%
Fighting (Boxing) (05%)
Firearms (Handgun) (20%)
Firearms (Rifle/Shotgun) (25%)
.First Aid (30%) 44%
History (05%)
Intimidate (15%)
Jump (20%)
.Language (Latin) (01%) 44%
Language (Own: English) (68%)
.Law (05%) 20%
Library Use (20%) 65%Listen (20%)
Locksmith (01%)
Mechanical Repair (10%)
Medicine (01%)
Natural World (10%)
Navigate (10%)
Occult (05%) 60%
Operate Heavy Machinery (01%)
Persuade (10%) 41%
Pilot (choose specialty) (01%)
Psychology (10%) 60%
Ride (05%)
Science (Psychical Phenomena) (01%) 70%
Sleight of Hand (10%)
Spot Hidden (25%)
Stealth (20%)
Survival (choose specialty) (10%)
Swim (20%)
Throw (20%)
Track (10%)
Background:
Personal Description:
Slight of build with an unruly mop of black hair that he hides under his hat, Bernard is a fair looking man but not one you'd call handsome. Generally he seems to be looking past people but it can be unnerving when he pulls his attention to you, as though he's laying bare secrets. Bernard works as a legal researcher for his father, though in truth he doesn't work all that often spending his time in own his own research.
Born and raised in the Bloomsbury area, he saw and heard things that couldn't be there. Thinking he was suffering from a weakness of mind his parents home schooled him and didn't allow contact with other children his age. This isolation only increased the sightings and voices but he learned quickly not to tell his parents of them.
Ever weak of constitution this was worsened when he contracted poliomyelitis. While he survived he was left with a paralysed left leg and systemic muscle weakness that left his co-ordination damaged.
Now a man grown Bernard has been investigating his own odd abilities, looking into ghost sightings, hauntings and attempting (and sometimes succeeding!) at making contact with the other side. Bernard occasionally takes payment to try and speak to loved ones who have passed, but should he not succeed charge only a minimal rate for his time - he's no confidence man.
Ideology and beliefs:
Bernard is a rationalist and an empiricist, believing what his senses tell him, all 6 of them. He is an agnostic about religion having seen no evidence of a god but evidence that the dead don't always leave for somewhere else. He believes in the inherent decency of man and has become enamored with the ideas of Bentham and Mill believing that it's a gentleman's duty to maximise the well-being of all.
Significant People:
His mother, Ruth, has always done her best for Bernard and he loves her dearly. Bernard has good relations with his father but they are strained as his father, Cornelius, still worries that Bernard is mentally unsound and is disappointed his son didn't show the wherewithal to follow him into the legal profession. The other person he is close to is his spiritual guide, Annabelle, who died 6 years past. Bernard has spent no small effort trying to find out who owned the carriage that crushed her but to no avail. Bernard has recently begun careful flirtation with a librarian at the British Library, Mabel, though this relationship is in its infancy.
Meaningful Locations:
The British Library where he has spend countless hours in the reading room looking into the occult. He also has a fondness for the halls of UCLH where he would wander while his mother worked, though some of the apparitions he saw there, and the wounds they bore, he would sooner forget.
Treasured Possessions:
A battered copy of
True Magick, the first book he has read that showed some deeper understanding of the world behind this world.
Traits:
Tries to hide the palsy in his hand by putting it in his pocket all times. Although his father might consider him feckless and witless he is actually very driven to understand psychical activity and hopes one day to publish his findings. He is friendly though initially awkward, this a result of his cloistered childhood.
Key Connection:
Mother, Ruth aged 56, retired nurse and now gives alms and what medical support she can to the sex-workers of Kings Cross.
Assets:
A small one bedroom flat in Bloomsbury,
Receives a modest stipend from his family in addition to a wage and whatever he asks from conducting seances.
He has a small blade concealed in his walking cane (sword-cane) to fend off ruffians as his frail appearance attracts them.
He carries a small amount of cash on his person.
True Magick - A small and crumbling hand-bound manuscript with a number of pages missing, but nonetheless describable as a veritable encyclopedia of Devil's lore.