forum || The Ghost | blood and gore and all that fun stuff included | oxo | CLOSED ||

Started December 04, 2020 by @PrettyLittlePyro

tune

A string of murders has been happening in Glenwood City, although that in itself isn't unusual. Murders and crime happens all the time there. The media has christened it The City of Criminals, and they aren't wrong. Even the Nova, the most admired and powerful group of superheroes in existence, are reluctant to try their luck there.

No, the unusual thing about these murders is how they're killed. The bodies have been skinned, so that the victim is unidentifiable, and the flesh is then hung in front of the hero's headquarters, expressions intact.

No one knows anything about the killer, except that they wear a white mask.

You are a powerful hero from the Nova. Although you're still fairly young, by hero standards, you are still one of the most powerful in known history. You decide to try your luck finding this mysterious killer, known to the public as Ghost. As you follow the clues, you are joined with a young person who knows more than they wants to admit.

---

If it's not already clear, this is a hero/villain roleplay. I would like there to be romance, because I'm a weirdo like that, but if there's none, I won't die. I'd be the villain, obviously. You have the freedom to design your character however you want… mostly.

Some rules:

• This will be a gorey roleplay, so if that kind of stuff bother you, maybe you shouldn't participate.
• I would like an experienced roleplayer. At least 2 paragraphs per response, please. If you can't think of anything to write, maybe write about your character's thoughts or feelings. I dunno. If I've never roleplayed with you, please give me a writing sample.
• No racial slurs.
• There will be a lot of swearing, at least on my part, so be warned. Unless you're not comfortable with that. If you want some sort of steamy romance, then we'll take it to the pms.

And lastly,

• Have fun. Enjoy this. You can let this die, if that's what you want. I don't care. It's up to you!

~ @PrettyLittlePyro

---

- Basic Stuff -
Name:
Nicknames:
Alias:
Age:
Gender:
Sexuality:
Abilities: (you can have up to 5. As long as you're not tooooo OP, I'm okay with pretty much anything)

- Appearance-y Stuff -
Appearance:

• Hair:
• Face:
• Skin:
• Body:
• Distinguishing Features:

Normal Clothes:
Hero/Villain Suit:
Weapons:

Personality:

- Optional Info -
Family:
Pets:
Theme Song:
Background:
Other:

- Basic Stuff -
Name: Aloysha Turgenev
Nicknames: Law, Lawsha
Alias: The Acolyte
Age: 20
Gender: Male
Sexuality: Straight
Abilities: Blood Absorption, Illusions, Esoteric Health Manipulation

- Appearance-y Stuff -
Appearance:

• Hair: Deep crimson; short back and sides, long on top, looks like it has been left to grow for a month; wild and wavy. He either keeps it so that it goes over his forehead, or covering the right side of his face.
• Face: He has an angular facial structure; defined jawline; chiseled cheekbones; symmetrical button nose, regular yet full lips of a slightly darker pink than normal. His stormy grey eyes are slightly rounded and lined by thick eyelashes.
• Skin: He has a rather fair complexion with pink undertones, his skin is smooth with little to no blemishes.
• Body: He stands around 5'10, roughly 16 stone in weight, and has a well-built, athletic, slightly trapezoid structure with broad shoulders.
• Distinguishing Features: A couple of cat scratch scars on his right cheek, usually hidden by his hair.

Normal Clothes: He is usually seen wearing a navy and cream varsity jacket over the top of a white hoodie, with a ripped baby-blue jeans and a pair of white, canvas lace-up plimsolls.
Hero Suit: A pair of leather pants, a long-sleeved t-shirt with a hooded vest jacket. He also wears a pair of knee-high lace-up boots, and a black mark that covers the entire face apart from his left eye.
Weapons: In way of hand-held weaponry, he carries an expandable pocket staff and a butterfly knife. His ability of Blood Absorption allows him to create blood weaponry that only lasts for a certain amount of time.

Personality: Aloysha is a sweet person, one could almost call him wholesome, but that's what he wants people to believe. You need to be tough, firm even, when you're against a villain and surrounded by death–he knows when it's time to stop playing the innocent nice guy. Despite this, however, he's constantly worried that he will do something wrong and end up unintentionally hurting someone. He is very independent and doesn't like having to ask for help from others unless he has no other choice.

- Optional Info -
Family: One biological mother, one step-mother
Pets: Two kittens
Theme Song: Falling by Why Don't We

- Basic Stuff -
Name: Chantara Aitne
Nicknames: Tara
Alias: Ghost
Age: 20
Gender: Female
Sexuality: Bisexual
Abilities: Something she calls Ghosting - the ability to phase through things, which makes it nearly impossible to grab her, and camoflauge that isn't total invisibility, but gets pretty close. One ability that I made up, called Shockwave, that makes it so that when she feels an impact, she can direct some of the shock away from her, so if she jumped on a building, when she lands, she directs the impact away from her, so that it's like she only jumped from 10 feet up instead of several stories. She can't control where the impact goes, though,

- Appearance-y Stuff -
Appearance:

• Hair: Used to be brown, but bleached a blonde so pale it's practically white anyways. A little past her shoulders, and usually kept up in a messy ponytail, with a few strands hanging free by her face.
• Face: Kind of pretty, I guess? Delicately formed features, which can often make people think she's innocent… except for the glare she gives people when they mess with her. Startlingly blue eyes, a few pale freckles, and a glare that could freeze almost anyone in their tracks.
• Skin: Pale, but not as pale as it could be. Kind of like she spent some time in the sun, but not longer than a few hours. Almost no scars, except for some burn or scratch scars from her childhood - the scars everyone gets.
• Body: Slender, and slightly curvy, and about 5'5''. Makes up for her height in attitude. Pretty fit…
• Distinguishing Features: Her typical glare
• Link: Tara

Normal Clothes: A pair of skinny jeans or leggings, and combat boots. A sweatshirt with a jacket over it, usually a leather jacket. A bracelet on her right wrist that she says is a family heirloom.
Hero/Villain Suit: A full-body suit, a little bit like Spider-Gwen's. A pale white-ish color, but more of a light silver-gray. A hood and white boots and black gloves. No skin is shown. And the main feature of her costume: a blank, featureless white mask with a black line crossing one eye. It disguises her voice if she ever has to talk, which is helpful.
Weapons: Daggers, knives, scalpels, anything sharp. Sometimes a poison, too, when she feels like making her wounds painful.

Personality: Coarse and blunt, Tara seems unapproachable at first. She acts prickly so that people can't get close easily, and then acts nice when she knows them well enough, but that's just another wave of her walls. She is clever and calculating, although she does tend to overlook things when she's in a hurry. Impatient and spontanious, she prefers to get things done her way, without getting help from anyone. She doesn't like to show or feel emotions at all, and isn't very loyal. She can bullshit her way out of things pretty well.

- Optional Info -
Pets: A black cat that she technically doesn't own, but follows her everywhere. She calls it Talin.
Theme Song: Panic Room by Au/Ra
Other: She really likes chewing gum, and so she will more likely than not be chewing gum when people see her.

The Ghost strikes again: can the Nova really keep this demon under control? That was the headline on the newspaper that morning, which Tara spotted when she was shopping. She sneered at it, blowing her gum into a bubble and popping it before continuing to chew. If only the public knew that the Nova hadn't sent anyone at all… at least, no one good. She had seen the new guy, Aloysha Turgenev, who was supposed to be a detective or something, from afar, and he didn't seem like much of a threat at all.

She gave her cart a violent push past the freezer isle, stopping to grab a box of frozen chicken from one of the tall, frosted doors, and tossing it into her cart, before continuing. Today, according to her job at the Investigation Department of Glenwood City, or IDGC, she would be ghosting the guy who came, to see what she could learn from his investigation skills.

Because she wanted to be a detective. No one suspected detectives.

She paid for her stuff and left the store, toting five bags of groceries. She glared at the trunk of her car and juggled the bags around so that she could reach her keys, and unlocked her car before opening the trunk and putting the bags in. Her phone vibrated, and she slammed the trunk shut, climbing into the front seat and answering the call. It was the head of the Department, Romberdo Lyin, a small-time hero called Tracker. Also her boss.

Without so much as a hello, Romberdo started to speak immediately. "We need you right now."

Tara scowled and started her car, glancing behind her and backing up, the phone wedged between her ear and shoulder. "You said I wasn't needed until 2."

"But Turgenev arrived early, and we want you to be here now. We don't want the Nova to get the wrong idea." Romberdo sounded annoyed - but then again, he always did.

"He's a small-time detective, boss, what's the Nova gonna care about him?" Tara scowled and pulled from the parking lot. "Fine. I'm on my way, but if my ice cream melts, I'm blaming you."

From the other side of the phone, her boss sighed, and she grinned. "Fine, Aitne, drop off your groceries off, and then come. I need you here as soon as possible, please. And please try to make a good impression on him, or we won't get any other help."

"Yes, sir." She pried the phone from her ear and hung up. She drove to her apartment, dropped her groceries off, and slipped one of her small vials of poison into her jacket sleeve, just to be careful. One could never be too careful in Glenwood City. Making sure she had her keys, phone, poison, and daggers, she left.

When she arrived at the IDGC, she was immediately hustled to Romberdo's office, where a handsome man with red hair waited with him. Romberdo immediately stood and smiled with relief. "Mr. Turgenev, this is my assistant, Chantara Aitne. Aitne, this is Detective Aloysha Turgenev from the Nova."

Tara stuck her hands into her pockets and gave the guy a nod. "A pleasure, I'm sure." Her tone was bored, and her boss sent her a glare, which she ignored.

Aloysha Turgenev, the man who never intended to be early for anything. He wasn't exactly a morning person so as his alarms went off in the morning, he just rolled over and snoozed them all– at least until he realised that he was going to be late if he didn't get his backside in gear. He leapt out of bed and rushed around to get dressed.

He quickly rushed out of the house, fumbling with the keys so he could lock the door, and ran over to his car with a prayer that he would make it in time. He switched on the radio, already knowing what the news coverage was going to be. Another body was discovered outside the headquarters; nothing was new there anymore. The body was another unidentifiable which really put a thorn in his plan to try and find a connection between the murders. Perhaps, now that he was going to the detective agency, he would be able to find more leads. You would think, being a hero, he would be on top of the case as much as the police department, however it was rather difficult to keep on top of everything and go on a hunt for The Ghost when they attacked so frequently.

Slamming the door of his car shut, Aloysha ran his hand through his wild hair to try and neaten it out, before briskly walking through the doors of the IDGC. "Sorry I'm late!" he smiled nervously as he entered, only to receive a few odd looks from the people in the lobby. As it turned out, he was over an hour early, and the man spent a good ten minutes wondering how the fuck he had messed the times up that badly.

Now, everyone he was supposed to be meeting with was ready and present. He was introduced to a woman who didn't appear to be pleased to meet him, and really he didn't blame her– he too would be annoyed if he had been called into work before he was supposed to be there. Still, he smiled politely and nodded to her with a rather cheerful tone. "A pleasure to meet you, Miss Aitne. My apologies for arriving so early."

Tara wasn't sure how to respond to his words. Usually, when people heard her annoyed voice and saw her glare, they would back off, or be afraid. Then again, this guy was a detective, so he must be used to this kind of thing. "I'm probably supposed to be polite, so I'll tell you that it's fine." Her tone was cutting.

"Aitne!" Romberdo snapped. "Please respect our guest."

She sent him a sarcastic smile. "Yes, sir, my apologies." She nodded to the man she would be following, and then sat down on one of the chairs by her boss's desk. "I sincerely hope you can forgive my little outburst there."

Romberdo glared at her, then shook his head and turned to the guy, Aloysha. "She's not always like that. She'll warm up to you soon." Tara snorted at this, which he ignored. "I apologize for her rudeness. As head of the Department, I take full responsibility for her ac-"

Pop.

Tara had just blown a bubble of gum, and popped it as loud as she could. She leaned back in her seat and raised her eyebrows at them, as if to say what are you gonna do about it?

Aloysha waved his hands dismissively with a bright, polite grin. "Oh please, you don't need to apologise on her behalf. Nor does she need to be forgiven for anything," his eyes turned to the woman while a warm expression spread across his features. "I like that sarcastic apology. She has a fire, and that'd good in this line of work!" Perhaps he was being a little too enthusiastic, but he genuinely believed that having the sort of personality that Chantara was showing was somewhat a good thing when you were a detective. It made things more interesting.

After his little remark, he took a seat and looked over at Romberdo with a firm look in his eyes. Being in this kind of situation never sat well with his heart or his stomach, but over the years he had learned to deal with being in even the smallest of confrontations. "So, shall we get down to business?"

This guy… he was interesting. Chantara let a smirk cross her face, and she watched the two of them. Evidently, the reaction Aloysha had given was not what Romberdo was expecting, because he stammered for a few moments before speaking.

"Yes. Let's get to it." He sat down at his desk and looked at the detective from over the desk. He handed Aloysha a thin file, filled with all the information they knew about the Ghost. "We don't have much information on them, except we believe that it is a woman." He hesitated. "Although, the brutal method of the killing-" Tara clenched her fists at it. If her boss had one big fault, it was his slight sexism. If only he knew.

"-The brutal way of killing seems to have been done by someone strong."

The red-head nodded as he flipped through the file, thoroughly reading every paper and note. "I don't think you should rule out the possibility of the culprit being a woman, they are known to be rather strong," he glanced over at Tara. "Right?"
He almost chuckled to himself as he thought about the time his step-mother carried a rather heavy armchair up a long flight of stairs. "Women are equally capable of these things as men are, and I think you would do well to keep that in mind."

Aloysha closed the file and lay his hand on top, gently tapping his fingers on it. "Do you have any other information to give me? Anything you haven't included in this file?"

Instead of feeling gratitude or warmth toward this guy, Tara simply gave him a confused look. What was he hoping to accomplish by buttering her up? He didn't have much to earn by it, and even if he was doing it to make a good impression, she didn't hold much power here, and so it would mean nothing. No one cared about a small-time intern.

Romberdo shook his head. "This is all we have." Then he corrected himself. "Wait, yes. We have a recording of a conversation between the Ghost and one of our investigators, before he, ah… met a rather unfortunate end."

He rifled through his desk, pulling out a tape and inserting it into the tape recorder behind him. Two voices instantly sounded. The recording was fuzzy, but the words were understandable.

"Y-you're them! You're the Ghost!" The speaker was obviously terrified.

"I mean, I've been called that before. I assume you're one of those fuckers at the IDGC or whatever they call it?" This voice was cold, and it wasn't quite clear if it was a male or a female's voice. "They used to be the only ones to call me that. I suppose I should be flattered that I've made a name for myself, though. That's never easy here."

"What do you want with me?"

"Nothing. You were just here. But, I guess, now that you're here, I can use you as a threat. That could work, of course. Those bastards are very paranoid, and so one of their own dying will be a great shock, I'm sure."

"W-why are you doing this? What do you have to get- to gain from this? From this mindless killing? You can let me free, and I won't tell anyone!" The man pleaded.

The Ghost snorted, clearly amused. "That so? Well, that's too bad that I don't trust you. Besides, you're worth more to me dead than alive."

"I-I'll give you whatever you want! Just let me go!"

"What I want?" The Ghost paused. "What I want, no one can give me. You wouldn't rid me of my fun, right?" And then suddenly, their voice was much louder, as if it had moved closer to the recorder. "To those who listen to this, let me tell you that no, you can't stop me from killing even if you tried. Stay out of my way, and maybe fewer people will die. It's up to you." There was a click and the recording was done.

Aloysha's eyes were wide as he listened to the audio, replaying it again a second time. The voice of The Ghost sent chills through his body, especially the harshness of it. That wasn't a voice you heard on a daily basis and he felt rather privileged that he had been able to listen to an audio of the killer– something he would never admit to aloud.

He repeated the audio a third time, pursing his lips together as he rubbed his chin. "What they want, no one can give them…" Perhaps that was linked to why The Ghost was killing people, but since there was no clear connections between all of the victims it was hard to definitively make that judgement. "The killer wants something, even if it is something that no one can give them." Aloysha's eyes fell onto both Tara and Romberdo. "Put yourself in the killer's shoes. What do you want? What would drive you to kill so many people as a result of not being able to have it?"
He remembered his mother always saying that to try and sympathise with someone, put yourself in their shoes. It was a good tactic when trying to understand the reasoning behind a person's actions.

Tara didn't answer his question. She wanted desperately to smirk, but she held it back, face as blank as a whiteboard during a test. She fiddled with one of the pens she had grabbed from Romberdo's desk, and kept quiet. It was a dumb question. She knew the answer to what the Ghost wanted, for the very obvious reason that she was the Ghost. Kind of helpful.

And that something no one can give me bullshit? It was something to mislead the listeners, take them down the wrong path. It was fun, making people believe something, but it not being right in the end.

Romberdo spoke, maybe wanting to impress the man in front of them. "Freedom, perhaps. Or a world rid of humans. Maybe a loss that resulted in them snapping?"

The young man shook his head at Romberdo's response. "That's the most cliché thing you could have said." He let out a heavy sigh and rubbed his chin while leaning back in his chair. "A loss would result in The Ghost's victims being specific, something they are clearly not."
There was obviously something that they were overlooking, or perhaps he was asking the wrong questions, but with so little information to work with it felt only necessary to ask questions that may not have even helped in the long run.

After a long moment of silence from Aloysha, he tilted his head to the side and sighed when his eyes fell on Tara. "What is your take on the matter? I want to know what's going through that head of yours. You're an apprentice, right? Well it's only fair that you have an input on all of this as well and quite frankly I think you'll be able to provide an insight myself and Romberdo have missed."