(no subject)
Character Name: Erik Destler
Series: Phantom of the Opera (1989 version)
Age: Appears to be late thirties or early forties; actually 150 years old.
From When?: Right after Christine tears his music and tosses it into a sewer along with the discs containing Don Juan Triumphant
Inmate/Warden: Inmate. Erik is an unapologetic murderer, and he would have raped Christine the night she had planned to leave him if they hadn't been interrupted. Further, Erik kills people for two reasons: the first is because he is in need of their skins in order to create his mask, and the second is in Christine Day's name. He kills with pleasure and entirely without remorse.
Abilities/Powers: Due to the fact that Erik has sold his soul to the devil, he has been imbued with certain powers. The first is the fact that he is immortal as long as his music survives in some sort of way, shape or form. He can be shot, stabbed and set on fire, but he lives through it. He also appears to have heightened, nearly feline reflexes, which would be slowed to that of an exceptional human aboard the barge. The strength he exhibits would also be lowered to exceptional human as well.
Personality: The single most important part of Erik's personality is obsession. While he did not actually realize that he was selling his soul to the devil in order to be loved for his music, he was obsessed with the idea of people loving him enough that he would, in fact, 'give everything' to be loved for it.
The obsession reveals itself more prevalently in Erik's obsession with Christine Day. He became obsessed with her from the first moment he saw her, manipulating circumstances until she was in a place where he could teach her how to sing as he wished that she could. The obsession with her grew until he was “killing in her name.” He killed Buquet for nearly killing Christine with a mirror, then placed his skin body in Carlotta's dressing room in order to make it so that she could preform in the diva's stead.
This obsession also overrides Erik's caution. He nearly forgets himself during Christine's performance of the “Jewel Song” from Faust, expressing nearly boyish glee. There is a moment when he nearly leaps up to offer her a standing ovation only remembering to remain in the shadows of what is meant to be an unoccupied box at the last minute.
But even in his obsession, there is a tenderness there. Erik would do literally anything for Christine, and when he brings her down to his liar, he is mild mannered, polite, charmed by her and charming. He's moved to tears when she sings the libretto to the unfinished opera. Literally, there is nothing that she can ask of him that he wouldn't grant her. He even joins her soul to his, placing the ring that the devil gave him on her finger.
Further, when he accidently bumps into a prostitute with dark hair, he offers her his arm like he would a lady. When they adjourn to her rented rooms, he is tender with her, taking her by the hand and blowing out the candle. Where he can be as cruel to her as he desires he only makes a single demand of her: “tonight your name is Christine.” In exchange for this, he pays her extremely well for her services, and she wakes with a wide smile.
However his obsession turns murderous when Christine attempts to leave him, and he kills several people in order to keep her, swearing that she would never leave there. Further, there is a strong implication that he is going to rape her if he wasn't interrupted by the intrusion of the police into his lair. His rage makes him even more violent, and it removes any of the tenderness that he has shown her prior.
The mingling of anger and obsession is extremely dangerous. Because Erik believes that his soul is already damned for his fool's bargain, he believes that there is no consequences for his actions. In his anger, Erik has a vicious, vicious streak. He is more violent than he needs to be and he enjoys the savagery of it. While he does need to (at some points) kill people to take their skin, Erik employees techniques that keep the victim alive far longer than they need to be.
He enjoys playing with people in other ways. When he is attacked with the intention of being robbed, Erik toys with the men who would try and kill him, taunting them with words and then the ring leader with the severed head of his cronies. Severed heads are a theme with Erik; after he kills Carlotta (in the middle of a sarcastic seduction) he puts her head in the soup to taunt the opera company and the people assembled, especially Christine's suitor, Richard. For Erik, these acts of violence become a form of hunting, and the victims are his prey. He wants them to know that he is superior to them, and that they here merely for his amusement.
However, unlike other Erik's, this Erik is able to function in society, and he has a public persona for that. Before he unwittingly sold his soul to the devil in exchange for his music being loved forever, he was a mild manner composer who played piano in a whore house. He was nice, polite and quiet, never raising his voice. There was a shyness to him, and he preferred to speak with his music rather than words. He uses this as a way to get people to trust him. He can be forceful, but he also pretends to be calm and peaceful. He will feign concern and attempt to friend people so they don't know his secret.
Path to Redemption: All of the issues (well, probably 95% of them) come from the fact that Erik believes that he has lost his soul, and because he has already lost both his soul and Christine, he thinks that he can do pretty much whatever the hell he wasn't because it doesn't matter. The fact that he is here means otherwise, and this is something that Erik is going to have to accept. Further, the idea of being loved for his music is one that is going to need to be worked on also. Erik sees himself as unlovable because of his deformity, and if he couldn't convince Christine whom he was bound too, then he doesn't think he can convince anyone. Further, the deal/choice he keeps demanding that she make (love or music) will be important as Erik learns to accept both.
History: < a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Phantom_of_the_Opera_%281989_film%29">Movie Wiki.
History for the intervening hundred years: With a scream and a cry, Christine Day disappeared from Erik's life and the burning rooms below the London Opera House. Manuscripts fluttered around him, and it was a moment before he gathered one into his arms, smothering the flames below the velvet of the Red Death costume that he wore.
As long as his music lived, he would live as well. He couldn't live here; too many memories and too many people knew of him. Erik had planned to take Christine to Paris; he would start there. Christine made him tighten and want to howl, and he kicked Richard's corpse. Richard was the first skin he took. He'd keep it forever and give it to Christine when he found her again. He would find her again; their souls were joined. It was a matter of time and patience.
From Paris, Milan, Rome, Athens, St. Petersburg, India, Erik killed and composed his way across the world, never staying for more than a year at a stretch. He gathered money and knowledge, so that when he reached America, he had enough to set himself up lavishly in New York. Working behind the scenes in many of the more famous broadway shows, producing and guiding, Erik became more and more certain that New York was where he would find her.
His name changed several times, before he was finally Erik Frost, the most popular producer of Broadway shows. New techniques in latex masks had made it so that he no longer needed to hunt for skin, allowing him to step into the limelight that he craved for so long.
The kills continued; Erik was a predator and he couldn't unlearn that skill simply because he didn't need it anymore. So he became more sophisticated with his killing techniques, never once leaving a trail that someone like the inspector could follow to his rather posh doorway.
Sample Journal Entry: [5-10 Sentences] [The page is speckled with notes etched haphazardly here and there. The handwriting is scratched.]
It's funny, I thought given that I'd actually met the bastard that hell would be at least a little more fire and brimstone. I suppose it's just another way for him to twist the screws. After all, 150 years he's waited for me, what's a few more days?
Me voici! - D'où vient ta surprise?
Ne suis-je pas mis à ta guise?
L'épée au côté, la plume au chapeau,
L'escarcelle pleine, un riche manteau
Sur l'épaule; - en somme
Un vrai gentilhomme!
Eh bien! que me veux-tu, docteur!
Parle, voyons! ... - Te fais-je peur?
{The libretto from Faust, Méphistophélès's entrance: Here I am!
Why are you surprised?
Is my attire not to your taste?
My sword at my side, a feather in my hat,
Money in my purse, a splendid cloak
Over my shoulder; in short,
A real lord!
Well, doctor, what do you want with me?
Come now, speak, are you afraid of me?
Sample RP: Erik Destler had never been good at expressing his feelings verbally; he'd always allowed his music to give voice to things words never would. His notes could be sad, they could be happy, they could be rage and often they could be all of the above. He stood in the bedroom of his New York loft, but he knew that this place wasn't his home. Gloved fingers touched the face that Christine (his precious Christine) had torn off, and he knew that the mask was destroyed.
He'd died and come back so many times that this was merely one more inconvenience; he cared more for the loss of the mask than he did for the death throes. He would be returned to New York proper and then he would find his lovely wife. It was only a matter of time before he did; love and music were forever, and Christine would always come back to him. As his thoughts turned towards her, the harsh notes he had been playing on the violin softened, and the movement of bow to string became sweet.
He had finished his opera; and he had done it for her. She had given the music words before, and now he had known how she knew them. He hummed along as he swayed, the tenderness and promise racing down his arm and into the strings. Time, love, music, violence, they were all jumbled together; The notes became louder, a screech of rage and anger before he lowered the bow and looked around in the sudden silence.
He was still not returned to New York proper; someone was going to pay for this.
Special Notes:
Erik is scarred, but his room from New York will have a number of faces in it. Still, he will need to be allowed some sort of stitching or cutting implement in order to be able to use them. Or he'll find another way.