Deerington App

[the_archivist]

IN CHARACTER

Character Name: Jonathan Sims/The Archivist
Canon: The Magnus Archives
Canon Point: During Episode 170: Recollection

In-Game Tattoo Placement: Back of the neck. The antlers are centred around an eye.
Current Health/Status: He's perfectly healthy and borderline immortal.
Age: 32
Species: Human/Avatar of an eldritch god

Content Warnings: Angst, manipulation, injury, mental manipulation and torture.

History:
Personal History
World History

Personality:
At first meeting, it is easy to write Jon off as pretty much exactly the sort of person you’d expect to be an archivist. He’s in his early 30s, but looks older, speaks with precise, clipped words and sounds kind of posh. He can easily come across as arrogant and condescending - he doesn’t hold back his opinions of people and he has a sharp tongue and can be extremely sarcastic.

None of this is untrue, and he definitely can come across as cold and uncaring. In early episodes, he is extremely dismissive of the various statements he deals with, even to the point of having people complain about him.

There is a lot more to Jon than meets the eye though. Much of his attitude and brusqueness towards other people can be tracked back to him being extremely socially awkward and generally bad with people. He was raised by his grandmother after his parents died, and while she took good care of him, and loved him, she also wasn’t able to hide the fact that she did resent him - she’d raised her own child, and now had to raise another. This definitely rubbed off on Jon, leaving him rather distant and cold, not used to people being warm with him. He has a tendency to keep people at arm’s length because it’s easier to deal with them that way.

Once someone does get close to him though, he’s able to relax and shows a lot more of what lies underneath. With his ex-girlfriend, Georgie, he’s relaxed and almost charming, able to show off his intelligence and sarcastic sense of humour. There’s obviously something to him, since Georgie allowed him to stay with her indefinitely even when he was on the run from the police and worse horrors.

And when he does feel close to someone, when someone is his, he is fiercely loyal and protective, even at his own expense. He willingly throws himself into the Buried’s coffin to rescue Daisy, even though the woman had been quite clear that she thought he was a monster, because Daisy is part of his team and is worth protecting. He’s also willing to risk the hatred of people he cares about to try to protect them.

In fact, he seems to expect this in some ways because Jonathan Sims does not have a particularly high opinion of himself. He is well aware of his flaws - that he’s fussy and socially inept and off-putting, oh, and also is turning into a monster. Why wouldn’t someone hate him?

His outward attitude hides a lot of insecurity. He hates not being in control. He admits to Martin that the reason why he’s so dismissive of most of the statements is because he’s scared - scared that there’s something so much bigger going on and he doesn’t know what it is, and also there are many many worms trying to eat them and use their bodies as hives. He takes failure hard - he feels deep guilt for the murder of Jurgen Leitner, who was killed when he went out for a cigarette, and also feels responsible for Tim’s death, and for his friends being bound to the Archive alongside him.

His guilt is compounded at his current canon point by the fact that he was used as a tool to end the world and bring about the apocalypse, by Jonah Magnus. He feels that this event is his fault, something that he is personally responsible for, and he is constantly bathed in the fear of the entire world and all of its inhabitants. He likes this and hates it at the same time, and it just adds fuel to his crippling guilt.

Knowledge is something he uses as a shield and he is extremely driven when it comes to it. When he was eight, he countered his first Leitner - a supernatural book called ‘A Guest for Mr Spider’. The book nearly claimed him, but a much older boy who bullied him stole the book, and was the one taken instead, saving Jon’s life. Since that day, Jon became interested in the supernatural, and determined to learn what he could about it so that he would be able to protect himself and other people. That’s what drew him to the Magnus Institute in the first place.

Knowledge is his main driving force. He will seek it out to the exclusion of nearly all else, even to the point of risking his life - he seeks out two Avatars of other powers in this pursuit, and barely comes out alive each time. Even when kidnapped and threatened, the minute his mouth is open, he’s trying to ask questions and find out more.

This lack of regard for his own well-being is also displayed in a more mundane way - he is a workaholic who frequently forgoes sleep and food when he’s in pursuit of knowledge. He keeps a bed in the Archive because he works late often enough to need it.

His abilities as an avatar of the Beholding are a source of a certain amount of conflict. On the one hand, Jon actually likes having the power to get the answers he wants - people have to answer him now, On the other… he is very concerned about his loss of humanity. He’s seen other Avatars, and he’s seen the previous Archivist use her assistants and other people as tools, and he doesn’t like that. He worries about becoming like that, stopping caring about anything except more knowledge. So far, he tries to use them as ethically as he can, tries to use them to help his friends, and avoid using them on his friends.

He knows that the people around him are his best chance of retaining his humanity and pushing them away, event for their safety, doesn’t help. He’s admitted that he isn’t certain he’s capable of trusting people naturally anymore, so instead he consciously chooses to trust them.

Abilities/Powers/Weaknesses & Warping:
In Jon’s canon, there are a number of entities which exist outside reality but can influence it. These entities are fears made manifest, and they feed on human fears, as well as influencing reality, primarily by causing supernatural occurrences. Some people can become bound to an entity and gain great power from it, but at the expense of much of their humanity.

As the Archivist, Jon is an avatar of The Eye/The Beholding. It is the manifestation of the fear of being watched, exposed, followed, of having secrets known, but also the drive to know and understand, even if your discoveries might destroy you. It is also the fear that you’re suffering for the sake of something watching.

As the Archivist, Jon has a variety of abilities.

1. Jon can compel people to answer his questions. People will answer his questions truthfully and to the best of their ability, although he can’t make you tell him something that you don’t know.

He can also compel people to give him statements - stories explaining a supernatural occurrence they have experienced. When a statement is given, the person giving it will recount the event in incredible detail and eloquence. This has been known to make the statement giver feel a great sense of relief and catharsis when it is complete. He is able to extract statements directly from people’s heads and recount them in the same way as reading a statement.

If he 'hunts' for a statement, he can force someone to recount their statement to him. This is much more satisfying for him, and much more devastating for the victim. The victim will be forced to recount their statement, and will experience it as though they were living through it again. The fear they felt will become almost paralysing for them, even if they had almost entirely recovered. They will also see Jon in their dreams, and often as hallucinations.

When reading transcripts of statements, Jon is able to emulate the voice of the person who gave the statement to a certain extent, and relives the experience in the statement.

If a statement is given directly to him, he will then experience any nightmares that the statement-giver has about it.

Reading statements is still tiring for him, pulling statements from people’s heads is even more exhausting. However, he also needs to read statements to remain healthy as this is what feeds The Beholding. If he goes too long without reading a statement, he starts to become ill. Reading a statement almost immediately revitalises him. He can also use statements to heal himself - reading one vastly improved his condition after being in a coma for 6 months.

He can read statements in any language and will be able to immediately translate and understand them, even if he does not understand that language. However he cannot read and understand these other languages outside of the statements.

2. Jon has the ability to Know information that he shouldn’t otherwise be able to. In his home world he theoretically can Know anything. This knowledge often has a horrific bent to it - for example, knowing how someone's primary school teacher died. I'd like to reduce this power to his pre-apocalypse levels; he occasionally gets flashes of Knowing, such as Knowing how to cut a bullet out of someone's leg, but often the knowledge will be horrific.

In the apocalypse world, this Knowing extends to being able to read thoughts. He is mostly able to hold back from this, however it is an effort. He can also become overwhelmed by this, and will be hearing the Deerington creepy voice murmuring to him.

3. Jon heals much more quickly from injuries than a human would. He healed from a deep scalpel wound inflicted upon him in a few days. Supernatural wounds take a little longer. If the wounds are self-inflicted, then they heal near instantly. I'm happy to have this power warped so healing near to people inflicts those wounds on someone else nearby.

4. He has a limited ability to see through illusions and mental manipulation - during the Unknowing ritual, he was eventually able to see through the ritual which was warping his perceptions, and recognised the truth. He was also able to see a cursed ‘ghost’ bullet in Melanie’s leg, and the corruption is was causing, even though it was invisible to anyone else.


Inventory:
1. A tape recorder which has a habit of switching on at plot-relevant times
2. A metal zippo lighter with a spiderweb engraved on it.
3. A manilla file full of paper Statements
4. A set of clean clothes appropriate for an office job
5. A small box of cassette tapes
6. A highland cow stuffed toy

Writing Samples:
Sample 1
Sample 2

OUT OF CHARACTER

Player Name: Zalia
Player Age: 35
Player Contact: zaliachimera

Other Characters In Game: N/A
In-Game Tag If Accepted: Jonathan Sims: Zalia
Permissions for Character: Dreamwidth
Are you comfortable with prominent elements of fourth-walling?: Yes
What themes of horror/psychological thrillers do you enjoy the most?: I really like seeing characters start to become something other, to have to question whether their impulses are their own, or if there is something else inside them, or that they are becoming. The slow creeping sense of wrongness.
Is there anything in particular you absolutely need specific content warnings for?: Nope
Additional Information: Nope