application for box

[gren]

Player Information
Player name: Trace
Contact: carrier pigeons
Are you over 18: yep
Characters in The Box Already: shepard, clementine, and sally

Character Information
Character Name: Grendel, 'Gren' for short.
Canon: The Wolf Among Us (Fables comics technically, but he was never in the comics)
Canon Point: Episode 3, when he's high off his balls because I'm the worst
Is your character Dead, Undead or Alive: Alive
History: right here

Personality:
From the first episode, Gren is painted as a sort of lesser antagonist figure. We meet him for his first major scene in a bar, where he's deliberately impeding Bigby's search for the Woodsman for a few minutes before the two of them square off in the giant end-episode brawl. He may not be the big bad end-boss (this is a video game, after all), but he's clearly not "one of the good guys".

Or is he?

Okay, let's be real here: Gren's kind of scum. He spends every evening in a shady bar on the wrong end of town. He's a complete asshole who acts like he bar-fights on commission. He has an abrasive remark for anything, especially if you're trying to be friendly. (Then again, nobody tries to be friendly without an agenda, when you're a low-class Fable.) He's ready to tear you a new asshole on zero notice, whether you're friend, foe, or... well, Bigby.

But if you sit down and listen to what exactly he's yelling about? That gives you a whole new perspective on what Gren's all about. See, he may be an abrasive fuck, but Gren cares so much about the people around him. Holly and Woody are great examples of that - the bartender and another regular. Gren's blowing up at Bigby at every opportunity for the first two episodes, and why? It's because Holly's sister Lily's been missing for weeks and the Fables up in the Woodlands (the high-end Fable housing) only start to give a single shit once it comes into play in another investigation Bigby's conducting. He's fiercely protective of the people he does care about, ready to do what it takes (whether it's just being dodgy, telling someone where to fuckin' shove it, delivering death threats, or dissipating his glamour and slamming someone against all available walls and furniture) to protect not just their physical being but their honor and respect, too. He may be ready to throw some low-blow insults around, but if you dare even hint something bad about Holly, Woody, poor dead Lily, or anyone else he feels strongly about, he will shut you up fast.

More than just the people he loves, he's ready to fight for the underdog in general. There's this subcategory of people who're extremely good people but society shits on them on a day to day basis, and that angers Gren so bad. It's part of why he has such an extreme adverse reaction to Bigby's presence. The bargoers and anyone else on that end of town can get raped, murdered, kidnapped, anything but they're practically invisible until it's convenient for Bigby and the long arm of the law. Then it suddenly matters what the fuck happened to Holly's poor sister, who could've very well been alive when they found her if Snow White had sent someone to look into it when Gren showed up to demand their help on Day 1. Gren's willing to take things into his own hands, even against the people in charge, in order to get some kind of justice for the people who need it the most. Holly reported her sister being missing a couple of days before Gren went down to the office to talk to Snow about it, but nobody even returned her call, so he took matters into his own hands to maybe get something done for once.

Gren is actually straight-up horrible at handling loss/trauma. He tends to snap out on anyone nearby for seemingly tiny reasons, and then he just unloads everything - not what's at the heart of his emotions, he never talks about those more than an offhanded comment or two, but he can start off telling someone to shut the fuck up and end up telling them they're worthless scum and everything's their fault, even if they weren't even involved. Imagine yelling, shoving, no-holds-barred insult-flinging. Alcohol's a pretty common attempt at a coping mechanism too, but he's been drinking nightly for so long that it doesn't much help anymore.

Overall, even on a good day, Gren's high-strung and ready for a fight. He's always got a chip on his shoulder (probably the chip I detailed two paragraphs up), and he's just raring for a chance to take it out on someone. He does best when he's got someone he cares about to tell him to leave it, that it's not worth it, but then again he sometimes ignores that too.

The quickest ways to get on his good side are... well, obviously to liken yourself to the sort of relatively-good-hearted low-lifes he makes a point to stick his neck out for, but that's a given. Casual sass is also a winner, but he's picky on the source. If you're a legitimate asshole and you sass him, it'll probably make him mad instead. Same re: a brat sassing him. You'll pretty much always win him over by hating the same people he hates. Bigby got a grin out of him when he called Crane an asshole, and it didn't hurt at all that Bigby booted Jack out of the bar for mouthing off about Holly's sister, either. That doesn't make them friends though, not by a long shot, and anyone willing to talk shit about Bigby with him is good in his book.

Gren isn't a coward, but he isn't brave either. His bravery often happens to coincide with his anger. The more fired-up he is about something, the braver he's ready to be about it. But like Jack pointed out in the bar in Episode 2, Gren and Holly talk all the time about the low-class Fables banding together and rising up against the Woodlands, but they aren't fired up at the time so it's all just half-drunk bullshit. All of his bravest moments have been in somebody's defense, like when he fought Bigby for the sake of Holly and Woody in Episode 1.

Another fact to note is that he's been alive for at least a thousand years, at least in his original form. The way The Wolf Among Us (and Fables by proxy) plays that is, a lot of people are really fuzzy on their time in the old world, that is to say: their time before they were forced into the city and took up the guises of normal people. The Big Bad Wolf, for example, is now the local one-man detective force, and while he and the Woodsman (Woody) both remember the story of Red Riding Hood and how that played out, they talk about it like a past life. Grendel was originally from the Beowolf mythos, in which he basically slaughtered a bunch of people until Beowolf came and tore off his arm and then he slunk off and bled to death. Clearly some of the details haven't carried over to his Fables origins - he still has both arms, and he likely just bled a lot rather than bleeding out altogether, but the fact stands that he (like Bigby) was a story's antagonist in the old world. Time and the world as a whole have worn him down, on top of the fact that it seems like almost all of the Fables are less dramatically good/evil now that they're out of their original environment, so rather than an outright villain he is now just an anti-hero. However, it's only been in the last decade or so that they've had to live in the city, so he doesn't act like he's been alive for a thousand years. Like I said, that's all a sort of past life.



Items on your character at canon point: His glamour capsule in his pocket, which is super crucial so please let him keep it. :x Also a shot glass, still full.


Abilities, Strengths and Weaknesses:
He's a fable, so while he's got a glamour on most of the time, his real form is this ugly fucker. In that form, he is pretty frickin' strong, as shown by the way he flings Bigby around like a rag-doll. He has no magic of his own, so all his real form offers him is added strength and a memorable mug-shot.

On top of that, being a Fable makes him, in general, a lot harder to kill. Woody, a buddy of his, took an axe to the skull (deep enough to have to step on his shoulders for leverage to pull the axe out) and was walking around at the bar later that day. Gren himself, at his canonpoint, is recovering from a close-range shotgun blast to his chest.

As for weaknesses, he's a totally normal human 95% of the time (that is to say, whenever he's under his glamour), and a lean one at that. He's ready to try and win a fight through sheer ferocity, but he's not muscular by any means. Also, if he loses his glamour capsule (what is it even called? idk if it has a name, glamour pod? tube??), he's stuck being an Oogie Boogie lookalike pretty much 24/7, so that's no good. He's pretty sharp, that's a strength, but he's really not too book-smart beyond decent literacy.

Samples
Network/Action Spam Sample: right here!

Prose Log Sample:

There's nothing like the distinct sensation of drowning to wake you from a deeply drunken sleep. Gren jolts upright with a sharp exhaled snort, his nose wrinkling and his upper lip curling as he goes to set his hand on the ground to push himself up more properly and plants it right in a puddle. That explains the liquid burn in his nose. The smell, however - that awful fuckin' smell - can only be explained by the distinct white opaqueness of the liquid, because oh my fuckin' god, he passed out in a piss-warm puddle of milk.

Or maybe the milk got there after he did. He can't find a bottle, and to be honest, he doesn't care all that much anyway. What he cares about's a shower before this shit goes rancid in his hair. Gren smears it off the side of his face with his palm, then scrubs his palm on the leg of his jeans, giving the newly damp spot an utterly disgusted look.

"Of all the fuckin' places," he mutters, hauling himself to his feet just roughly enough to send a sharp twinge through. The events of last night filter back in a haze - he was yelling at someone, some guy, about... something (it was fuckin' important) and the guy damn near inverted his knee cap.

Not being one of the baddest assholes around when he has to be? That's taking a lot of getting used to. Comes with picking fights with mundies, he guesses. He can't drop his glamour unless it's the Wolf he's beating down.

He's made it about three steps with the realization stops him short: This shithole's got no fuckin' showers, either. Pushing his nasty damp hair out of his eyes, he lets out a heavy sigh and sinks down into a nearby armchair.