Benjamin Derrick
Player Info:
Name: Vicky
Character Audition Questions:
Name: Benjamin Gabriel Derrick
Age and date of birth: February 17, 1977
Physical description: At a rather average height of 5'10, Benjamin is pale with golden-brown eyes and a strong jaw. His dark hair was something he inherited from his mother, or so he's been told. Never the largest in his class, Benjamin is rather lean with smaller shoulders and long limbs (which make up most of his height). He made sure his school mates understand his size was not a disadvantage, trying out and scoring a spot on Slytherin's quidditch team as a beater during his fourth year. He has fallen into the habit of letting his stubble grow longer than is considered fashionable.
Parent's Allegiance: (DE, OotP, Ministry, etc.): Before their deaths, they were loyal to the cause of blood purity, whatever incarnation. His grandparents were loyal to Grindelwald (and Dumbledore, when he understood the importance of purity.)
Personal Allegiance: (DE, OotP, Ministry, etc.): Being raised under his grandfather's fist, and belonging to Salazar's house, instilled in Benjamin the idea that purity of blood, whether a supporter or a dissenter, matters. The basis for wars can never be considered trivial. This being said, he is not particularly political, something that was a continual disappoint to his grandfather, and Benjamin only cares about the Ministry insofar as what laws he must bend to his keep his business below their radar.
How do people perceive this character: Most only remember Benjamin from school, as he's been off the Island for the last ten years, and even then, he was a quiet boy who only contributed to the conversation of his housemates when he considered the topic worthy and his words important enough to add. Now, most would consider him overly serious a majority of the time, but if one garners enough trust (a process which is lengthy and difficult), they learn that Benjamin has a rather dry and dark sense of humor.
Greatest fear: Water. When Benjamin was a fourth year and had just landed his spot on the Slytherin Quidditch team, a hazing gone awry resulted in his almost drowning in one of the boys bathroom stalls.
Greatest passion: Antique, Dark Magical items. Not for personal use, but for the value and inherent power they posess.
Aspiration: Benjamin isn't sure what he aspires to. He's learned to keep his expectations low, even the ones he has for himself.
Greatest Positive Attribute: Benjamin is determined and once he sets his mind to something, it is very difficult to see him changed.
Biggest Fault: Ben doesn't make friends easily. He doesn't understand the general populace at large and tends to balk at what they consider proper public ettiquette. While he understands the desire for enjoyment, he does not consider getting pissed and embarrassing yourself by running around in your pants as 'fun'.
Happiest Memory: Starlight, champagne, La Giralda, and a well placed disillusionment charm.
Most painful Memory: Having everything his grandfather drilled into him regarding how you could not trust anyone but yourself in this world be proven truth.
Does your character value the purity of blood: He knows it has value, whether people desire to admit it or not.
Is your character "pure-blooded," a "half-blood" or "Muggle-born": Pureblood, and reminded of it at every family dinner he was called to attend.
Describe the character's personal history (however brief or extensive):
Benjamin Gabriel Derrick was born to Richard and Rebecca Derrick two years after the pair had been married, long enough of a time that Richard's father, Tobias, had begun to wonder if the woman chosen for his son was barren.
Granting the heir that had been required of her marriage, Rebecca had no further use for her son, giving the task of raising the boy to nannies. Richard, too busy with his business and mistresses, saw no problem with this lack of personal parenting.
An angry boy, Benjamin acted out against his caregivers, doing everything in his small power to elicit the emotions that he was unable to in his parents. Tantrums were a daily occurance and it was not uncommon for him to grow hoarse from hours of screaming.
When Benjamin was four, his parents were killed during a chaotic Death Eater's raid at an opera house in Muggle London. The only memory Benjamin has of the night is his grandfather fetching him, informing him that his parents had died 'servicing the integrity of the wizarding world'. It was not until Benjamin attended Hogwarts that he learned the full details surrounding his parent's deaths.
Tobias Derrick felt no need for nannies in his home, leaving Benjamin to learn how to take care of himself from a very early age. Outbursts and tantrums were not allowed in his grandfather's home, and the young boy learned quickly the consequences of forgetting this rule. Tobias was a harsh man, devoid of caring and empathy, who was greatly bitter that he was too old to be of use to the newest campaign against the dilution of the purity of wizarding blood.
As his son had been foolish enough to get himself killed, Tobias began the indoctrination of his grandson in earnest when Benjamin was 8. For the three years before his Hogwarts letter arrived, Benjamin spent his days listening to his grandfather's unending diatribe against mudbloods and their desire to taint the immaculacy of their world.
It was this continual ranting, which started at breakfast and continued well into the evening, that made Benjamin apathetic towards his grandfather's championed cause. When he was finally allowed to escape from the oppressive home by way of Hogwarts, he made sure to be sorted into Slytherin, knowing the repurcussions if he wasn't. The cheer of his house was drowned by his sigh of relief as he took his seat, happy that he was not the first non-Slytherin Derrick since the inception of the school.
His time at school was spent in the library, the only refuge he'd been able to find in his ancestral home during summer holidays. Most of the books in his grandfather's personal collection delved into darkness and Benjamin found himself increasingly interested in the material of their pages. The objects, and the power they held, seemed to be of a particular attraction.
Slytherin was not a very welcoming and caring house, and Benjamin was often the butt of jokes and dark pranks. He was not the strongest looking of fourth years, growing to his full height before filling out his frame, leaving his limbs and torso long and lanky with very little muscle mass. To combat this image, and to hopefully garner him enough respect to be left alone, Benjamin tried out for a beaters spot on the Quidditch team. His swing was not particularly strong, but he was fast and had a knack of knowing where an opponent would be in the air. A few well-timed hits earned his spot and a reprieve from the taunting of his housemates.
This plan backfired, however, during the hazing of the Quidditch Team, something he'd overlooked. The laughter of his teammates ringing in his ears, he was locked in a boys' loo stall while it slowly filled with water. It was meant to be a lark, but Benjamin had never learned how to swim. It was when his vision had started to tunnel and turn black that he was released from the water prison. He still remembers Marcus Flint's deep chuckle as he fell to the floor, sputtering and gasping for air.
After leaving school, he defied his grandfather and left the country, uninterested in the man's demand that he finish the job his father had been unable to due to his untimely death. The bulk of his parent's estate had fallen to him, so he was without guidelines and adult supervision while he traveled, finally settling in Spain and acquiring a job at a local Dark antiquity shoppe, La Oscuridad Importa.
The years spent in Spain were long and lonely, leaving Benjamin ample time to hone the skills of acquiring and assessing Dark antiquities. Though he attended the social functions that were required of him as a man of his position and upbringing, Benjamin never connected well with any of his coworkers or the people he saw on a regular basis at social gatherings. He's had several physical relationships, but none that held his interest in more than a passing way. Most people find his serious nature and dark humor off-putting and choose not to spend more time with him; this serves him just fine, as he's learned quite well how to get on by himself.
Benjamin would have happily stayed in Spain, were it not for his grandfather's steadily declining health. In early 2005, he left Spain and returned to his Grandfather's home, taking care of the fading man in the last months of his life. His grandfather passed quietly in May, passing the entire Derrick estate, lands and vaults to Benjamin in the process, the last living heir of the Derrick bloodline.
Since returning home, Benjamin used a bulk of his inheritance to purchase Borgin and Burke's at a hefty sum, intent on bringing the name back the glory it had lost since the end of the Second War. He recently bought a flat in Hull, the idea of living on Derrick familial lands turning his stomach, and is hard at work re-collecting the dark objects that once made Borgin and Burke's the best dark wizarding shoppe in Europe.
Profession: Recently acquired Borgin and Burke's and is working extensively to return the "unusual and ancient" artifacts that the shoppe was known for in the past. This includes contacting those who have collected the items in the past for personal collections, museums who have the objects on display, and the Ministry, which confiscated countless numbers of Dark Articles after the Second War.
Benjamin's visual representation is Joseph Gordon-Levitt.