P L A Y E R I N F O R M A T I O N

Your Name: Adi
OOC Journal: marshmallowing
Under 18? If yes, what is your age?: nope, I am 24!
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Characters Played at Ataraxion: Lucrezia Borgia | The Borgias

C H A R A C T E R I N F O R M A T I O N

Name: Regina Mills
Canon: Once Upon a Time
Original or Alternate Universe: ou
Canon Point: 2x01 – Broken.
Number: rng it please!

Setting:

There is not one setting in Once Upon a Time; not one world, but two.

Our story begins in one realm called the Enchanted Forest and moves into Storybrooke, Maine.

The Enchanted Forest:

The story begins in the realm called The Enchanted Forest. A fairytale world of kingdoms and fairies, dwarves and trolls who all have one thing in common: they all surround the forest. In the Enchanted Forest, wishes can come true and true love's kiss can break any spell, witches can transform to dragons, men to crickets and boys of wood become real boys of flesh. The kingdoms are ruled by kings and queens and there are certainly social classes.

The upper society who attends the balls and the simpler men: farmers and stable boys and shepherds and huntsmen. It is a sort of a nearly medieval society, prince charming is all valor and bravery and his men are held to him by oath, there are councils and there are arranged marriages between the kingdoms to assure peace. The amount of freedom and rights the simple men get depends on the king; Prince Charming ruled with wisdom and justice and invited even simple men to his council (who all sat around a round table, much like their friends from Camelot), Regina was a solitary queen who ruled by invoking fear in others.

The Enchanted Forest, while supposedly a place of dreams come true and wishing upon a star is also a place where darker things happen such as murder, usurping a throne, betrayal and lies, blackmail and witches who eat children.

Not every fairytale is as innocent as it is told.

Storybrooke, Maine:

On the surface, Storybrooke is just another small town in the United States with no uniqueness to it. You might have driven past it and not have noticed it. There is nothing about it to attract tourists and overall, Storybrooke never had a big share of strangers.

There is a reason for it.

Storybrooke, Maine is not an ordinary small town at all. It was created for a single purpose: to imprison the people of the Enchanted Forest under a curse. Those who live in Storybrooke have been living there for years, held under false identities with no memories of their lives in the Enchanted Forest. Time is frozen in Storybrooke and never moves, the clock of the town does not begin to work until Emma Swan, the one who is destined to break the curse, arrives in the city. The people in Storybrooke have been living this way for years, not remembering how they have met one another or their childhoods; but the curse stops them from minding it too much, keeps them trapped in the city for all eternity.

Only two of the town's people know the secret. Regina, as she is the very person who cast the Dark Curse and Mr. Gold, also known as Rumplestiltskin, who helped Regina activate the curse and demanded to keep his memories as a price. The others? Are all fairytale characters who live the lives of regular people with only small hints as to who they are (Red Riding Hood is called Ruby in Storybrooke, Cinderella is Ashley).

Another important thing is that Storybrooke is also called A Land Without Magic. All the magic that the fairytale characters had in the Enchanted Forest is gone in Storybrooke as the people of "our" world have stopped believing in magic, it simply cannot exist. Some characters, mainly Regina, have a supply of items and trinkets from the Enchanted Forest that still has some magic to it but mostly it is gone.

For more information about the Enchanted Forest see here ; for more information about Storybrooke see here.

History:

Once Upon a Time in a faraway land….

Not much is known of Regina's early childhood. The series allows us to see from around age 19-20. What we do know is that Regina is the only daughter of the nobleman Henry and his wife Cora. Cora was but a miller's daughter turned nobility (it is an assumption that she is the Miller's Daughter from the known fairytale). Cora is an ambitious woman; enamored with richness she had set herself a single goal, to make her daughter a queen. She is a strict and ruthless mother; proficient in magic, she is seen punishing Regina for her independence with it, suspending her mid-air and binding her with leather straps that are usually used to sustain a wild horse. She had no remorse and little care for her daughter's wishes and ambitions. Regina is merely a tool for her to live up to her dream of being not only nobility, but royalty as well.

Regina's father Henry is a good man, compassionate and kind but weak when compared with his wife's power and her strict personality. Usually, while he tries to encourage Regina to be happy and do what she wants to do, he fails in defending her against her mother.
Regina's childhood then, was passed under the rule of a ruthless, overbearing mother who did everything to make her a proper lady even if it was against her freedom. She lives in fear of her mother's magic and spent her time riding horses and trying to sustain her own personality in a reality that didn't always allowed her to do so.

That is, until Daniel showed up.

He was the family's stable boy, a handsome, humble and rather charming man and Regina's only true love. By that time, her mother had named her an old maid, showed grave disappointment in her not marrying and loathed her free spirit, her insistence of riding a horse with no saddle, her wishes to have her own voice. Regina, meanwhile, was in love with Daniel and kept their love affair a secret from her mother.

Cora was a wise woman, subtle and cunning; she had devised a plan to make her daughter queen. She heard of an old king whose wife had passed away who came to look for a noble girl to marry him and become to wife of his only daughter. She had isolated the child as she rode in the forest and without her knowledge, had it that her horse will become wild and race her down the hill, endangering her, as she was no professional rider.

She also knew Regina was nearby.

Regina, bold and brave, climbed her horse and saved the girl from almost certain death. When the child said she will never ride again, Regina encouraged her to face her fears and get back on her horse as soon as possible.

That child was Snow White.

The king heard of the tale and came to thank Regina. He also proposed to her on the spot.
Regina was speechless. Her mother said 'yes' for her.
Distraught, she hurried to Daniel and asked him to run away and marry her in secret. Her agreed and proposed to her. They did not know they had an audience. Snow White had seen them at the stables and ran away crying, heartbroken that the nice woman who saved her does not wish to be her mother. When Regina explained to her that true love is magic, the most powerful magic of all it creates happiness she vowed to keep the affair a secret, especially from Cora.

She broke the promise. Cora who suspected something was off had manipulated and tricked Snow White to tell her the truth under the cover of a motherly concern. Snow, who didn't wish that Regina will lose her mother like she did, told her everything.

That was the end of everything. Cora had cornered Regina and Daniel, mocked their love affair and when she had seen Regina will not step aside from the man, she pretended to be happy for her daughter. She even reached her hand to shake Daniel's hand.

When he offered his, she reached further with her magic to his heart, took it out and crushed it between her fingers.

He died in Regina's arms who wept and asked her one question, why?
Cora's answer?

Because this is your happily ever after.

The Evil Queen of the Enchanted Forest

Regina changed after that, her heart, her dreams, every aspiration she ever had to leave and be free was broken. She became distant and sad after that, a woman with no purpose.

Until Snow White had confessed to breaking her promise.

Regina changed, then. Suddenly, her life had a cause and a purpose.


She wanted revenge. She swore to destroy Snow's happiness as she did hers. She pretended to never have loved Daniel, lied to Snow that he is still alive only he does not have her heart. The lie was to spare Snow of the truth of what she did, she will only tell her said truth much later.

But before bitterness had taken a strong hold on her she had one last desire, to be free. She never wished to be a queen, she wished to escape the castle and start fresh somewhere; afraid that living with her powerful and oppressing mother will make her exactly that, power hungry and evil. However, Cora was not about to let Regina escape and rob her of a chance of power and she did everything in her power to keep her bound to the king. In her desperation, she called upon the man who gave her mother her magic to begin with, Rumplestiltskin. He, in turn, offered to guide her and also gave her a mirror through which to push her mother and send her into what he called another land. In her anger, Regina did exactly that, lashed out in violence and sent her mother through the mirror to a place where she could no longer control her life from.

For the first time ever, she was free from Cora but forever tied to Rumplestiltskin. For he offered Regina to teach her magic and told her she could decide whether to become vicious and ruthless like her mother was.

He was lying.

Since when Regina's compassion kept her from disheartening a unicorn and giving in to dark magic, Rumplestiltskin devised a plan. He united forces with the man who will once be known as the Mad Hatter, Jefferson and a man who called himself a doctor from another land and tempted Regina to try and bring Daniel back from the dead.

He knew it would fail; he also knew it would break Regina's spirit. The plan worked and Regina turned to dark magic, becoming as ruthless as her mother and rising up as Rumplestiltskin's monster.

Regina then plotted to murder the kind man she had married. It took some years for her to find a golden opportunity. She used a wandering genie who came to the kingdom and fell in love with her, framed him for the king's murder and when he still made a wish to be with her always?

He had become the face in her infamous magical mirror.

After the king died she usurped his throne, becoming a solitary queen. The next target was Snow herself who was now a young woman, beloved by all. Regina knew she'd need a heartless man to do the task of murdering her.

So she hired the huntsman to take the girl to the forest, murder her and bring her back her heart.
By that time, Regina was a skilled witch, powerful as her mother, she took away hearts and kept them in vaults.
The huntsman failed to do his task, he took pity over Snow and let her escape. However, Regina found out that the heart he had given her was not human. Enraged, she tore out the man's heart and kept it in one of her vaults, making him her slave, a puppet forever. She used him for her own desires after that. She blamed Snow for conspiring with the genie and taking part in the king's dead, and made a bounty for her head as she was blamed for treason.

While seeking her, she made to ruin the lives of those who lived in the Enchanted Forest. She trapped Jefferson in Wonderland by tricking him to help her release her father who was trapped there. Jefferson had an only daughter who stayed an orphanage but Regina who tempted him with a promise of richness to help her, told him that he should never have left his daughter for money. She also used Belle, the Beauty who had fallen in love with Rumplestiltskin and tricked her into trying and rob him off his magic by kissing him and turning him into a man without magic.

When Regina finally confronted Snow, after many attempts at her life and at the life of her prince Charming, she told Snow she wished to ruin her the way Snow ruined her. She told her she would kill her prince if she did not take a bite from a poisoned apple, designed to trap her in a land of nightmare and regrets. Snow bit the apple, Regina was victorious.
Until her prince broke free and gave her a true love's kiss, breaking Regina's sleeping curse and leaving her defeated. In her rage, she made a vow to ruin not only Snow's happiness but the entire kingdom's. She faced her old friend Maleficent and stole back something she had once given her, something powerful made by Rumplestiltskin himself, the Dark Curse. That curse would be the one that would ruin the kingdom and move all those who were there to a land without magic, without memories, under Regina's control.

She killed her own father to activate the curse, ending the one man who still believed in her goodness and dragged the realm into a new one.

She did, however, have one problem. Prince Charming and Snow White managed to send away their baby Emma by a magical portal. Emma who would one day rise up to end her curse.

Madam Mayor of Storybrooke

Regina ruled the city of Storybrooke as their mayor for 28 years, unchallenged and unprovoked, watching the people of the Enchanted Forest live their everyday lives without memories of who they once were.

All except one; Rumplestiltskin helped her activate the curse but only if she'd let him keep his memories and answer to his orders in the few times he'll say 'please'. She agreed and the two of them were the only two to know of the curse or the realm from which they came.
Somewhere along the way, Regina became lonely and longed for the one thing she had always wanted, a family. She told Rumplestiltskin, now Mr. Gold, to find her an orphan baby to raise.

He brought her a child she named Henry, after her father.

What he didn't told her? Henry was the son of Emma Swan, the same Emma who will one day come to Storybrooke and defeat her.

And indeed that's how it was; Henry, fully believing his mother to be the evil queen and relying on a fairytale book given to him by his teacher, actually Snow White, set out to find his mother and break the curse.

He brought her to Storybrooke.

It was the beginning of the end.

Emma and Regina loathed and challenged each other; both mothers of Henry, both wishing to be present in his life they clashed time and time again. Regina tried to drive Emma away time after time in various means, she also tried to ruin Mary Margaret, actually Snow White's life by keeping her away from one David Nolan, actually Prince Charming, who rose from his come.

But Emma's arrival changed everything; suddenly, she became deputy to the sheriff, the infamous huntsman who was still under Regina's control. When he fell in love with Emma and started regaining his memories and rejecting Regina, she murdered him, hoping to keep the secret safe.

But it was a matter of time and the truth came out after Regina tried to do to Emma what she did to her mother, poison her by baking the infamous poisoned apple into a pie. Henry who wished to prove to Emma who by then was still an unbeliever in the curse, ate the thing and fell into a cursed sleep.

Regina and Emma then reunited their forces to bring Henry back to life. Emma rose up to the role of the savior, Regina gave up the curse, doomed herself and her plan to bring the son she loved back.

He returned, the curse was broken, Regina was defeated.

But Mr. Gold had an ace up his sleeve; he released magic into the realm, freeing Regina's powers in the process.

She had a new game to play but found out that she was rather unable to play it, having a hard time learning the laws of magic in the new realm as they were not like the ones in the Enchanted Forest.

The ending of the curse led to many couples reuniting, one of them was Rumplestiltskin and Belle. When he found out what Regina had done to her, Mr. Gold called upon a wraith and sent it to steal away Regina's soul. Surprisingly, the ones who joined Regina to help her were Snow White, Prince Charming and Emma who wished to send the wraith back to the Enchanted Forest in the only portal still existing, the magical hat of the Mad Hatter.

It worked, mostly. Only Emma and Snow were both taken to the Enchanted Forest through the hat as well and Regina, who above all wanted to keep Henry alive, promised him to prove her love to him by bringing them back.


Personality:

Regina's personality is all contrasts. On the one hand, she is the evil queen. She is ruthless and unforgiving, manipulative and addicted to the power that dark magic offers. Once upon a time she lost someone she loved, and that led her into a road that changed her forever. Where there was once love there is bitterness and hate. Regina takes out all her sadness and pain and turns it into anger and resentment. She has no compassion to others, if she's miserable, everyone will be.

As mayor Mills she says losing someone you love can make you do unspeakable things, and that is probably coming from personal experience. Regina can appear polite and smiling, but the smile never reaches her eyes as she is cold and distant, unable to connect.
She is ambitious and hungry for power, killing her king and turning into a solitary queen that fills Snow White's land in darkness. At Storybrooke, she rules alone and though some may think themselves their allies, she will betray them all and wipe them out if they cross her. She doesn't share her power, she never cared to.

She is willing to use every mean to achieve her ends. That includes separating Hansel and Gretel from their father, framing the genie despite his love for her and even killing the one person she truly loves, her father. Regina's willingness to go to this length proves that her need for revenge against the world that left her lonely is stronger even more than her love. Despite the warnings that this action will make her heart even more void, her soul damaged forever, she stops at nothing to achieve her goal and make Snow White miserable.
Regina's world is black and white; there are no compromises as she sees them as weakness. There is good and evil, foe or possible ally. She seeks to have the upper hand in nearly all her relationships, seeing them as competition. Every person can be a foe, and Regina is always careful, she never lets anyone in.

But then there is the other side, the compassionate, hopeful girl Regina was before magic corrupted her. Though others have a hard time seeing it, that girl isn't entirely gone, not entirely dead. The one who brings her out is Henry. Regina, even above being an evil queen, is a mother. She loves her son more than anything she had ever loved, wanting to be better for him so he may accept her back after the curse's end. Only Regina is her mother's child, she doesn't know how to love very well as she herself confesses. She knows greed and she knows how to be controlling, she knows how to try and win a child's favor with offering him magic and candy but she can't let her guard down and be humane around him.

She tries, she does try but it's hard for her, truly is. She lost that emotional side of her when, affected by Rumplestiltskin, she lost her heart to magic, becoming exactly what she never wished to be, her mother. Regina forgot who she was, what she once wanted her life to be. She wished to use magic for good but let her broken heart lead her down a dark path.
She is not inhuman, she's able to relate even if she's rather unable to show it. She weeps as she kills her father and Graham, looks genuinely hurt when both Graham and Henry reject her for Emma.

The problem with Regina is that she doesn't know how to love someone without trying to control and use them. She thinks love can be bought; she offers Hensel and Gretel to stay with her in the castle and have everything they can ever dream of and remains furious when they choose to leave her. She doesn't understand why Henry cannot connect with her. The truth behind it is that she tries to bribe people to love her as she doesn't know how to offer them anything else. She is desperate not to be entirely lonely, but her very character usually makes people leave her and by that affirm her hatred of the world. It is no wonder she punches Emma when she says that she needs to look at herself and see why people keep leaving her, why no one seeks her company; that is a very sore spot for Regina. She doesn't want all these people leaving her; she doesn't know how to keep them.

Regina was once naïve but all the betrayals and heartbreak turned her suspicious and unable to trust. She is clever and cunning, certainly not a foolish woman and is able to be patient and grinning while planning a man's doom. She is vengeful to an extreme: she holds a grudge to Snow White that makes her doom the destiny of many in a kingdom she was supposed to rule. She would sacrifice everything in order to see Snow White broken hearted, and when Snow asks why she simply replies with, "this is my happy ending." Unable to achieve the famous happy ending because her love is dead, his loss drives her to achieve a very twisted sort of happiness, that which is created by the sorrows of others.

But it is important to remember than when the time comes to choose between her revenge, her control of others and Henry's life she chooses Henry. She chooses saving him knowing well that it might lead for her own death as all of Storybrooke will want her head. When push comes to shove Regina is not an evil queen, she is a mother. That is a redeeming point in her personality; she chooses to give up her curse for the love of her son. Sacrificing 28 years of dark work for something pure that not even the darkness of her heart destroyed, true love of a mother to her child. It doesn't mean she's a good person, of course, she is still a woman of control and manipulation but it's a start. For Henry, she'll go to great lengths, even trying to be the woman she once as.

Rumplestiltskin thought that by breaking Regina's heart again he will manage to make her into the perfect monster. For a while, that was true but at the end, Regina proved that saying that true love can break every curse. Emma might have broken the curse by giving Henry a mother's true love's kiss but Regina was just as responsible for this turn of events when she found it in her to connect with light rather than with darkness, with love rather than with hate.

Abilities, Weaknesses and Power Limitations:

Strengths:
Magic - Regina, as a start, is a powerful witch. While she needed Rumpelstiltskin's help to activate the Dark Curse, she has a supply of magic of her own. As far as moving objects, spells and using magic to protect herself, she can hold her own without any issue. One aspect of her magic that is very important to mention – Regina can remove someone's heart without killing said person. She later places the hearts in a box she magicks for that purpose, where it is kept, alive and beating. The person she takes the heart from is still alive and functioning, sometimes it's hard for that person to know something is wrong. But something is very wrong; those who lose their heart to Regina will find it hard to ever feel anything at all, they will find it nearly impossible to defy her and become subjects to her. Her magic is so cunning, that if someone places their hand over the said person's chest, they would feel a heart beating, even though Regina took it.

Limitations - As a start, the ending of the curse already proved that Regina has a very hard time using her magic in any place that is not the Enchanted Forest. This will continue on the ship. She will not have her magic for the first two weeks and will only manage to barely sway an item. What I want for her is to let her keep a few simple powers, moving objects about with her mind, mostly. Her ability to making plants obey her, her ability to conjure food and items from thin air, all those will be lost. What I do want to keep is her disheartening ability. However, I want this to only come back to her after at least 2-3 months and she will have a hard time keeping the heart alive after taking it out. What it basically means is that she won't be able to control another person (with the mun's approval of course!) for more than 2 weeks tops. After that, the person will die and Regina will lose all power over him. I would also want her to keep one more power, that of being able to disguise herself as an old hag. She won't be able to transform into anything else!

To sum it up what she keeps is the following:

1. The ability to move about objects (will start coming back to her in small measures after 2 weeks and will grow over the months, not returning at once!)
2.The ability to turns solely into an old hag.
3.The ability to disheart a person but only for two weeks tops.

Politics: Regina was both a queen and a mayor, she is a ruthless politician but also a very manipulative one, able to smile at the right moment, destroy the next. Her ability to lie and manipulate others got her just as far as her magic did.

Weaknesses:

Magic – both a power and a weakness, Regina is aware that she is addicted to magic and so at times she will even consider whether to use it or not. She is rash when it comes to choosing it to solve her problems but it will take one time when it won't work for her to consider if it is indeed worth using to begin with.

Unlikeable – Regina is maybe a tough politician but it doesn't change the fact she lacks what every good leader needs, honest support from her people. She knows how to rule through fear, how to "buy" someone's favor with blackmail and promises of goods. It's hard to relate to her because it's hard, nearly impossible for her to relate to others and let them in. She is a formidable woman, usually causing fear and disdain rather than warmth. In a situation when she is not in full control, like the one on the ship, this will be a clear disadvantage.

Inventory:

Regina will hail from Storybrooke with the following items:

(2) black pencil skirts.
(1) White blouse, cotton.
(1) Purple blouse, silk.
(2) pairs of high heel shoes.
(2) dresses, black and grey.
(1) coat.
(1) purse holding the following objects: skull-headed-keys, used to open every door in Storybrooke and useless on the ship, two (2) red lipsticks, one (1) small bottle of perfume.

Appearance:

Regina is a beautiful woman for all her ruthlessness. She has olive skin, short black hair, constant red lips and dark brown eyes. She is attractive and knows it, sometimes using her charms and her good looks to win people to her side. Her face is flawless, mostly, changing from smirks and false smiles to fury.


Regina Mills as played by Lana Parrilla in Once Upon a Time.


Age:
Not aging because of the curse, Regina lived for 20 something years in the Enchanted Forest and then for 28 more years in Storybrooke, making her about 48 years old. She looks in her early 30s.

AU Clarification: n/a

S A M P L E S

Log Sample:

Regina Mills knew of different realms and of portals and magic which allowed one to travel from a certain realm to another.

She should know; the Dark Curse trapped a whole realm in another land.
A land without magic; or at least, it was so until her curse was broken.

She buttoned up her shirt, mouth set in a firm line as she cursed the shoes that were given to her. With the sickness she was feeling, high heels were bound to be a problem.
The ride between realms was much more pleasant when she commanded it.

And she was in another realm, of that she had no doubt. Everything from the very moment she had opened her eyes and until now when she took her clothes out of a locker of all things proved to her that this is not Storybrooke, nor the Enchanted Forest.

This was something else. The question was how she arrived here.

Her first thought was Gold. The little imp tried to end her once with the Wraith; it would make sense that he would try again before she had a chance to wrap her hands around his neck and attempt to break it, for all his magic and his pathetic please.
But she had to admit, though he has found a way to release magic into their world, it was unlikely that Gold, that anyone for that matter, would find a way to send one away from Storybrooke into a new, unexplored land as this one.

The hat barely worked and it was the only way out she could think of.
Suddenly, her mind raced to the very reason she tried to think of ways to go back to the Enchanted Forest to begin with.

Henry.

She hurried to finish dressing, walked quickly through the corridor, her heels clicking against the floor. She was a queen and a mayor and a mother and all three were currently unhappy.

To be sent or kidnapped here was unacceptable. To leave her son behind with not even Miss
Swan to take care of him was even more infuriating.
She lifted her chin, face turning into the comfortable mask of a confident sneer. Whoever was in charge of this was going to pay and there was hell to be paid.
If there is a way to bring her here, wherever 'here' was, there is also a way of sending her back. And Regina was a woman who imprisoned others, she was not about to become a prisoner herself.

She lifted her hand, attempted to call flames onto it for her little meeting with her captures. She could feel her magic, at least. This realm was not as foolishly ignorant of magic as Storybrooke was.

Still, she tried and tried again but to no avail. Though she could feel it, her magic did not answer to her call, refused to be summoned by her.
The same thing that happened in Storybrooke. Magic works differently in each realm, I must master the new rules. The sooner the better.
Magic would offer the solution to this…unplanned trip. If she could control it, truly control it, then her kidnappers would fall to their knees in front of her.
As all men and women should.

She hissed as her next attempt to summon her magic to the surface had failed and decided that to storm out in rage without her powers to back her up would be most unwise.
Instead she relaxed her crimson lips into a smile. Sweet and laced with poison as the apple
she once gave Snow White was.

There is a saying about flies, she remembers. Something about honey and vinegar.

She will catch them, either with one or with the other.

The real games would begin afterwards.

Comms Sample:

[ At first, silence. And then the obvious noise of heels against the floor.

A woman comes to sit in front of the device. A buttoned up white shirt and a black pencil skirt that reaches just above her knees, short but well-kept hair, legs folded as if she is a queen on her throne and red lips.

Her eyes are steel, dark and composed; you may think she is used to this. ]

I will hear about this Tranquility if this is indeed what it is called; spare me the basics, I have grasp of the basic idea.

[ If you doubt she spied on the network for hours - ]

I wish to know who governs here and I would hear of you all, your worlds. Where did you come from? Did something happen before your arrival?

I wish to know if my son is here. His name is Henry.

[ Something burns in her eyes as she mentions him. ]

If someone had hurt him - a mother's wrath is worse than any other, they say, and not for nothing.