Full Character Name: Mortimer Saul Gamp
Character Birthday & Age: 79, 1st September 1930 (will be 80 on 1st September 2010)
City & Country of Birth: Oxford, England
Current Location: Godric's Hollow
Blood Purity: Pureblood
Alma Mater: Hogwarts, Slytherin
Job/Position: Head of the Department of Mysteries

Wand: 7 and 3/4 inches, oak, dragon heartstring.

Physical Description:

Mortimer is a tall wizard of about six feet with a slight stoop. He began losing some of his hair in his late fifties, and now it is very thin indeed on top, and a wavy, snowy white with sideburns and quite wiry in texture. His eyebrows are still fairly dark, which reflect his former hair colour.

He appears to be taller than he is, owing to the fact he has long arms and legs, and a shorter upper body than the average man. His stride is long, and his reach equally. What gestures he makes are larger than most but in general conversation he is not overly animated, confident enough to let his arms by his sides.

His face is ageing rapidly, with deep lines across his forehead, both vertical and horizontal, deep eye-sockets and sunken cheeks. His mouth is drawn down into a lined mouth, shadowed by  clean shaven face. His father before him aged quite rapidly, but it was never clear if it was the work or a trait that caused it.

From beneath his bushy eyebrows are dark brown, hide keen eyes which appear to be from a much younger man. Though this youth is rarely seen what with the lines on his face and the infrequency with which he smiles. When he does smile, lines crease up from the corners of his eyes and a dimple appears in his chin.

Mortimer prefers wizard-made clothes, simply for their quality - he thinks Muggles make do with awful craftsmanship in all aspects of their daily life. His clothes tend to be heavy cottons and linens, velvets, suit robes. He's more often seen with high necks and neckties and waistcoats that dare to show a deeper colour. Out and about he wears a short top hat and gloves, and on his feet, long boots to his knees. He prefers to keep his ankles covered from the perils at floor level.

He would not look out of place at an undertaker's or in any formal photograph. The only times he was less formal in recent memory are when he rolls up his sleeves to get involved in hands-on work, and of late that has been less.

His voice is deep, and conveys pleasing reassurances in every day conversation, a subconscious feeling amongst those he works with, especially combined with his age and years of service.

Despite his features, his voice is not unkind in tone, but he selects his praises for opportune moments with his colleagues. Should the room be too noisy, he is able to summon a far more commanding tone to make heads turn - and when angered or commanding, the warmth fades from his voice and the volume seems to disturb the very hair on your head.

Personality Description:

Ever since he was a child, Mortimer has always sought answers for the bigger questions in life. What happens when we die? Why do only some people become ghosts? Is there a limit to how fast brooms can fly? Why and how to spells evolve? As he became older, the questions moved from more simplistic questions about chickens and eggs to existential questions about the soul, Muggle belief systems with deities, and to thoughts that would render the fact someone was running late to a meeting infinitely insignificant in the grand scheme of life.

Mortimer might be a thinker, but he is a good conversationalist. He has many allies, and makes a point in remembering the names and roles of those who interest him. He can speak to both a Minister and a diplomat and to small children without losing meaning, and has an ability to deconstruct complex problems and adapt his language. This puts him in good stead amongst Mysteries, and might have made him an admirable candidate for a Hogwarts professor had he pursued the route.

Amongst the department he never lets others become dismayed with their lack of progress. He would rather spend a well invested ten minutes broadening their mind and possibilities to a problem than leave all to their own devices. This can inspire those who feel they have round aground, but can be seen as meddling by others who prefer to be undisturbed. He is always quick to reassure the Ministry that their investment in the Department is sound, and that all work undertaken is worthwhile and of great value.

His appointment as Head of the Department has been a long time predicted, but he has quietly side-stepped it at earlier opportunities, preferring to pursue his own projects with colleagues than to take up an administrative role and get saddled with it all. As such he has been a useful and productive leader amongst the rest of the senior staff in the department.

Research is what drew him to his work, with his enquiring mind. He has a great attention to detail, to the point that if items are out of place at home they can distract and irritate him on a low level. Everything has its place, and sometimes he can be preoccupied in putting things right than progressing. When he is focusing on research, or feels particularly close to a breakthrough he will shut himself away, and not come home. His sons were often at the receiving end of some of his sharp words when they interrupted him working at home as children, and even as adults.

Mortimer is perceived as others to be wise, a good role model for research and a natural leader.

History:

Mortimer was named after his great-grandfather of the same name on his mother's side. His middle name, Saul, was a great-grandfather on his father's side and given their surname of Gamp is also a British Muggle world for a large unwieldy umbrella, the wizard's name boiled down to the Dead Sea asked for a big umbrella, which proves that naming your offspring after family is very noble, but often with ridiculous consequences.

He was born September 1st, 1930, which meant that every birthday from eleven to eighteen was a mixture of separation from family, a lengthy train journey where he would be reunited with friends and a large feast. When his children were born, the day was overshadowed by them going to school, until they were all at school or away in which he and his wife would celebrate in the blissful peace of no charges to supervise.


Hogwarts

1st September 1942, on his twelfth birthday, Mortimer (Mort, never Timmy) was sorted into Slytherin house, though the hat pondered over whether he would enjoy the learned company of the Ravenclaws until the boy assured him he would prefer Slytherin after his father, Robard Gamp. His mother, had been a Hufflepuff, and he had no great desire to be a badger as the house was not held in high regard with his  friends.

The name Gamp was recognisable in wizarding circles, not only as a family (distant relative Hester Gamp was Sirius Black's great-grandmother) but also for the elemental laws of transfiguration.

Mortimer knew about these laws from his father, Robard, who studied elemental and ancient magic - almost druid-like in style - and magic in its purest forms, for the Department of Mysteries. What work he could speak about beyond the Ministry confidentiality his father wrote a few works on, discussing the development of modern day magic.


Adult life

In later years, his father became rather addled by his long years of research. Strong magic had on several occasions, laid him out for days at St Mungo's while his mother had been sick to the stomach waiting for him to open his eyes again. It was this parental lead on the research, along with his investigative mind that naturally led to working in the Department as an adult, after finishing his NEWTs at Hogwarts in 1949, from a tap on the shoulder from one of his father's colleagues.

His school performance had been admirable, and the Department put Mortimer through several years of further study and specialisms. He had an interest in magical energies, and by extension how it was linked to the soul, and untempered magical potential in children. This led to all manner of weird and wonderful assignments in the years that followed.


Lyra, his wife

Lyra, Mortimer's future wife had been a decade behind him in Slytherin, and had entered the Department to begin with as an administrator and trainee researcher, progressing through the ranks. She would record results painstakingly for experiments and keep books upon books of numbers and patterns. She had excelled at arithmancy and potions after that and her hard work paid off to further her position to that comparable to Mortimer.

Mortimer and Lyra worked closely together on a project to measure the magical potential and prediction of the release of that potential. Over the years they became closer, and things progressed. A year later, Mortimer proposed, and the two married in 1969, seeing it only logical.


Their sons, Orion and Cepheus

In 1975, their first son, Orion was born, when Mortimer was 45, and Lyra, 35. She moved away from the more practical and risky experimentation and over to a focus in using her skills in arithmancy and potions to help develop new techniques to improve shelf-lives and stability of potions for St Mungo's, which was a little mundane, but gave her flexibility to look after Orion, and then two years later, Cepheus. Mortimer offered for them to employ house elves to look after the boys, but Lyra insisted that they would not allow for such folly.

Much to Mortimer's surprise, she taught the sons and daughters of several magical families with their own while they were too young to attend Hogwarts, filling the Gamp household with noise and childhood friends for their sons for years. At first hand, Lyra would recount the development of the young witches and wizards, in a far more intense experiment than they had been able to conduct when they had first worked together, and continued to school young children in their home for other wizarding families in the years that followed, pursuing further knowledge on the subject.


A change in research

Meanwhile, Mortimer continued to progress with more and more responsibility within the department, leading projects, writing proposals. Sometimes he would not come home if he was close to a breakthrough, other times he would have to go overseas for a few weeks to pursue possibilities. He disliked to be away from his family for too long, though the separation allowed him to concentrate. His research began to mirror his wife's independent research - and he began to focus on the possibility of stealing, or removing the magical potential of a witch or wizard, instead. The pursuit was wrought with ethical issues.

In the mid-eighties, both of his sons began to attend Hogwarts, and in the 1990s, Mortimer witnessed the progression of the two colleagues who would precede him as Head of the Department: Dante Ward would work amongst the potions and herbology research as his father, Hector retired as the head of the section, and Analiza Snark would begin her years as an unspeakable in 1992.


The Second Wizarding War

The late 1990s were dark years. Mortimer and Lyra escaped the worst of the troubles of the war through their heritage and bloodlines, though some of the children who Lyra taught vanished, the families with Muggle husbands and wives going into hiding, imprisoned, ridiculed or worse.

Within the Ministry, there was a new chain of power, and the accusations against Muggle Borns that they had 'stolen' magic from someone suddenly gave Mortimer's earlier proposals to research the possibility of taking magic from another and rendering them without, an abrupt green light.

The Death Eaters were obsessed with the possession of magical talent, the possibility that they might increase their own by stealing from another, or even remove it entirely from their enemies. For those long and dark months from August 1997 until the Battle of Hogwarts in May Mortimer was flooded with candidates to experiment on, but he could never sleep easy at night. This was not how he had anticipated his proposal would be answered.


Peacetime

Shacklebolt and Granger revolutionised the Ministry in the years that followed, and Moritimer's research was deemed highly dangerous and ceased immediately. His findings by this point had intrigued Mortimer too far by this point, though he accepted he had to keep it quiet in peacetime. With the ban on them using dementors, the rug had been firmly pulled out from under his feet.

With new, somewhat more ethical projects to conduct, Mortimer threw himself behind other research, though the possibility of stealing magic from another and rendering someone without still nagged at his curiosity.

When the news came that Dante Ward would be stepping aside, Mortimer declared his interest amongst the unspeakables, and had colleagues propose and second him to the Minister.

He had stood aside for too long with the younger ones taking up the reins, and now felt that it was time to oversee. His role would now allow him access to see what other projects were being undertaken, and if he could, perhaps rekindle that research that had both unsettled and fascinated him since the second wizarding war.

Describe your job duties and how you go about them:

Mortimer oversees the Department, managing the budget, and leading the approval or denial of proposals from the unspeakables. He deals with requests for help from other Departments and other organisations with help from assistants and the section heads. At regular intervals he consults with the wider Department to construct the vision and path ahead for their research and betterment of the wizarding world in Britain. He also represents the Department in meetings, and reports directly to the Minister.

Elaborate on your expertise in your field:

A lifetime of working in the Department of Mysteries as an unspeakable, researching a great number of proposals and theories, leading to a senior role for the past couple of decades. Mortimer has stood by and supported Snark and Ward in their role up until now, and has survived the second wizarding war. He is well respected by the other unspeakables, in society, and is of an age where he feels his experience and insight is well suited to the role of Department Head.

Writing Sample:

n/a

Sum up your character in one paragraph:

Mortimer is approaching his eighties, and is a wrinkled but respected unspeakable, married for long happy years with two sons in their thirties. He joined the Department after finishing at Hogwarts and has performed research of all manners in the Department with a particular leaning to the study of how magic manifests itself in individuals - studying its development in children. Before and during the second wizarding war, Mortimer was heavily researching into the possibility of witches and wizards losing their magical potential, whether to transfer to another, or to dissipate it entirely. He put himself forward to take on the role of Department Head due to his age and experience, and because he feels it is time.

Special Ability

Character Name: Mortimer Gamp
Age: 79
Character Biography: Biography
Do any of your other Characters have Special Abilities?: Yes
If Yes, then Please provide their name and a link to their bio: Ignan Storm (Occ/Leg)
 
Special Ability: Occlumency & Legilimency

What level is this ability at?: Advanced

At what age did your character gain this ability?: 25 with occlumency, late 30s with legilimency

How did they learn or hone this ability?:
Training in occlumency is encouraged, if not compulsory for unspeakables to keep their research secure. As years progressed, Mortimer regularly updated his training with the guidance of his department, according to the nature of the research he was undertaking.

His studies in legilimency came much later, and were most useful when he was studying the manifestation of magic in young witches and wizards, where with their permission and that of their parents, he would use it to try and more accurately ascertain young magical potential.

Describe how the Special Ability influences their life.  What do they use it for?:
He uses occlumency to protect research, and legilimency to further it where ethical. If necessary he might wish to use legilmens ability to try and grill his unspeakables if he thought they were being dishonest, but this has not happened.

His sons used to be fearful that their father would use legilimency to see through their fibs. His wife, Lyra used to threaten it on them when they were very badly behaved, and Mortimer did not discourage the fear!

Occlumency makes Mortimer far more conscious of who he surrounds himself with, and their abilities. However, as the decades have gone by, it has become part of nature, and if anything, it is refreshing to open his mind and push that door open when he does holiday with his wife.

Write a description of what happens when your character is exhibiting this Special Ability: When attacked, he is aware of another presence trying to influence his thoughts, often by a change in sensation or pain in a headache. Normally this can be deflected with wand magic or physical interaction with the attacker. Some of the trickier research, and certainly during the wartime, he had to push his occlumency skills, fearful that his slightest thoughts would cause his family to be subjected to violence from Voldemort's supporters.

When he uses legilimency, he must seek permission, and reassures the other party and explains the process before he attempts. Much as he has been tempted to use it forcibly - and has been given some training on using it for such purposes in emergencies - he has not attempted. Navigating the thought of another can be nauseating.

Morning
Headcanons-on-a-train series post: here

Has always got up the same time in the morning for decades despite the day, and the time he went to bed. Takes breakfast in morning clothes at dining table before dressing formally for the day.

Weekday Lunch
Headcanons-on-a-train series post: here

Takes lunch in his office, if at all. Brought by his family’s house elf.

Travel
Headcanons-on-a-train series post: here

Apparates and has spent a long time perfecting a quieter apparition for stealthy reasons. Otherwise floo. Never glimpsed walking very far and will not use a broom.

Colleague Approaching Desk
Headcanons-on-a-train series post: here

Uses his secretary to filter. Seemingly short attention span.

Drunk
Headcanons-on-a-train series post: here

Has never been truly drunk, though perhaps once for research purposes.

Pets
Headcanons-on-a-train series post: here

Animals are for eating, working and experiments.

Aspirations
Headcanons-on-a-train series post: here

Finish his research and go down in history, or die trying.

How do they prepare to go out for dinner with friends?
Headcanons-on-a-trainplane series post: here

Pretty much always wears the same dark robes and knows exactly how long it takes to get ready. Finds dinner conversation tiring.

How would they cope with an unexpected, anonymous valentines gift?
Headcanons-on-a-trainplane series post: here

Dispose of it. He and Lyra don’t do surprise gifts, or valentines.

What is an Airplane?
Headcanons-on-a-trainplane series post: here

“A risk to broom flyers and subject of many pieces of magical research.”

Where is the furthest they have been abroad?
Headcanons-on-a-trainplane series post: here

It’s bad form to ask an unspeakable.

What was their first job?
Headcanons-on-a-trainplane series post: here

Unspeakable, Department of Mysteries.

First romance?
Headcanons-on-a-trainplane series post: here

Lyra, his wife.

Thoughts on having children
Headcanons-on-a-train series post: here

when the right woman entered his life, they planned them accordingly with their careers. Three was quite plenty, though he wishes they were more like him.

What would happen if they bumped into a celebrity in an unusual situation?
Headcanons-on-a-trainplane series post: here

After weighing up the possible gains of interaction, be either polite or ignore them completely. More likely the latter.

Character Name: Mortimer Gamp
URL Link to Biography: You can use BBCode. http://absitomen.com/index.php?topic=15710

Cover Job (If any): N/A
Type of Criminal: Kidnapping, unethical experimentation
Allegiances / Loyalties / Political Faction: Ira Almasy, loosely

Are they currently under pursuit by the Ministry of Magic?: Yes

What previous crimes have they committed? Were they convicted?:
Abduction and experimentation on Hogwarts students

Resisting arrest against aurors

What crimes might they commit in the future?  Discuss all possible:
None. Captured February 2011.

Career Change

Character Name: Mortimer Gamp
Character Biography: Biography
Previous Job/Position: Head of the Department of Mysteries
Position Applying For: St Mungo's Patient

Why have you chosen to change careers?:
Mortimer was arrested and found guilty of the abduction of students in February 2011. He is not considered to be in his right mind and has been committed for treatment.

Elaborate on your expertise in this new field:
N/A

Describe your new job and how you go about doing it:
He is at the mercy of whatever the healers require him to do.

His wand has been confiscated.