Willow Rosenberg

*A Witch Among Slayers*

* Overview
* Sheet
* Background
* 'Ships
* Logs

 Facing my fear. I'm facing my fear... Hear that, fear?
I'm facing you.

— Willow Rosenberg

A part of the Slayer's group even before there were many Slayers, Willow was the one to perform the magic that activated the potential of every Slayer out there. Once just her best friend's sidekick, for better or worse Willow Rosenberg is now well-known in her own right. She went off the grid for a long while, but as of recently, she's surfaced again: near the Slayers, just like before.

In person, she's perhaps less impressive than her reputation, usually.

## Personality

Before meeting Buffy, Willow was very shy, easily intimidated, nerdy and unconfident. She was often made fun of by her peers and struggled to make friends. Both of her parents were negligent and permissively indifferent, and because of this neglect, Willow struggled for self-assurance. Upon befriending the Slayer, Willow started to see herself in a newer light, being important and advantageous to the Slayer's mission by using her intelligence and skills, allowing her self-confidence to grow.

Willow's nature is sweet and forgiving, always giving people the benefit of the doubt. Though she is far more confident than she was in high school, she is still shy and comes across as awkward and quirky. Her emotional growth since high school has been considerable. Back then, she was little more then an over-achieving nerd; however, Willow still occasionally sees herself as that person, friendless and unwanted, and this affects many of her motivations.

Willow's computer hacking is founded in an attempt to have some control over her life. Her love of magic is based in this same desire, hacking into reality itself. However, due to the very nature of this desire to be able to take control of her life and feel like she is more than just that scared little girl, she runs the risk of falling into the trap of addiction and misuse.

## SIGNATURE ABILITY

### Vengeful Rage

While Willow's general temperament is sweet, kind and forgiving, she can be pushed too far. If she endures great tragedy or horror, if she is overwhelmed and broken by the circumstances of things, an inner darkness can emerge from within Willow, taking down all of the limits and controls she's put on her own powers and tapping directly into the core of mystic power within her. In this state, she becomes a powerful fury capable of incredible feats of sorcerous might. She can tear open the walls between worlds, rip people to shreds with her telekinesis and summon dark powers potent enough to devastate whole regions. She's quite mad in this state and will not resume her normal form until the torment in her heart is reached and she allows herself to feel the pain from which she hides.

## SKILLS

Naturally brilliant, Willow always succeeded in every school subject she applied herself to. Considering her disappointment in getting only 740 on the verbal section of her SATs, it is sensible to assume that she got at least as much if not higher on her Math section, giving her a minimum of 1480 on her combined score which would place her in the top 1% of the country. Had she remained in college, she likely would have attained equal, if not higher, scholastic achievement. However, her growing interest in the arcane caused her to drop out of school. (Despite not finishing school, her aptitude for academics remains expert level.)

Willow was always academically minded. Turning this talent towards the arcane and things that go bump in the night was a relatively simple transition. Researching spells, monsters and historical relevance to supposed 'acts of God' has become almost second nature to her. She has even managed to take her knowledge into the modern age, keeping a digital collection of information as well as cross referencing the arcane tomes at her disposal for quicker access. This is kept on an external hard drive that is warded against tampering.

Though it is true that one doesn't spend years around a Slayer without learning a thing or two about fisticuffs, Willow's talents in this regard are mostly in the not dying capacity. She has even learned nifty skills like how to use a hunting rifle.

Willow Rosenberg has been accessing secure systems since high school, including Sunnydale High School, the Mayor's office, and even higher level government sites. Despite her cheery and adorable demeanor, it is not because people give her the password. Her acumen with computers was even recognized by the faculty of her school, putting her in the position of teaching computers when the current teacher was killed. She is almost absurdly good at this stuff and that's before she even uses her magic to help.

Willow has learned to read a few languages since she has been doing this whole witchy thing. She already knew Hebrew from growing up in a very strict Jewish family, but since becoming part of the Scooby Gang and doing a lot of research for the repeated ends of the world, she has learned to decipher Greek, Latin, and Gaelic as well.

For such a young witch, Willow has managed to pull off some feats that are usually left to witches that are far more powerful than her, sometimes even to whole covens; the restoration of a vampire's soul and the empowering of every potential Slayer on the planet, just to name the most remarkable. She has much room to grow in both knowledge and experience, but what she does have is a lot of sheer, untapped /power/ and the potential to learn to harness it. Currently, unless she manages to tap into her power, her spells tend to only work half the time and sometimes even when they do work, they work in ways that she didn't intend. Her magic rituals are generally linked to earth-based powers and involve communing and commanding spirits and spiritual energies.

## ABILITIES

Divination, of which scrying is a specified form, is the magic that deals with the uncovering of mysteries and the perceiving of people or places at a distance. Willow realizes that this can be very useful and has used it a few times but does her best to not invade people's privacy unless she really has to. Demons and other monsters, however, are not granted this privilege if the Slayer needs to know. (Of course, scrying into the business of demons may come with its own consequences, so it is best not done carelessly.)

Willow has learned to cast a few spells in regards to the elements: lighting candles from afar, creating an obscuring fog, starting the barbecue for Xander. In particular, she has focused on electromancy, as lightning makes a great way to stop a demon in its tracks and tasers need to be recharged after every use. She worries that this talent might not be a good one, since Xander often talks about Star Wars and how only the Emperor used lightning, so she tends to practice in secret for if she should ever need to use it again.

One of the things every good little witch learns at an early point in her career is the ability to move things around with the power of her mind alone. Having started off with pencils, it wasn't long before Willow was using this skill to do things like stir her potions from across the room while she gathered the next ingredient. Currently, her ability in this skill is more adept at fine motor control and in the lifting of many small things. The manipulation of items heavier then about 20 lbs tends to elude her at this point but she is certain that with more practice she might be able to use it to fly. Or flay someone alive, but that would never happen.

Given time, preparation, and materials, Willow can cast reality-altering spells on a global scale. Put simply, if she gets her hand on the plot item, she can cast the spell that makes the plot work. She can pierce the veil between dimensions and generally do most of what the narrative requires her to do if she has enough time to work out how. In common practice, she can perform most commonplace forms of magic, if she has had time to research the proper spells and other considerations, at Basic level. She has some particular areas of expertise, of course, which have been noted elsewhere in her Powers entries.

Willow has learned a few warding spells, from simple spirit-wards to keep out ghosts, to recreating the barrier to stop a vampire coming in after it has been invited, to even creating an invisible barrier to protect against bullets when she was able to tap into her true power. A few wards have been cast so often that she has them memorized, like the vampire warding. Currently, Willow needs to use special ingredients and whispered incantations to cast the warding spells. When she taps her full power, she needs neither and can cast on the fly. Specifically, as as Enhanced-level user of warding magic, Willow can cast reasonably powerful wards without ritual preparation, but her psychological reliance on rituals and ingredients often limits what she believes herself capable of doing.

## ADVANTAGES

Willow has always looked up to Giles as a source of information for all things regular and occult; whether it be spells or monsters or even history or philosophy. While she is not as close to him as Buffy is, she has a soft spot for the older man. The fact that he has a vast library of books for her to use for her research is no small part of that. Oh, and there is the little crush she had on him in her sophomore year, but that's another matter entirely.

Willow may not be the most experienced witch out there, but what she does have is pure, raw POWER. Because of her lack of experience, she usually isn't able to tap into this power. Currently, it takes strong emotion, whether that be love, anger, or a belief that she is doing something for the greater good, for her to access her true potential.

Witches are well known for the "Power of Three." That is, they are especially adept at combining their individual strengths in order to cast much more powerful, impactful magics. Some of the most powerful spells a witch can cast require a circle of others to cast, and a circle is usually formed out of triads of witches, each wielding the Power of Three. Power of Three spells can be done by any three witches, but they have to have the same focus on their goal and ideally be on the same page. Witches who are at odds with each other may even have the spell fail or go wrong. For even greater effect, various groups of three can assemble into larger circles of nine or twelve, and a circle of thirteen is particularly potent.

The Scoobies are Willow's true family. While her own family has mostly ignored her and even at one time tried to burn her at the stake, the Scoobies have stood by her side through thick and thin. With her two best friends and her mentor, as well as the significant others of the core four, Willow has found what is important to her and knows she can count on them when she needs to.

Unlike many spellcasters, Willow has no problem with the technology around her going haywire despite her heavy magic use. Indeed, she freely mixes her knowledge of computers with her knowledge of magic, and keeps spreadsheets of her spell components!

Willow's best friend is not just A Slayer, but Buffy Summers, the last Slayer before fate saw it to make two, and then Willow herself saw to it to make many, many more. Should Willow be in trouble, she knows that Buffy is going to kick their ass.

## WEAKNESSES

Power has a siren's song about it that causes a person to feel that because they \*can\* do a thing, that they \*should\* do that thing. The more potent the power, the louder the song. Willow has a metric buttload(that's 126 US Gallons) of power, but doesn't have the experience or the proper training to use it properly. She has felt the euphoric surge when she manages to tap the power and it feels good. Really good. So good that Willow keeps working at magic in the hopes to feel it again. The problem is, if she should ever get to the point where she can use her full potential of power before she has learned to resist the lure of abusing it, there is a very real chance that she will become corrupted by it.

When Willow falls in love, it is with all her heart. That person becomes her all, her everything. This is both an advantage and a weakness in that while she can find strength in her partner, they can also be used against her.

The Scoobies are Willow's true family. While her own family has mostly ignored her and even at one time tried to burn her at the stake, the Scoobies have stood by her side through thick and thin. With her two best friends and her mentor, as well as the significant others of the core four, Willow has found what is important to her and will do everything in her power to protect them should the need arise.

Unlike many witches in the world, Willow is completely self taught. Having used the many books in Giles collection, Willow has taught herself spellcraft and gotten rather good at it. Still, this means that though she is extremely talented, she is still a very rough around the edges sort of witch. This also means that though she is extremely powerful, she has not really learned yet how to access that power with any degree of reliability.

Being the best friend of Buffy Summers, The Slayer, has always made Willow a bit of a target. When one wants to hurt Buffy, the best way to do that is through her friendships. This means that sometimes, Willow will be attacked for no apparent reason.

Willow was born in Sunnydale, California to Ira and Sheila Rosenberg. As the last name would probably imply, she parents are Jewish and she was raised as such. Her parents were very business oriented and distant, not having much time for her. Luckily, after meeting her best friend, Xander Harris, in kindergarten after an incident involving yellow crayons, Willow's parents found a source of free babysitting in the form of play dates. Growing up, Willow was always scholastically minded, pushed to such by her parents who repeatedly told her that that was the key to succeed in life. In middle school, Willow started to join clubs in the attempts to make more friends. Unfortunately for her, the Math, Science, Chess and Computer clubs were not the places one should go if they wanted to be popular. And when that someone is tutoring the cheerleading squad, any hopes for being more than used by the popular crowd is down to a big zero. This all changed upon meeting Buffy Summers.

The rest of her sophomore year was filled with adventures, not the least of which were falling in love with a demon named Moloch and the Hellmouth opening up. Luckily, Buffy was there both times to save the day. After a summer that was oddly adventure and Buffy free, Buffy returned and the adventures resumed. Just as the year before, whenever Willow got into trouble, her best friend was there, and Willow continued to do her best to return the favor by being good with the research and even handier with her laptop. She started to blossom and grow, her knowledge that she was making the world a safe place bolstering her confidence. She started to dabble in spells, learning things from Jenny Calendar, the Computer Sciences teacher and technopagan. When Jenny was killed by Angelus, Willow was asked to take over and teach the class. After finding the floppy disk that held the translated copy of the gypsy ensouling ritual and Giles having been kidnapped by Angelus, Willow cast her very first spell. It was while she was casting it that she seemed consumed by something greater then herself. She felt the magic flow through her and from that moment on she knew that magic was something she wanted to learn. More than Science. More than Math. More then computers.

The next year, her senior year in Sunnydale High, proved to be a big one, scholastically, magically, and emotionally.

Emotionally, her relationship with her werewolf boyfriend Oz had its ups and downs, including a short split after Willow and Xander had a brief fling that only went so far as a kiss, but by the end of the year they were stronger then ever before.

Scholastically, she came in the top 1 percent of all of the USA in her SATS and was made offers from Yale, Harvard, Oxford and MIT. She could have gone anywhere in the world but in the end chose that she liked fighting the "good fight" with Buffy and that was a worthy enough pursuit to keep her in Sunnydale.

Magically, however, is where she saw the most growth. Starting with simple things like a small glamour to hide a pimple, Willow created a coven with fellow witches and Sunnydale High students, Amy Madison and Michael Czajak. The coven was quickly disbanded after Willow's mother and the other followers of MOO (Mothers Opposed to the Occult) tried to burn her Buffy and Amy at the stake while under the influence of a demon. Willow, not having the talents for transmogrification that Amy did, was unable to change her friend back to her human state and so took her friend as a pet. Willow also practiced talents such as kinetomancy (otherwise known as telekinesis), though only able to lift and manipulate a pencil at this time, and warding, having broken the magical protection around the Box of Gavrok that was held in the Mayor's office. Though she was learning a lot about magic and about herself from this magic, there was never any moment like that one with the spell to reensoul Angel, which came to be like her Holy Grail for her, something to work towards.

After graduating, life got -- well, it was Sunnydale. It got even more interesting. The First Evil rose, and the Scooby Gang learned about the First Slayer. Upon Buffy's request, Willow worked on a spell of her own creation that would activate every Potential Slayer around the globe. Using her computer, her witchcraft and the Slayer's Scythe, Willow managed to once again tap into that well of Power that she found so euphoric the first time it happened. Realizing that this feeling was more than just "losing her magic cherry," Willow started to use her magic more readily, for little things like turning on the lights and stirring her cup of tea, in the hopes that she could make it happen again. Oh! And they had to all move from Sunnydale as it kind of all fell into a huge sinkhole.

Not long after dealing with the First Evil, a daemon goddess known as Glory made life a bit of a living hell. This Glory apparently wanted to bring Hell to earth, the usual thing that the Big Bads want. After months of dealing with her, and after brain sucking Xander, Willow took it upon herself to fight with Glory. In a different way than she had in the past, Willow was able to call upon the Power that was constantly evading her, allowing her to fight with Glory and actually injure her. Had it not been for Glory brain sucking her as well, she might have done more. Willow doesn't remember anything that ensued after that until her mind was suddenly hers again, just before Glory's apparent defeat.

Since the whole Glory situation, Willow is trying to figure out what it is that seems to trigger the ability to get that rush of Power. Is it something within herself? Is is something from an outside source? She wants that euphoria again and hunts for her Holy Grail.

Logs featuring Willow Rosenberg:

*Coming soon!*