Clement Evans

The Basics

Name: Clement Matthew Evans
Nicknames: Various have tried calling him 'Clem' but he won’t answer to it.
Age: 14 (DOB: Jan 31, 1999)
Orientation: He's not interested in anyone that way yet.
Desired Rank/Job: Student, sixth grade (again). He ought to be in ninth, but he repeated kindergarten and third grade.
Powers: Manifestation of body armor.

Currently only manifests when Clement is in danger or uncomfortable/nervous and is out of conscious control. The armor is a dark grey-blue color and can manifest in whole or part. Typically the place it manifests in part is on Clement's hands and lower arms. The armor manifests directly over Clement's skin and does not take into account clothing. It segments itself into tightly overlapping plates where movement is needed, though a knife would not be able to wiggle under due to the segments being linked at their bases. The whole looks very much like a plated diving suit and covers every part of him, with a helmet and faceplate that has a clear material in ovals over his eyes. It's not bulky, roughly three-quarters of an inch (2.5 cm) thick, but Clement will have to wear looser clothing to allow for it. The armor is made of a non-conductive material that can withstand a bullet of up to 14 mm. It protects against fire and cold, and can keep Clement alive in a drop of up to 150 onto cement.

The armor only increases Clement's durability in the same way a real suit or armor would and does not enhance his senses, strength, speed, flexibility, or intelligence. It does not protect against dangers that can be inhaled like smoke, fumes, or airborne poisons, and would be detrimental in a drowning situation. It also cuts off sensation, so whatever is encased in the armor can't feel things touching it - tapping an armored shoulder would not get Clement's attention. When Clement's mouth is armored he can't speak or move his jaw, and only the loudest of vocalized noises can be heard faintly.

Sometimes if Clement is agitated but not enough to trigger the armor his arms or body or wherever it will manifest will turn the area that grey-blue color before the armor pops. It's a warning sign and a tell, and the area that colors also turns stiff in preparation, making it hard to move.

The other unfortunate aspect of the armor is that it does not allow for traditional eye correction (glasses) and can do nothing itself to improve Clement's vision. Unless another method is found, Clement will not see very well when he's in full armor (or just covering his head).

Clement will require added protein and sugar in his diet to combat the effects of manifesting the armor.

Play By: Gregory Smith

The Details

Hair Color: Brown
Eye Color: Blue
Any Piercings? ---
Any Tattoos? There's a tiny self-made tattoo inside Clement's left arm that says 'foreigner' in Hangul (외국인), or 'waegukin'. He made it by repeatedly scratching the design with a paperclip end.
Any Scars? There are some suspect scars on the backs of Clement's legs and around his shoulders, but he's not saying anything about them. There's also tiny scars peppering the area around his eyes that either look enough like freckles to be ignored or are faint enough not to be seen without a close look, and they're from the single disastrous period he wore glasses.

General Appearance: Short and skinny, Clement is only 4'10" (143 cm) and weighs 80 lbs. (36 kg), appearing less like fourteen and more like twelve. He looks like he didn't get enough to eat growing up, and didn't. Clement has a boniness to him that tells those that know what to look for more about how he grew up than he wants known. His hair his short and sometimes is mistaken as gelled when it’s more perpetually uncombed. His eyes are typically narrowed (if not squinting), and are a very pale shade of blue. Despite living in California, Clement has fair skin with a smattering of light freckles across his nose and cheeks. He tans reluctantly. He rarely smiles, and has been told his brow furrows even in his sleep. For the most part, Clement has closed body language, but eyes that actively take in everything about his surroundings and occasionally give him away.

His usual wardrobe is cheap no-brand jeans and the kind of t-shirt that comes three to a bag for five bucks, and more often than not his sneakers are too small. As underthings were not always present in his life, Clement rarely wears socks (which will probably change during his first winter in Vermont) and is quite used to going commando (another thing that will probably change during the winter).

Small he might be, but Clement's muscles are hard and strong from a lot of walking and manual labor. He doesn't have a six pack or anything, but he's much stronger than he looks, something the people who fight him discover as an unpleasant surprise.

Personality: In his short life Clement’s learned that the best defense is to keep to himself, the best offense is to start with his left, and that self sufficiency is the key to everything. He guards himself closely, and his personality is best described as reactionary - he doesn't seem to have needs or desires or even be human until something that can't be ignored requires a response. It means his personality is as compartmentalized as his issues are, allowed or forced to be one sort of person within one situation and a completely different one within another.

There is the boy Ajima sees: obedient, respectful, a little shy, eager to learn, self-contained, forever scribbling in a notebook, a loyal friend to her son. A damaged child, she can see that in his hesitance, but one who has allowed her gruff motherly affections. She watched him turn from a boy who was forever fighting to one who could hold his temper... at least in her presence. A boy she is proud to have raised, to have as a son.

Who his father's friends see: a sullen, stubborn, silent boy, with sharp eyes that see everything they do and burn with hate, who has teeth they know can cut skin, a kid they believe needs to be physically intimidated and reprimanded into doing what they want, but who keeps his mouth shut even when he knows he's being wronged. The last makes them think he's not very bright, and they treat him accordingly.

Who his teachers and the other students see: a child so uncooperative that his first name alone is an explanation down at the office. Obstinate, combative, closed, angry, and extremely violent when provoked. The kid the good kids and even most of the bad kids avoid. The only white kid in their Koreatown school who understands every word of the Korean-speaking gyopos, who speaks more Korean than he does English. The kid who stuttered if he was wound up and got nose dirt on his book pages and came to school in the same jeans and shirt for months at a time. The kid who'd been kept back twice.

And finally who his best friend Minho sees: a smart, funny, imaginative, sympathetic, tough kid, his little brother in all but blood. His maknae. The tiny boy who stood up for him in kindergarten, both of them too old and ungainly next to the bright children around them. The one kid who was patient enough to both teach him enough English to get a grip on it and learn enough Korean to better communicate. The one who understands his hopes and dreams and doesn't laugh when he says he's going to be a famous Kpop star someday, who shares his own life, even when it's not very good. Minho isn't stupid. He can see what's going on. He takes his duties as hyung very seriously, but there's only so much a fellow kid can do.

Clement's true self isn't any single one but a mix of all of them. He gives back exactly what he gets, but even if he spent the rest of his life with Ajima and Minho he'd still have to deal with his anger and his temper and most of all his fear.

The underlying factor in everything Clement is or does is fear and his reaction to it. It's the first emotion he remembers experiencing, it's the emotion he experienced the most during his formative years, and it's been part of every reaction ever since. Fear of rejection, fear of being laughed at, fear of being vulnerable, fear of being put away somewhere and forgotten, fear of the future (as in when he was going to get to eat next), fear of the unknown (if an action was going to get him punished that day or not), and smaller fears like that of the dark or of the gunshots he heard around the trailer park. Fears that were never comforted. Fears that were ridiculed, or taken advantage of. His method of dealing with it has been to subconsciously turn it to anger, because he could deal with anger. But as the emotion fueling the anger was never addressed, his anger could never be fully appeased. And since he'd been hurt much worse by much bigger people than the kids at school, when he was pushed down or hit, he didn't much care what happened to him and took a rather savage joy in letting that anger work for him for once (and since he'd seen fights in the trailer court he could even throw a more than competent punch and never hesitated to go for the nuts). Clement will always be fearful. But hopefully he'll also learn how to control it.

As someone lied to on a regular basis, Clement abhors doing it himself, though he can understand the need for it. The closest he can get is lying via omission, though he knows that not saying anything can be just as damning. Otherwise, Clement is honest, in his speech, anyway. Blunt and unelaborated, but honest.

Clement has a mild speech impediment that only really asserts itself when he’s stressed or nervous. And since most of the people that won’t take silence for an answer are the ones that bring it out, adults find out he stutters pretty fast. It’s not a heavy one, but still frustrating, and sometimes the embarrassment of it makes it easier just to not talk at all. That said, he hates it when people try to finish his sentences for him or guess what he’s trying to say before he’s done. Clement only stutters in English.

Your Vices

Likes:
~ his best friend Minho and his mom, Ajima
~ Speaking, reading, and writing in Korean
~ his notebooks and pencils
~ spicy food, particularly Ajima's kimchi
~ Kpop
~ cleaning - it's strangely soothing and Ajima showed him how to clean everything from a kitchen to his clothes (in the sink when he couldn't get to the laundry). Clement's favorite thing to clean is a bathroom.

Dislikes:
~ almost all of his father's 'friends'
~ adults in general and adults in authority positions that have an effect on his life in particular
~ sleeping on anything other than the floor
~ computers/technology in general
~ people who complain excessively
~ cold weather
~ people who don’t let him finish speaking when he’s nervous
~ school
~ things on screens - he usually can't see them very well
~ reading, when it's around other people - they either stare or object to how close his face is to whatever he's reading
~ aegyo - the Korean word for an extra-cute (to Koreans, anyway), typically child-like gesture or expression, like obvious winks or speaking in a high, babyish voice. Clement's okay with a little bit for humor, but too much gets on his nerves.

Strengths:
~ Korean - the most obvious. Clement is bilingual, and at this point in his life is stronger in Korean than he is in English. His fluency level is comparable to what the same aged native Korean would have in terms of vocabulary and reading skills. The only book Clement owns is a Korean-English dictionary.
~ art – with a pen/pencil and paper, Clement is a more than talented artist, in either a realistic or cartoonish style
~ writing - a prolific writer since age seven, one of Clement's primary stress releases has been recording his thoughts, the events of his life, making up stories, or writing out streams of consciousness.
~ dancing - Clement has been learning Kpop dances with Minho since he was nine and has a great deal of natural talent. However, talent does not guarantee a performing spirit, and Clement has rarely danced in front of anyone but his friend.
~ money management - something that would surprise his social worker. Clement has not had a lot of money in his life, but the few dollars he's earned doing favors for Ajima's friends around Koreatown have been spent wisely, purchasing his notebooks and pencils during back to school, and buying things like shirts and underwear instead of candy.
~ a small degree of ambidexterity - Clement is naturally right handed when he writes and draws, but has found most other skills that use one hand like throwing and using tableware come more easily with his left.

Weaknesses:
~ school
~ trusting people
~ insecurity
~ eyesight - Clement has needed glasses for both distance and close work since he was seven but refuses to wear them due to what happened during the time he had them when he was nine. He has nearsightedness and astigmatism, and his prescription currently is -5.00 -2 x 200, or around 14/20. The astigmatism means glasses would be the most effective course, though contacts are possible, he'd still have to have reading glasses with them.
~ showing preference - When he was quite young, Clement learned that if he made preferences known, favoring or showing dislike for a color or a food, the men who watched him would take advantage of it, for instance by serving him a food he didn't like while eating the one he did without giving him any. He tried to stop appearing to like or dislike things, but found that didn't work, so he decided to stop caring, and that did work. Currently he'll wear whatever he's given and eat whatever's put in front of him, without giving any hint that he might actually hate it (or conversely really likes it). He figures he ought to be thankful for clothes and food in general and leaves it at that.
~ reading in English - his bad eyes are directly to blame for this one. He can't really see the board clearly in school and is tired of people ragging on how close he holds his books. In school he reads at a third grade level, but when he can put his nose to a page he reads closer to fifth. The only reason he reads better in Korean is that it was away from a crowd and the Lees didn't care how he did it.
~ language - in the sense that Clement's mouth can be incredibly foul, in both English and Korean.
~ anger - almost every negative emotion, but primarily fear, turns almost instantly into anger when Clement experiences it.

Fears:
~ adults, especially people who can affect his life
~ eyeglasses
~ doctors - medical doctors have found out everything he's ever tried to hide, and he finds psychologists difficult to deal with because they seem to be able to discover things about him even if he doesn't say anything

Secret: One of the most common punishments Clement experienced (somewhat indirectly) was being denied use of a toilet, either by being locked out of the trailer entirely or being told not to move from wherever his caretaker decided he should be (basically so he could be smacked around when he needed to eat, drink, relieve himself). As a result, Clement regularly and unconsciously holds his water for an abnormally and sometimes unhealthily long time. Unfortunately, this means he's had incidents of nocturnal enuresis as recently as last year, typically during times of great stress, poor sleep, and bad dreams. While he's learned to deal with it practically, it embarrasses him more than anything else.

Family Ties

Father: Justin Evans (deceased at age 38, in June 2013)
Mother: Zoe Peterson (deceased at age 19, in Sept 2001)
Siblings: There are rumors he has a half-sibling or two by his father, but he’s never met them and no real effort has been made to track any down.
Any Other Important People: Miyoung Lee (46), surrogate mother. Clement calls her 'Ajima', and she thinks of him as a second son.

Minho Lee (15), best friend and surrogate brother. Clement calls him Hyung in his more serious moods and Minnow most of the rest of the time.

History

((Triggers for violence.))

"This kid, this white, American-born kid, speaks and reads Korean fluently but only reads his native language at a fifth grade level?" Aaron Fowler, from Vermont's social services, looked confused. He held Clement Matthew Evans' astonishing thin file in his hands. Anything less than an inch thick for a kid who'd been in it as deeply and as often as Clement meant that something somewhere was broken, and Fowler didn't like what it meant for either the system he tried to make work or the kid caught within it.

"Fifth grade might be pushing it," admitted Deliah Anderson, the social worker who'd been working with Clement since he was put into the system, which in his case meant before he was born. "But we don't know. He tests poorly, but it's more a power thing than a lack of intelligence. Clement can be extremely uncooperative. If he doesn't want to do something, he just crosses his arms and clamps his mouth shut. He'll even shut his eyes." Her voice held the exasperation of one who'd experienced it firsthand. "And he can't be bribed, not even with food when we know he's missed meals, and there's no appealing to his better sense when he's like that either - and we know he has some, because Mrs. Lee says he's an angel, as hard as that is to believe."

"When did this whole Korean thing start?" Fowler flipped through the file, but on that count it did not enlighten.

"During his second time through kindergarten," Anderson said, as she filled out the paperwork to get him transferred from California. "He met Minho Lee that year. Minho didn't speak any English, so they put him into kindergarten even though he was seven. And then Minho repeated second grade and after that Clement redid third, so they're still in the same grade now."

"How's he in sixth if he's below level?"

"His school district's pretty poor, and they've got more than their fair share of disadvantaged and at-risk kids. God knows they do what they can, but there's too many kids who need attention and not enough time or money or people. You know, the usual. Clement's tests didn't fail due to incorrect answers, a lot of the time they were just blank. But the teachers say that when they can get classwork out of him it passes. He barely squeaks through, and he's already two years older than his classmates. There's issues with kids when they get too far past that in age difference, and the resources are all being spent on kids who have documented learning disabilities. And this kid is so difficult it's easier for teachers to pass the buck up to the next grade level. I'm positive he'll repeat either seventh or eighth, and if he doesn't get his act together by high school it's not a stretch to see him in a resource room. But I think if his home life weren't such a trainwreck school wouldn't be as big a problem."

Fowler flipped through the initial intake. "Mother's parents signed away the baby to the state when she was seven months pregnant because she was seventeen and on smack, in exchange for treatment. Rehab was ultimately unsuccessful, baby was born at least half addicted, mother died two years later from an overdose."

Anderson sighed. "Yes. Father was in jail at the time of birth. His second B&E. He served 18 months of a three year sentence, got off for good behavior, finished parole, and was granted custody just after Clement turned three." Anderson sighed again. "Here's where the story gets sketchy. The father has at least three part time jobs at any given time, sometimes as many as five. He's only home long enough to sleep, if that. And he has a number of friends from prison he's helping out by paying them to look after Clement."

Here she paused and simply looked at Fowler, who was already wincing. "Social services intervened for the first time when a neighbor in their trailer park called the police. Clement was wandering around after dark by himself in nothing but an oversized shirt, with a bruise around the back of his neck-" she flipped open the file to the police statement, where an old photo in a plastic sleeve was paperclipped to the report, taken by the hospital, that showed a deep black and red bruise that ringed the boy's neck like a collar "-see there, we think those parts were made by fingers squeezing. He was barely five-"

"Five?!" Fowler pulled the file back to study the photo.

"Yeah. He only weighed 34 pounds. And the backs of his legs were marked up." She shook her head angrily. Clement's story was hardly unique, but that fact also made her mad. "The kid gave quite a performance. With the police, at the hospital, in his first three days at the children's home, he just pressed his lips together and never said a word. The only thing we got out of him was a shake of the head when we asked him if his father had made the bruise or the marks, and we only got it once. Confirmed, too, the father was at work. It wasn't till Wendy Haines at the kids' home told him he couldn't leave unless he spoke to her that he said anything. Later, too much later, he let it slip to me that if he told on people they 'got you back even worse'. His words. But by that time he was eight, and he refused to elaborate.

"The father was told he had to find different people to watch his kid, but we know by the time Clement was in school his old prison friends were back doing the babysitting." Anderson shook her head. "Mrs. Lee's the best thing that ever happened to him, but I know it meant Dave Shilbaugh got away with whatever he was doing for too long."

"Shilbaugh... here it is. Oh. Shit." Fowler's mouth twisted as he read.

"Yes, exactly." Anderson moved some papers till she uncovered a cup of cold coffee. She drank it. "But let's take things in order. This is where all that Korean comes in. By the time Clement's in first grade, he and Minho are inseparable. He's going over to the Lee's apartment after school till whoever's watching him that day comes to pick him up, either Shilbaugh or a man named Phil Nelson. Whatever's going on past mutual language exchange is good for the kid without a doubt, but he's still getting into physical fights at school on an almost weekly basis. Always provoked. Clement told me his father said it was important he never instigate. He even used that word, 'instigate'. Because then it was self defense."

Fowler snorted.

"Over the years three families have tried to press charges," Anderson continued. "I've never seen it, but apparently Clement has a hell of a left hook and a deceptively strong grip. But every single time it's been proven Clement was violently provoked. In two instances he was jumped." She paused. "I think it's an important thing to note, that he refuses to hurt anyone till he's received a physical catalyst."

Fowler thought about that in conjunction with the rest of Clement's file and finally nodded. "It's subtle. But I think you're right."

"I'm not the first person to see it," she said, "but so far no one's been able to do anything with that fact. I think it could be built on. I think Clement's like a lot of angry kids out there, he's got the potential to be good, probably even wants to be good, but he's got no coping mechanisms. He holds it in till some outlet presents itself and explodes."

Fowler was already scribbling a note in the form he'd half filled out that recorded this meeting for the file. He added a sticky note to the report he was filling out for the Hammel Institute. He figured it would be a relief to hear something positive about the kid. On paper, Clement Evans was, to put it mildly, discouraging. What was worse was that the kid probably knew it, too.

While Fowler wrote, Anderson got them both fresh cups of coffee, adding three sugars to hers. She'd tried her best, over the years, to add things into Clement's file that would humanize him instead of allowing a reader to come to the inevitable conclusion that the child on the pages was destined for prison and/or a short, violent life. But the kid was closemouthed about all aspects of his life, and the tidbits she'd gotten via an interpreter from Mrs. Lee were few and far between, and also rather difficult to believe. He did chores like the most filial son in the world, she'd said, bursting with obvious pride. And even if he hadn't been instrumental in her son learning English, her boy could not ask for a better friend. She'd told him to call her 'Ajima'. She'd said she'd wanted him to call her 'Umma', which meant 'mother' rather than 'aunt', but felt that it would cause him too much embarrassment.

And the notebooks. The dozens of notebooks filled with drawings and Hangul Mrs. Lee kept at her house for safekeeping - Clement had shown Anderson one once because he knew she couldn't read it. She'd been shocked by the copious, precise, tightly packed lines of writing and the skilled renderings. Enough volumes to fill a document box, two of which sat in her office and contained the sum of Clement's possessions, the second box only half full of donation clothing.

Fowler looked up from another line in the file that caught his attention. "...His Korean is better than a sixth grade level. Seriously?"

"When the one adult who'll converse with you speaks Korean and not English..." Anderson didn't have to finish. "Mrs. Lee is pretty vocal. And I gather that at home, no one really spoke to Clement other than to tell him to go to bed or go outside."

She handed Fowler his coffee and went on. "Other salient points: Clement's been sleeping on the floor of his father's trailer under the back table since he was five. The trailer's one of those that hitches to the back of a truck, and it's only got one bed and the father claimed it. He was supposed to be sleeping on the built in bench, but it's also the only place to sit, and he was kicked off every night by whoever was watching him so they could watch TV and now he won't sleep anywhere but on the floor. It drove his last fosters up the wall.

"We found out a year ago he hasn't been getting lunch at school since first grade. Dave Shilbaugh - again - had been pocketing the money Clement's dad gave him every week for Clement's lunch. Clement just assumed they couldn't afford it and - again - never said anything.

"He needs glasses. I know it's affecting his schoolwork, but he won't wear them. He had a pair when he was nine, but hasn't worn them since." Here Anderson exhaled. "It's what got Shilbaugh put away. Part of it, anyway. Lord knows I wouldn't wear glasses if I had my first pair shattered and ground into my face. I know he has a pair somewhere but they're out of date. The state buys them but he won't use them, and he won't cooperate during eye exams."

The second-most recent page in the file was still crisp, only two days old. Justin Evans' death certificate. The man was one of a select group, young prison inmates who'd died of natural causes. Brain aneurysm, though thought to have been brought on by a head injury received in a fight a day previous and certainly not helped by the past months of heavy drinking. Fowler's file did not yet include a copy, and Anderson wordlessly handed it over. For clarity's sake, Clement had two files, one for his time in his home state of California and one for his new start in Vermont.

The last page was a combined police/hospital report, but Fowler had already read it. It was why he was there, after all, he and the Hammel recruiter. Justin Evans had injured his back lifting too heavy a load at one his part time jobs six months previous and had not been employable since, and had used his free time and unemployment paycheck to develop what was eventually a stunning case of alcoholism. Five days ago, Clement had interrupted his father's daily drinking binge by trying to make himself a bowl of cereal. It was still unclear what about this action had been objectionable, but Justin had flown into an uncharacteristic rage and had for the first time struck his son. Punched him so hard Clement had collapsed, disbelieving, onto the floor. And then Justin had taken off his belt.

The police had come, called by a neighbor who was bothered by all the shouting coming from the Evans trailer. Justin had been arrested. Clement had manifested.

Luckily the manifestation did not last very long, or rather, lasted exactly as long as it needed to. There was no need for the meta blood test but it had been given anyway. The second the belt had made contact, Clement had turned an odd grey-blue color all over and his cry of surprise and pain had been cut off when his skin erupted into hard segments that had ripped the seams of his old jeans. He didn't have enough energy to keep it up, and the police had all watched as it disappeared, displaying the growing goose egg on his face.

The hospital kept him for observation, noting he was malnourished and that he had given a stony 'yes' to the question of whether his father had hit him or not. The armor popped several times during the first 48 hours, and Clement lost weight he couldn't afford to lose. A heavy dose of protein Ensure seemed to combat it, and with the blood tests they did the doctors determined that added sugar would be necessary, something none of them ever thought they'd be recommending.

The recruiter from Hammel arrived shortly, alerted by the hospital, bringing with him Aaron Fowler from Vermont's social services.

Three days later Justin Evans died in jail while awaiting sentencing.

The custody of Clement Evans was transferred to the state of Vermont less than a day later.

"It might not be a bad idea to restart him in sixth grade at Hammel," Anderson said as they signed off on the last documents.

Fowler sighed. "A kid who should be starting high school in the first year of middle school. It's like kicking him while he's down, but I agree." He made another note. Their files complete, the two shook hands, and Fowler went to pick up Clement at the hospital.

Clement arrives at the Hammel Institute in Pilot Ridge, Vermont in June of 2013.

Roleplay Example

"Vermont?"

The shock and confusion on Clement's face made him look unusually and uncharacteristically vulnerable, something Deliah Anderson knew would make him angry if he knew. "You're s-s-sending me t-to Vermont?"

And then something in his face twisted, and before she could answer, he suddenly blurted, "Wh-where the fuck is Vermont?"

For a horrible moment Clement had an idea that they were sending him out of the country. But his third grade teacher(s) would be happy to know he remembered Vermont was a state. Just one... to the right. Way, way the to the right of Cali on that big multicolored map he remembered on the wall, the one that had made him believe that seen from high above, the states were the same color as they were depicted. But he couldn't remember exactly where Vermont was. His memory was trying to suggest it was further right than he wanted to believe was correct.

His hospital bed propped him into a sitting position. As proof the more things changed the more they stayed the same, both of his wrists were secured to the bed with padded cuffs. According to the hospital staff, before he was restrained they couldn't leave him alone for five minutes before he'd pulled all his IVs and tubes and was climbing over the metal sides of his bed.

Anderson took out her phone and brought up a map of the United States that had all the states white but Vermont in red. She held it till it was almost touching his nose as his eyes grew large and distressed. She took the phone away the second the profanity started spilling out of him, a mix of Korean and English, and blinked as he gasped.

Clement was rarely involuntarily speechless, but if anything was going to do it, turning cadet grey to his neck and his hands and arms breaking out into armored plates was a good place to start. But his face, which was still person-colored, went the same color as the sheets, and he seemed to be having trouble breathing. Anderson called for a nurse, and one walked swiftly over while a second pulled a bottle of something out of a fridge.

It wasn't that he couldn't breathe, it was the stupid fucking pain. It was like someone had taken a toothache and the moment just after ripping off a scab that wasn't ready to come off and a punch to the face and distilled it down to three seconds of terribleness. It was a brief pain, but it was easily the worst thing Clement had ever felt, and afterward the reward for bearing it was looking like a fucking freak. He shoved his armored arms under the prickly blankets, panting, and remembered just in time not to snarl at the nurse who started to take a blood draw. From the back of his knee, because his arms weren't accessible. Something about his blood something-or-other after popping his armor blah blah blah treatment something something. Clement hadn't paid attention because he didn't understand.

The nurse with the bottle poured it into a graduated cylinder with a tube on the end and affixed the tube to the portal of the nasogastric taped to Clement's face. Clement was glad of the tube, however invasive it was, because that first whole day had been nothing but him drinking. He'd been tired and hungry and confused enough to be okay with it, even the really shitty tasting stuff that was like drinking concrete, but on the second day he'd zipped his lips.

The nurses left, and Clement resisted trying to upset the hanging tube of liquid by leaning as far away as he could. Instead he looked at Anderson, and his eyes narrowed again. "Isn't there a school... closer?"

"The next closest school for metahumans is in Switzerland," she said with a small smile, and she sighed when Clement's face told her he didn't know where that was either. "In another country."

"Aniyo," he said instantly. And then in English, so she'd understand. "No."

"No," she agreed. "I'm sorry, Clement."

She'd been about to say something else, but Clement's brows drew together and an expression of horror spread over it. About to call for the nurses again, he coughed a sob that sounded like it'd had to fight its way out. For a moment, all Anderson could do was stare in astonishment. After all this time she'd never seen him cry. She took a step forward, and then a step back when her ears filled with his angry Korean, and left the room, closing the door behind her.

Clement cried.

What About You?

Name: Captainomega
Age: Legal is but a memory.
Experience: 9-10 years.
How Did You Find Us? RPG-D
Ready To Play? Fully within reality substitution mode!