James Whitman
Mar 28, 2011 23:37:13 GMT -5
Post by James Whitman on Mar 28, 2011 23:37:13 GMT -5
The easy S T U F F . . .Name: James Whitman
Nickname: Scoops
Age: Twenty-Eight
Member Group: Institute Security
Power: Detonation
Play By: Joel HeymanLet it F L O W . . .
SPECIAL ABILITY !
Imagine an explosion in your mind. Just like in the movies when the front bumper of a car taps the opposite vehicle and a huge explosion occurs. Yeah, James' power is kind of like that - it really depends if there's gasoline at the time. In the car of course, but he can pretty much make a car explode even without gas. The gas is just added bonus, it creates the mushroom cloud.
Unlike disintegraters who use their mental ability to 'dissolve' objects, James has the power to create explosions and internally blow up an object. James has more of a physical than mental ability where his power, once it is controlled can be used in deadly ways during combat. He can detonate a wall where the rubble would topple over an attacking enemy, if lucky enough, trapping the mongrel under all that rock. Or, during his military years as he often used his ability; a distraction to both enemies and friends alike.
He's limited to objects no bigger than a van, and in most cases can only blow up anything bigger if there are certain resources or detonators alike helping him during the process. Resources along the lines of electricity lines/boxes, gas and fire combined or a bomb itself. He can deal a lot of damage with a bomb, making it deadlier depending on which type it is and the radius of the explosion. It's all in the matter of energy and particles of matter he is combining and holding together as he concentrates. Once James blows up something bigger than a car, if he manages, the tension he had been carrying is released but fatigue kicks in. With the energy drain, James is done for the day - a week of sleep and no interruptions and only then he can move onto blowing up a plane with the help of another detonator. He can only reach up to ten meters and cannot detonate any organic life forms.
PERSONALITY !
He's a kid at heart, no questions asked. He's fairly outgoing, and is often up for getting into all kinds of trouble. He can have a bit of an emotional take at things, whatnot with everything he's been through, but he'll either show his feelings through humor, or by simply hugging someone and telling them that he is sad.
Whitman also has a habit of thumb twiddling and rolling up his sleeves, often punching couches to get rid of his anger. In fact, his case of thumb twiddling may have been the new world record. He does it almost every time he is bored, and spacing out. He's too much of a thinker at times, often getting distracted by things that shouldn't distract him - like birds flying by. Hm. He likes to shift his eyes while raising his brows, and tilting his head - it's like his trademark and he's been doing it since high school after a confusing, incomplete Math question that made the expression become natural every time he wonders about something.
And honestly, sometimes James has a brain of a five year old. He'll say weird things and expect everyone to get it when in reality they don't. And that's the hard truth, no matter how much he wants people to believe what he says. Sorry James, not everyone believes in Santa. Stop saying that he's real.
APPEARANCE !
James will wear whatever is comfortable for him at the moment. Such as jeans, shorts, long sleeved polo shirts, t-shirts, sweaters. He often wears hoodies, preferably dark ones and PUMA shoes. Throw in a silver watch in his accessory, a Rolex perhaps.
He chooses very dark and simple clothing, maybe a quirk he's picked up during his military years. The Captain always said to blend in as much as possible. Even though, James can dress formally if he chooses to. Styles ranging from trench coats, military jackets and scarves. He tries to match his outfits with his black rimmed glasses. James reaches a 6' 2" and has dark, brunette hair. Thing is, he always forgets to brush his hair, but it ends up coming out natural in most cases. Some people don't even notice that it hadn't been brushed.
HISTORY !
Whitman first experienced his power around the age of eleven when a sunny day at school darkened after a bully decided to punch him in the face for no apparent reason. James' first reaction was to fight back, but he wasn't really the kind of person who lived up to whatever encouraging things they said, or thunk at the time. He ended up getting back on his feet and rushing off to the bathroom to clean his muddied shirt. With frustration and confused anger he scrubbed his grey shirt clean. It wasn't until that out of the blue, he almost flew back into a stall from fright. Whatever had happened, the tap had managed to pop off and hit the wall beside him, followed by a rush of water greeting his face. He ran out of the bathroom screaming and never returned to that particular restroom for the rest of his elementary school years. He claimed that there was a ghost living in there and he did not want to become Bloody Mary's next victim.
Then it happened again the next day, the punch to the face followed by another surprising event. It was during class when he was supposed to be working on his activity books, but rather stared blankly at his eraser instead. He hadn't been paying attention to his work, but his eyes couldn't believe what they had witnessed next. A soft sound of something like a short circuit and his eraser exploded into bits. No one had witnessed what had happened since everyone was in their own little groups, as oppose to James who was a wallflower.
It eventually came to the point that the more James realized something was wrong with him, the more he lost control of his own ability. He tried to forget about it, and hoped that it would go away, but when his night light blew up caused from the questionable thinking and oblivious concentration he had been doing while in bed, he screamed in fear, and ran to his parents' room for safety. He had difficulty stabilizing his power until it mysteriously disappeared one day. James had to admit that he missed having soda cans explode in someone's face (not including himself), or being able to obliterate an eraser just by mere concentration of constantly telling his mind to make it explode, but there were times when Detonation gave him a sudden jolt that he truly wished he didn't have such power. The event had taken place within his next door neighbor's lot. The Mustang caught fire and exploded.
James Whitman blew up a car.
Oops.
It wasn't until later when the firemen came after evacuating the area, was that he heard reports of what really happened, that the engine had an oil leak and the amount of heat reached the gas tank and set aflame to the vehicle. The tank was actually nearly out of gas, and the explosion? It was a tire simply popping. James had just been in panic when it all happened. What a bummer, but even greater news that the fire didn't spread and no one had been hurt or died. For James' sake, no one knew of his ability, and it hadn't been a danger to anyone much less a threat since the only things he made explode were soda cans, pencil boxes, erasers and jars. It happened rarely since James noticed that the chance of something blowing up is when he's either angry or frustrated, or both at the same time and he wasn't the kind of person to get mad over anything unless it was an act of cruelness. Most of the casualties happened in Mathematics, not including the students, but the thousands of erasers he's murdered when he became annoyed with an equation.
A week later, James came home from school like any normal day to find a letter in the mail box with his name on it. He didn't know anyone who would send him a letter, and he went ahead to open it. The parchment within the envelope definitely surprised him. A letter from a school up in Vermont, offering to help him with his abilities. Accepting the letter looked to be a good idea, though he was a bit anxious as to what may await him. He didn't have any choice in the matter if he wanted to get help from people who knew what was wrong with him, and ignoring his ability would probably only make matters worse. A recruiter came three days later, and James left for Vermont. The recruiter made him feel welcome as they rode a train to Vermont, and gave him pamphlets and other supplies he needed to get started. He couldn't help but be cautious, since the stories in the books he's read about gifted people, they always either ended up in a government facility where they were experimented on, or used as weapons for the military. He was relieved when Hammel Institute wasn't the kind of place he had been imagining, in fact, it was better than the average school. For most cases, teacher wise.
James had a very strict teacher, her name remains vague in his mind now since it has been so long, but Ms. 'X' (we'll label her that) was a pain in the arse. She was a great teacher, no arguing with that, but her teaching techniques made James want to become a lab experiment. If one of her students didn't get something right, she'd make them stand outside in front of the school entrance. To Mrs. X, standing in corners was for babies - at least she thought they were man enough. She was part Asian, and apparently in the olden days where kung fu masters didn't find a student's performance well enough, they'd make their students stand outside until they've learned their lesson. Mrs. X did the same thing, and being up in the mountains... it was freezing outside.
It was unfortunate for James that he always ended up in Mrs. X block during his high school years. The punishments kept on coming, having to stand outside was becoming a habit for James. He can't seem to do anything right, he always made mistakes and it was frustrating. The fact that you had to stand outside made you want to be perfect, but knowing that he'd always make mistakes, James wanted to give up entirely. He was getting used to the cold anyway, and there was no way that Mrs. X would make anyone stand in the boiler room, that would be stupid.
Class came the next day, and Mrs. X began with the usual warm up. She'd put a glass of water down on a stool as usual, and would ask students to volunteer, show her what they can do with a glass of water. A few students volunteered, the first one was a Shielder. Using the water available, she created a liquid sphere around the glass. Another one had the power of Telekinesis, it wasn't so special. The guy took the water out, played around with it and set it back in the container. James could say that it was like juggling, but cheating, not that he could do any better anyway. Then Mrs. X volunteered him to take a step up and show the class what he can do. He stared at the glass of water for a moment. Stared. Stared. STARED. All he could do was stare, because what else was there with Detonation? He could blow the glass up and spill the water, but what good will that do? That wasn't performance. After much pondering Mrs. X told him to take a seat and by next class he should have a proper presentation.
After classes he started to think of what he could present to the class, and then it struck him. James walked out of his dorm, and went to the Telekinesis guy - he had a plan. Next class came, and when Mrs. X asked James to step up, he did with his partner Lorenzo flicking off the lights. Unafraid, James waited for his turn as Lorenzo started levitating the glass of water, tipping it over but keeping the water inside. There was a silent crack, and the glass exploded. The shards stayed in the air, creating a sphere from the impact of the explosion. If Lorenzo hadn't been helping, thirty students would be injured by now. The water stayed within the structure, also being held by Lorenzo. What was neat about it was when the light hit the ball of water from the rooftop window, it became like a disco ball. James wasn't finished yet, asking a Disintegrator to come up and help him, Lorenzo let the shards go, and James popped the water. It sprinkled the classroom with a refreshing feeling, followed by twinkling dust as the shards Disintegrated. It was an impressive performance, asking others to help when Detonation also had limits in its artistic nature. Not only James slowly developed control for his ability, but also learnt the use of help from others. He graduated, and took three years of Creative Writing in college until he found it to be just a hobby and enlisted to the military.
Enlistment to the military wasn't all sunshine and rainbows, he became great friends with his comrades at Command, but some of the soldiers were also afraid of him. The Captain ensured everyone that James meant no harm, but most kept their distance. James understood although he would've appreciated if the people who feared him told him why they were afraid. He knew there was a lot of reasons, but he'd prefer someone coming up to him and telling him what and why, instead of staring at him fom a distance and whispering to their friends. When he was made sniper, the people who had been afraid grew with more anxiety. They said that he had the ability to blow up their heads now. Great.
As if things could get any worse, half of his team gets captured during a recon mission. There were casualties and soldiers were running out of ammo. The enemy was stronger than they perceived them to be, and more strategic it seemed like it. No matter how much fire ammo they threw at the opposing team, the same treatment was thrown back at them more deadlier than before. The dudes were seriously dedicated to winning the war - it made Whitman's team look like a bunch of slackers.
There came a decision from Command that the post was not to be left behind until reinforcements came the next day. That would've been great timing when a crew member who had managed to snuck a hidden radio in enemy camp didn't provide them message that half of them would be dead within the next few hours. Whoever the guys they have been fighting were serious business. What was Command thinking to send in first year soldiers? Oh right, life sometimes threw wild cards at you. This particular event, was definitely a wild card. It was a simple recon mission that turned drastic in a matter of seconds. What other choice than to save them. James couldn't leave half of the team to die, most of them had families back in the States. He quickly devised a plan with what little soldiers left who could still run, and left the medic behind to tend to the injured. They went at night, used the tunnels for stealth and was surprised that there wasn't much patrol as they thought there'd be. The team patiently listened to chatter from above the tunnels, and eventually got a move on where the rest of the team was being held at. They infiltrated, James blew up a stack of tanks nearby the prison as distraction, and busted out stealing a few vehicles on the way and traveled back to base with a once again complete team.
Eventually coming back to command after the team's mission, Command hadn't liked the steps taken to secure the safety of a few men, that were clearly fighting for their country and if they were really true soldiers, they'd die for their country. The argument is valid, and however anyone may contradict it, the performance of James Whitman was highly idiotic. At least he proved he could 'blow' an entire operation up, that itself was self explanatory. Without any hesitation, and in fear of Whitman screwing up another mission, they stripped him off his military status and sent him home.
One thing is for certain that when James came back home he knew that there was one place he could always go back to. He left for Vermont and registered into Hammel Institute as security. People refer to him as Officer Scoops, though he never really knew the concept of the name, nor found out. It was a nickname his comrades gave him back at Command, and he had a theory behind it although it wasn't much. Perhaps his team intended to him the name 'scope' but by the sound of it, it sounded ridiculous and maybe that's how Scoops came into play. James will never really know.Behind the M A S K . . .Name: legi0nn
Age: ... o-o;;
RP Experience: A while.
How did you find us?: caution 2.0Show your S K I L L S . . .Just look at MIA !
