Gavin’s always been a bit of a small guy. Premature baby, tiny toddler, the whole nine yards. Even in the middle of puberty slapping him around, the guy just won’t grow. Standing at a five foot eight inches, the boy’s technically well within the average for a guy his size. In reality, though, most of his peers back home tower over him. It doesn’t help that he’s skinny as a rail. Throw in the long limbs, small joints, and stringy muscles and you’ve got the typical ectomorph...just without the tall.

His most striking feature, however, would have to be his hair. See, Gavin’s got this wild wavy brown mane that hangs down around his head in loose curls down to about the base of his neck/tip top of his shoulders.. And points off to the side. And up. And backwards. It’s a nightmare, really. But, hey, it’s got a nice, healthy shine to it and only sometimes gets in his eyes/mouth/etc.

Below the man’s mane is a set of well-maintained eyebrows framing a pair of dark brown eyes. Naturally long, dark eyelashes line his eyelids doing...eyelash things. Just a hop, skip, and a jump away would be a rather average nose. Medium length and width in both bridge and nostrils. Useful for smelling things and attracting fists in fights. Below that is full set of lips hiding a set of straight, white teeth. Also great at attracting face punches. What’s that? Ears? Yes, he has those too. Where? Dunno. Check the hair.

Stretched over his lanky body is lightly tan or olive skin. A few moles dot that otherwise clear skin, most prominent being the ones located below his Adam’s apple, above his lip, and around his eye, all on the right side. The final nail in his potential action-film leading man career would be his lack of prominent scars. Can’t be a badass without scars.

The Glover kid is the epitome of easygoing. He’s relaxed, patient, and calm. He takes things in stride, taking plenty of time to stop and smell the roses. Punctuality isn’t exactly one of his strong suits, nor is he competitive whatsoever. Stress just isn’t a good motivator for him. If he fails, then he fails. He’s not about to shift the blame or make up some kind of lie. It’s no big deal. Things will work out somehow.

What he lacks in drive, however, he makes up in sheer pleasantness. He’s a good-natured guy, agreeable to the bone, and able to freely laugh at just about anything. He speaks very casually, never cursing or raising his voice. He’ll bend over backwards to make others happy, and there won’t be so much as a single complaint uttered on his end. Really, it’s not likely to hear Gavin say a bad thing about anybody or anything. That’s not to say that he doesn’t think it from time to time, he’s human after all, but if he doesn’t have anything nice to say, then he won’t say anything at all. And despite his personable ways, Gavin can be a bit quiet. While yes, he is rather soft-spoken, it’s more that he’s completely comfortable in silence. He’s not the biggest fan of small talk, though he will respond properly if engaged. Consider him an outgoing introvert. Oxymoron? Oxymoron.

Gavin is nauseatingly optimistic. There’s always a bright side, or good in someone, or some kind of silver lining. That pure, raw optimism flirts with outright naivety from time to time, leading Gavin to make decisions without considering the negative consequences, though he sticks to a moral creed of “Do the right thing and be a good person.” If it outright harms someone else, it’s no bueno.

Now onto the less-than-stellar parts of Gavin.

Poor Gavin really isn’t the smartest guy around. Not saying that he’s an idiot, but he’s not going to be winning any academic awards any time soon. He’s slow to pick up new concepts and rather resistant to change.

He’s indecisive to an obnoxious degree. He’d much rather just go with somebody else’s call than make his own. Put him on the spot and he’ll never come up with an answer. The thing is, he can easily make a decision so long as it only affects him. Get him to a restaurant with some friends and he’ll have no trouble ordering something. Ask him to pick the restaurant and laugh while he anguishes over his options or cry as you’re beset with echoing choruses of “I don’t really care. You pick.”

He’s lazy. Dress it up and call it whatever, but when push comes to shove, Gavin’s just plain lazy. Why do today what you can do tomorrow and all that jazz. He’s much easier motivated when apart of a group, but when flying solo? Forget about it. It REALLY doesn’t help that Gavin’s pretty easily distracted. If something new or interesting pops up, Gavin’s gone. And his organization is...nonexistent. All that “everything works out” mumbo jumbo really doesn’t help with a guy’s work ethic.

Surprisingly, the boy does have a dream: he wants to see the world. All of it. He wants to travel all over and do new things and meet new people. Truly the bane of career guidance professionals the world over.

For most of his life, Gavin lived with his maternal Grandmother along with his little brother in a small town somewhere outside Columbus, Ohio. His father was never in the picture while his mother was in-and-out of prison so often that the other inmates held bets on when she’d be back.

Granny subscribed to the old Draconian school of thought when it came to childrearing. She ruled the household with an iron, albeit wrinkly and liver-spotted, fist. Gavin and his brother were broken of potential bad habits before they even formed. They were raised to be polite, well-behaved, and disciplined. For a good chunk of Gavin’s childhood, that was the norm.

But as the years went on, Granny got sick. Very sick. Abnormally sick. It wasn’t until much later that Gavin learned that it was due to his little brother. A metahuman who activated very early, the younger Glover child apparently grew resentful of his grandmother’s cruel ways and slowly poisoned her. The plan wasn’t very well thought out, go figure, and the boy’s actions were soon discovered by the visitors.

Granny ended up being relocated to a nursing home to be cared for, while Gavin was seized by the state and placed into the Academy program. Gavin’s still not sure what happened to his little brother after the incident, though he prays that the boy was simply placed in another Academy.

The Academy ended up being the most stable part of Gavin’s life. For the most part, Gavin had a relatively unremarkable stay. He didn’t excel in his education, but he wasn’t the absolute worst. His social life was healthy, with plenty of good friends. All-in-all, things simply got better. Moreso when he was contacted and told that he had been randomly selected for a spot aboard The Promise.

In SPACE.

Of course he accepted. He always did want to see the world. And besides...there was chance, no matter how small, that his brother could be there.

Charger

Think of Gavin as a spare battery and one will have a pretty solid indication of the boy’s power. Metahumans have a certain pool of energy that they draw from in order to fuel their abilities. While potentially similar, for the most part this energy is unique to the metahuman in question.

Therein lies Gavin’s ability.

See, his energy is incredibly well suited for adaptation. When exposed to another energy, it will rapidly convert to a compatible form. Gavin, being so intune with both his and others’ energy, can merge the pools as it were, allowing another metahuman to use his energy as their own. The most effective and efficient way for Gavin to do so it to make physical contact with the second party. He can do the same at a range, but the details on that will be discussed down below.

Assuming Gavin and his partner are of equal strength with equal energy pools, their options are as follows:

A.) Extended Energy Pool: Wherein the partner will have access to an energy pool roughly double the size of their normal reserves. Effectively granting double the maximum number of ability uses. For this, Gavin’s energy morphs to a near identical form as the partner’s allowing for the easiest access to the greater reservoir. The energy usage can either be shared between both partners (1:1), or primarily drain one pool before the other.

B.) Amped Energy Pool: Wherein the partner will have access to their original energy pool, but the potency of their abilities is roughly double the norm. For this, Gavin’s energy morphs to a compatible, yet different form compared to the partner’s. The boost “piggybacks” onto the partner’s energy, allowing for more power to be expelled without increasing effort on the partner’s part. This requires a 1:x mix where x must be greater than or equal to 1.

C.) Energy Exchange: Wherein Gavin may move energy around to and from all connected pools. In practice, this allows to absorb energy from others, or replenish their supply. Theoretically this could be used to transfer energy from Party A to Party B with Gavin acting as a conduit, however a 1:1 transfer is not possible, as will be discussed below. For this, Gavin’s energy uses a secondary function: converting foreign energy into the unstable form. This takes time, much more than converting unstable to foreign. It cannot be rushed, though it will result in a near perfect conversion.

Strap in fellas.

Now, to address the elephant in the room, Gavin can use most of his ability at a range. For A and B listed above, assuming a 1:1 mix is in use, Gavin is capable of connecting his pool to another at about thirty feet out. This is the maximum that Gavin can stretch his tether while still transferring some amount of energy. It requires an unobscured line of sight, and can be intercepted should anything move into the tether (a very faint shimmer with a light aquamarine tint, appearing as a ribbon between Gavin and the target, originating at Gavin’s hand). The less distance between Gavin and the target, the more effective he can be, up to a nearly perfect transfer at physical contact. That means skin to skin, people. Sure, it technically can be used to go through clothes, but even that tiny tiny amount can eat into the efficiency. Tether cannot pass through windows or other translucent objects. C, as listed above, cannot be used this way in any real application. The energy would have to travel two ways on the tether, effectively cutting the maximum range in half, which at that point would be easier just to high five to victory.

Now, the above examples explained the ideal scenarios (Gavin+Partner at equal strength), but what if there is a power difference?

A is likely affected the least, here, as Gavin can supply a much greater pool to a weaker partner. A stronger partner will have a much larger pool, so Gavin’s extension won’t make much of a difference there.

B is where things get a bit...sketchy. When used with a weaker partner, the amplification is limited by the smaller pool. If Gavin has sufficient enough charge, however, he could fill the partner’s pool back up then amp it up again, but this requires a significant amount of energy on Gavin’s part. With a stronger partner, the amp pool would then be limited by Gavin’s reserves, resulting in fewer amped uses.

C isn’t exactly reliant on the partners, other than Gavin being unable to take more energy than a partner has access to: i.e., cutting into their health for energy and being unable to absorb more energy than he can hold. He cannot overcharge himself. Due to the conversion time for turning foreign energy into his unstable kind, Gavin cannot just connect to Partner A and Partner B to use A to fuel B. A>G>B, not A>B. Got it? Good.

As far as weaknesses go, Gavin’s got about zero combat viability on his own. He’s small. He’s weak. Yeah…

He also cannot toggle his ability on or off. Anytime that physical contact is made, the pools are connected. This being said, should a more experienced metahuman, or somebody with experience with his kind of charger wish to do so, they could connect to him and forcibly use his energy to fuel themselves. Futhermore, should a connected party try to pull more energy than Gavin has access to, his body will harm itself to meet the demand. So...normal overuse policy applies. A truly nasty individual could even purposely waste Gavin’s energy, then continue to drain him until he ashes. But what kind of sick fuck would do that?