Gems probably don't wear armor because its innefective. Sure, Bismuth forged a whole new weapon for rose, some upgrades for the gems, but I don't remember seeing any armor in her forge, or in Rose's armory. If what we've seen of their strength from Jasper is any indication, warrior gems hit hard, with weapons that don't seem to be able to break from striking hard surfaces at full force, again as we've seen in the show. If the weapon isn't going to snap when it comes into contact with armor with that much force, it's probably going to go through the armor.
So we've got a biological scientist of some sort, an engineer, and a... Reggie, not sure what he'd fall under. We've got the makings of either an awful sitcom or one hell of a 'super-hero' team.
And here we have him, folks; Carmen 2.0! @Raijinslayer Let me know if you want me to change any of the info on Reggie.
Name: Carmen Brass
Gender: Male
Age: 20
Details: Carmen stand's at a towering 6'4, which is only made more imposing by his lean, chiseled musculature. His skin is sickly pale, his hair is pure white, and his eyes are an unnatural shade of red, due to Carmen's albinism. He doesn't let this stop him from going out in the sun, though, and can be found wearing his hoodie, along with his rucksack full of tricks and inventions.
Biography: Born to a neurosurgeon mother and PhD physicist father, Carmen was destined for great things. Things might have been grander still, had he not been born albino and ostracized by other children his age. From a very young age, Carmen found that children this day and age weren't accepting of people that didn't fit their definitions of normal, especially when the odd one out looked like a gem. That was often times the thing Carmen heard most. 'It's the gem kid, stay back or he'll suck all the life from you.' 'Ew, its the gem. Why didn't you leave with the others?'. Without much of a social life to worry about, Carmen threw himself into other activities instead; He had to get smart if he wanted to prove these assholes wrong, and he had to get tough to fend off the regular bouts of bullying he suffered.
So he did so. He studied hard and played even harder, going out of his way to find ways to push his young body to become stronger. It was during one such day that Carmen found himself trying to climb up the side of a building, and once it started raining on him, falling from it. The boy was saved, however, by a creature that stunned him into silence with its appearance. Tall and gaunt, the Selenite that saved him had mistaken him for one of her own kind due to their strikingly similar appearances; Pale skin, white hair, pink eyes. The only major difference was his lack of large wings, and the stoic mask over her face. The Selenite began to scold him for disobeying mission parameters, taking unnecessary risk, and for being somewhere so open without his mask, even if it was off Homeworld.
It wasn't until the child started crying that the Selenite realized something was amiss, and as she shielded the crying boy from the rain with with a wing and reached out a comforting hand, she realized this was not one of her unit, but a human. Once Carmen had calmed down from the fright of his near-death experience, the gem made sure he was okay, asked him what he was doing, what he was, why he looked so similar to one of her own kind. Carmen explained his disease, how other saw him, how he almost wished Selenite hadn't saved him, just so he could finally be at peace and not be constantly stared at, pointed at, whispered behind his back about.
The Selenite wove him a tale, then. The story of her kind, her unit. They were imperfect, defects. They were supposed to be gypsum, graceful warriors and commanders, but had come out Selenite, too weak and soft for combat. They were of a low caste in society, used as expendable scouts to be sent into dangerous places without regard for weather or not they came out alive. To others, they were merely tools, things to be used and destroyed if they didn't perform as they were instructed, simply because they'd come out differently. They were one in the same despite being different species altogether.
"The key," Selenite had said, looking the little human in the eye, "Is to prove them wrong. The reason I'm here is because I survived. I proved I was more than just a weak gem. My team and I have gone to some of the most dangerous places in the universe, and we prevailed. We were told we were lesser. We were told we would die on our first mission, if not our second. Yet here we are, dozens later, on the most important mission of our lives. We worked hard and proved them wrong, despite our appearance, despite our 'defects'."
These words have stayed with Carmen constantly, providing him with the will to move through even his darkest days. The Selenite, happy to have improved someone else's view on the world, passed on her mask to him, an act usually reserved as an honor to Selenite that had proved themselves in tests of exemplary skill. She told Carmen that if he continued to improve himself, to prove others wrong, that she'd return for him one day, and see how much he'd grown, how much he'd proven the doubters wrong. He just had to survive and thrive until she did so.
Come middle-school, no one talked to Carmen. There were whispers behind his back, dirty looks shot from across the classroom, but everyone that had tried to push him around quickly found he pushed back, a whole hell of a lot harder, in the face. Happy he'd created a safety bubble around himself, Carmen simply continued to work on sharpening his mind and strengthening his body, just to make sure he could stay far enough ahead of the pack they wouldn't be able to snap at him.
It was around this time that he met Reggie. The one person that had commented on his gem appearance with wonder instead of fear or hate. The one student that matched his fascination with technology and machinery. His relationship to the biggest weapons manufacturer in the world probably helped with that, but it only helped to polarize him from other students, due to the origins of those weapons.
Carmen found out in highschool that being tough wasn't always enough, not when people that weren't as tough traveled in packs. He also found out that being tough isn't nearly as effective if you aren't also quick. So, Carmen got quick, did his best to stick to his AP and honors classes, and started working on robotics fair projects with Reggie. But, if he was putting his mind to practical use, why not his body?
And so Carmen became the 'mail man' for Crystalisis. There was never a package too sensitive or delivery too illegal, so long as he could fit it in his bag. He experienced many a nasty fall, numerous broken bones, and enough fractures to put the grand canyon to shame, but he didn't let that stop him. He was always back on the rooftops the second he was able to run and jump effectively. But he did eventually grow tired of his parents repeated scoldings and threats of locking down his workshop. If he was going to do this, he was going to do it right. So, with some help from Reggie and Reggie's Father's workshop, he developed his wrist-mounted grappling hook, and invention that won both himself and Reggie their senior science fair. To celebrate both this accomplishment and Carmen's 18th birthday, as well as his obtaining a driver's license, they managed to ship him over a rickshaw.
Not one to be satisfied with a pea-sized engine, Carmen used his savings to purchase an engine from a sports bike and placed that in it instead. But, since it was already in the chop shop, why not trick it out further? Undercarriage lights, the nicest stereo system he could afford to fit in its small interior, smokescreen, rear-mounted flamethrower, caltrop compartment... He may have went a little overboard, but by the time he was done, Carmen had quiet the machine. And, with all that power in the engine and his history of minor lawbreaking, Carmen took it racing.
Now on the cusp of his 21st birthday, Carmen has full run of his family's home in Crystalisis. His mother and father moved to France shortly after he graduated highschool, with his mother working at the Hadron Collider and his father teaching at medical schools across Europe. Carmen stayed in Crystalisis to pursue his PhD in engineering, to continue to develop his rooftop-running skills, and to contnue to build a name for himself in the underground racing circuit.
Carmen's getting a degree in engineering with a minor in robotics, and as such, he's quiet the handy guy to have around. His garage has been converting into a workshop for all of his inventions and machines, many of which he uses to help him navigate the city for his side job, and others for his own amusement.
Carmen was very active, even from a young age. His parents were always terrified that he'd climb somewhere and fall, but thankfully for them all, he never did... To their knowledge. This affinity of climbing and running along high places has followed him through life, and now he's quiet the parkour runner, using the skills he's gained from his years to deliver packages, both benign and too 'sensitive' for lawful eyes.
A fully-functioning, arm-mounted grappling gun.. His is a bit more compact, the reeling mechanism is much more powerful, and he uses a stronger, carbon fiber cable. He's also forgone a CO2 canister in favor of magnetic repulsion, allowing it to shoot just as far, if not farther. The mechanism on the end is a claw, clamping tight around either the cable or whatever surface presses the pressure-sensitive switch in the middle, allowing Carmen greater mobility and options in what he can grapple onto, and the claw can be clamped shut and open manually by pressing a button on the side of the glove the grappling hook sits on.
His ((Hastily drawn)) mask, given to him by a 'friend' he refuses to talk about. He rarely wears it during the day, but its nice to have something to hide his face when he's already doing shady things at night. He'll use it when welding too, as it seems impervious to most heat damage, and it effectively asks as a pair of welding goggles in the presence of bright light, while allowing him to see normally otherwise. The 'eyes' are only visible when worn, and mimic the color of the wearer's own eyes.
Carmen's quiet the speed demon on the road, with his tricked-out Tuk-Tuk. He's put a lot of time and money into his, the thing able to reach speeds of most high-end racing motorcycles.
Other: Carmen's got quiet the sweet tooth. Favors can often be bought for a bag of gummy worms or a chocolate orange.
@Raijinslayer Nah, thanks though. Honestly, it might be more fitting if the gem that gave Carmen his mask was dead and gone. If the Selenite that passed on their mask is dead, that opens the gem up for others, and gives me a neat plot point for the albino engineer. Speaking of, what did you think of the school friends idea?
I rescind my claim to selenite. Raijin has a similar idea with their new gem and has done it a lot better, I'll have to start from scratch and see if I can come up with something I like. Until then, I'll stick with Carmen.
@Raijinslayer Maybe school buds? Carmen's a recluse, since his albinism made him a target in school. But I can imagine the guy that lives around weird gem tech would have interest in a kid that looks like a gem.
