tommy shepherd >>> SPEED (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
expeditiousness) wrote2018-09-16 06:45 pm
expeditiousness) wrote2018-09-16 06:45 pm
Entry tags:
6i >>> character info.
Name: Thomas "Tommy" Shepherd; hero alias Speed.
Canon: Marvel (616 comics)
Scrubs Color: Teal
Visible Age: 18
Gender: He's a dude.
Height: 5'8
Physique: Weight is given at 155 lbs., and he's all lean muscle - he's a runner, after all.
Hair: White-blond
Eyes: Blue
Defining Marks: N/A.
Accent/Speech: He generally talks fast, runs his words together, and has a New Jersey accent. Tommy and Billy do sound similar, though Billy's accent is slightly different and he enunciates his words much better than Tommy does.
Bearing/Demeanor: Restless, mostly - he's used to having a lot of energy to burn. You'll often see him fidgeting, tapping fingers and toes, etc. Otherwise, Tommy carries himself with confidence.
Skills: Tommy most heavily relies on his mutant speedster skills in all types of situations, but in their absence, he does have a few additional skills to contribute.
Determination: Despite a history of missteps and run-ins with the law, Tommy chose a hero’s life as Speed, and he’s quite dedicated to the cause of doing overall good. When the Young Avengers disbanded in the wake of Stature’s death, he was the only member to voice a desire to continue, stating “This is a war we’re fighting … you don’t stop fighting, or the bad guys win.” When his priorities align with his die-hard work ethic, there’s very little that will stop Tommy from reaching his goals. This will be a useful quality in the 6I setting, as it’s significantly less modern than Tommy is used to, and a lot more unusual. Not giving up is an important survival skill in adverse situations.
Responsibility: Tommy might act more devil-may-care than his twin, but he takes being a good guy just as seriously as Billy does - holding himself to a high standard of performance, pushing himself to save everyone in need, feeling utterly disappointed when he fails to live up to the expectations he’s set for himself. In the field, he takes personal ownership for his actions and doesn’t need to be asked to pitch in and help - by the time you ask, he’s already hard at work. He should find a place in the village to make himself useful in record time.
Resilience: Tommy didn’t get the best start in life; his parents divorced when he was young, and he spent his life before meeting the Young Avengers in and out of juvenile detention for frequent trouble with the law, such as “accidentally” vaporizing his high school with his mutant superpowers. When the Young Avengers found him, Tommy had been imprisoned for months under court order in a highly secure facility and subjected to experiments designed to turn him into a living weapon. Despite these troubles, Tommy was able to turn his life around as Speed, dedicating himself to using his powers to help rather than harm. His ability to bounce back from adversity and roll with the punches is noted by his teammates. Again, this is a handy quality to have when dealing with a strange location where anything can happen.
Leadership: Not Tommy’s strongest quality, but it exists. He typically runs his own race, even when working as part of a team, and strategy isn’t his strong suit – the extent of Tommy’s plans is usually “go now and run fast.” However, he does demonstrate an ability and a willingness to step up and take charge of a situation, as shown in recruiting David Alleyne to investigate a break-in at the building where they both worked. He could prove to be a valuable addition to the village’s affairs, both of a daily and a more irregular variety.
CANON SKILLS (locked in 6i): Tommy is a mutant equipped with superhuman speed in both physical ability and mental perception, which means he both moves much faster than the average person and thinks/processes information that much faster as well. Using this super-speed, he can generate hyperkinetic vibrations capable of accelerating solid objects on a molecular level to either explode or destabilize enough to safely pass through other solid objects. Other speedster gifts Tommy possesses include superhuman stamina, agility, strength, and durability. (Wikipedia and the Marvel wiki go into the specifics of these abilities in a little more detail, if needed.)
Canon: Marvel (616 comics)
Scrubs Color: Teal
Visible Age: 18
Gender: He's a dude.
Height: 5'8
Physique: Weight is given at 155 lbs., and he's all lean muscle - he's a runner, after all.
Hair: White-blond
Eyes: Blue
Defining Marks: N/A.
Accent/Speech: He generally talks fast, runs his words together, and has a New Jersey accent. Tommy and Billy do sound similar, though Billy's accent is slightly different and he enunciates his words much better than Tommy does.
Bearing/Demeanor: Restless, mostly - he's used to having a lot of energy to burn. You'll often see him fidgeting, tapping fingers and toes, etc. Otherwise, Tommy carries himself with confidence.
Skills: Tommy most heavily relies on his mutant speedster skills in all types of situations, but in their absence, he does have a few additional skills to contribute.
Determination: Despite a history of missteps and run-ins with the law, Tommy chose a hero’s life as Speed, and he’s quite dedicated to the cause of doing overall good. When the Young Avengers disbanded in the wake of Stature’s death, he was the only member to voice a desire to continue, stating “This is a war we’re fighting … you don’t stop fighting, or the bad guys win.” When his priorities align with his die-hard work ethic, there’s very little that will stop Tommy from reaching his goals. This will be a useful quality in the 6I setting, as it’s significantly less modern than Tommy is used to, and a lot more unusual. Not giving up is an important survival skill in adverse situations.
Responsibility: Tommy might act more devil-may-care than his twin, but he takes being a good guy just as seriously as Billy does - holding himself to a high standard of performance, pushing himself to save everyone in need, feeling utterly disappointed when he fails to live up to the expectations he’s set for himself. In the field, he takes personal ownership for his actions and doesn’t need to be asked to pitch in and help - by the time you ask, he’s already hard at work. He should find a place in the village to make himself useful in record time.
Resilience: Tommy didn’t get the best start in life; his parents divorced when he was young, and he spent his life before meeting the Young Avengers in and out of juvenile detention for frequent trouble with the law, such as “accidentally” vaporizing his high school with his mutant superpowers. When the Young Avengers found him, Tommy had been imprisoned for months under court order in a highly secure facility and subjected to experiments designed to turn him into a living weapon. Despite these troubles, Tommy was able to turn his life around as Speed, dedicating himself to using his powers to help rather than harm. His ability to bounce back from adversity and roll with the punches is noted by his teammates. Again, this is a handy quality to have when dealing with a strange location where anything can happen.
Leadership: Not Tommy’s strongest quality, but it exists. He typically runs his own race, even when working as part of a team, and strategy isn’t his strong suit – the extent of Tommy’s plans is usually “go now and run fast.” However, he does demonstrate an ability and a willingness to step up and take charge of a situation, as shown in recruiting David Alleyne to investigate a break-in at the building where they both worked. He could prove to be a valuable addition to the village’s affairs, both of a daily and a more irregular variety.
CANON SKILLS (locked in 6i): Tommy is a mutant equipped with superhuman speed in both physical ability and mental perception, which means he both moves much faster than the average person and thinks/processes information that much faster as well. Using this super-speed, he can generate hyperkinetic vibrations capable of accelerating solid objects on a molecular level to either explode or destabilize enough to safely pass through other solid objects. Other speedster gifts Tommy possesses include superhuman stamina, agility, strength, and durability. (Wikipedia and the Marvel wiki go into the specifics of these abilities in a little more detail, if needed.)
HISTORY.
What is your canon exit point?: Young Avengers (2013) #6 – just as he’s been disappeared to some other dimension by Patri-not (we’re never told exactly what happened, and Tommy claims to have no memory between the warehouse and the New Year’s party at the end of the series).
PERSONALITY.
Emotional dishonesty: Tommy loudly proclaims “I don’t have feelings,” which is a) untrue and 2) unhealthy - even Magneto, his grandfather and one of the most notorious mutant villains, cautions him against it, warning “you’ll end up like me.” Refusal to acknowledge his feelings means Tommy experiences significant roadblocks in developing deep, meaningful relationships of all kinds - he’s friendly enough, but it’s on a superficial level. Even with his twin Billy, who is probably his strongest personal bond, Tommy is somewhat emotionally distant.
Arrogance: Tommy almost constantly runs his mouth, and a lot of that’s spent on talking himself up, such as claiming he’s faster and better-looking than his uncle Pietro, or that out of his entire team of superpowered friends, he’s the only one necessary to take on another group of adversaries. Some of this is bravado - Tommy downplays his insecurities about being good enough and never admits to these feelings aloud - but some of it is honest. Tommy knows he’s skilled and capable, but he doesn’t acknowledge that he isn’t indestructible, which can lead to trouble. Everyone has limits.
Lack of foresight: Tommy’s all go all the time, which means he doesn’t take the time to plan ahead before he acts, and he doesn’t consider consequential effects of his actions. Most of the time, he’s quick enough to land on his feet, but he has run into trouble in the past as a result of this no-planning policy - trouble of the “getting poofed by a cosmic horror-monster to an unknown dimension for months” kind. Tommy raced into action without taking any strategy into consideration, and while he ended up OK and with apparently no memory of where he was during that time, that episode could have ended a lot worse for him.
Why did you choose this specific character for 6I, and how do you picture them fitting into the game? I wanted to do something that Marvel didn’t – explore the trauma Tommy endured at the hands of the government during his time in “juvie” aka double secret secure lockup where he was depowered and experimented on with the goal of turning him into a living weapon. We’re not told exactly what those experiments entailed, but Tommy’s destructive rage against the doctors and wardens after the Young Avengers freed him is a good indication that it was extremely unpleasant. Tommy claims he doesn’t have feelings, which means he doesn’t have to acknowledge what was done to him – he can simply brush it off and race onward to the next thing that catches his interest. Being imprisoned in another place where he’s stripped of his super-speed powers will be a triggering reminder of that time, and my overall goal is to make Tommy acknowledge and work through his issues in a setting where he literally cannot outrun his problems, as is his default coping mechanism.
TL;DR – I want to make the speedy boi slow the heck down and do some serious soul-searching.
How do you imagine your character will survive in 6I, and in what ways will they contribute to the settlement, if any? Tommy is pretty resourceful, but he doesn’t really have any non-urban survival skills to speak of, and he’s mostly gotten by with the help of his mutant super-speed, so he’ll likely end up relying on others for help a lot of the time. But that’s a good thing! Because Tommy has a tendency to act as a lone wolf most of the time – even when functioning as part of his team, the Young Avengers, he’s usually half a mile ahead of everyone else, because he moves so much faster. Learning to function with better, more cohesive teamwork will be good for him! He’s not averse to hard work, so he’ll gladly pitch in wherever he’s needed, doing whatever he can – though he may need to be taught some job skills first. He’ll bring a willingness to learn and help to the table, at least.
How will your character react to...