Ragdoll

Ragdoll
Author	/u/glass_paper
Civilian name	Oliver Shull
Alignment	Hero
Affiliation	Wards (Devilfish)
PRT Classification	Mover, (Brute,
Status	Active

Effectively none, bar some broken infrastructure from when he needed to test out his powers. His family is aware, and support his choice of becoming a ward, and he’s told a few friends at school.

Aside from that, he’s a moderately well known kid at school. Most of his peers don’t think much of him, but get along well enough, especially when they need help with math homework. He has a few close friends, and a few people he doesn’t get along with. He’s had some issues with minor bullying in the past.

Character Sheet

Appearance

Oliver is a wiry kid with red, straight hair and freckles. He’s got a small birthmark under his hair, and brown eyes. hes perpetually covered in bruises and scratches. He’s got a missing tooth. He has a sunny demeanour, and he's missing his left hand, up to the elbow.

He usually wears a hoodie, with a brooch that his younger sister made pinning his empty sleeve to his shoulder.

Equipment and Resources

• His old Nokia phone, still’s got a year or two in it but it’s going out.

Skills and Specializations

• Oliver has a very developed logical intelligence, which make him very good at pattern recognition and mathematics and the like.

• Oliver has tried his hand at several martial arts, but he’s not very good at any of them.

Mentality

Oliver is a kid, and his big concerns are those of a kid. He’s interested in video games, superheroes, and fantasy novels. He’s at the age where common sense dictates that he should be slowly taking interest in more mature things, but he doesn’t really want to.

Oliver has a mild case of autism, which can make social situations difficult for him at times. He’s very logical, and tends to get into arguments with people around him over rules. He also gets uncomfortable in large crowds, loud places, or smoky areas.

Overall, Oliver tries to be polite and friendly to people around him, and generally wants his worth to be recognised. He can have trouble with people that are antagonistic towards him without a reason he can understand.

Power

Trigger Type: natural trigger. (Mover/Brute)

Oliver’s power has two aspects. The first, is that he can propel his own body at high speeds in a direction. He can choose to either throw his whole body, or only move a part, such as sending his hand in a direction to spin himself around quickly. He can control the force of this throw, between a simple push to 250 km/h throws. This ability needs a preparation time of about 5 seconds, during which Oliver must be “balanced”: standing on his own two legs, on firm ground. This time will not “charge” if Oliver is falling or tripping or sliding down something etc. , and will charge slowly (think half as fast) If running, lying down, sitting, etc.

The second aspect of the power is a defensive power that is only active when Oliver isn’t “balanced”, meaning when he’s falling, throwing himself with his power, stumbling etc. (But not when jumping in place, it requires Oliver to instinctually fear getting hurt by the fall, even when he knows it’s not going to hurt him). This aspect of his power remembers what state Oliver’s body was in, and strives to keep outside factors from changing it. In effect, this means that whilst falling, Oliver can take heavy impacts and damage without effect. This effect’s strength is stronger based on how unbalanced Oliver is. Tripping over a rock and getting shot could slash his skin if placed right, getting shot whilst falling off of a building would leave a bruise at most, and Oliver is nigh-invulnerable whilst propelling himself with his power. The power “drains away” from Oliver‘s body gradually upon regaining balance, weakening into nothing after one or a few seconds, based on the original strength of the Effect.

If Oliver touches someone whilst in his “unbalanced” state, he can transfer the effect to them, or share it. It runs out like normal. If he’s sharing it, he gets to choose how much he grants the person, with a weaker charge being less effective and running out faster.

Oliver’s skin takes on a rootlike pattern when he’s in his unbalanced state, tied to the strength of the effect.

Oliver has an innate understanding of his own trajectories, speeds, and if a throw would hurt him to prevent him from killing himself on accident.

The balance aspect is partially determined by Oliver’s own sense of balance, so drugs that induce nausea or damage to his inner ear canal could set his power firmly into “unbalanced” mode for a time, turning him into a normal brute.

Whilst his defense is active, Oliver can’t heal, digest food, or use other bodily functions as his power is keeping his body in a certain state. As such, long-term use (around a few days at a weak level, or hours at it’s strongest) would probably kill Oliver.

Backstory

Oliver Shull grew up in a lower middle-class family, with two siblings. His relationship with his family was good, and although he had some trouble making friends at school, he eventually fell in with a few good kids that he felt like he could spend time with. Overall, life was good, school was fun, and things were easy.

One day, a kid that had needed to be held back entered Oliver’s class. Oliver quickly grew to dislike him, and he wasn’t the only one. There was something about his jokes and comments that rubbed people the wrong way, or went too far, or were in bad taste, And eventually, most people started avoiding him. Oliver had heard rumours about people playing harsh pranks on him, but he really didn’t want to get involved. He was pretty sure that they didn’t like him on principle of being a nerd, or something. He never really could figure that stuff out.

One day, when he and the new kid had been paired on an art project (Oliver already didn’t like working with other people on projects, and this was one of the worst choices!) the kid told Oliver to do some math work for him. Oliver doesn’t remember what exactly he had responded with, but it must have been harsher than he usually was, because the next thing Oliver remembers is being picked up by the scruff, carried up some stairs, and thrown out of a window. Apparently, he had landed on the old flag pole, broken it with his leg, and then impaled his arm on the wooden stump, driving wooden shards deep into his flesh and tangling his tendons on the stump, his own bodyweight tearing him through it. Whilst stuck in this unlucky position, he triggered.

His arm had to be removed, due to the bizarre injury, and the new kid never showed up at school again. Oliver never really asked what had happened to him.