ғᴜʟʟ ɴᴀᴍᴇ
Augutus Nicole Maines
ᴀʟɪᴀs
Mercury
ᴀɢᴇ
Twenty-three
ɢᴇɴᴅᴇʀ
Male
sᴇxᴜᴀʟɪᴛʏ
Bisexual
ᴡᴇᴀᴘᴏɴs & ᴀʀsᴇɴᴀʟs
➤ CYBERNETIC LIMBS: Gus's body began to fail on him at a young age. To stop the neural damage, cybernetics were placed into his body to stabilize his failing nerves. His legs, knees down, are cybernetic, and his arms are also cybernetic. His spine is also covered in a metallic shell that houses countless wires and neural interfaces. These limbs are stronger than a humans, but they aren't made to be weapons.
➤ MERCURY SUIT: In the years that followed his receiving of cybernetic replacements, he figured out how to turn his body into an entire super suit. It is made from a super flexible, yet super strong metal that he can collapse into his cybernetic limps and spine.
➢ The metal in his suit is bullet-proof and resistant to heavy temperature changes.
➢ He flies due to the energy wings on his back and feet.
➢ The suit gives him super strength due to the fiber-weaving within it. He can pick up a car and throw it. He doesn't really like to, though, because it's rude.
➢ He also blasts energy from his hands. It can come out in a large pulse or staccato bursts. They have the capability to go through and destroy most man-made materials. Yet, when they hit organics they just stun. They aren't meant to kill.
➢ His helmet reads in several modes: normal, hyper and hypo saturation, energy readings, thermal readings, night vision, and an identity locating HUD.
➢ His suit can survive space, but it is not meant to travel in it.
➤ GADGETS: Gus has invented several things to help him take down the bad guys: flash bang grenades, energy-based nets, and transportable shields. He also has an assortment of screwdrivers on his person at any given time.
ᴘᴏᴡᴇʀs
➤ EIDETIC MEMORY: If Gus has laid eyes on it, he knows it. He has a perfectly photographic memory that can't be tampered with. Once he's seen something, it is stored in his brain for all eternity. Truths, lies, Russian submarine plans, he'll remember all of it. That being said, he does have a good bullshit detector for those lies. He'll remember you lied though.
ᴡᴇᴀᴋɴᴇssᴇs & ғʟᴀᴡs
➤ HYPERMNESIA: Gus has the unfortunate side effect of reliving his photographic memories from beginning to end. This can overlap his day to day and make it impossible for him to accomplish anything. The memory had to be somewhat exact, but it has happened to him on many an occasion. It stalls him entirely.
➤ HYPERINTELLIGENCE=HYPERDEGREDATION: His body is failing because the synapses in his brain are working in a way that humans shouldn't work. He recalls everything at will. That has been slowly killing him since he was about ten. He has had to receive so many implants to keep him working at full strength. He even has an dampener built into his spinal chord to make him more like most humans. He turns it off, unfortunately. If he leaves it off, he'll only see the age of forty.
➤ RELIANCE ON THE SUIT: Without his suit, Gus isn't anything special. He doesn't know how to fight, and he isn't physically strong enough to even seem the slightest bit threatening. The only thing he has going for him is that he's tall. That's pretty much it.
➤ EMPS: Yes. They will take out Gus's suit. Though they have to be strong and within short proximity. He's built some fail safes, but he is far from impervious.
➤ SCARY NEAR-SIDED: Without his suit's helmet or his glasses, he would probably walk off a cliff.
➤ HAS A HORRIBLE SENSE OF HUMOR: Seriously. He will say something and start giggle-snorting about it, and many people will stand there like: "was that a joke? It might have been? I can't tell with this guy. Really. Why is he even on our team?"
sᴘᴇᴄɪᴀʟ sᴋɪʟʟs
➤ AUTOMECHANICS & CYBERNETICS: If it moves and it is a part of machinery, he can fix it. He can also destroy it very systematically and without much mess.
ᴘᴇʀsᴏɴᴀʟɪᴛʏ
Gus is a very enigmatic individual. He is not shy, but he is not charismatic either. Gus is likely to shake your hand too long, realize he's doing it, stop doing it, and then give an awkward chuckle about the entire thing. Some people find it endearing, but most find it annoying. He's also prone to long bouts of explanation, layered with more explanation, and the curious ability to turn anything into a whiteboard. He also likes things being explained to him. His thirst for knowledge is downright annoying at times. He smiles too much. He laughs too hard. He snorts really loudly. And he is prone to relaying jokes that have been coined "dad puns." Still, all that aside, he is a good person, and he will always strive to do good. While not fatalistic, he knows his time is limited and he has to do what he can do in it.
ʙᴀᴄᴋɢʀᴏᴜɴᴅ sᴛᴏʀʏ
Augustus Nicole Maines is the son of Bernard Thaddeus Maines and Samantha Juliet Maines-Crawford. It is apparent that they decided to pass the "possibly from the Civil War" heritage to their son by naming him the way they did and then shortening it to Gus. No one ever talks about where the "Nicole" came from. Anyway, despite that, Gus wasn't held down by social conventions. He was constantly into everything. Books. TV. The internet. If he could learn something from it, he would pilfer it away and study it until he couldn't learn anymore. The Maines realized that there was something awfully odd about their son, but they didn't look too far into it until they received a heavily worded letter from Gus's teacher more-or-less saying: "Your son is too smart for kindergarten, and he keeps answering all the questions. The other kids hate him, and I think I hate him a little too." So, he was moved to a private school that specialized in the weirdly academic.
When he was thirteen, his body gave out. He was running track--miserably--and his legs just seized up and quit. Afterwards, he had a seizure that nearly killed him. After extensive tests they discovered what was the problem Gus's sheer intellect was killing him. His brain wasn't meant to operate like it did. So, they repaired what damage they could and put a dampener that was attached to the base of his skull. He returned to school to find that everything had gone from interesting and new to hard and boring. He fell into a heavy depression.
The Maines realized that the quality of life should be greater than the quantity. So, they allowed their son to turn the dampener off but only while he was at school. Of course, Gus was
always at school, and so that phrasing may not have been the best. When he was sixteen, he had another episode and his nerves died entirely in his limbs. The Maines poured a ridiculous amount of money into cybernetic prosthesis for their son. There was no longer any funds for him to attend the private school or to live in their house. In one fell swoop, they became impoverished.
Gus became very aware that it was his fault. So, he always tried to be upbeat, and he always tried to do his best so his parents didn't have to supply for him. He graduated school shortly there after, and managed to nab several scholarships to some of the greatest colleges. He received his degree at a young age, and was quickly scooped up by one of the more prominent technology corporations. There Gus was given free reign over a lot of projects. After some time he realized he could do more than help build a new kind of car or bodysuit or fancy cellphone that you could implant in your head--though, the latter was pretty cool. So, he took the scraps from the projects he worked on to make him a super suit. He dubbed it: Thanatos the God of Death, realized that that was way too morbid, and altered it to Mercury, the Roman derivative of Hermes. After he got it entirely built, he hugged it, realized how awkward that was and then took it out for a test spin. He managed not to crash into a building, but it was a very
very close encounter.
ᴛᴏᴅᴀʏ
Mercury has a mixed reputation. While he's only ever done good, people worry that there isn't a man under that machine. He hides his identity and doesn't ever let it come up for air. It's not that he's afraid. It's just that--well he can't describe it. Being Mercury makes him feel like he's invincible, and Gus Maines isn't invincible. So, he hides behind his mask and takes on powered criminals and the occasional rogue metahuman. He's made a small name for himself, and has appeared in the news a few times but only ever as a blurb. And said blurb usually questions if he's a person or not. "It's something. I guess."
I read and understood the rules. ^_^b