name: bobthejeep
other characters? n/a
contact details: bobthejeep (AIM); bobtheep at yahoo dot com (email)

---

name: John Smith
nickname/alias: Johnny
codename: Doe

age&&birthdate: Feb 29 1986; 23
gender: Male



eye colour: brown
hair colour: black
complexion: white
height&&weight: 5' 6" | 140

picture:
resembles: Michael Landes

overall appearance: Johnny Smith is hot shit; what else is there to say really? He's got some pretty nice black hair that he gels every morning and he usually sports the gruff facial hair look. But gruff does not equal gross. Johnny takes great care to always be clean cut and smooth. He often wears nice dress pants, a fashionable dark t-shirt, and a dark jacket. He's a professional and he dresses accordingly and damnit, he looks amazing.

Or...rather, he thinks he looks amazing. All ego aside, Johnny is not quite as attractive as he may think. He's not unattractive but he's also not drop-dead gorgeous. He's pretty short for a dude--just barely reaching 5' 6"--and he's also pretty average. No buff muscles on this guy. He's got a cute smile and a lovely set of eyes and, thankfully, his acne cleared up after high school. (But let's not bring that up to Johnny. Ever.) Johnny used to wear glasses but now he's into the contact thing because, as far as he can tell, the chicks dig it.

Generally, Johnny walks with an air of nonchalance. His movements are a little lazy and carefree but that doesn't mean he's not aware of his surroundings. He's very attentive to details and his eyes reveal a thoughtfulness that may surprise those who first meet him. He's usually always grinning about something and his face is very expressionable. It's easy to tell his surface thoughts just by looking at the way his eyebrows crease or the arch of his eyebrows.

For the most part, people's first impressions of Johnny are pretty good. By the way he stands and moves, it's clear that he will do and say whatever he pleases but he also has a distinct aura of self-restraint. He knows how to play the game of society's social rules. Though Johnny is a little superficial in most of his endeavors, his body language is generally welcoming. He exudes self-confidence--which is clear by the professional way he dresses and the constant grin on his face.

Even when he's angered or upset by something/someone, Johnny still manages to appear self-confident and fun-loving. He truly believes in everything he does--whether it be violent or sleazy--and his movements often reflect this self-assurance. Getting into a fight with someone is less about real anger and more about living life as it comes--so though he may be hitting someone or something, he'll still probably have a bit of a self-important grin on his face.

Rarely does Johnny allow his outward appearance to reflect his inner emotions and thoughts. Mostly, because Johnny does not allow himself to acknowledge these inner scars and demons. Very very rarely--and if pushed by the right people--Johnny's facade of self-confidence and laid-back coolness will dissolve into what he really is: an insecure young man.

As a result of his power, Johnny has been known to wear black gloves on occasion to quell the constant chatter or thought fragments that enter his mind whenever he touches anything. He's not particularly fond of wearing gloves--(maybe because of the resemblance to Michael Jackson?)--but he's also not super keen on massive headaches.

Johnny also sometimes puts wax on his fingertips to help solve this problem.



powers: Printing - Johnny Smith has the ability to lift thoughts and images from fingerprints, palm prints, footprints, etc (basically anything that carries a unique signature via the skin). For example, if Johnny places his hands on anything that contains a fingerprint, Johnny will hear whatever thoughts that person might have been thinking when they left the fingerprint. If Johnny were to shake hands with someone and have his palmprint touch someone else's palmprint, then Johnny basically becomes that other person. He is able to see what they see, hear what they are thinking, and know what they are feeling.
limits: Johnny cannot control the intake of thoughts from fingerprints. Basically, no matter what he touches, he must hear what is there. Oftentimes--since most fingerprints are on top of other fingerprints--this means that Johnny will hear nothing but a background static of many thought fragments. If a fingerprint is smudged or broken, Johnny will only hear bits and pieces of the thought it carries. For Johnny to get a clear and distinct thought, he must touch a perfect fingerprint. When Johnny touches a fingerprint directly through physical contact (ie, fingerprint to fingerprint or palmprint to palmprint), then Johnny will gain access to that person's inner thoughts for as long as he touches the other person. He cannot, however, gain access to past thoughts or future thoughts--merely the current thoughts the person is having. The longer he maintains the connection, the deeper the thoughts he has access to.
side-effects: If Johnny continues to maintain a physical fingerprint or palmprint connection with another person for longer than 30 seconds, then the other person will gain access to all of Johnny's inner-thoughts in return. If Johnny continues for longer than 45 seconds, then Johnny will lose control of his ability to distinguish between his thoughts/pesonality and the other person's thoughts/personality. He will overload his mind and, if the connection continues, Johnny will fracture his personality, possibly making himself insane. If the connection is maintained longer than a minute, it's possible that the sudden splitting of personality will kill the person that Johnny is touching. (How dangerous it is for the person wholly depends on how powerful their mind/personality is. Those with stronger personalities may not be affected at all--but may actually kill Johnny instead.)

In addition, this power comes with one more side-effect. Since Johnny's power comes from his sense of touch through the organ of the skin, his whole skin is incredibly sensitive. He's very much prone to rash, sunburn, and other common skin ailments. Any prolonged physical activity that requires him to have skin-on-skin action usually results first in discomfort and then in increasing pain.
mutational lineage: Johnny is a first generation mutant.

strengths:
insane confidence and ego
writing
picking up on small details
communication skills
managing money

weaknesses:
insane confidence and ego
the inability to maintain relationships
superficiality
talking before thinking
anger
caring a little too much about people


faction: Xavier's
role in faction: As a journalist, Johnny helps put the spin on stories to make the X-Men and Xavier look good. He's also useful when a little investigation needs to be done. His cover as an investigative reporter comes in right handy. Johnny's also been asked to substitute teach a few journalism electives and English courses now and again.




likes: girls, scantily-clad girls, classic rock, alcohol, sarcasm, challenges, cars, soccer, traveling, talking, fighting
dislikes: idiots, txting, fake rock, cats, job interviews
fears: being alone, lacking intimacy, facing his genuine thoughts, fighting anyone with real power, being wrong, looking foolish in front of a girl

overall personality: In truth, Johnny Smith is incredibly insecure. Orphaned at a young age, he struggled to find any true human connections and so now--as an adult, he's wary of getting too close to any one person for fear that he'll be deserted again.

Unaware of this deep-rooted psychology, Johnny believes himself to be very well-adjusted and highly successful. As a foster kid, he pulled himself up from the lowest social class of inner city Chicago and made something of himself. He went to a specialized university for the fine arts in New York and he's fighting his hardest to join the competitive ranks of the journalism business.

He has convinced himself that he knows what he's doing and that he's right. By being over-confident and self-assured in his current life-style, Johnny can ignore the deep fears he has about lasting relationships.

Of course, while Johnny is convinced that he is doing everything to make himself happy, he also is vaguely aware that he's missing something in life. What he's missing, though, he just can't seem to put a finger on. So he continues to push forward the way he is.

As a young free-lance reporter, Johnny is a great writer and has a keen eye for details. He likes to observe other people and he's very good at picking up on other people's non-verbals. He's a pretty good listener but he doesn't always choose to respond in the most constructive ways. He will usually say what he is thinking--whether or not it's necessarily the nicest thing to say.

Still trying to land a job as a reporter with a huge newspaper, Johnny is also working as a bartender. He loves this job because 1) he loves seeing all the people who come to bars, 2) he loves alcohol and 3) he loves, repeat, loves the women.

Johnny loves women. He loves everything about them. He has pretty low standards--and he's been known to hang out in strip joints and bars--but that doesn't necessarily mean that he's a total asshole. He's not one to really look for commitment from a woman (and he likes flight attendants in particular for this reason) but he also doesn't try to piss women with higher standards off. He's a pretty good smooth talker to any women who'll buy his crap but women who have pretty high standards usually just roll their eyes at him.

Johnny will crack jokes about his lifestyle and he'll defend it but he won't push his love for women on anyone who's not interested. He figures it's his life and if someone has an issue with it, well, then, that's their problem.

Though Johnny doesn't allow himself to get too close to people (whether girls or guys), he is a pretty loyal and good friend. He won't blow someone off without an explanation and he'll apologize when he's wrong (but Johnny hardly ever considers himself "wrong"). He'll show up on time and he'll play the social game. He's a fun-loving guy who's up for getting drunk or playing cards or cruising the town.

Johnny doesn't consider himself to have very many enemies. He hardly gets close enough to anyone to feel that much hatred towards anyone. If he's been wronged by someone, then usually he'll just stop hanging around that particular person.

As a person with a somewhat fake sense of happiness, it's no surprise that Johnny's true emotions have to find a way through. His insecurities sometimes manifest themselves through physical outlets, sometimes mistaken for anger. He's not the type who can be pushed into a fist-fight because someone called his mother a name. But, he is the type who might let some energy go by beating the hell out of a punching bag, doing a whole lot of unnecessary exercise, or beating the crap out of a real and true jerk. Or just beating the crap out of a wall--whatever works in the situation.




siblings and/or other notable family: parents are deceased, no siblings
place of birth && nationality: Chicago, USA | American
place of residence: New York City
occupation: Bartender and Journalist

overall history:

When Johnny was 4 years old, his house had a carbon monoxide leak. Both of his parents died and Johnny was in the hospital for a month. When he was finally healthy enough, he was released into foster care in Chicago. He lived with a few different families and was enrolled in an inner city school. Though the combination of foster families and inner city schools often screams horror story, Johnny actually had a relatively pleasant childhood. His foster parents were not the crazy types that always seem to make the papers with stories of abuse and neglect.

Rather, his first foster parents, Harry and Linda Jepsen were a normal couple--two people in their 40s who had 3 children of their own. As their children went off to college, they opened their house up to two different foster kids: Johnny Smith and Jack Worthington. Johnny stayed with this family for about a year and was then transferred to a group home closer to his school.

He lived for a little while in this group home before, at the age of 9, he was placed with a single woman named Terry Liger. This woman was a widow, whose children were all already married and on their own. In her late 50s, she offered Johnny a home until she suffered some kind of sickness--either a heart attack or cancer. Nobody ever told Johnny. All he knew was that he was moved to another group home for boys at the age of 12.

Of course, with the death of his parents and the constant moving around, Johnny struggled with trusting others and building strong emotional relationships. Though the adults in his life were all nice enough, Johnny still didn't want to get too close to anyone. He was a good kid, who listened in school and did what he was told. Except for being a little emotionally distant, he was all around normal.

And, like any kid, he couldn't hide himself from the ridicule of other kids. He always felt second best--what with his cheap clothes and glasses but he worked hard to be better than his circumstance. Still, he was always teased for being so short and for having such a generic name. In fourth grade, Trevor Sanders started the running joke that John Smith might as well be John Doe. After all, here was a kid with no unique family, no special abilities, and no particular skills. Johnny was average. He looked average. His name was average. Subsequently, thanks to Trevor, Johnny became known as Doe.

For the most part, though, Johnny's childhood was normal. He went through the same amount of teasing and insecurities as most other kids. Really, the death of his parents left a deep scar that wasn't too noticeable until much later on in his life. As a young boy, the only thing he had to worry about was little things--this, however, all changed when Johnny turned 14.

At the age of 14, Johnny first realized he had a power. It began small, with strange noises or static whenever he happened to touch objects that were often touched--like doorknobs and handles. As his power continued to manifest, Johnny began to figure out that he could hear thoughts from fingerprints. Johnny was very excited to learn that he, average and normal John Smith was actually special.

Of course, his excitement over discovering his power was tinged with fear. Like many other mutants, he was afraid of how people might react--especially his social worker. Would she put him in a different foster home? Tell the government? Was being unique and special really worth moving his whole life again?

So... John Smith remained "Doe" to everyone at school except Johnny's closest friends: Derek Reynolds and Rob Roscoe. At 14, the three boys decided to use Johnny's newfound power as any teenagers would: stealing answers for tests, to get inside girls' heads, to steal from local gas stations. Small thrills for young minds.

At 15, Johnny and Derek were hanging together at a skate park. Curious about Johnny's power, Derek wanted to know what would happen if Johnny didn't touch a fingerprint on a doorknob or desk but instead connected physically finger-to-finger. Without really knowing too much about his power or how it was developing as he matured, Johnny saw no harm in testing out Derek's theory. After all, he'd brushed hands with others before and all he'd ever gotten was the same dribble of surface thoughts.

So Johnny placed his whole palm up against Derek's whole palm--unaware that as he matured, his mutation became became more powerful. Once the connection was made, Johnny immediately saw what Derek saw and felt was Derek felt and thought as Derek thought. And Johnny was surprised to feel the hidden hatred in his best friend, the dark fears about mutants: the true reason for why Derek wanted to know what Johnny's power limitations were.

The longer he kept the connection, the harder it was for Johnny to distinguish his personality from Derek's. The sudden rush of duplicity--the unfiltered flow of unchartered thoughts--was too much, causing Derek to pass out and Johnny to jump backwards with the fastest splitting headache he'd ever had.

Seriously creeped out, and feeling betrayed by one of the only people he considered a real friend, Johnny reluctantly tried to wake Derek up, but the boy was out cold. As much as Johnny wanted to do something, he didn't know what he could do. He was afraid and confused and very much disturbed. He'd never lost his personality before and he'd never made someone faint before just by touching them.

Unsure about what else he might be able to do or how dangerous he might become, Johnny took off, just needing to get some air and figure things out. But the more Johnny walked, the more he continued to walk until he realized he had no plan on returning to the latest foster situation. What was the point, really? What did it matter? He had nothing going for him with his fake friends and his lame school.

He was afraid Derek would tell everyone at school that he was a mutant and a dangerous one, too.

So instead, Johnny took off, wandering the streets, couch surfing, taking whatever work he could get. Luckily, after only a month or two on the streets, Johnny was found by some of Xavier's men and offered a home at a school for the gifted. While living at Xavier's school, Johnny learned the limitations of his powers and tried to make friends as he finished out his years of high school.

He instantly took a liking to Xavier's academy and jumped on the opportunity to reinvent himself. As a mutant-teenager, Johnny struggled to come to terms with his powers and, like any typical teenager, he struggled to maintain relationships. With the death of his parents still eating away at him, he began to develop a more superficial personality and being awesome and cool was more important than anything.

Graduating from the academy, Johnny went to Plattsburough University in Northern New York and graduated with a degree in journalism. He moved back to New York City and got a job as a bartender while he tried to get a real job with a newspaper. For now, he does freelance writing for any paper that will publish his stories.

In 2008, he witnessed the events of the Liberty Island attack and tried to do some damage control for the X-Men by writing his own twist of the events for the local papers.

By mid-October, Johnny started to get a lot of pressure to write against mutants--especially after the attack on the president--but he stayed true to his own beliefs and wrote what he thought best. Of course, after the harsh political atmosphere against the mutants, Johnny has been very careful to keep his power to himself.

other:


rp sample:

Here is a past-tense sample from an RPG I used to admin called Kerfuffle Academy.