B050 - Leven, Clayton[/DECEASED]

[BetaKnight]

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Name: Clayton Leven
Gender: Male
Age: 18
Grade: 12th
School: Aurora High School
Hobbies and Interests: Reading, sketching, drama club (tech)

Appearance: Clayton is a rather small man at 5'7 and 130 pounds, putting him below many of his peers in both height and build. He's fairly thin, but has some wiry muscle along his arms and legs. He keeps his blonde hair close cropped in a military style to keep it out of his small, light brown eyes. He looks younger than his true age and always keeps himself clean shaven, which has led to some of his close friends (and some unaware adults) calling him "kid", jokingly or otherwise. While not entirely unattractive, with a short and narrow nose and high cheekbones, his unusually youthful appearance makes him seem somewhat childlike and babyfaced. Clayton has a very typical wardrobe of his age group: t-shirts and polo shirts in a variety of colors (mostly dulled to keep them from standing out too much), jeans and cargo shorts, and some khaki pants for formal events. At the time of the kidnapping he was wearing a light brown t-shirt reading "National Sarcasm Society: Like we need your support", light blue jeans, and white tennis shoes.

Biography: The Levens were always a fairly unassuming family: they came to the Seattle area some time in the 1960s from Oklahoma, making Clayton (an only child) a second-generation resident of Washington. They were a strictly middle-class family, his father (Ted) being an accountant and his mother (Barbara) being a teacher at the local elementary school.

Clayton did well throughout elementary school under his mother's after-hours tutelage, and he began showing an interest in the arts and drawing after receiving praise for his work during typical elementary school art classes. His natural talent for noticing small details and understanding motion, perspective, and shading allowed him to easily make excellent drawings above the talents of his peers. Clayton became an excellent artist by 9th grade, and seemed to be on the fast track to the University of Washington. He had dreams of becoming an artist and making millions off of his gallery displays, a dream that his parents encouraged.

His elementary school and middle school years went smoothly: Clayton's gregarious personality made friends easily among many different groups, with him freely befriending cheerleaders and the children of wealthy family as easily as he did the self-professed loners and odder ones of the bunch. He would often offer to draw them or their possessions for practice, giving them copies of the drawings to keep. After being introduced to video games by his friends in middle school, he became an avid gamer (especially multiplayer with his friends) and would often spend a night or two a week playing Rock Band, Timesplitters, and other games with his friends. He built up a sizable collection of games, which made his house a popular spot for anyone who had become a friend of his.

Unfortunately, the infamous recession not long after he entered high school put a major crimp in these plans. Mr. Leven was laid off at the end of 2008; while he was able to recover his accounting job, he was working for a much smaller company that paid far less. With the sudden drop in income and the period of several months where Ted Leven remained unemployed, Clayton's family became morose and distraught, having to sell off their more valuable possessions and often struggling to make ends meet. They tried to remain upbeat at first, but they were unable to keep up the facade for more than a few months before their anger at their circumstances turned into arguments. Their unhappiness rubbed off on Clayton, his happy home life being replaced with a monotony of school, homework, and sleep. The Levens replaced their vacations and camping trips with watching TV and going out to eat at cheap local restaurants.

When Mrs. Leven was laid off in 2010 and unable to find a replacement job, Clayton's mood and will completely dropped; with his family even poorer than before, the arguments between his parents grew more fierce and protracted. It took very little time for them to become so upset and caught up in their worries that they began to neglect their son. Clayton lost interest in school, his grades slipping until he had finally lost his chance at a scholarship. While he had once been the talk of all the teachers in school for his friendliness and good work, he responded to their attempts to help him with stoic silence and shrugs, and eventually they passed on their concerns to his guidance counselor. She tried to cheer him up and get him back into shape, but to no avail. By the time his senior year started in 2011, the faculty had mostly given up and just tried to give him enough encouragement and chances to keep him from failing. His parents were notified from the start about his grades and had attended several parent-teacher conferences, where they always promised to try and help their son and get him on the right track. Unfortunately, they always got into more fights about it afterward, blaming the other for their son's problems; eventually, their fights would move on to unrelated subjects, and it was business as usual. They attended family counseling the summer before Clayton's senior year and began to try and work together on fixing their mistakes, but the damage was done.

He continued to hone his talents, but replaced large projects and art shows with filling his sketchbook with drawings of people and objects he saw in his day to day life. He sold off most of his games during a particularly hard stretch to give his family more grocery money, and he barely touches what he still owns. In his depression and anger, he neglected his friends and became curt or even outright rude. It wasn't entirely intentional, but it pushed them away until only a handful of his closest friends remained. He was too distracted by his bigger problems to care (possibly a willing distraction to avoid having to admit that it was his own fault), and for a long time he brushed their abandonment of him off. He figured that it wasn't his problem if someone didn't want to be his friend.

At the encouragement of his parents, he joined the school's drama club and put his talents to work helping design and make the backdrops and painting the sets. He did some other minor tech work (mostly handing off props backstage and running the light board, neither of which are complicated jobs), but otherwise keeps his activities in the club to the artistic side. He's made some new friends and gotten back old ones by joining, which his parents are quite glad for. While not unpopular by any means, he mostly drifts on by with the rest of the masses and some of his lost friends barely even bother to remember his last name. With his family's economic situation barely improved and the arguments and neglect continuing at a lesser (but still existent) level, Clayton remains in his barely-there state of funk. His grades aren't poor enough that he risks failing his senior year, but he's certainly in the bottom ranks.

Clayton mostly only cares about passing high school at this point, without any real desire to excel. He's happy that he's managed to avoid the risk of missing graduation and finally getting out of public school, but he feels no incentive to deliver more than the minimal effort to keep his teachers happy; his grades are in the C's across the board (typically on the low end, verging into D territory), only occasionally pushing up to an A for a time in Creative Art before dropping back into the high 80s from a bout of laziness or a neglect of detail. The only place outside of his art class that he truly seems to put forth more effort has been the artistic work for drama club, and he still gets enjoyment out of the praise for his talents. He still maintains vague dreams of success and is fully aware of his talent, but he lacks the drive to succeed that he once had. He rarely considers the future, and has generally decided that he'll concern himself with adulthood and a career when they arrive. Clayton has never held a job, even a small part time one, and he often spends his free time sketching, going on the internet, watching TV, and occasionally reading some of the old books he has laying around the bedroom.

Clayton usually keeps to himself throughout the school day and drama activities; he'll be more chatty around his friends, but is rarely the one to instigate conversation and usually just responds to dialogue from others. He's not rude or cold and will acknowledge others simply out of courtesy, but often won't do more than deliver a simple nod to anyone unknown as he sits next to them on the bus or at the lunch table. He doesn't even go out with his friends much, almost always seeing them in school or during after-school activities. He's only gone to a friend's house (or had one come over) several times in the past few years.

Advantages: Clayton's small size makes him a difficult target and gives him an easier time when hiding or moving through small spaces. He has a sharp eye for detail thanks to his drawing talent and might notice something in a scene that others don't.
Disadvantages: Clayton's bad attitude toward people later in high school has pushed some of his old friends away and led to some lack of trust between them. He tends to react rather than act, and is likely to simply go with the flow instead of pushing himself or taking charge.  

Designated Number: Male student No. 050

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Designated Weapon:  Handcuffs
Conclusion: Given this kid's downward spiral, he was going to get introduced to handcuffs sooner or later.  At least this way, he can use them on someone else first. - Shamino Wahren


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