Gender: Male
Age: 17
Grade: Junior
Hobbies and Interests: Painting, rock collecting, ballroom dancing, horror fiction
Gift: Blob Form
Power Details: Raymond can transform parts of his body into a pliable, viscous, semi-solid substance the same color as his skin, making his flesh appear rubbery and melted. In this state, his body becomes supernaturally flexible, and he will gradually absorb and digest any organic material that comes into contact with him. If his blob form is unable to completely digest something, he is able to cough up the remnants from his throat, provided the object is able to fit. His internal physiology is similar to those of earthworms and muscular hydrostats; his respiratory, circulatory and digestive systems are merely rudimentary, and he can exchange gases through the pores of his skin when his Gift is active. Because he lacks a more conventional skeletal system, he recovers slightly faster from physical injuries.
Limitations and Drawbacks: Raymond's gift is tied directly to his physical and emotional well-being, meaning that he will rapidly lose control of his physical form if he overexerts himself or experiences strong emotions. If he cannot recover himself, he risks melting into an amorphous, immobile mound of flesh, a process which requires about three minutes to reverse. Due to Raymond's quasi-hydrostatic physiology, his internal organs have far less protection from outside damage than a normal human's. He also needs to consume far more fluids than a normal human to prevent himself from losing mobility regardless of whether or not he is in human shape, as while he heals more quickly, he is more likely to lose blood and other fluids in the process. Lastly, his blob form's absorptive abilities often cause him to inadvertently absorb his own clothing.
Appearance: Raymond stands at 5'7.5" and 220 pounds, most of it fat but with slight traces of muscle. He is of French and Italian descent, with curly, dirty blond hair in a messy mullet cut, a Roman nose, thin lips, and light brown eyes. Due to his Gift, his skin is extremely pale and clammy. When he sweats, it slowly melts like candle wax; when he becomes angry, it forms small bubbles of air. Raymond dresses semi-formally for a high school student, favouring polo shirts, button-down shirts, khakis, jeans, and dressy shoes.
On the day of the abduction, Raymond was wearing a light grey wool coat, a dark blue button-down shirt, dark grey dress pants, and a pair of black slip-on loafers.
Background:
- Raymond was born September 14, 2004 in Portland, Oregon. He is the only child of James and Nancy LaSalle. Nancy worked as an assistant curator for Portland's Museum of Contemporary Craft until its closing in 2016, while James continues to work in hotel management.
- When Raymond was two years old, he got into a physical altercation with another toddler, William Ferguson, at his daycare. This fight caused his Gift to manifest for the first time, as the daycare workers soon learned when his fist melted into Ferguson's cheek. Although both boys were rushed to the hospital, they were largely unharmed aside from a small scar left behind on Ferguson's face. Following this incident, the two of them became unlikely friends.
- Raymond inherited his love of art from his mother, and he has been drawing ever since he was three years old. He often went to summer art camps when he was in elementary school. There, he developed a passion for painting and a distaste for ceramics, which reminded him far too much of his Gift for his liking. Nancy encourages her son in his artistic endeavours: for his tenth birthday, she bought him a drawing tablet, starting a foray into digital art as well. He currently takes commissions for digital drawings and paintings, and he has a bad habit of doodling during classes that don't interest him.
- Throughout Raymond's childhood, James dedicated weekends to showing his son the city of Portland. Raymond took a special liking to the Oregon Museum of Science and Industry, particularly its earth science wing. He has a collection of rocks and minerals in his room as both a hobby and a reference for his art.
- Raymond started reading from the age of four. As a budding artist, he was especially drawn towards books with elaborate, award-winning illustrations. When he picked up Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark at the age of seven, he fell in love with the terrifying artwork that accompanied the book's various myths and legends. From there, he graduated to watching horror movies with his parents. His favorites tend towards the surreal, such as Eraserhead.
- Because Raymond loses control of his Gift whenever he overexerts himself, he rejects every opportunity to participate in sports, fearing that the exercise will render him immobile. This fear stems from his elementary school's Field Day, during which he collapsed under the strain of his Gift in the middle of a relay race.
- In an effort to ensure Raymond's worries about physical activity would not result in a self-fulfilling prophecy, Nancy enrolled him in dance lessons when he was nine years old. Although he is still very overweight, these lessons have not wholly been in vain: for instance, they have helped his auditions for musicals during his career at Duniway High School.
- When the Museum of Contemporary Craft closed in 2016, the LaSalle family moved from Portland to Bend in search of a fresh start. Raymond bitterly resented the move; his anger alienated him from William Ferguson, and at his new middle school he began lashing out at classmates with his Gift for petty reasons. In response, Nancy kept a much closer eye on Raymond at home and encouraged him to make new friends as he entered middle school. Due to his temper, he was fairly unpopular during middle school and generally "laid low" during seventh and eighth grade without really speaking to anyone.
- In middle school, Raymond's unpopularity gave him the opportunity to use the time he would have spent socializing to study. As a result, he achieved high marks in his classes, and even in high school his grades are still mostly As. Raymond considered himself comfortable enough academically to try socializing again following his middle school graduation. To that end, he joined Duniway High School's art club and Science Olympiad, and he auditions for plays whenever he gets the chance.
Other Skills: N/A
