character :: Chase Coleman
Some children have difficulty blocking out all of the background noise. There’s toys to be played with, kids to talk to, secret projects going on inside of coat pockets and notes passed stealthily under the desk; this kind of distraction goes right on through adulthood. There’s bills to pay online in another tab at the office, expertly whisked away from the screen when someone walks by the cubicle…or there’s the ever-skyrocketing demand for “multitasking”, codeword for doing the job of many people for the same pay. Luckily for Chase, the barrage of this outside world ceased for him after a minor and seemingly innocent accident as a toddler – a small fall from the family’s front porch – changed his world forever.
Chase has been non-hearing since age 3 after this small head injury, and nothing has worked to get his senses back in order. Not that Chase ever let that hold him back: in fact, if you’d as him, he rather prefers his life exactly as it is. While it wasn’t the same story for many of his classmates, Chase credits his solitude and intelligence almost solely to his independence of sound. As he grew, his world seemed to encapsulate him in isolation – a warm and quiet place that he loved to daydream. And daydream he did; much to the despair of his hardworking parents. They indeed had their hands full as Chase began feeling out his own world, very different from that of his family; and nothing could get through to him. He fancied himself an inventor, fashioning all kinds of imaginative trinkets out of suddenly broken essentials around the house. In his home, as soon as he located the tool set in the garage, a working remote had an average lifespan of exactly 3 days before it would be kludged into yet another “Chase project”. Bigger and bigger pieces of technology found their way into Chase’s room, taken apart and pieced back together differently each time.
with compliance.
Chase was 16 when he filed for his first patent for what he called the SolarSurfer project. In his mockup, two small platforms about 45 cm long and 15 cm wide each held a small antigravity generator that could lift many times their weight a few feet from the ground. These two apparatus could then be attached to special stabilizing boots, and if the wearer were talented enough…he or she could use the propulsion to navigate. The solar panel was the hardest thing to perfect, a massive 100 cm by 45 cm platform on which the generators must sit; keeping the feet equidistant. Chase pressed on with his study, losing interest in school: while his parents were proud of his advancements with his little “project”, coming home with failing grades seemed to be much more pressing. A rift began between the two parents and their only son, a genius destined to fail if he continued to “goof off” in class.
Chase developed quite an ego by the time high school graduation rolled around. He fought with his parents constantly, refused the company of his peers, and talked back to his few advanced placement teachers in a language of fingers and motions that many of them couldn’t exactly understand. He was a “troubled kid” placed in a special circuit for hearing impaired students…but even in silent rooms with like-minded kids, he found himself alone with his thoughts.
Chase’s bad-boy exterior and general broodiness did have at least one perk: it made him quite popular with the ladies. He had a selection of fine young women at his disposal, but a particularly turbulent relationship with a young equally-troubled girl named Natasha would be his choosing. The two argued extensively, and Chase took great pleasure watching his new plaything stumble over signs and angry gestures as she learned how to speak to him. The two would be on-again off-again as Chase finally obtains his high school diploma, a year late, before obtaining a dead-end job in data management for some Tech insurance company. He had scraped by, his barely-passable grades impossible to sell to the advanced engineering programs at the schools of Technelogia in which he belonged…and he knew this. Chase had a sour attitude and small mindset, and in one afternoon of weakness, his ego got the best of him. He broke up with Natasha, left their small one-bedroom college apartment, and cut all ties with his few friends and small family. He packed very light for his trek across the Requisite: a change of clothes and a project that had sat at the back of his mind for almost five years.
is above all that.
Chase went into hiding in a region that had perked his interest as a teen: the hot, dry, perpetually sunny Ørken Region. With his specialty revolving around solar energy, no region could suit him better. A network of caves wouldn’t seem like the ideal home for an inventor, but after a few months of hot toil, it became exactly that. The roof of his home generated power from the thermal energy of the sand above, and the desert provided everything he could possibly need. Finally, at long last, Chase felt alone enough for his liking: the only one for miles. Now that he was finally free from the expectations of his parents , Chase could dedicate as much time as he wanted to the SolarSurfer…within a year, the patent had been finalized and Chase was not surprised to see the money flooding in. The secretive creator of the SolarSurfer had everything he could possibly want, and onward to the next project he went: a SolarSurfer just for him, different from any others that would ever hit the market.
So, where does Chase go from here? A visit from a Glitch would change his life forever, followed by a steady stream of visiting