forum Not as we seem (closed; stalkers welcome) hero x villain, enemies to lovers

Started Feb 24 by @Lily_needs_some_coffee!

tune

Name - Jasper (Jas) Lockwood
Allias - Hero, Cheshire, Jassy, (various nicknames from family, friends, and enemies insert here later)
Age - 26
Personality - In his personal life, Jas is usually very reserved and quiet. He's more calm around people when he's not out playing city hero, preferring to observe rather than be the center of attention. Contrasting his hero life, Jas cherishes his quiet, normal life, almost craving it at the end of the day to let himself just be himself.
As a hero, Jas is far more open and adventurous. He gets a thrill out of a good chase and almost becomes a new person when facing off against his favorite adversaries. He's very openly flirtatious, convinced that making jokes and flustering his villain is an effective way of deescalating a situation, or so he's told himself that's the only reason why he finds so much enjoyment from it.
Appearance - While Jas has never really paid attention to his looks, he has been told he's handsome, even though he doesn't see it. He has dark brown hair that falls in curls to the nape of his neck. He has sun-tanned skin and deep green eyes that shift slightly in different lighting. He usually rims his eyes with black eyeliner to enhance his eyes. He has full red lips and a nice smile.
Superhero Outfit- Nothing fancy, he usually all black clothes, he wears a simple black mask that covers his upper facial features, except his eyes.
Likes - loves chocolate, warmth, the snow, affection
Dislikes - being bored, being ignored, coffee, early mornings
Ability - he can move between grey areas in time and space. He also has an alternate form, somewhat like shapeshifting. It resembles a large black mountain cat, the size of a small car, made of shadows, not entirely solid which gives it the ability to pass through solid objects depending on thickness.
(Here's my boy! I tweaked him from another hero/villain I have so he might be a bit familiar but hope he's ok! Let me know if anything else is needed)

Name: Chernobyl Melanie Lovette
Nickname: Cherry, Cerese, Mels, Love
Age: 22
Gender: Cis Female
Pronouns: She/They
Sexuality: Androsexual
Race: Hispanic; Spaniard/Caucasian
Ability: Brass Ichor– Golden "blood" that is a double-edged sword. It can heal as it can harm. It burns and hardens once out of the body and away from the user, temporarily used as a makeshift "heal" for any types of wounds. It can also be made into a sturdy weapon, the thick liquid commonly taking the form of a spear; however, not limited to just the one weapon (projectiles are also her domain).

Appearance: Cherry has big, round hazel eyes, chestnut brown taking up most of the space in her eyes towards the middle but mixing with the deeper green on the outside.

Cherry's hair is styled in a fluffy shoulder-length shaggy mullet with soft bangs. Their hair color is a dark brown that is naturally fluffy and thick, getting tangled much more easily. If she doesn't brush it often or washes it, it clumps together, making it a tangled mess- oddly taking on a wavy and even slightly curly texture.

Cherry has a square-shaped yet sort of button nose. Her face also takes on a bit of a combination of two shapes, a fusion between heart and square shapes, some parts of her features looking sharp while others take on a softer look.
She doesn't have freckles per se, but more so several beauty marks on her face, the right side having the majority of them, about three or four, while her left side has only two. There are a few more dots scattered about, but those are lighter than the other ones, which are more noticeable and darker. All of them are positioned by the outer corner of her eyes, decorating the top half of her face, mostly the cheek area.

Cherry's mouth is what can only be described as very "pouty", her top lip a more rounded shape instead of Cupid's bow, though it isn't fully round, just barely having an M shape. She has full lips, the bottom half only slightly bigger than the top.

Her body type is mesomorph, a bit of muscle to her but mostly on the thinner side, her body taking on an almost hourglass shape. She naturally has a bit of extra fat on her stomach area even though she's a fit and active person, not being flat-stomached like most toned and athletic people. The best way she can be described is as having a "relaxed" body shape with soft curves.

Cherry's skin tone is a lot lighter than most people who are considered Hispanic. She has a rose beige skin color, with a few small yet faint moles dotting her back and the rest of her body.

At some point when she was a teen, she got top surgery, it being on her list of things to prepare herself for college. Cherry also has several tattoos, all of them being in a micro realistic style with lots of geometrical lines and shapes, none of them really connecting and instead being spread out, yet looking like the whole thing goes together; a large art piece that took years to do. One of them is a "XV" tattooed on her wrist and a verse of a Sanskrit hymn on her other arm.

Her type of dressing style is mainly huge t-shirts over bell-bottom skirts, the skirts having a bit of a flare to them. She wears what would be considered a "corset" over her shirts to give her clothes a "cleaner fitted look," but they're not exactly corsets, just another clothing piece that loosely sits on top as a decoration.
(Example of what she wears: I, II, III).

Cherry is also known for wearing coin jewelry- things like gold coin earrings and necklaces. Hoop bracelets and thinner flat "bracelets" (more so cuffs) on the upper part of her forearms.
She's got an odd combination of minimalistic Egyptian and dark academia rockstar going on, her helix piercings being a testament to that (and winged eyeliner).

(Here's the closest thing I could find to a face claim. I, II).

Personality: Cherry is generally a very kind and soft person, often worrying about others' well-being, be that emotionally, mentally, or physically.

Although she is kind and soft, these things do not mean she is meek and quiet; in fact, it's the opposite. She's very energetic and gets excited easily, a very loud personality to be around, almost intoxicatingly so, but for that same reason, she has a soft spot in her heart for those who match her energy and can put up with her.

Cherry's got a huge heart, which can be taken advantage of at times, but she does well in standing up for herself. There'll be times when she's more inclined to not say anything and let things happen in favor of not starting anything, but even Cherry has her limits and is not above decking someone in the face and starting a fight.
However, one thing about her is that she is very much a person who works through problems until she solves them, looking at them from all angles and only resorting to extreme measures when she absolutely has to.

While her outer nature is along the lines of being "catastrophically aware of herself and everyone around her", the truth is she's very prone to letting emotions get to her, a melancholic air about her once you get to know her on more than a surface level (if her indulgence in love poems and letters says anything). Her favorite types of books being romantic philosophical books; secretly carrying around a book or two on her person at all times but never anything more than that.

She's not at all strong as her determination and willpower to keep going makes her look, her physique often overlooked and not considered much of a threat, but what she lacks in strength she makes up with being attentive to detail and taking deadly risks- even if she cracks just a little more under the pressure every day.

Cherry may be a bit more impatient nowadays due to the circumstances and is a lot quicker to snap, but she means well, trying her best not to take things personally, even if they are meant personally.

Backstory: Cherry comes from a very well-off family who immigrated from Spain to America when she was a kid. While no specific event sticks out to Cherry as being "tragic" or having it bad, there were a series of lows during the moving period to a new country, mostly common things almost everyone feels at some point during really stressful times.

Her parents separating or fighting was not something Cherry ever had to worry about; her mother and father loved each other dearly and shared that love with her, too.

From a young age, she was encouraged to be herself; they never scolded her for "being too much" and never treated her as an actual kid either, knowing that even though she was a small human being, she was very capable of intellectual conversations. This also helped her be firm in her decisions as she grew up.
Cherry's parents pretty much let her wander to her heart's content but gently corrected her and reeled her back in when she did something wrong, letting her find her footing while also being there to catch her if she did fall.

Ever since Cherry could remember, she's had the best of the best. Her father, Alvaro, a talented artist, picking up watercolor and acrylic oils as his medium for painting when he was younger. He was arguably the gentlest towards her while Cherry's mother would have been considered the more "fiery" person, oftentimes snapping her fingers as she rounded the two to go out for an appointment, "Vamonos! Vamonos!" a common phrase in the household as both Alvaro and Cherry took forever to get ready.

Other: https://pin.it/3Ic8y7F

Name: Olivier Dufonte
Nicknames: Olive, Olive Oil (She hates that one), Oliver
Villain Name: Nova
Ethnicity: French Canadian
Ability: Her power is somewhat unique, even among the abilities that exist in the world. She can "charge" materials with dark/antimatter, changing its appearance or all of its properties in general. In general, objects and people that she charges like this only retain the charge for an hour, but depending on effort and power expended, she can make the charge permanent… or lethal. It works strongest when she targets individual elements, such as gold, silver, platinum, palladium, neodymium, copper and iron, but it has unique effects when interacting with magnetic fields, plasmas, and certain alloys. Depending on environmental circumstances and energy levels, she can even temporarily ionize and harden the air into small weapons that explode after a couple minutes.

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Height: 5'9" (Slightly above the average for a French woman)
Weight: Why would you ask a woman her age? Hmph!-
Age: 22
Appearance (Civilian)-

Appearance (Villain)-

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Personality: She can come across as carefree one moment, but the very next she could be the most serious woman ever. This is because of her upbringing. Growing up, she had to play two roles. One was the perfect child, for her father. Nothing less than actual perfection was tolerated. Anything less resulted in severe punishment. Her mother, however, was almost the exact opposite. She viewed her daughter as worthless and useless, letting her rot away in bed and do absolutely nothing. Because of these vastly different ways of being raised, it led to a perfect child-trouble child split in her personality. She believes she can build a better world, but can't do it on her own - but also believes she'll fail if she tries.

Backstory: "Growing up, she had to play two roles. One was the perfect child, for her father. Nothing less than actual perfection was tolerated. Anything less resulted in severe punishment. Her mother, however, was almost the exact opposite. She viewed her daughter as worthless and useless, letting her rot away in bed and do absolutely nothing. Because of these vastly different ways of being raised, it led to a perfect child-trouble child split in her personality." Her mother would never lay a hand on her, so in her mind, her mother was the good parent. Her father was severely abusive, physically and mentally, so he was the "bad parent." In reality, it wasn't that simple. Her mother was severely depressed and her father was a diagnosed bipolar and OCD, with signs of schizophrenia and early onset dementia. Olivier was being raised by people who by all accounts should never have become parents, which is what led to her becoming a villain. Of course, she tried to be a hero. But the destruction her powers caused always got her scorn and fear, so she decided to change things by becoming a villain. A world where everyone could live as they wanted to live is the world she's aiming for. But right now, she's just a well known scientists in the field of quantum and theoretical physics.

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Likes: Science, food, reading, learning, open spaces, labs

Dislikes: Being forced into choices/ultimatums, arrogance, cooking her own meals

Hobbies: Running experiments, working out, reading, writing, going to karaoke bars

They were in. Renny knew it the minute he heard the lock click as the girl in front of him turned the key. It had taken him weeks of sweet talking the NYU tech lab assistant's roommate in order to get invited over to their apartment. He thought her name was Ainsley, but, honestly, he wasn't certain. He didn't care. He just needed her roommate's keycard.
The soft spoken girl let him in and smiled at him as he walked past. He smiled back… and rolled his eyes when she was looking. "Do you want some coffee?" Her question came out quiet, and he knew he had to engage her a little. He smiled down at her and brushed a lock of hair out of her face. "Sure, sweetheart. Black, please." He took a step back, putting his hands in his pockets. "Where is your bathroom? Mind if I use it?" His thumb rolls over the ring on his middle finger. The technology had taken years for him to create, and he'd just recently deemed it ready for use in something like this.
She points out directions and he follows them, finding himself in a tiny bathroom, staring in a small and cloudy oval mirror. He shuts the door and sighs deeply. His bones feel heavy, and there are dark circles under his eyes. He rolls the ring again, closing his eyes and visualizing. He sends the illusion of himself out the bathroom door, hearing the girl giggle as the vision he's created flirts her straight into distraction. Ren smirks to himself, and slides out of the bathroom and into the office space at the back of the apartment. Where is it…. Bingo!
He snatches up the tech lab key card and places it in his pocket. Pulling the illusion back into the hallway and ending it, he clears his throat. "What's in here? Oh, an office." The girl– maybe her name was Annette now come to think of it, not Ainsley– comes in after him, twirling her hair around her finger. Ren holds back a shudder of repulsion. Stupid girl.
"Just our work space. My bedroom," she gestures behind her, "is over there if you wanted to… chill." She smiles coyly and Ren bites his tongue in an effort not to laugh at such a poor attempt.
"Actually, I'm gonna head out. But thanks." Her face falls. "Oh. Sure, of course."
When he leaves, he closes the door behind him and lets his head fall back to the wood grain of it, grinning. He slips the phone from his pocket and pulls up his messages with Olive.

Text Message to Olive Oil
1:53pm, March 14th
I got it. Meet me at my place and we'll order in dinner and plan. Chinese sound good?

Olivier was at home, but still doing work.

Mainly paperwork.

She hated paperwork with a passion, actually, so she wasn't sure why she didn't relegate it to her secretary. Her mind immediately snaps to, "But then it won't be perfect, and then there will be problems."

So she sighs and keeps doing the paperwork.

It was like this every day this week, actually. Go into the lab, find that her research still hadn't yielded any results, go home, do paperwork. She'd barely had any time for her… hobbies this week. She sighs again.

"Whatever. It's not like it can get any worse…"

Just then, her phone buzzes and she checks it.

Text from Deceptive Manwhore.

Great. Just what she needed.

To be clear, she didn't hate Ren. They were close friends, actually. Had been for about a year, really since she started her villain activities. She often worked alongside him, but lately, he'd been especially irritating to her.

She snatches up the phone and looks at the text before sending back, "KK. Be there in 15 I guess. Chinese is fine, but it's your choice."

She gets up and stretches, looking down at all the unfinished paperwork.

Suddenly, she couldn't give less of a fuck about it.

She quickly gets changed into her casual clothes - black jeans, faded ACDC tee, beat up sneakers and her leather jacket - before grabbing her helmet and going out to her motorcycle.

She's outside Ren's house exactly when she said she would be and knocks loudly.

Ren flips the key card over and over in his hand, on the subway. The wherring of the public transport clams him as he stares at the key to his life's work. With his hands on it, he and Olive could begin planning for the next steps. When he got what he wanted, maybe he could finally rest without Zellie's memory haunting him. His phone buzzes and he pulls it out, the text message from Olive pulling him out of his thoughts. He taps out a reply:

Kay, i'll call the restaurant on my way home. You'll probably be there before me so let urself in with your key.

He'd given Olive a key a month or so ago once they'd started planning and talking about the objective as she once had referred to it. She was honestly his best friend, but he'd never admit it. They acted more like annoyed siblings than friends, come to think of it. She was probably as close to a replacement sister as he could barely to have. He shakes off the thought, pushing Zille out of his mind.

He gets off the R train at his stop, Brooklyn Bridge-City Hall station, and walks the two blocks to his apartment. Or at least he means to. But, lost in his thoughts, he bumps smack into a stranger, causing Ren to drop his bag and the key card. Shit. He scrambles to grab it, his long limbs reaching across the concrete, shoving it back in his pocket before glancing up at the stranger… the rather attractive annoyance of a stranger who was still standing in his way. Ren picks his bag back up, standing and scowling. "Move."

(Perfect opening, thank you! sorry this took a bit)
Jas had been given simple enough instructions by his agency. Be at the apartment at 7:00, be discrete, don't get caught, get the info, and leave. Out of all his colleagues, you would think he would be the most competent, given his abilities and experience. And on any other day, Jas would love to accept the worthy praise, but today had particularly sucked. How he had managed to not only get lost twice around the city, which consequentially made him half an hour late but then to slam into exactly who he wasn't supposed to meet was beyond even his comprehension. Well, Jas wouldn't be one of the best heroes at the agency if he hadn't learned to improvise a bit.
Jas gave his best apologetic smile as he knelt to help his target gather his belongings. "Oh, I'm so sorry, dear. I'm just the clumsiest of people when I'm in a rush," he explained in his hurry, taking a glance at the keycard before it was snatched from view. At least he knew he had the right person. Jas let the other take his belongings, straightening as he made a show dusting off his jacket, all the while slowly taking in his newest assignment.
Wyatt Ren Copeland, better known to the agency, Stygian, a villain they hadn't been able to quite get a hold on, that is, until now. Jas wasn't delusional, or so he convinced himself most days. He knew catching the guy was going to take far more than just happening to run into him, but Jas considered his bad good luck a step in the right direction. He caught Wyatt's glare and raised his hands in defense, moving off to the side with a sheepish grin. "of course, sorry." He squeaked out, a slow smile crossing his features. He was never one for being on time, discrete, or not getting caught but he would like to argue he got the agency's worst criminals for a reason, and it wasn't by playing by the rules. "It's almost cute, how you live a normal life right stealing some poor college student's lab key card, and probably the poor thing's heart." He chuckled softly as slowly turned on his heel. "The game is on Ren, I have a feeling we'll be seeing each other soon, dear." he gave a tiny salute before slipping into a crack in the world, one moment slipping behind a street sign post, the next moment gone, the only evidence of his appearance was what Ren could recall.

Jas stumbled onto the rooftop with a laugh, shaking his head as he hunkered down at his makeshift lookout just a few blocks from Olive's apartment but just close enough for him to spot any going on in the surrounding area. He sent a quick text to contact in his phone with just the emojis of cherries and a heart, as well as a location change to his current spot.
"U should have seen him, he looks so mad, omg!
He's gonna be a fun one. Here in 5?"

Ren was fuming. He'd been so careless. He'd been over confident, arrogant, stupid. The man had known him, had used his full name. Ren was short-handed, left without information, without the upper hand which he hated. He played the words back in his head.
It's almost cute, how you live a normal life right stealing some poor college student's lab key card, and probably the poor thing's heart.
Ren moved quickly, backtracking and sliding into a crowded coffee shop to think. He needed to act quickly. He turned the ring around his finger, concentrating, and his jaw ticks once. A mangy looking brown tabby cat appears outside the coffee shop window, causing a smirk to appear on Ren's face. Through his glasses, he could tell it was his best illusion yet. Fully solid, acting of its own accord on Ren's orders, able to go up to five miles from him. Best of all it was recording all in saw, audio too. His heartbeat calmed. This was his upper hand. Whoever that was, he must have been from the agency to know so much. And the agency didn't know about this.
With a wave of his hand, the stray cat slinks off, following the trail of the pretty boy stranger. Ren cautiously finishes the two block walk to his apartment building, doubling back and switching paths until he is certain no one is following. He rides the elevator to his floor and checks in on the cat using his glasses– who seemed to be slinking up the stairs of an apartment building a few blocks away, towards the rooftop. He quickly uses the lenses to edit the illusion, changing it from a shabby stray to a sleek housecat with tags marking him as owned by someone in the building. Satisfied with himself, he heads down his hall, finding Olive outside his door. His brow furrows. "Why didn't you use your key?"

Olive heard Ren coming from a bit away. Finally. Took him long enough.

"I figured it might piss you off more if I was waiting outside for you with a cup of your coffee." Oliver replies, indicating the mug of coffee in her hand with a deadpan expression.

"Although it already looks like you're kind of upset, so…" she opens the door to the apartment and walks in, kicking off her shoes right in front of the couch and sitting, propping her feet on the coffee table and staring at Ren, daring him to say something.

It wasn't as though she liked being like this to him, but it was fun. A way to actually try and let her true self show a bitm

"Anyways, you going to order food or what?"