[Phantom]

Sunyoung Bartholomew Min

Full Name: Sunyoung Bartholomew Min
Pronouns: He/Him
Nicknames: Sun, Pinkbeard(gamertag)
Age: 27
Gender: Male
Room #: -
Birthplace: Meridian, Idaho
Birthday: August 4th
Orientation: Bisexual
Status: Single
Power: Energy Signature Manipulation
Play-By: Jinwoo Kim
Height: 5'7"
Weight: 126 lbs


Personality:
Sunyoung's power makes him supernaturally perceptive. He can adapt to any situation with ease, although it's not he, himself, that's doing the adapting. Sunyoung is a dynamic, expressive individual- it makes sense that he makes a living making an ass of himself on Twitch. He is often contemplative, although if you ask him what he's thinking about, he'll usually just smile and say: nothing much. What do you want him to do, ruin the surprise? He is something of a perfectionist, sometimes.

In reality, he's often very mellow. Sunyoung is dynamic in expression, but feeling? He doesn't tend to feel very extremely either way. Sunyoung often seems absentminded, and sometimes he just goes on autopilot. But, other times, he's planning something- and he doesn't want anyone to know that. He is unpredictable, although unless he has a mission, Sunyoung usually only sets out to do things that he thinks would be amusing. Short term swapping people's powers- disguising himself as someone far less threatening- phasing a crap-ton of energy through someone and discombobulating them.

While Sunyoung looks sweet, he's very brutal with his words. He says whatever he wants, with the sweetest smile. He is frequently blunt, even when he doesn't necessarily mean to be. He has no problem being assertive, and he is frequently meddlesome. But Sunyoung has one major problem- unless it's something he has to do, or it's really important to him- he is a major procrastinator. Sure, he could do this really awesome thing... but, he'd rather play nap roulette.

Sunyoung has really strong opinions about random things. And then, sometimes he doesn't care at all. He is fanciful, and enjoys pretty things. He can be both surprisingly caring and aloof. He is a colorful, experimental individual. But he's also quite devious, if he cares enough to put his ideas into action. Shrewd, witty, high-handed, and somewhat unfathomable. He really just does whatever he wants when he's in the mood for trouble.

History:
(cw: eating disorders)

In his childhood home, Sunyoung was taken care of, but he often wasn't seen. His parents were more interested in yelling at each other, and arguing, than listening to whatever he had to say.

By the time he was six, he'd had enough. He climbed up on the table one day, and yelled at them to stop. He was punished! He wasn't allowed to yell. He felt distressed by his environment, and the complete lack of control he had over anything. It felt unfair. He felt wronged, but he didn't yet have the words to articulate that.

Even if he did, they probably wouldn't have listened. Or they'd have nodded and said, okay honey- and maybe bought him a new toy. That was always their way of solving problems. They would have more time to fight with each other if he was in his room doing something else.

If he didn't know any better, he'd have thought that they just liked fighting! When he was alone with one of them, things were perfectly fine. Together? He learned to be the mediator in almost every situation- wedged between them- it was his way of trying to get into the driver's seat.

He was absorbing all kinds of things. His mother was almost always dieting, and the diet she was on changed frequently.

Food. Food was the key. Sunyoung didn't have control over anything else. Not what he saw, not what toys he had, not what food he ate- but he could control how much. And since it was the only thing he could control, so he zeroed in on it.

Despite how much they both seemed to want him out of their hair, he was homeschooled. Sunyoung didn't have many friends- partially because he had adopted his parents speaking habits. And outside of his household, nobody really seemed to like being talked to like that.

Maybe that was for the best. Because on his own, he was able to start experimenting with his power early. It didn't matter if he didn't have a playmate, he could play by himself. Even board games: he'd just project his energy out- and they could play together. He only ever played chance games against himself, it was no fun otherwise. He had to be careful that he didn't accidentally destroy anything, but he got better as he practiced.

At some point, his parents fighting just became the background noise of his internal world. Sunyoung couldn't really trust them to do anything but buy him things, so he turned inward. Games were the seam that stabilized and connected the fabric of his life. Once he got it, he couldn't stop playing Pokemon on his Gameboy Advance.

Controlling the number on the scale was like a game to him. He'd set an arbitrary goal to meet- like he perceived his mother did. Sometimes he wasn't even trying not to eat- he was just so into what he was playing he accidentally skipped a meal.

Until he met the most important game of his life, Sunyoung was just picking up and putting down games as quickly as his dad could buy them for him. He rarely finished them, but they occupied his attention.

Then, when he was thirteen, they bought him his own computer. Sunyoung was thrilled- no more competing with his mom for her work computer! He could play all the games he wanted to. Of course, he had it to do his homework on too, but that's besides the point.

World of Warcraft. He was a little skeptical of a pay to play game at first. But he picked up the free trial, and gave it a go. His first character was a gnome mage named... Pinkbeard. He didn't know why it was so funny to him at the time. He could have rolled anything else... Troll, Orc, Night Elf- but Pinkbeard was calling out to him.

So he started the game- and almost quit- until he joined a Guild.

It was great! The people there somehow all said some pretty mean things to each other, but they seemed close. They didn't fight- they were just blunt. That was pretty bad, wasn't it? A guild on World of Warcraft felt more warm than his own family. It wasn't like he was planning on running away from home to go live with one of them. But he did, like magic, meet the most important person in his life through it.

Now that he had hit puberty, and was in the middle of what should have been a growth spurt, Sunyoung's eating habits were catching up to him fast. But he almost never left the house- and now that he was old enough to dress himself- his parents didn't really see him.

When he passed out cold, they called 911. Sunyoung doesn't remember much from that time- just waking up hooked up to two IV's and passing back out again. He spent the next (blurry,) month in an inpatient program.

The eating part actually didn't bother him that much. It was graded, so it wasn't like they were force feeding him until he puked. The worst, most tortuous part of being institutionalized was the utter lack of control he had over his own life. Control that he had worked so hard to build! He ate what they gave him. He went where he was allowed to go. He slept when they told him to. If it were pleasant, he'd probably remember more, and fear less.

The only nice thing he did there was experiment with his power. And he found out something very interesting too- that it wasn't just his own energy signature that he could manipulate.

He couldn't play any actual games there- except for the occasional boring game of Monopoly. So instead he made his own fun, and started playing games with the other kids in the program. Sometimes, he'd switch their signatures, just for a laugh.

Otherwise, he'd amuse himself by sneaking into locked rooms, or opening file cabinets- by jimmying the locks by shaping his signature. Sunyoung wasn't out to hurt anyone, he just wanted to have a little fun.

He would like to say that that was it- he was scared straight. But no. He was terrified of being committed again. Instead, he changed his tactics. The number on the scale game was clearly not a good one to play. Instead he'd go by how he looked in the mirror. If he was satisfied, he was satisfied. And if he wasn't, he would have to adjust.

He also became a vegetarian.

He was gone, without a word, from the game for a month. He came back to multiple letters in his mailbox from one of his Guildmates. They'd talked a few times before- she(?) seemed pretty cool. They were, allegedly, around the same age. She seemed genuinely concerned about him, so he wrote back- although he was careful to glaze over why he had been gone. He wasn't exactly lying, he just hadn't even begun to process what he'd just gone through himself.

Sunyoung wasn't about to let his new skills go to waste, though. If his parents hated each other's guts so much, how about they walk in each other's shoes for a bit? He'd muss up both of their terrariums of perception for a couple of hours, and buy himself some peace and quiet to talk to his new friend. He still wasn't totally sure that she(?) wasn't an old man in a bathtub trying to lure him in- but they were good company, so they kept talking.

Eventually, they exchanged phone numbers. She couldn't text him during the day- she was at school. But during the evening, they'd text each other back and forth constantly. Apparently, she lived in Boise! It felt weird and jarring for him to meet someone else from Idaho. Weren't there only thirty people in the entire state? He told her that too, but she just laughed at him.

It felt weird to have a friend... A genuine friend. Not someone that had to hang out with him because they were in the same playgroup. He didn't really count his Guildmates, they only talked in the game, about the game.

After the institutionalization, almost everything went back to normal. Aside from the things he had changed. His mom hid her scale, which was actually pretty funny- because as a teenager he was perfectly capable of just grabbing that shit off the top shelf of the closet where she put it. She didn't talk about dieting in front of him anymore. He had to eat at the table, which he hated. He didn't like it when people watched him eat, it made him feel sick to his stomach.

But he got good at seeming like he ate a lot. His parents respected his diet choices. Maybe he just didn't like meat all that much- and he's eating in front of us! So clearly he's better. He didn't look like a skeleton anymore- but that was his choice. He was back in the driver's seat, making all the decisions for himself. He felt relaxed and in control again.

Sunyoung continued to play WoW religiously. He sometimes took a brief break to play other games, but they never held his attention for long. He and his friend formed a 2's team, and that's mostly what they did outside of raiding. They were actually talking to each other on the mic now, so he at least knew that she had a very feminine voice.

It probably sounded pathetic, but every day when he logged on and saw all the people on his friends list, and guild roster, online, it felt like he had something that was genuinely worth sticking around for. It motivated him to eat a little.

Sunyoung was not terribly attached to being alive. But he didn't actively want to die either. He didn't feel disappointed when he woke up in the hospital, it just was. And if he hadn't? He wouldn't necessarily have been happy about that either. It was like he had a chip missing- but when he was playing the game, and talking to his friend, he felt alive.

He was actually really relieved the first time she sent him a picture. She really was just a teenage girl. He sent her one back, although he was very careful about the angle and the lighting- he didn't want her to ask any questions. Didn't want their conversations to take up the same dimension that almost all of his conversations with his parents took.

She did catch on though. It was hard not to. Sunyoung's version of "not very thin" and a normal person's version of "not very thin" were two circles with no overlap. The only people he could fool were his parents. He felt kind of sick when she asked if he was okay. But he talked about it, slowly, over time. And then she shared a "secret" of her own with him.

'i know this is going to sound crazy but...' It did. It would have to anyone else. But even if he didn't have his own ability, he still would have shut up and nodded along. If she could deal with him being the rude, blunt person he was- if he could deal with being a little uncomfortable when she asked if he'd eaten anything that day- he could be a little uncomfortable with whatever she told him... But it wasn't that unbelievable to him. Now that everything was out in the open between them, he felt comfortable enough to share a secret of his own. And he could one-up her:

'Okay. But I'm actually a wizard.' He couldn't cast fireball or cone of cold, but he could wield his energy to do... Almost anything, really- if he was creative enough. Or if he cared enough.

'suuuuuuure! ' Haha- keep laughing! He'd show her, one day. Considering she'd told him that as a secret, he didn't think she'd be happy if he sent her a video. Actually, he'd never really thought of it as a secret. He just never had any real friends, and he didn't want his parents to know that he was actively messing with them.

Stepping into each other's shoes, it turned out, didn't really help. They really did just like fighting. It was the glue that held their relationship together, and they never seemed to be that interested in bringing him into it. He might as well not exist.

'- i met some other people like us today.
- Like us?
- yeah, you know.
- you need to get over here already!
- I don't want to be reported missing
- Or charged with kidnapping lol'

People like us... He really did need to get over there already. Sunyoung was seventeen. He had gone through a dozen different phases, but he was still in love with World of Warcraft. And he was still talking to her. Secrets and all. Of course he wasn't playing actual WoW anymore- Warlords of Draenor was the last straw for him. Grom? Hellscream? Warchief?! What were the writers smoking? Thrall would never make a decision like that! Vol'jin was literally right there! He'd been an Alliance player since forever, but Jesus, man. The lore was good, he'd admit that. But it was such a major step back from Mists of Pandaria.

The raids weren't as fun anymore, 2's were getting old. The classes were all getting mashed together, and there was only one 'correct' spec anymore. Sunyoung was still addicted to the game, he was just playing on a private server now. Wrath of the Lich King. Now that was some good shit! Sometimes he played on a Burning Crusade server, too. WoW classic really was it.

By that point, he had managed to develop a fine control over his control disorder.

Of course, he controlled his eating disorder like his mother looked after her prized tulips. She was out there every single day watering them, changing their dirt, checking their PH. During the winter she even dug them up and potted them inside, under a heat lamp. Those damn tulips ruled her life, but they were beautiful.

Like his mother's tulips, his body was a thing he was capable of taking care of. When he ate, even if it was only a little, he could eat something green and nutritious. If he learned only one good thing from being in the program- it was the concept of naming his disorder. When the ED think got bad, he could stop, and think: 'Fuck off, Earl.'

He was capable, he was in control. He was disciplined. He stuck to his diet. He ate just enough- so not to arouse suspicion. And when things felt overwhelming, and like he just couldn't take it anymore and he needed something, he ate and ate and ate until he felt like he was going to puke. Sometimes he did vomit, but it felt so good when he let himself go.

Then he felt terrible, and restricted again. Back on diet. He was just waiting, biding his time at this point. He was going to live with her and her friends, when they were all old enough. He was going to turn eighteen first, and she would five months later. Until then, he'd take the gifts that his parents still occasionally bought for him.

They had actually already met once. She squealed out "Pinky!" and wrapped her arms around him. His head fit right under her chin, which he- strangely- wasn't embarrassed about. He looked more like her younger brother than her friend.

He didn't go out on expeditions to the city often. Apparently playing World of Warcraft at thirteen was perfectly fine, but driving twenty five minutes to see his actually age-appropriate friend was crossing the line- and he definitely didn't want her at his house.

He supposed that it might have been their misguided way of keeping an eye on him- making sure he wasn't completely skipping meals- something is better than nothing right? The day they met, she brought one of those vitamin drinks for him, and he drank it. He didn't love it- but, well- she was trying, right? His parents were trying too- even if they were more wrapped up in each other.

He did really want to meet those friends she told him about though. Like us. It felt like time slowed down to a crawl. But he had graduated and even started college- Sunyoung was on his way to becoming an adult. He didn't feel particularly thrilled, or prepared, but he was on his way.

The first time he met them, he was actually nervous. There was a group of them- almost like they were a party. And every party needed a wizard, right? It felt weird and exhilarating- he felt dizzy- and not just because he'd "forgotten" to eat.

He wasn't always the type to make a good impression, but they welcomed him. And he really, really wasn't prepared- but at least he had his friend.

The gifted world was brand new to him. At first it was wonderful- he marveled at what his friends and new roommates were able to do- but it was also incredibly dangerous. People like them were getting swept up- by who, for what? If they stuck together as a group, they'd be safer.

They weren't particularly political. And Sunyoung himself wasn't either. Perhaps it really was just all a big misunderstanding. Whatever the case, they stayed out of trouble.

Sunyoung continued to study, and he continued playing games. Now that they lived together, they played together all the time. She always laughed at his jokes and commentary. It just slipped out one day- he was really funny- why didn't he try streaming?

...It wasn't like he wasn't going to play games for hours at a time anyway. So he gave it a go.

At first things were a little shaky. He didn't have much of a setup- and it was way harder to entertain an audience of strangers. Mostly because he felt like he had to entertain. She bought him a bag of googly eyes, so he could stick a pair to his camera- it was good for making eye contact.

But Sunyoung was good at games, he just usually dropped them when he got bored. Now, he had a captive audience to listen to his blunt jokes and shit talking. Even if he only had a dozen viewers, suddenly he felt like he had to actually finish the game. Or, if it was an old one- try and exploit a glitch- and break it irreparably in the funniest way possible.

Having a hobby that put him in front of a camera did not help his body image issues. Especially when he was getting dozens of (as he read them) positive comments about how thin he was. Sure there was the occasional person that told him to eat a sandwich, or do a Mukbang, but he was making an ass of himself on the internet- so he expected that kind of thing.

It was only a matter of time before he developed a sizable following. For him it was more slow and steady rather than an overnight slam dunk. And that worked out well, since they moved. He was able to set up his own "studio" to film.

They moved because either things were heating up, or they were all getting extremely paranoid. Sunyoung wasn't sure then. And that was the first of many moves. He used a VPN as the first layer of many for any internet activities.

But it wasn't all dour and grey. They laughed a lot- they hammed it up constantly. If someone had a problem, the whole group converged to try and fix it. Some problems weren't fixable- but the idea that they had each other's backs was enough for him.

At some point he quit studying. He never really saw himself as an academic. It turned out years of dicking around on the internet when he should have been doing something more substantial with his life came in handy- when the income from streaming wasn't cutting it, he knew a dozen places to make decent income. And he also went vegan.

His housemates, especially his friend, watched him like a hawk. 'Oreo's are vegan!' was something she said a lot. And he tried to humor her. Sometimes it was hard. The threat looming over their heads deeply threatened his sense of control. So he tried harder- and the harder he tried, the more cracks in his constructed reality there were.

Maybe they were all just ineffectually playing revolutionary, and wasting each other's time.

And, maybe the only way to "recover" was to accept that he was going to relapse, over and over again. Swimming against the current, and having a knee-jerk reaction to what he perceived as him fucking up again wasn't going to cut it. He still couldn't let go, he wasn't capable of that. But he could acknowledge the currents pushing and pulling him, on his dinky little wooden raft in the middle of the ocean.

If he ever found himself craving the old sensations of home, he could peek in at what one of the more "serious" groups of gifted were doing. Sunyoung himself tried to never get directly involved, but he felt a little better when he knew even the tiniest bit about what was going on. It was another way of trying to take control. He never got any insider information, but he probably didn't want it.

Even though they lived with each other now, they still texted each other constantly. And despite being the one that pulled him into this mess, his friend seemed to be having second thoughts.

'maybe it is all just bullshit'

Usually he texted back right away, but he wasn't sure what to say. He read it a couple of hours ago, and still didn't know. But he had to start his stream in an hour, so he was changing the sheet that he used as a background.

He sat back down, and finally got to typing his reply, when she burst into the room and grabbed him by the arm:

"Come on Sun, we've gotta go-" She was lifting him up. He didn't protest, and dropped his phone as she dragged him to his feet.

"What's goi-" She opened the door, and it felt like the world was on fire. One moment, everything was fine- and the next he couldn't see further than he could reach.

They ran- she was dragging him- because barely weighing a hundred pounds soaking wet didn't make him a star athlete. His energy signature was fast- but he couldn't move his signature and his body at the same time.

The building was crumbling to pieces around them, the floor was shaking so hard they almost fell into each other multiple times. He knew he was only slowing her down, but he didn't want to let go.

What the hell was going on? Where were the others? Had they already gotten out, and she came back for him?

No- everything had been fine a second ago.

They were being raided. He was psyching himself up- if they tried to grab them he'd fight. His signature was strong, and he wasn't alone.

But if it were easy to escape a raid, he'd have heard of it before. They made it outside. Then in the blink of an eye, they were separated. The only thing he had left was the warmth from her hand, and the world was fading out around him.

When he came to, he was in a grey room that looked an awful lot like a hospital room. This time he was only hooked up to one IV, so clearly he had gotten better. There was no sign of any of his friends. And it was only then that he realized that he didn't have his phone. It was melted somewhere, with everything else that he'd ever owned- and he never got to send that text.

He wished he did. If he had just been a few minutes earlier- if he had been less preoccupied. It was the only thing he wanted her to know.

'It wasn't bullshit to me.'

It never had been, not for a second. Sunyoung wanted to control everything around him: that was folly, but he felt more balanced than ever with them. Somehow, he managed to hold it together, through all of it. The moves, the underground, all of it. He even learned to think harder before he spoke, even if he did still decide to go ahead and make a pointed comment.

He still had no idea where he was. They kept coming in and 'evaluating' him. He tried to ask about his friends. When it was determined that he was 'stable'- whatever that meant, he was told he was being transferred. His gift was dangerous, and he needed to learn to control it. There was a school for people like him. He'd be safe there, after what happened.

Puzzling- they made it sound like it wasn't their fault. But refusal didn't seem like an option. They had almost burned them alive, just to get them. If he said no... Sunyoung didn't feel strongly about being alive- but he did feel strongly about his friends. It wasn't bullshit to him, never was.

He still had no damn clue where he was, and then he was on the island.

It wasn't anything like what he'd been expecting. Beautiful garden, dorms that weren't in shambles, an arcade. Perhaps they were two different groups, and this was all a misunderstanding. He never saw the faces of the people that took him- then he was out cold. None of their signatures matched, not here, and not there. That, or this went incredibly deep.

Sunyoung might not have cared what happened to him, but he was going to find out about his party. And sure, he'll learn to 'control' his power. If he had been faster, if he had been stronger-

Just like when he was a kid, he could restart the game: ↑, X, B.
And, if he ever met those people again, he'd make them regret it.
There are few things to fear more than the wrath of a wizard.

Other:
The Powers:
Energy Signature Manipulation- Sunyoung's power is versatile. He can manipulate energy signatures, so he can read them too. There's no fooling him about your identity, unless you've changed the signature. He can see people coming from pretty far off too- when he's paying attention.

He can project his own energy signature from his body. Unlike his physical body, his energy signature is much stronger and faster- but he can't move his physical body and his projected energy signature at the same time. And while it can stretch- they must always remain connected, even if the connection is only a couple centimeters thin. His signature can take any form he desires it to take, he doesn't even have to completely project it from his body- and could use it to make something like armor, or a weapon.

Alternatively he can also change the frequency of energy signatures, at a sub-quantum level. Positive to negative- to even an entirely different kind of energy. He's not very good at this yet though, and since it needs to be connected to him, has probably burned himself a few times! If he ever gets any good at it, he could use it to absorb or deflect different energies.

But the most interesting application of Sunyoung's power isn't just manipulating his own energy signature. He can manipulate others too. The simplest and easiest thing for him to do is use someone else's signature to disguise himself as someone far less threatening.

It's a very short term effect, but if he were to switch two people's signatures- they would swap powers, and their perception would change. They could temporarily gain new abilities. He can get a vague idea of what someone's power is just by looking at their signature. He can even tell if they're totally in control of themself, or being controlled by someone else's power.

If his signature phases through someone, sometimes it temporarily immobilizes them- it's always painful though.

Love him, hate him, wanna date him?