Retort

Retort
Author	Shimme
Civilian name	Jackson Meier
Alignment	Villain
Affiliation	None ({{{location}}})[[Category:{{{location}}} characters]]
PRT Classification	Tinker
Status	Active

Character Sheet

Backstory

Every time Jackson did better, the expectations rose.

All the damn time. Whenever he mastered something, whenever he medaled, it just raised the bar higher, the pressure on Jackson increasing, until a passion, a sport he loved became an all-consuming, oppressive force on his life.

He was the golden kid, a prodigy who could do no wrong, with his success assured to the minds of everyone else... they just needed to push him farther.

Then there was a crack in that image. Distracted by the stress that was being heaped on him, he fell badly during a jump, and broke an ankle on the ice in the middle of a competition. It marked the beginning of a downward spiral even after he'd healed and recovered, his confidence shattered.

His parents saw their child losing the thing that had been so defining in his life, saw his dream - their dream - slipping out of grasp and resorted to the only thing that they knew worked.

Mr. and Mrs. Meir pushed their son harder than ever. When that didn't work, when he kept doing worse and worse it turned to yelling. Shouting. Then verbal abuse.

Jackson started to hate the sport that he once loved, the thing that he was so damn good at. He wasn't performing out of passion and drive like he once had - he was doing it because he was obligated to, because he was becoming afraid of his parents reactions if he didn't achieve to their expectations.

It showed. Compared to what he'd once been, he sucked.

On his earlier successes, he was going to try out for the US Olympic Figure Skating team, only fifteen years old.

The weeks leading up to it were worse than anything that came before it, and by the time he was travelling to try out, he was exhausted, a nervous wreck, terrified of what would happen if he didn't impress on the ice.

So he never went on the ice.

When his name was being called, when it was his time to perform, he was in the locker room experiencing an intense panic attack, unable to walk out of that locker room let alone make a serious attempt. That was when he triggered.