Characters/Glitch

Yanying Yu – Glitch

“Glitch” is, by all objective accounts, absolutely crazy. Between hearing voices, seeing hallucinations, seeing an the same invisible man, and being unable to distinguish dreams from reality, many would agree with that conclusion. However, the young woman is far more nuanced than meets the eye.

History
Born on mainland China, Glitch was simply the unlucky one of her family. Born the second child under the PRC's one child rules, Yanying was subject to a dark claim on her life. Either her parents go to jail and have both their children 'adopted' by the Chinese government, or they willingly give up the girl for the greater good of the nation.

They chose the latter.

Yanying was almost immediately sent to a top secret Chinese facility near the North Korean border. In this facility, she was raised under the strictest regimen, Yanying was trained how to fight, observe, and more than anything, how to use her intellect to create items for the communist leadership. At the age of 14, the general of the base and leader of the project, selected his "Daughter" as the next recipient of a glorious advancement in science that would supposedly boost her intellect to super human levels. A naive child, Yanying happily went along with it. She knew that her "father's" favour would save her from the harsh living environment of her siblings, and if she was lucky, her body would not reject the advancements like it had for many of siblings. Within days, Glitch was upon the operating table, her skull cut open, as the scientists under the general set to work installing the various wires and electrodes deep within her brain, as well as a small access point on the back of her head.

However, as was with every sibling before her, Yanying did not walk away as promised. Despite a successful intelligence boost, the young woman developed a severe studder, a partial nervous twitch, and endless hallucination, driving the young girl to the point of insanity, saved only by her youth and her, at that point, latent unawoken abilities. In her sense, she was saved by her own belief that the science done to her would work. Indeed, Yanying's intelligence saw a vast improvement over the next few weeks as her body healed from the operation. But with it came a terrible knowledge. The knowledge that she had been used for the selfish ends of decrepit old men.

This all came to a boiling point when her father gave her a pet cat to raise. At first innocuous, it became apparent that Yanying wasn't given the animal as a gift, but as a final lesson to purge her remaining innocence. One day, Yanying was simply asked to kill the cat and "grow up". It was the final straw, causing Yanying to snap. In a rush of mad energy, the girl overtook the general, and strangled him without a second thought. Realizing what she had done, and with a rare moment of clarity, Yanying scooped up her cat, Mimi, and the General's keys and fled into the night, stealing a jeep in order to make her getaway, her transgression not noticed until the next morning by virtue of luck alone. She quickly and quietly made her way across the Russian border into the city of Vladivostok, stowed away aboard a train bound for Moscow, and didn't look back. After nearly five years of running, the now twenty year old had made her way to the city of London. During this time, she took to using the name "Glitch"

Personality and Description
Glitch is outwardly very plain. Normally found wearing practical clothes due to years of being homeless. With medium length black hair, and originally brown eyes, Glitch appears like as any other Chinese person living in London. Her normally unkempt hair is often tied back to keep it out of her work. She has deep bags under her eyes and appears about ready to snap due to the fact that she rarely sleeps more than an hour or two a day, and often fills up on coffee, tea, soda, and any number of other carbonated drinks. Every now and then, she simply falls asleep for a day or two and comes back looking like a normal human being. A recent change in her appearance is a change in her eyes. Once basic brown eyes that exist through all of Asia, Glitch's eyes have somehow transformed, turning electric blue with black sclera.

Glitch's personality is considered to be extremely eclectic and selfish, often ignoring others and acting upon whim. Indeed, she appears to be entirely psychotic. However, the reality is far more nuanced, and rarely shows on the surface. It is simply Glitch's way of coping with the multitude of voices and hallucinations that plague her waking and dreaming world. Her detachment is simply an attitude of blocking out those voices and acknowledging them equally in order to not be disappointed when seemingly good friends turn out to be hallucinations running through her head. On those rare days of clarity, Glitch can actually be a very sociable person. However, those rare moments are overlooked as being superficial by most in favour of her far more common schizophrenic behaviour.

Powers
Glitch has the power to create and control technology at will, from spare components, bits of metal, and whatever else she has lying around her. As she grows stronger, she is beginning to find that she can create more and more complex and supposedly impossible things. However, her power comes at two major costs. The first is that there is a requirement of presence. Most of technopathic related items only work within such a distance of her, as it is her power that sustains the physics of most items. It is in effect her power filling in missing or wrong components on technology, or in larger things, breaking the known laws of physics to maintain them. If an item proves useful enough, she will sometimes build it from scratch without her powers if it is possible. The other catch to her powers is how long they stay together. The bigger the item, the quicker it falls apart without her concentration. Small items, like radio transmitters tend to stay together longer, but large items have a time limit after Glitch releases her concentration before they crumble back to their base components. If she wills it though, such items can fall apart immediately if need be.