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xxxxxBorn the only child to farming parents in a tiny town nestled in at the base of Appalachia, Jax's early life was a pleasant enough one. Sheltered, for sure, a combination of living in a tiny backwater Georgia town and growing up with very conservative parents who were rather overprotective of their only child. Devout Catholics, they passed their faith on to him from early on. His life was simple, but full. Church, school, learning how to take care of the farm, these were foundations; on top of which there was swim team, dance lessons, and above all art, for which he showed a great aptitude from an early age.
In classes he tended to do well, not out of any great intelligence but more by dint of hard work and a deeply instilled sense of self-discipline. When he struggled in a subject, he'd apply himself that much harder to it, tending to end up always frustratingly near but never actually at the top of his classes.
Outside of classes, things tended to be harder. The conservative people in his ultra-red hometown didn't react overly favorably to the sensitive artistic type. As he grew older and entered middle school, the harassment he got from the other children only got worse. To compensate, he threw himself more heavily into the other things in life that were important to him, spending more time in the pool, more time in the dance studio, but most of all, more time in church and more time in front of his canvas.
The onset of his mutation near the end of middle school didn't help matters any. At first it was just headaches, painful changes in vision, but then his powers began to manifest, first in his sleep, projecting images of his dreams while he slept, but then more frequently while he was awake. Unable to hide this, the hostility and violence he and his family faced in the community grew worse, not only from his peers but now from the town in general.
When, some months after his powers began showing themselves in earnest, a woman showed up at their farm saying that she was from a school in New York that specialized in helping youths in his situation, his parents were relieved and grateful. Though initially reluctant and nervous about sending their young son to a boarding school so far from home, ultimately they knew that it was the best thing if he was to learn to control his rather visible powers and have a normal life. They sent him to Xavier's, where his mother managed to be overprotective even long-distance.
In the new environment he thrived, once he got over homesickness, learning to control his powers and applying himself to practice with the same diligence he gave the rest of his schoolwork. After graduation he left to study art at the Pratt Institute, but was compelled to leave the school in the wake of being outed as a mutant.
His life changed a lot, in the wake of his outing. His powers caught the interest of people working at Prometheus, and he spent months in their labs; his ordeal there left him somewhat scarred emotionally and physically as well (he came out of it minus one eye and one finger.) In the wake of his rescue from there, he and some of the other rescuees have attempted hunting down other similar facilities and liberating their occupants. A few of these liberated labrats have ended up as part of his family, twin teenagers and a young son who have become his foster children. He's working on making this official.
These days, he keeps as busy as ever. He's gone back to school, at the Cooper Union, now, and between this and working -- part-time as a tattoo artist and body pierced, part-time as a bartender; between life as an X-Man and helping out at church and the various activist groups he's involved in, he doesn't find much time for sleep. Not to mention raising three kids.
Thank goodness his mutation lets him get away with it.
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xxxxxAt its base, Jackson is a photokinetic. His mutation controls the light around him, bending it in accordance with his moods and thoughts. With training and practice he's learned to leash it so that for the most part it doesn't visibly happen when he doesn't want it to, and so that it /does/ respond when he /does/ want it to.
This power makes him effectively an illusionist, and in this he is most adept, bending and reorganizing light waves to change their appearance. He creates vivid holographic images that are substanceless, soundless, but quite visually convincing. Unlike psionically-based illusions, his are "real" in that he is actually moving the light waves themselves and therefore the resulting imagery would show up on camera. He's less adept with some newer-emerged facets of his power that he can use offensively and defensively; offensively, in bursts of focused energy, or defensively, in solar-powered force-shields.
His mutation -- and him -- powers itself largely on solar power. Without a good enough charge, he can't shield at all and his beams will be weak. His illusions require the least energy expenditure, but still take a lot out of him if he does too much too long.
He stores solar power like a batter; he can't produce light innately, but can store energy for later. Too much sun is dangerous, too; he has a point past which he can't store anything more and if he doesn't expend the energy he's taking in continually, it will built up and is prone to exploding. He can't turn off the storing, but he's gotten pretty good at finding ways to let it out in small doses all day long so as to not burst.
He's gotten pretty used to fueling himself on solar power, too. More sun means more energy, for him, and can leave him even more hyperactive and prone to cheer. It helps that fueling himself this way brings down his need for sleep, although relying on it isn't the healthiest path.
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