Name: Lark Athlai
Age: 18
Birthday: October 1st
Gender: Nonbinary (they/them)
Appearance: Long silver hair and green eyes, the shade of green much paler for younger Larks and much darker for older ones, are the hallmarks of this tricksy time-traveler. They're willowy, on the thinner side but not unnaturally so, and they always look exhausted, with heavy bags under their sharp eyes. They dress conservatively, covering their arms with long sleeves and their legs with long skirts. Their boots are well-worn from travel, and they often have small hand-sewn patches on their clothing where they've repaired their favorite pieces.
Personality: A trickster by trade, Lark likes to play good-natured pranks. Nothing that would ruin anyone's mood or cause any permanent distress, just enough to spice up the day - putting stickers in odd places is an old favorite, along with randomly gifting people things by way of sneaking into their residence. They’re generally friendly with most people, and quick on their feet despite constantly looking like they need a nap… or twenty. Quick to laugh, slow to anger, they’re squeezing every drop out of every day and living life to the fullest.
Powers:
Time Manipulation - Lark can travel forwards and backwards in time to create stable time loops (continuity is important). When traveling to a time they already exist in, they can choose to remain where they are or be pulled to where any other version of themself is. They are unable to travel to any time after December 30th in the year that they turn 19, but with the use of chained jumps they are able to rappel into the far-distant past. The activation of their powers doesn't require much energy, but the actuality of living out more time than any human should be able to leaves them drained if they don't return to the present to recharge.
Lark can also pause time for a few seconds at a time, though this takes more active concentration and willpower on their part. Time doesn't like to be stopped, and will fight to restart if they pause it for too long, leaving them with a terrible headache.
One handy side-affect of their powers is that, while displaced from time, they don't age, as their body is put in a sort of stasis until they are back in the present. However, they also don't heal or recover any energy spent, meaning that they must return to the present at some point in order to recharge. In this way, time marches on, and they are drawn inevitably towards the future regardless of how much they would rather live in the past.
They can sense when time is being manipulated, whether it be their own doing or another traveler. This most often appears in the form of faint music only they can hear, emanating from the source of the disturbance. They also have an always-accurate internal clock, which tells them both what time they are currently in and what time they should be in (their present time, in other words).
Equipment:
Lark, despite being more of a vigilante than a true hero, has their own ‘hero outfit’ - it’s just a reinforced long-sleeved shirt, gloves, sturdy boots, and a skirt. They don't even bother with a mask. They are fooling absolutely no one, but there isn’t much difference between them in and out of costume, anyways.
Their favored weapon is the shuriken, and they tend to keep several of the throwing stars in their pockets even when they aren't actively looking for a fight. They're decent with a sword or a club, but they're a terrible marksperson, preferring to break or dismantle guns rather than deal with them at all. They don't tend to get into any fights they aren't sure they can win - they'd rather run away and leave it to be someone else's problem than get bogged down.
Fun Facts:
Lark knows when they're going to die and has accepted it as well as they can. Or, that's what they'd like to make people believe, when they can't just lie or avoid talking about the topic at all. Regardless, they plan on using the remaining time they have to its fullest, often running several loops within a single day to stretch it out for as long as they can. You can often spot several Larks hanging around the time of a particularly nice moment.
There are only a few Larks who regularly travel to the future rather than staunchly avoiding it and sticking to the past, those being a 12-year-old Lark desperately trying to find a way to change their fate, a 16-year-old Lark keeping an eye on the 12-year-old, and the single 10-year-old Lark who tried to jump to the end of their timeline and kicked the whole cycle off.
Growing up as an only child, Lark would often be visited by future versions of themself, keeping them company and keeping them entertained. Because of this, future versions of Lark often keep that same older/younger sibling dynamic with past versions, no matter how small the difference.