[hr][hr][center][color=ffbc57][h1][b]H E L L F I R E[/b][/h1][/color][/center][hr][hr]
[color=ffbc57][B]|  NAME  |[/B][/color]
[color=darkgray][INDENT]Andrew Grant "Andy" Hughes[/INDENT][/color]

[color=ffbc57][B]|  AGE  |[/B][/color]
[color=darkgray][INDENT]Sixteen, going on seventeen[/INDENT][/color]

[color=ffbc57][B]|  MENTOR  |[/B][/color]
[color=darkgray][INDENT]Batman[/INDENT][/color]

[color=ffbc57][B]|  APPEARANCE  |[/B][/color]
[color=darkgray][INDENT]Caucasian. Green eyes. Brown hair, cut short and left to its own devices. A decent jaw, and a gentle smile that often widens itself into a grin; it’s very rare to see Andy’s lips turned downwards, except for when in deep thought or high concentration. He’s got muscle on him, but not too much – he doesn’t look bulky so much as he does solid, his build the kind that allows for both strength and agility in equal parts. He stands at 5’ 11”.

Andy’s suit is made of an experimental material designed to be bulletproof and impervious to the elements. It’s coloured a black with orange highlights. An upside-down orange triangle sits on the centre of the chest; the emblem. The helmet is orange. His face is completely covered, with holes for the eyes, which are covered by white lenses. The suit itself appears to be moulded to Andy’s body shape, fitting like a glove. The helmet contains a voice filter, which he activates in the presence of people that know him.[/INDENT][/color]

[color=ffbc57][B]|  BIO  |[/B][/color]
[color=darkgray][INDENT]Andrew Grant “ Andy” Hughes spent the first eleven years of his life in Australia, the product of a high school romance between a mechanical engineer in Wayne Enterprise’s (WE) WayneTech subsidiary in Brisbane and a police officer of the Australian Federal Police. Sam Hughes and Carlissa Rosenfeld got married at the age of twenty and had Andy at twenty-four. Eight years later, his little brother, Damon, was born. His parents’ marriage was far from idyllic; sure, they loved each other, but their arguments were constant and intense. A frequent topic broached by their clashes was Sam’s career – a hard worker and high achiever, he’d earned the admiration of his boss, who passed along word to WE headquarters in Gotham. Ever since Damon was born, Andy could remember his parents arguing about moving to New Jersey, his mother yelling that “I don’t [i]care[/i] how much money’s in the offer, we’re not moving to that [i]vigilante’s[/i] city!”, his father placating her with a quiet voice, declining the Gotham department’s insistent offers every time.  

Tragedy struck the Hughes family when Andy was ten years old, tipping everything upside-down for the young boy. Carlissa was driving Damon home from kindergarten on one of her days off. Fresh out of an argument at home with Sam earlier that morning, she was angry and unfocused... drunk. Speeding through a four-way intersection, she realised too late that she’d run a red light – a car slammed into the right rear end of her own, sending her into a violent tailspin. She awoke at the hospital later that evening, a tearful Sam informing her that their two year-old didn’t make it. Damon succumbed to his injuries in the ambulance. 

Andy remembers the divorce vividly: it was long, messy and painful. Carlissa didn’t just remove herself from Sam – she removed herself from Andy, from her own flesh and blood. It seemed like she didn’t want anything to do with them, and although Sam tried to reassure Andy that it was her guilt that made her feel that way, he couldn’t help but feel like he’d done something to make her hate him. With Sam and Andy no longer tied to Carlissa, they were plane-bound to Gotham City only days before Andy turned eleven, his dad promising him the best birthday he could ever imagine in America. 

They went to a Big Belly Burger in Gotham Heights, celebrating with a dollop of burger and chip-shaped grease. It wasn’t much, but to Andy, it meant the world. 

Sam went straight to work at his new position at WayneTech, working under Lucius Fox to develop a diverse range of technology that excited him to no end – although Damon’s death still affected him greatly, a job he loved and the opportunity to build a new life with Andy helped him move on more than staying in Australia ever could have.

Andy’s powers manifested when he was fifteen. He’d been walking home from work, having acquired a part-time job at Big Belly Burger. He was supposed to catch a cab – Sam made it very clear how uncomfortable he was with Andy walking through the streets alone, regardless of his boxing training at Wildcat Gym – but he didn’t want to spend what little cash he had on hand, and his paycheck wasn’t due for another couple of days, so he figured what the hell, why [i]not[/i] put his life in frugality’s hands? He was walking down the corner of Gotham Heights’ Kane Street when he was pushed into a back alley by a group of muggers that had been tailing him. Beaten and held at knifepoint, Andy’s metahuman gene activated.

A miniature sun, no bigger than a marble, exploded in the palm of his hand; flames whipped out at his assailants, burning with the unrestrained ferocity of an uncaged beast. It made Batman’s job that much harder to help the teen.

After taking care of the muggers, the Dark Knight turned his attention to the admittedly more pressing matter at hand – the tiny, powerful ball of solar energy floating in front of Andy. Realising that he couldn’t get rid of it, Batman had no other choice, knocking Andy out as painlessly as possible. The flames dissipated with Andy’s consciousness. 

He woke up at Elliot Memorial Hospital the next morning. He endured his dad’s relief-distilled lecture with a half-present mind, too occupied with the night’s events to feel guilty about how worried Sam must have felt. On the drive home, he resolved to do something with his newfound powers. Something [i]irresponsible.[/i] Every night, he snuck out of his and his dad’s apartment to test out his powers and get the hang of them, occasionally jumping into dangerous situations to do his part for the city. For those few weeks, he had no idea that Batman was watching him.

The Caped Crusader approached Andy on one of his “patrols” (with no knowledge of urban traversal or the capabilities of his powers, there was only so much he could do to seek out street crime), explaining that he’d been watching Andy ever since the night of the mugging, gauging what kind of person he was – he didn’t tell Andy that it was because, given the nature of his powers, he could either make for a useful ally… or a powerful threat. Luckily for Andy, he passed the test, and Batman offered to train him, giving him the position of a secure location not too far from Gotham Heights. For the months following, Andy continued to sneak out, training with the mythical vigilante his mother had used to argue against moving to Gotham in the first place. Eventually gifted with a supersuit of his own, he took to the streets as [color=ffbc57][b]Hellfire[/b][/color], boasting much more control over his powers than before, owing it to Batman and the Justice Leaguers he’d enlisted to help hone his abilities. He’d learned of Bruce Wayne’s identity by that point.

Come the summer of 2020, Andy was leaving Gotham for an extended writing and journalism course run by the Daily Planet, hand-picked by the Wayne Foundation Scholarship Committee with all expenses covered. That is, as far as his dad knew. Where he was really going was Happy Harbour’s Mount Justice… the headquarters of the Young Justice Initiative. With only a few months of experience on his belt, it would prove to be the adventure of a lifetime. 
[/INDENT][/color]

[color=ffbc57][B]|  ABILITIES / SKILLS / EQUIPMENT  |[/B][/color]
[color=darkgray][INDENT]Andy is essentially a walking fusion reactor; a [color=ffbc57][b]human sun[/b][/color]. His body is able to create and manipulate all aspects of a star, including its energy, heat, luminosity, magnetism and radiation, to name a few. His powers’ volatility and extreme danger is apparent to all, and even his body, it seems – except for times of immense psychological and/or emotional stress, he can only manifest his powers as solar energy, channelling the nuclear fusion reaction outwards into concentrated explosions: unbelievably powerful flames. Andy’s body has altered itself into an organism capable of withstanding any and all effects of a sun – as a living fusion reactor, this is necessary so he doesn’t melt, inside and out. As such, his touch is warmer, almost toastier than a regular person’s… but inside his body, protons constantly collide in a furnace of solar energy waiting to be released. 

Prior to Batman’s mentorship, Andy dabbled in some boxing at Wildcat Gym, and through self-training on his trampoline at his Australian home, he could boast a limited array of acrobatic skills – his roundoff backflip was pretty damn cool, he used to think. Enter Bruce, and Andy soon acquired skills he’d only dreamed of developing: proficiency in [color=ffbc57][b]multiple martial arts[/b][/color] (namely boxing, Brazilian Jiu Jitsu, Taekwondo and Krav Maga), [i]actual[/i] [color=ffbc57][b]acrobatic ability[/b][/color], and a [color=ffbc57][b]strategic mindset[/b][/color] that’s only emerged since Batman’s training, fighting against Andy’s impulsive nature.

Andy’s [color=ffbc57][b]Hellfire suit[/b][/color] is made of a bullet-resistant material that’s nigh-impervious to the elements; the perfect outfit for someone with the physiology of a sun. It’s designed to absorb punishment, reducing lethal forces exerted against Andy into more manageable bone-breaking ones. That’s not to say that it can soak up all damage, though – hit Andy hard enough, and there’s a very good chance that he’ll die.
[/INDENT][/color]

[color=ffbc57][B]|  LIMITATIONS AND WEAKNESSES  |[/B][/color]
[color=darkgray][INDENT]Andy’s [color=ffbc57][b]stubborn about his beliefs[/b][/color]. He likes to think that he’s flexible and open to arguments, but the truth is that when he sets his mind about something, it’s not likely that he’ll budge about it. [i]You’re entitled to your opinion[/i], he’ll think, [i]But I’m not going to listen to it[/i]. This goes hand in hand with his insistence in seeing the good in everyone – his [color=ffbc57][b]naivety[/b][/color] – an admirable, if foolish trait that endears him to people, but also occasionally lands him into trouble. He can be incredibly [color=ffbc57][b]impulsive[/b][/color], acting according to his instincts (and his heart) instead of his head, something that Batman’s training attempts to address little by little. Another very important limitation to note, at least for the time being, is his [color=ffbc57][b]inexperience[/b][/color]; yes, he has Batman’s training, but he’s still relatively new to the game, and that can lead to rookie mistakes – usually on account of his impulsivity.   

Most of all, though, [color=ffbc57][b]he’s only human[/b][/color] – well, no, he’s a metahuman, but being a walking fusion reactor doesn’t give you bulletproof skin, nor does it give you an accelerated healing factor. Andy’s still flesh and bones, and he can most definitely die, let alone get injured. Not to mention that the Sun generates millions of megatons’ worth of energy every second – pack that into a 5’ 11” teenage boy, and you get a yield similar to that of a nuclear bomb. Imagine what would happen if that got exposed in an [i]uncontrolled[/i] burst…?

Yeah. Not very nice to think about.
[/INDENT][/color]

[color=ffbc57][b]|  NOTES  |[/b][/color]
[color=darkgray][indent][list][*]Keep in mind that while Batman, Ollie and Dinah are aware of Andy’s past (his brother’s death, and Andy’s subsequently strained relationship with his mother), the Team is not. This will be revealed to them over the course of the IC.[/list][/indent][/color]