The Brooks Family
Welcome to the Brooks! Here you’ll meet Oliver and Holly, as well as their parents! You may even run into Oliver’s crush…
Holly Brooks
Art Fight Character ID: 4034150Holly is a ball of energy. If she isn’t bouncing off the walls, climbing on stuff, or getting into trouble, then she’s doing all three at once. Even though she’s starting sixth grade in the fall, she hasn’t outgrown her “childish” traits. She loves stuffed animals, funny slap bracelets, and anything brightly colored. She explores any new environment she's thrown into, and every stranger is just a future friend (Vale wished he pretended to be deaf when he first met her, but it’s far too late for that…).Holly is a plant alter, meaning that she is biologically part plant. She not only needs food and water like a human, but she also needs some daily sun and soil. She has the ability to grow and manipulate plants around her, but she’s not that strong. The most she can do is make a single flower grow at a time (which is subsequently picked and given to whoever she’s closest to as a gift).As Oliver’s little sister, she’s got a special ability known as “raising Oliver’s blood pressure.” She’s gotten her head stuck in between stair rails, crammed herself in one of the kitchen cabinets, and stuck a cactus she named Sir Steven the 17th to her arm (she recently learned she could do that). Her biggest accomplishment is that she tamed the raccoon under the porch with Coco Puffs. It's trained to attack robbers, door-to-door salesmen, and Santa Claus. Roxanne can neither confirm nor deny if she's a source of inspiration for Holly's schemes.For the rest of the group, they can’t help but enjoy her company, even if she can be a bit much. Vale will even halfway tolerate her presence. Which means Holly thinks they’re best friends.
Oliver Brooks
Art Fight Character ID: 4034109Oliver is clumsy but good hearted. He’s a brown belt in jujitsu and also holds the school record for “most times fallen down the stairs”. He has a love of baking (discovered after accidentally crashing into the school’s bake sale table and baking a hundred cupcakes as an apology) and is always ready to lend a helping hand, even if his powers are the accidental source of the problem.Oliver is a psycalter- his powers give him abilities from other people’s emotions. Anger gives him strength, fear gives him speed, happiness lets him jump high, and love causes him to float into the air. Sometimes that means helping an upset person carry their heavy boxes. Other times it means jumping really high on the trampoline to make a baby sister laugh and crash into the tree in the backyard.If Oliver is alone with someone for long enough, he can feel exactly what they’re feeling. However, most of the time he’s in a crowded school, hanging out with his friends, or relaxing at home with his family. So, most emotions end up being a muffled jumble.No matter what, Oliver is committed to doing the right thing, even if that means stopping Holly from creating the “ultimate smoothie” filled with fruit, gummy bears, and vanilla or being a bit oblivious to the signals his crush keeps trying to give him.
Oliver’s Development
I feel like it’ll put me in danger to say this, but Oliver is my favorite character (Flint is tracking down my location as I speak). He’s the first of the characters I ever developed, and it’s been a rocky road since trying to figure out who exactly he is. Originally, Holly was going to be the adopted one of the family, but once I switched it to Oliver, there’s been stuff brewing in my head about how this sort of thing could impact his personality (positively and negatively).Most of the changes he’s been through have been surface level. Is he clumsy to the point of being unskilled and a bit incompetent? No- I ditched that idea not too long ago. What kind of powers does he have? I changed his abilities to better suit the Oliver I’d like to be able to write one day.Despite all this, though, he still wears that silly beanie.
Holly’s Growth
Holly still rocks the overalls and boots, but thank the Lord she isn’t mint green anymore (my eyes are burning looking at that first image). Writing children is difficult, despite being a formal child myself. There’s a tricky balance one must make when writing the kind of character that is Holly: you can’t make her too friendly and impulsive to the point of being annoying. Hopefully her mischievous spirit balances it out a bit!
