| Leto Jones | |
 |
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| Portrayed By | Adrien Brody |
|---|---|
| Gender | Male |
| Date of Birth | February 12, 1980 |
| Age | 27 |
| Zodiac Sign | Aquarius |
| Aliases | Lee |
| Place of Birth | New York City, NY, USA |
| Current Location | New York City, NY, USA |
| Occupation | Junior High School Civics Teacher |
| Known Relatives | Billy Jones (father; missing), Mary Jones (mother; missing), Ghanima Jones (twin sister) |
| Significant Other | None |
| Known Abilities | Hanging around making smart remarks |
| First Appearance | Like A Daffodil |
Lee's real name is Leto, can you blame him for going by a nickname? He's a junior high civics teacher in New York City.
History
Billy and Mary Jones loved comic books and science fiction. They met at a science fiction convention, had a Starfleet wedding, and their family business, a comic book store named "The Secret Lair", was their pride and joy. But what the world didn't see in these two eccentric young folks was an obsession. A dangerous one. Maybe it was an encounter earlier in their lives with the evolved still hidden, or a particular twist in a strand of acid they dropped at a Lord of the Rings-themed party, or a misplaced government document that ended up mimeographed in their hands, but both of them had become convinced that superpowers were real. Their whole lives were dedicated to this obsession, to obtaining such power for themselves - and when that proved unlikely or impossible, gaining them for their children. With the hard-white light of their madness visible like a beacon, they - and their twins Ghanima and Leto, named for twins in Frank Herbert's Dune series, became the catspaws for much more serious and dangerous forces.
The Joneses subjected their children to strange and dangerous experiments - dropped them off buildings into firefighter nets, while the other filmed. Put additives in their food. Exposed them to strange medicines, herbs, supplements. Even simple family games involved tests of psychic ability. By any objective measure, the Joneses were mad beyond belief.
The kids never saw it, though, thinking their parents merely eccentric, when they were old enough to understand. By the time their memory was sequential enough to understand what was normal and what wasn't, their parents had, after years of constantly trying, given up their more extreme methods of awakening super-abilities. Their parents' obsessions were disappointed, crushingly disappointed, though like the obsession itself, they hid it well from their children, and they certainly had sufficient and genuine love for their twins that their upbringing was only a few degrees off from normal. The twins saw their parents foibles about comics and superheroes as a shared interest, at first, then an embarrassing, mortifying mark of social ostracism, then, in their own ways, they eventually made their peace with it. Billy and Mary never gave up on the idea of their children becoming more than human, always trying this or that behind their backs, new treatments and chemicals in their food ("Mom never could cook.") and one day in 2004 the debt from one of their Faustian deals came due and they disappeared without a trace.
Lee was away at college, in UCLA, but he returned to his sisters side to grieve a loss that, unsolved and unresolved, he has never really understood. Ghanima honored her parents memory the way she felt they would have wished, turning her considerable business skills to saving the old, musty shop that had been the center of their parents lives. It is now more successful than when their parents ran the place. Leto, by contrast, wanted nothing to do with the comics that had always driven him crazy, and went back to college to get his Master's, for all the good that it did him.
Lee went as far away as he could for college and majored, as he explained to his mother, in "very thick books where people wear their underwear under their clothes, not over." His superior attitude wouldn't get him much in the job market, though. After his parents' disappearance and his return to the city of his birth, the only work he could find with his Masters' degree was teaching at a junior high school, not even in his field, a job he hates and finds tedious and pointless. His sister is always trying to draw him into geeky pursuits, but he still harbors a good deal of resentment over what he sees as a wasted childhood. (He does, however, play electric violin in what he considers "her" quirky hipster electro band, Mobius Ouroboros.)
Timeline
- February 12, 1980. A bit after midnight, Leto Eomer Jones is born. His sister Ghanima follows about an hour later.
- December 18, 2002. Leto graduates from UCLA with a degree in literature and a minor in philosophy.
- March 18, 2004. Returning from class, Ghanima discovers that the family store has either not been opened for the day or has been closed, and neither father nor mother are anywhere to be found. Nothing is missing.
- March 20, 2004. Billy and Mary Jones are declared officially to be missing persons. Investigation by Detective Benito Aceveda of the NYPD over the next few months reveals no leads. Eventually it is classified as a cold case and archived.
- June 18, 2004. His studies aborted before he could receive a doctorate, Leto settles for a Masters of Arts in humanities from UCLA.
- December 2, 2004. Leto is certified as a teacher by the New York Department of Education. He is hired for substitute teaching and internship over the next few months.
- March 2005. Leto is hired at John Philip Sousa Junior High School #142 in the armpit of the Bronx as a civics teacher.
2007. Present day, present time.
- February 2007. Lee is nearly burned up in a fire. The stress is such that he falls out of bed. And hits the ceiling. He discusses the fire with Cass and is snarled at by Hendrickson.
- March 2007. Lee is over at Cass' when a bunch of friggin' maniacs run in and punch him in the groin. Cass explains partly to him and Nima but he ends up believing a bit less than when he was drugged. He is later almost shot trying to help one of his students and later is set on fire and mistaken for a Koreatown pimp on a first date. Lee hangs around the comic shop and makes smart remarks. He talked to Nima about everything that had happened, and finds out his father is alive and may be up to no good. He hassles a guy who broke in the shop with a gun.
- April 2007. A second date ends in a murder of a hobo. Lee goes on a double date and it's not tragically horrible.
- May 2007. Lee hassles a guy in the shop with a lot of money.
- July 2007. Lee meets his father again, but it isn't exactly the happiest reunion and he feels trapped and blackmailed by people who may or may not mean well. He recruits some assistance and discovers the existence of powers, which he decides is highly infuriating due to being so derivative and cliche. He complains to Cass about it.
Quotes
- "Okay, everybody sit down. Sit down please…we have a lot to get through before Friday's quiz!…Anthony, sit down. Yes. Sit down, please. All right. Neveah, yes. Sit down. Thanks. Now we start with the three branches of government and….sit down, Jan…"
- "Well, don't bring your friggin' dog on the Lindbergh kidnapping next time, for crying out loud!"
- "It's so fucking cliche! It's so…so derivative! The woman I care about has this fucking secret all along? Two comic book shop owners get tangled up with people with superpowers? The bad guy is telling the truth when he's talking crazy? A serial killer murdered his wife and now he's out for blood? What's fucking next? What's next? He meets the serial killer and it's his wife's boyfriend? Or maybe he becomes a serial killer himself? Who'd see THAT coming, excluding of course those who have read the back of a book in a grocery store in the last twenty fucking years?"
Trivia
- Rhode Island did not send delegates to the Constitutional Convention.
Themesong
Falling, falling. Gonna drop like a stone. I'm falling through the atmosphere on a warm afternoon. If lovers discover that everyone dies….So don't tell me. Please hold me. It's a dangerous life. Daddy dear, let's get out of here. I'm scared. Ten o'clock - night time in New York - it's weird. If you're looking for trouble, well, that's what you will find. Mom and pop. They will fuck you up. For sure. Love so deep. Kills you in your sleep. It's true. Love keeps us together. Love will keep us alive. We are criminals that never broke no laws. And all we needed was a net to break our fall. They're searching for diamonds. They're grabbing at straws. Sex and sin. Sax and violins. It's hell. Wooden heads. Furniture with legs. For sale. Love keeps us together. Love will drive us insane. And we are criminals that never broke no law. All we needed was a net to break our fall. Going home, back where I belong. To stay. Rays of light, they will turn the night to day. Birds travel together. Birds follow the sun. I am watching as the birds go flying home.