Charles Reyes

Charles Reyes is a side character that appears in several games and short stories set in the Elsaverse, and who sems to be taking the main villain's role for the second story arc. He is Morland Reyes' son, and Chloe's older brother; following Morland's orders, he was in a relationship with Jessica Springfield, just to hurt her. Charles is a Suppressor: other people's powers don't work properly when he is around.

Personal
Charles is, basically, the exact opposite of his sister Chloe: snide, selfish and evil-hearted, Morland defines him as someone who is "as loyal as a collie, and about as smart". Born from the same human mother, who tried to give them a moral compass, Charles simply chose to follow his father's footsteps, shared his goals, and never questioned his methods. From a very young age, he showed some serious evil potential, to the point of even infecting his mother with the scarlet fever, which eventually caused her death. As an adult, he became one of Morland's minions and carried out several missions for him. The most important one, at least according to its effects during the period covered in the saga, was to becoming Jessica Springfield's boyfriend, in order to make her realize about her power in the most dramatic way, which should prevent her from intervening in the future bombing Morland was planning. They met in a Mayhem's concert at one of Morland's casinos, and despite his selfish attitude, Charles managed to impress Jessica enough to start a relationship with her; some time later, though, he break up with her right before one of her concerts, and she sang in anger. Due to Jessica's power, that anger infected the audience, and Charles used it to fuel a massive brawl he started. As a consequence, five people died, and Jessica fell into a depressive state. About six weeks later, Charles was assigned to plant a bomb inside a car near Mayor Joey Bertradino's rally; fortunately, and thanks to Marc's moral support and Miranda secret actions to protect her using Chloe's insight info, Jessica was able to prevent a huge massacre. However, the bomb still caused some victims and, eventually, led Mayor Bertradino to lose the elections, as Morland desired.

In that six-weeks interim, Charles wasn't exactly inactive. Right after causing the riot at Mayhem's concert, he left his apartment to avoid the Police, and was seen selling a book he had borrowed from Jessica. Then, less than a week before the bombing, he tried to trick a man called Patrick Bower into killing an accountant, Lucile, that Morland wanted to eliminate. But Xara's unexpected intervention foiled that plan, and Charles was assigned to gather as much info as possible about that short, blind woman. A couple of weeks after the bombing, Charles helped Crow to abduct Xara, and he then ran away in a car when Xara's friends came to rescue her.

With Morland gone, and while still hiding from the Police, Charles decided to take over his father's dirty business, and started to recruit different people from Sangrive with unnatural abilities. So far, it's known he has convinced Maria, a girl who can draw people's attention to herself so that they don't perceive anything else going on around them, and Trisha Blackhawk, who apparently can make people trust her and confess their secrets. Using Maria as a bait, he also tried to get Trisha's brother, Michael, on board, but Michael refused. Although Charles' ultimate goal remains unknown, he has already achieved something his father never could: stealing the "Morpheus", the magical book of dreams, thanks to Trisha's efforts.

Powers
The contrast between Charles and Chloe is specially visible when talking about powers: while Chloe has no powers at all, but causes a malfunction on her father's foreshadowing power, Charles is a Suppressor who shut off other people's power, except Morland's. Powers that affect all people at once, like Maria's distraction power, seems to be totally blocked by his mere presence within a short range of just a few metres from the power bearer. On the other hand, powers that can be focused specifically on someone, like Alexis' or Candace's emotion reading powers, simply don't work at all when they try to use them on him, no matter the distance. This different behaviour explains why Jessica could broadcast her anger during Mayhem's concert, as Charles was at some distance from the stage, while Alexis couldn't read his emotions at all, despite being also relatively away from him.

Ironically, given the effect his power causes on others, Charles can't turn his own power on and off at will, as most people with powers do: his power is always on.

Miscellaneous

 * Charles is infatuated with Crow, and used to peep on her having sex with Morland.


 * The fact that Charles didn't seem affected by Jessica's singing during the riot was perceived as some kind of built immunity, like the one Marc, Mayhem members and Jess' old friends have. Although it's still possible he is immune to Jessica's voice, he might also be using ear plugs.


 * Charles isn't unveiled as Morland's son and Chloe's brother until the short story FM: Alpha (2017). However, this family link was already hinted in Redemption for Jessika (2016), when Elsa says that Charles reminded her of someone she met, referring to Chloe.