Garrett's powers are, as far as anyone can tell, a result of random genetic mutation. There are no outstanding incidents in his past that might have granted him his abilities, and nobody knows of any supers in the family tree.
Physical: Garrett is noticeably more physically gifted than the average human. Significantly improved reflexes and modestly increased strength combine with almost a decade of aikido to make him competent in combat and difficult to hurt, if only through talent and training rather than any actual physical resistance to damage.
Energy: While he's still very much learning how to control it, Garrett's more impressive talent is how he manipulates the ambient energy in space in order to stretch or compress it. He has no inherent energy attacks (yet?), as all he does for now is move the energy in space, and doesn't actually remove or add any.
Enhanced Strength: A largely untrained skill, Garrett's strength is on par with a high-level weight lifting competitor. Negligible compared to what some supers can do, but far above the human average.
Enhanced Reflexes: Garrett's reflexes are far superior to what a 'normal' human could hope to achieve, though such a thing is understandably difficult to quantify.
Spatial Distortion: Garrett's main bag of tricks and by far most unique talent. Garrett can create an energy vacuum between two points (though those 'points' can be two distinct volumes of space, not necessarily distinct points), effectively shrinking the space between two points to cross that distance in less time without actually needing (or being able to) personally move any faster. The side effect of this is that space behind the compressed region is proportionally stretched, so anything travelling through the stretched space is effectively slowed. This combination of compressing and stretching forms a field, with the speed/slow effects diminishing proportionally as things approach from closer to perpendicular to the target areas of distortion. With practice, Garrett should be able to effectively control how large of a field he can generate, at what distance, orient the compression/stretching effect as needed, and maybe even generate multiple fields simultaneously. NOTE: Garrett is, as of his enrollment at Coral Springs, only vaguely aware of this aspect of his power. He's not positive what it can do, let alone how to do it.
Weaknesses: Garrett is vulnerable to being flanked; since the greatest compression/stretch effect is in a straight line, things coming in perpendicular to that line are unaffected. If attackers were to come at Garrett from two directions, he's only be able to use his powers on one without repositioning himself.
Since the fields don't /actually/ slow or speed things up, they can neither be used to add force behind a blow, nor render bullets harmless; getting hit by either a punch or a bullet that is being effected by a field would be the same as one not being influenced. Things enter and exit the field at the same speed.
Garret's abilities only effect the physical; matter and energy are the only things that are sped/slowed by his fields. Magic not only ignores spatial distortion, but causes the field to collapse entirely in the process. Furthermore, Garrett is unable to construct distortion fields when he is under the influence of magic (whether it is aiding or hindering him). Stretched/compressed space has no influence on the range of psychic powers.
Do No Harm: Last, Garrett does his best not to be violent. He won't shy away from a fight if it's truly necessary, and he acknowledges that in an imperfect world, killing might even be a necessary evil at times. That doesn't mean he can't try to avoid it.
When Garrett was born in Philadelphia, there was no reason to believe he was any more special than any other child. His engineer mother, Morgan, and lawyer father, Lincoln, thought him just an ordinary child, no different from his older sister, Alexis (age 3 when Garrett was born). After another two years passed Eric, the youngest of the siblings, was born, but already Garrett's parents began to suspect he was a little different from their other children. At the park he was already navigating monkey bars and small rock walls unassisted. As this seemed only slightly unusual, his parents thought nothing of it. As years passed, though, they noticed he constantly seemed a fair bit stronger than he should be. Garrett was 7 when what should have been a mostly harmless shove over a toy resulted in Eric's arm getting broken. Realizing they could no longer pretend their son was perfectly normal, Garrett's parents enrolled him in aikido to try teaching him to control himself without hurting anybody. Garrett has been a regular practitioner ever since, and was even lucky enough to go to Japan in fifth grade as an exchange student.
For a while, things seemed well under control for Garrett and his family. Fear from hurting his brother as a child combined with years of aikido led Garrett to adopt a number of non-violent hobbies. Art in all forms, be in music, visual, or written, captured and kept hold of his attention. He took up a variety of musical instruments before he discovered, and promptly latched onto, the guitar. He never gained much proficiency in artistic writing, but that did nothing to lessen his appreciation for the written word. Indeed, it left him more time for sketching and music. For a while he even swore he would become a doctor when he grew up, but that particular dream didn't make it far initial first aid and CPR classes. It was when he was looking into treating more serious injuries that he realized he'd rather find a way to prevent people from getting hurt in the first place. As puberty set in, Garrett began to manifest what was his most impressive ability, though nobody quite understood it at the time. The children were all outside, Eric was climbing a tree and fell, and Garrett did as would be expected, running to try to catch him. Catching his younger brother safely in his arms, Eric and Garrett both gave little thought to how Garrett had managed to get there in time. Alexis, who had been looking on, would swear that Eric slowed down in midair as he fell. This was mostly written off as adrenaline making things seem to slow down, and no further thought was given to it. Nothing similar happened for another couple years until Garrett, now 15, stopped at a convenience store on his way home. The only other patron in the store was there to rob it. The poor resolution of the security cameras only did a little to help clarify what happened when the thief produced a pistol, but what is certain is that someone made it around the counter to shove the clerk aside then back to the front to disarm and take down the would-be thief, leaving a confused Garrett standing over him a heartbeat later. The failed thief ran away, uncaught, as Garrett stood stunned. Eventually the footage managed to attract the attention of a certain school off the New Hampshire coast, and so with the onset of his sophomore year, Garrett found himself attending Coral Springs.
