Gloria (C2H5NO2)

"I've seen comets a million times too and they never get boring."

Gloria always seems to know how to behave in any situation. She’s been called the best of her constituent Elementals, and is a sort of golden child among the amino acids and Compound Kids at large. Extremely flexible and able to handle whatever is thrown at her, it seems like nothing ever gets Gloria down. When alone she tends to be more quiet and withdrawn, calm and lost in thought. Among her friends she’s excitable and bursting with joy. Yet she never seems to be in a bad mood. Perhaps she is just really good at hiding her bad emotions. As excited and worked up as she can get, at the end of the day she can always calm back down. She effortlessly fits in time to relax and always seems recharged when she’s needed. She’s always positive, yet she doesn’t seem as sickeningly sweet as some other Compound Kids. Her constant desire to help out with everything leads the other amino acids to wonder if she really is burning herself out and hiding it. Is she hiding her dissatisfaction, her negative thoughts, anything that would take away from the idea that she’s perfect? She can be controlling and tries to take over the jobs of the other amino acids, especially Mei’s leadership role. She’s been pestering the Small Molecular Council to give her a bigger role. Does she share Hannah’s controlling tendencies? Even if not, she surely shares Hannah’s love of astronomy. She spends her nights looking up, and always has the next big astronomical event marked on her calendar. Aside from amino acid training this seems to occupy the most of her time. She has a big appetite and loves to snack on whatever protein-rich thing she can get her hands on. She also loves gelatin. Polly is one of Gloria’s closest friends, and the two just seem to work together. Polly helps Gloria not take on too much. Gloria has helped Elaine warm up to others, and Elaine always brings out the peppy side of Gloria. Alana is her rival, which of course leads people to read something more into their tension. Gloria and Mei frequently butt heads, and Mei seems to be at least a bit jealous of Gloria, always happy and carefree while she’s bitter and stressed. 

Physical Appearance

Slightly shorter than average at 152 cm (5’0”). Thin but moderately muscular. Four digits on each hand and foot. Minimal curves, rectangular figure. Round face, puffy cheeks. Light peach skin tone with slightly pinkish undertones. Large light blue eyes. Small, upturned nose. Four clusters of ten white dots arranged like a glycine molecule; one on her forehead, one on her chest, one on her left forearm, and one on her right thigh (only the first is usually visible and drawn). Chest-length platinum blonde to white hair, sometimes in two ponytails secured by pinkish hair ties. For her training outfit she wears a loose long-sleeve shirt and long pants with an outer space/nebula design on them; a belt that’s red on the right side and blue on the left, with a white circle with a black “G” in the middle; and white sneakers with pinkish soles and laces. For her casual outfit she wears a dark blue to light blue long sleeve shirt with comets on it; a navy blue puffer jacket; medium blue pants with dark orange-yellow vertical stripes; and white shoes with brown soles and laces

Design Notes

Gloria’s shapes are overall round, as she is friendly and hard to anger. As the smallest and simplest amino acid, she is the shortest and has a low body weight. Though she is thin and flexible, she still has a bit of muscle mass because as an amino acid she is a component of proteins. The building blocks of biomolecules and other organic Compound Kids intimately tied up with life tend to have more natural human eye and hair colors. It’s common for amino acids to have natural hair colors that are dyed bright colors on the ends. Gloria’s white tips reference the CPK coloring of hydrogen, as glycine’s side chain is just a hydrogen atom. Her twintails reference the two hydrogen atoms attached to the central carbon in glycine, and comet tails. Like all zwitterions she has plus and minus signs on her palms with colors that match her valence marks. Her valence marks are on her forehead, chest, forearm, and thigh. The forehead cluster references glycine as a neurotransmitter, the chest cluster references collagen, which is important to the heart’s structure, and the remaining two reference muscle protein. Her training outfit has a long-sleeve shirt with a round neckline like all aliphatic amino acids and loose pants like all nonpolar amino acids. She wears the red-and-blue belt of conditionally essential amino acids with glycine’s one-letter abbreviation, G (they’re not always obvious like that). Her hair ties and shoes are based on the appearance of pork rind, which has a lot of collagen. The main pattern of her shirt and pants is based on outer space and nebulae, as glycine has been found in meteorites, comets, and maybe interstellar space. Her blue jacket and casual shirt are also based on this. Her casual pants have stripes on them that represent collagen fibers. Collagen is one of the most glycine-rich proteins.