Dax Jones is a shapeshifter and COLA.
Discovery of Powers[]
Dax Jones first shapeshifted when locked in his garden shed. His half-sister, Alice Jones, and his step-mother, Gina Jones, had left him to go shopping. As a punishment during lunch, he had been shut outside and expected to weed the garden. Once the wind shut the door behind him, he began to dehydrate and panic. After a long time, the stress, as well as the need for fresh air, caused him to shift into a red fox.
Three days after his first shapeshifting experience, he involuntarily shifted to attack Clive's bullies, Toby and Matthew whilst at school. He noticed that he could smell their hostility and resentment as a side-effect from being a fox. Upon returning home that day, he met Owen Hind, who introduced him to Cola Club.
Appearance[]
He is described as having dark brown eyes, olive skin and thick glossy dark hair.
Relationships[]
As soon as he joined Cola Club, he quickly became best friends with Gideon Reader. Previously, his best friend was Clive, whom he helped numerous times after Toby and Matthew's bullying. Dax slowly became friends with Lisa Hardman: at first, she would pass spiritual messages to him so that she would not have to; after the death of Patrick Wood, she fully integrates into his friendship group. She later becomes his girlfriend after the attack on Fenton Lodge by Mia Cooper. He is also distantly related to Spook Williams.
His father, Robert Jones, is an oil worker who is often away from home in the North Sea, leaving Dax with his step-mother Gina and his half-sister Alice. Since his admission into Cola Club, Dax's relationship with his father became even sparser. Although he wants to talk about his Cola powers, his father often ignores him or changes the subject.
Dax's mother, Anita Jones, died when he was four. Like most Cola mothers, not much is known about her. However, she flouted the rules of the senders and left Dax a cleftonique to contact the Quorat. Through this he was able to visit the home planet of his mother, where he met his Aunt Hessa and cousin Carra. Both shapeshifters, Dax was able to see Aunt Hessa's form of a red bat-like creature. Carra, did not show her forms despite having the same power.
Before shapeshifting for the first time, Dax was visited by the spirit of Wolf Boy, the first shapeshifter. Throughout his time as Cola Club, the wolf prophesised various dangers that would affect Dax. Often the contents of these messages was unclear. Dax learned over his stay in Cola Club to respect the wolf more and dedicate more time to trying to decode what he could.
Relationship to COLA Club[]
Dax never fully saw eye-to-eye with the Cola Club administration and often tried to forge his own path where possible. On multiple occasions he left the agreed boundaries of the campus to help other students. Upon the arrival of Catherine Reader and the subsequent fog that followed her, he stopped eating food prepared on-campus as his suspicion about various tests the scientists had started grew.
Dax had a very close relationship with Owen Hind, his teacher and mentor whilst in Cola Club. Despite this, the two have fought multiple times based on miscommunication. After Hind's faked death, Dax's attitudes towards Cola Club shift, and he ultimately leaves due to the rise in drastic security measures.
Abilities[]
As a shapeshifter, Dax was able to shift between three other forms: a red fox, which he suspected to be one of his most natural of forms; after numerous messages from Wolf Boy to "take to the wing" during the fall of Tregarren College he learned to shift into a peregrine falcon; and finally after the supposed death of Owen Hind, he shifted into an otter. Upon taking each form, his perception of the world changes significantly. For example, Dax could see with the full scope of a peregrine falcon's eyes. Notably, his smell and hearing vastly improved as a human after shifting for the first time.
Dax also has a variety of minor psychic abilities due to his shifting. He was able to pick up other people's emotions when nearby, such as resentment from Toby and Matthew or sadness from Darren Tyler who felt homesick. In both cases, this acted as a forewarning exclusive to him. Furthermore, he is unaffected by most types of Glamour, especially illusion glamour: Patrick Wood was unable to charm him or Wolf Boy, and the other illusionists never could affect him. To him, the air appeared hazy around anyone who used glamour, the only way for him to see illusions were by touching the glamourists. Dax also had the ability to contact people telepathically, which he first realised he could do when he was a fox.
Dax was also able to telepathically contact Lisa. This started out as a byproduct of his own vulpine senses and later extended to being universal across his forms.