Paul Slater

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Paul Slater is one of the main characters in the Mediator series by Meg Cabot, from its fourth book. He is considered at times the antagonist, though in the end he means good. He was born in Seattle as a mediator and moved to Carmel, California when he was seventeen. He is a very clever and cunning young man, and will stop at nothing to get what he wants.

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[edit] Biography

Paul was born in Seattle, Washington to parents Dr. Rick and Mrs. Nancy Slater. He has a 9 years younger brother, Jack, who is unlike him almost in every way. He was born a mediator, or shifter, as were his grandfather and his little brother, and was, to some degree, ashamed of it, like his father.

As was hinted several times in the novels, Paul was not Mr. Popularity at his old school, despite his stunningly handsome looks and intelligence. He remarked, in book 5, that he could 'get used' to being captain of the tennis team and adored by his classmates.

When Paul was around 17 years old, at the beginning of Darkest Hour he and his family came to vacation in Carmel, where they stayed in the Pebble Beach Hotel and Golf Resort, where Suze and her stepbrother were working at the time. Suze was Jack's babysitter and Paul took a liking to her immediately, though it was quite different than his parents' liking for her. He constantly followed her around and hinted that he thought she was beautiful. However, when Suze helped Jack overcome his fear of ghosts, he realized she was a mediator herself and tried to hide his own talent, until, finally, he revealed it to her and Jesse unexpectedly.

In the beginning of the next school year, Paul tried to get closer to Suze and moved in with his 'gork' of a grandfather in Carmel. He spent the year trying to seduce her and teach her about shifting, which was the proper term, according to his grandfather and himself, to their kind of mediation. After realizing that he wasn't going to make it in the conventional way and fighting horribly with Jesse for her, he goes back in time in the sixth installment and tries to keep Jesse from dying, to wipe out his opponent. Instead, Suze follows him to 1850 and they accidentally bring him back to their time, where he comes alive again. At the end of the series, he seems to have 'lain off' Suze, turning to Kelly Prescott (reluctantly) instead, and the pair had forgiven him.

[edit] Appearance and Personality

Paul is described as being, to make a long story short, hot. He has brown hair and mesmerizing blue eyes. He is tan and 'ripped'. Also, Suze described him as being funny, smart and athletic. He is a fantastic tennis player, and reads very 'serious' books by Kierkegaard, Nietzche, and Martin Heidegger. Father Dominic once said it would have been hard to come up with something to use to not accept him to the academy, because of his great grades and teacher recommendations. All in all, he gives off the impression of an exquisite young man.

However, as Suze soon discovers, he is not all he's cracked up to be. He is manipulative, cunning, selfish, egotisctical and almost disturbingly persistant. He does not care if he has to hurt people - either physically or emotionally - to get what he wants, and has very little respect for people he feels are inferior to him. He is a liar, resorting to fabricate stories and opinions to get people to believe him, and tends to conspire with less-than-desirable people. Once, when he presented Suze with a handkerchief, his reply to her amazement was "You never know when you'll need to gag someone". Suze has referred to him as the Devil, and said he came out of Hell - an explanation to why he is so 'hot'.

Eventually, however, Paul's true colors are shown and it is clear he really means good, and was driven by his love for Suze. He is revealed to be weaker than he's portrayed, and apologizes for the way he's behaved and the damage he's caused. Suze accepts his apology, understanding his motives, and is actually thankful to him for causing her to bring Jesse back. Paul isn't really as bad as he seems.

[edit] As a Shifter

Paul is known to be abusive of his talent as a shifter. Though he uses it and cherishes it at times, it is clear he is ashamed of the way he was born and what he was born into, desiring to be like his father. Though he knows and has learned a lot about this gift, he remains extremely displeased of being born with such an anormality, which he links inevitably with his crackpot grandfather and unintellegent brother. In a certain way, he inherits his shame of the subject from his father - back when Paul's grandfather had paraded his gift around proudly, his son felt so ashamed to be related to such a man he had to change his name.

Despite his misgivings to his gift, Paul enjoys the benefitial parts of it very much. He seems to have conspired with Maria De Silva and Felix Diego's ghosts to get Jesse, Suze's love interest, out of the way in Darkest Hour, and has "ghostly minions", as Suze called one of them, to do his bidding. He is powerful and knows what he's doing. Unlike Father Dominic and Suze, he doesn't use his abillity to help the spirits, but takes advantage of them dismissively, like he did in Twilight, with the ghost of Mrs. Gutierrez - he takes her money, which was meant for her children, and sends her away so she would not bother him.

Paul is very intellegent concerning shifting. He knows everything there is to know about it - almost, anyway - and seems to have learned it all from his grandfather's works. He is the one who taught Suze most of the things she knows about shifting, including abusing the existence of 'Shadowland', the limbo she goes to in the fourth book, and how to time travel. However, as mentioned before, he is abusive of these, and does not use them to benefit anyone but himself.

[edit] Relationships with Other Characters

[edit] Suze

Paul met Suze while he was vacationing in Carmel. Though, at first, Suze saw him as nothing but a hot, smart guy that she's embarrassed to be in front of in her awful uniform shorts, he likes her immediately as something much more than just his little brother's babysitter. He takes to skipping games to coming to the pool to 'spy' on her and becomes very persistent of asking her out, though she always refuses, being madly in love with Jesse. Paul, of course, catches this, and conspires with the Diegos to eliminate him. He doesn't succeed, however, and decides to move to Carmel to try again. Suze believes he tried to kill her, though technically he just did not save her, and refuses to talk to him, but he corners her several times to tease her and try to seduce her. One of the biggest problem in their relationship, however, is suspicion. Suze constantly suspects Paul, thinking he is up to something to try to get her - which he usually is - and therefore unable to speak to him without becoming hostile; and Paul suspects Suze of lying to him and planning to use soul transference to move Jesse's soul into his body and, in the process, murder Paul. This is one of the major obstacles between them. Also, they have remarkably different personalities. Having received everything he's wanted in the past, he cannot even accept the idea that Suze is out of his reach. He goes as far as traveling back in time in the last installment to try to win her, but in the end, he realized it just won't work after seeing Jesse save her life for real, and gives her up. They part ways in good terms.

[edit] Jesse de Silva

Paul and Jesse have an extremely hostile relationship. Paul has referred to Jesse several times as 'Rico Suave' and, in the sixth installment, they tend to say Him contemptuously and scowl everytime the other is mentioned or hinted at. Paul thinks of Jesse as the obstacle standing between him and Suze's happiness, and persistently tries to break them apart, telling them several times that they have no future together and he is better for her. Jesse thinks of Paul, in turn, as a spoiled, interfering, pompous brat who thinks he is superior to everyone, and means to harm Suze. They are so hostile and competetive with each other that one specific argument, which started as teasing and taunting, caused them to ruin half of Suze's house in a violent fight, where Jesse went as far as throwing Paul down the stairs, through a glass door and attempted to drown him in a hot tub. Even Past Jesse, the live one they met in Twilight, disliked Paul very much. Eventually, they are forced to reconcile to some degree, but will never quite be friends.

[edit] Dr. Slasky

Paul does not have a functional relationship with his grandfather. One of his favortie nicknames for him is 'Grandpa Gork', which Suze is very unhappy with. He takes him as nothing but an old idiot who knows nothing of the proper way to use his talents, and considers his revealing his theories to the world completely crazy. He hopes greatly never to become like him again and believes he can talk of nothing but gameshows in his condition. In the end of the series, however, Father Dominic encourages him to make peace with his grandfather before it is too late, and he complies. They seem to be in better terms in the end than before.

[edit] Jack

Jack is Paul's little brother, and Jack thinks highly of Paul, constantly trying to impress him. Paul, however, thinks, for the most part, that his little brother is a wimp and not very bright. He showed complete lack of interest in Jack by ignoring his cries for help, and not helping him understand what he his. However, he does like him, as a family member, to some degree.

[edit] Kelly Prescott

Kelly is, in a way, Paul's cover in the Academy and his way to try to make Suze jealous. She has a crush on him, but, or at least so it appears, she is only a sexual object in his eyes, not like Suze. He disses her completely in the fifth book in a tantrum, but they seem to be on good terms in the sixth one. She is his date for the dance depicted in the last chapter, so it is presumed he has compromised for her instead of Suze.

[edit] Appearances

Paul Slater has appeared in the following installments:

•"Darkest Hour"/"Young Blood"

•"Haunted"/"Grave Doubts"

•"Twilight"/"Heaven Sent"

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