Aquaman

Aqualad (real name Kaldur'rahm, sometimes referred to as Kaldur) is the current leader of Young Justice. He is an Atlantean and the protégé and subject of his king and mentor, Aquaman. He has the ability to manipulate water at will and breathe underwater.

Personality
Aqualad is a very calm person, a trait unshared by the rest of his teammates. Soft spoken and clear headed, he has a tendency to think things through and formulate plans before taking any sort of action. He tries to see the good in all people, and often acts as the voice of reason amongst his teammates, who are rarely if ever as cool-headed as he is. Aqualad always speaks with an air of respect to all people, both young and old, and he demonstrates the utmost respect to all of the adult heroes of the Justice League (even when he disagrees with them). He holds Aquaman in higher regard due to being his king. He also makes it an active duty to instill these respectful traits into his teammates, with the most notably being Robin. An example is when he nudged Robin to stop laughing at Superboy during his bout with Black Canary and telling Robin he needs to be more respectful when talking about other people. Still, despite his calm behavior, Aqualad is still a teenager, and can at times behave rashly and impulsively. This is, of course, what led to the team's first mission together.

Aqualad was (eventually) considered by all his teammates to be the natural choice for team leader. He considers the position to be temporary, and believes Robin will take command when he's ready. Although he has proven to be a natural leader, Aqualad seemed reluctant to take the job, calling it a heavy burden. Still, he accepted taking on the role, and has done rather well for the most part.

Characteristics
Aqualad is an Atlantean teen, with blond hair, brown skin, silver eyes and a strong build. He possesses light black eel-like tattoos that run across his back and along his arms and glow a bright blue when using his powers. Aqualad also has webbed hands and feet and possesses a set of gills that allows him to breathe underwater.

His superhero costume is a skin tight full body red and blue swimsuit that exposes his arms and feet. For black-ops missions, he wears the same clothes except for his shirt which, using stealth-tech, changes to black. Aqualad also carries a waterpack that holds twin water-bearers and water. He can manipulate his water-bearers and turn them into whatever he chooses, but most often creates twin water blades, he also often manipulates nearby as easily as he manipulates the water he carries around. Off-duty, he usually wears a blue and black jacket with a high collar to hide his gills, black pants and black sandals.

Whenever at the beach, he wears dark blue swim trunks.

Early Life
Prior to the creation of The Team, the villain known as the Ocean Master had attacked Atlantis, causing Aquaman to do battle with him. During the fight, Aquaman looked on the verge of defeat, but was suddenly helped by the combined forces of Kaldur'rahm and Garth, who had both been students at the Atlantis Conservatory of Sorcery under the guidance of Queen Mera. Using a combination of Garth's magic and Kaldur's fighting abilities, the two helped Aquaman defeat Ocean Master. After the victory, Aquaman offered the boys the opportunity to become his proteges. However, while Garth declined the offer and returned to his studies, Kaldur jumped at the chance to serve his king as his sidekick. He became a superhero two years before his tour of the Hall of Justice.

He has an impressive knowledge of the people or factions he encounters and has identified many such as Guardian, Sportsmaster, the Cult of the Kobra and Professor Ivo.

Present
On July 4, Aqualad and Aquaman defeated the villainess Killer Frost at Pearl Harbor. Later the same day, he appeared at the Hall of Justice alongside Speedy, Robin, and Kid Flash, where they were supposed to be receiving a tour of the League's headquarters. He, along with the other sidekicks, were surprised at Speedy's sudden outburst of how their mentors continued to treat them like children. After the League members left the Hall of Justice, he decided to accompany Robin and Kid Flash to Cadmus Labs. At Cadmus, the young heroes discover the genomorph project and Superboy, whom they freed and unintentionally instill a battle (which they lost). Soon afterward, he convinced Superboy to free them from their pods and help them escape Cadmus. After fighting their way through the labs, the young heroes end up in a brawl against Blockbuster which in turn, destroyed the upper floors of Cadmus Labs. Aqualad is then present when the heroes decided to confront their mentors about the way they have been treated and how they are ready to prove themselves as heroes. On July 8, he along with Superboy, Robin, and Kid Flash are given their own headquarters in Mount Justice by Batman and introduced to Miss Martian. Later, he was introduced to Artemis.

Powers

 * Electricity Generation: He has the power to generate electricity from the eel tattoos on his arms, which he can channel through water or use as a direct offense against opponents.
 * Superhuman Strength: As an Atlantean, he possesses superhuman strength, as he was able to punch through solid concrete.
 * Enhanced Durability: Most likely due to his Atlantean blood, he is able to sustain multiple blows from both Superboy and Blockbuster without tiring. This also allows him to withstand high water pressure.
 * Hydrokinesis: Aqualad is able to manipulate water to serve any number of uses i.e. water blasts, whips, waves, shields, or water spouts to lift him into the air. He can manipulate water from a nearby source, like fire hydrants, lakes, etc or his waterpack. His water blasts are capable at slicing through metal and other materials.
 * Hard-Water Constructs: Aqualad has the unique ability to solidify water into a myriad of different weapons for physical attacks. So far he has created swords, maces, sledgehammers, and a small shield. This ability, like his hydrokinesis and electricity generation is powered by his eel tattoos.
 * Toxin resistance: Aqualad has a partial immunity to poisons of sea creatures, such as jellyfish toxin.
 * Superspeed Swimming: Aqualad's strength plus webbed hands and feet give him above average swimming speeds.
 * Underwater Breathing: Aqualad has the ability to breathe in water through the gill slits found on either side of his neck.
 * Sorcery: Before becoming Aquaman's sidekick, Aqualad was trained in the mystical arts by Queen Mera. Because he left his studies to be a hero, his skills have fallen behind those of his friends Tula and Garth, but his water-bearers compensate somewhat.

Equipment

 * Waterpack: Water-Bearers.jpg.]]A black metallic backpack that holds an unspecified amount of water that Aqualad can use. It also holds his Water-Bearers.
 * Water-Bearers: Twin hilts that can hold onto water which Aqualad then uses to create his hard-water weapons. They are also used as a type of water gun to shoot water from his waterpack and can be used to help manipulate sources of water.
 * Stealth-tech: Technology that is intergrated into a piece of clothing and can shift the color of that clothing from the original color to a darker color. Aqualad can access it by pressing the "A" belt buckle on his waist, his "blend" color is dark grey.

Aquaman
Being the King of Atlantis' partner, Aqualad sees Aquaman as a ruler, a mentor and a father figure. He was saddened upon learning that his king had kept vital information of the Justice League from him. The two however have since then repaired their friendship and partnership, with Aquaman offering Aqualad advise on relationships, love, and duty.

Superboy
Because of Aqualad's more soft-spoken nature (compared to Robin and Kid Flash) and his ability to empathize with others, he was able to convince Superboy to free them, as well as go with them as they made their escape. It seems as though he will continue to help Superboy adjust to normal life, as evidenced when he suggested for Superboy to "just say sorry" to Miss Martian when he overreacted to her use of telepathy.

Robin
Due to being one of the oldest members of the team, is naturally the team's big brother. This relationship is most obvious between him and Robin. While Aqualad is the mature rational older brother, Robin behaves far more impulsively and immature, which often results in Aqualad having to keep him in-check. However, despite their extreme differences in personality, the pair of them get along very well, showing great respect for each other. When time came for the team to chose a field leader, Robin initially saw himself as the most appropriate leader of the team, citing his greater experience despite being the youngest member of the team. However, Aqualad explained that Robin's experience and his strong working relationship with Batman meant that Robin assumed his teammates could follow his plans without much explanation, whereas the team really needed a leader who would be clear. Robin instead suggested that Aqualad should be the team's leader, and Aqualad accepted. Nevertheless, Aqualad claimed that Robin was a natural leader and would one day be ready to take control of the team.

Miss Martian
Aqualad is Miss Martian's teammate and an earnest friend. He is the first to reveal his real name to her, and he sometimes helps her with unfamiliar aspects of Earth culture. Miss Martian has mentioned that she looks at Aqualad like an older brother.

Artemis
Aqualad was the first to accept Artemis, believing that she was a good asset to the team. He behaves like a friend to her.

Garth
Aqualad is best friends with Garth back in Atlantis and they along with Tula trained together at Atlantean Conservatory of Sorcery under Queen Mera. When Kaldur'rahm became Aquaman's protege he left his studies and carried out his responsibilities as Aqualad, and later joined Young Justice. During this time, Garth and Tula began dating, which hurt Aqualad who also had feelings for Tula.

Tula
Tula is Aqualad's former love-interest/crush from Atlantis. They, along with Garth trained together at the Atlantean Conservatory of Sorcery, until Aqualad was offered the role of Aquaman's sidekick. Aqualad thought long of Tula, who he had feelings for, and considered leaving The Team for her. He returned to the team however, when he realizes she and Garth had begun a relationship.

Black Manta
Black Manta was revealed to be Aqualad's father. However, Aqualad has yet to discover this but it seems Manta knows about it and it hasn't stopped him from trying to kill him.

Notable Quotes

 * "So just like that? We're a team on a mission?" - Independence Day
 * "I'm here, 100%" - Downtime
 * "I'm sorry, but we will. Apologies my King, but no. We did good work here today, the four of us." - Fireworks

Production background
Kaldur'rahm was developed specifically for Young Justice, rather than using the existing Aqualad, Garth. There were several reasons for this. In the comics, Garth had stopped using the name Aqualad and started going by the name Tempest. Furthermore, Garth had been killed off during the event Blackest Night, so the character was not current at the time of development. A new character also provided an opportunity to add more diversity to the cast. Kaldur'rahm was therefore created, inspired by characters such as Cal Durham (a supporting character from the Aquaman family of books, after whom Kaldur is named), as well as the DC series Arion, in which it was revealed that not all Atlanteans are Caucasian.

During production of the series, Geoff Johns saw the designs for Kaldur'rahm and decided to transfer the character into the mainstream DC universe as the new Aqualad (replacing Garth). Johns' Aqualad has a slightly different background to Kaldur'rahm: rather than being raised in Atlantis, he was raised as a human in New Mexico and he goes by the name Jackson Hyde rather than Kaldur'rahm. He lacks Kaldur's obvious Atlantean physical traits, but retains Kaldur's eel tattoos and powers (in the TV series, the tattoos were given to Kaldur by the Conservatory of Sorcery; in the comics, Jackson Hyde was born with them). Jackson Hyde first appeared in Brightest Day #4, which preceded the pilot movie of Young Justice by five months.

Trivia

 * Aqualad speaks in a very formal manner and doesn't seem to use contractions, as an example he says "you are" instead of "you're".
 * Aqualad's father is revealed to be the Black Manta, Aquaman's enemy, although Aqualad is currently unaware of this.