Layne wears a long black shirt and torn blue jeans accompanied by a long brown leather jacket. Layne usually uses contact lenses but he is known to wear a pair of small rectangle shaped silver-blue glasses when he is not piloting his zoids. Layne is also known to carry at least one book with him at all times.

History:
Dark Layne was anything but a zoid pilot when he was born, with no sign of any potential to become a pilot, or even a mechanic for that matter. His father, a rather famous yet unnamed zoids pilot, gave Dark two rather impossible options: either develop an ability to pilot or fix zoids or to go a boarding school ran by Dark's uncle, John Clayven. Unable to develop his skills in the limited amount of time set by his father, Dark was banished to the boarding school, developing a hatred to all things mechanical, especially zoids.

The Gray Torch Academy was unanimously remembered by all of its students as the worst place they have ever lived in. Most of the students in the academy were kids who ran away from home and found by the authorities, this being their last chance to make something of themselves before becoming part of the streets for good.

Dark entered the academy at the age of 12 and was asked to perform a test before being placed in one of the classes; he didn't find the test too hard and finished it quickly. Dark was surprised to learn that the test he took was an IQ test and that not only did he score the highest score that has ever been registered in the academy, but he also finished the test in record time. Dark was hailed by his teachers as a brilliant mind and was also designated by his classmates as a target all kinds of abuse.

Being the brightest student in the academy made Dark become an extreme loner and a devotee of his studies, spending hours upon hours learning physics, chemistry, math and many more subjects, all in degrees well above those a mere 16 years old child should learn. Dark yearned to expand his knowledge as much as he could and he decided to abandon the academy, feeling that staying in that place was both beneath him and holding him back. Dark started to travel the world, obsessed with a need to learn more.

Unfortunately for Dark, fate had other plans for him. While on his way to a university Dark found himself in the middle of a large zoids battle between a bunch of bandits and the local police force. Dark had seen these fights a million times over and knew exactly what was going to happen. He was about to walk away from there when he noticed that in the middle of the battlefield was a young boy roughly 70 feet from the zoid of the bandits leader, but he was not the only one to see this boy; the bandit leader, piloting an elphander zoid noticed him too and was about to lay waste to him.

There are a lot of things that can be said about Dark Layne: he is arrogant, spiteful, and cynical, but underneath all of that he is still the same kid he was in the academy and he would never let someone be abused and beaten the way he was then. Dark decided to let go of his ancient hatred of zoids in order to save the kid. Without fully realizing, he was now an able zoid mechanic, he was able to quickly reactivate a damaged shadow fox used by the bandits and headed straight for their leader. Letting his knowledge become the instincts of a zoid pilot Dark maneuvered the shadow fox with amazing skill and accuracy, decimating both the bandits’ leader and he’s zoid with relative ease.

The bandits, after their leader's defeat, attempted to flee the battlefield but were quickly captured by the police force. Dark, who was nearly arrested as an accomplice was thanked and offered a job by the chief of police in the area. Dark refused after seeing he finally became a talented zoids pilot and decided to prove it not only to his father but also to the entire world by entering the sanctioned zoids battles.