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[Dead Cruiser]

Bella

Name: Belladonna "Bella" Aconite

Age: 16

Class: Witch

Race: Human

Reputation: Bella was born to a coven of witches that lived in a forest not far from Axel. They lived in seclusion from civilization and in harmony with nature, under the domain of a faerie prince that they worshiped. Bella was taught the art of witchcraft from her mother, as was customary for all of the women in their coven. However, not long after Bella's Rites of Passage on her sixteenth birthday, her mother fell deathly ill. While the other witches of the Coven knew the cure for her sickness, it required a rare herb that could not be found in their forest. Bella's mother would die before they had the time to travel and retrieve it, and so Bella took it upon herself to venture into civilization to find it.

Finding herself in Axel, Bella was eventually able to find the needed herb in an apothecary's shop. However, having no money and little understanding of civilized ways, she attempted to take it without paying, which lead to a greater altercation with the shopkeeper that resulted in a great deal of his product being destroyed. While Bella was able to send the ingredient off to her coven (with the help of her crow familiar, Hemlock), she found herself in considerable debt with the apothecary. Bella knew that if she was to flee back to the forest, she would be followed and the secret location of her coven would be revealed. As such, she has stayed in Axel to pay off her debt. Due to the stigma most civilized people have against witches, however, the only work she has been able to find has been that of a rookie adventurer.

Personality: Bella is a cheerful and charming young woman, ever optimistic and with a great desire to help others. Though her upbringing has made her somewhat naive and sheltered, she is far from stupid, and can be exceptionally clever and observant. Bella can show great determination when she sets her mind to a task, and is willing to make great self-sacrifices to help those she holds dear. However, she is not a milquetoast beacon of pure goodness, as she has a considerable anti-authoritarian streak, and can be as beguiling and mischievous as one would expect a consort of the fae to be.

Skills: As a witch, Bella is skilled in herbalism and alchemy, able to brew a variety of potions and poisons. She is a practitioner of fae magic, primarily illusions and enchantments that she may use to beguile and confuse her foes, but she can also wield some influence over the natural world. Bella also is versed in hexes and other black magics, but only uses them in the case of dire emergencies.

Belongings: Bella carries nearly nothing but her heirloom witch's staff, a focus for her magic, some herbalist's tools such as a pestle and mortar, and a small pouch of herbs and various magical reagents. Her companion in civilization is her crow familiar, Hemlock, who is trained to assist her with a variety of magical and mundane utilities.

Spells and Potions

Spells

• Eldritch Blast
• Friends
• Poison Spray
• Minor Illusion
• Mage Hand
• Cause Fear
• Hex
• Witch Bolt
• Faerie Fire
• Sleep
• Charm Person
• Unseen Servant

Potions

• Healing
• Elemental Resistance
• Water Breathing
• Animal Friendship
• Growth
• Poison
• Love
• Fire Breath
• Slipperiness

[Dead Cruiser]

Rust

Name / Sex / Age
Rust / Male / Died at age 29, eons ago

Appearance
Rust, though born human, has become something that cannot be entirely described as such. His figure is normal enough, with a tallish frame and a wiry, almost emaciated build. His features are sharp and regal, and his hair is thick and oily, a long mane of red-orange for which he is named. However, his skin is a sickly hue of pallid grey-green, and his eyes are pure black. His nails have lengthened into long, dark talons, and he bleeds thin black ichor instead of red blood. A discoloration like soot darkens his face, and his tongue is black, dry and smooth. Smoke belches up from his mouth when he speaks and breathes, and a metallic, acrid odor surrounds him. His only garments are a simple robe that covers his lower torso, and a cloak that hangs to his knees. Both are made from the leathery husk and scaly chitin of some creature, colored a darker hue of green than his skin.

Personality
Having been raised in a world of darkness, Rust is conditioned to survive against all odds. Pragmatic and resourceful, he can barely bring himself to comprehend such concepts as pride and greed. He is greatly self-sacrificing, as well as inherently trusting and communal in nature. The needs of the many outweigh the self, in his view, and the prosperity of future generations is more valuable than personal prosperity. Accustomed to loss and horror, he keeps a thick skin and though he easily relies on others, keeps from forming close attachments to them. Despite this, Rust is prone to bouts of loneliness and despair, possibly influences of the inhuman blood in his veins.

Background
Ages ago, the world was a far darker and more vicious place. The Long Nights lasted generations at a time, and the beasts that lurked within them defied human imagination. Mankind was so beleaguered by darkness and monsters that it could barely raise itself above the state of savage, squabbling tribes. These tribes could form and be wiped out over the course of a single night, their people never knowing the light of day. One such tribe, known as the People of the Stars, formed as most do; humans huddling together for mutual protection. They were so called for their traditions of navigating by the constellations of the stars, and shaping their culture to match the patterns and stories they saw in the skies.

A boy with hair as red as fire was born to the People of the Stars. They named him Rust, after the constellation of oxidized metal and tepid water. As with any child born in the Long Night, his life was one of hardship and sorrow, forced to fight unending battles against nightmares from the dark, endure ceaseless famine, and bury countless loved ones. As with all of his people, he looked to the stars for guidance, and was rarely led astray. One day, though, a falling star caught his eye, and he watched it as it fell all the way to the earth. In his youthful curiosity, Rust separated from his tribe and ran to find where the star had fallen, wondering what the stars looked like up close. He eventually tracked down the glowing crater, and was amazed to find what lurked inside: a dragon.

The beast howled in rage and agony, its membranous wings beating uselessly against the dirt. It had grown old and weak, and could no longer fly. Thus it had fallen to earth to die ignominiously. Rust, either brave or foolish, ventured forth to confront the dragon. The monster was horrifically powerful despite its imminent death, and energy rolled off of it in boiling-hot waves that blistered Rust's skin and grew sickness in his bones. Still he endured, and met the dragon face-to-face. The dragon told him that it was the last of its kind, and with its death, the stars would be empty and lifeless. Rust asked the dragon about the legends of his people written in the sky, and the dragon was intrigued by such figures as the two-faced Gambler and the repugnant Goblin. The dragon entrusted the legacy of the stars to Rust and his people, and commanded the boy to consume his heart.

Rust tore open the dragon's ribcage, its bones hollow and flesh papery, and extracted its glowing heart. He greedily devoured it, even as it blackened his face and burned his tongue. Rust sputtered and coughed up smoke as the heart burned him from the inside out, filling him with warmth and light unimaginable. His blood boiled and his bones melted, but he did not die, instead he emerged as something that was not quite human, and not quite dragon. When Rust regained his senses, changed, he found that he was filled with the dragon's cosmic power. He fashioned garments from the dead dragon's scales, his own robes turned to cinders by its power, and returned to the People of the Stars.

Monsters were little match for the raw power Rust commanded, and even rival human tribes had little choice but to submit to his might. Legends of this mighty figure spread, most knowing him by the epithet of "the Tyrant." It was not only fearsome strength that Rust had gained, but cosmic knowledge was well; the stars whispered secrets to Rust, of how to bend matter and energy to meet his will. He taught some of these secrets to his people, but most were ill-prepared to hear it, the knowledge boiling their grey-matter in their skulls. Those that endured were perhaps some of the earliest practitioners of the art of "magic," now all but lost to time.

Despite his changed form, his human body was too fragile to withstand the dragon's power. Over time, his flesh deteriorated, his bones turned to dust and his blood turned to poison. His cosmic power kept him alive, but in great agony, and his control over his strength quickly slipped from his grasp. Eventually he completely lost control, his body catastrophically melting down, unleashing all of his pent-up power at once. In seconds both he and the People of the Stars were wiped from existence in a pillar of starfire, leaving behind nothing but the glowing dragon's heart.

Abilities
Rust is the inheritor of the cosmic power of the last dragon. His body is filled with supernatural strength and vitality, as well as the overwhelming energy of the stars themselves. Rust can channel this power into blasts of starfire or waves of invisible, agonizing energy, but doing so causes a buildup of heat and energy in his body that his human form is incapable of withstanding. As his body heats up, it grows weaker until the heat naturally dissipates, or he unleashes the buildup in an all-consuming blast.

Additionally, Rust is a practitioner of some of the lost arts of sorcery, magic learned from the stars. By bending the laws of reality and the whims of destiny, Rust can exert power and force from a range, teleport short distances rapidly, generate structures of mystic obsidian, and can perform advanced incantations to bring about even more spectacular effects.

Equipment / Other
Rust's garments, made from dragonscale, are effective shields from the invisible waves of pain that his power brings. Along his travels, he acquired a long, silver spear, forged from skymetal, and fashioned according to designs divined from the stars. While a sturdy and effective weapon, it can also serve as a locus for his power.

When channeling cosmic or draconic energy, Rust's dragon heart glows white-hot, the illumination spreading through his veins as the power is sustained until eventually his entire body is glowing.

[Dead Cruiser]

Crowned-By-Fire

Name: Crowned-By-Fire

Age: 150

Gender: Male

Race: Weredragon

Appearance: As a werebeast (also known as beastfolk, or Fera in their own tongue), Crowned-By-Fire is shapeshifter. His human form is that of a exceptionally large, muscular man. Bronze of skin, with yellow eyes and numerous battle scars. His thick, brown hair is tied into over twenty braids, each bound with the leather and bones of a fallen enemy, and various other, similar adornments are worn over the simple furs and hides he wears as clothing. Various reptilian features, such as his forked tongue and fanged teeth betray his inhuman nature. His draconic form is a terrible monster with scales like volcanic glass and a maw of hellfire. Jagged claws and vicious fangs make him a wicked, tyrannical beast, and his powerful wings allow no creature to rule above him. As his whims or necessity dictate, Crowned-By-Fire can partially shift from dragon to human to gain access to such advantages as his wings or claws without assuming his true and terrible form.

Magic: Wild Shamanism

Techniques:
Elemental Control: Crowned-By-Fire commands control over the chaotic and mercurial forces of the elements, with particular mastery over fire. He can shape and wield as weapons the natural forces that surround him, and can learn much from the elemental balance of a place or person. Fire is the element to which he is most naturally attuned, and such is his domain over it that flame cannot harm him.

Master of the Wilds: The Dragon King is master of the living forces of nature as well. Foliage grows and moves at his command, and he can easily commune with and assume control over most any beast. As well, he can imbue nature with particular elemental alignments, making even common animals into powerful magical entities.

Spiritspeaker: Crowned-By-Fire could not call himself a true shaman if he could not commune with the natural spirits of the world. He can perceive any spirits that wander outside their realm, speak with them, and even command or bind spirits weaker than himself. As well, he has a general sense of the spirit world, and with great effort and good conditions can open portals into it.

Skills: Crowned-By-Fire is a vicious close-quarters combatant, often easily able to overpower his enemies without having to resort to the use of his magic or transforming into a dragon. He is also an expert survivalist, able to thrive in nearly any environment, regardless of its harsh conditions or dangerous flora or fauna. While he is far from the ideal of a learned naturalist, he has considerable practical knowledge about nature, plants and animals, and the nature of spirits and their dimension.

Equipment: As a master of the natural world, Crowned-By-Fire often has little need for tools. He does carry a massive axe, carved from dragonbone, which he wields in battle and uses as a focus for his shamanic power. Apart from that, he merely wears various hides and furs over his body, and carries a variety of shamanic fetishes and charms.

Personality: Crowned-By-Fire knows what he is and makes no effort to hide it. While to many he would appear to be a hyper-aggressive, swaggering locus of arrogance and rage, no special effort is made on his part to present this. Deception is a construct of civilization, one that Crowned-By-Fire finds too distasteful to use. While he feels this way about many aspects of the civilized world, he is not naive enough to not understand or detect them. A firm believer in the ideals of "kill or be killed; eat or be eaten," Crowned-By-Fire has only contempt for the weak and those that would stoop to protect them. Appropriately, he has great respect for that which he deems strong and worthy, foremost being the concept of nature itself. A creature without pity or mercy, the only rules the Dragon King follows are his own and the laws of the wild.

History: In the savage, volcanic jungles of Zarkoum, the clan of Weredragons lives in secrecy in tune with their unforgiving environment. Normally unassuming creatures whose beast forms resemble large mundane reptiles, any who hatch when the moon eclipses the sun are Dragon Kings among their kind, which can take the form of the true rulers of the wild. Crowned-By-Fire was such a hatchling, and his coming was a subject of great celebration among his tribe. Strong of will and body from an early age, he was a survivor and warrior of esteem among his clan before he had completed the trials of First Change.

For werebeasts, every First Change is different, and each usually is given visions of what they believe to be the destiny provided for them by their patron spirit, Gaia. In his First Change, Crowned-By-Fire saw great visions of the world being reborn anew in fire and blood. He interpreted this to mean that he would cleanse the world of the corruption of civilization, and began to plan his conquest. Recognizing the power and potential of his peoples' magic, he dedicated himself to learning it, mastering it and improving on it.

After decades of study and practice, he became one of the greatest shamans among the Fera. Still, he knew that knowledge of a single form of magic would be insufficient to accomplish his destiny. As the ultimate power in this world, magic could still impede his conquest. He would have to study its other forms up close. To accomplish this, he has traveled to Rothar to investigate the magic of the civilized peoples personally.

[Dead Cruiser]

The Red Man

Artist's impression, circa 1786.

Name: Unknown; most common alias is "The Red Man," or variations thereof.

Age: Again, unknown. Estimated to be roughly nine-hundred years old. To the casual observer, he appears no older than his late forties or early fifties.

Gender: Male

Species: Demon-blooded Human

Rank: Member/Outsider

Personality: To many, the Red Man is a solemn and somber individual. Grim and nearly humorless at first impressions, his dedication to hunting the monsters of the dark seems to have overtaken his entire life. This is only mostly true; while he is utterly dedicated to his "profession," which he performs with grave seriousness, a personable and down-to-earth man lies deep beneath his stony exterior. Simple in taste, and unassuming in manner, the Red Man displays a humility that borders on the servile in private company. Surprisingly intelligent, he displays discernment and tolerance uncommon in his profession. Even deeper down, he is fascinated (some would say obsessed) with the concept of redemption; both in the eyes of God and his fellow men.

Other: As a "Child of the Seventh Generation," the Red Man has inherited a number of supernatural advantages from his demonic ancestor. His slowly-aging body among the most obvious of his strengths, others include the ability to mark sinners and inhuman monsters for all to see, conjuring ever-burning hellfire, summoning and binding lesser creatures of Hell, speaking the lost tongue of Babel, or calling upon the Beast within his blood to take form within his flesh.

Appearance: A massive, imposing figure, the Red Man stands head-and-shoulders taller than a common bystander. His body is thickly-built and muscular from years of training and hard labor, with little slack despite his age. Blue eyes stand out on his roughly-featured face, accompanied by a mane of auburn hair and a thick beard to match. Though his body is still strong, he wears his years haggardly on his face, and silver has begun to creep into the proud red of his hair. Scars and tattoos of varying ages and era cover his body, though he usually keeps them hidden under his clothes. His favored garments, a wide-brimmed hat and an oilskin duster, give his towering frame an even more intimidating silhouette. His clothes otherwise are quite strictly utilitarian; simple fatigues in either grey or black, leather work boots, riding gloves, and an old, ragged muffler.

Equipment/weapons: An expert in improvisation, the Red Man carries little in the way of weapons typical to hunters such as himself. A silver rosary, a somewhat antiquated flip-phone and a windproof lighter make up his most conventional equipment. For armaments, he prefers large-caliber revolvers, which suit his strength and frame and can accommodate special ammunition, such as incendiary rounds or silver slugs. The Red Man typically carries four of these at any given time, hung in holsters under his coat, as well as a variety of ammunition. A well-worn machete is usually kept strapped to his hip in easy reach, and he keeps a carton of cheap, unfiltered cigarettes stuffed away in one of his coat pockets.

History: The history of the Red Man is a long one, and not even the man himself remembers most of it. He assumes that he was born some time not long before the Third Crusade, probably in France. His memories of his earliest centuries are a small collection of sights and sounds, places and battles fought there. Pillaging at the foot of the Balkans, taking fire and steel to the holy land, sacking Jerusalem, and returning home embittered. Memories of the Catholic inquisitions arise somewhere after those, mostly spent breaking the legs of unrepentant Jews and Muslims. It was at this time he remembers, roughly, that he realized that he was not like other men. Methuselah cast into the shape of a mighty Norman. He sought the church for answers, but he was answered only by brands and lashes. When his will would not break and his faith could not be shaken, he was offered redemption, just as he had been offered as a Crusader and as an Inquisitor.

The Red Man took the fury of God into the crevices which normal men dared not tread. He battled against the monstrosities and abominations of the Old World, and emerged victorious. However, as he battled his first demon, the scent of his blood was familiar to the infernal creature, and he told the Red Man of his true heritage. The Seventh Generation after the coupling of a mortal woman and a Prince of Hell always gave rise to a mortal of infernal power, and the Red Man was such a creature. However, the Red Man had long come to terms with what he was over his already long years; his mortal insecurities had grown, blossomed and fallen away. He fought on to redeem himself for the sin that was his very existence. He fought ever harder, believing that through his triumphs he could redeem both himself and his demonic ancestor.

Centuries passed in a blur for some time after. He remembered his bitterness following the plague, and the endless war between the mighty kingdoms of his mother Europa. He left for the New World, and yet war still followed him. He served as a privateer among the tropical island colonies for some time, his allegiance varying wildly between nations as the years rolled by. He did not land in "America" until the colony of Nouvelle-Orléans had been established, yet still spent most of the following century as little better than a common pirate. In these years he lost sight of his holy quest, giving into the debauchery that seemed to thrive in his infernal blood.

However, after his home port of choice had been host to a terrible naval battle, the Red Man once again felt the ground shrinking under his feet. He turned his gaze westward, not riding straight to the coast with the thrill of adventure, but gradually working his way there along the steady pace of farmers and settlers. Hard life on the frontier turned the Red Man back to God, and he committed himself once more to holy service by ridding the West of any evils he encountered, human or otherwise. The two centuries after that were a relative whirlwind for the ancient Crusader, as war and great technological advances ripped through both the United States and the world at large. He kept his head down for the most part, choosing to stay out of the conflicts that continued to tear through the Old World.

While he finds the technological advances of the last century bewildering, the Red Man has done his best to adjust to a world that he finds growing stranger with each passing day. He has generally stayed on the East Coast of the United States since the end of the Second World War, working a gradual circuit from Boston, to New Orleans, and back. Hunting communities often find his presence distasteful, and he is a bane to monsters and maniacs alike, so he stays constantly on the move to avoid undue attention. However, this conflict brewing in New York troubles him greatly; if all-out war spills onto the streets, there will be little left to keep the monsters in the shadows and out of sight of the world at large. The Red Man is unsure of what could happen in such an event, but his experience with holy war tells him that it would not be pleasant.

[Dead Cruiser]

Orthan Ghosar

"I don't have to tell you things are bad, everybody knows that. The economy is receding, there's violence in the streets, and the UN's leash is getting tighter by the day. We've gotten by hoping that if we stay quiet, and we leave it alone, things will get better, but that's just not good enough anymore. For things to get better, we have to act. We have to stand up and take back our planet. But all I need is for you to do one thing.

"I need you to get mad."

Name: Orthan Ghosar

Alias: When involved in activities of questionable legality, Orthan goes by the alias, "Ophidian."

Age: 46

Gender: Male

Appearance: Orthan is a Caucasian male, standing six feet tall, with an athletic build weighing 190 lbs. Square-jawed with robust features, Orthan has never been a particularly handsome man, though the lines starting to settle in his face lend some dignity to his appearance. His blue-grey eyes are narrow and deep-set, carrying a way, distrustful look. He stays clean-shaven and keeps his dark hair neatly trimmed, though silver is beginning to creep into its edges. Orthan dresses smartly, with a preference for tailored suits in a sleek, modern style, typically in such colors as dark grey and navy blue.

Abilities: Orthan has been granted the ability of electrokinesis, allowing him to control electricity and electromagnetism. However, he has scarcely used this ability since gaining it, and so can only manipulate electricity on a small scale. Minor electric shocks, lesser feats of magnetism and the disruption of unshielded electronics are the best he can currently manage with his abilities.

Skills: Above all else, Orthan is a cunning businessman and a shrewd manipulator. The combination of his sharp intellect, skill in finance and business management, his deep insight into the motivations of both demographics and individuals, and his remarkable charisma make him a powerful and influential man. More subtly, Orthan has knowledge and contacts that put him in a position of control and influence in the Martian criminal underground, and he is well-versed in putting these deniable assets to his best use. On a minor note, Orthan is a decent shot with a pistol, and still has some muscle memory left from his time spent as a boxing in college.

Flaws: While he tries his best to stay connected to his working-class roots, Orthan has had it easy for the last couple of decades, and so his ability to empathize with the common man on an individual scale has slipped. As well, he has the undesirable combination of being an ambitious leader in a ruthless business, as well as a sympathizer to the plight of the common worker. Orthan's goals and empathy often clash, which can make him at times indecisive, other times guilt-ridden. In addition, he is getting on in his years; while he is in good health for his age, he is far from the athletic prime of his youth.

Background: Orthan was born in New London, a native Martian, the only son of a simple miner. The same year that Orthan entered secondary school, a mining accident killed his father. He and his mother were shaken terribly by the loss, which was compounded when they were denied restitution from his father's employer, the Lorne Corporation, on the basis that the accident was the result of human error. Embittered from a young age by the callous nature of corporations, Orthan aspired to change Mars to become a better place for common folk like his family. While his mother worked three jobs to keep a roof over their head, Orthan worked diligently in school, eventually graduating as valedictorian of his class and earning a scholarship to New London University. Though at first he desired a career in politics and law, he saw that it was corporations that controlled the fate of Mars, and so pursued an education in business and finance. Orthan graduated with honors, and quickly found work as middle-management official in the Lorne Corporation.

Orthan's rise to success and power was a long and difficult one. Countless hours of tedious labor and networking, risky decisions and his unique cunning were instrumental to his rise. As time passed, he found that his goals and morals shifted and changed. Orthan grew less idealistic quite quickly, becoming cynical and ruthless not long after that. Betrayal and manipulation became second-nature to him as he clawed his way up through the cutthroat environment of high business. To gain a better edge against his compeitors, he even delved into the realm of organized crime and corporate warfare, carving a place for himself among the mobs and shadow-runners in the the seedy underbelly of New London. Orthan eventually established his own company, Ars Mechanica Industries, a manufacturer of mining equipment and other such heavy machinery. Now the foremost fabricator and supplier of industrial equipment on Mars, Orthan is force to be reckoned with in the arena of the Martian business.

However, the growing unrest on Mars has been hard on even the affluent such as Orthan. Rioting and protests have decreased his productivity considerably, and the overall slowing trend of the Martian economy has hurt the growth of his business. Lesser companies have been swallowed up by the Lorne Corporation, which has been growing into an unstoppable monopolizer of every business on Mars. As well, the increased scrutiny of the UN has edged uncomfortably close to Orthan's less than legal contacts. He feels as though ground is shrinking under his feet, and that he may not hold his position of power for much longer. The rise of strange abilities in the populace following the aberrant seismic activity has compounded Orthan's problems further, as he too has begun to exhibit unusual powers. His lower-class roots give Orthan a great deal of pity toward the oppressed masses of Mars, and as he is now a member of a persecuted population, he is even more empathetic to those afflicted similarly. The tensions on Mars are reaching a boiling point, and Orthan is preparing himself to take advantage of the chaos to come. He has been sheltering those that have developed abilities, helping them and their families move far from population centers. As well, he has been in talks with various other corporations that have their business similarly threatened by Lorne. Strangest of all, he has been scouting various paramilitary organizations on both Mars and Earth, and has dramatically increased production in his factories of such items as mining lasers, plasma generators and environmental hazard suits.

Sample Post: I'll get to it.

[Dead Cruiser]

Spiro Leandros

SPHiNX

"Just pretend like you understand what's important."

Age: 23

Gender: Male

Place of Birth: Chicago, United States

Occupation: Secretary of the Militia, Executive of Judicial and Penal Affairs

Race: Psion (Human)

Appearance: The superhuman known to the public as Sphinx is rather mundane in appearance in comparison to some of his peers. Aside from his costume, consisting of blue, hooded robes, emblazoned with various arcane patterns in white, he looks mostly like a normal young man. His skin is vaguely tan, owing to his Mediterranean heritage, and his hair is dark and thick. Sphinx's features, usually hidden in the shadows of his hood, are neither especially handsome nor particularly ugly, with a sharp jaw and a narrow nose. His eyes are normally grey-blue in color, but blaze with spectral light when he uses his powers. He is of average height, and his build is somewhat thin and waifish; as befits one that literally fights with their mind.

Powers: Sphinx is one of the greatest telepaths ever known, and in these dark times is likely among the most powerful psions alive. With his telepathy, Sphinx can enter the mind of anyone within roughly three kilometers of himself. Simple mind-reading is child's play to him, as is telepathic communication; his true talents lie in shaping (or destroying) the minds of others. Sphinx can dig through minds down to their subconscious, and often has better access to a person's memories than they, themselves. These memories can then be altered or removed to Sphinx's liking. Similarly, Sphinx can insert ideas and thoughts into others' minds, or twist their current thoughts in a different directions. He is skilled in creating illusions by distorting the sense and perceptions of others, even capable of inducing hallucinations to "attack" his enemies. Should Sphinx feel sufficiently threatened, he can overwhelm the minds of his enemies, and in doing so induce tremendous mental and physical pain, unconsciousness, paralysis, or even stun their automatic bodily functions. His most powerful ability is that to completely take control of another's mind, though he can only mind-control a single person at a time.

Skills: Having led a relatively sheltered existence, Sphinx has few practical skills. He is decent in information-gathering and in manipulation, and has some skill in managing logistics, but beyond that he relies solely on his powers.

Equipment/Resources: Given his relatively weak body and his lack of practical skills, Sphinx carries almost no equipment on his person, and lives off of the resources of the Citadel.

Weaknesses: All of Sphinx's powers manifest in the minds of others, and have no impact on the physical world. This said, he is effectively helpless against forces or enemies that do not possess minds to manipulate. Foes with susceptible minds can protect themselves through magical and technological means, or through rigorous training to block out invasive telepathy. Inhuman creatures are inherently more resistant to Sphinx's powers, requiring more effort on his part to influence their minds. Other telepaths are his bane, as they can easily take advantage of any mental connection he forges to wreak havoc on his mind. His more powerful techniques put a great strain on his mind, and he runs the risk of inducing hemorrhaging in his skull by overexerting himself. Lastly, Sphinx is a thin, unathletic sort of fellow, and is practically useless in physical combat or in most menial labors.

Psychological Profile: Despite his decidedly superhuman abilities, Sphinx is utterly human in his personality. He carries a public persona of an aloof and mysterious being of omniscient power, but in private company among his peers he is a friendly, sociable character with a quick wit and a dry sense of humor. Though he can be high-strung at times, Sphinx is far more casual in demeanor than most other superhumans, and acts as a voice of moderation and outside perspective to his peers. He is calculating and logical by nature, but is not without empathy. Sphinx tries his hardest to do the right thing, and help others as much as possible, but often sees the value of practicality over ethics. He is not afraid to make difficult decisions that others would baulk at, as long as he is confident that it is the "correct" decision. Even so, he does not see himself as infallible, and has moments of weakness wherein he questions his own ability and righteousness.

Biography: Spiro Leandros was born to two hardworking parents of Greek-American descent in the city of Chicago. Raised in Greektown, Spiro was brought up in a tight-knit community by his civil engineer father and his mother, a nurse. However, the closeness of the community merely lead to Spiro's ostracization as his powers emerged. His telepathy manifested at a young age, and shaped the young Spiro's behavior oddly. He knew things that a boy his age shouldn't have known, and this knowledge often made its way out of his mouth. Adults were made uncomfortable, even fearful, by him, and other children acted on their parent's superstitions by tormenting him. Spiro's parents had no idea how to raise such a strange boy, and after some time gave up trying to understand him.

As a result of his solitude, Spiro grew up as a dark and lonely youth. He was easily preyed upon by a Greektown gangster, known mostly by his epithet of "The Sphinx." The Sphinx was a psion as Spiro was, and detected the boy's potential after meeting him by chance in a gambling den. Seeing an opportunity in the boy, the Sphinx took Spiro under his wing, raising him as his protegee. Under the Sphinx's tutelage, Spiro had everything that he had been wanting for as he grew up: understanding, encouragement, purpose and something to challenge him. He was trained to improve his psychic powers, with which he showed vast potential. But as his powers grew, so did his usefulness to his mentor. The Sphinx used Spiro as a child soldier, using him to collect information and plant false leads to rival gangs and the police, as such factions had the Sphinx himself under heavy surveillance. Spiro was under the assumption that he was protecting the both of them, and not furthering criminal activity, as his mentor had been routinely wiping his memories and implanting him with false ones.

At the age of eighteen, on an inconspicuous day, Spiro decided to challenge his mentor to a surprise bout of mental sparring. However, as he intruded into the Sphinx's mind, he discovered the extent to which his "benefactor" had been manipulating him. As he discovered this, the Sphinx knew that he had lost the boy's trust, and had to kill him before he became a dire foe. What would have been a friendly duel quickly became a struggle to the death. The Sphinx possessed a far more powerful mind than Spiro, but the young psion used this to his own advantage. He lured the Sphinx into his mind, and in destroying his own memories, destroyed the other psychic's mind in turn. Spiro forgot his youth, his parents, his upbringing, and his former master. The Sphinx forgot how to breathe.

Now a self-made amnesiac with only vague recollections of his life, and a sense of guilt which he could not explain, Spiro decided to turn his powers to the benefit of others. He adopted a vigilante persona, emulating Zenith, who had come to the forefront of world history. Spiro decided on adopting the moniker of "Sphinx," for reasons that he could not quite place. He worked as a young, yet potent psychic hero for some time, mostly acting as an informant for more physically-powerful heroes, and all the while further honed his abilities. As the world descended into chaos, Sphinx did his best to defend his home city of Chicago, but it was merely prolonging the inevitable. After Chicago fell, Sphinx heard rumors of a superhuman-run safezone in Los Angeles, and made the perilous journey to the West Coast to join the Citadel. Since then, Sphinx has worked as the logistics manager of the Citadel's militia forces, its highest-ranked judicial arbiter, and the warden of its small prison.

[Dead Cruiser]

The Black Rose

Name: Marchesa, the Black Rose

Universe: Magic the Gathering (Fiora)

Appearance: Marchesa is an older woman, perhaps in her mid-forties, but she has retained her looks well throughout her years. Not stunningly beautiful, she maintains a presence of dignity and grace; in some ways resembling a woman even older than herself. Her raven hair is typically worn up, fastened with ornate pins, with trailing locks that frame her tastefully made-up face. Eyes the color of smoke always seem to know more than they let on, and her expression usually hints at a greater scheme in the works. Her clothes match her aura, as they are more in fashion for women older than herself, but she wears them with elegance and mystique. Quite notable is the amount of jewelry she wears, as her fingers are practically gilded with rings at all times. Though given the rumors surrounding them (which happen to be completely true), many quickly become nervous when she idly rubs and plays with her rings.

Personality: Marchesa is ambitious to the core. She allows nothing and no one to deter her from her goals, and will not hesitate to destroy any in her way. Ruthlessly cunning, Marchesa is a brilliant schemer, and her mind constantly bubbles with the possible subterfuge of her foes, and possible counter-subterfuge of her own. Though she has a considerable taste for the finer things in life and prefers to keep her hands clean when she can, Marchesa is not above doing her own dirty work, and will take any opportunity presented to her. A distinct streak of vanity runs through her outward persona, preferring to flaunt her wealth and status to her rivals.

Powers/Skills: First and foremost, Marchesa is a skilled manipulator and conspirator. With little more than threats, bribery and charisma, she alone built the largest criminal organization in all of Fiora. The Black Rose has a particular knack for reading people; their intentions, their motivations, and most usually how to use the both of those against them. Despite her venomous intentions, Marchesa is completely amiable in public or with esteemed company, and is even pleasant and polite in the midst of murdering a rival. Many other skills have grown in the wake of her empire. She can manage money masterfully, multiplying it when she can, and making it disappear when need be. Politics are a simple matter for her, as she far less often fears for her life against mere nobles and senators. Even sleight of hand is an acquired talent of hers; all the better for slipping a rival a dose of poison in the drink.

More overtly, Marchesa is a wizard of some repute. While far from the usual idea of a spell-slinging arcanist, she can use magic aligned to Black, Red and Blue mana. Her most frequent use of this is in raising undead bodyguards, which she hides in the walls of her estate. Her magic is used to concoct the poisons for which she is so feared, and is also used to aid herself or her agents in stealth, espionage and evading enemy attacks.

Brief Bio: Born to a lesser noble family in the High City of Paliano, Marchesa began her climb to the upper echelons of society early on. As an ambitious young girl, she quickly edged out her incompetent older brothers as heirs to their father's estate, and inherited the majority of it after his "tragic" passing. Knowing that she needed to build a base of power, she used her newfound wealth to establish a network across the Lower City, as well as the seedier corners of the High City. Criminals, outcasts, rebels-- Marchesa recruited to her cause anyone who stood to gain from a change in regime. Once her network was in place, she slowly established a stranglehold on the criminal enterprises of the region, bringing every service from smuggling to assassination under her control.

Today, the Black Rose is known as the leader of the most powerful crime syndicate in the High City, even among her fellow nobles and other such respected members of society. Though none are foolhardy enough to air such accusations in her presence. Her next goal is a mystery to many in Paliano. Some claim that she seeks to usurp Brago, the spectral king of Fiora. Others claim that the Black Rose is already the most powerful person in the High City, and that a throne would merely tie her down. Whatever her intentions, there seem to be few capable of stopping her.

Equipment: Each of Marchesa's many rings is a compartment filled with exotic and virulent poison. Not all are inherently lethal, some bringing about mere sickness, or even temporary madness. Even so, one would be particularly mindful to watch one's food and drinks carefully in her presence, lest they end up in a shallow grave in the Lower City.

Others: The Black Rose is the symbol of her crime syndicate, worn openly by its more valued members. Onesuch member is Grenzo, the warden of the Royal Prison, whose depths are said to have swallowed as many of Marchesa's enemies as it has spat out criminals under her employ.

[Dead Cruiser]

Gwafa Abdullah

SEKHEM

"As the world falls to ruin, I ascend."

Age: 37

Gender: Male

Place of Birth: Cairo, Egypt

Occupation: Director of Cultural and Technological Preservation; Morale Committee Chairman

Race: "Mummy" (Magic-Infused Human)

Appearance: Sekhem is a twisted being, in some ways more than human, but less in just as many ways. While tall and strongly-built, his features have shriveled and eroded, giving him the facial resemblance of a burn victim. His skin is a dry, dessicated brown in color, no longer grows hair, and has the texture of parchment. To appease his vanity, his disfigurements are usually hidden behind linen bandages that cover the entirety of his body, save for his dark, bloodshot eyes and perpetually-snarling mouth. The clothes worn over Sekhem's bandages vary depending on his taste, but always included is a floor-length suede trench coat, with a pronounced collar that evokes images of the burial headdresses of pharaohs of old. Suits are Sekhem's usual preference, sometimes with a fedora and gloves, but he will opt for more utilitarian black combat fatigues when the situation calls for them.

Powers: At the height of metahuman society, Sekhem was one of the most dangerous sorcerers in the world. In these fallen times, he may be the greatest magician left alive. Sekhem is a practitioner of the ancient magical tradition native to North Africa and Asia Minor: a tradition later bastardized into the hermetic magic of Pharaonic Egypt. He calls on the power of the supreme chaos: the primordial maelstrom of energy that preceded the gods, and indeed much of the known cosmos. His knowledge of ancient spellcraft is mighty, but not omnipotent, as he is restricted to the techniques known in his past life. Sekhem bears mastery over death and its progeny, able to raise myriad servants of unliving flesh and soul. The stars and their secret masters are well-known to him, and he may call upon them seeking wisdom or power. Base materials are his to command, with intrinsic power over both the natural elements and the artifacts of mankind. Fate is his domain as well, able to grant boons of fortune or most maleficent curses at his choosing.

Sekhem's very flesh has been utterly transformed by the power he wields. He does not age, and his mortal needs have drawn close to nothing. His leathery flesh is unnaturally durable, able to withstand harm that would kill most lesser men. Even should he be felled in battle, the arcane spark within his soul can resurrect him at further cost to his sanity. He wields the strength of several men, and his mental fortitude is inhuman in its power. Something beyond the comprehension of man lurks within his soul, and while not wholly visible, it can be felt by any creature with a soul. Its influence varies, between the enchanting glory of a god-king and the sickness of the mind that true understanding of mortality brings. Though creatures of magic and the mightiest champions of mankind are safe from his influence, common men are driven by his presence either into fanatic devotion or madness, usually both. By unleashing the latent eldritch power from within himself, Sekhem may take on the form of an alien avatar of incomprehensible matter and geometry; the "true form" hidden between his atoms.

Skills: In his previous life, Sekhem was a distinguished scholar, and retains his skills from his past experiences. He speaks Arabic, English and French fluently, and has great understanding of numerous dead languages. He is intimately familiar with ancient human history and mythology, and is an eloquent man of letters. After his "rebirth," Sekhem has devoted much effort to arcane study and theory, though he is not apt to sharing his discoveries and revelations.

Equipment/Resources: Sekhem essentially carries no weapons, though he can summon tools to aid him, such as a blessed ankh of divine electrum, an animated golden medallion of a scarab, and a khopesh forged from pure light and darkness. Aside from these things, Sekhem seems to possess a nigh-endless supply of linen bandage with which to dress his deformed flesh. The living mummy has an almost literal cult in the underbelly of the Citadel, mostly dedicated to espionage, counterespionage and managing his "empire."

Weaknesses: A terrifying enemy of mankind for years, Sekhem is far from easily dispatched. That said, his primary weaknesses lie in his crumbling psyche. Despite his intelligence, Sekhem is quick to allow his pride to blind him, and can be manipulated by those adept enough to exploit this. He is prone to outbursts of irrational paranoia and other psychotic behavior, which can be capitalized upon by his enemies. As the man is exceptionally difficult to kill, and even harder to keep dead, physical violence is usually a poor means of combating Sekhem. That said, as magic is his greatest strength, it is also a great weakness, as magic can be used to pull at the ancient framework of spells keeping him "alive," and quickly weaken and deteriorate his physical condition.

Psychological Profile: Sekhem can be laconically described as a cunning politician, corrupted mentally and morally by degenerative megalomania. He retains his intelligence, creativity and social intuition, all of which making him a dangerous foe. However, his rampant narcissism and paranoia are pitfalls to which he frequently falls victim. His morality has crumbled to dust with his madness; he demands power and respect as he believes he is deserving, and will crush any in his path to achieve his goals. Even so, he is at least somewhat aware of his own insanity and corrupt nature, and will take efforts to disguise it behind a persona that is equal parts an imperious king, an erudite wizard, and an affable businessman.

Biography: Gwafa Abudllah was born into affluence in Cairo. His mother was the daughter of a member of the National Assembly, and was an ethnic Berber. His father was a well-respected pediatric oncologist for the 57357 Hospital. As such, Gwafa grew up in a comfortable, culturally rich, and intellectually enlightened home. He proved to be a bright boy, earning good marks in his private school, and his parents adored his curiosity, doting upon him many books and toys such as telescopes and aquariums. As Gwafa grew older, he found his calling in studying the history of the ancient world, taking special interest in both the history of his native Islam and his legendary homeland.

He studied at Al-Azhar University, earning his undergraduate degree, and then traveled abroad to Oxford to earn his doctorate in anthropology. His grandfather's political clout was able to secure Gwafa a place in a reputable archaeological team, with whom he traveled for years, studying ancient ruins and lost civilizations. It was in the years following the emergence of Zenith that his team made a breakthrough discovery deep within the Rub' al Khali in Saudi Arabia. It appeared to be an ancient city, deep beneath the sands. However, their radio-imaging equipment suggested that ruins at that depth spread throughout Asia Minor and into much of North Africa. Having possibly uncovered a truly lost, ancient civilization, they quickly began their excavations. Once the ruins had been uncovered, the young and eager Gwafa lead the expeditionary team into the catacombs that had been preserved beneath the sands. It was in the bones buried beneath the Empty Quarter that his fate was changed forever.

Happening upon a sarcophagus in the sand-flooded tombs, Gwafa found himself unnaturally drawn to its mystique, as though it radiated power. He wandered toward it, as though in a trance, and with great effort heaved off its tremendous, stone lid. The warnings of his expedition mates (urging him to be cautious of traps or to not disturb the historical sanctity of the tomb) fell on deaf ears. The coffin had been opened, and the being within seized Gwafa within its deathly power. An ancient sorcerer-king of the Nameless Empire, which would be succeeded by the Egyptians, this particular mummy was an distant ancestor of Gwafa himself, and was imbued with the unholy magics of undeath. Their biological bond resulted in the two beings, Gwafa and his ancestor, to be fused into one. The resulting creature was a half-living human, scarred and exalted by tremendous cosmic power. He called himself Sekhem, and only the world was large enough to be his kingdom.

After the unexplained death of the entire expedition crew, the ruins returned to anonymity, and the powerful Sekhem began to unfold his grand schemes of global conquest. From the shadows he manipulated world leaders, taking on a role remarkably similar to that of the mythic Illuminati. Always separated from his scheme by several degrees, he elevated lesser villains to sow chaos where needed. Though more heroic forces were vaguely aware of his presence, the shadows surrounding him were too great for him to be confronted or brought to justice. As such, his schemes unfolded nearly unabated, as even his "failures" pushed the world toward the precipice of destruction.

As the world fell, Sekhem made his move. The territory that was formerly southern California held one of the largest concentrations of superhumans in the world, and there he began his master plan. By allying himself with the remaining superhumans, they together constructed the Citadel, a last bastion for mankind. His peers were far from trusting him implicitly, but in their desperation could not turn down such a powerful ally. As the Citadel stabilized, Sekhem stepped back from his role as a mover and shaker to assume a more humble position scavenging and preserving what remained of human culture and technology. Sekhem as well took it upon himself to maintain a library in the Citadel, and on occasion personally leads scavenging expeditions into the ruins of Los Angeles. Even so, he as well claims to the dubious title of "Chairman of the Morale Committee," running a ring of secretive clubs, bars, brothels and other such low establishments in the Citadel's seedy underbelly. These places are maintained by the elderly and the invalid, as well as survivors that Sekhem has been smuggling into the Citadel. Other superhumans hesitate to end his operations, as the Morale Committee has also established a cinema and a youth center for more tasteful leisure.

To maintain his underground operations, as well as spy on the activities of various other key players in the Citadel, Sekhem has established a network of informants and underlings, comprised of both normal humans and some lesser superhumans. While structured like a criminal organization, the temperaments of his followers more resemble religious devotees than hirelings. Some other superhumans are aware of his slowly growing faction of supporters, but none are sure of its true size and control, and thus refrain from rushing to dismantle it.

[Dead Cruiser]

-Name: Leonard August Winfield

-Gender: Male

-Type: Fishman

-Appearance: Leonard's profound ugliness is at once striking as well as repulsive. While he is a tall and strongly-built man with long limbs and broad shoulders, he stands with a hunch, his gait seems clumsy and unnatural, and his posture suggests a distinct unease. He has a greenish, sickly complexion, and is bald as an egg, with no eyebrows nor beard stubble. The structure of his face suggests deformity, with cheekbones too low, a pinched forehead, and a sunken brow. He has barely any chin to speak of, and thick wattles of flesh hang from his neck. His nose is flat and broad, his ears are small and close against his head, and his bulging eyes are spaced too far apart.

These however, are Leonard's most human-like qualities. His eyes are unblinking, oversized globes the color of milk. Rows of small, sharp teeth line his gums, jutting at odd angles, and his thin-lipped mouth seems to stretch too wide and open at too severe an angle. The digits of his fingers are at odd lengths, with his forefinger longer than his middle, and black claws tip them rather than nails. Leonard is repugnant to smell as well as to behold; he exudes a heady musk of fish, salt, and rot, like a wharf after an autumnal storm. His flesh is slick to the touch, as he constantly perspires a foul, viscous mucous.

Leonard's presence is offensive even to the higher senses of the spiritual and the supernatural. An aura of wrongness surrounds him, and his soul is a sick and tepid thing, a perverse hybrid born in defiance of natural law. Mortal men find him difficult to look upon for long, and even most animals find him repellent.

In ironic contrast to his hideous nature, Leonard is a notably sharp dresser. He is scarcely seen outside of a three-piece suit, and typically dons a tailed overcoat and hat when out of doors. He frequently walks with a cane, which is not a necessity as much as a cover for his strange gait. Dark spectacles hide his other notably inhuman feature when in company of mortals and the mundane, and his other deformities typically go unnoticed as humans generally avoid examining him closely.

-Age: While his sagging flesh and strange features make his "apparent" age difficult to gauge, Leonard claims to be 133 years old, approximately.

-Powers/Traits: While Leonard's precise species cannot be ascertained, it is obvious to even the casual observer that he is some manner of amphibious piscine humanoid. He possesses gills for breathing water in addition to lungs for air, and his body is covered in equal measure by rubbery skin and thick scales. His strength and endurance both exceed that of a human being, though he is not as physically powerful as the common werewolf. Obviously adapted for water, Leonard seems best suited to the freezing temperature, crushing pressure, and pitch-darkness of the deep ocean. Leonard can swim for long leagues, see, hear, and smell with clarity underwater, and can easily outrace a human in water, though he is not nearly as fast as most boats or predatory fish.

Beyond the obvious features of his physiology, Leonard displays more unusual characteristics. His biology is, to phrase it delicately, malleable to some extent. By his will he can subtly alter his own anatomy to better suit his needs. Scales may retreat and become smooth skin, fins may retract, and his cartilaginous skeleton may warp to suggest features such as a nose or ears. This manner of shape-shifting is how he can take on a human-adjacent appearance, while his "natural" form resembles some blasphemous fish-frog. He is capable of other minor permutations and transformations, such as creating a long, prehensile tongue, or altering his moisture-retaining mucous to become toxic and caustic. Leonard's anatomical plasticity lends itself toward a prodigious regenerative ability, which allows him to recover fully from the most grievous of wounds, even capable of regrowing lost limbs.

While the abilities inherent to Leonard's flesh are intriguing, he seems to additionally possess some form of extrasensory perception. Much like the echolocation present in marine mammals or electroperception present in some fish, Leonard can detect the psychic presence of other creatures. This perception extends for some thirty meters around him, growing weaker further out, and can precisely track the location of most entities, even through walls and other barriers. Some mild empathic ability is associated with this, as he can sense base emotions such as hunger, anger, pain, or rage, and detect the presence of supernatural influence. Leonard can notably detect dead or incorporeal conscious presences such as vampires or ghosts without difficulty. With significant mental concentration, Leonard can release a psychic "burst" at close range that can temporarily stun or disorient those affected by it, but this appears to be the full extent to which his abilities can be projected outward.

-Background: On 18 November, 2015 the Japanese fishing vessel Kawatora caught an abnormal specimen in their nets in the south Pacific Ocean. The creature, described by the fishermen as a "fish-man," was initially aggressive when pulled aboard, but was subdued with an emergency firearm and placed in a storage tank below-decks. The fishermen intended to sell the creature to a museum upon returning to Yaezu, but their communications were intercepted by a local Bain & Hoyle affiliate who retrieved the specimen at their port of call, and had the incident covered up.

The specimen was tranquilized and transported to B&H headquarters in London for study, under the code-name "Sandy." Kept in a large saltwater tank for study, Sandy was initially aggressive to researchers, and displayed symptoms of pressure sickness and photo-sensitivity. Once accommodations were made Sandy's aggression quickly dissipated and became more tolerant of researchers near its tank, but displayed no signs of human-level intelligence for the first six months of its captivity. However, Sandy first began to display an unprecedented level of humanoid behavior as a night watchman described its alleged preference for specific music and radio programs. A week later, Sandy began to tap a particular rhythm against its tank, which was identified to be a show tune from the 1902 Broadway musical The Silver Slipper. The following day, researchers relieving the night watchman of his duties found that Sandy had scratched the phrase "RED SOX" into the glass of its tank, letters mirrored so they could be read from the outside.

Sandy was given speech therapy for three weeks, before researchers determined that it could speak English. Allowed to emerge into the feeding chamber attached to its tank, Sandy was able to identify itself as Leonard August Winfield, an American man born in 1885. Over the course of several more weeks, continued interviews with Mr. Winfield determined that he was born in British Guiana to colonial aristocrats, and emigrated to the United States in his childhood. He attended medical school at Harvard, and served as a Naval Surgeon with the rank of Lieutenant Commander in the first World War. His recollections seemed to halt around that point, and he suggested that he had been transformed into his current state roughly eighty years ago, and had spent the intervening time in the deep sea. Dr. Winfield's following interviews were focused on reintegrating him to life on land, human society, and the changes that had occurred over the near-century he spent in the ocean.

Offered employment by Bain & Hoyle to aid in his rehabilitation, he was transferred to his requested location in Boston. His adaptation to both the world of the supernatural as well as the 21st century has progressed smoothly, and Dr. Winfield has proved to be an intelligent and resourceful operative. While his rehabilitation is still ongoing, he spends his time assisting the Boston branch with whatever services he can provide, as well as actively studying to reattain his medical license.

[Dead Cruiser]

John Jones

Player Name:
Dead Cruiser

Primary Character:
"Martian Manhunter" (Not his superhero identity, merely the inspiration character.)

Secret Identity:
Jonathan "Jay" Jones

Status:
Titan

Age:
17 (Years spent on Earth)

City:
San Fransisco

Day Job:
Student

Powers:
Jay has numerous abilities, nearly all of which are tied into his extraterrestrial physiology. A shapeshifter, Jay has complete control over his own physiology, and it is malleable enough to assume the form of nearly any biological substance or construct. Utterly adaptable, Jay can reform himself to have the musculature needed to fight fist-to-fist with a Kryptonian, armor harder than diamonds, and can even alter himself to be able to fly or become completely invisible and intangible. Naturally, this makes Jay exceptionally difficult to wound, as he can merely shapeshift to regenerate even grievous injuries. Any form that requires an increase in mass forces Jay to consume the required elements from his environment. However, Jay's control over these powers is limited at best, as anything more drastic than a moderate change of certain body parts he cannot perform willingly. He might take on more drastic changes in times of duress, or out of reflex, but as a whole most of them seem "locked away" to him. His "base form" is that of a human with moderately superhuman physiology, and an advanced regenerative ability.

Rather than the measly human five, Jay has no less than nine senses, all of which are tuned beyond that which a human is capable of. Even his sight, common enough to humans, can see across various wavelength of the electromagnetic spectrum. His more esoteric senses are tuned to his psychic abilities, which are prodigious. Jay is an advanced telepath, capable of reading minds and detecting thoughts, as well as communicating mentally, and manipulating the minds of others in various ways, such as illusions and false memories. In addition, he can create powerful mental barriers for both himself and others, protecting against similar psychic attacks. These are merely the abilities that he has the most reliable access to, as more advanced powers seem similar "locked." Given the malleability of his body, "brain matter" is an irrelevant concept, therefore making every cell of his body a psychic resonator, and suggesting that his powers have the potential to increase in magnitude dramatically. He is also a telekine, capable of creating very basic telekinetic blasts and shields, though again their potential power seems artificially limited.

Weaknesses:
Jay is highly sensitive to extreme heat, generally that produced by a fire or greater. If his flesh is exposed to it, he loses control of the biochemical bonds that allow him to shapeshift, literally melting him until his component parts recover from the shock of the heat, which could take minutes to hours depending on exposure.

Skills:
Jay has a number of niche talents and hobbies, such as playing the bass guitar, DIY tailoring, and extensive knowledge of cultural topics (video games, music and comics in particular) from the mid-80s to late 90s. That aside, he can be surprisingly charismatic when in the company of other "misfits and outcasts," and is adept at thinking on his feet in stressful situations.

Appearance:
Jay stands a bit over six feet tall, and has a wiry, muscular build. His features are somewhat heavy and brutish, giving him a visage resembling a bulldog. His eye and hair color vary depending on his mood, but they are usually some bright, outlandish color somewhere in the spectrum between blue, purple or pink. His hair is worn in an undercut that is sometimes styled into a tall, spiky mohawk, and he typically dresses in degraded and distressed leathers and denims, usually black and adorned with badges and slogans typical of the punk subculture, as well as various rings, chains and wristbands. When operating in his "superhero" persona, he will accessorize with such items as ornamental goggles or gas masks.

BRIEF Bio:
Jonathan Jones, who prefers to go by the nickname of "Jay," was taken in as a foundling by an orphanage in Southern California. Given the lack of identification with him, the orphanage gave him his alliterative name based on the month he was found in, January. For much of his infancy and early childhood, Jay was a sickly child, prone to infections and seizures. While his health seemed to level out by the time he was about eight, he was still an outcast among the other children, who avoided him based on his strange aura and mannerisms. Jay had a lonely adolescence, drifting between whatever foster homes would take him in, and grew into niche interests and social groups in a desire for belonging.

As he aged, though, he superhuman abilities began to make themselves known. His body would transform seemingly at random times, or he would be suddenly plagued by the deluge of thoughts surrounding him. These made him continue to act out, isolating himself, and reacting violently to forced socialization. While he has generally grasped him powers at this point, by his late teens the damage had been done, and the only social group that would accept him were fringe outcasts and petty criminals. While robbing a convenience store with some of his "friends," Jay was caught, and due to an outburst of his powers, he hospitalized a police officer. He was detained as a super-criminal, and was about to be sentenced and imprisoned as such, until the intervention of Batman. After reviewing his files and determining that his potential was enormous, Batman offered to vouch for him and keep him out of prison, as long as he joined the Titans. Seeing little choice, Jay has done so, though approaches the concept of superheroism with great suspicion and trepidation.

Supporting Characters:
NA

Secondary Character:
NA

Additional Notes:
While Batman is reasonably sure that Jay is some sort of alien, bases on genetic testing that he (begrudgingly) consented to, there is still no idea what his origins are. Human DNA markers were found among his incredibly complex genetic code, which combined with his extremely convincing human "disguise" (Jay passes for human even under an MRI), Batman theorizes that Jay is some sort of "infiltrator" organism meant to pass as a human. To what end, he can only guess.

Even as advanced as Jay's human form is, he is still adapting to Earth's biochemicals, and sometimes has strange reactions to common substances. For instance, he has developed an addictive reaction to chocolate, the formula in Oreo-brand chocolate cookies in particular.

[Dead Cruiser]

KYON

THE WARHOUND

Name: Kyon

Sex: Male

Place of Origin: Kothar

Appearance: Kyon is a towering brute of a man, standing well over two meters tall, with a dense, muscular body that weighs nearly twenty stone. Kyon's body is of a sturdy musculature, bronze skin, and coarse, dark hair. An extensive network of scars cover both his form and his face, lining his body with countless dark fissures. His features are rough and square, as though hewn from stone, and a particularly brutal scar along his jawline pulls his mouth into a near-constant sneer. Dark eyes peer out from deep, tired sockets, and while alert and predatory, they take on a true fire when Kyon is in battle. He keeps his hair- turned grey at the edges prematurely- cropped short, and does his best to stay clean-shaven. His dress sense is utterly utilitarian; riding leathers and sandals, save for the ring of tarnished silver he wears on the smallest finger of his left hand.

Psyche: Kyon is regarded by many as a hard man; a hard man to know, and a harder man to like. Stoic and introspective, he emotes little and says even less. When he does speak, he is utterly blunt- vitriolic, even. He is generally a man without artifice, with little patience for deception or decorum. He is pragmatic by nature, not prideful in the least, and while uneducated, possesses a particular low cunning. He is not without virtue, however, as he possesses a fierce and protective sense of loyalty (to those that manage to earn it), and detests slavers, rapers, liars, cravens, and others that prey upon the weak and vulnerable. His sense of personal honor extends to a general disgust for witches and monsters as a whole, and takes quiet satisfaction in their killing. In battle, he can seem to many like a different man, as what was originally his stony exterior explodes into a howling battle-fury, stopped usually when there is no more blood left to spill. In battle does his sheer willpower show through best, as he is as bendable as a mountain, often pushing well past the point where his body has failed and broken.

Skills: Kyon is an experienced and skilled soldier, a veteran of dozens of battles, and many more duels or common brawls. His command of the blade is admirable, as is his brutal efficiency with his bare hands. A mercenary by trade, he is generally self-sufficient, more than capable of hunting, camping, fishing, cooking, arms and armor maintenance, rough field medicine, and general navigation, and has some experience in horsemanship and bartering. Quite notable is Kyon's sheer physicality: stronger even than his size and musculature would suggest, and with perseverance that outstrips just about any man he's ever met.

Equipment: Kyon travels light, with a knapsack full of generally-useful supplies and tools for traveling on the road, and an iron hatchet. His armor is light, consisting of an unpainted bronze breastplate, greaves, gauntlets, and helmet. His primary weapon is a broad cavalry-blade, a meter and a half in length, meant for unhorsing riders at a distance; Kyon swings the blade around as though it were no heavier than an arming sword.

Bio: The origins of the man known as Kyon are hazy. His earliest memories are of his childhood in the war-camps of one of Kothar's many slave legions. His parentage is utterly unknown to him; he supposes he was some sort of war-orphan taken in by the slaves- possibly of the Baccum, given his monstrous size. Regardless, he was raised as a slave in his earliest memories, living on scraps, and silently enduring beatings and other brutality at the hands of masters and elder slaves alike. For this, the child was called "Kyon" by the other slaves, a crude name meant to evoke the scavenging gutter-dog he so resembled.

Pity was taken on Kyon by one of the oldest slaves, an elderly veteran known as Arcturus the Grey Wolf. In another life, Arcturus had been known as Arcturus Lupercalia, the Wolf Knight: a heroic kestaphos of Mennon, and a descendant of the mythic barbarian queen Regina Lupercalia, the She-Wolf. Captured in one of Mennon's many skirmishes with Kothar, he was prized as a trophy for some time, spent years in gladiatorial arenas, and was eventually sent to fight his own people as a slave-soldier. Knowing that Kyon had never known a life outside of suffering and slavery, Arcturus took the boy under his wing and taught him the sword. His training was brutal, but Kyon took to it, growing into a formidable warrior by the time he could grow his first chin-hairs.

Kyon fought alongside the other slave-soldiers for some years, cutting his teeth on the vicious and dangerous battles that the slave legions were marched into like so much fodder. It took particular prowess and determination to survive where their Kotharan masters dared not send their professional soldiers, and while Kyon was tested, he persevered. As this continued, he, Arcturus, and the other slaves plotted violent rebellion against their masters, which they enacted at their earliest opportunity. The slave rebellion was quick and bloody, and while it claimed the life of Arcturus, the man Kyon had come to regard as a father, he had won his freedom, and set off into the world.

Knowing no other trade but warfare, Kyon sold his services as a mercenary. In this field he gained a considerable reputation; a vicious warrior with the strength of ten men, some claimed. He could walk into a melee and slay a hundred men on his own, claimed others. Kyon paid little attention to rumors, focusing on honing his skills and finding his next battlefield. In time he was followed by a particular sobriquet: the War Hound. Kyon did not mind this, as it mostly replaced a different, humiliating designation that had also begun to built around him: the Slave Knight.

As years and battles wore on, Kyon's skill grew, and so did his scars. Not merely scars on his body, but on his soul. The loss of Arcturus was merely the first of many. He lost so much in those first few years. Comrades, friends, brothers, even lovers, all turned to ash in the fires of war. He grew cold, retreating to the silent perseverance that had kept him as a child. Kyon did not trust himself to feel anything beyond the rage of battle, fearing no man but he that called him friend.

[Dead Cruiser]

The Black Dragon

Name: Lotan Felheart, the Black Dragon

Age: Ancient, easily in excess of 1000 years.

Gender Male

Race: Svariel

Culture: A people as ancient and prolific as the Astoriel have their fair share of dissidents. Whether heretics that forsake the worship of The One, or secessionists that desire an empire outside of the Enclave's influence, there have been those that have broken away from the greater whole of the Astoriel over the ages. These fragments and outcasts are known as Svariel, or the Dark Kin, and are sometimes called Dark Elves by more ignorant races. As they are a collective of numerous splinter factions, there is no cohesive culture among the Svariel, aside from their collective rejection of their peoples' collectivist values and religion. Common enough among them is the desire to use the magical and technological might their kind has cultivated over the eons to empower themselves, and subjugate other races. Dark Elves are frequently seen as untrustworthy or cruel by other races, and not without good reason; they are frequently pirates, marauders, unscrupulous mercenaries, or subjects of the bloodthirsty empire of Malerion.

Racial Features: Svariel are not biologically distinct from their kin within the Enclave, and are indistinguishable from them by an outsider. However, each "Elf" can intrinsically sense the presence of The One (or the lack thereof) in their kin, and can sense whether they are Astoriel or Svariel instinctively. Additionally, Svariel are far more likely to modify their bodies drastically through the use of transmutative magics or biological engineering; it is not unheard of for enclaves or covens of Dark Elves to possess wings, serpentine bodies, additional limbs, or any combination thereof.

Appearance: Lotan is a tall and imposing figure; his fey Elvish features marred by his pallid and sickly complexion. His hair has long fallen out, and a single eye as dark as a moonless sky stares imperiously. His pale, lithe flesh is covered in numerous dark tattoos; pirate symbols and prison markings. His presence is that of a predator, an ancient monster sat atop a horde of bones. In private company he dresses in rich, dark robes, which cloak and frame his lithe form voluminously. In more serious matters he wears an armored bodyglove, and cloaks and raiments that evoke the image of a warrior-king. He is particularly fond of a golden mask that depicts a high-crested, tentacle-mawed visage, further evoking the image of a hunter of the deep.

Occupation/Concept: In the uncharted and forbidden realms of Elysia, Lotan is a lord among lords. Among the many pirates, corsairs, privateers, brigands, and freebooters, he commands the greatest power out of any of them. A Pirate King the likes of which have not been seen since ages that have faded to hazy memory, he is the terror of the void and a blight on many worlds. He and the rest of his corsair warband, the Void Dragons, are known to strike without warning, and vanish without a trace. They oversee many illegal trades among their secret paths between worlds, and plunder the riches of empires as they see fit.

Training:

• Deadly and experienced close-quarters combatant; adept with blades, whips, sidearms, and such.
• Legendary pirate; expert in naval battle, boarding actions, and piloting small craft.
• Master of ancient lore; speaks many dead languages and has great knowledge of lost empires, specifically their secrets and their treasures.

Powers:

• Mind Flay: Lotan can invade his enemies' minds and assault them with waves of ruinous psychic agony.
• Voidbolt: By conjuring a bolt of pure void energy, Lotan can tear his enemies apart or wrack them with debilitating pain.
• Voidform: Lotan's flesh becomes one with the void, allowing him to survive in such lethal environments as open space.
• Vampiric Touch: Sucking the very life energy of his enemy away, Lotan can heal his wounds and sustain his failing body.
• Word of Death: Lotan speaks an ancient curse in a forsaken tongue: those too weak to bear its horror perish instantly.

Equipment:

• Ghost Armor: A bodyglove adorned with lightweight armored plates that do not slow Lotan or restrict his movements. The suit has a light force-field installed, as well as an in-built holofield that can obfuscate his appearance.
• Masque of Serakith: Lotan's golden mask, taken from the corpse of a favored Malerion prince.
• Nidhogg-Scale Cloak: A night-black hide flensed from the flesh of a great void-serpent, it is durable against many varieties of weapon and energies.
• Venom Blaster: Lotan's preferred side-arm, which fires crystallized shards of horrifically virulent neurotoxin.
• Agonizer: An elastic, electrified lash, which buries into the flesh of those it contacts and overstimulates their pain receptors.
• Nightfang: Lotan's personal blade, a chaotic relic forged from the bones of demons. Its touch envenerates flesh on contact, causing debilitating and necrotic wounds.

Airship: The flagship of Lotan's fleet and his most prized vessel is the Forever Worm, a lost relic of an Astoriel battleship. Blisteringly fast and armed with potent Darklight weapons, its true strength lies in its advanced cloaking technology, which can evade a great majority of modern sensors. Lotan's personal craft is Star Vampire, a custom craft capable of breakneck maneuvers and armed with miniaturized Darklight cannons.

Motivation: While Lotan's wealth and power are both immense, he is living on borrowed time. Millennia of exposure to cosmic radiation, several lifetimes' worth of debauchery, and foul and forbidden magics have all taken their toll on his supposedly-immortal body. Only though stealing the life-energy of others does he remain potent; without this vampirism his health would quickly deteriorate and he would perish. As time wears on, it takes more stolen lives to keep him hale and healthy, and Lotan fears the end immensely. For these reasons, he seeks out a cure for his condition, or any other means of keeping his flesh from failing in perpetuity.

Personality: Lotan is considered by some to be more a force of nature than a man. Capricious and imperial, his sights and ambitions often seem to be set beyond the realms of mortals, and his motivations are often difficult to discern. While seemingly stoic and inscrutable, this is a veneer over his burning ambition and sharp cunning. Lotan projects a dignified charisma, with the silent majesty of a dark idol and passionate fury of a warlord all at once. In most pursuits he is vicious and unshakable, with the tenacity of a starving hound. He delights in dark decadence and long-planned revenge, and no values higher than his own freedom and personal power.

Flaws:

• Cursed Flesh: Lotan's body is failing, slowly yet surely, and the end can only be staved off by sucking away the life of others.
• Outlaw: A legendary villain, Lotan has a tremendous bounty in every government that has heard of him, and numerous other criminals (many among them his own underlings) wish to see him dead.
• Villainous: Trusting no one and trusted by no one, Lotan leads a difficult and solitary existence. Amorality, vengeance, and paranoia rule his daily life, and not all of the knives he perceives pointed at his back may be real.
• Debauched: Lotan has... peculiar tastes. Centuries of hedonism have driven him to extremes of decadence and debauchery.
• Eye on the Prize: He has a hard time seeing things to his right.

Bio: Long, long ago, the man who would become known as the Black Dragon was born a slave on a pirate galleon. His ancestor had been an outcast noble among a lesser Svariel principality, and so his entire lineage was condemned to servitude. Lotan was born and raised on a slaver-vessel, and from a young age he was brought up as a slave-soldier. Vicious naval combat and near-suicidal boarding actions were his life from early adolescence onward, and his skills were honed to a razor-edge so he could as much as stay alive. When not raiding other vessels for wealth, his pirate masters forced him to fight his fellow slaves in brutal gladiatorial combat for their amusement. Even at a young age, a fire of ambition and malevolence burned in Lotan, and he planned his revenge.

He conspired with his fellow slaves over the course of years, mapping out their ship and the habits of their masters to plot out their revolt. When the fated hour came, many of the slaves faltered and betrayed their fellows to their masters. The revolt would have been a failure, with Lotan slain at the hands of a horde of turncoats, had he not Exalted at that moment, and driven the revolt forward with his own sheer strength. While the fighting was vicious and cost him his right eye, Lotan eventually won his freedom with a sword's edge.

For many years after he wandered Elysia, frequently as a pirate himself, or some other manner of sellsword. He sold his services to many crews and unscrupulous governments, and often enough ran afoul of the law and served time in some brig or prison before eventually springing loose. All the while he accumulated experience, wealth, contacts and power, and slowly ascended as a mighty pirate lord of his own right. All the while, he pursued a peculiar interest in empires that had fallen under the demonic sway, and the forbidden magics they practiced. This "void magic," which controlled such matters as dark energy and the mind often gave him an edge over his competitors, to say nothing of his latent power as an Exalt.

Lotan's true ascension came after centuries of piracy, as he set his sights on become the most powerful pirate lord of all; a king among kings. The mightiest pirates of the age had formed a triumvirate alliance, and Lotan sought their deaths. By cutting deals throughout the noble court, Lotan was able to infiltrate and abduct the crown prince of a mighty empire of the age, and framed the trio of pirate lords for the crime. The empire went to war over the slight, and the battle between them and the pirate lords was apocalyptic in scale. Once it had ended, all of his rivals were dead, and the empire's military had been crippled. Lotan struck then, consolidating the remaining power of the the pirate lords under his own banner, the warband then forth known as the Void Dragons, and plundered the territory of the weakened empire freely. This masterstroke cemented his status as a king of the underworld for centuries to come, and his infamy and power have only grown since that momentous ascension.

Extra Info: Lotan is sometimes accompanied by a bound Devil called Whisper of N'Zoth (often shortened to Whisper). A diminutive creature that often rides upon his shoulder, Whisper is a font of dark knowledge and terrible secrets. As its name implies, it often whispers to Lotan, telling him of methods of furthering his pursuit of void magics, or locations of relics and loci of power. These have been lies as often as not, as it seeks Lotan's death to release itself, but cannot act directly against him by the nature of its binding. Its true form is allegedly horrific and powerful, but none but Lotan have beheld it.

Dragon-Blooded

[Dead Cruiser]

Hunter with the Taste of Death

Name: Yamamura Seishiro

Appearance: Seishiro is unremarkable at first glance. Tall, but not too tall, strongly-built, but not bulging with muscle, without close examination he could pass for a student athlete. However, he does have several peculiarities. He has shining golden eyes, like a cat's, that are not hidden by his limiter, and so he will sometimes wear contacts in public to cover them. He carries many scars all over his body, including his face, as a result of the power of his bloodline and the training he underwent in his upbringing. Seishiro's dress sense is a bit eccentric, as he likes punk-style clothes, featuring a lot of leather, studs, spikes, chains, and silver jewelry.

Age: 16

Gender: Male

Backstory: The Yamamura bloodline is as ancient and storied as Hunter bloodlines come. However, they have faded into the realm of myth over the last few centuries, and have been thought to be extinct by many. In a long-distant year, the Yamamura clan heard tell of another bloodline of hunters, their name lost to history, conspiring to bring a powerful and malevolent Youkai into the world. Rather than let this catastrophe come to pass, they went to war against this enemy bloodline, and eradicated them. However, when the other bloodlines called upon the Yamamura to answer for their deeds, they could not prove the other clan's wrongdoing, as the perpetrators had all been killed. Those that had participated in the purge were marked as Youkai and executed, which combined with the casualties from the battle, greatly diminished their bloodline. The Yamamura faded into obscurity, and were thought to have quietly gone extinct.

However, this was revealed to be untrue as Seishiro emerged to join the Hunter's Club. He had spent his early childhood as the rest of the remaining Yamamura had in the intervening years; in secrecy and seclusion in distant places such as mountains and forests. Seishiro had grown up with no other children, with his father as near-only human contact. There he had been tutored and trained in the ways of the Hunter, with shocking success, and yet his isolated upbringing has made him a bit eccentric, like someone lost out of time. Even though he is overwhelmed by modern city life, he is eager to make new friends among the Hunter's Club and regain the honor of his fallen bloodline.

Hunter Power: The bloodline of the Yamamura is strange and considered disturbing by some. They have been known to call it "Death Eater" (死食べ), which is as accurate a description as any. If Seishiro becomes wounded or otherwise damaged by some form of attack, he can "savor the taste of death," and develop an adapted resistance to that attack. This only lasts as long as he can concentrate on the "taste of death," and so the time and number of adaptations he can manifest are both limited by his concentration and willpower. At the present moment, he can juggle three in his mind at once, but he is training to improve. If need be, he can "consume a bitter death," to completely heal from what would otherwise be a fatal wound, but this does not provide him with a resistance to the damage that would have killed him, and is exhausting, thus hampering his power until he can rest.

Techniques: Seishiro's fighting style is classically trained, almost antiquated, but is highly aggressive, relying on his ability to cheat death to deal the most possible damage.

Hari (針): Seishiro kicks off with tremendous speed, diving toward an enemy sword-first, like a wasp hunting a fly.

Sengiri (千切り): Seishiro delivers as many cuts as he can in as short a time as possible, his blade becoming a barely-visible whirlwind, hoping any will find purchase and deliver Blood Shadow's venom.

Haru (駆る): Seishiro's primary unarmed technique, similar to Hari, where he closes distance with his foe at maximum speed to kick them into the dirt.

Heirloom: The heirloom Seishiro carries is Blood Shadow (血影), a strange, antique katana. Its metal is old and dark, and veined with strange channels and symbols. It has no crossguard, and the wrappings about its hilt are wine-red and ragged. Upon activation, Blood Shadow pricks Seishiro's palms with hidden needles in the grip, and channels his blood up into the blade. Like its master, Blood Shadow savors the taste of death, and inflicts this taste upon his enemies. Whatever sort of creature Seishiro has adapted to become more resistant to, his blood becomes a deadly venom against. The more he has adapted himself to face this particular foe, the more potent this poison becomes.

Skill: Seishiro is rather self-sufficient, and adept at rural living. Given that he lived alone with his father, he is used to doing a lot of housework. Besides that, he has near-encyclopedic knowledge of vintage music, movies, and other pop-culture, as these were all he was exposed to during his isolated upbringing.

Limiter/Charm: Seishiro's limiter is a skull-shaped silver ring he wears on his left hand. The charm for Blood Shadow is as antique as the blade itself, and takes the form of a tarnished silver hair-pin that Seishiro keeps stuck through the lapel of his jacket.

Theme Song: I picked two what of it

Most of the boys won't ever cross this line,
If they all wanna die dead broke that's fine that's fine,
Everybody's got their limits,
Nobody's found mine

Dead I am the dog, hound of hell you cry,
Devil on your back, I can never die

[Dead Cruiser]

Jason Flanagan

"Don't be scared, he's just sixteen-hundred pound friend!"

---

Name: Jason Flanagan

Nicknames: Big Red, Monster Mash

Aliases: The Kaiju King, Master of Monsters, Mr. Unova (5 years ago)

Age: 30

Gender: Male

Origin: Castelia City, Unova

Appearance: Jason is a truly massive man, head and shoulders taller than most people, and covered in thick slabs of muscle. He prefers athletic wear when acting as a trainer or member of the Elite, but in more casual settings will wear things like jeans, boots and flannel.

Personality: Jason is a boisterous character, full of emotion and a love for life. Everything he does he puts as much as himself into as possible, be it laughing, crying, training, or battling. He respects strength most of all, but understands that it comes in many forms. Though he can be overbearing, he is an inherently kind soul, and doesn't want to use his strength to hurt anyone.

Short Biography: Jason is from Castelia City, where he was an awkward youth due to his size compared to other children his age. However, around the time that most children start their Pokemon journey, a freak accident in the city took place. A trainer from far away lost control of their Tyranitar, who destroyed an entire skyscraper. No one was seriously hurt, but it was a serious shock to the city, and especially to Jason. He was awed by the Tyranitar's power, and became enamored with the strength of huge and monstrous Pokemon, who he found common kinship with. He found an egg when exploring in the rubble of the skyscraper, and the Larvitar that hatched from it became his first Pokemon. Jason spent his journey traveling to many different places and discovering what mighty and monstrous Pokemon lived there, and training with them to maximize both his and their own terrifying power. He became a member of Unova's Elite out of recognition for his strength after many years of training and dedication, and was loaned to Sinnoh's elite out of a desire to use his strength to help wherever he could.

Pokemon

Khan

Name: Khan
Species: Tyranitar
Gender: Male
Ability: Sand Stream
Appearance: Larger than most Tyranitar, with scratched armor from heavy training.
Personality: Khan is noble and solitary, seeking to fight only the strongest opponents, but is utterly ferocious when in battle.
Special Moves: Shadow Claw, Outrage, Fire Punch, Thunder Punch

Tank

Name: Tank
Species: Aggron
Gender: Male
Ability: Heavy Metal
Appearance: Tank is a truly huge specimen of an Aggron, with iron armor much thicker than normal.
Personality: Dutiful and patient both in and out of battle, Tank can seem sluggish, and has moments of arrogance when it comes to his armor.
Special Moves: Dragon Claw, Stealth Rock, Toxic, Superpower

Jaeger

Name: Jaeger
Species: Golurk
Gender: N/A
Ability: Iron Fist
Appearance: More grey-green compared to most Golurk, and the flames of its jet thruster are blue.
Personality: Jaeger barely seems alive at times, as it won't move at all unless commanded; except when Jason is in danger, when it will move to protect him with shocking speed.
Special Moves: Fire Punch, Thunder Punch, Drain Punch, Ice Punch

Princess

Name: Princess
Species: Feraligatr
Gender: Female
Ability: Sheer Force
Appearance: Princess is hulking compared to most Feraligatr, with thick limbs, and huge claws and fangs.
Personality: Surprisingly lazy, Princess spends most of her time lying about, but becomes a force of nature when moved to action.
Special Moves: Dragon Dance, Liquidation, Ice Punch, Dragon Claw

Kaiser

Name: Kaiser
Species: Hydreigon
Gender: Male
Ability: Levitate
Appearance: Kaiser is larger and more fearsome-looking than most Hydreigon, and his body crackles with latent energy.
Personality: Kaiser is almost impossible to control, willing to viciously battle basically anything. His destructive nature worries Jason, and as a result he spends most of his time in his ball.
Special Moves: Draco Meteor, Dark Pulse, Fire Blast, Flash Cannon

Dozer

Name: Dozer
Species: Nidoking
Gender: Male
Ability: Sheer Force
Appearance: Dozer is bulkier than most Nidoking, darker purple, with cracked and chipped armor and horns.
Personality: Most like Jason among his other Pokemon, Dozer is boisterous and competitive, but is inherently kind and helpful.
Special Moves Toxic, Poison Jab, Drill Run, Fire Punch

Emperor

Name: Emperor
Species: Tyrantrum
Gender: Male
Ability: Rock Head
Appearance: Emperor is a very unusual Tyrantrum, larger than most recovered specimens, with a scarred face and jaws, but is royal blue in color instead of red-brown.
Personality: Imperious and arrogant, possibly Jason's most prideful and hot-headed Pokemon, but surprisingly polite.
Move Set: Fire Fang, Outrage, Superpower, Zen Headbutt

Titania

Name: Titania
Species: Volcarona
Gender: Female
Ability: Flame Body
Appearance: Huge among Volcarona, Titania's wings seem brighter than usual and embers constantly drift from them.
Personality: Titania is enigmatic and quiet most of the time, but is brutal and relentless in battle.
Move Set: Solar Beam, Sunny Day, Morning Sun, Hidden Power

Killer

Name: Killer
Species: Aerodactyl
Gender: Male
Ability: Pressure
Appearance: One of the largest Aerodactyl specimens restored, with a darker-grey coloration and viciously hooked fangs and claws.
Personality: Killer is excitable and friendly, eager to compete and more eager to be praised.
Move Set: Aqua Tail, Sky Attack, Steel Wing, Fire Fang

Duke

Name: Duke
Species: Slaking
Gender: Male
Ability: Truant
Appearance: Bulky enough that some would think that he's overweight, Duke is in fact covered in compressed muscle.
Personality: Duke is as lazy as most Slaking, but seeing his master or friend being harmed fills him with unquenchable fury.
Move Set: Crush Claw, Dynamic Punch, Fire Punch, Gunk Shot

Summary: A kind-hearted master of massive, monstrous Pokemon.

Other: Character theme lol

[Dead Cruiser]

Sword X

Name: Fujiwara Hideo
Nicknames: Black Cat, Ten
Villain Name: Sword X
Age: 38
Gender: Male
Appearance: Hideo is a tall and dark figure, though he is getting on in his years and his hero days are behind him, he is still strongly-built, with a trained, athletic build. His face is lined and weary, with thin, dark, suspicious eyes. He keeps a thick, dark beard, though trimmed short, and his hair falls to his shoulders in a black curtain. Hideo's fashion sense is unremarkable, mostly keeping in casual attire, though all black. In place of having a villain costume he dresses in things like slacks, button-down shirts, and sweaters, though he may keep armor and weapons hidden on his person. While he normally tries to avoid looking conspicuous, if the occasion calls for dramatics, he merely adds a cheap witch's hat, a Halloween costume prop, to his ensemble.

--

Weapons: Hideo keeps a handgun on his person and a knife in his boot, but otherwise doesn't carry weapons.
Hero(Villain) Equipment: Preferring to remain inconspicuous, Hideo merely carries binoculars and a handheld radio, to keep from standing out in a crowd. More advanced operations may call for night-vision goggles, or some manner of camouflage.

--
Combat Section:

Strength: Hideo, though trained, is nothing to write home about physically. He keeps in shape, and has all the strength a grown man of his size can bring to bear, but he is not a bodybuilder, a martial artist, or anything of that caliber.

Endurance: As stated, Hideo is in good physical shape, and can run for some distance, but he is not extraordinary in this regard.

Willpower: As a hero, Hideo's willpower reached his limit, and he broke mentally, driving him to villainy. Now as a villain, he figures that he can sink no further, and this has lent him a surprising wellspring of depraved fortitude to tap into.

Speed: Again, Hideo takes care of himself, but he is no athlete. Long legs help him move quicker than someone shorter than him, but he is not about to outrun any trained sprinter.

Reaction Speed: Surprisingly quick on the draw, Hideo has a mental sharpness about him that helps him activate his quirk as quickly as needed when the chips are down.
--
Quirk Section:

Name of Quirk: Bad Luck Charm

Ability of Quirk: Bad Luck Charm allows Hideo to seemingly induce bad luck and misfortune by altering the circumstances of the environment or inanimate objects or that Hideo can see so that they create a state of "failure."

Qualities of Quirk: Depending on what can be justified as "misfortune," Hideo can cause electrical equipment to fail, machinery to malfunction, weather to turn foul, building structures to weaken, and a variety of other misfortunes as long as he understands the physical conditions needed for that failure, and it would not be an egregious break from reality (e.g., someone struck by lightning in broad daylight).

Strengths of Quirk: Bad Luck Charm exerts no direct physical power.

Weaknesses of Quirk: Heroes with quirks that rely only on their own innate power or biology are the most resistant to Hideo's quirk, and things that limit his visual range such as smoke limit the effectiveness of his quirk.

Limits of Quirk: Hideo's quirk only works on inanimate objects, and can only work on something he can see, though he does not need precise visual confirmation (e.g. he only needs to see a gun to affect its bullets, given they are part of its mechanism). If he cannot justify the failure state mentally, he cannot exert his influence.

----

Biography: Hideo's childhood was an uneasy one; while his family was not destitute, they often skirted the edges of poverty. He was seen as a cursed child by some, as he was seemingly quirkless, and he and his family were constantly surrounded by misfortune. It was not until he was a teenager that he began to understand and learn to control his quirk, whereupon his lot in life dramatically improved. He enrolled into one of Japan's less-premier Hero Academies, and while his quirk was far from flashy, he made good progress developing as a support hero, providing backup to the more direct and offensive heroes.

Graduating with his Hero license, Hideo joined a local Hero association under the guise of the Sabotage Hero, Tripwire. Even as a Hero he was somewhat private, and concealed the exact nature of his quirk, believing this to both be to his advantage against criminals, as well as preventing other Heroes and society from alienating him for his "evil" quirk. His initial Hero name was a deliberate misdirection to that end. His early years were quite successful; he married a fellow hero, and started a family.

However, his luck did not carry through, as his Hero firm became embroiled in an embezzlement scheme and was dissolved, leaving Hideo without steady work. His family grew into dire straights financially, as his wife could not work as she was pregnant with their second child. Determined to not let his children be raised in the stressful environment in which he was, he slipped into illegal work, using his quirk to rig bets or carry out small vendettas. However, when his wife died in childbirth, leaving Hideo alone with their two children, he grew more desperate, and engaged in blatant criminal activity to keep a roof above their heads.

A bank-robbery foiled by Heroes was the end of Hideo's run on the skirts of criminality. He was imprisoned on charges of felony murder due to a bank guard that had been killed during the robbery, his Hero license was revoked, and his children were taken into state custody. It was during his imprisonment that he came to learn about Dark Tree, and accepted an invitation into the organization from a fellow inmate. He was then instrumental in the execution of a prison break, along with several other heroes, given that the authorities still did not understand his quirk as well as he did, and were unprepared to defend against it. Since escaping, he has fully embraced the status of a villain, and adopted the villain name, Sword X, another misdirection to conceal his true power.

Personality: Hideo is morose and bitter, a frequent pessimist, though he considers himself to be a pragmatist. He has given up on the altruism the he embraced as a hero, and is determined to extract what he believes he deserves from society. He is inherently self-serving, and owes no loyalty or friendship to any of his fellow villains. While he is usually practical and undramatic, he still has his moments of pettiness and viciousness, an outlet from the stress of his Hero years and the years of misfortune he's suffered.

----

Other: Hideo has an annoying habit of saying things like, "That's tough luck," or similar catchphrases.

[Dead Cruiser]

AZRAEL

Forgive me for this violence I am about to inflict.

Name: Azrael Irkalla

Age: 26 (Earth Years)

Birthdate: 14/26

Gender: Male

Nationality: Born on Rayyud, Currently in service to the Knights of Metatron on Erelim, lives in the United States, Earth.

---

Appearance:

Height: 6'3"
Weight: 270 lbs
Fashion Sense: While normally he wears an assortment of robes and sandals, on Earth he has adopted athletic wear such as sneakers, yoga tights, muscle shirts, and so on. Still fond of sandals and parading shirtless, however.
Distinguishing Features: Large bundle of dreadlocks typically tied up behind his head. His aura flares with violet flame when he activates his abilities.

---

Biography:

Personality Questions:

You're fighting a worthy opponent who you're about to defeat, then they forsake their humanity and give up their self just to beat you, how do you react?

"I was not planning on sparing them to begin with. All they have done is revealed the depth of their desperation, like the cornered vermin they are."

A good friend of yours abandons you and everyone they know in the pursuit of strength, how do you feel?

"I wish them well on their journey. Reach Heaven Through Violence."

Where do you go when you die?

"Mortals are not blessed with reincarnation as the sacred angels are. We are given the gift of cessation of existence, and so our souls burn all the brighter."

Backstory: Azrael was born the son of a citizen-soldier on a faraway world known as Rayyud. He lived a simple life, caring for his mother and sisters while his father was at war. However, when he was just barely a man, ruin came to Rayyud. Invaders from beyond the stars laid waste to his home, and stripped it bare. The soil, the oceans, even Rayyud's sun was stolen by these conquerors before they fled back to the stars. His family dead and his world barely hospitable, Azrael should have given up the will to live. However, the fire of rage borne of injustice burned in his heart, and he clung to life despite his world's desolation. Salvation came in the form of an angel, one in service to the Knights of Metatron. A peacekeeping force between the worlds, the angel had arrived too late to save Rayyud, but just in time to save Azrael. Seeing the powerful being, he begged it to take him with it, so he could become strong enough to ensure this calamity never befell another world. The angel took pity on Azrael, and spirited him away back to Erelim, the homeworld of the Knights of Metatron.

On Erelim, Azrael was forced to undergo trials to see if he could join the ranks of the Knights. Most mortals could not survive these tasks, and none had lived through the final trial in generations. To finally be inducted as a Knight, one had to listen to the word of Metatron, the last living Prime Angel, the titans forged by the gods themselves. Though his ears and eyes bled from the Prime Angel's speech, Azrael clung to life, and Azrael became the first mortal in decades to become a Knight of Metatron. As one of them, he was trained in the secretive martial arts of the angelic host, and taught to harness the spark of divine power within his mortal soul. He grew powerful quickly, his righteous fury spurring him on, and he never lost sight of his goal to avenge his homeworld.

The Knights' prognosticators had a vision of another world befalling a similar fate as Rayyud, and though his training was still incomplete, Azrael begged them to allow him to intervene. Normally he would have been forbidden, but the people of this world greatly resembled Azrael's race, where an angel would have been seen as an aberration. He was allowed to travel to this world, Earth, to live among their kind and endeavor to save the planet from ruin. Since being sent to Earth, Azrael has found himself in a place called Los Angeles, and has done surprisingly well to integrate himself among humankind. His talents in physical training, martial arts, and meditation, as well as his interest in tea have all lent him the air of a sophisticated spiritualist, though he has been described as a "hipster" by some, more ignorant humans. He has lived on Earth for two years now, living as a barista by day, and continuing his training in astral form by night, still living in anticipation for calamity to befall Earth.

Abilities:
Azrael is trained in the angelic martial art known as the Path of Seven Kings, which has imbued him with tremendous physical strength and preternatural power. He can lift an ox-cart over his head one-handed, and can pulverize stone with his bare fists. His fighting technique is superb and sharply disciplined, and so he is formidable against even foes that surpass him in sheer strength. The Path of Seven Kings is reliant on unlocking spiritual "gates" within one's soul, with the intent of unlocking all seven and achieving a form of physical and spiritual enlightenment known as "ROYALTY." So far, Azrael has unlocked the gates of "GLORY," "TOWER," "FLAME," and "DIAMOND," leaving three gates still to be unlocked. The so-far unlocked gates bestow him with the ability to project his blows at a distance as though his spiritual power was a projectile, his supernatural strength, the power to project his astral form and commune with others that can do the same, and his flesh is imbued with extreme hardness and durability.

---

Equipment: Azrael possesses a Magus Key, essentially his ticket "home." A small, unassuming object resembling a pearl, it can open portals between worlds, and this one is tuned to return him to Erelim.

He is also is in possession of a bottle of a curious substance from the slum known as Hell 71, "Blue Devil Liquor." A strange alcoholic liquid with unusual side-effects when ingested by mortals, those who imbibe the liquor (which Azrael already has) gain the ability to speak Universal Metaconstant, the primordial tongue from which all others are derived, thus gaining the ability to speak and understand essentially any language.

Other: Azrael has proved to be surprisingly popular among Earthlings near his age, and has quite a few friends that share his passion for tea. He is also quite enjoying this "yoga" business.

Theme

[Dead Cruiser]

ЗЭКА

Superhero Name: Zeka

Civilian Name: None, official scientific designation is NII-0302007.

Hometown: None, generally escapes into low orbit between sightings. Originally housed on Severny Island, Siberia, in the former Soviet Union.

Sex: None, though his humanoid form is male in appearance.

Race: Unknown, some form of energy being.

Height: 185 cm (humanoid form)

Weight: 634 kg (mass of corium body)

Age: Unknown

Birth Date: Unknown, first discovered 19 July, 1960.

Costumed Appearance: Zeka’s humanoid form is that of a robust and muscular human male, with the heroic and statuesque proportions typical of the Socialist Realism style of the post-World War Soviet Union. His facial features are strikingly aesthetic, subtly stylized, and his body gives a fit and powerful appearance, though he is not disproportionately nor ripplingly muscular. His hair is a completely static sculpture of a short and combed style.

The most obvious indicator of Zeka’s inhuman nature is that his entire body, including his hair and teeth, is composed of a glossy, black mineral substance (corium, a crystalline techno-alloy comprised of such substances as silicon, boron, graphite, lead, and uranium) that resembles volcanic glass. His eyes and the inside of his mouth both glow intensely with the white-yellow light of his reactor core. While Zeka can alter the material of his humanoid form to resemble whatever he wishes, he maintains this form at essentially all times due to psychological conditioning.

Civilian Appearance: Zeka has no secret identity, and as a result is essentially always “in costume.” His taste in clothing generally revolves around two or three piece suits, usually worn without ties. He may sometimes remove his shirt or strip down entirely if engaged in battle.

Icon: Zeka does not have an overt costume and as such does not have a sigil emblazoned on his chest, though he still identifies with the hammer and sickle of the CPSU.

Costumed Personality: Zeka’s inhuman mind has been shaped considerably by the psychological conditioning he went through while he was the captive of the Soviet Union. The resulting synthesis has created his “heroic” persona. Zeka can be described as empathetic, as he cares deeply about common people and their suffering, but at the same time he is a ruthless pragmatist; he cuts to the quick and does whatever is necessary to benefit the greater good. He prefers direct action whenever possible, and can be ruthless and devastating in its application. Zeka is not completely without mercy, kindness, and other humane qualities, but his confinement and the world he has emerged into have made him bitter and cynical. He still has some remaining hope for cooperation and a utopian future with a united mankind, but he knows that it cannot be achieved without sacrifice.

Civilian Personality: As has been said, Zeka does not have a civilian persona, and so he treats with common people and metahumans in an identical manner. He is a creature without deception and artifice, and has nothing to hide from anyone.

Super Abilities

Skills: Zeka does not have much in the way of civilian skills. During his decades of captivity, he has achieved a mastery of such topics as nuclear physics, Marxist socio-economic theory, and the construction of antiquated late-Soviet era nuclear reactors. He speaks several languages, including most of those spoken by Warsaw Pact states.

Powers: Zeka’s obsidian body is a construction around his true form: he is essentially a sapient nuclear fusion reactor, in other words a living star. The vast majority of his abilities are derived from the controlled release of energy from his nuclear heart. His physical humanoid form is a byproduct of his ability to reshape and manipulate radiologically hyperactive material, and was constructed from the liquified materials that formed his Siberian prison. While it typically seals the heat and radiation his core produces, Zeka can choose to allow this energy to permeate his body and revert to the toxic nuclear lava his body originally resembled. Given that his body is merely the container of his true form, it is very difficult to physically harm him in any meaningful sense, and his strength is only limited by the energy output of his reactor.

By carefully allowing the energy of his core to be released, Zeka can attack with controlled bursts of heat, light and radiation. Just as he can release this energy, he can also absorb energy (typically radiation), which adds fuel to his internal reactor. As a result, his attacks that would normally contaminate an area can have their fallout reabsorbed by him if he so chooses, helping him avoid collateral damage from his abilities.

While Zeka’s nuclear energy generally acts according to how mankind understands it, it also has otherworldly properties that cannot be readily explained by modern science. His ability to transmute radioactive material can result in him taking surprising forms, and his radiation can interact strangely with living things, particularly insects and other arthropods.

Gadgets: Zeka does not carry any equipment with him; his natural radiation tends to interfere with electronics.

Weapons: See above.

Vulnerabilities: Zeka's limitations derive from the fact that he is a purely physical creature, bound by the laws of physics and reality (though perhaps not has mankind fully understands them). As such, he has no ability to comprehend, wield, or make special defenses against magic or other forces that are distinct from reality or physical law. While he is still a living creature with a soul, magic and other metaphysical forces are beyond the limitations of his existence.

As stated, Zeka must obey the laws of physics, and this includes thermodynamics. His nuclear heart is not an engine of perpetual energy, and requires fuel to continue to burn. The most efficient fuel for his fusion reactor core would be hydrogen or helium, but such elements are rare on earth and diffused into the planet's atmosphere. As a result, he must absorb ionizing matter or reactions into his core in order to not only keep himself alive, but also fuel his powers.

Additionally, Zeka does not interact well with electronic devices. While his physical body contains the vast amount of radiation his core produces, he still has a constant output of low-level ionizing radiation, which disrupts complex electronic devices such as microchips. Any electronics that spend a significant amount of time around Zeka are inevitably degraded in a span of hours or days, depending on the hardening of the device in question.

While Zeka's physical form cannot be truly injured, as it essentially a "suit" worn by his true, plasmic, nuclear body, it is not particularly durable. His corium body is malleable, but can still be destroyed by sufficient force. Zeka's inherent empathy would prevent him from willingly discharging his body's intense radiation if he can avoid it, and as a result, inflicting significant damage to his physical form can force him to retreat until he can reform and reseal his nuclear core.

Civilian Occupation: None.

Character History: Zeka’s origins are a mystery; whatever factual information may have existed about what he is or where he came from has been obscured by misinformation, intentional redaction of information, the disappearances of individuals involved, and the records lost following the dissolution of the Soviet Union. This much is known: the being known as Zeka came into the possession of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics in the early 1960s, and was stored in a secret laboratory on a remote island off the northern coast of Siberia. Designated NII-0302007 by the Soviet Scientific Research Institute, once it became apparent that the being was in fact sapient and intelligent, it came to be informally referred to as “Zeka,” a Russian slang term meaning “prisoner.”

Zeka was initially hostile and combative to the researchers contaning and studying him, and briefly escaped in October 1961. However, the advanced interrogation and psychological conditioning procedures practiced by the KGB proved effective even on a truly inhuman being, and he became compliant and receptive. Zeka had little to express about his (he had adopted a male persona at this point despite his incorporeal form) past or his species, only remembering that he was “lured by natural urges.” He spent most of the 20th century in containment, being indoctrinated by his captors socialist theory, as well as helping them expand their understanding of nuclear energy, which they educated him in as well.

Following the Two-Months War, the Russian Federation, which had already neglected the funding for Zeka’s containment facility, allowed his prison to deteriorate to the point where he escaped. Unable to recapture both Zeka and deal with the fallout of the war, Zeka was able to escape into the wildlands and pursue his own mysterious agenda.

[Dead Cruiser]

Emel

Emel Thilverlyg

The Ivory Dragon

Species: Elf (Dark)

Sex: Elf Male

Age: Emel does not know the count of his years, as he is old in the way that only Elves and trees are old. He does not help this matter by often suggesting exaggerated and conflicting estimations of his own age.

Height: 5'10", tall for an Elf.

Description: With a tall and sturdy build by Elvish standards, Emel is an intimidating figure. By the standards of Men, he is slender and of average height, pallid and pristine, as though he were carved from porcelain. His graceful figure belies his strength and ferocity, and he is fond of fine robes and jewelry to accentuate his pale beauty. His looks are strange even among Elves, and to those among the mortal races he seems alien and exotic, moving with a fluidity that seems unnatural. His eyes are the burning yellow-red of molten copper, his flesh is the color of bleached bone, and his long, shimmering hair is the white of fresh snow. When in battle, Emel prefers dark cloaks to conceal thin layers of Elvish armor, and straps a variety of blades and weapons to his person, with his largest sword strapped across his back.

Abnormalities: As an albino Elf, Emel is of an even paler coloration than most of his kind, with hot yellow eyes that match his boiling, golden blood. Scars the color of tarnished brass cross his body in an intricate network; trophies earned in battle, or lessons learned from past mistakes.

Other: Emel is a known and hated exile among Elf-kind, and is given the epithets "Ivory Dragon" and "Prince of Swords." Among those learned enough, it is clear that he is one of the outcast Dark Elves, though he seems unusually hale and strong for one among their number. Mysteriously, he retains his agelessness, and his psychic magic is potent and focused. Emel carries an enigmatic greatsword across his back at nearly all times; the magically sensitive may sense a disturbingly powerful and vicious aura surrounding it, comparable to an arch-demon from the deepest pits.

[Dead Cruiser]

ANARKY

Player Name:
Dead Cruiser

Primary Character:
Anarky

Secret Identity:
Lonnie Machin

Status:
Solo

Age:
17

City:
Gotham

Day Job:
Lonnie works full-time as a member of his commune, and also runs an online anarchist bookstore.

Powers:
In general, Anarky seems to have no powers beyond the natural abilities of a human, but enhanced to exaggerated levels. Physically (with regards to strength, speed, endurance, reflexes, coordination, etc) he can perform at the level of an olympic athlete with ease, and can achieve low-level superhuman feats with exertion. His senses, when concentrated on, can allow him telescopic vision, sight in darkness, hearing at subsonic or supersonic frequencies, the ability to identify chemical compounds by smell, and can sense minute changes in air pressure and temperature. He seems immune to most common diseases, and his metabolism can detoxify his body rapidly. Anarky can go exaggerated lengths of time without food, water, or sleep, and his injuries recover markedly faster and more completely than normal. Even the composition of his skin has changed to have a similar tensile strength and heat resistance as kevlar. Anarky has increased mental prowess as well, as his memory is eidetic, he can absorb and retain information at an extremely rapid rate, and he is able to accept and caluclate large amounts of data with shocking speed.

Weaknesses:
While seemingly at a level above a common human, Lonnie is not as far removed as one thinks. While his skin can repel blades and small-arms fire, direct hits will still give him tissue damage, and he can only withstand heat and flame in short bursts. High caliber weapons, extreme kinetic force, or excessive temperature will all harm him easily enough, as will any sort of otherworldly or supernatural element that can harm humans.

Skills:
Given his enhanced mental abilities, Anarky is knowledgeable on a variety of subjects, from martial arts, to engineering, to botany, to economics. His particularly favored subjects are history, philosophy, sociology, computer engineering, and network security. Under the secondary alias "Moneyspider," Anarky is a prodigious grey-hat hacker, responsible for security breaches at the national level, and has evaded digital identification by even the Justice League. Notable also is Anarky's skill in navigating and surviving in the urban underground, and he possesses a remarkable charisma for leading the downtrodden and oppressed.

Appearance:
Beyond his flawless physique, Lonnie is generally unremarkable. He is not particularly tall, nor overly muscular, nor is he especially attractive. He generally resembles a typical American teenager of European descent, with dark hair, brown eyes, and some traces of Slavic and Semitic ancestry visible in his features. As Anarky, he dresses in black fatigues with dark combat boots, and a black leather jacket with a hood sewn in. He conceals his identity with a mostly-featureless white mask with a red anarchist "A" emblazoned over it, and this same symbol is sewn into the back of his jacket.

BRIEF Bio:
Lonnie Machin was born to Francesca Machin, a single mother, in the East End of Gotham City. The two lived an impoverished existence, surrounded by crime and corruption, even sometimes resorting to it themselves to survive. Growing up in the roughest neighborhood in Gotham was difficult, but Lonnie manage to get by with his compassion intact. Even in his early teenage years he was a relentless protestor and youth activist, fighting against the corruption deeply ingrained into Gotham City, and helping those he could in his own neighborhood. Even so, as time went on, he began to tire of the seemingly endless struggle against poverty and the indifference of those in power. His body began to change in this time as well, his superhuman nature revealing itself as he went through the stages of puberty. Eventually Lonnie had simply had enough; he had seen too many people suffer and die at the hands of violence both from criminals, and from the systems supposed to protect them. Having studied the great revolutionary thinkers of years past, Lonnie has taken on the alias of Anarky, and seeks to take justice into his own hands and protect his neighborhood, and anyone in need. In recent months, Anarky has managed to push the gangs out of his block in the East End, and has established a mutual-aid commune in a building he and a few other like-minded individuals have been squatting in. At the current moment he is generally below the notice of superhuman justice, and is at best regarded as a low-level gang leader.

Story Arcs:
Street Justice: A supervillain is on the lamb from their most recent escapade, but has wandered into the wrong neighborhood: Anarky's neighborhood. Apprehending them himself, he plans to make a brutal example of the villain, but this is at odds with the more civilized justice of Gotham City and its protectors. (Group)

The Master's House: As Anarky's commune grows, they'll have greater need of space and resources. Who will complain if they "collectivize" a few more tenement buildings, some funds from an international banking conglomerate, and perhaps a convoy of WayneTech prototypes? (Solo)

Supporting Characters:
None yet.

Additional Notes:
Nothing yet.

[Dead Cruiser]

Gost

Name: Therion "Gost" Domitian

Description: Tall and strongly-built, like many among the warlike Clan Domitian, Gost is an intimidating, formidable presence. Almost none of his features can be observed, as his face is covered at nearly all times by an arcane survival masque, and no skin is left exposed under his dark, lengthy robes and archeotech augmentics. While his masque normally gives him the countenance of some metallic beast with eyes burning with azure light of lost technology, in the rare moments it is removed (typically only to eat), his countenance is grim and pale, hollow-eyed, and with thin, matted hair the color of silk.

Race: Avanagashan (Augmented)

Faction/Unit: Necrodomii, Clan Domitian

Location: Zar Vorgul

Synopsis of Role: Therion (known by his child-name of Gost among his clanmates), is a Warlock of the Necrodomii, specifically the dominant and militant Clan Domitian. Already an esteemed warrior and scholar among the cultish Necrodomii, he is currently undergoing his Rite of Ascension, a ritualized trial to mark his advancement to the ultimate rank of Magus and earn the privilege of working directly with Deus Machina. To complete his Rite, he must acquire a functioning component of archeotech that can interface with a Deus Machina in the event that one of the god machines is damaged.

To this end, Gost has come to bargain with the sorcerer lords of Zar Vorgul, and plans to offer his services and potentially those of his clanmates in the coming hositilites in exchange for one of their relics. Gost's very body has been augmented with the archeotech that his people venerate, specifically a series of relics known among them as Kyrofulgarii; these amplify and shape the neuro-electricity that runs through his nervous system into weapons that seem to function magically to the ignorant masses. Sparking bursts of lightning, blades of channeled plasma, and electromagnetic barriers can be produced by the wondrous Kyrofulgarii, though its use runs the risk of shorting Gost's entire nervous system. For reasons of practicality, he also wields a galvan-lock pistol and a taser maul.

Necrodomii

Name: Necrodomii Clans

Type: Tribe/Faction

Faction/Unit: Independant

Description:

Known throughout the Red Wastes as Tech-Cults and Iron Crows, the seven Necrodomii Clans are an influential yet enigmatic presence in the Avanagashan. They are at once a bastion of knowledge and logic in a world where so much of both has been lost, and a force of chaos and destruction, beholden only to their own whims. To the average Waster, a black-robed tech-cultist is a deadly and capricious entity, a silent emissary of doom. To those with greater knowledge or previous dealings with them, the opinion is much the same, but their fear is justified by the knowledge of their capabilities rather than mere superstition.

The origins of the Necrodomii are lost to time, as is much in the Red Wastes, and the subject is a matter of passionate debate both within and between the clans. Most hold themselves as successors in some manner to the Old Ones, either being the survivors of the cataclysm that destroyed their civilization, or the descendants of the engineer-slaves that maintained their wondrous technology. Regardless of their specific origins, the clans all venerate the Old Ones in much the same manner as gods, and elevate the archeotech they have left behind to the status of holy relics. For the Necrodomii, scavenging and repairing archeotech is at once a noble intellectual pursuit, a holy calling, and a means toward survival in the harsh world that the Old Ones have left behind. Despite their religious fervor, the clans are suitably pragmatic, and possess no reservations toward wielding archeotech for its intended (or even improvised) purpose. While they are loathe to do so, it is not unheard of for them to trade away some of their hoarded technology for critically-needed supplies, or some other purpose.

Divided since ancient times into a variable number of clans (at the present moment seven), the Necrodomii roam the Red Wastes in behemoth sand-crawlers, monumental vehicles that are at once mobile fortresses and the among holiest of Old Ones' relics. Ostensibly nomadic, the clans slowly wind across the desert in looping and intersecting paths, stopping often to scavenge among the ruins of the old world, or terrorize settlements for what little archeotech they may possess. Mercurial in temperament, a tech-cult caravan may trade trinkets such as arc rifles or water purifier chips for food or raw materials, and then years later the same clan may raze the village to take back their "stolen" artifacts.

Even other Necrodomii clans are not immune to this treatment, as squabbles and skirmishes over heterodoxical disputes, perceived slights and centuries-old grudges are common among them, and they will often view each other as tempting targets to raid for supplies and technology. While the differences may be imperceivable to outsiders, the clans vary significantly in their esoteric rituals, societal structure, theology, and scientific philosophies. Despite their lack of cohesion or loyalty, the clans view each other as being infinitely morally superior to any other Waster faction and settlement, and will come to each other's aid against outsiders, but generally only if it is to the convenience of the aiding clan and there is a perceived material benefit to doing so. These alliances are as devastating as one may expect, though there has never been a recorded instance of more than three clans joining forces at once. Even a single clan is a terrifying force should they commit militarily, bringing their centuries of accumulated knowledge and technology to bear in horrific fashion. Mercy and humanity are of no consideration to Necrodomii on the warpath, as they make generous use of weapons deemed cursed or forbidden by most other societies. Frequent use of technological augmentation among their number make them shockingly difficult to kill, and often immune to poisons, flame and radiation.

Greatest among these are the absolute most holy relics to the Necrodomii: the Deus Machina. True weapons of mass destruction, each clan possesses only a single one of these archeotech masterworks, and they are venerated as avatars of the Old Ones themselves. While they vary greatly in form and precise function (usually a result of being cobbled together from pieces and remains of other Deus Machina), they are each a roughly humanoid construct of magic and technology combined. To the Necrodomii, they are the apex of artifice: divinity crafted from base metal. These machine-gods are brought to bear against their foes only in times of the most dire strife, and there have even been occasions where a clan was wiped out before their Deus Machina could be wielded in battle. The resources required to activate them are incredibly rare, and only the highest-ranked tech-cultists have the privilege and skill to maintain them, much less operate them in combat. Indeed, a Deus Machina cannot be successfully piloted by a single operator, nor any number of common humans. Vital to their operation is a Grimoire, a Necrodomius of high rank that has been augmented to have portions of their consciousness replaced by Old One computational matrixes. Typically used as living databanks, Grimoires rely on the fragmented remains of Old One AI in their matrixes to assume control of the numerous subfunctions a Deus Machina must engage to activate.

Beyond the Deus Machina and other scattered instances of magical technology, the Necrodomii treat magic and its practitioners with measured caution and pragmatic distrust. While they may learn of it and archive it where opportunity arises, they pointedly avoid practicing it themselves. The risks inherent to practicing it outweigh its potential benefits in many cases, and some of their more religious subsects consider the use of magic to infringe upon the divine realm of the Old Ones.