Morden Man

Absolute Comics - Season Two: The Monster Within

I don't want to be that guy, but I have pretty significant plans for Katana down the line.

I should have put it in my sheet, but I didn't want to tip my hand to the plans I have down the line. (Some of which is already written up...)

Absolute Comics - Season Two: The Monster Within

In … The Beast Within: Pt. III

Terrace, British Columbia

Five days had passed since James Hudson and Heather MacNeil had first encountered “Logan” on that snowy Kitimat road. But more importantly to Jerome Jaxon, Can-Am Corporation’s chief executive and Hudson’s boss, it had been five days since the Guardian project had missed out on funding from the Canadian government. He had only heard from Hudson once since, despite peppering him with phone calls constantly, and even then he’d sounded hurried, almost indifferent to the fact the project Jaxon had been bankrolling for him for three years was on the skids. The tone of voice James had used on the phone with him had left him so incensed that he’d wanted to get on a plane to Iqaluit that very morning. His assistant had talked him down. After four days of radio silence, there was no talking Jaxon down again.

The septuagenarian had boarded a private jet all the way to the town’s remote airport, where a heavyset man in an ill-fitting suit was waiting for him. The driver helped Jaxon climb into the blacked-out jeep and then set out towards the location that had been provided for him. It was an hour’s drive away, even on these open roads, and Jaxon soon found himself incapable of sustaining the rage he felt towards "Jimmy" Hudson. He reached for his cell phone, punched in a familiar number, and launched into a diatribe that seemed to have neither beginning nor end.

“So I have to find out from Maxwell Lord of all people that we lost the bid … Langkowski, I think. You know Langkowski, we met him a few years back at that stupid gala the Van Dynes hold. Well, trust me when I say if you saw Langkowski you’d remember him. He’s huge. Used to play football back in college. One sec, Gabe.”

Jaxon had been ranting for the best part of thirty-five minutes, though it felt like longer for the driver that had suffered through it in the driver’s seat. The petrochemical mogul had only stopped because the jeep seemed to have come to an unexpected halt. He leant forward, peering over towards the driver with a scowl.

“What’s the holdup?”

The driver pointed to a yellow sign that had been planted in the middle of the road. “Road’s out up ahead.”

“The road’s out,” Jaxon sighed as he slunk back into his seat. “Great. Even in the middle of butt-fucking nowhere we’re still running into traffic issues. Gabe, you there? Yeah, sorry about that. Where was I? Oh, that’s right ... can you believe that cocksucker Jimmy didn’t even have the stones to tell me we had lost the bid? After all the millions I’ve poured into this crappy project of his.”

The jeep took a sharp turn into a bumpy offroad. Jaxon felt each shake in his weary bones, but was too proud to ask the driver to slow down. His friend Truett Hudson had passed away three years ago to an unexpected stroke, and he was almost twenty years younger than Jaxon, and ever since, despite his bluster, Jerome had become acutely away of his own advancing years. After a minute or two of rough going, the jeep came to another sudden halt, this one more violent than the first. It took all Jaxon had not to be hurled out of his seat.

“What is it this time?” Jerome shouted towards the thick man in the driver’s seat. “Let me guess: an avalanche has b-”

Without saying a word, the driver flung his door open and took off sprinting. Jaxon watched him in bemusement for a few moments, almost incapable of processing what was happening, before suddenly snapping back to life. He opened his own door, stepped halfway onto the road, and howled towards the driver with rage.

“Hey! Where the hell do you think you’re going?”

If the driver could hear him, he showed no sign of it. Jaxon let out a deflated sigh, rested one of his arms against the open door and leant against the seat in disbelief at what had just happened. He suddenly became aware of the fact that he still had the phone pressed against his wrinkled ear.

“Great. Fucking great. Gabe, can I call you back? My driver has just bailed on me … Yeah, you just can’t get the service anymore. Alright, you take it easy now, and lay off those g-”

There was a scream in the distance. The phone fell from Jerome’s hand onto the rock path, its screen smashing on impact, but he showed no sign of caring. There was something among the trees that had caught his attention. Jaxon made out two arms and legs, a torso the size of a small car, and lithe, silver tentacles that seemed to move as if they had a life of their own. His palms grew sweaty and his aged heart began to pound uncontrollably in his chest. Each heartbeat sounded like a bomb going off in his head.

And then there was the screaming again. The sight of something hurling towards him caused him to stagger backwards into the jeep for protection. There was a dull thud and the entire vehicle shook as the projectile made contact with it. Jaxon peered out and almost vomited as he recognised it as the driver’s ravaged corpse.

“Holy crap.”

Jaxon panicked and surveilled the inside of the jeep in search of a weapon. His arthritic hands fumbled around desperately but found nothing. From the trees, he could sense the figure approaching. With a lunge, Jerome leant out of the jeep for the cell resting on the path. His fingers made contact with it but it was just outside of his grasp. He stretched out further than his old rickety skeleton would allow and almost had it when a large booted foot came stomping down on top of it.

“You are the one they call Jerome Jaxon, nyet?” came a chilling Russian accent. “Chief executive officer of the Can-Am Corporation?”

Jaxon looked up at the man. He was bigger than any human had any right to be, but it wasn’t his size, nor even the vicious tentacles slithering from his arms that concerned Jaxon the most, it was his skin. It was grey and lifeless. He’d never seen anything like it before. The man looked dead – deader than dead, almost – and the straw-like hair and red bandana across it only made him appear even more ghoulish.

Sensing that the man was growing impatient, Jaxon made no attempt to disguise his terror when he answered. “Uh, yeah ... that’s me.”

One of the man’s tentacles slithered up an around Jaxon’s neck. It clamped around it tightly and lifted him from his seat with ease. Each second it was in contact with him, the old man almost felt like he was suffocating – like his life force was being sapped away from him. He felt it come rushing back slightly as his attacker pulled him from the inside of the jeep and slammed him against the side of it.

“Take me to him and I shall let you live.”

“T-take you to who?”

The question seemed to anger the grey-skinned man and the tentacle around Jerome’s neck tightened with his annoyance. “Weapon X.”

“What? I… I don’t understand, I don’t know what that is,” Jaxon cried. “But I’ve got money, lots and lots of money, I’ll … I’ll give you as much as you want, please, just don’t kill me, alright?”

“Tsk, always money with you people.”

A look of dread flashed across Jaxon’s face. There was a sickly crunch and his neck crumpled beneath the tentacle. He fell to the ground with a thud, landing alongside what remained of the driver, and what little life was left in his body began to drain away. The light in Jerome’s eyes began to darken and his tongue, now purple and discoloured, came sliding out of his mouth with a pathetic lurch. The last thing he saw was the grey-skinned man walking away from him. As he faded out of distance, he passed by old snow-covered sign that read: ‘Kitimat: 22 miles’.

Absolute Comics - Season Two: The Monster Within

In ... The Beast Within: Pt. II

Kitimat, British Columbia

All through the night the captive wildman had thrashed and thrashed. Heather MacNeil and James Hudson had taken it in turns to watch him, but now in the cold light of day the seriousness of the situation they had found themselves set in. What would they do with him? What could they do with him? He was unconscious now but to set him free would be to risk certain death. Heather quietly damned Hudson’s big heart. Were it her decision, they would have left him to bleed out – instead they were trapped in their own home with a creature chained to their bed. James was cradling the shotgun whilst staring down at their captive. She called out across the room to him in a soft, sympathetic voice.

“What are we going to do? We can’t keep this thing tied up in our living room forever, James.”

There was a flicker of annoyance in Hudson’s face. “Don’t you think I know that?”

“I still say we should call the Mounties,” Heather responded matter-of-factly. “If we explain what happened, I’m sure they’ll understand. I mean, it could be a fugitive for all we know ... it could be some kind of kind of escaped mental patient. I bet they’d just be glad that someone got it off the streets.”

James sighed. He flicked the shotgun’s safety on and from his seat opposite the bed set the but of the gun on the ground. There was a weariness to the motion that made Heather realise that Hudson wasn’t annoyed, he was tired. There were heavy bags beneath his bloodshot eyes. He had looked drawn out yesterday after finding out the bad news about the Guardian project, but now Hudson looked like a wraith.

“You shot him at point-blank range with a shotgun and there’s not a scratch on him, Heather. I think it’s fair to say that whoever our John Doe is, he’s not just some oddball that caved in his mother-in-law’s skull with a clawhammer, he’s … well, he's obviously a mutant. That means the poor bastard is going to end up at a government black site on a lab table if we get law enforcement involved.”

Heather walked towards the living room window and stared at the snowy hills that surrounded their home. “That’s not our problem.”

“You don’t mean that,” James murmured weakly as if he was trying to convince himself more than MacNeil. “I know you can’t mean that.”

A sudden pang of guilt ran through Heather and she stepped away from the window and walked towards Hudson. It hurt her to see the disapproval in his eyes. She knelt down in front of him and placed a loving hand atop of one of Hudson’s thighs. The disapproval softened somewhat and he set the shotgun to one side.

“All I know is that you are my world, James, and the longer this thing stays under our roof, the more dangerous it is for both of us.”

“He,” Hudson said with renewed disappointment in his voice. “He is a human being, Heather, just like you and I are. He's not a thing.”

MacNeill nodded eagerly in an attempt to recapture the tenderness that had she had lost through her clumsy choice of words. “You’re right.”

James abruptly stood up from his seat with a tired grunt. Heather’s hand slipped from his thigh and she watched as he reached once more for the shotgun and claimed the spot beside the window where she had been standing. His tired eyes were surveilling the hills, though for what he wasn’t sure. Heather looked towards the man, wrapped in the thickest chains that Hudson could get his hands on, and repressed a sneer.

The next half an hour passed in silence. Occasionally their sleeping John Doe would let out a moan, but otherwise Hudson and MacNeil had only the sound of the savage winds hitting their cabin for entertainment. When an electronic whirring came from one of Hudson’s pockets, it acted as a welcome respite from the sound of the wind. He stared down at the name on the screen and sent the call to voicemail with a sigh.

“Is that Jaxon calling?”

“Yeah,” Hudson nodded. “He’s been trying all morning.”

“Why haven’t you picked up? He’s going to want answers and the longer you leave it, the worse it's going to be. You say that Guardian is dead but I still think we could win Jaxon around. We’re not going to be able to do that if you’re screening his calls.”

Hudson sighed and lifted a hand up to acknowledge his mistake. “Alright, alright, you don’t need to lay it on thick. I’ll call the man back.”

“Now, James.”

“Okay, I’ll only be a few minutes,” James agreed as he handed Heather the shotgun. “If you need anything, if he so much as moves a muscle, you shoot first and ask questions afterwards, alright? At the first sound of trouble, I’ll come running.”

“Don’t worry, if I was able to nail him with this thing last night, I’m pretty confident I’ll be able to now that he’s been pumped full of painkillers and chained to a bed.”

The door to their cabin flung open and a vicious, bracing wind came snaking inside. Hudson stepped out onto the porch and slammed the door shut behind him. Heather watched him through the window, making sure he’d dialled Jaxon back, before slowly approaching their captive with the shotgun in her hands. She prodded the sleeping man with it and he didn’t stir at all. Once she was sure he was sleeping, she pressed the barrel hard against one of his cheeks and then leant towards him.

“I want you to listen to me. I don’t care what you are, if you so much as think about laying a hand on that man, I’ll kill you. Do you hear me? James might be soft but I’m not. I know a cold-blooded killer when I see one, and that’s what I see when I look at you. Human, mutant, you could be the missing link for all I care, you’re a monster in my books and I’m not going to risk losing everything for you.”

Suddenly the man’s eyes opened. They looked different this time. Still beastlike, but haunted almost, and fixed on Heather’s shock of red hair in confusion. She attempted to stagger backwards but her feet wouldn’t seem to move. Worse still, she noticed that one of the man’s hands had wriggled free from beneath the chains. It was clamped around the barrel of the shotgun. It took half a dozen empty, frantic clicks before Heather realised the safety was still on, and by the time she had flicked it off the emergence of noise from the man’s throat stayed her hand.

“No, not ... not a monster,” he pleaded in a hoarse growl that seemed to carry a hundred lifetime's worth of suffering and anguish. “Logan...”

Absolute Comics - Season Two: The Monster Within

Every now and then, the people need a reminder that this is @Byrd Man's world and we're all just living in it.

I guess today is one of those days.

Absolute Comics - Season Two: The Monster Within

In ... The Beast Within: Pt. I

Kitimat, British Columbia

Heather MacNeil had been holding her hands in front of the heater for the best part of ten minutes and they were no closer to being warm. Beside her James Hudson was bristling in the driver’s seat. His face was as white as a sheet and the blankness of his expression worried her. Rather than break the silence, MacNeil slid one of her icy cold hands around Hudson’s as he reached to shift gears. Usually it elicited a smile from him, but this time he didn’t so much as acknowledge the gesture. Finally the silence became too heavy for Heather to bear anymore.

“What’s wrong?”

“It’s nothing,” Hudson murmured without so much as looking in her direction.

“It’s obviously not nothing, James,” Heather sighed. “You’ve hardly said a word all evening.”

Both MacNeil and Hudson worked for the Can-Am Corporation. Three years ago, Heather had been secretary to Truett Hudson, James’ half-brother, but she had given that up to follow James to Kitimat because she believed in him – but most of all because she loved him. It had been hard living for both of them, but the research James was doing had the potential to change everything.

Perhaps sensing that he’d been too brusque, Hudson cleared his throat quietly, and looked away from the snowy road for a second.

“They gave to grant to Langkowski.”

Heather’s hand slid back around Hudson’s and she gave it a sympathetic squeeze. “Oh, baby, I’m so sorry.”

“I’ve got to break the news to Jaxon in the morning.”

Jerome Jaxon was Can-Am’s chief executive. He’d humoured Hudson’s little venture in Kitimat out of sympathy more than anything else. James had needed an escape when Truett passed away and the Guardian project had provided him with it – but it was leaking money like a sieve, and having missed out on a grant for three years running now, there was no way that Jaxon would support it anymore.

“God, Langkowski’s such a hack,” Heather sighed. “I can’t believe it. There must be some other way? What about next year?”

The grimace that appeared on Hudson’s face as the words left her mouth all but confirmed the impossibility of their being some way out for the pair of them.

“You don’t get it. We’re screwed, Heather, without that money we’re not going to make it through the winter, let alone to next year. Everything we’ve done, everything we’ve worked for these past three years, it’s all been for nothing. Absolutely nothing.”

Suddenly MacNeil perked up as if struck by a lightning bolt.

“You still have that money that Truett left behind in his w-”

James shook his head grimly.

“We might as well pack up and head back to Toronto because the Guardian project is officially dead in the water as of this afternoon."

A deflated rattle left Heather’s lungs and she glanced out of the window at the unpressed snow reaching out into the darkness. Hudson’s icy hand switched on the radio. He flicked past a news station, then past another playing metal music, until he settled upon something more to his liking. Kenny Rodgers echoed around the front of the truck as they crept through the cold towards the ranch the pair called home.

“I pushed my soul in a deep dark hole and then I followed it in,
I watched myself crawlin' out as I was a-crawlin' in,
I got up so tight I couldn't unwind,
I saw so much I broke my mind,
I just dropped in to see what condition my condition was in.”

For a second, Hudson’s eyes began to close with tiredness but he jolted away just in time to see a sudden flash of movement appear in his headlights. His foot crashed down on the breaks and the truck skidded along the icy road, very nearly flipping onto its side at one point, before coming to a screeching halt.

Heather’s eyes were fixed on him in desperate confusion. “What the hell, James?”

“There was something in the road.”

Hudson could tell from the look on MacNeil’s face that she didn’t believe him. He let his hands, now wet with sweat, slip free from the wheel and cut the engine. Now the truck had come to a halt it was clear that there was a carcass in the road in front of them, but it wasn’t the carcass that concerned James. It was what was stood over it.

“It almost looked like a person … but that doesn’t make any sense,” Hudson murmured with shock. “All the way out here in this cold? They’d be dead in minutes. It doesn’t make any sense.”

James tried his best to reconcile what he’d seen with what he knew about the Tundra. Whatever he’d seen didn’t look anything like any animal he’d seen before, but there was no way it could have been a man. He tugged the keys out of the ignition and slipped them into his coat pocket. As he reached for the driver’s side door he felt Heather’s hand clamped tightly around his bicep.

“I think we should call the Mounties.”

“No,” James said with a shake of his head. “It’s fine, I’m going to go out and check.”

Hudson pulled his arm free and stepped out into the road. He slammed the door shut behind him, smiling unconvincingly to Heather through the frosted glass, and slowly made his way towards the carcass. It was a deer – or at least what was left of one. He knelt beside it and pressed his hands against it. It was still warm to the touch. There were no teeth marks, only long, straight gashes along its stomach and neck.

“Whatever that was, it's long gone,” James muttered. “Christ, it really went to town on this poor thing. It’s all torn up. There are claw marks here I’ve never seen before.”

Hudson tried once more to parse the images that had flickered through his brain in the moments before he’d slammed down the brakes. He was still struggling to make sense of it as he set the deer’s head down on the road and rose to his feet. The least he could do was move the carcass out of the road, he thought, as he took one last look down at the savaged animal.

“James,” Heather called out nervously from the truck.

“What’s wrong?”

There was a desperation in her voice this time. “Get back in the truck, James.”

Hudson nodded. “I’m coming, I’m just going to make sure this thing’s out of the road. It’s dangerous enough out here witho-”

Without warning, James found himself on his back with the taste of blood in his mouth. His ears were ringing and there was a dull pain in his chest. In the distance he could hear Heather screaming and managed to lift his head enough to make sure he hadn’t been shot. Standing over him was a hairy brute of a man with blood caked around his mouth. There was a crazed look in his eye that made Hudson’s blood run cold.

“Whoa, take it easy there bud,” James spluttered feebly as he tried to push himself onto his elbows. “I’m not going to hurt you.”

A guttural growl left the man’s chest as Hudson tried to climb to his feet slowly and James froze. He met the feral man’s gaze but something told him not to hold it. Instead he lowered it, glancing towards the hairy, torn feet that looked as if they were frozen through. After a few seconds, James carefully tried to climb to his feet again, slower this time, taking care to step back away from the man and to seem as small and unthreatening as possible.

“Alright, I get it. The deer’s yours. Look, here, I’m moving away from it. You see? Take it. I’m going to just back away slowly and head back to my truck, you hear me? Nobody needs to get hurt here.”

The growling quieted as James retreated and he was sure that the truck was only a few metres behind him. He was almost counting the inches as he moved. He felt the hood of the truck hit him in the back and moved to turn around but as he did so made the mistake of making eye contact with the wildman one last time. James heard the roar and saw a glint of metal as the beast seemed to cut the distance between them in a millisecond. It was inches from him when a loud bang rang out.

In Heather's hands was an old shotgun that James kept in the truck in case of emergencies. It was so heavy that she could barely keep it aloft. The naked man had been flung by the impact of the shot into the snow and looked, as far as either of them could tell, to be dead. Hudson was planted to the spot in shock. It took him a few seconds to realise he hadn’t answered.

“Are you alright?” Heather called out. “He didn’t hurt you, did he?”

“I’m fine,” James mumbled. “Though I don’t think we can say the same for our friend here. That was one hell of a shot, MacNeil.”

It was clear from Heather’s face that she saw through his bravado. “I don't care what you say, this time I’m going to call the Mounties.”

James took the shotgun from MacNeil and trained it on the naked man’s bleeding husk. Heather scuttled towards the truck in search of a phone as Hudson drew closer to the man. The snow around him had been splattered with blood. Under other circumstances, the patterns in the blood-flecked snow would almost have been beautiful. James set that thought aside as he nudged the body with the shotgun. A gentle groan came from it. Hudson staggered backwards in shock.

“Wait,” James shouted towards the truck. “This crazy son of a bitch is still breathing. Get some blankets.”

Heather’s face twisted in revulsion. “What? You’re not seriously suggesting that we try and move h-”

“The blankets, Heather.”

MacNeil groaned and ran towards the back of the truck. Hudson shot her an approving look, and then tightened his grip on the shotgun. The man in the snow stirred ever so slightly, revealing the wound in his chest to the elements. Seconds ago it had been the size of a basketball. Amongst the mess of blood and hair, Hudson could have sworn the muscles were reaching out to one another. The naked man was healing.

Absolute Comics - Season Two: The Monster Within

Open the game, you cowards.

Absolute Comics - Season Two: The Monster Within

If you're going to have a Nova corpsman of 16/17 why not just use Sam Alexander?

@Hound55

Because Sam Alexander sucks, obviously.

Absolute Comics - Season Two: The Monster Within

Just looking for feedback on concepts before diving into actual writing.

[+]

C H A R A C T E R C O N C E P T P R O P O S A L

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^{_{T Y R O N E J O H N S O N // C A S S A N D R A C A I N // E D W A R D B L O O M B E R G // T A N D Y B O W E N // C H A S E S T E I N
♦ N O N E ♦ L O S A N G E L E S ♦ I N D E P E N D E N T ♦}}

C H A R A C T E R C O N C E P T:

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^{"When the world goes crazy you run...You runaway."}

Tyrone Johnson

The eldest of the group, 19 years old. Left home after the death of his brother and subsequent collapse of his parent's stability. Suspicious of the men in coats promising Tandy money to take part in a drug trial, Tyrone advised against it, but went with her when she disregard the advice. As a result, Tyrone became a conduit for the darkforce; giving him the powers to use it to teleport, become in tangible, or displace others in the darkforce dimension. As a side effect, he now requires lightforce to sustain his mental state, something that can only be provided by the light of a human soul, or Tandy Bowen's powers.

Cassandra Cain

The youngest member, only 14 years old. Trained by her father and the League of Assassins to become the ultimate weapon, she knows near nothing of the world except fighting. She was sent to kill a man not fully grasping what that meant, but after seeing what she'd done, she ran from her family only to end up in Brooklyn. She found Tandy and Tyrone after watching them chase off gangs trying to recruit desperate teens. For a while she followed them and simply watched, occasionally sneaking into their 'apartment' when the weather was too much or to steal some of their food. One day the pair came home to find her sleeping on the bed, incredulous to how she managed to get into the third floor of locked and boarded building, but she's remained with them ever since. While she has mostly learned English after nearly a year in the city, she typically remains mute and completely illiterate.

Edward Bloomberg

Eddie only ever had one wish in his life; to be a superhero. It began with tinkering away in his room trying to make his own Iron Man suit, and ended with selling his soul. He was approached by a well-dress man shortly after his 16th birthday, who made great promises. Eddie accepted, too excited and naive to consider the cost. He was rewarded, with flight and hellfire, as well as a mistaken identity and an un-earned target on his back by demon hunters. Forced to run from his old life, he sought out a new on in Los Angeles, hoping to make a mark somewhere he could be accepted.

Tandy Bowen

A 17 year old girl who ran to LA to pursue a dream of becoming a dancer and escape a home of neglect in San Francisco. Shorty after her arrival in the city she was mugged, only to be saved by Tyrone Johnson, beginning their close friendship. The two stuck together despite having no money, no home, and no prospects. So when she was offered to cash to participate in a drug trial, Tandy jumped at the prospect, despite her companion's weariness. After a night of agonizing pain, and an escape that lead through a variable warehouse of dead kids, she became a conduit for the lightforce. The light from her own soul became bright enough for her to physically manifest it, in forms varying from self-targeting daggers, to a faint glow used for light, or to feed the new hunger in Tyrone; which she considers herself to be the cause of.

Chase Stein

A good looking 17 year-old, that by all outward appearances, had the world handed to him on a silver platter. The only son of wealthy tech moguls, Chase was always aware of his parent's cruelty, being abused from a young age for excelling in athletics rather than academics as they wanted. Somehow that didn't lesson the shock of seeing a recording of them with five other pairs sacrificing a young girl. Shortly thereafter he discovered the other, shadier parts of his parent's business; dealing weapons to the criminal underworld. After making the mistake of going to the LAPD with his evidence, he had to flee his home, stealing a set of his parent's weapons as he begun to seek the truth on his own.

C H A R A C T E R M O T I V A T I O N S & G O A L S:

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Something about a hodge-podge group of lonely and confused kids with crazy powers eventually coming together as a family is a trope that never really seems to get old for me. It seems a bit ridiculous to even call this group The Runaways, as there is only one of the original members in it and The Pride will not be the main focus, but it is the spirit of the series I'm looking to recreate rather than the plot. A group of teenagers without any support setting out to face their demons and maybe make the world a better place. While each has their own strengths, none of them are entirely capable enough to be considered true heroes in their own right.

Cassandra and Chase's backstories are largely staying the same, save that Chase is the only current descendant of The Pride. Tyrone and Tandy are getting slight tweaks to fix the parts of their backstory that kind of rub me the wrong way, having their powers created by the Nefaria family of the Maggia on purpose in effort to harness the darkforce in a human to get a leg up on the other families: This rather than a freak strain of heroin. Their relationship, while still fiercely loyal and co-dependent, will not be romantic. Eddie is getting an even more drastic overhaul to his backstory in attempt to keep contradictions in the two universes inline, as well as acknowledging that looking like a devil is pretty off-putting.

All of the heroes I've chosen are fighting for different things, Tandy and Tyrone are looking back to protect the other displaced teens in LA, while being tacked down by the Maggia. Cassandra is constantly being hunted by the League of Assassins. Eddie wants to be a hero and save the world, but needs to save his soul and try to prove he isn't a demon in the first place. Finally Chase seeks to stop his parents and the Pride. Individually, they all want to do good, but are completely under-qualified to fight their respective battles alone.

C H A R A C T E R N O T E S:

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Villains

The Pride:

Six powerful crime families in LA that make sacrifices to some unknown dark presence for wealth and power, all while poisoning the city's streets with illicit activities.

Maggia:

In particular the Nefaria family, testing some of their experiments on the west coast, were responsible for giving Tyrone and Tandy their powers in effort to create more powerful henchmen to hold more power over the other families of the Maggia. Various LA cells are continuously searching for the pair, who equally seek revenge.

The League of Assassins:

Cassandra was over a decade of investment for her father and the League, and they're not letting her go easily. They continue to try and tack her down, and while well practiced in hiding her own trail, being in a group make Cassandra all the easier to find.

Azazel:

The 'demon' that granted Eddie his powers, and new form. Not yet in possession of his soul, but it is his for the taking any time he returns.

S A M P L E P O S T:

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A sample post that can be used in the IC if you so desire upon acceptance. This post should provide an example of your vision for the desired character. This sample post should meet all standards outline in the rules and additionally include dialogue, mannerisms and other actions representative of your intended portrayal.

P O S T C A T L O G:

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A list linking to your IC posts as they're created. This can be used for a reference guide to your character or to summarize completed arcs and stories.

@Tackytaff

I really like this Runaways roster, a slightly more macabre approach works really well for them.

Between this and @Jareth's X-Force, we have some really interesting teams on deck for this game. I can't wait to see where you both go with them.

Absolute Comics - Season Two: The Monster Within

Hider

C H A R A C T E R C O N C E P T P R O P O S A L

W O L V E R I N E

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^{_{L O G A N ♦ A T L A R G E}}

C H A R A C T E R C O N C E P T:

---

For all intents and purposes, this version of Wolverine is indistinguishable from the depictions of Logan most of us are used to. I have attempted to repurpose his backstory for a shared universe setting and as such have incorporated DC characters into his past and present where possible. Other than that, conceptually I have not made many, if any, radical changes to the character.

C H A R A C T E R M O T I V A T I O N S & G O A L S:

---

Wolverine has been my favourite comic book character since I was a kid, but I've mostly avoided playing him in roleplaying games, outside of an incredibly short-lived run in the dying days of SHH. I think a big part of that is because, even as a Wolverine superfan, I'd grown as tired of the character due to overexposure. Listening to Wolverine: The Long Night kind of rekindled my interest and, despite having vowed to be done with comic book games, here I am. Dusting the cobwebs off the saddle for one last ride. Again.

C H A R A C T E R N O T E S:

---

N/A.

S A M P L E P O S T:

---

Hider

In ... The Beast Within: Pt. I

Kitimat, British Columbia

Heather MacNeil had been holding her hands in front of the heater for the best part of ten minutes and they were no closer to being warm. Beside her James Hudson was bristling in the driver’s seat. His face was as white as a sheet and the blankness of his expression worried her. Rather than break the silence, MacNeil slid one of her icy cold hands around Hudson’s as he reached to shift gears. Usually it elicited a smile from him, but this time he didn’t so much as acknowledge the gesture. Finally the silence became too heavy for Heather to bear anymore.

“What’s wrong?”

“It’s nothing,” Hudson murmured without so much as looking in her direction.

“It’s obviously not nothing, James,” Heather sighed. “You’ve hardly said a word all evening.”

Both MacNeil and Hudson worked for the Can-Am Corporation. Three years ago, Heather had been secretary to Truett Hudson, James’ half-brother, but she had given that up to follow James to Kitimat because she believed in him – but most of all because she loved him. It had been hard living for both of them, but the research James was doing had the potential to change everything.

Perhaps sensing that he’d been too brusque, Hudson cleared his throat quietly, and looked away from the snowy road for a second.

“They gave to grant to Langkowski.”

Heather’s hand slid back around Hudson’s and she gave it a sympathetic squeeze. “Oh, baby, I’m so sorry.”

“I’ve got to break the news to Jaxon in the morning.”

Jerome Jaxon was Can-Am’s chief executive. He’d humoured Hudson’s little venture in Kitimat out of sympathy more than anything else. James had needed an escape when Truett passed away and the Guardian project had provided him with it – but it was leaking money like a sieve, and having missed out on a grant for three years running now, there was no way that Jaxon would support it anymore.

“God, Langkowski’s such a hack,” Heather sighed. “I can’t believe it. There must be some other way? What about next year?”

The grimace that appeared on Hudson’s face as the words left her mouth all but confirmed the impossibility of their being some way out for the pair of them.

“You don’t get it. We’re screwed, Heather, without that money we’re not going to make it through the winter, let alone to next year. Everything we’ve done, everything we’ve worked for these past three years, it’s all been for nothing. Absolutely nothing.”

Suddenly MacNeil perked up as if struck by a lightning bolt.

“You still have that money that Truett left behind in his w-”

James shook his head grimly.

“We might as well pack up and head back to Toronto because the Guardian project is officially dead in the water as of this afternoon."

A deflated rattle left Heather’s lungs and she glanced out of the window at the unpressed snow reaching out into the darkness. Hudson’s icy hand switched on the radio. He flicked past a news station, then past another playing metal music, until he settled upon something more to his liking. Kenny Rodgers echoed around the front of the truck as they crept through the cold towards the ranch the pair called home.

“I pushed my soul in a deep dark hole and then I followed it in,
I watched myself crawlin' out as I was a-crawlin' in,
I got up so tight I couldn't unwind,
I saw so much I broke my mind,
I just dropped in to see what condition my condition was in.”

For a second, Hudson’s eyes began to close with tiredness but he jolted away just in time to see a sudden flash of movement appear in his headlights. His foot crashed down on the breaks and the truck skidded along the icy road, very nearly flipping onto its side at one point, before coming to a screeching halt.

Heather’s eyes were fixed on him in desperate confusion. “What the hell, James?”

“There was something in the road.”

Hudson could tell from the look on MacNeil’s face that she didn’t believe him. He let his hands, now wet with sweat, slip free from the wheel and cut the engine. Now the truck had come to a halt it was clear that there was a carcass in the road in front of them, but it wasn’t the carcass that concerned James. It was what was stood over it.

“It almost looked like a person … but that doesn’t make any sense,” Hudson murmured with shock. “All the way out here in this cold? They’d be dead in minutes. It doesn’t make any sense.”

James tried his best to reconcile what he’d seen with what he knew about the Tundra. Whatever he’d seen didn’t look anything like any animal he’d seen before, but there was no way it could have been a man. He tugged the keys out of the ignition and slipped them into his coat pocket. As he reached for the driver’s side door he felt Heather’s hand clamped tightly around his bicep.

“I think we should call the Mounties.”

“No,” James said with a shake of his head. “It’s fine, I’m going to go out and check.”

Hudson pulled his arm free and stepped out into the road. He slammed the door shut behind him, smiling unconvincingly to Heather through the frosted glass, and slowly made his way towards the carcass. It was a deer – or at least what was left of one. He knelt beside it and pressed his hands against it. It was still warm to the touch. There were no teeth marks, only long, straight gashes along its stomach and neck.

“Whatever that was, it's long gone,” James muttered. “Christ, it really went to town on this poor thing. It’s all torn up. There are claw marks here I’ve never seen before.”

Hudson tried once more to parse the images that had flickered through his brain in the moments before he’d slammed down the brakes. He was still struggling to make sense of it as he set the deer’s head down on the road and rose to his feet. The least he could do was move the carcass out of the road, he thought, as he took one last look down at the savaged animal.

“James,” Heather called out nervously from the truck.

“What’s wrong?”

There was a desperation in her voice this time. “Get back in the truck, James.”

Hudson nodded. “I’m coming, I’m just going to make sure this thing’s out of the road. It’s dangerous enough out here witho-”

Without warning, James found himself on his back with the taste of blood in his mouth. His ears were ringing and there was a dull pain in his chest. In the distance he could hear Heather screaming and managed to lift his head enough to make sure he hadn’t been shot. Standing over him was a hairy brute of a man with blood caked around his mouth. There was a crazed look in his eye that made Hudson’s blood run cold.

“Whoa, take it easy there bud,” James spluttered feebly as he tried to push himself onto his elbows. “I’m not going to hurt you.”

A guttural growl left the man’s chest as Hudson tried to climb to his feet slowly and James froze. He met the feral man’s gaze but something told him not to hold it. Instead he lowered it, glancing towards the hairy, torn feet that looked as if they were frozen through. After a few seconds, James carefully tried to climb to his feet again, slower this time, taking care to step back away from the man and to seem as small and unthreatening as possible.

“Alright, I get it. The deer’s yours. Look, here, I’m moving away from it. You see? Take it. I’m going to just back away slowly and head back to my truck, you hear me? Nobody needs to get hurt here.”

The growling quieted as James retreated and he was sure that the truck was only a few metres behind him. He was almost counting the inches as he moved. He felt the hood of the truck hit him in the back and moved to turn around but as he did so made the mistake of making eye contact with the wildman one last time. James heard the roar and saw a glint of metal as the beast seemed to cut the distance between them in a millisecond. It was inches from him when a loud bang rang out.

In Heather's hands was an old shotgun that James kept in the truck in case of emergencies. It was so heavy that she could barely keep it aloft. The naked man had been flung by the impact of the shot into the snow and looked, as far as either of them could tell, to be dead. Hudson was planted to the spot in shock. It took him a few seconds to realise he hadn’t answered.

“Are you alright?” Heather called out. “He didn’t hurt you, did he?”

“I’m fine,” James mumbled. “Though I don’t think we can say the same for our friend here. That was one hell of a shot, MacNeil.”

It was clear from Heather’s face that she saw through his bravado. “I don't care what you say, this time I’m going to call the Mounties.”

James took the shotgun from MacNeil and trained it on the naked man’s bleeding husk. Heather scuttled towards the truck in search of a phone as Hudson drew closer to the man. The snow around him had been splattered with blood. Under other circumstances, the patterns in the blood-flecked snow would almost have been beautiful. James set that thought aside as he nudged the body with the shotgun. A gentle groan came from it. Hudson staggered backwards in shock.

“Wait,” James shouted towards the truck. “This crazy son of a bitch is still breathing. Get some blankets.”

Heather’s face twisted in revulsion. “What? You’re not seriously suggesting that we try and move h-”

“The blankets, Heather.”

MacNeil groaned and ran towards the back of the truck. Hudson shot her an approving look, and then tightened his grip on the shotgun. The man in the snow stirred ever so slightly, revealing the wound in his chest to the elements. Seconds ago it had been the size of a basketball. Amongst the mess of blood and hair, Hudson could have sworn the muscles were reaching out to one another. The naked man was healing.

P O S T C A T A L O G U E:

---

Absolute Comics - Season Two: The Monster Within

C H A R A C T E R C O N C E P T P R O P O S A L

W O L V E R I N E

---

^{_{L O G A N ♦ A T L A R G E}}

C H A R A C T E R C O N C E P T:

---

For all intents and purposes, this version of Wolverine is indistinguishable from the depictions of Logan most of us are used to. I have attempted to repurpose his backstory for a shared universe setting and as such have incorporated DC characters into his past and present where possible. Other than that, conceptually I have not made many, if any, radical changes to the character.

C H A R A C T E R M O T I V A T I O N S & G O A L S:

---

Wolverine has been my favourite comic book character since I was a kid, but I've mostly avoided playing him in roleplaying games, outside of an incredibly short-lived run in the dying days of SHH. I think a big part of that is because, even as a Wolverine superfan, I'd grown as tired of the character due to overexposure. Listening to Wolverine: The Long Night kind of rekindled my interest and, despite having vowed to be done with comic book games, here I am. Dusting the cobwebs off the saddle for one last ride. Again.

C H A R A C T E R N O T E S:

---

N/A.

S A M P L E P O S T:

---

Hider

In ... The Beast Within: Pt. I

Kitimat, British Columbia

Heather MacNeil had been holding her hands in front of the heater for the best part of ten minutes and they were no closer to being warm. Beside her James Hudson was bristling in the driver’s seat. His face was as white as a sheet and the blankness of his expression worried her. Rather than break the silence, MacNeil slid one of her icy cold hands around Hudson’s as he reached to shift gears. Usually it elicited a smile from him, but this time he didn’t so much as acknowledge the gesture. Finally the silence became too heavy for Heather to bear anymore.

“What’s wrong?”

“It’s nothing,” Hudson murmured without so much as looking in her direction.

“It’s obviously not nothing, James,” Heather sighed. “You’ve hardly said a word all evening.”

Both MacNeil and Hudson worked for the Can-Am Corporation. Three years ago, Heather had been secretary to Truett Hudson, James’ half-brother, but she had given that up to follow James to Kitimat because she believed in him – but most of all because she loved him. It had been hard living for both of them, but the research James was doing had the potential to change everything.

Perhaps sensing that he’d been too brusque, Hudson cleared his throat quietly, and looked away from the snowy road for a second.

“They gave to grant to Langkowski.”

Heather’s hand slid back around Hudson’s and she gave it a sympathetic squeeze. “Oh, baby, I’m so sorry.”

“I’ve got to break the news to Jaxon in the morning.”

Jerome Jaxon was Can-Am’s chief executive. He’d humoured Hudson’s little venture in Kitimat out of sympathy more than anything else. James had needed an escape when Truett passed away and the Guardian project had provided him with it – but it was leaking money like a sieve, and having missed out on a grant for three years running now, there was no way that Jaxon would support it anymore.

“God, Langkowski’s such a hack,” Heather sighed. “I can’t believe it. There must be some other way? What about next year?”

The grimace that appeared on Hudson’s face as the words left her mouth all but confirmed the impossibility of their being some way out for the pair of them.

“You don’t get it. We’re screwed, Heather, without that money we’re not going to make it through the winter, let alone to next year. Everything we’ve done, everything we’ve worked for these past three years, it’s all been for nothing. Absolutely nothing.”

Suddenly MacNeil perked up as if struck by a lightning bolt.

“You still have that money that Truett left behind in his w-”

James shook his head grimly.

“We might as well pack up and head back to Toronto because the Guardian project is officially dead in the water as of this afternoon."

A deflated rattle left Heather’s lungs and she glanced out of the window at the unpressed snow reaching out into the darkness. Hudson’s icy hand switched on the radio. He flicked past a news station, then past another playing metal music, until he settled upon something more to his liking. Kenny Rodgers echoed around the front of the truck as they crept through the cold towards the ranch the pair called home.

“I pushed my soul in a deep dark hole and then I followed it in,
I watched myself crawlin' out as I was a-crawlin' in,
I got up so tight I couldn't unwind,
I saw so much I broke my mind,
I just dropped in to see what condition my condition was in.”

For a second, Hudson’s eyes began to close with tiredness but he jolted away just in time to see a sudden flash of movement appear in his headlights. His foot crashed down on the breaks and the truck skidded along the icy road, very nearly flipping onto its side at one point, before coming to a screeching halt.

Heather’s eyes were fixed on him in desperate confusion. “What the hell, James?”

“There was something in the road.”

Hudson could tell from the look on MacNeil’s face that she didn’t believe him. He let his hands, now wet with sweat, slip free from the wheel and cut the engine. Now the truck had come to a halt it was clear that there was a carcass in the road in front of them, but it wasn’t the carcass that concerned James. It was what was stood over it.

“It almost looked like a person … but that doesn’t make any sense,” Hudson murmured with shock. “All the way out here in this cold? They’d be dead in minutes. It doesn’t make any sense.”

James tried his best to reconcile what he’d seen with what he knew about the Tundra. Whatever he’d seen didn’t look anything like any animal he’d seen before, but there was no way it could have been a man. He tugged the keys out of the ignition and slipped them into his coat pocket. As he reached for the driver’s side door he felt Heather’s hand clamped tightly around his bicep.

“I think we should call the Mounties.”

“No,” James said with a shake of his head. “It’s fine, I’m going to go out and check.”

Hudson pulled his arm free and stepped out into the road. He slammed the door shut behind him, smiling unconvincingly to Heather through the frosted glass, and slowly made his way towards the carcass. It was a deer – or at least what was left of one. He knelt beside it and pressed his hands against it. It was still warm to the touch. There were no teeth marks, only long, straight gashes along its stomach and neck.

“Whatever that was, it's long gone,” James muttered. “Christ, it really went to town on this poor thing. It’s all torn up. There are claw marks here I’ve never seen before.”

Hudson tried once more to parse the images that had flickered through his brain in the moments before he’d slammed down the brakes. He was still struggling to make sense of it as he set the deer’s head down on the road and rose to his feet. The least he could do was move the carcass out of the road, he thought, as he took one last look down at the savaged animal.

“James,” Heather called out nervously from the truck.

“What’s wrong?”

There was a desperation in her voice this time. “Get back in the truck, James.”

Hudson nodded. “I’m coming, I’m just going to make sure this thing’s out of the road. It’s dangerous enough out here witho-”

Without warning, James found himself on his back with the taste of blood in his mouth. His ears were ringing and there was a dull pain in his chest. In the distance he could hear Heather screaming and managed to lift his head enough to make sure he hadn’t been shot. Standing over him was a hairy brute of a man with blood caked around his mouth. There was a crazed look in his eye that made Hudson’s blood run cold.

“Whoa, take it easy there bud,” James spluttered feebly as he tried to push himself onto his elbows. “I’m not going to hurt you.”

A guttural growl left the man’s chest as Hudson tried to climb to his feet slowly and James froze. He met the feral man’s gaze but something told him not to hold it. Instead he lowered it, glancing towards the hairy, torn feet that looked as if they were frozen through. After a few seconds, James carefully tried to climb to his feet again, slower this time, taking care to step back away from the man and to seem as small and unthreatening as possible.

“Alright, I get it. The deer’s yours. Look, here, I’m moving away from it. You see? Take it. I’m going to just back away slowly and head back to my truck, you hear me? Nobody needs to get hurt here.”

The growling quieted as James retreated and he was sure that the truck was only a few metres behind him. He was almost counting the inches as he moved. He felt the hood of the truck hit him in the back and moved to turn around but as he did so made the mistake of making eye contact with the wildman one last time. James heard the roar and saw a glint of metal as the beast seemed to cut the distance between them in a millisecond. It was inches from him when a loud bang rang out.

In Heather's hands was an old shotgun that James kept in the truck in case of emergencies. It was so heavy that she could barely keep it aloft. The naked man had been flung by the impact of the shot into the snow and looked, as far as either of them could tell, to be dead. Hudson was planted to the spot in shock. It took him a few seconds to realise he hadn’t answered.

“Are you alright?” Heather called out. “He didn’t hurt you, did he?”

“I’m fine,” James mumbled. “Though I don’t think we can say the same for our friend here. That was one hell of a shot, MacNeil.”

It was clear from Heather’s face that she saw through his bravado. “I don't care what you say, this time I’m going to call the Mounties.”

James took the shotgun from MacNeil and trained it on the naked man’s bleeding husk. Heather scuttled towards the truck in search of a phone as Hudson drew closer to the man. The snow around him had been splattered with blood. Under other circumstances, the patterns in the blood-flecked snow would almost have been beautiful. James set that thought aside as he nudged the body with the shotgun. A gentle groan came from it. Hudson staggered backwards in shock.

“Wait,” James shouted towards the truck. “This crazy son of a bitch is still breathing. Get some blankets.”

Heather’s face twisted in revulsion. “What? You’re not seriously suggesting that we try and move h-”

“The blankets, Heather.”

MacNeil groaned and ran towards the back of the truck. Hudson shot her an approving look, and then tightened his grip on the shotgun. The man in the snow stirred ever so slightly, revealing the wound in his chest to the elements. Seconds ago it had been the size of a basketball. Amongst the mess of blood and hair, Hudson could have sworn the muscles were reaching out to one another. The naked man was healing.