Name: Thorne Barrett
Alter Ego:
Deathrose the Meta-SlayerOrigin: Midway City
Hometown: Mobile
Sex: Male
Race: Enhanced Human
Height: 6'2"
Weight: 217lbs.
Age: 36
Birth Date: December 4th
Appearance:
Masked.
Unmasked.
Icon: A wilted rose crossed with a combat knife
Occupation: Mercenary, Assassin, Bounty Hunter
Personality:
A cold professional while on the job, Barrett sees himself as the best weapon against a changing world full of both wonders and horrors. Confident in his own talent and willing to do just about any job for the sole reason that he believes he
can do any job successfully, he markets himself as a specialist against all things unnatural. A patriot at heart, Barrett was proud of his duty as a "metahuman wrangler" in his former life, finding a sense of purpose by using his talents to serve his country. Proud of America for what it was and disappointed for what it's become, Barrett regards his fellow metahumans as well as the beasts and wizards that emerged from the hidden world with silent disdain.
While biased against such forces, it is only mages that Barrett shows some sort of open distrust towards, partially because he feels pain whenever he's near anything actively magical in nature, but mainly because it was mages that destroyed the life he once had. Still, Barrett is willing to make an exception to work for a mage if he agrees with its purpose (and he's paid extra). The only thing Barrett isn't willing to do is work for the Blackthorn Coven in any way, shape, or form, and he regrets the times where he was forced to work for them early in his career. Barrett would love nothing more than to take vengeance against the Coven for the countless atrocities they have performed, but as of now he has chosen to bide his time, keeping himself under their radar until the day comes where he could finally take them down once and for all.
Abilities:
Skills:
Tactical Acumen:
Due to his inborn ability of accurate analysis refined with years of experience, Barrett's intellect can be considered superior to the average human. Capable of calm analysis of the abilities of the opponent as well as the battle conditions even when in danger and deduce an appropriate course of action after considering all possibilities to engage and escape from a predicament. Level of understanding depends greatly on factors such as the amount of experience Barrett has against a specific opponent or ability. It is because of this that Barrett employs tactics that favor forcing particularly powerful target to use everything at their disposal before retreat so that Barrett may be able to devise potential countermeasures for future encounters.
Military Training:
As a former Special Forces operative, Barrett has received some of the finest military training in the world. His skills with ballistics are comparable to even the most seasoned of marksmen, and he is even capable of using explosives to a dangerous degree. This knowledge also extends to leadership training, combatives, parachuting, combat diving, survival training, first aid, unconventional warfare, trap-making, vehicular proficiency, production of improvised explosives, and the modification of firearms.
Martial Arts Mastery:
Due to his photographic reflexes, Barrett could be considered a master at any sort of martial arts he would encounter. Barrett's capabilities at hand-to-hand combat are at a degree where Barrett has devised his own school of martial arts that involves techniques that allow him to adapt to his opponent's own fighting style while also taking full advantage of his own ability, embracing every martial art that he has analyzed with techniques mainly drawing from from Muay Thai, Wrestling, Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, and Kali.
Powers:
Photographic Reflexes:
An inborn mutation of the brain's learning and acting processes. Advanced photographic memory that allows Barrett to perfectly understand and copy whatever technique he sees performed reflexively. Allows Barrett to match his opponents' skills after mere observation of the skill being utilized. However, he can only imitate techniques that he has seen, and is incapable of emulating feats that his body cannot perform. Because of the nature of his body, Barrett is also incapable of imitating abilities that require the use of one's meridians, such as magic. An ability that Barrett had at birth that pushes the boundary of the human brain's capabilities, it stems from a defect that prioritizes the brain's active learning processes. Because of this, Barrett's ability to feel empathy or express emotion has diminished, and even parts of his memory retention have taken a toll. While this increases his resistance against psychic attacks that target emotions, this also makes him more susceptible to effects that modify his memories.
Accelerated Healing:
A form of adaptation that allows the body's healing rates to increase exponentially, sealing wounds in minutes and clotting blood at half the time. Minor wounds take mere seconds to heal, while severe wounds take hours to fully heal, and even then it would only take Barrett a few minutes to recover from lethal wounds enough to keep fighting. The only things Barrett is unable to heal are completely severed limbs. Barrett's increased healing has also seemingly stopped him from aging, appearing the same way he did 10 years ago (though with whitened hair and darkened skin). A power that has awakened after Barrett was blasted with strong chaos magic, Barrett theorizes that his healing results from formerly dormant metagenes fully awakening within him.
Enhanced Physical Ability:
Amplified strength, durability, endurance, speed, senses, reflexes, and agility, Barrett's physique surpasses human limits, standing above even the greatest Olympic athletes. Because of his enhanced faculties added with his other abilities and skills, Barrett can be considered the "perfect" soldier, as he is able to fight toe-to-toe against even stronger beings. However, his enhanced physiology is only considered "middling" or worse in comparison to the likes of a Kryptonian or Amazonian. Whether this is another metahuman ability or a result of chaos magic radically changing his body is currently unknown to Deathrose.
Magic Sensitivity:
An increased reactivity towards entities magical in nature. In Barrett's case he is able to feel pain when close to magic that ranges from mild discomfort to the feeling of "being ripped apart at a molecular level". The level of pain depends on the level of magic, but it also seems to react more violently to chaos magic. Also has the added effect of granting Barrett a minor form of resistance towards the effects of magic which also prevents him from casting spells or using magical implements himself, though the pain he feels from stronger magical effects may just be enough to disable him regardless. Barrett believes that this pain stems from his body's metahuman genes trying to "violently reject" magic from his system, surmising that his "true" metahuman ability is "adaptation".
Gadgets:
Tactical Full-Body Armor + Clothing:
Barrett wears an all-black full-body composite weave bodysuit designed to cushion against concussive blows and defend against blades and smaller-caliber ballistics. Over this, Barrett also wears a breastplate made out of all the Promethium he was able to obtain in his dealings with more higher-up clients, as well as a pair of steel-alloy boots and shin-guards. Even Barrett's signature red cloak is fireproof and made with a special material that allows him to endure the elements. The bandages Barrett wears over his face are meant mainly to mask his breath to a surprisingly effective degree.
Grappling Gun:
A specialized device that allows Barrett to easily reposition or reach high places quickly using a claw-like hook that clings onto an object on-command. The chord is made of a durable, hard-to-tear alloy that can support up to almost half a ton in weight.
Smoke Grenades:
An explosive device that emits a screen of smoke that obstructs vision and scent. Useful for escaping or for just creating cover. A favored tool of Barrett that he utilizes in conjunction with his photographic memory and enhanced sense of hearing.
"Cobra" Pill:
A highly potent potassium cyanide capsule that quickly dissolves into the human body, able to kill a normal human within seconds. Barrett keeps it hidden and secured on his person not as a weapon, but as a last resort "when all else fails". In truth, he utilizes it only to feign his death, as its effects merely slow down his bodily functions to a rate where he would be perceived as "medically dead", allowing him to get the jump on unsuspecting adversaries, or escape from more unique predicaments. Barrett holds the antidote to this toxin hidden inside his mouth within a false tooth.
Weapons:
Custom-Made M9 Bayonet:
Barrett's signature knife and favored weapon for close-range engagements since he is unable to properly utilize enchanted armaments. He is also capable of affixing the bayonet onto his rifles if needed. The blade itself is made with a special, anti-magic alloy given to him as a reward by a strange winged demon for an equally peculiar job.
Fragmentation Grenades:
Explosive ordnance. Good for crowds of adversaries, or one really tough metahuman.
Throwing Knives:
Specialized throwable blades used by Barrett with expertise after careful observation of a certain member of the Justice League. Sometimes equipped with either light explosives or LED lights used to trace opponents in dark or otherwise obscured areas.
Firearms:
About 80% of Barrett's firepower comes from the vast armory of guns at his disposal. Because he is incapable of using enchanted weaponry well, Barrett breaks that limitation by instead loading himself with cheap, reliable firearms within an underground armory situated at an undisclosed location in the Shattered Scar. The firearms that he normally uses for most engagements are as followed:
- A modified M16A4 meant for engagements at all ranges. Equipped with military-grade laser sights, a variable scope utilized to engage at long range, and an underbarrel grenade launcher.
- A Mossberg 590A1 meant for medium and close-range engagements mainly for its varied types of ammunition. Barrett usually 00 buckshot shells, but also carries slugs and dragon's breath shells since most of his opponents tend to either be too durable for normal bullets, or adverse to fire.
- A Heckler & Koch MP7 meant for close-range engagements, equipped with laser sights and an extended magazine. Barrett's preferred weapon of choice when he needs a room cleared.
- A Desert Eagle meant for close-range engagements. High stopping power and more reliable than an unwieldy magnum revolver. Barrett's favored sidearm mainly due to its expense in comparison to his other firearms, he has less of these in reserve than his other guns.
Backstory:
One of the most top-rated mercenaries in the criminal underworld, Deathrose the Meta-Slayer was once a man named Thorne Barrett. A former operative of a now-defunct United States Special Forces unit trained to deal with metahumans and other extraordinary threats due to his own remarkable talent of absorbing knowledge instantaneously, Barrett had slain dozens of rogue metahumans for his country in the shadows. After the disastrous reveal of the Blackthorn Coven in 2010, Barrett was one of the many confirmed dead in a catastrophic blast of Chaos Magic within Midway City. However, he had woken up a year later in the rubble of his former home, alive but... changed.
As Barrett adapted to this new wild world, he began making a name for himself as a hired gun, selling his talents and experience alongside his newfound enhance physical abilities. As the years went by, both Barrett's reputation and his repertoire of techniques grew as more and more shadier types hired him to deal with threats they can't normally handle. As the name "Deathrose" grew throughout the criminal underworld, more lucrative jobs opened up to the mercenary by this underground network's upper echelons, allowing him to build his arsenal up with more advanced technology, including limited access to rare materials such as promethium. This was all part of a long-term plan Barrett had in order to establish himself enough to take out those responsible for his country in pieces, his city in ruins, and his own body in a constant state of pain: the Blackthorn Coven.
