EternalPhoenix

Tattoo (Josephine "Finn" Kent) Power Level: 9; Power Points Spent: 180/180 STR: +2 (+14) (Base, Jaime, & Renee) +5 (14/20) (Satsuki), DEX: +2 (14), CON: +2 (14), INT: +2 (14), WIS: +2 (14), CHA: +2 (14) Tough: +2 (Base) +4/+6 (Jaime) +2/+6 (Renee) +6/+8 (Satsuki), Fort: +7, Ref: +8 (Base) +12 (Jaime & Renee) +10 (Satsuki), Will: +9 (Base) +11 (Jaime & Renee) +13 (Satsuki) Skills: Acrobatics 3 (+5/+15 Jaime), Concentration 8 (+10), Craft (electronic) 3 (+5/+15 Satsuki), Craft (mechanical) 3 (+5/+15 Satsuki), Diplomacy 3 (+5/+15 Renee), Drive 3 (+5/+15 Jaime), Escape Artist 3 (+5/+15 Jaime), Gather Information 3 (+5/+15 Renee), Intimidate 3 (+5/+15 Renee), Investigate 3 (+5/+15 Renee), Knowledge (earth sciences) 3 (+5/+15 Jaime), Knowledge (life sciences) 3 (+5/+15 Satsuki), Knowledge (physical sciences) 3 (+5/+15 Satsuki), Knowledge (streetwise) 3 (+5/+15 Renee), Knowledge (technology) 3 (+5/+15 Satsuki), Medicine 3 (+5/+15 Satsuki), Notice 8 (+10), Search 3 (+5/+15 Renee), Sense Motive 8 (+10), Stealth 3 (+5/+15 Jaime), Survival 3 (+5/+15 Jaime) Feats (Base): Beginner's Luck, Equipment 2, Improved Critical 2 (Renee's Pistol Shot (Blast 4)), Jack-of-All-Trades, Luck 2, Second Chance (Concentration checks to maintain powers), Uncanny Dodge (Auditory) Feats (w/Jaime): Acrobatic Bluff, Attack Focus (melee) 4, Challenge - Improved Acrobatic Bluff, Defensive Attack, Defensive Roll, Dodge Focus 4, Evasion, Improved Initiative, Takedown Attack 2 Feats (w/Renee): Attack Focus (ranged) 6, Connected, Contacts, Defensive Roll 2, Dodge Focus 4, Improved Aim, Move-by Action, Precise Shot 2, Quick Draw, Skill Mastery (Diplomacy, Gather Info, Intimidate, Investigate), Startle, Well-Informed Feats (w/Satsuki): Attack Focus (melee), Attack Specialization 2 (Unarmed Attack), Defensive Roll, Improved Grab, Improved Grapple, Improved Pin, Improvised Tools, Inventor, Move-by Action, Power Attack, Takedown Attack Powers: Psychometric Soul Tattoos (Mimic 9) (mimic: all traits, Feats: Beginner's Luck, Jack-of-All-Trades; Residual; Channeling (Must have loved the deceased to mimic)) Psychometry (Super-Senses 4) (postcognition; Limited (to touched objects)) Renee's Pistol (Device 2) (Easy to lose) Renee's Pistol Shot (Blast 4) (DC 19, Feats: Improved Critical 2 (Renee's Pistol Shot (Blast 4))) Satsuki's Safe Scientific Gear (Device 6) (Hard to lose, Restricted use (Must know Satsuki's password (that Tattoo must be active))) Analysis Goggles (Super-Senses (analytical (type): Visual, extended (type): Visual 1 (-1 per 100 ft), infravision, microscopic vision 2 (cell-size), ultravision) Gripper Arms Backpack (Linked) Additional Limbs 2 (Linked; 2 extra limbs; +2 to Grapple when not using Imp. Grapple, Feats: Improved Grapple) Elongation 3 (Linked; Elongation: 25 ft., range incr 30 ft., +3 Escape & Grapple; Projection) Enhanced Strength 6 (Linked; +6 STR) Super-Strength 3 (Linked; +15 STR carry capacity, heavy load: 3.2k lbs; +3 STR to some checks) Hover Disc (Flight 2) (Speed: 25 mph, 220 ft./rnd; Platform) Psychometric Soul Tattoos Settings: Jaime Langford (Blaze Knuckle) (Power Setting) (Powers: Martial Arts (Strike 2), Pain Tolerance (Protection 2), Acrobatics +10 (+15), Drive +10 (+15), Escape Artist +10 (+15), Knowledge (earth sciences) +10 (+15), Stealth +10 (+15), Survival +10 (+15), Reflex +4 (+12), Will +2 (+11), Feats: Acrobatic Bluff, Attack Focus (melee) 4, Challenge - Improved Acrobatic Bluff, Defensive Attack, Defensive Roll, Dodge Focus 4, Evasion, Improved Initiative, Takedown Attack 2) Martial Arts (Strike 2) (DC 22, Feats: Improved Critical 2 (Martial Arts (Strike 2)); Accurate (+2), Mighty) Pain Tolerance (Protection 2) (+2 Toughness) Renee Allen (Query) (Power Setting) (Powers: Evidence Gathering (Quickness 3), No Evidence Left Behind (Super-Senses 2), Diplomacy +10 (+15), Gather Information +10 (+15), Intimidate +10 (+15), Investigate +10 (+15), Knowledge (streetwise) +10 (+15), Search +10 (+15), Reflex +4 (+12), Will +2 (+11), Feats: Attack Focus (ranged) 6, Connected, Contacts, Defensive Roll 2, Dodge Focus 4, Improved Aim, Move-by Action, Precise Shot 2, Quick Draw, Skill Mastery (Diplomacy, Gather Info, Intimidate, Investigate), Startle, Well-Informed) Evidence Gathering (Quickness 3) (Perform routine tasks at 10x speed; One Task (Search checks to gather evidence)) No Evidence Left Behind (Super-Senses 2) (counters concealment: Visual; Limited (to Search checks)) Satsuki Tanahashi (Miss Fixer) (Power Setting) (Powers: High Pain Tolerance (Protection 4), Low Level Telepathy (Communication 3), Polymath (Quickness 4), Craft (electronic) +10 (+15), Craft (mechanical) +10 (+15), Knowledge (life sciences) +10 (+15), Knowledge (physical sciences) +10 (+15), Knowledge (technology) +10 (+15), Medicine +10 (+15), Defense Bonus +2 (+10), Reflex +2 (+10), Will +4 (+13), Feats: Attack Focus (melee), Attack Specialization 2 (Unarmed Attack), Defensive Roll, Improved Grab, Improved Pin, Improvised Tools, Inventor, Move-by Action, Power Attack, Takedown Attack) High Pain Tolerance (Protection 4) (+4 Toughness) Low Level Telepathy (Communication 3) (sense type: mental; Omni-Directional Area; Limited (Only with friends/loved ones)) Polymath (Quickness 4) (Perform routine tasks at 25x speed; One Type) Equipment: Blaze Knuckle’s Sash 0, Jaime's Motorcycle, Miss Fixer’s Watch 0, Query’s Fedora 0 Attack Bonus (Base): +8 (Ranged: +8, Melee: +8, Grapple: +10) Attack Bonus (Jaime Langford): +8 (Ranged: +8, Melee: +12, Grapple: +14) Attack Bonus (Renee Allen): +8 (Ranged: +14, Melee: +8, Grapple: +10) Attack Bonus (Satsuki Tanahashi): +8 (Ranged: +8, Melee: +8, Grapple: +13/+19) Attacks (Base): Renee's Pistol Shot (Blast 4), +8 (DC 19), Unarmed Attack, +8 (DC 17) Attacks (Jaime Langford): Martial Arts (Strike 2), +14 (DC 22), Renee's Pistol Shot (Blast 4), +8 (DC 19), Unarmed Attack, +8 (DC 17) Attacks (Renee Allen): Renee's Pistol Shot (Blast 4), +14 (DC 19), Unarmed Attack, +8 (DC 17) Attacks (Satsuki Tanahashi): Renee's Pistol Shot (Blast 4), +8 (DC 19), Unarmed Attack (Gripper Arms), +13 (DC 20), Unarmed Attack (regular arms), +8 (DC 17) Defense (Base): +8 (Flat-footed: +4), Knockback: -1 Defense (Jaime Langford): +12 (Flat-footed: +4), Knockback: -2/-3 Defense (Renee Allen): +12 (Flat-footed: +4), Knockback: -1/-3 Defense (Satsuki Tanahashi): +10 (Flat-footed: +5), Knockback: -3/-4 Initiative: +2 (+6 Jaime) Languages: English Native Totals: Abilities 24 + Skills 20 (78 ranks) + Feats 6 + Powers 80 + Combat 32 + Saves 18 + Drawbacks 0 = 180 **************************************************************************************** Jaime's Motorcycle Power Level: 9; Equipment Points Spent: 10 STR: +5 (20) Toughness: +8 Powers: Speed 5 (Speed: 250 mph, 2200 ft./rnd) Defense: +0 Totals: Abilities 2 + Skills 0 (0 ranks) + Feats 0 + Features 0 + Powers 5 + Combat 0 + Saves 3 + Drawbacks 0 + Equipment 0 (0 ep) + Weapons & Armor 0 (0 ep) = 10 Age (as of Jan 2019): 27 Height: 5’ 10” Weight: 150 Ethnicity: ½ Black British, ½ Caucasian Hair: Brown Eyes: Light Brown Base of Operations: London, England, United Kingdom Background: Every Five Year Vet knows the stats. 90% of rookie heroes don’t make it to the second year. 90% of the remainder that finish that first year don’t get to the full five. This is not necessarily as dire as it sounds. A lot can change for the usually young rookie hero. Any number of things could happen that has absolutely nothing to do with their hero life but nonetheless require them to quit. With that said, hero work is extremely dangerous and rookies/the inexperienced can quickly find themselves in over their heads with no backup. Friends and family can be menaced and harmed. It tends to be forgotten, sometimes, but not everyone is the Exiles. Or The Seawings. Or the Icons. Not everyone can pull miracles out of desperate situations. The heroes who do it regularly tend to have expert medican attention if not outright healing powers available on demand. And the demand for their services is often quite high. With all that mind, there are three stories to be told. That of Jaime Langford, Renee Allen, and Satsuki Tanahashi. Or (as they attempted to be better known as) Blaze Knuckle, Query, and Miss Fixer. Jaime Langford was an occasional dojo sparring partner of Emily Knight. At the time, she was actually better than the heroine. This prompted Jaime to consider heroics herself. And she was actually quite good at it. The martial artist Blaze Knuckle was arguably the most promising rookie in a while. Teen martial artist who had “it”. She got through her first year, which was impressive. She got through her second and looked on track to coast through the five year boundary. Behind the scenes, however, she was starting to fall apart. It’s one thing to be a high school student, maintain a social lifef, and do superhero work. It’s quite another to add a part time job and swap high school for university on top of it. So when she was out with her beloved girlfriend (Josephine "Finn" Kent) and that drunk driver ran the light, she was simply too exhausted to react quickly. She shoved Finn out of the way, but was herself struck. She died there in the street before the ambulance even arrived. Inspector Renee Allen of Scotland Yard led the investigation that sent the drunk driver to prison. She was a respected member of law enforcement, having worked with Paragon, Big Ben, and even Sir Randall Knight. She was a skilled detective, a crack shot by police standards, and compassionate towards crime victims. The latter of which is why she kept in touch with a heartbroken Finn, which led to a romantic relationship between the two. However, every detective worthy of the term has That One Case. Such things cannot usually be solved within the restrictions that law enforcement operates under, so Renee Allen put on a mask and became Query. She was neither a prodigy nor incompetent; just a typical rookie hero. With that said, she was an example of someone who put on the mask for the wrong reasons. She did it out of obsession, not altruism. She was never quite as good as she thought she was, either. She got in over her head, and into a situation she could not easily get out of. She was shot and left for dead. She survived long enough to get home. She died in Finn’s arms before the ambulance could arrive. Paragon, however, had been keeping tabs on her. He recruited Umbrella Queen and Nisse. Together they finished what Query had started. This was UQ and Nisse’s first encounter with Finn. It would not be the last. Finn thought she was cursed, haunted, or going crazy. Heartbroken twice over, she had moved to a new neighborhood and was attempting to live a quiet life as a barista. Satsuki Tanahashi was a regular customer, and always stared at Finn whenever Finn’s issues started to act up. Turns out, Satsuki knew Finn was not cursed, haunted, or going crazy. She has psychometry. Extremely strong psychometry. She needed help to learn to control it. Help Satsuki was all too happy to provide. She had three other things going on, only two of which she shared with Finn. First, she was a genius tech specialist, operating as the hero Miss Fixer. She was post first year, but pre fifth year. Second, she was just as knowledgeable about medical science and biology as she was about physics and technology. Hence how she knew about Finn’s powers just by observing her over several weeks. Third, however, was what she did not tell Finn at all. The reason behind those first two items. She was younger than Finn was at this point, and had spent much of her childhood in and out of hospitals for leukemia. There was always room for hope, but by her teen years Satsuki admitted to herself she wasn’t living to be old. It had come back before when thought gone, and undoubtedly would again. Hence a bit of training while she was still relatively healthy and doing the best she could for everyone else. She did not expect to fall in love for the first time. This is where Umbrella Queen and Nisse re enter the tale. The British hero community is smaller and more tightly knit than the American one. Who else could you trust with the woman you love after you’re gone but a duo of Five Year Vets? So, some introductions were made and everyone was hitting it off swimmingly. Just in time for Satsuki to get sick again. This time, however, her oncologist (cancer specialist doctor) uttered the dread word “metastasized”. You, Dear Reader, know how this ends. With Finn holding another love in her arms as they died. This time, however, she was not left alone. There was a pair of superhero friends to console her. There was also the appearance of Lady Knight and Paragon. Miss Fixer had it both right and wrong. Finn was neither haunted nor going crazy…but she had been cursed. Paragon knew why. He’d recruited Lady Knight (the rest of her family were unavailable), and left it to Nisse to explain and counter the spell holding Finn’s powers back. And for the first time in her 24 years, Finn Kent gained full access to her powers in a powerful surge of psionic energy. It was time to kick ass. What was happening? A conspiracy of supervillains had been working to cut off new heroes at the source. The original Chasseur over in Quebec, Canada, had systematically eradicated all heroes in that province this way. His only failings were trying to do everything himself instead employing a little teamwork and not employing nearly enough finesse for a trick archer. Blaze Knuckle (Jaime Langford) was so exhausted because she’d been up against their machinations, and it was a matter of time before she made a mistake. Query (Renee Allen) had actually discovered much of what they were doing before her murder, which drew in the more cautious and experience Paragon. And Miss Fixer (Satsuki Tanahashi) had been deliberately poisoned at the coffee shop Finn worked at, causing her leukemia to recur stronger than ever. Finn and her psychometry linked the whole thing together, and guess who was helping her to get it under control. Oh, yes. It was absolutely time to kick ass. So. You know. Lady Knight, Paragon, Umbrella Queen, Nisse, and the newly christened Tattoo rolled out and absolutely stomped the conspiracy. The fight itself wasn’t some spectacular city spanning affair. These were relatively low rent supervillains, after all. It was spectacular for a steel level battle, to be sure, but only that. Didn’t even leave the block. Afterwards, they went their separate ways. Lady Knight and Paragon both left alone after promising to keep in touch. UQ & Nisse, however, stuck by their friend. Thus was formed the “UQ Trio”, and they’ve been working together for the past few years. Powers & Tactics: Tattoo is both a metahuman and a mutant. It’s incredibly rare, but sometimes the use of someone’s metahuman powers functions as the trigger to activate their mutant ones. She is a psionic with both powers, and carries two technological devices. As a metahuman, she is a psychometric, able to see the past of any object she touches. It is her mutant psionic power, however, that is fascinating. It works in tandem with her psychometry to let her apparently mimic the knowledge, skills and abilities of the person who owned the item in question. Please note the past tense. The owner of the item has to be dead. Not only that, but she needs to have had a strong emotional connection to that owner. It can seem like she’s summoning their spirit and letting it partially possess her. Especially since she talks about them like they’re in her head with her. The three small tattoos on her chest of their faces don’t help her power not seem supernatural. But it isn’t. The knowledge, skills, and abilities she gains are activated via psychometry, yes, but they’re specifically her own perception of what Jaime, Renee, and Satsuki were capable of. The originals weren’t quite as good as she perceived them to be. So, ironically enough, her rose colored glasses for her three late girlfriends make her better in some ways than they ever were. That’s how psionics work. The mind and will makes it real. As a note, it is possible that the strong emotional connection to the item’s owner and the item’s owner being dead are psychological limits she places on herself unconsciously, and not the actual limitations of her powers. Furthermore, it is unknown if she can replicate actual superpowers, as the three she has did not have any themselves (with one very small exception). Jaime Langford, alias Blaze Knuckle, was a martial artist. She was a practitioner of kickboxing, muay thai, and a compatible Changquan style (Changquan being the classic acrobatic and kick heavy style of Chinese martial arts). Years of dedicated training had made her a better striker than grappler, and heightened her resistance to pain. She was a skilled acrobat and driver, and was knowledgeable in geography, geology, and wilderness survival. The items Tattoo keeps to access her are her motorcycle (willed to Finn, one way in which Jaime was smart about things) and the sash she wore as Blaze Knuckle. Renee Allen, alias Query, was a highly skilled detective and crack shot with handguns. Her detective work was excellent in all three dimensions. Few knew the criminal world better, including the actual criminals. Questioning suspects, interviewing potential witnesses, and gathering physical evidence. She could do it all. The latter of which she could do quite rapidly compared to many. She never seemed to miss anything that was hidden when evidence gathering, either. The items Tattoo keeps to access her are her Pistol (not turned in to Scotland Yard, naughty Finn) and the fedora Renee wore as part of her Query outfit. The Pistol can be used without Renee being active, but she’s the one who’s highly accurate with it. So normally pointless. Satsuki Tanahashi, alias Miss Fixer, was a highly skilled scientist (in both life and physical sciences). She was additionally a tech specialist, inventor, and doctor. A lifetime of leukemia treatment had increased her pain tolerance to about human maximum. Finn may not be able to replicate her natural genius intellect, but she can replicate the sheer speed with which Satsuki figured things out. It is Finn’s replication of Satsuki’s very limited telepathy (under a mile range and only with people she has a strong emotional connection with) that shows that Finn could very well be able to replicate actual superhuman powers. The items Tattoo keeps to access her are the watch she wore as Miss Fixer (it’s time for science was her catchphrase, because nerd) and her Safe Scientific Gear. The Gear consists of Analysis Goggles, a Gripper Arms Backpack, and a Hover Disc. The first and last are basically what they say they are. It’s tough to do science if you can’t see what you’re doing, and an analysis suite is just helpful. The Disc was quite useful for observing situations where being on the ground was, uh, hazardous. Also sometimes she was too tired to walk. The Gripper Arms Backpack, however. was explicitly an assist device. Satsuki spent her entire life small, and much of it weak and exhausted. Her arms and hands could not be trusted. So she made a second set. Stronger than she would ever be, and able to reach much further than her short arms ever could. The maximum lifting capacity of the arms is over 3 tons, so they’re pretty good at hitting and grappling people too. As a side note, Finn cannot use the Safe Scientific Gear without Satsuki being active. Using it requires a password that only Satsuki knows. Why Finn can’t remember or use it without her active is apparently another psychological limitation, as it was one that Satsuki had herself. Tactically, Tattoo isn’t as complicated as she appears to be. Jaime is the normal go to for combat situations, and she’s a pure unarmed fighter who uses Improved Acrobatic Bluff to hit better and Takedown Attack 2 to goonsweep like a champ. It’s not that Renee and Satsuki can’t defend themselves. They certainly can. It’s that their primary skillsets are detective work and sciencing things. Jaime is an ass beater. Renee does a lot more with her investigative skills, Connected, Contacts, and Well Informed than she does with Startle and a Pistol Shot. Satsuki is a hell of a grappler with her Gripper Arms, but her strengths lie in her medical and technical skills along with using Inventor to help solve the problem du jour. So, ultimately, Tattoo is a bit of a Swiss Army Knife as heroes go. Especially with Beginner’s Luck and Jack of All Trades supporting her endeavors. She absolutely does not power stunt. Personality: Tattoo, well, she’s been through a lot. Losing a loved one is hard enough. One dying in someone’s arms is harder still. She’s been through this three times. Calling her a cheeful, gregarious person would be a lie. She’s very clearly bearing some strong emotional scars. She just isn’t a people person. Quiet, you know? Withdrawn. Keeps to herself. This is a lack of desire, not a lack of ability. She does socialize more or less enough to remain in practice, but not enough to make new friends. Everyone who isn’t Umbrella Queen or Nisse is kept at arm’s length. Grief is heavy enough for someone without the ability to pick up an object and literally relive part of the lost loved one’s life. Humans can get used to anything, but it’s been both a heavy ask and a long road. With that said, these last few years she’s developed a new appreciation for life and how precious it really is. She has loved and been loved by three extraordinary women. She’s still a hero after that first outing for a few reasons, the most obvious of which is honoring Jaime, Renee, and Satsuki. There is also that new appreciation spurring a desire to never see anyone hurt or heaven forbid killed if she can do anything about it. The third reason is that she has a deep and intimate knowledge of how short life can be. Jaime was 18 when she died. Satsuki was 20. Even Renee was only 28. There is no way of knowing when the end is going to come. So it’s important to her to live her life as fully as possible. Normally when someone says this they mean social bonding, thrill chasing, and general hedonism. What Finn means is that she wants to do as much good as she possibly can in the time she has left. Whether that time comes to an end next Tuesday or when she’s 117 is beside the point.

Nisse (Alwyn Kendrick) Power Level: 9; Power Points Spent: 165/165 STR: +0 (10), DEX: +3 (12/16), CON: +2 (14), INT: +5 (16/20), WIS: +3 (16), CHA: +5 (20) Tough: +2/+6, Fort: +5, Ref: +8/+12, Will: +10 Skills: Bluff 10 (+15), Diplomacy 10 (+15), Gather Information 5 (+10), Knowledge (arcane Lore) 10 (+15), Language 3 (+3), Notice 7 (+10), Sense Motive 7 (+10) Feats: Artificer, Attack Focus (ranged) 4, Challenge - Improved Feint, Challenge - Improved Taunt, Evasion, Improved Defense 2, Ritualist, Taunt, Teamwork 3, Uncanny Dodge (Auditory) Powers: Enchanted Senses (Super-Senses 10) (awareness: Magic (visual), counters concealment: Visual, counters illusion: Visual, counters obscure (all): Visual) Faerie Magic (Array 10) (default power: blast) Flight Disc (Flight 6) (Array; Speed: 500 mph, 4400 ft./rnd; Affects Others, Burst Area (30 ft. radius - General); Platform; Selective, Subtle (subtle)) Illusory Glamours (Illusion 6) (Array; affects: 1 type + visual - visual & auditory, DC 16) Mystic Blast (Blast 10) (Array; DC 25) Mystic Bolts (Blast 6) (Default; DC 21; Autofire (interval 2, max +5); Accurate 2 (+4)) Mystic Telekinesis (Move Object 6) (Array; Strength: 30, Carry: 532 / 1.1k / 1.6k / 3.2k; Range (perception); Precise, Subtle (subtle)) Solid Glamours (Create Object 6) (Array; Max Size: 6x 5' cubes, DC 16; Duration (continuous); Precise, Subtle (subtle)) Half-Elven Physiology (Container, Passive 3) Enhanced Dexterity 4 (+4 DEX) Enhanced Intelligence 4 (+4 INT) Immunity 4 (aging, disease, sleep, starvation & thirst; Limited - Half Effect) Leaping 1 (Jumping distance: x2) Super-Senses 4 (extended (type): Visual 1 (-1 per 100 ft), low-light vision, ultra-hearing) Shield Amulet (Device 5) (Hard to lose, Only you can use) Illusory Shielding (Enhanced Trait 15) (Traits: Defense Bonus +4 (+12), Reflex +4 (+12), Feats: Evasion, Improved Defense 2) Mystic Armor (Force Field 4) (+4 Toughness; Impervious [2 extra ranks]) Attack Bonus: +4 (Ranged: +8, Melee: +4, Grapple: +4) Attacks: Mystic Blast (Blast 10), +8 (DC 25), Mystic Bolts (Blast 6), +12 (DC 21), Unarmed Attack, +4 (DC 15) Defense: +8/+12 (Flat-footed: +6), Knockback: -6 Initiative: +3 Languages: Elven, English Native, French, Welsh Totals: Abilities 28 + Skills 13 (52 ranks) + Feats 13 + Powers 72 + Combat 24 + Saves 15 + Drawbacks 0 = 165 Age (as of Jan 2019): 38 (chronological), 19 (biological) Height: 5’ 9’ Weight: 160 lbs Ethnicity: ½ Elven, ½ Caucasian (Welsh, to be specific) Hair: Blonde Eyes: One Green, One Blue (has heterochromia) Base of Operations: Background: Not every half Elven kid comes from a loving relationship. Neither are all they mistreated or abused as children. Ms. Kendrick was quite young then. She went to a party, met a very charming and sensual gentleman, and had one very good night. She doesn’t mind not recalling all of the specific details, as she got rather inebriated that night. She isn’t quite as clear on why she didn’t get an abortion. She says it simply didn’t occur to her. Alwyn knows what that is. The Winter Court is full of predators of all types. His father is one. It would be pathetically easy for Alwyn himself to geass a young drunk woman into having his child. His father is significantly more powerful and persuasive than he is. It would have been child’s play. Growing up at half speed sucks in general. Doing with a single unwed mother sucks more. Doing it while smallish and pretty sucks yet more. Kids can be such assholes. It was a long, lonely childhood. But whatever. See, neither of his names nor the identity of his moher were accidents. Alwyn means Son of Elves. Kendrick (his mother’s surname) is derived from Cynwrig, which means Greatest Champion. So naturally, great expectations were placed on him for the day he was born. Expectations his father, who had never met, finally deigned to tell him about when he was 16. Chronologically 16, that is. So what was basically an 8 year old had the weight of Ultimate Inescapable Destiny dumped on his shoulders. Superb timing, Father. Well done. Son of Elves and Greatest Champion? To hell with that. Who did he think he was? Showing up after a decade and a half? Honestly. It should now be mentioned that young Alwyn was born a sorcerer. This was also not an accident. His father, in the manner of the Fae, didn’t so much as train him as assign tasks. Tasks that, if not completed, would endanger him, his mother, and/or innocent people. Naturally, this wasn’t every day, every week, or even every month. But often enough. So it was that he grew older and more proficient out of sheer necessity. Nothing more than a puppet whose conscience supplies their own strings. It was in this state that he met Umbrella Queen, and things began to change. She was a rookie in those days, and thought him, well, a colleague. A fellow superhero. With shock, he realized that she wasn’t exactly wrong. He enjoyed her company quite a lot, and so they became partners. Of course, humans are ever unpredictable creatures, capable of disrupting even the best laid plans. Because when, years afterward, Alwyn’s father came to take him to the Winter Court for the next phase of his training, she did not do as Alwyn did and simply accept it as if it were inevitable as the rising and setting of the sun. She got angry. She defended him. She stood in front of the entire Winter Court and told them off, without a care as to what they could do to her. And then she fought his father for him, and won. Her winning had a lot more to do with the steel (AKA cold iron) in her umbrellas than her being more powerful or skilled than a Fae Knight. Alwyn Kendrick, alias Nisse, was now free of everything but his Ultimate Inescapable Destiny. This has not made his life any easier. Becoming free of his father also meant becoming free of a high ranking Fae noble’s protection. So the Son of Elves and Greatest Champion was now fair game to everyone who wanted to prevent him from reaching his Ultimate Inescapable Destiny. Summer Court. Wild Fae. Random wizards. Vampires. Seriously, does everyone know what he’s going to do someday but him? Ahem. Anyway. He’ll also let Tattoo tell the story of how he and UQ’s dynamic duo included her to become a terrific trio. For his part, well. It’s been a ride. His life has not been easy, but now he has a pair of loyal partners by his side. There is just…the one thing, really. If you’re reading this, please. He knows how he looks. Long blond hair. Effeminate natural features. A slim and slight build. Even his sense of fashion isn’t exactly, well. Look, he knows he looks like the bottom in just about every trashy stereotypical male-male romance ever written, all right? He knows. His manner isn’t even particularly imposing, furthering the illusion. But if everyone could please stop assuming that he’s actually like those fictional characters, that would be absolutely wonderful. For the record, he’s quite straight and it is exceedingly tiresome to have to continually disappoint all those gentlemen who try to chat him up. He’s…he believes they call it gender non-conforming, these days? Eh, whatever. He looks how he looks and he likes what he likes, Neither of those has no bearing on his orientation. For heaven’s sake, it’s 2019. Powers & Tactics: Nisse is half-Elven, a sorcerer, and an artificier. He has one magical device. Half of his blood come from the mystical Fae increases his physical dexterity and intellect. He ages at half speed, has a higher resistance to mundane diseases, and less need for food, water, and sleep. He can also leap higher, hear higher frequencies, and see both further and in less light. Relatively minor advantages, but a bit useful. As a sorcerer, his innate magic is Faerie Magic. It is based on the usage of glamours, which are not merely illusions. It is creating something false that then operates as if it was real. The core of it is tricking and deceiving reality itself into believing what the magician is doing is real. An illusion, yes, but one perpetuated on reality and not any one individual’s senses. As such, it’s rather important to not let reality know it is being tricked. Like that one individual, if it knows about the trick, then the illusion doesn’t work. Of course, letting reality know isn’t much more difficult than letting that one individual know. So the tradition works quite well, really. A very flexible and useful one. There is, however, a hell of a downside in modern life. It can be effortlessly countered with use of iron or steel, and if anything made of either is touching his skin, he can’t use it at all. Anyway. Nisse mostly does basic magician stuff with it. A big damaging blast. Rapidfire bolts. Telekinesis. Creating objects that linger until he dismisses them. The illusions expected from Fae magics. The last one, however, is a wide disc that he uses to fly. Since it’s 60 feet in diameter, he can carry multiple people. The speed is subsonic, but rivals modern airliners. This is how the “UQ Trio” gets places further away than around the block. Furthermore, he’s augmented his vision so that it detect magical effects and simply not be deceived by anything. For him, the invisible is visible, visual illusions might as well not exist, and smoke bombs are a waste of time. His device is a shield amulet. It gives him a force field which increases his natural resilience to the point that he can ignore bullets, and subtly alters where he appears to be, making him significantly harder to hit. The latter is especially true when he is focusing on defense. It is not made with Faerie Magic. Artificing is a separate magical discipline. This means attacks using iron or steel will not pass through his defenses like they don’t exist. He learned that lesson after being shot with a steel jacketed bullet quite early in his partnership with UQ. Tactically, he’s more likely to be controlling the battlefield with Illusory or Solid Glamours. He’s not opposed to using Mystic Bolts or doing the car throw with Mystic Telekinesis. Mystic Blast is reserved for tougher foes that won’t take lethal damage from it. Flight Disc is, as mentioned, how he functions as team bus so to speak. He has both Improved Feint and Improved Taunt, and can further support allies with Teamwork 3. And that’s about it. Ritualist uses Faerie Magic as a base, but as mentioned Artificier is a separate thing entirely. Like any magician worth the name, he has a handful of power stunts. Mystic Burst (Blast 6, Burst Area). Mystic Bindings (Snare 10). Full Power Telekinesis (Move Object 10). However, he power stunts rather rarely. Personality: Alwyn didn’t ask for any of this. He didn’t ask to be born. He didn’t ask to be only half human. He didn’t ask to be a sorcerer. He didn’t ask to be Son of Elves and Greatest Champion. Everything that ever happened to him prior to meeting Umbrella Queen was something that happened regardless of anything he thought, felt, or said. Ironically enough for someone with as big of a destiny as he allegedly has, he felt totally powerless to do, well, anything. It was a life of utter monotony with occasional breaks of desperation and terror. A life of gradually increasing despair, and gradually decreasing ability to care about anything at all. And then it wasn’t. He thinks UQ put it best when she defended him in front of the entire Winter Court. The only thing any of them saw was Son of Elves & Greatest Champion. Alwyn Kendrick was irrelevant. UQ, though? She saw him. Perhaps not everything, but she knew he wasn’t happy and she knew why. She had a point, too. A Champion isn’t a Champion because they’re powerful, skilled combatants. A Champion is a Champion because they give a shite. Quite strongly, in fact. And it was that exact thing his father’s training was slowly beating out of him. Matters of the heart of a Summer Court domain. Time goes on. It could fairly be said that Nisse has regained what he lost and acquired more besides. But to tell the truth, he’d really rather be ordinary. Please, don’t misunderstand. He considers his hero work important. Saving people and defending the helpless…they’re good and right. He should be doing this with the power that he has. He’s not disgruntled, or anything. It’s a good life with good friends. But he still has the weight of that Ultimate Inescapable Destiny on his shoulders. Whether he likes it or not, he was special from the moment of his conception. Created specifically for the role he is in. Virtually every other hero on the planet can simply stop. Put the costume away and never help, defend, or save ever again. There is nothing bad that will happen explicitly because they stopped. Alwyn does not have this liberty. This is what he means when he says he’d really rather be ordinary. To never have to wake up and wonder if today’s the day his destiny arrives. It’s quite a lot of pressure. And honestly, he’s just a person. He doesn’t know if he can live up to the expectations placed on him. Well. At least UQ and Tattoo have his back for everything until then. It’s something, at least.

Umbrella Queen (Siobhanna) Power Level: 9; Power Points Spent: 165/165 STR: +2 (14), DEX: +3 (16), CON: +3 (16), INT: +2 (14), WIS: +2 (14), CHA: +5 (20) Tough: +3/+9, Fort: +6, Ref: +6/+9, Will: +9 Skills: Acrobatics 7 (+10), Bluff 10 (+15), Diplomacy 10 (+15), Escape Artist 2 (+5), Gather Information 5 (+10), Knowledge (art) 13 (+15), Knowledge (business) 3 (+5), Knowledge (current events) 3 (+5), Knowledge (popular culture) 8 (+10), Medicine 3 (+5), Notice 8 (+10), Perform (acting) 5 (+10), Perform (dance) 10 (+15), Perform (singing) 10 (+15), Sense Motive 8 (+10), Stealth 7 (+10) Feats: All-Out Attack, Attack Focus (melee) 8, Benefit 2 (Wealth), Challenge - Improved Feint, Challenge - Improved Taunt, Defensive Attack, Evasion 2, Improved Critical 2 (Umbrella Smack (Strike 4)), Improved Defense, Improved Initiative, Lionheart, Luck 3, Power Attack, Set-Up, Skill Mastery (Bluff, Medicine, Perform (dancing & singing)), Stunning Attack, Takedown Attack 2, Taunt, Teamwork 3, Uncanny Dodge (Auditory) Powers: Shield Umbrella (Device 3) (Easy to lose, Only you can use; Indestructible, Subtle (subtle)) Shield Blocking (Impervious Toughness 3) (Duration (continuous); Duration (sustained)) Shield Deflection (Enhanced Trait 12) (Traits: Defense Bonus +3 (+9), Reflex +3 (+9), Feats: Evasion 2, Improved Defense) Striking Umbrella (Device 2) (Easy to lose; Indestructible, Subtle (subtle)) Umbrella Smack (Strike 4) (DC 21, Feats: Improved Critical 2 (Umbrella Smack (Strike 4)); Penetrating [3 ranks only]; Mighty) Umbrella Coat (Device 4) (Hard to lose, Only you can use; Indestructible) Umbrella Plating (Protection 6) (+6 Toughness; Impervious) Waterproof+Miscell Immunities (Immunity (critical hits, damage type: Water, environmental condition: Radiation) Attack Bonus: +4 (Ranged: +4, Melee: +12, Grapple: +14) Attacks: Umbrella Smack (Strike 4), +12 (DC 21), Unarmed Attack, +12 (DC 17) Defense: +6/+9 (Flat-footed: +5), Knockback: -9 Initiative: +7 Languages: English Native Totals: Abilities 34 + Skills 28 (112 ranks) + Feats 30 + Powers 40 + Combat 20 + Saves 13 + Drawbacks 0 = 165 Age (as of Jan 2019): 26 Height: 5’ 8” Weight: 140 lbs Ethnicity: Afro-Barbadian Hair: Black Eyes: Dark Brown Base of Operations: London, England, United Kingdom Background: It wasn’t any one thing. Siobhanna (pronounced Sheh-vaughn-na) doesn’t have some fancy backstory motivating her. Not all heroes do, you know. There’s no great tragedy to angst over, either. Truthfully, the beginning of a heroic career is often quite mundane. And so it was with the new Umbrella Queen. She didn’t quite know when she’d gotten her powers, exactly. A storm whipped through London, breaking a lot of umbrellas with high winds. So far, so normal. Hers, however, was torn out of her hands instead. Still reasonably normally. A quality umbrella can be pretty sturdy, and she had the money to afford one at the time. Best selling debut albums tend to give the artist a boatload of cash, after all. It blew into the street, and the normality ended as it smacked into a windshield and cracked it. It landed softly in the road, and a different car broken it’s bumper running into it. The umbrella sustained no damage of any kind. Siobhanna managed to both play it off as and parlay it into a sponsorship deal with the company that made the umbrella in the first place. The company itself was not able to duplicate the effect. She, however, was. With a different model from a different company. Huh. Of all the random superpowers to have. How random. She could make umbrellas rock hard and indestructible to anything the average person would have around the house. And it was just umbrellas. She tested a dozen different household items with a steak knife. And then she tested the steak knife, just in case. She spent some time thinking about what she wanted to do about it. She wasn’t someone who secretly wanted to be a superhero for her entire life, you know? Buuuuuut. Honestly, what the hell else was it good for? And it wasn’t like she didn’t care about people or want to help them. It’s just that there were other ways for an ordinary young woman with no special skills to do that which weren’t punching crime in the face. Bad guys had guns and she wasn’t bulletproof. Except now she could be, maybe? She just had to put together a little something something, and yeah she could give this a shot. A club, a shield, and some armor? Yeah. Umbrella Queen hit the streets. She’s never really left. However, a rewind is required for greater context. Remember that debut album mentioned in passing? In 2019, Siobhanna is one of the most famous musical artists on the planet. Pop and R&B are her genres. So one of the most famous people on the planet has spent the last several years (when she wasn’t recording, touring, or attending to personal matters) going out at night in a mask and costume to club criminals in the head with an extremely hard umbrella. Like…that’s not the entire story. There’s been organized crime drama, keep her secret identity from the paparazzi drama, and helping her best mate Nisse with his endless Fae drama. She’ll let Nisse tell the story of how they partnered up and Tattoo tell the story of how the dynamic duo became a terrific trio. That is, however, the gist of it. So if you’re in a spot of trouble in London Town, look up the Umbrella Queen and her partners. You can shelter from just about anything under her umbrella. Ella. Ella. A. A. A. Powers & Tactics: Umbrella Queen (UQ for short) has one extremely unusual mutant power and three special devices which utilize it. She can make ordinary everyday umbrellas completely indestructible to all known methods. This process also makes them harder than any known substance. The blunt tines on the end of one have scratched diamonds. Somehow. Though she has discovered that this is slightly incorrect. Most umbrellas are made of nylon with two separate coatings on the underside and top. This particular fabric made in this specific way is what her powers actually affect. It’s simply not a precise effect, bleeding over easily onto the metal frames of most umbrellas. The metal by itself she can’t do anything to, and any other material in the umbrella is totally unaffected. So, the umbrellas she uses as Umbrella Queen are somewhat specially made. No glue, plastic, or wood. 100% stitchwork holding the nylon onto the frame, which is engineered to fit together without welding or glue. Said devices are quite simple in function, really. One umbrella to smack with, one to be a shield against attacks, and a long coat partially made from that nylon fabric. Not completely made from it, because dear god that’d be hot. She’d be invincible, sure, but she’d also die of heat prostration. No, thanks. Being bulletproof plus a few other things (like how water just slides right off of it) is quite enough. Considering that combined with the shielding umbrella she can ignore artillery fire. Yeah, that’s good enough. For the record, the martial art she uses with her striking umbrella and hand to hand is bartitsu. She’s an expert in it. It combines elements of boxing, jujitsu, cane fighting, and savate. Tactically, she’s a melee fighter who hits people with a very hard club. With that said, she has both Improved Feint and Improved Taunt. All Out Attack, Defensive Attack, and Power Attack let her move her caps around at need. She can slide into team player mode with Set Up and Teamwork 3. Lionheart gives her +4 vs Fear. Stunning Attack is for more polite violence than clubbing bad guys about the head and shoulders. And Takedown Attack 2 lets her smash through whole goon squads real easy. (If we’re telling the truth here, her gear and fighting style is inspired by Sir Randall Knight’s days as the fourth Knight, but she’ll never admit to that.) Personality: Umbrella Queen is, well, fun. Also extremely loyal and immensely trustworthy. She has a certain “joy of life” that most don’t. She’s a very happy person, and it’s fairly infectious. With that said, don’t get confused. She’ll move heaven and earth, metaphorically speaking, to help a friend or keep a promise. Fear, fatigue, pain, and injury are kind of irrelevant to doing so. She can be quite saucy and smartmouthed at times. An interesting character quirk is that, while wearing the mask she refers to trouble of any sort as rain. And who better to shield people from the rain than the queen of umbrellas? Honestly, there isn’t any one big motivation for going out there as often as she does. It’s a bunch of little things, you know? Helping people is good. Fighting crime is good. Having Nisse and Tattoo’s backs is good. People rely on her to be around now, so there’s another little reason. And you know, it’s pretty damn cathartic to beat jerkasses about the head and shoulders. Really if she sat down and thought about it she could probably work out some kind of ideology, but bah. Too much effort. The part that matters is that she’s out there anyway. The rest is basically irrelevant.

Templar (Daniel Page) Power Level: 11; Power Points Spent: 210/210 STR: +7 (14/25), DEX: +3 (16), CON: +3 (16), INT: +2 (14), WIS: +3 (16), CHA: +3 (16) Tough: +3/+12, Fort: +6/+9, Ref: +10, Will: +11 Skills: Acrobatics 12 (+15), Bluff 12 (+15), Diplomacy 7 (+10), Disable Device 3 (+5), Drive 2 (+5), Escape Artist 7 (+10), Gather Information 7 (+10), Knowledge (arcane Lore) 8 (+10), Knowledge (business) 8 (+10), Knowledge (life sciences) 3 (+5), Knowledge (physical sciences) 3 (+5), Knowledge (tactics) 13 (+15), Knowledge (theology & philosophy) 8 (+10), Medicine 2 (+5), Notice 12 (+15), Search 3 (+5), Sense Motive 12 (+15), Sleight of Hand 2 (+5), Stealth 2 (+5), Survival 2 (+5) Feats: Accurate Attack, Acrobatic Bluff, All-Out Attack, Assessment, Attack Focus (melee) 4, Attack Specialization 2 (Glaive Throw (Blast 3)), Benefit (Wealth), Challenge - Improved Acrobatic Bluff, Challenge - Improved Feint, Challenge - Improved Taunt, Defensive Attack, Dodge Focus, Elusive Target, Evasion, Improved Critical 2 (Glaive Strike (Strike 3)), Improved Disarm, Improved Initiative, Improved Trick, Interpose, Luck 3, Move-by Action, Power Attack, Precise Shot, Stunning Attack, Takedown Attack 2, Taunt, Uncanny Dodge (Auditory) Powers: Enhanced Biochemistry (Linked) Enhanced Trait 3 (Linked; Traits: Fortitude +3 (+9)) Immunity 9 (Linked; life support; Limited - Half Effect) Templar's Armor (Device 9) (Hard to lose, Only you can use; Indestructible, Subtle (subtle)) Armored Might (Super-Strength 6) (+30 STR carry capacity, heavy load: 25.6 tons; +6 STR to some checks) Armored Strength (Enhanced Strength 11) (+11 STR) Heavy Plate (Protection 9) (+9 Toughness; Impervious) Translation Enchantments (Comprehend 2) (languages - speak all, languages - understand all) Templar's Glaive (Device 3) (Easy to lose, Only you can use; Indestructible, Subtle (subtle)) Glaive Strike (Strike 3) (DC 25, Feats: Improved Critical 2 (Glaive Strike (Strike 3)); Penetrating [2 extra ranks]; Extended Reach 2 (10 ft.), Mighty, Precise) Glaive Throw (Blast 3) (Alternate; DC 25; Mighty 7 (+7 to damage), Precise) Attack Bonus: +8 (Ranged: +8, Melee: +12, Grapple: +19/+25) Attacks: Glaive Strike (Strike 3), +12 (DC 25), Glaive Throw (Blast 3), +12 (DC 25), Unarmed Attack, +12 (DC 22) Defense: +10 (Flat-footed: +5), Knockback: -10 Initiative: +7 Languages: English Native Totals: Abilities 32 + Skills 32 (128 ranks) + Feats 33 + Powers 61 + Combat 34 + Saves 18 + Drawbacks 0 = 210 Age (as of Jan 2019): 28 Height: 6’ 2” Weight: 185 lbs Ethnicity: Black British Hair: Black Eyes: Dark Brown Base of Operations: London, England, United Kingdom Background: The tale of Daniel Page is that of a young man who almost became a supervillain, thanks to the immortal nemesis of the Knight Family, Blackguard. On paper, it was just another one of his dastardly schemes to kill Sir Randall and end the legacy of The Knight for good. He caused Diane Page (Daniel’s mother) to fall deathly ill with his nefarious powers, and then manipulated the young man into luring Sir Randall into a trap with a promise of healing. This was, obviously, a long term scheme. Sir Randall and Daniel had met on a few occasions, and the young man knew how to contact the fourth Knight. This wasn’t entirely unusual, either. Sir Randall being who he is, there are several people who have earned, for lack of a better way to put it, the right to have his personal contact information. He knows that they won’t call him for nothing or merely to say hello. In Daniel’s case, he was starting to go down the wrong path. When one is too young to get a job and help their mother out with the bills (and she wouldn’t permit it regardless), one begins to explore other, less legal options. Like burglary and pickpocketing. The ever duplicitous Blackguard weaseled his way into the young man’s life. He deceived, tricked, and duped him. He left the poor lad hoodwinked, bamboozled, and thoroughly conned. And so was Sir Randall ensnared, helpless, with his life in the balance. However, before the vile and iniquitous Blackguard could strike the final blow, 14 year old Daniel Page stepped between the two. He would not allow this to happen. One of the finest swordsmen in Europe versus and unarmed and untrained boy. It would have gone exactly as expected. Except. At that exact moment, miles away in the Knight Family Estate, the enchanted chain mail and short sword of The Squire glowed in its storage area and disappeared. If The Knight would not select his Squire, then the mail would select one for him. Specifically, Daniel. Now the fight was slightly more even. He could and did hold off the enraged Blackguard long enough for Lady Alchemist to arrive and aid her husband with a Healing Tonic. Then the Knight and his new Squire drove off the villain before collapsing from their injuries. So. Daniel Page was The Squire. His mother was too ill to take care of him, so she went to the hospital (with all bills sent to Knight Industries) and the Knight Family took him in. Emily hated him on sight for (in her mind) stealing her birthright, and it was hard for Daniel to disagree. Morgan seems to wince a little whenever she saw him, which kind of made sense once he learned the basic family history. Meaning he was her husband’s replacement when he died in probably less than a decade. But she was still quite kind, if incredibly eccentric. Sophie was quite young, but clearly doing her best to not cause problems of her own. Her taking up her mother’s old heroic mantle of Alchemist Girl was proof of that. And Sir Randall, well…Daniel still admires him for looking at the literal proof in the form of an lightly armored teenage boy that his death was preordained in an all too short amount of time and…not even blinking. Randall both trained and treated Daniel quite well when another man wouldn’t have done either out of fear. He’ll always ben quite greatful to Sir Randall for that. At any rate, his life was school (then Oxford), training, and being The Squire. Sir Randall set a blistering pace as a hero, almost exactly like a man who knew he was running out of time. 2012. Glastonbury Tor. Sir Randall was not running out of time. The Knight Family went together, including the still ailing Diane Page. Despite modern medicine and even Morgan’s best efforts, she was still very ill. They had managed to keep her alive, but were at their wits end. Which is really saying something for The World’s Finest Chemist. There were some fights, some trials of character, and something entirely unexpected happened. Avalon granted Sir Randall and Daniel new, superior armors. Sir Randall became Crusader and Daniel became Templar. Sophie became the new Knight or, as she put it, The Alchemist Knight. Emily stopped hating him after she learned it was never her birthright in the first place. That was nice. Avalon is a place of healing, and so they took Diane in to see what they could do. Even better. As a last thing, the Marshal-At-Arms pulled him aside and asked him to look after Sophie a bit. She was very good at taking care of everyone else, but a bit rubbish at taking care of herself. Like mother, like daughter, albeit in different ways, said Daniel. He could do that. These days Daniel works for Knight Industries under Morgan. He has his MBA from Oxford. She spends much more time in the lab then the boardroom. This has been a problem in the past, so Daniel keeps an eye on business matters and any ambitious employees. Officially he’s a consultant, but everyone knows he’s her eyes and ears. He gets up to see Sophie at Cambridge when he can. He works with both her and Emily fairly often on heroic matters. It is, however, when the former Knight and his former Squire team up again that the British supervillain community groans aloud. Crusader and Templar have impeccable teamwork and only the toughest villains in all Britain make them so much as break a sweat. Avalon managed to cure his mother’s illness. She just has to stay there. Fair enough. All in all, it’s not a bad life. Powers & Tactics: Templar has no superhuman powers aside from having received the same biochemistry enhancement serum that all Knight Family members have. It makes him more resistant to uh…everything. But especially environmental concerns, disease, poison, and suffocation. Thanks for the formula, Mrs. Morgan. Aside from that, he has two enchanted devices in the form of the armor and glaive of Templar. Templar’s armor is heavy plate capable of ignoring artillery fire. It increases his strength significantly, with a maximum lifting capacity of over 50 tons. It has translation enchantments that permit him to speak and understand any language. For the record, a glaive is a polearm weapon with a single edged slashing blade as its main attacking point. A blade on a stick, if we’re being simplistic. The blade is quite sharp and cuts very well with much more range than non-polearm weapons have. Surprisingly, he can also throw it for ranged damage as if it was an ordinary spear. A chain attaches from the armor and retrieves it immediately after each throw. Daniel has not yet figured out if he can use that chain in other ways, like preventing himself from being disarmed or making some sort of attack. And if he can, how would he even use it? Thoughts for another day. Both armor and weapon are indestructible by any known method and can disguise themselves. This includes, for the glaive, being collapsible. Tactically, Templar only has the two attack options. One in melee and the other at range. So that part’s simple enough. The rest, well. People tend not to expect a man in heavy plate to move like he’s wearing spandex instead. Improved Acrobatic Bluff, Improved Feint, Improved Trick, and Improved Taunt make his enemies’ lives more difficult. It’s amazing how annoying being concerned for someone’s welfare can be if phrased correctly. Accurate, All Out, Defensive, and Power Attack let him shift his caps around to his heart’s content. Assessment informs him of which is best. Interpose keeps the vulnerable nice and healthy. He does prefer the shield over the sword, after all. Move by Action keeps him mobile, especially in a ranged fight. Stunning Attack applies a more polite version of violence to today’s foes. And Takedown Attack 2 plus the range on the Glaive means no minions are safe. Personality: To be clear, Templar doesn’t think poorly of himself. The interpersonal troubles the Knight Family has endured are not his fault. He is, however, the cause. If he had not been chosen as the Squire…if he had not betrayed Sir Randall that day…well, who can say? Perhaps Emily and her father wouldn’t have endured seven years of estrangement. Perhaps Sophie would take care of herself better. It is not his fault that these things aren’t so. He knows that. Britain and the world are undeniably better off because he was chosen. Lives saved, schemes thwarted, and villains imprisioned. He knows that. But the moment that chain mail appeared on his body, the Knight Family fundamentally broke in a way it still hasn’t recovered from. That it may never recover from. It may not be his fault, but he chooses to make it his responsibility to do something about it. Even if it’s only being a loyal friend and crimefighting partner to all four of them as often as possible. Templar is remarkably like his mentor and partner. He is kind and generous with both his time and his money. He is polite and respectful, treating everyone the level of deference they deserve. Indeed, Daniel Page strives only to be a good man. A man of kindness and forgiveness. Of empathy and compassion. Of courage and valor. And of honor and respect. With that said, Sir Randall is just a bit…stuffy. Daniel idolizes the man as many do, but he is not the type of man who would be considered “fun” in the traditional sense. Daniel, on the other hand, is a bit more socially graceful. He has a easy smile and a quick laugh. Sir Randall is the best possible version of your dad. Inspirational, yes. Relatable, no. By contrast Daniel is everyone’s best mate. Easygoing until it’s time not to be. A man with a quite relaxed nature who nonetheless can be deathly serious at need.

The Alchemist Knight (Sophie Knight) Power Level: 9; Power Points Spent: 180/180 STR: +5 (14/20), DEX: +3 (16), CON: +3 (16), INT: +5 (20), WIS: +3 (16), CHA: +3 (16) Tough: +3/+9, Fort: +6/+9, Ref: +6/+9, Will: +9 Skills: Acrobatics 7 (+10), Craft (chemical) 10 (+15), Craft (mechanical) 5 (+10), Diplomacy 7 (+10), Gather Information 7 (+10), Investigate 5 (+10), Knowledge (physical sciences) 10 (+15), Knowledge (popular culture) 5 (+10), Knowledge (technology) 5 (+10), Notice 7 (+10), Search 5 (+10), Sense Motive 7 (+10) Feats: Attack Focus (melee) 3, Attack Specialization (Sword Strike (Strike 3)), Defensive Attack, Eidetic Memory, Evasion 2, Improved Critical 2 (Alchemist Knight's Sword (Device 2)), Improved Defense, Improvised Tools, Inventor, Power Attack, Takedown Attack, Uncanny Dodge (Auditory) Powers: Alchemist Knight's Armor (Device 6) (Hard to lose; Indestructible, Subtle (subtle)) Armored Might (Super-Strength 4) (+20 STR carry capacity, heavy load: 3.2 tons; +4 STR to some checks) Armored Strength (Enhanced Strength 6) (+6 STR) Scale Mail (Protection 6) (+6 Toughness; Impervious) Translation Enchantments (Comprehend 2) (languages - speak all, languages - understand all) Alchemist Knight's Shield (Device 3) (Easy to lose; Indestructible, Subtle (subtle)) Shield Blocking (Impervious Toughness 3) (Duration (continuous); Duration (sustained)) Shield Deflection (Enhanced Trait 12) (Traits: Defense Bonus +3 (+9), Reflex +3 (+9), Feats: Evasion 2, Improved Defense) Alchemist Knight's Sword (Device 2) (Easy to lose; Indestructible, Subtle (subtle)) Sword Strike (Strike 3) (DC 23, Feats: Improved Critical 2 (Alchemist Knight's Sword (Device 2)); Penetrating [1 extra rank]; Mighty) Alchemist's Grenade Satchel (Device 6) (Hard to lose) Alchemical Grenades (Array 12) (default power: snare) Acid Grenade (Blast 6) (Array; DC 21; Burst Area (30 ft. radius - General), Secondary Effect) Adhesive Grenade (Snare 6) (Default; DC 16; Burst Area (30 ft. radius - General), Regenerating) Flash Bang Grenade (Dazzle 6) (Array; affects: 1 type + visual, DC 16; Burst Area (30 ft. radius - General)) Healing Tonic (Healing 6) (Array; DC 16; Action (standard), Restoration) Neural Reset Grenade (Stun 6) (Array; DC 16; Burst Area (30 ft. radius - General), Range (ranged)) Shock Gel Grenade (Paralyze 6) (Array; DC 16; Alternate Save (Fortitude), Burst Area (30 ft. radius - General), Range (ranged)) Stink Bomb (Nauseate 6) (Array; DC 16; Burst Area (30 ft. radius - General), Range (ranged)) Enhanced Biochemistry (Linked) Enhanced Trait 3 (Linked; Traits: Fortitude +3 (+9)) Immunity 9 (Linked; life support; Limited - Half Effect) Attack Bonus: +5 (Ranged: +5, Melee: +8, Grapple: +13/+17) Attacks: Acid Grenade (Blast 6) (DC 21), Adhesive Grenade (Snare 6) (DC Ref/Staged 16), Flash Bang Grenade (Dazzle 6) (DC Fort/Ref 16), Neural Reset Grenade (Stun 6) (DC Fort/Staged 16), Shock Gel Grenade (Paralyze 6) (DC Fort/Staged 16), Stink Bomb (Nauseate 6) (DC Fort/Staged 16), Sword Strike (Strike 3), +10 (DC 23), Unarmed Attack, +8 (DC 20) Defense: +6/+9 (Flat-footed: +5), Knockback: -9 Initiative: +3 Languages: English Native Totals: Abilities 38 + Skills 20 (80 ranks) + Feats 11 + Powers 77 + Combat 22 + Saves 12 + Drawbacks 0 = 180 Age (as of Jan 2019): 21 Height: 5’ 5” Weight: 120 lbs Ethnicity: Caucasian Hair: Brown Eyes: Brown Base of Operations: University of Cambridge, England, United Kingdom Background: Until 2012, Sophie Knight had spent all 14 years of her life firmly in the background. There were no public expectations set on her. Not really. She could just be a normal girl. Except she was neither blind nor deaf, and certainly not an idiot. She remembers Emily, prior to 2005. She misses that version of her sister, sometimes. The one who wasn’t so hurt and angry. She misses when they were just a regular family, without any of the drama from the ensuing years. She knows that her being like Mom (a chemistry genius) made Emily feel more alone. Like she didn’t belong. But honestly, Sophie was nothing more than a background character. She did everything she could to get good grades, behave in school, and in general not make anybody in the family’s life any harder than it already was. She didn’t know how to fix any of their problems, but at least she couldn’t add to them. And she could offer hugs. This is why she took up her mother’s mantle of Alchemist Girl. Emily was off doing Lady Knight things and Mom and Dad were sad about it. So she got out her mother’s old costume and original grenade satchel. A seven year old offering emotional support in the form of replacing her sister when they went out on less dangerous adventures. They were very happy, so she was helping, right? Right? Right. It had to be. Sophie had settled into a classic example of the “good child”. The one who deals with their own problems by themselves, so the parents they adore have more time for both their own issues and those of the “bad child”. Randall was being slapped in the face with his own mortality and had to get totally untrained Daniel up to speed. Morgan was scatterbrained, not the most emotionally astute, and had a billion dollar company to run. Emily was going through her brooding anti-hero period. And Daniel was suddenly thrown into a whole new life. Everyone had their own problems, but at least Sophie couldn’t add to them. And as Alchemist Girl she could do more than just offer hugs. Even if she was scared. Even if sometimes it was really terrible and she didn’t know what to do. Emily could do it because she was tough. Sophie didn’t think she was tough at all. This brings us to 2012. Glastonbury Tor. Of course Alchemist Girl accompany The Knight and Lady Alchemist there. She was their emotional support daughter, after all. To be clear, the previous is in her own mind. Randall and Morgan leaned much more on each other than on their younger daughter. Sophie was simply unaware of that fact. They, Emily, and Daniel went through the trials and fought the battles. Sophie was scared as usual but forged ahead anyway. And now she bears her father’s armor. He got a new one. Daniel did too. Emily still got next to nothing. This did not make Sophie feel better. Not at all. She privately asked the Marshal-At-Arms to take it back. To give it to her sister. She didn’t want it in the slightest. She wasn’t even a sword…person, for heaven’s sake She threw chemical grenades! To which that frustrating man said that made her only more worthy to have it. Sophie really didn’t and still doesn’t understand that line of reasoning. So now she got to be a new thing. The Alchemist Knight. How was she even supposed to do this? As of the current year, she’s arguably still not figured it out. She doesn’t work with her parents all the time anymore. She’s at Cambridge, so it makes sense. Sometimes she works with her sister and sometimes with Daniel. The latter of which is always quite solicitious of her welfare. He’s not trying to chat her up. That’d be weird, they’ve known each other since Sophie was in Grade 2. They’re practically brother and sister. But he does seem to be looking after her more than he did before. She doesn’t know what’s up with that. And that’s the story, really. She hasn’t picked a Squire because she doesn’t want to. Shortly before she left for university, the armor twitched a little like it was going to go somewhere soon. So, she weighed it down with cold iron and put it inside a magic circle in the weapons storage room at home. Her life is complicated enough. She doesn’t need another face in it. Powers & Tactics: The Alchemist Knight has no superhuman powers aside from having received the same biochemistry enhancement serum that all Knight Family members have. It makes her more resistant to uh…everything. But especially environmental concerns, disease, poison, and suffocation. Thanks for the formula, Mum. Aside from that she has three magical devices in the armor, sword, and shield of The Knight, and one technological device in her satchel full of chemical grenades. The shield and sword of The Knight are just that; a protective shield that helps block and deflect attacks and a nice sharp sword. The armor, however, increases physical strength and lifting capacity in addition to being functionally bulletproof scale mail. The weight limit on its strength is a little less than 6 and a half tons. The last item is a set of translation enchantments that let the wearer both speak and understand any language. The combination of armor and shield can permit her to ignore artillery fire. She knows this because her father did it. All three devices are indestructible by any known means, and can disguise themselves as regular clothing and items. Her Grenade Satchel contains acid, self repairing adhesive, flash bang, electrical stun, electrical paralysis, and stink bomb grenades. The remaining item is reverse engineered, as her mother guards the formula for her healing tonics closely. Sophie’s are inferior, like her grenades. However, they still virtually invoke Clarke’s Law. A few ounces of ingested liquid can cause any living creature to instantly heal their worst injury, be it from violence, disease, or poison. The inferior part is that it can fail to work on those without strong constitutions. It will fail to heal the average person approximately 15 percent of the time. This seems like a nonproblem, however the equivalent failure rate of her mother’s formula is 0 percent. Ah, well. She’ll figure it out one of these days. Tactically, The Alchemist Knight is not a natural at combat. She’s still more or less in swordmanship training. So she still relies on her chemical grenades. Acid Grenade is not used on living beings, period. Adhesive Grenade is her go to. She is rarely fighting solo, so Flash Bang Grenades and Stink Bombs are Plan B. If she has to handle things herself, Neural Reset and Shock Gel Grenades can handle that if the others aren’t working. The sword is Plan D, as she genuinely doesn’t want to actually injure anyone. As mentioned, she’s not a combat natural by any means. So no feinting or demoralizing. She does have Defensive Attack to protect herself, Power Attack to do more damange, and Takedown Attack to cut down enemies should she actually use her sword. This is, however, unlikely. Don’t forget that while she’s not the chemist her mother is, she still has Inventor. Power stunts would be other chemical grenades. But getting them is easily accomplished with Inventor, so she doesn’t normally bother. It’d be something like Sleep Gas Grenades (Fatigue 6 with Cloud Area and Range [ranged]). Personality: The meme is a little old now, at the time of writing, but Sophie Knight is a precious cinnamon roll. Too good for this world. Too pure. Nothing but a sweetheart who wants to help people more than anything. She is a kindhearted, compassionate girl who does her best and doesn’t make trouble for anyone. This is, in many ways, the problem with her. She just keeps swallowing her teeth, metaphorically speaking. She can’t get angry and complain. She can’t be visibly sad. That might make her parents or someone else unhappy. Everyone has enough to worry about without adding her to the list. She has developed into the kind of person who refuses to allow herself to become a bother. The type who will likely literally die before asking for any kind of help. To be clear, she has also developed into a very good superhero. Many people owe her their lives and she’s very well liked. But her smile and cheerful, positive attitude are things she puts on with her clothes in the morning. She pretends to be just fine all the time. Nobody has to worry about this Knight, be she Sophie or The Alchemist. But by the same token, nobody really knows her, either. She’s not lying, exactly. The smile and the attitude are legitimately hers. With that said, everyone feels bad sometimes. Angry. Scared. Sad. Whatever. Sophie shoves this down inside and keeps smiling. For everyone else’s sakes. She’s self sacrificial to a fault. An example of what happens when someone favors the shield too much and the sword not at all. As a final note, it should be said that she has inherited most of her mother’s autism and ADHD symptoms. However, instead of reveling in her eccentricities, she suppresses most of them. Can’t cause trouble for the people she cares about, after all. So she’s under a lot of strain on top of what is mentioned above.

Lady Knight (Emily Knight) Power Level: 9; Power Points Spent: 195/195 STR: +3 (16), DEX: +3 (16), CON: +3 (16), INT: +3 (16), WIS: +3 (16), CHA: +3 (16) Tough: +3/+6, Fort: +6/+9, Ref: +12, Will: +9 Skills: Acrobatics 12 (+15), Bluff 7 (+10), Diplomacy 7 (+10), Gather Information 7 (+10), Intimidate 12 (+15), Investigate 7 (+10), Knowledge (life sciences) 2 (+5), Knowledge (physical sciences) 7 (+10), Knowledge (streetwise) 12 (+15), Knowledge (tactics) 12 (+15), Language 2 (+2), Medicine 2 (+5), Notice 12 (+15), Search 7 (+10), Sense Motive 12 (+15), Stealth 12 (+15) Feats: Acrobatic Bluff, All-Out Attack, Attack Focus (melee) 4, Attack Specialization 2 (Compound Bow (Blast 3)), Challenge - Improved Acrobatic Bluff, Challenge - Improved Demoralize, Challenge - Improved Startle, Defensive Attack, Dodge Focus 3, Equipment 1, Evasion, Improved Aim, Improved Block, Improved Critical 2 (Sword (Strike 3)), Improved Defense, Improved Disarm, Improved Initiative, Improved Trick, Lionheart, Luck 3, Move-by Action, Power Attack, Precise Shot, Quick Change, Quick Draw, Set-Up, Skill Mastery (Acrobatics, Intimidate, Notice, Stealth), Startle, Stunning Attack, Takedown Attack 2, Teamwork 3, Uncanny Dodge (Auditory), Weapon Bind Powers: Archaic Arsenal (Device 2) (Easy to lose; Custom (Multiple Weapons)) Archaic Arsenal (Array 5) (default power: strike; Custom (Array 4.5)) Compound Bow (Blast 3) (Array; DC 21; Mighty 3 (+3 to damage)) Sword (Strike 3) (Default; DC 21, Feats: Improved Critical 2 (Sword (Strike 3)); Penetrating; Mighty) Avalonian Training (Container, Passive 1) Flash Step (Teleport 2) (200 ft. as move action; Limited (to places she can physically reach); Subtle (subtle)) Longspringer (Leaping 1) (Jumping distance: x2) Longstrider (Speed 1+2) ([Stacking ranks: +2], Speed: 50 mph, 440 ft./rnd) Concealed Body Armor (Device 3) (Hard to lose) Concealed Kevlar Weave (Protection 3) (+3 Toughness, Feats: Quick Change; Subtle (subtle)) Grapple Harness (Linked) Speed 2 (Linked; Speed: 25 mph, 220 ft./rnd; Stacks with (Longstrider (Speed 1+2))) Super-Movement 4 (Linked; slow fall, swinging, wall-crawling 2 (full speed)) Enhanced Biochemistry (Linked) Enhanced Trait 3 (Linked; Traits: Fortitude +3 (+9)) Immunity 9 (Linked; life support; Limited - Half Effect) Equipment: Mission Specific Equipment 5 Attack Bonus: +8 (Ranged: +8, Melee: +12, Grapple: +15) Attacks: Compound Bow (Blast 3), +12 (DC 21), Sword (Strike 3), +12 (DC 21), Unarmed Attack, +12 (DC 18) Defense: +12 (Flat-footed: +5), Knockback: -3 Initiative: +7 Languages: English Native, French, Polish Totals: Abilities 36 + Skills 33 (132 ranks) + Feats 42 + Powers 32 + Combat 34 + Saves 18 + Drawbacks 0 = 195 Age (as of Jan 2019): 28 Height: 5’ 7” Weight: 130 lbs Ethnicity: Caucasian Hair: Brown Eyes: Brown Base of Operations: London, England, United Kingdom Theme Song: [url=]Spark, by Zach B featuring McGwire[/url] Background: Emily Knight spent half of her life wanting to be The Squire with all of her heart and soul. Then she spent another quarter of it hating the dammed armor for picking someone else and being angry with her father for allowing it. She was an angry, bitter person. And she’s spent the most recent quarter being a better person instead. That is the short and simple explanation of her life. Of course, as everyone ought to know, explaining someone’s life in short and simple terms misses a hell of a lot. Like what it was like being the firstborn child of one of the most famous people in Britain. She was never merely Emily. She was The Heir To The Knight Legacy. To be clear, she never found this a burden. She was quite proud of her father. Still is, actually. This isn’t one of those stories, where the weight of being the successor crushes the poor heir. On the contrary, it was the source of much of her self-worth and self-esteem. It didn’t give her a swelled head and make her a brat. Once again, on the contrary. If she was to be worth of someday being The Squire, and fighting by her father’s side…if she was to someday become the fifth Knight…she had to act like it. So she tried to be the most polite, courteous, and well behaved little girl one could ever meet. Of course, this didn’t particularly endear her to other children. No one likes a suckup. But it was worth it, because one day she’d be The Squire. She had a critical misunderstanding. The one that, in time, would drive a wedge between her and her father. For now, however, she could at last take up the spear and armor of Miss Page. It wasn’t like her mother and father took her into battle with murderous supervillains. Heavens, no. She was seven. She could defend herself to a degree, yes, but she was a child. She had school and various mind expanding extracurriculars. She remembers the adventures they went on very fondly. How many other children got to visit other realities or play with Fae children? Not many, that’s who. So it was good. She was even helpful on occasion, instead of just along for the ride. The best quarter of her life, aside from the ending. School was actually even less fun than before. No one likes a suckup, after all. The more maturely she tried to deal with things, the more her schoolmates seemed to hate her. Not all of them, of course. Even as children, people are wide and varied. Suffice it to say she was a very polarizing figure, and she had her own coterie of suckups. She was one of those girls. Apparently good at everything. Very helpful to everyone. Benevolence personified. Well, more or less. She was still a child, after all. Elementary school wasn’t so bad, but the pre-teen to teenage years, well…she could deal with the violent ones and ignore childish insults. Legitimate social exclusion, however, stung. School social hierarchies aren’t so different from adult ones. Other girls were thinking about romance, fashion, music, and pop culture. They cut loose. Had fun. Emily was preparing for life as The Squire. Making absolutely sure that she was as worthy as possible. She was driven and serious in a way that many young girls simply aren’t. And, well, part of being worthy was allowing no injustice to stand. A stick in the mud, pain in the ass goodie two shoes. Obnoxious in her commitment to virtue and doing her best at all times. The type kids will generally think are acting like they’re better than everyone else. Whether that’s true or not is irrelevant. So, by the time she was 14, she had no friends and her social calendar was completely bare. And there was some venomous hatred for her among some of her peers. Ah, teenage insecurities and juvenile misunderstandings. But it was worth it. It was worth it. Because she was going to be The Squire. A hero. A champion of justice, if one will pardon the wordplay. And then that didn’t happen. That dammed armor chose wimpy Daniel Page, and in the process, shattered her world. Because she was still wrong. That thing she misunderstood drove that wedge between her and her father. She tossed away the spear and armor of Miss Page, and took up the sword and bow of Lady Knight. This wasn’t merely childish rebellion. This was anger, bitterness, confusion, and a broken heart. She had worked so hard, given up so much, and endured so many hardships. For what? Well then, to hell with Daniel Page. To hell with that dammed armor. And to hell with Sir Randall Knight. She didn’t need any of them to pursue justice. She had weapons. She had training. She could do it by herself. Miss Page was her parents’ sidekick, absolutely. Lady Knight worked alone in the shadows. Yes, the literal teenager went angsty, brooding, and excessively violent anti-hero. How cliché. Even in her personal life, she no longer had any reason to completely behave. To those not privy to the inner workings of the Knight Family, it seemed like she’d finally snapped from the stress of being Little Miss Perfect all the time. Her studies suffered. She missed school days. The teacher’s pet converted into a rowdy delinquent. She turned up with unexplained injuries and slept in class. Sometimes she didn’t turn up at all. Her enemies in school were delighted at her fall and then terrified of how rapid it seemed to be. But in truth? Her moral code never wavered. Lady Knight was violent, yes, but nobody died. She’d simply stopped caring about anything but being the hero she’d always wanted to be. So she was out late every night. Sometimes that entailed partying with shady individuals who neither knew nor cared how old she was to get information. Sometimes that entailed bringing a sword and a bow to a gunfight. The daughter of billionaire Morgan Knight didn’t need to go to university. So she could commit full time to stabbing criminals and supervillains with sharp metal objects. It wasn’t exactly spiraling downward, but anger and bitterness fade. She was beginning not to care even about justice and merely go through the motions. Sooner or later she was going to get herself killed. Because she still, at age 21, did not know the difference between the sword and the shield. And thus did not know why she had been found so unworthy despite all of her efforts. Emily only came along to Glasonbury Tor because her mother asked. The invitation was for the entire Knight Family. Fine, mum. I’ll put up with Father and Daniel for a bit. For you. She did not expect to succeed in the trials they were faced with, and she was not surprised when she was again found unworthy of the new armors. Her father got the superior Crusader armor. Daniel got the superior Templar armor. Yes, yes, pat the chosen good boys on the back. Whatever. What surprised her was her younger sister Sophie getting to be the new Knight. This led to a blazing argument with Avalon’s Marshal-At-Arms in which her misunderstanding was finally cleared up. The sword, you see, is an avenger. It seeks out evil and destroys it. It can ultimately protect nothing, for it is a weapon. The shield, by contrast, is a guardian. It stays with and protects those evil would harm. However, it has trouble attacking, for it is a defensive tool and not a weapon. Neither is wrong, per se. With that said, a knight by the Avalonian definition is a servant and protector of the people. Someone who favors the shield over the sword. Emily had spent her entire life training and then being the opposite, much like her paternal ancestors Emerson and Cedric. She could change her ways now, true, but that would be out of self interest and not genuine belief. Plus she had a bit too much pride, anyway. Still…how to put it? Finally knowing why someone else had been chosen was a weight off of her shoulders. It wasn’t Daniel’s, her father’s, or even that damned armor’s fault. Not really. She was the one who had the wrong idea. She was the one who never asked about her father’s ideology and just assumed. She wasn’t even unworthy as a human being. Just as an Avalonian armored knight. Which, as the Marshal-At-Arms pointed out, was not the only valid way to be a hero. After all, a shield functioned best when paired with a sword, yes? It was freeing, actually. The past seven years have been the best of Emily’s life. Regularly teaming with her sister or Daniel. Being the contact point for the “UQ Trio” of Umbrella Queen, Nisse, and (later) Tattoo. Oh, she’s still living up to the anti-hero archetype, but it’s calculated and practical now. Nobody, realistically speaking, is afraid of anyone in the Knight Family. Except her. Randall & Daniel are very honorable men. They’ll kick lots of ass, and even kill if the villain in question forces the issue, but ultimately there’s no reason to fear what they might do. Morgan has crossed some lines to protect her family, but she’s also a rigidly ethical scientist who’s never knowingly harmed anyone. And the idea of soft little Sophie scaring anyone ever Emily finds absolutely hilarious. Her family is full of very nice people, really. Full of compassion and the milk of human kindness. Emily is not. She’s been through it a bit, and she’s seen some shit in the process. Organized crime, from the suits on top to the street gangs at the bottom, is not full of people who’ve learned the value of mercy and compassion. Supervillains can be worse. Operative word being “can”. They aren’t always or even most of the time. So, Emily is the one they have to worry about having visit them in their bedroom at night. You know, for a cuppa and a chat. All friendly like. Savvy? Though if she’s being honest, it’s not particularly chivalrous behavior. So she’s considering a name change. What is the British equivalent of a ninja, anyway? Powers & Tactics: Lady Knight has no superhuman powers, except that bit from the serum her mother gave her a while back. Said serum enhanced her biochemistry, making her more resistant to uh…everything. But especially environmental concerns, disease, poison, and suffocation. Useful. Thanks, Mum. Otherwise she uses one technological device and a set of two archaic weapons. The weapons are a sword and a bow. The bow is a modern design. The sword is not. But they’re both just weapons. The device is her armor. It’s not much different than a mundane bulletproof vest, except for the grapple harness built into it. It lets her swing around London or wherever, rapidly ascend walls, and catch herself when falling. Lastly, there is her Avalonian training from the Marshal-At-Arms. She runs a bit faster, jumps a bit higher, but the main event is the Flash Step. For just a instant, she can move at the speed of light. She can’t go very far (only 200 feet), and she can’t go through anything (like walls, locked doors, or over open canyons) that she couldn’t normally. But it’s still kind of badass. Tactically, Lady Knight fights with a sword in melee and a bow at range. That’s it. Very uncomplicated. It’s everywhere else that she’s got a lot going on. She is a movement god. Running, swinging, and Flash Stepping all over the battlefield. Improved Acrobatic Bluff, Improved Demoralize, Improved Trick, and Improved Startle are on deck. Defensive Attack to protect herself, Move by Action to stay mobile, and Power Attack to do more damage when needed. Improved Aim is useful for those longer bow shots from Stealth. Set Up lets her be a team player on demand. Stunning Attack is more polite violence. And Takedown Attack 2 makes her a minion slashing machine. She does not power stunt. Personality: What happens to a dream deferred? Does it dry up like a raisin in the sun? Or fester like a sore and then run? Does it stink like rotten meat? Or crust and sugar over like a syrupy sweet? Maybe it just sags like a heavy load? Or does it explode? -Harlem, by Langston Hughes. Lady Knight is kind of, uh, terrifying. If you’ve never met Emily Knight out of costume, anyway. She seems more like a masked force of nature than a human being. With no powers or extraordinary devices, she puts a lot of effort into having a fearsome reputation. So yes, she’s cut off fingers, ears, toes, etc. Occasionally her opponents need emergency medical attention to uh, not die. Indeed, she’s the type to cut a man down, then bandage his wounds and call him an ambulance and stay until they take him away. Her reputation isn’t fearsome because she’s a killer. It’s fearsome because killing her enemies is the one thing she won’t do to them. Again, this is reputation. She lightly maims a guy here, and partially cripples a man there, and it’s remembered that she’s capable of that. It’s not something she enjoys or something that happens all that often. Just often enough to keep criminals (that suspicious and cowardly lot) on their toes. And honestly, you don’t need that hand anyway, Mr. Paedophile. “Technically, it’s ephibo-“ Oh, are you saying you don’t want the other one either? Emily Knight, on the other hand (if you’ll pardon the wordplay), well…she’s a very driven woman. Some would say she’s arrogant, but is it arrogance to know your worth and insist upon it? Is it really having a chip on your shoulder if you’re really as good as you say you are? If you really work as hard as you say you do? You’re goddamned right she has something to prove. She’s only member of the family who isn’t a genius or “worthy”. She’s the only one who isn’t special in some way. Part of her is and forever will be that 14 year old girl who had worked her entire life for something that was casually given to someone else. Part of her will always be stuck in that moment, feeling betrayed by the entire universe. Learning that effort, sacrifice, and desire by themselves are sometimes not enough is a brutal lesson, and before God it still hurts her. Part of her is and forever will be that 14 year old girl who cried herself to sleep over how unfair it was. By the same token, part of her is and will forever be that same 14 year old girl who woke up the next morning and decided all of that could go directly to hell. If nobody would make her special, she’d do it for herself. And, of course, this angry, angsty rebellion was just as pointless as her prior hard work. Nobody cared, and she was only hurting people (her father and Daniel, mainly, but her mother and Sophie a little too) who didn’t deserve it. In the end she was nothing more than a spoiled little girl throwing a tantrum out of sheer entitlement. She was the one who’d never asked what it took to be The Squire. She was the one who simply assumed it would be hers if she worked hard. And then she was the one who got mad when the fantasy she’d built up in her head turned out not to be reality. All the hurt, anger, and confusion was her own dumbass fault. What else could she do but laugh? And also cry. Because it hurt. It hurt a lot. Righteous self-images shattered tends to hurt like a bastard. She is in this, ironically enough, her mother’s daughter. One’s failures are not what matters, says Morgan Knight, it is what you learn from the experience. The implicit assumption being that of course you’ll try again. So Emily Knight picked herself up, dusted herself off, and decided to try to be a better person. ‘Nuff said.

Lady Alchemist (Morgan Knight) Power Level: 9; Power Points Spent: 210/210 STR: +0 (10), DEX: +1 (12), CON: +2 (14), INT: +7 (24), WIS: +2 (14), CHA: +1 (12) Tough: +2/+14, Fort: +5/+8, Ref: +4, Will: +12 Skills: Craft (chemical) 13 (+20), Craft (mechanical) 3 (+10), Diplomacy 4 (+5), Gather Information 4 (+5), Investigate 3 (+10), Knowledge (life sciences) 8 (+15), Knowledge (physical sciences) 13 (+20), Knowledge (technology) 3 (+10), Language 6 (+6), Notice 8 (+10), Search 3 (+10), Sense Motive 8 (+10) Feats: Attack Focus (ranged) 4, Benefit (Fame (World's Finest Chemist)), Benefit (Status (President of Knight Industries)), Benefit 3 (Wealth (virtually limitless)), Challenge - Improved Fast Work (Craft [chemical]) 2; quarter crafting speed 2, Dodge Focus, Eidetic Memory, Equipment 15, Evasion 2, Improved Critical 2 (Tranquilizer Round (Fatigue 6)), Improvised Tools, Inventor, Luck 3, Precise Shot, Quick Draw, Second Chance (Craft (chemical) checks for Inventor), Second Chance (KN (phy sci) checks for Inventor), Skill Mastery (Craft (chemical & mechanical), KN (physical science & technology)), Teamwork 2, Ultimate Effort (Craft (chemical) checks), Ultimate Effort (KN (phys sci) checks), Uncanny Dodge (Auditory) Powers: Alchemist's Coat (Device 6) (Hard to lose) Chemically Treated Fabric (Protection 12) (+12 Toughness) Grenade Proofing (Enhanced Trait 2) (Feats: Evasion 2) Hat & Goggles (Immunity 5) (dazzle effects; Limited - Half Effect) One Sturdy Coat (Super-Strength 2) (+10 STR carry capacity, heavy load: 400 lbs; +2 STR to some checks; Limited (to Carrying Capacity)) Slippery Outer Fabric (Immunity 5) (entrapment) Sticky Gloves & Boots (Super-Movement 3) (slow fall, wall-crawling 1 (half speed), water walking) Alchemist's Grenade Satchel (Device 9) (Hard to lose) Alchemical Grenades (Array 18) (default power: snare) Acid Grenade (Blast 9) (Array; DC 24; Burst Area (45 ft. radius - General), Secondary Effect) Adhesive Grenade (Snare 9) (Default; DC 19; Burst Area (45 ft. radius - General), Regenerating) Flash Bang Grenade (Dazzle 9) (Array; affects: 1 type + visual, DC 19; Burst Area (45 ft. radius - General)) Healing Tonic (Healing 9) (Array; DC 19; Action (standard), Restoration) Neural Reset Grenade (Stun 9) (Array; DC 19; Burst Area (45 ft. radius - General), Range (ranged)) Noise Cancelling Smoke Grenade (Obscure 6) (Array; affects: 1 type + visual, Radius: 250 ft.; Duration (continuous), Selective Attack, Total Fade; Fades) Shock Gel Grenade (Paralyze 9) (Array; DC 19; Alternate Save (Fortitude), Burst Area (45 ft. radius - General), Range (ranged)) Stink Bomb (Nauseate 9) (Array; DC 19; Cloud Area (45 ft. diameter, lingers - General), Range (ranged)) Very High Explosives (Blast 9) (Array; DC 24; Burst Area (30-450 ft. radius - General); Progression, Decrease Area 3 (-3 ranks), Progression, Increase Area 3 (area x10), Triggered 2 (any trigger)) Alchemist's Tranquilizer Rifle (Device 6) (Easy to lose) Tranquilizer Round (Fatigue 6) (DC 16, Feats: Improved Critical 2 (Tranquilizer Round (Fatigue 6)); Range (ranged), Secondary Effect; Accurate 2 (+4), Precise, Subtle (subtle)) Enhanced Biochemistry (Linked) Enhanced Trait 3 (Linked; Traits: Fortitude +3 (+8)) Immunity 9 (Linked; life support; Limited - Half Effect) Regeneration 3 (Linked; recovery bonus 3 (+3 to recover); Regrowth) World's Finest Chemist (Quickness 6) (Perform routine tasks at 100x speed; One Task (Inventor Design Checks)) Equipment: Knight Family Car (example), Knight Family Estate, Knight Family Helicopter (example) Attack Bonus: +4 (Ranged: +8, Melee: +4, Grapple: +4/+6) Attacks: Acid Grenade (Blast 9) (DC 24), Adhesive Grenade (Snare 9) (DC Ref/Staged 19), Flash Bang Grenade (Dazzle 9) (DC Fort/Ref 19), Neural Reset Grenade (Stun 9) (DC Fort/Staged 19), Shock Gel Grenade (Paralyze 9) (DC Fort/Staged 19), Stink Bomb (Nauseate 9) (DC Fort/Staged 19), Tranquilizer Round (Fatigue 6), +12 (DC Fort 16), Unarmed Attack, +4 (DC 15), Very High Explosives (Blast 9) (DC 24) Defense: +4 (Flat-footed: +2), Knockback: -7 Initiative: +1 Languages: Arabic, Chinese (Mandarin), English Native, French, German, Russian, Spanish Totals: Abilities 26 + Skills 19 (76 ranks) + Feats 43 + Powers 92 + Combat 14 + Saves 16 + Drawbacks 0 = 210 ***************************************************************************************** Knight Family Estate Power Level: 9; Equipment Points Spent: 26 Toughness: +20 Features: Communications, Computer, Defense System, Fire Prevention System, Garage, Gym, Hangar, Infirmary, Laboratory, Library, Living Space, Personnel, Pool, Power System, Security System 3, Workshop Size: Colossal Totals: Abilities 0 + Skills 0 (0 ranks) + Feats 0 + Features 18 + Powers 0 + Combat 5 + Saves 3 + Drawbacks 0 + Equipment 0 (0 ep) + Weapons & Armor 0 (0 ep) = 26 ***************************************************************************************** Knight Family Car (example) Power Level: 9; Equipment Points Spent: 30 STR: +15 (40) Toughness: +15 Features: Alarm 3, Caltrops, Navigation System 2, Oil Slick, Remote Control, Smokescreen Powers: Jump Jets (Leaping 3) (Jumping distance: x10) Sticky Tires (Super-Movement 1) (wall-crawling 1 (half speed)) Superfuel Engine (Speed 6) (Speed: 500 mph, 4400 ft./rnd) Defense: -2, Size: Huge Totals: Abilities 2 + Skills 0 (0 ranks) + Feats 0 + Features 9 + Powers 11 + Combat 2 + Saves 6 + Drawbacks 0 + Equipment 0 (0 ep) + Weapons & Armor 0 (0 ep) = 30 ***************************************************************************************** Knight Family Helicopter (example) Power Level: 9; Equipment Points Spent: 19 STR: +12 (35) Toughness: +10 Features: Navigation System 2, Remote Control Powers: Superfuel Engine (Flight 6) (Speed: 500 mph, 4400 ft./rnd) Defense: -2, Size: Huge Totals: Abilities 1 + Skills 0 (0 ranks) + Feats 0 + Features 3 + Powers 12 + Combat 2 + Saves 1 + Drawbacks 0 + Equipment 0 (0 ep) + Weapons & Armor 0 (0 ep) = 19 Age (as of Jan 2019): 49 (chronological), 28 (biological) Height: 5’ 6” Weight: 115 lbs Ethnicity: Caucasian Hair: Brown Eyes: Brown Base of Operations: London, England, United Kingdom Background: Morgan Jones was, well, nobody. Just another lower middle class girl. Everything about her was totally ordinary, except for one thing. She wasn’t particularly athletic. She wasn’t particularly acrobatic. She wasn’t particularly pretty. She was just a face in the crowd. Except for that one thing. She was, indisputably and unmistakably, a genius. Not a regular genius, either, but standing at the pinnacle of human intellect. The United Kingdom is extremely reluctant to have any students skip grades, no matter how well they’re doing. So Morgan stayed in her age group all the way throughout her compulsory schooling and education. She absolutely aced her GCSE exams and all four of her A Levels (Biology, Chemistry, Mathematics, & Physical Science). This got her admitted on a scholarship to the University of Cambridge’s Department of Chemistry, living in Murray Edwards College. Fortunately, Cambridge is a bit more flexible than the English public school system, and Morgan was able to accelerate her education. Because the young woman was carrying pretty big dreams for a supposed nobody, and she was falling in love. Rewind to six years prior, when she was 12 years old. 1982. The massive invasion of Kuros The Conqueror, in which the world’s heroes all teamed up with the USA’s Champions of Justice to ultimately defeat it. Young Morgan wasn’t silly enough to think she could have made a difference on the front lines this time or next time. To make a long story much shorter, she found the world’s chemical infrastructure woefully inadequate. Fuels, armor, medicines, etc. Not. Good. Enough. She could do better. She would do better. And so, two years later at age 14, she debuted at the superheroine Alchemist Girl to test her chemical inventions on the battlefield. The redebut of Sir Randall Knight as the fourth Knight after his father’s death had nothing to do with it. She had not met either man at the time, and Sir Sheldon Knight had not been well liked. She actually met Sir Randall a few years later. The Knight and Alchemist Girl teamed up for the first time. Randall was a perfect gentleman (he was keenly aware of being significantly older than the young heroine), and Morgan found her heart twitch for a boy for the very first time. They teamed up several more times before she was off to Cambridge. She didn’t want to stop seeing him, so she told him who she was and invited him to visit her at university. What followed was something quite old fashioned and courtly, as a friendship (on Randall’s end) evolved into something more. Randall and Morgan were married two years into her university education (in 1990), and Emily was born in 1991. Alchemist Girl changed names to Lady Alchemist in response. The following year, three things happened. Morgan started racking up advanced degrees from her accelerated studies. She started Knight Industries, her chemical company. And Kuros came back for revenge. With Emily still a baby, Morgan was stuck caring for her during the brief bit of excitement before Nick Phoenix swatted the invasion and Kuros aside like annoying insects. Once Emily was old enough to not need her mother around almost constantly, Lady Alchemist was back in business. Morgan’s chemical innovations began to make her fabulously wealthy. And that’s…basically the story. Yes, there was a pause for the birth of Sophie in ’98, and Emily began to accompany her parents on their tamer adventures under the name Miss Page. The death of Starman II in 2001 had no real effect on them. In 2005 Emily got a little alienated, the poor girl, and took the name Lady Knight. She did this became young Daniel Page became the new Squire, and Emily had wanted that for herself. Well, said Morgan, it wasn’t Daniel’s fault. So she welcomed him into the family as if he was her own child. Speaking of, this was also the year Sophie started taking after her mother, becoming the second Alchemist Girl. Ah, Morgan was so very proud. She will, however, admit to being worried about losing Randall after these events. All three of his predecessors as The Knight had died seven years after the debut of their Squire. However, this is not what happened. Instead, in 2012 they went to Glastonbury Tor as a family, succeeded at some challenges and fought some battles (you know, the usual for a hero) and two new armors were revealed. From Knight to Crusader. From Squire to Templar. And, most surprisingly to Morgan, from Alchemist Girl to Alchemist Knight. And in the process, Emily managed to resolve her alienation. Quite lovely, even if Morgan didn’t quite understand all the fuss about choosing the sword or the shield. And again, that’s basically the story. She’s the matriarch of the Knight Family and the World’s Finest Chemist. She has a lovely husband, three wonderful children (one of whom isn’t so, legally speaking, but that’s irrelevant to Morgan), and a thriving multibillion dollar business. What else is there to be said, really? Well, there is one thing. You know all those heroes with higher tier gear than is normally commercially available? That they couldn’t have possibly made themselves? Those are Morgan Knight designs. Lady Alchemist is the most prominent source for armor and non lethal munitions that one can’t buy at the store. For repeat customers who have earned her trust, she doesn’t even charge for the work. Knight Industries, her company, is also the primary source of power nullification drugs and serums. Metahumans are easy. Each of their type of powers works in the same way. Mutants require something custom made to their biology. If they’re still biological in nature. Magicians can be kept in check with an agent that disrupts their ability to fully concentrate. Cyborgs or those with divine powers she refers the client to the Baroness Valia. Her nullification devices are more effective but much more expensive because Valia is only ever helpful when it suits her purposes. Powers & Tactics: Lady Alchemist had no superhuman powers before she enhanced her own biochemistry with an experimental serum. However, she is a genius chemist and skilled mechanical engineer with three unique devices. Her enhancements to her biochemistry basically just increase her bodily integrity and resistance to environmental hazards like mundane diseases, poisons, heat, cold, and a lack of oxygen. She could probably give herself much more potent superpowers, but mutation is…unpredictable, at best. She’d really rather not accidently turn into something inhuman. She very much likes being human. So instead she has her devices. On that subject, the starting point is her Tranquilizer Rifle. It is highly accurate, silenced, and rarely fails to render targets unconscious or virtually too sleepy to function properly. That is, if they’re not superhuman in powers or training. Then its effectiveness is chancier. She refuses to make it any stronger, as it’s quite easy to accidently kill with narcotics and other sleep inducing agents, actually. So she won’t be doing that, no. Moving on, there is her Grenade Satchel. This is as literal a name as the last. Though none of the grenades in question are available for sale anywhere. Not even from her. She’s got powerful acid, self repairing adhesives, flash bangs, electrical stunning, electrical paralysis, truly nasty stink bombs, and very powerful explosives in the Satchel. The remaining two, however, are not offensive weapons but genuinely ingenious support gear. After all, most would not expect her smoke grenades to also absorb all sound in their area of effect. And the healing tonics virtually invoke Clarke’s Law. It is the chemical formula she most closely guards, as a few ounces of ingested liquid can cause any living creature to instantly heal their worst injury, be it from violence, disease, or poison. The last is her Alchemist’s Coat. Coat is a bit of a misnomer, as it comes with a hat and goggles that increase her resistance to having her senses dazzled, and sticky gloves and boots that allow her to blunt falls, climb walls, and literally walk on water. The coat part itself is better armored than most tanks, is structured so that her carrying capacity is literally quadrupled with it on, and the outer fabric is virtually frictionless (meaning she cannot be grappled or bound in any way, as they simply slide off). The last thing it does is increase her ability to avoid area of effect attacks. Though Randall was the original sole owner, as a married couple they own the Knight Family Estate together. And it’s her money that keeps it, the cars, and the helicopters the family uses to get to parts of the UK that aren’t London. It’s also her money that buys the new ones once they inevitably get broken because supervillains have no respect for personal property. Tactically, well. Lady Alchemist has a lot of options. Her Tranquilizer Rifle and Adhesive Grenades can make short work of most opposition when operating alone or nearly so. For group combat, the aforementioned is still Plan A, but she’ll layer in Flash Bangs, Neural Reset Grenades, Shock Gel Grenades, and Stink Bombs. She does not ever use Acid Grenades or Very High Explosives on living beings or where they could cause a lot of unnecessary property damage. Healing Tonics work both on her and any allies she might have. With that said, she’s also shockingly poor of a fighter for a hero with her decades of experience. So she relies entirely on her Devices. There’s no feinting, no demoralizing, no moving her caps around, nothing. Due to the size of the array in her grenade satchel (9 settings!) she very rarely power stunts. I have saved Inventor for last, because what she can do is wild stuff. Under normal, not pressured circumstances, she can take 20 and design a 30 point chemical Invention in 5 hours. This would take just about anyone else 500 hours. And then she can use Ultimate Craft (chemical) to hit the construction check target, and Improved Fast Work 2 to slash the usual construction time of 120 hours to a mere 30 hours. A grand total of 35 hours from start of design to finished Invention where anyone else with her skill would need 620 hours to do it. And this assumes she doesn’t use her Second Chance (Craft) feat with Jury Rigging to whip out a 15 point chemical Invention in a minute and a half. World’s Finest Chemist, indeed. Personality: How to put this? Morgan is basically a benevolent mad scientist. No, seriously. She’s always been a little eccentric, and her grip on reality and what’s actually possible is a bit…looser…than most people’s. Additionally she shows several symptoms of having autism and ADHD. The world outside of her lab can effectively disappear for her at times. During these periods of hyperfixation she can forget to dress, wash, or even eat. These are also the times when she’s at her most brilliant and wildly creative as a chemist, so it is merely a double edged sword instead of potentially a liability. So most people who meet her have trouble believing that she’s THE Morgan Knight. Surely someone so brilliant couldn’t be so…eccentric. She’s a cheerful, upbeat, and optimistic woman…who’s prone to rambling on about things irrelevant to the current topic of conversation and making rather baffling and dramatic leaps of logic that most who haven’t learned how her mind works simply can’t follow. She’s just a weirdo who oscillates from hilarious to pathetic to terrifying often enough make people wonder why she’s allowed to walk around alone in public…until it’s time for serious business. Because while her personality and habits may be strange, there is an incredible genius intellect in there, with a strength of will that makes steel look soft and a warm, compassionate heart to rival any other hero in the world.

Heroes of Britain Overview The United Kingdom has never had a proper superhero team, and even established groups have proven to be rare, with the only major group currently operating being the Knight Family. This is partly due to the UK being smaller in both geography and population than the United States (arguably the nexus of heroics since the Mystery Men Era). Less ground to cover and less people to do it. The other reasons are Big Ben, the periodic appearances of Keaira, and whoever was The Knight at the time. Anything large scale, Ben could likely handle on his own. When he couldn’t Keaira showed up. Anything more moderate The Knight handled. It’s not like there weren’t other heroes helping and doing good work throughout the nation, however with those three on the job there has never been any need for any large scale banding together. His/Her Majesty’s Government has also…gently discouraged…such a thing. It’s much easier to keep track of and guide a relative handful of independent heroes than any super teams or groups. In the modern age, this gentle control is beginning to fracture primarily thanks to the ever inspirational Sir Randall Knight. He is effectively uncontrollable with such gentle methods, as men of strong convictions always are. Not much can be done about him for multiple reasons. The respect he has in Britain’s hero community, especially with Ben and Keaira. His wife Morgan’s corporation is a critical part of the British economy. And he’s apparently favored of mythical Avalon, as the Knight Family is now operating three of the legendary armors. Crusader, Templar, and the original Knight. Where Hospitaller (no, not the rookie hero, though her choosing that name is…concerning) and Cavalier are is not known to Her Majesty’s Government. Well. At any rate, Britain’s hero scene appears to be on the rise. In addition to Ben, Keaira, and the Knight Family, several other heroes have debuted in the last decade. Some quite recently like Yeoman, Hospitaller, and XX. Some a few years ago like Tattoo. And some several years ago, like Paragon, Umbrella Queen, and Nisse. The Knight Family Crusader (Sir Randall Knight) Lady Alchemist (Morgan Knight) Lady Knight (Emily Knight) The Alchemist Knight (Sophie Knight) Templar (Daniel Page) UQ Trio Umbrella Queen (Siobhanna) Nisse (Alwyn Kendrick) Tattoo (Josephine "Finn" Kent) Miscellanous British Heroes Big Ben (Benjamin Prestwich) Keaira, Princess of Avalon Paragon (Syed Nawaz) Yeoman (Joshua Birch) Hospitaller (Abigail "Abby" Priest) To Be Named (Elastic Detective Type)

Queenie Maybelle slid into the seat across from Leon, wincing slightly as she did so. “I don’t know about that. Matt’s got that strange whisking technique of his.” Like everyone who has a booth side all to themselves, she spread out and leaned back, stretching. She suppressed a hiss of pain and relief, as stiff muscles loosened up. “What do I always say? I’m not a doctor and this isn’t a fancy restaurant. You don’t need an appointment and I don't take reservations.” Meaning she wouldn’t ever hold him to anything like a visitation schedule. “Those two little rays of sunshine doing well?” Because that was the thing about Leon. Maybelle wasn’t dumb, she’d noticed how he was by now after so many visits. If he wanted to do or say something, he’d do it himself. Pushing him to just made him more and more likely to not to out of sheer contrariness. “I remember that old photo you showed me. Both cute as a button.” So the trick was to just wait, and eventually he’d get on with it. Fortunately, Maybelle was a patient woman. She had to be. The list of dishes that required it lest they be ruined was not short.

Queenie It hadn’t been that rough of a day at the Southern Queen for Maybelle McQueen, alias the superheroine Queenie. Just another day slinging her recipes to a wide audience. She was a little tired, actually. Closing time was late. She was thinking about having Chris and Rose lock up tonight. She’d had a quick clash with a supervillain rookie robber at the grocery store down the block earlier in the day, and thus a new bruise on her side that probably wouldn’t bother her in the morning. But then Amy poked her head in and said Leon was here. He’d been dropping by periodically for some months now, since they’d met at that Claremont event she’d catered. Yes, even this late. She didn’t mind. He didn’t seem like one for rules, and she wasn’t his mother or legal guardian anyway. No reason to make a fuss over nothing. So, with a quick word to David to finish tidying up without her, she walked out to go see him. “Hey there sunshine, why the long face? Matt’s pie can’t be that bad. It’s my recipe, after all.” Her smile did not literally light up the room, but she was always happy to see a friend. No matter what said friend’s age was.

Wilona Wilona was not someone who cried easily or for very long. So by the time the friggin’ cat showed up, she was merely slightly red-eyed and a little sniffly. Neither Carmen nor Neko was on her team, but it did not take a rocket scientist to figure out a sudden mystery cat belonged to one of them. She reached out and started petting it. “Not like you understand English. You’re a cat.” She sighed. “You’ve got it easy, cat. You can do whatever you want, and all anyone’ll do is chase you away. Me, I get to hear all these words about ‘potential’ and all the things I could be if I tried really hard. Do they care if I even want any of it? Hell no.” She sighed again. “Look, this place is nice, but all I want is to go home.” Her voice cracked slightly on “home”. “I know it’s not paradise or anything, but it’s what I understand. And if I say that to anyone human, they’re gonna get that look of pity in their eyes for the poor little homeless girl and it makes me SO GODDAMN MAD THAT I COULD-“ And this was when Carmen walked out. So the cat belonged to Neko. …yeah, that tracked. The usual mask snapped back into place with an almost audible sound. “Watch me do what? Skip class? I was tired of being in there anyway.” Naomi Naomi brightened immediately at Ryder. “Yes.” This was loud for her. She opened it and flipped through them so he could see. “My art. It’s good and people like it.” She gave a rare mischievous smile. “Bank wanted to sell them, but they’re mine.” She nodded in thanks at Owain. And now Leon was upset at her. She was noticeably baffled, which was a rare change from her usual unreadable expression. “Why not? I don’t mind. I have lots.” Had she taken a shot at him? Oh. Oh, no. She had. She didn’t mean to do that. Feelings leaping out ahead of her conscious mind, ugh. So, instead of writing him a check, she put the checkbook away and rummaged around in her pockets. She found a battered five dollar bill, and gave it to him. “You’re my friend, Leon.” Meaning she’d help if he asked, and it had nothing to do with how much money she had. Also she was sorry for making him feel bad.

Mirage Power Level: 10; Power Points Spent: 240/240 STR: +5 (16/20), DEX: +1 (12), CON: +5 (16/20), INT: +5 (20), WIS: +3 (14/16), CHA: +3 (16) Tough: +5/+8, Fort: +8, Ref: +8/+12, Will: +9/+10 Skills: Acrobatics 4 (+5), Computers 15 (+20), Concentration 7 (+10), Craft (electronic) 15 (+20), Diplomacy 7 (+10), Gather Information 7 (+10), Knowledge (technology) 15 (+20), Language 3 (+3), Notice 12 (+15), Sense Motive 7 (+10), Stealth 4 (+5) Feats: Attack Focus (ranged) 3, Beginner's Luck, Contacts, Eidetic Memory, Improved Initiative 4, Luck 2, Online Research, Second Chance (Toughness saves vs. Force), Skill Mastery (Computers), Ultimate Effort (Computers checks), Uncanny Dodge (Auditory), Well-Informed Powers: Discreetly Armored Clothing (Device 1) (Hard to lose; Subtle (subtle)) Energy Scattering Fabric (Protection 3) (+3 Toughness, Feats: Second Chance (Toughness saves vs. Force); Subtle (subtle)) Edgerunner Communicator (Device 3) (Hard to lose) Long Range Radio (Communication (sense type: radio; Subtle (subtle)) Universal Translator (Comprehend 3) (languages - read all, languages - speak all, languages - understand all) Heavy Blaster (Device 3) (Easy to lose) Heavy Blaster Shot (Blast 6) (DC 21; Accurate (+2), Precise, Subtle (subtle)) Sionil Longevity (Features 1) Sionil Physiology (Container, Passive 3) Lightless Vision (Super-Senses 3) (darkvision, infravision) Sionil Abilities (Enhanced Trait 11) (Traits: Strength +4 (20, +5), Constitution +4 (20, +5), Wisdom +2 (16, +3), Will +1 (+10)) Sionil Resistance (Immunity 2) (disease, poison; Limited - Half Effect) Technopathy (Active) (Array 21) (default power: mind control) Control Technology (Mind Control 10) (Default; DC 20; Affects Objects (Only), Alternate Save (Fortitude), Conscious, Effortless, Instant Command; Limited (Technology); Mental Link, Subtle (subtle)) Deactivate Technology (Nullify 10) (Array; counters: all powers of (type) - technology, DC 20; Burst Area (50 ft. radius - General), Effortless; Precise, Subtle (subtle)) Reprogramming (Transform (Mental) (Array; affects: alter mind, DC 18; Duration (continuous), Range (perception); Limited (to Technology); Precise, Subtle (subtle)) Sensor Network (ESP 10) (Array; affects: 2 types, inc. visual; No Conduit, Simultaneous; Medium; Subtle 2 (unnoticable)) Technopathy (Passive) (Container, Passive Combat Analytics (Enhanced Trait 24) (Traits: Attack Bonus +4 (+9), Defense Bonus +4 (+12), Reflex +4 (+12), Feats: Improved Initiative 4) Infoweb Uplink (Datalink 4) (sense type: radio; Cyberspace, Subtle 2 (unnoticable)) Interface (Comprehend 2) (machines / electronics - speak to, machines / electronics - understand) Technopathic Mind (Quickness (Perform routine tasks at 500x speed; One Type (Mental)) Technopathic Vision (Super-Senses 1) (awareness: Infoweb (visual)) Attack Bonus: +5/+9 (Ranged: +8/+12, Melee: +5/+9, Grapple: +10/+14) Attacks: Control Technology (Mind Control 10) (DC Fort 20), Deactivate Technology (Nullify 10) (DC Will 20), Heavy Blaster Shot (Blast 6), +14 (DC 21), Reprogramming (Transform (Mental) (DC Will 18), Unarmed Attack, +9 (DC 20) Defense: +8/+12 (Flat-footed: +6), Knockback: -4 Initiative: +17 Languages: Hijazi-Sionil Native, Neo-Nobellian, Netspeak, Outer Sionil Totals: Abilities 34 + Skills 24 (96 ranks) + Feats 13 + Powers 127 + Combat 26 + Saves 16 + Drawbacks 0 = 240 Age (as of Jan 2019): 30 Earth years (chronological), late teens/early 20s (human biological equivalent) Height: 4’ 9” Weight: 180 lbs Ethnicity: Sionil (Arabic equivalent) Hair: Black Eyes: Blue Background: It’s a familiar story wherever there’s at least a perceived gender binary. Boy meets girl. They fall in love. They chase their dreams together. When the young are in love, even the impossible seems possible. Technopaths are a terrifying prospect for a society that relies on computers and advanced technology like any spacefaring civilization does. Just one can plunge a planet or even a sector into chaos. This too, is a familiar story. A small percentage of a minority group turns to fanatical terrorism. They are by far the most publically prominent members of that minority. So, the expected happens. Fear. Oppression. Dehumanization, so to speak. There is, of course, pushback from the minority group and decent people who don’t surrender to fear. There always is. And so, the worst doesn’t happen. This is sometimes cold comfort, as the fear and suspicion never go away. Being a technopath is..not an easy life, at the best of times. There’s no telling who will accept it, who will reject it, or who will become violent over it. So it goes. Mirage (any other name he may have had has been erased from all databases and likely only exists within his memory alone) met Amina. They were both technopaths. They fell in love. They had big dreams. Redeeming technopaths in the eyes of the public. Making enough money to comfortably retire while still young. Maybe have some kids. You know, live the good life. Here is where the story deviates from the familiar. Reality is usually not nearly so dramatic. What happened was the stuff of ordinary lower class life. The young may have big dreams, but they also need to eat and pay rent. Years had gone by, and they had made no progress. Out of sheer frustration, they dipped their toes into the must more lucrative mercenary outlaw trade. And then, as happens to many who try to do it part time, fell into it full time. This was a slow and steady erosion of youth and idealism into, well, not age and cynicism, exactly, but a better understand of just how small the two of them were in the grand scheme of the universe. There was, realistically, very little they could do to change the course of intergalactic civilization. Amina couldn’t handle it. Well. It wasn’t like Mirage was coping perfectly fine, either. The familiarity of the story returns here. A charismatic figure who promises liberation for the downtrodden. A revolutionary. A savior. And he does appear to be effective. He does appear to be getting results. Steps on the road. He just needed a little help. Yeah. Amina and Mirage joined up. Him more for her than zeal for the cause. But Amina still wanted to believe, and got spoonfed everything she needed to keep doing it. Such descents are not as rapid as they appear, but still. It’s a little too easy to wake up one morning, realize you’re one of those terrorists you used to revile, and not mind all that much. Hatred’s easy. Anger’s easy. Amina may have been the one of the two of them who wanted to believe, but Mirage wasn’t exactly fleeing those talks either. The story continues in that familiar way. More and more drastic actions. More and more drastic reprisals from the authorities. Normally, this ends in the terrorist group being viciously suppressed. All their hopes and dreams cut to pieces in hail after hail of blaster fire and high powered explosives. But here again, the tale deviates from the familiar for just a bit. Mr. Charismatic Leader had a plan. One last big dramatic play to finally get people to listen. They hit an infoweb node. Each node is the hub for an entire sector. Without the node, the infoweb in that sector shuts down. No infoweb, everything that relies on it for power is left at best hours of backup battery power, and everything that relies on it for data locks up. So…saying that the nodes are well hidden and well guarded is like saying a Nobellian supermodel isn’t too bad looking. It’s technically correct (the best kind of correct), but rather dramatically understates the issue. So this was a massive operation featuring every member of every cell the terrorist group had. Every scrap of information, every bit of advanced tech, and every armament they’d ever gathered was deployed here. And Amina and Mirage were in the middle of it. And it was Amina who figuratively held the door shut while Mirage deployed the viral bomb that destroyed the node’s operating system. That bit above about no infoweb, everything goes bye bye? It’s one thing to know that it’s possible to do it. It’s quite another to realize that there is no backup plan in place for it happening. There were no safeties. No micronodes. The main power and communication source for an entire stellar sector (billions of people!) was just…gone. And it stayed gone for over a week. No transportation. No communication. No power. No food. No medicine. No help. Anything or anyone carefully balanced and monitored by tech was no longer so. The death toll was appalling. And Mirage was the person who figuratively pulled the trigger. Amina was thrilled. They had to listen to the technopaths now! Because if they could do this, they could do worse! Meanwhile, images of dead children danced in Mirage’s head. He knew better. Corp execs would just say that technopaths were too dangerous to be left both uncontrolled and alive. Big governments would never be bullied to the negotiating table by tactics like this. Amina didn’t want to hear it. They had a blazing argument. And then Mirage walked away. He’d already deleted his prior identity before that last mission. All that was left was to abandon the crappy one he was using with her. The woman he loved didn’t exist anymore. Though to be fair, the man she fell in love with didn’t, either. He went back to being a regular mercenary outlaw. After a while, he picked up the job that led him to Roxy Jett, and the rest is history. He doesn’t mind being an Edgerunner, not really. Having a steady crew is better than not having one. Especially if they’re badasses like Jackie, Esme, and Tetsukaze. Dying a year ago kind of sucked, but he came back so whatever. He’s just here doing tech support. He likes his coworkers. The pay is good. And he doesn’t have to be a bastard. He doesn’t want ever to be a bastard again if he can possibly avoid it. He would, to survive, but he wouldn’t like it. Powers & Tactics: Mirage is a Sionil technopath with a handful of technological devices. Technopaths will require a bit of a primer. They’re technically classified as mutants, but unlike Earth technopaths anti-mutant tech or spells has no effect on them. If anything they manipulate the infoweb like wizards do Quintessence. To be clear, what they do isn’t magic and it isn’t learned like wizard spells are. The working theory among public sources is that generations of exposure to the infoweb’s energies have resulted in, on rare occasions, individuals being born able to manipulate said energies. For the record, this is a genuinely impressive amount of bullshittery to cover a staggering amount of ignorance on the subject. In reality, they’re much like AI, with the notable caveats of being weaker overall and rooted to the body they’re born into unless they feel like being dead. They can take control of any technological device connect to the infoweb and do whatever the hell they want with it. They don’t even need to do proper hacking most of the time to do it. And since basically everything is connected to the infoweb, well…anyone can see why they’re scary to the masses. The very technology modern intergalactic life depends on can be turned against, well, anyone by one person who doesn’t look any different or indeed like they’re doing anything at all. This, of course, ignores that they’re people like anyone else. Something the masses generally tend to do on reflex. Regardless, the power they have makes them insanely valuable to various governments and especially the megacorporations, who stop at nothing to get their hands on every technopath they can find through whatever methods get the job done. They use them as weapons, volunteer test subjects, lab rats, and even murder and dissect them. The goal is, as ever, to figure out exactly how technopathy works, how to reproduce it, and (for the megacorps) how to monetize it. The brutal insensitivity to sentient life and its rights is, as always, par for the course. Nothing unexpected here. Until the Summerisle Incident, which brought the problem out of the shadows and into the light. Now the Nega Corps and Nobellian Federation (the non-corrupt sections, even) are paying attention. Young adolescents (at least outside of the Unclaimed Regions) are no longer being kidnapped off the street, murdered to prevent such a kidnapping, or the unholy combination of the two. Because even a techopath’s reasonably intact corpse still had research value. Somewhat long tangent aside, Mirage is an example of a technopath trained in combat instead of the usual “mighty mind, weak body” stereotype. His ability to link to the infoweb is and speak with anything connected to it is absolutely bog standard, as is the quickness of his mind and his ability to see the infoweb connections all around him (and what they’re doing). It is the rest that speaks of significant combat training and experience. A minor alternation to his personal infoweb connection gives him his own personal heads up display. Said display uses the computing power o the infoweb to deliver real time combat analytics, increasing his attack accuracy, evasion, and reaction time. His ability to take control of or shut down technology isn’t unusual, per se. However, he’s stronger than the average technopath with both, and can work around unexpected resistance with greater ease than that average technopath. Additionally, that average technopath would have to give verbal commands to the device they’ve taken control of, and can only deactivate one device at a time. Mirage can do the former mentally, and can shut down a full area of technology. It is the other two of his actively used technopathic powers that show off his combat training and experience. The average technopath wouldn’t even think of reprogramming a device so it keeps obeying them once they’ve departed the area. And while most can look through video cameras and the like, they forget to shield their own senses and rarely think to extend their range outside of their neighborhood. Mirage’s range reaches the average distance Earth is from it’s moon, and it requires sensitive, specialized equipment to detect his presence. His devices are simple enough. A wardrobe full of discreetly armored clothing that’s stronger against blaster fire. An Edgerunner Communicator with its long range radio and universal translator. And a partially silenced Heavy Blaster, because sometimes it’s simpler just to shoot people instead of hack something. Many techopaths can forget this. Not Mirage. Tactically, Mirage is nothing special. He’s just a guy with a Heavy Blaster. No feinting. No demoralizing. No Accurate, All Out, Defensive, or Power Attacking. His strengths aren’t on the physical battlefield; they’re in information gathering, computer hacking, and general tech support. Between Contacts, a +5 INT bonus, Eidetic Memory, Online Research, and Well Informed there is precious little he doesn’t know or can’t find out shortly. Consider him Mr. Exposition for matters that aren’t covered under History (that’s Esme), Tactics (that’s Tetsukaze), Arcane Lore (that’s Zima), or Pop Culture (that’s Roxy). That’s a pretty damn long list. With that said, Deactivate Technology can switch off cybernetics almost at will, and Sensor Network is as useful for scouting for a group as it is for an individual. Control Technology nd Reprogramming’s uses are generally outside of combat, as stated. Though there is nothing like turning the giant fucking battle drone who just smacked Tetsukaze through a wall against its owners. Heh. He does have a handful of power stunts. A beefy enough flying drone could serve as a Transport Platform for the whole group. Flight with Affects Others and Burst Area. He’s used Sensor Masking in the past for the Edgerunners. Concealment (all senses) with Affects Others and Burst Area, but Limited (to technology). And Bricking, which is for just destroying technology. Damage with Alt Save (Will) and Range 2 (perception) but Limited (to technology). Personality: Mirage is, in many ways, a typical member of the mercenary outlaw trade. You know, except for the whole…technopath…thing. He’s a consummate professional, fully capable of shooting people in the face for money. He wouldn’t enjoy it, but whatever keeps body and soul together. He’s not cynical, just a little jaded despite his relatively young age. Except when it comes to the sort of passionate idealism he used to have. He’s not, like, nasty to people who have it, but he has no love for “heroes”. The real deal is a different thing. He can respect someone who’s taken a good hard look at this cruel, shitty universe and still decided to do something good and worthwhile. But anyone with grandiose plans to “change the universe for the better” or “save X minority group for their systemic oppression” is at best a naïve idiot and at worst a dangerous lunatic capable of killing as many people as they deem necessary. He’ll have no part of that. Not again. He doesn’t regret what he did. Regret implies he wishes it didn’t happen or that he didn’t do it. This isn’t exactly true. Because Mr. Charismatic Leader’s plan (may he continue rotting in a suitably awful afterlife) kind of worked. Nbody throws rocks in the street at techopaths anymore. No more amateur hunters. Only the pros. If one can’t get respect from the masses, fear will suffice. He does, however, wish that the price of this had not been so dear. Millions of lives, plus the self-respect and ability to sleep soundly of one Free Sionil technopath. But you know, if he was sent back to the moment…knowing what it would cost…he might well do it all over again. Because while the price may have been high, and he may hate that with a furious intensity…he can certainly live with it. Oh, yes. He can live with it. If it means that the next generation of technopaths won’t grow up afraid of revealing the slightest hint of their powers for fear of losing their lives or freedom…he can live with it. If it means that no technopath will ever be disaffected, alienated, and angry enough to do what he (may he, too, eventually rot in a suitably awful afterlife) did to all those people, by the gods to those fucking babies…he absolutely can live with it. This makes him sound, well…pretty damn awful. He won’t deny it. He’s a bad man, but he ain’t that pretty. Heh. He doesn’t expect forgiveness or even understanding. He doesn’t even talk about it. Because part of him is still angry. Part of him is still not satisfied. Part of him is still damn angry. Part of him cheered wildly at the demise of so many of his oppressors, and thrilled to their lamentations. But unlike Amina (may she, three, eventually rot in a suitably awful afterlife), that part of him doesn’t get to sit in the driver’s seat. The last time he so much as listened to it, millions died. Children. Gods help him, babies. He doesn’t have the strength to endure something like that again. So. He’s just a guy who works with a crew and does his job. He’s cordial to his coworkers, backs them up when they need it, and tries to be a good friend when they need that. Jury’s still out on how well he’s doing at the friend part. Everything else was buried in the past behind him when he walked away. He’s just your typical mercenary outlaw, except for he’s also a technopath. He’s a consummate professional. And nothing else.

Geojang (Shin Min-ah) Power Level: 11; Power Points Spent: 255/255 STR: +5 (16/20), DEX: +5 (18/20), CON: +3 (16), INT: +2 (14), WIS: +5 (20), CHA: +7 (20/24) Tough: +3/+6, Fort: +7, Ref: +9/+16, Will: +10 Skills: Acrobatics 15 (+20), Bluff 13 (+20), Craft (chemical) 3 (+5), Diplomacy 13 (+20), Disguise 8 (+15/+40), Gather Information 8 (+15), Knowledge (behavioral science) 3 (+5), Knowledge (current events) 3 (+5), Knowledge (Galactic) 3 (+5), Knowledge (life sciences) 3 (+5), Knowledge (physical sciences) 3 (+5), Knowledge (streetwise) 8 (+10), Knowledge (technology) 3 (+5), Language 2 (+2), Notice 10 (+15), Perform (acting) 8 (+15), Sense Motive 15 (+20), Stealth 15 (+20) Feats: Acrobatic Bluff, All-Out Attack, Attack Focus (ranged), Challenge - Improved Acrobatic Bluff, Dodge Focus, Evasion, Improved Defense, Improved Initiative, Improved Initiative 3, Move-by Action, Power Attack, Second Chance (Toughness saves vs Force), Skill Mastery 2 (Acro, Bluff, Disguise, Diplo, Gather Info, Notice, Sen Mot, Stealth), Takedown Attack, Uncanny Dodge (Auditory) Powers: Cybernetics (Container, Passive 15) (Subtle (subtle)) Chameleon Cloak (Concealment 4) (all visual senses; Blending) Cyber Quickness (Quickness 5) (Perform routine tasks at 50x speed; Stacks with (Nobellian Quickness (Quickness 1+5))) Cyber Reflexes (Enhanced Trait 33) (Traits: Attack Bonus +6 (+15), Defense Bonus +6 (+16), Reflex +6 (+16), Feats: Improved Initiative 3) Cyber Senses (Super-Senses 7) (acute: Normal Olfactory, analytical: Normal Olfactory, analytical: Normal Gustatory, analytical (type): Auditory, infravision, ultra-hearing) Cyber Speed (Speed 2) (Speed: 25 mph, 220 ft./rnd; Stacks with (Nobellian Speed (Speed 1+2))) Cyberlimbs Strength (Enhanced Strength 4) (+4 STR) Data Upload Cable (Datalink 1) (sense type: radio) Dream Recorder (Features 1) Sensory Data Recorder (Features 1) Smuggling Compartment (Features 1) (Notes: Big enough to fit her Silenced Heavy Blaster or something of similar (Diminutive) size) Synthskin, Adjustable Facial & Body Implants (Morph 5) (morph: broad group, +25 Disguise; Duration (continuous)) Vocal Range Expander (Features 1) (Notes: +10 to Bluff to disguise voice/mimic other voices) Discreetly Armored Clothing (Device 1) (Hard to lose; Subtle (subtle)) Energy Scattering Fabric (Protection 3) (+3 Toughness, Feats: Second Chance (Toughness saves vs Force); Subtle (subtle)) Edgerunner Communicator (Device 3) (Hard to lose) Long Range Radio (Communication (sense type: radio; Subtle (subtle)) Universal Translator (Comprehend 3) (languages - read all, languages - speak all, languages - understand all) Nobellian Longevity (Features 1) Nobellian Physiology (Container, Passive 3) Nobellian Abilities (Enhanced Trait 6) (Traits: Dexterity +2 (20, +5), Charisma +4 (24, +7)) Nobellian Quickness (Quickness 1+5) ([Stacking ranks: +5], Perform routine tasks at 100x speed) Nobellian Reflexes (Enhanced Trait 5) (Traits: Attack Bonus +1 (+15), Reflex +1 (+16), Feats: Dodge Focus, Improved Initiative) Nobellian Speed (Speed 1+2) ([Stacking ranks: +2], Speed: 50 mph, 440 ft./rnd) Starlight Vision (Super-Senses 2) (low-light vision, ultravision) Silenced Heavy Blaster (Device 3) (Easy to lose) Silenced Shot (Blast 6) (DC 21; Precise, Subtle 2 (unnoticable)) Attack Bonus: +8/+15 (Ranged: +9/+16, Melee: +8/+15, Grapple: +13/+20) Attacks: Silenced Shot (Blast 6), +16 (DC 21), Unarmed Attack, +15 (DC 20) Defense: +10/+16 (Flat-footed: +8), Knockback: -3 Initiative: +21 Languages: Jeju-Nobellian, Neo-Nobellian Native, Outer Borustan Totals: Abilities 44 + Skills 34 (136 ranks) + Feats 12 + Powers 118 + Combat 34 + Saves 13 + Drawbacks 0 = 255 Age (as of Jan 2019): 40 Earth years (chronological), late teens (human biological equivalent) Height: 5’ 7” Weight: 105 lbs Ethnicity: Nobellian (Korean equivalent) Hair: Black Eyes: Dark Brown Theme Song: [url= https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-yrirRsRT4s]Can’t Go Back, by Fabvl featuring DizzyEight and Sinewave Fox[/url] Background: Geojang is tied for most dangerous Edgerunner with Esme. Anyone who’s read the latter’s entry willknow just how impressive that is. She’s not the most powerful, obviously, but it’s what she is that’s damn scary. A relic of an age long gone. The old name was Imperial Shadow, and officially they never existed in the first place. Many not in the know have wondered just how the old Nobellian Empire endured for so long. A brutal streak a light year long and a highly effective intelligence agency only go so far. Especially with literally intergalactic distances to account for. Enter the Imperial Shadows. The pop cultural image of them is not all that different from Earth’s super spy movies. Certainly many of the same narrative tropes are in play, whether the Shadow in question is a heroic Shadow gone rogue or a villainous Imperial out for blood. The reality, however, would not be nearly as interesting to see as a holovid. There were three Shadow Houses, each working directly for the Imperial Throne. House Harmony was to encourage unity among pro-Imperial factions as subtly as possible and eliminate all threats to unity among said factions. House Discord was entirely the reverse. They were to encourage disunity and infighting among anti-Imperial factions, and eliminate any unifying forces amongst them. House Dream acted both as handler, technical and magical support, and when necessary, clean up crew. The three Houses were frighteningly effective. Modern historians estimate the Imperial Shadows delayed both Nobellian Civil Wars by up to a thousand years. Each. And made them both longer and more devastating than they would have otherwise been. The thing that made them frightening was that they very much were not purely assassins. They did most of their work through social manipulation. The push and pull of trust and betrayal. Secrets and blackmail. And an intuitive understanding of psychology built into their training. The right words, spoken at the right time, can change the fates of billions. The same is true of the wrong words spoken at the wrong time, the wrong words at the right time, and the right words at the wrong time. This was what they did. It has been said that a skilled Shadow didn’t even need to be in the same galaxy to kill someone. But as the saying goes, all things both good and bad must come to an end. With everything Imperial gone, the question becomes what happened to the Shadows? Well, remember they didn’t officially exist? And, as has been implied, that they were embedded in basically every level and aspect of Nobellian society? If they couldn’t work off the books for the government, they could work for the megacorps. They knew them quite well at this point, after all. They were now Shadows, Inc., a consulting firm. And probably the best one in the universe. To be clear, the pop culture image of a Shadow is not entirely incorrect. There’s a large degree of dramatic license taken in most adaptations, as stated. The part about Shadows going rogue, however, has always been true. No amount of non-psychopathic training can remove a person’s conscience, no matter their species. And psychopathic training would crush a Shadow’s greatest asset, their ability to empathize and understand others. Anyone can train living weapons and virtually unstoppable assassins. It takes a far defter hand to craft untraceable undercover agents with the skills of a master con artist and the discretion of a priest. So yes, sometimes Shadows turn their coats. For honor, for liberty, for greed, and for spite. There are as many reasons as there are renegade Shadows. This is another reason both Civil Wars lasted as long as they did. Shadows on both sides causing and resolving various types of mayhem and mischief. This, however, brings us at last to Shin Min-ah. The young woman who would one day become Geojang. Being a Shadow is a job now, not some noble calling for earnest Nobellian patriots. It’s a very lucrative job, but it is only a job. Shin is from a high ranking family in the Nobellian Outer Reaches. Wealthy. Powerful. Etc. And a large portion of that wealth and power came from their long affiliation with House Discord. She was trained from a very young age in a Shadow’s work. She showed great promise, as most do not, so she was incorporated into House Discord’s Shadows. She was not a sorcerer or one of the Adroit, and she displayed little aptitude for wizardry. So, to keep pace with those who were, she chose to be extensively cybernetically augmented. When she chose to retire from Shadow work, she’d have far more than enough money to have her limbs and organs magically regenerated if she wanted. She was, in a very real sense, House Discord’s young prodigy. So naturally she was partnered with House Harmony’s young prodigy, Rana. At first they didn’t like each other. Then they did. And then they really did. Ah, young love. Is there anything more beautiful? Romance between partners wasn’t, strictly speaking, forbidden. Nobellian culture has had over 25 thousand years to get way the hell over any problems with non-heterosexual attraction, and the Shadows are not and never were a military organization that would forbid fraternization. Occasionally, it was even encouraged as it made the Shadows in question better at the work. And this was the case for Shin and Rana. A little too good, as it turned out. The relationships between megacorps are…well, let’s just say open warfare would involved a more decisive conclusion and a lower overall body count. Lots of political maneuvering. Use and sacrifice of pawns and deniable assets. Very messy. Relationships between high level employees of the same megacorp are less bloody, to be sure, but that’s only because some employees are critical to the functioning of the megacorp in question. The goal is to improve their personal fortunes, not damage their employer’s ability to make money. So the Shadows are kept busy on all fronts. Until a coward’s scheme is revealed and they sell out everyone else involved to save their own skin. The scheme was revealed because said coward was known to be…minimally competent, at best. But his department starting showing subtle improvements while his competitors’ performance starting subtly degrading. It was a trap set up to catch and finally remove a subpar performer, and despite the advice of two young prodigy Shadows said coward fell right into it. This got Rana captured. She was working in said coward’s department as a House Harmony Shadow should be. Revealed Shadows cannot be trusted under any circumstances. One never knows who else they’re working for. Shin had an opportunity to save her, but their handlers in House Dream forbade it. Wheels within wheels and plots within schemes for Shadow, Inc.. Plus it was a risky move, and there was no reason to lose two prodigy Shadows that day. Shin was a good Shadow. Well trained. She obeyed. Rana was killed. And her mind fractured into cyberpsychosis from the strain on her mind. The clash of intellectual and emotional loyalty overloaded her cybernetically strained neurology. So she was able to lie when debriefed and reassigned. She was fine and all was well. This was a very huge lie. Shadow, Inc. and the Imperial Shadows had managed a rather remarkable feat. No competent member of any of the three Houses ever managed to go renegade without it being detected before any real damage to the Houses themselves could be done. Their work has been compromised, certainly. Shadows have most definitely been lost. But the Houses themselves (administration, teachers, Shadows in training, and all sorts of necessary non-field staff) had never suffered any real damage or loss. Until Shin Min-ah turned her discord causing skills against her own House. Against all three Houses. It was extremely effective. House Harmony and House Dream had no idea what was happening. House Discord leadership only figured it out just in time for her to return unexpectedly and start killing them. She left House Discord’s main headquarters in flames with its primary leadership burning to ashes inside as Shadow fought Shadow outside. Meanwhile Houses Harmony and Dream were left dissolving into chaos and violence as rivalries and grudges both old and new boiled over. Shadow Inc., was set back decades. This was the revenge of Shin Min-ah. Something she would have never done or even considered if she were not a cyberpsychotic. Of course, now she had nowhere to go. She had always had a place to return to before, but now she had none. She could not, could never, go back again. It was a strangely lonely feeling, but money had to be earned. So she fell into the mercenary outlaw trade. Oddly enough, her first job was protecting the D-Screener Roxy Jett, alias Celia Cruz with a few others including Mirage. The two fell in love and lust at first sight, and very soon after that the nanotech apocalypse hit the galaxy they were in. And shortly after that they were stuck being Edgerunners after Celia pissed off most of known space with the holovid announcing their escape. This has not been as bad as it sounds. At least Geojang thinks so. She’s discovered a love of acting, and her one woman plays on Roxy’s channel get almost as many views as her recorded concerts and streams. Live concerts, not so much, but it doesn’t bother her. What bothered her was watching Celia turn to dust and blow away. Well, start blowing away, as Geojang was doing the same thing at the time. She didn’t have time to grieve, as she was, you know, also dead. But it was still a reminder of just how short life can be. Especially considering Celia was a Borustan, and thus would be (in the best case scenario) dying of old age long before Shin herself looked much older than she did right now. How to put it? It’s one thing to know that something’s not quite right with you. It’s quite another to be brutally reminded of just how short life can be. So, she at last admitted to herself that something was wrong with her. And what it probably was. So when Tetsukaze wanted to go see the Red Ronin about his cyberpsychosis, she stepped up beside him and asked to come along. What happens after they realign her neurology, she doesn’t know. Note: All names are translated to Earth equivalents. Powers & Tactics: Geojang has a hell of a lot of cybernetics augmenting her, and she carries a handful of technological devices. More than half of her isn’t organic. Her limbs, parts of her torso and head, and even most of her skin have been replaced. They’re advanced cybernetics, so this isn’t as immediately noticeable as, say, Tetsukaze’s chromed out self. Without careful examination or cyber detectors, Geojang appears to be entirely unaugmented. Her cybernetics have the usual strength, land speed, quickness, and reflexes (increasing attack accuracy and evasion) boost, all at a high level. It’s the other more specialized custom Shadow cyber that is remarkable. Her skin alone is a masterwork of engineering. It contains both her Chameleon Cloak and her Synthskin. The Chameleon Cloak is a camera and light projection system that effectively renders her transparent as long as she doesn’t move particularly fast. Her Synthskin is part of a system of implants in her face and internal body that allow to her to change into any Nobellian female, and the change holds until she changes it again. So she can sleep in her current appearance or even be knocked unconscious without it reverting. She can change into any Nobellian female body type, within limits. She can alter the size of her bust the thickness of her limbs and torso, the dimensions of her face, and the shape of every facial feature. Her hair and eye colors may also be altered at need. However, she cannot change her height and she can only put on but so much “weight”. “Weight” in in quotes because she does not gain additional mass and so may end up significantly lighter than she appears if impersonating an overweight Nobellian woman. The bulk of her remaining headware is sensory augmentations. Her inner ears and parts of her nose and tongue are synthetic, broadening their capabilities. She can hear high frequency sound, detect subtle differences in smells and tastes, and has analysis suites for hearing, smell, and taste. Her remaining augmentations are relatively minor. A recorders for both her dreams and all that sensory data she gets. A 10 foot cable to upload that recorded to the infoweb. An expansion to her natural vocal range, allowing her to disguise her voice/mimic others’ voices to infiltrate places and organizations even more effectively than she already could. And a smuggling compartment large enough to hide her Silenced Heavy Blaster from view. Because her Silenced Heavy Blaster is the weapon out of her trio of devices, and its shots are undetectable without specialized senses or equipment. Otherwise it’s a fairly normal Heavy Blaster. The other two are her wardrobe full of discreetly armored clothing (extra effective against blaster fire) and her Edgerunner Communicator (with its long range radio and universal translator). Tactically, Geojang is not the type to go in blasters blazing. She’s a very subtle woman. She’s an infiltrator, spy, and occasionally assassin, not a front line combatant. Her only offensive weapons are her Silenced Heavy Blaster and her martial arts skills. Direct combat is simply not something she can be forced into doing by opposition. Between Chameleon Cloak, high Stealth ranks, and her Morph. Her specialty is getting her opposition to shoot each other while being unaware of her presence entirely. Or, failing that, shooting them in the back via surprise. With that said, she has Improved Acrobatic Bluff, and Bluff ranks to feint with impunity. She also has the Diplomacy ranks to talk enemies down from being hostile in the first place. Or she could simply start mimicking enemy voices with Chameleon Cloak on, and sow…well…discord. If you’ll pardon the wordplay. All Out Attack and Power Attack are deck for sneak attacks, Move by Action can keep her mobile if she’s not using the Cloak, and Improved Defense is good for when one enemy is persuaded to stop fighting but the rest still prefer her to have more holes in her than she was born with. She does not power stunt. Personality: Cyberpsychosis affects everyone who has it differently. The stereotype is that of violent, rampaging maniacs, but those are merely the ones who catch the news headlines for reasons that should be obvious. The only common traits when it is active is a sudden disappearance of the ability to feel guilt or remorse, increased recklessness, and the affected’s remaining emotions become significantly stronger and more difficult to control. The rest depends on the person who, as should be carefully noted, does not undergo any other type of personality shift. So, when someone is already heavily armed and prone to violently losing one’s temper, three guess what happens when they have a cyberpsychotic episode. The previous has been said before, but is even more important to remember with Geojang. Shadows are not back alley thugs or professional soldiers. They are trained to remain in control of their emotions through extremely difficult circumstances and act with forethought instead of impulsively. Furthermore, they are selected for their high aptitude in those very skills. In a universe with advanced magical abilities and advanced technology that can sometimes seem indistinguishable from said magic, all of a Shadow’s other skills can be augmented in. Aptitude in them is not necessary. So when she initially entered her cyberpsychotic break, she simply didn’t notice. She had other things on her mind. She was a prodigy, after all. A young woman of relatively weak emotions and high natural control before she underwent any training. Weak emotions, that is, except for one. Love. Shin Min-ah loves with every fiber of her being. So yes, she wreaked a intricate, elaborate, vicious revenge on the system that took Rana from her. And if she noticed she didn’t feel bad about betraying, destroying, and finally outright killing people who were previously as close to her as her own family, she chalked it up to a sudden change of feelings being quite appropriate under the circumstances. Meeting Rana was like being born again. Meeting Roxy was not like that. D-Screeners all adopt somewhat similar larger than life personas. Meeting Celia, however, was. It was like a second chance with Rana. Who wouldn’t take it? Geojang was taught to control her emotions, not deal with them in a healthy manner. It has been years, but her grief for Rana has not abated. Her unyielding rage at Shadow, Inc for permitting it burns deep inside her. Her anger at herself for not defying her handlers then and there is also a potent thing. And isn’t it funny how wreaking a devastating and bloody revenge does nothing to satisfy such emotions? In someone else, such emotions would likely lead to spiral of violence and destruction, culminating in their death. However, like she was taught, she put them away. She was in control. Except for the part where nobody in the entire gods damned universe would take Celia Cruz from her. In someone else this obsessive overprotectiveness would doom the relationship. But again, she was in control. And she was very well trained in the diplomatic and deceptive arts. If this sounds like a villainous origin story, it ought to. Except for one little thing. Geojang is very young for a Nobellian. With said youth comes a degree of inexperience and, bluntly, stupidity. It is a universal truth that children, teenagers, and young adults of any species are prone to moments of incredible stupidity. In Geojang’s case, it was that she thought she was doing excellently at hiding her true emotional state. While in close quarters with five other people and extremely close quarters with a sixth. For years. With a heavy sigh. You are not a unique blindspot for all of your crewmates, Shin Min-ah. She was Not Okay, she knew everyone else knew it, and she was not and had never been the type to not do anything about a problem. That, and watching Celia get Dusted slapped a lot more stress on her already strained psyche. It was time to utter the dreaded word cyberpsychosis. It was time to see if she could get some help. And, perhaps, unburden a heart that was heavier than most. Because she knows. She has not been a particularly good person, even by mercenary outlaw standards, in a very long time. If indeed she ever was to begin with. And honestly? She’d kind of like to be.

Roxy Jett (Celia Cruz) Power Level: 11; Power Points Spent: 255/255 STR: +5 (14/20), DEX: +3 (16), CON: +6 (16/22), INT: +2 (14), WIS: +2 (14), CHA: +5 (20) Tough: +6/+10, Fort: +10, Ref: +9/+12, Will: +11 Skills: Acrobatics 7 (+10), Bluff 10 (+15), Computers 3 (+5), Diplomacy 10 (+15), Gather Information 10 (+15), Knowledge (arcane Lore) 3 (+5), Knowledge (art) 8 (+10), Knowledge (current events) 8 (+10), Knowledge (Galactic) 3 (+5), Knowledge (popular culture) 13 (+15), Knowledge (streetwise) 8 (+10), Knowledge (technology) 3 (+5), Language 1 (+1), Notice 8 (+10), Perform (dance) 5 (+10), Perform (singing) 15 (+20), Perform (stringed instruments) 10 (+15), Sense Motive 8 (+10), Stealth 7 (+10) Feats: All-Out Attack, Challenge - Improved Feint, Challenge - Improved Taunt, Defensive Attack, Distract (Bluff), Endurance (+4), Evasion, Fascinate (Bluff), Improved Initiative 3, Move-by Action, Power Attack, Precise Shot, Quick Draw, Second Chance 2 (Toughness saves vs Force & Slashing), Set-Up, Skill Mastery (Bluff, Diplomacy, Perform (aing & strings)), Takedown Attack, Taunt, Uncanny Dodge (Auditory) Powers: Borustan Physiology (Container, Passive 3) Borustan Abilities (Enhanced Trait 13) (Traits: Strength +6 (20, +5), Constitution +6 (22, +6), Feats: Endurance (+4)) Starlight Vision (Super-Senses 2) (low-light vision, ultravision) D-Screener Masquer (Device 1) (Easy to lose, Restricted use (Requires Roxy's Password)) Roxy's World (Illusion 2) (affects: 1 type + visual - visual & auditory, DC 12; Limited (to machines); Progression, Area (10 ft. radius)) Discreetly Armored Leather Outfit (Device 1) (Hard to lose; Subtle (subtle)) Energy Scattering Leather (Protection 2) (+2 Toughness, Feats: Second Chance 2 (Toughness saves vs Force & Slashing); Subtle (subtle)) Edgerunner Communicator (Device 3) (Hard to lose) Long Range Radio (Communication (sense type: radio; Subtle (subtle)) Universal Translator (Comprehend 3) (languages - read all, languages - speak all, languages - understand all) Internal Quintessence (Container, Passive 13) Enhanced Hearing (Super-Senses 1) (analytical: Auditory) Enhanced Quickness (Quickness 6) (Perform routine tasks at 100x speed) Enhanced Reflexes (Enhanced Trait 18) (Traits: Attack Bonus +3 (+12), Defense Bonus +3 (+12), Reflex +3 (+12), Feats: Improved Initiative 3) Enhanced Resilience (Protection 2) (+2 Toughness) Enhanced Speed (Speed 3) (Speed: 50 mph, 440 ft./rnd) Fascinating Voice (Mind Control 10) (DC 20; Perception Area (General), Duration (sustained), Effortless, Selective Attack; Limited (to holding attention), Range 2 (touch), Sense-Dependent (Auditory); Custom (Insidious), Subtle 2 (unnoticable)) Perfect Pitch (Features 1) Vocal Mimicry (Features 1) Roxy's Knives (Device 4) (Easy to lose, Only you can use) Knife Fighting Techniques (Array 9) (default power: blast) Fan of Knives (Strike 1) (Array; DC 21; Cone Area (60-120 ft. cone - General) [5 extra ranks]; Mighty, Progression, Increase Area (area x2)) Knife Slashes (Strike 1) (Array; DC 21; Autofire (interval 2, max +5) [5 extra ranks]; Accurate 2 (+4), Mighty) Throwing Knife Barrage (Blast 1) (Default; DC 21; Autofire (interval 2, max +5) [5 extra ranks]; Accurate 2 (+4), Improved Range 2 (50 ft. incr), Mighty 5 (+5 to damage), Progression, Increase Range (max range x2, 250 feet)) Attack Bonus: +9/+12 (Ranged: +9/+12, Melee: +9/+12, Grapple: +14/+17) Attacks: Fan of Knives (Strike 1) (DC 21), Fascinating Voice (Mind Control 10) (DC Will 20), Knife Slashes (Strike 1), +16 (DC 21), Throwing Knife Barrage (Blast 1), +16 (DC 21), Unarmed Attack, +12 (DC 20) Defense: +9/+12 (Flat-footed: +6), Knockback: -5 Initiative: +15 Languages: Iberustan Native, Neo-Nobellian Totals: Abilities 34 + Skills 35 (140 ranks) + Feats 16 + Powers 115 + Combat 36 + Saves 19 + Drawbacks 0 = 255 Age (as of Jan 2019): 20 Earth years (chronological), approx 24 (human biological equivalent) Height: 5’ 11” Weight: 225 Ethnicity: Borustan (Spanish equivalent) Hair: Brown Eyes: Light Brown Background: People forget just how vast the universe is, you know? Attempting to map it through visual methods from any one point in it is a waste of time. Whatever one is seeing from that point happened many Earth years ago. In the case of neighboring galaxies, this amount of time can be measured in centuries if not millennia. Objects in space do not stay still. The distance between galaxies is staggering. The amount of space inside any one galaxy can be equally staggering. This makes the administration of the major powers, all of whom span multiple galaxies, an astonishing feat of engineering. And it explains the Unclaimed Regions. It takes a lot of time, effort, and material for even the largest powers like the Nobellian Federation and Sionil Union to claim new galaxies for themselves. They’re not going to even try unless they’re full prepared and the galaxy in question has been explored and analyzed within an inch of its life. The megacorps are even less interested in that level of financial risk. This does not mean that no one ever is. Since the dawn of intergalactic civilization, plenty of dreamers, freaks, weirdoes, and outcasts have sailed off into the void full of hope. So while the Unclaimed Regions may be unclaimed and not under the authority of any of the major powers, this does not mean they are empty or lowly populated. This brings us to Celia Cruz, or as she’s better known, Roxy Jett. She may be Borustan, but she’s never set foot in the Tribal Confederation. She’d never even left her home planet in the flesh before, well, we’ll get to that. But virtually? She’s been a delta holoscreener (or D-Screener, the Earth equivalent is a V-tuber) since she was 12 Earth years old. That’s a little older than it sounds for the shorter lived Borustans, but still firmly underage. Parents? Please. They had a dozen other kids to worry about (Borustans have multiple births far more often than single) and it’s not like she was going to smoky bars and performing in a tank top and miniskirt. Fake background plus an initially cheap avatar and she was recording streams. She did gaming streams, sure, but more often she was singing while playing the guitar she’d gotten for her last birthday. Well. It’s not a guitar, exactly (being as space is not Earth), but close enough. You know, covering local hit songs in her sector and galaxy. Just like on Earth, this can be a pretty easy way to make money if you’re good at it, attractive, and get lucky. Unlike on Earth, there’s plenty of shady financial institutions who don’t particularly care about the age of their clientele. Three guesses what happened to Roxy Jett. She showed surprising foresight in really only upgrading her software and computer with the money, just letting it collect otherwise. And she got bigger and bigger. Especially when she started writing her own songs and singing them instead. Goodbye, sharing profits with record corps. But you know how it is. Corps are gonna corp. And a popular indy musician outselling their alleged stars and refusing their advances was utterly unacceptable. So they started digging for leverage to force her into a contract on their terms. Leverage like her real identity and the identities of her family because corp execs, as a rule, don’t play nice unless they’re forced to. The holovid service and shady financial institution she was using stonewalled the investigation while counting the money they were making off of her and laughing. But there was always outsourcing matters to a team of mercenary outlaws, like usual. By this time the Roxy Jett fan community was not small, and word got out that someone was digging into her hard. Someone slipped her a message, and she went hiring some mercenary outlaws of her own. Granted, she was the rookie at doing so and the record corps were the professionals, but she had the advantsge of her own squad working as much for love of her as the money she was paying out. Said squad of mercenary outlaws (assembled for the first time for her job, as they weren’t a regular team) included Geojang (the two started banging with shocking speed) and Mirage (he isn’t the meat in their sandwich, infoweb, jeez) among others. Thus began a stalemate that probably wouldn’t have lasted. Corps have more money and more reach than any individual, even one with a strong fan community backing them up. And most who defy corporate will for too long without being useful in some other way end up the victim of what everyone knows but nobody can prove is an assassination. Sometimes the actual killer even goes to jail, but that’s what mercenary outlaws are for, right? Deniable assets the corps don’t have to care about if they get caught. Before anything like that could happen, though, the AI possessed nanotech apocalypse came swarming over their galaxy. The corp execs and high politicos were, of course, the first ones getting the hell out. The disorganized nature of this part of the Unclaimed Regions worked against it, and the Nobellian and Sionil navies were blasting any wannabe blockade runners into their constituent atoms. But you know, Roxy Jett had money too, damn it. And so the Edgerunners came to her, her family’s and her squad of mercenary outlaws’ rescue. Just in time for that AI possessed nanotech apocalypse to come swarming over her own planet. It got very, very bad. A horror movie in real life bad. Her squad was pruned down to Geojang and Mirage. There wasn’t time to gather her older siblings (as they were adults and living away from home), so they were left behind. And she personally put one of her throwing knives between her father’s eyes as something else looked out through them for the first time. But they got the hell out, Jackie blew a goddamn hole though a Sionil battlecruiser, and Celia Cruz departed the galaxy of her birth. The triumphant holovid announcing her escape and survival even she will admit was a pretty big mistake. Mainly because the Nobellian Federation, Sionil Union, and Nega Corps were all now actively looking for Roxy Jett. Turns out major intergalactic powers don’t like it when someone flouts their authority. Um. Oops. Her holovid service kept right on stonewalling with bare minimum of cooperation, laughing and counting the money she was making them. She did, however, have to find another shady financial institution, as that trio took the one she’d be using apart to get at her and her money. Thanks to Mirage she didn’t lose everything, but she did lose a bundle. And the rest was mostly gobbled up by getting her mother and younger siblings set up somewhere they wouldn’t be easy to find. In the ensuring years, she’s had to jump from one shady financial institution to another as they’ve crumbled under Nobellian precision, Sionil stubbornness, and the relentless Negas. Well. She can’t build up a nice nest egg again, but her family hasn’t gone hungry and neither has she. So whatever. Geojang’s one woman plays and occasionally persuading Zima to sing with her doesn’t hurt her bottom line at all. Ironically, being Dusted for a year boosted her popularity. She’d had a couple vids in the queue already, but the lack of commentary on the Dusting and sudden radio silence after years of steady streams and holovids brought her surviving fans together in mourning, and created many new ones. So her triumphant return is likely to go over really big. But first things first. Geojang needs help, and has finally admitted it to herself. So they’ll do that, and get back to life as usual. Powers & Tactics: Roxy Jett is a Borustan with multiple different technological devices and the powers of one of the Adroit. The devices are all actually pretty simple. Her D-Screener Masquer is what she uses for live broadcasts. It alters the visual and auditory input of technological devices sensing her location. More precisely, within a ten foot radius of her location. So it’s background and disguise all in one. Her leather outfits are discreetly armored, with a focus on resisting slashing weapons and blaster fire. She has an Edgerunner Communicator, with its long range radio and universal translator. Last is her set of throwing knives. She has a lot of these. She has more knives than shirts. Or pants. Not panties, though. A girl can’t have enough underwear, she says. Anyway, she can throw the knives in an wide arc, throw a bunch at once, or just slash away with them. For anyone without her knife fighting talents and Adroit speed, they’re just a bunch of regular knives one can find anywhere. She was the typically untrained rookie Adroit when she joined the crew, but training with the most experience Adroit alive in Esme has sent her soaring leaps and bounds past any peers her age. She’s got the standard enhanced ground speed, physical quickness, and attack accuracy and evasion boosting reflexes. That, however, is where the standard ends. Every Adroit is different, and she is no exception. More of her additional abilities are relatively minor, and make her a even better musician than she already was. Analyzing any sound she hears, having perfect pitch, and being able to mimic any voice aren’t nothing, but they’re not especially potent in social or combat situations. Her Fascinating Voice, however, is. It isn’t a spell. It’s a magical alteration to her vocal cords that lets them manipulate sound of her voice to essentially control minds. The only thing she can do with this is force anyone she wants who can hear her to pay attention to her. And only her. This is much more useful than it sounds. She’s literally a walking distraction who only has to speak. Or, as she prefers, start singing. The additional effect is undetectable both to the affected and any observers without the appropriate special senses to detect subtle sound manipulation. Tactically, Roxy uses her knives more than anything. Fascinating Voice, while sometimes helpful to her allies, can get absolutely get her killed in heavy combat. So, you know. Fan of Knives as an area attack, Knife Slashes in melee, and Throwing Knife Barrage at range. With that said, she mainly plays support in group combat. Improved Feint and Improved Taunt used with Set Up makes the whole team better. She even has Distract (Bluff). She has All Out, Defensive, and Power Attack to mix things up, Move By Action to stay mobile, and Fascinate (Bluff) for non combat occasions. So while she can fight on her own just fine, when the fecal matter hits the oscillating device she’s setting up Jackie’s anything or Tetsukaze’s Katana for a devastating hit. She’d only power stunt if you, Dear Reader, can think of something else she can do with her Knife Fighting Techniques. Personality: Roxy Jett has a lot in common with the typical D-Screener. A big, extroverted personality. A super attractive avatar that look nothing like the person under it. Here for a good time, not a long time. Rock hard, party harder. Alluring, yet dangerous. Like all D-Screeners, Roxy Jett is an appealing fantasy. All of a person’s positive traits, none of the negative. The part that makes her different is that she’s a musician first. Most D-Screeners’ holovid are them talking. Playing games, reviewing stuff, visiting places, hang out streaming sessions. Like youtubers and V-tubers do on Earth. Roxy does do this type of thing, but it’s the side dish. The main course is her virtual concerts. Anyone with the right gear and a bit of money can log in and get a live concert. Like she says, Roxy isn’t in this to make money or be famous. She’s the approximate equivalent of an anarchist punk rocker. Her particular fantasy is that of the rebellious bad girl, after all. Your own manic pixie dream girl in leather and lace, here to rock your face off. This is who Celia Cruz is too, mostly. But unlike Roxy, she’s a fully three dimensional person. She is far from the typical mercenary outlaw. She’s warmhearted, fun, and spontaneous. She’s been through some stuff, sure, but Borustans recover quickly from psychological trauma and she’s fast even by her species’s standards. She still, after years in the trade, maintains part of her civilian perspective. She’s not some highly trained soldier or spy. She doesn’t use a blaster. She’s a musician. A real life rock star. This has actually the problem with her, as far as being an Edgerunner is concerned. She’s still, after years with them, quite young for a Borustan. She’s spent her life so far living fast, partying hard, and not caring all that much about the condition of her corpse. Because the young are immortal in their own minds, and young Borustans especially sometimes forget they can die at all. So she was extremely reckless and impulsive. Young enough to not truly think herself mortal, enthusiastic about life to a fault, and deeply in love. Oh, dear. Enter being Dusted. Because, you know, it had been years. Celia wasn’t blind or an idiot. She was actually maturing, if a little slowly for a Borustan. To put it in human terms, the way one sees the world at 18 is very much not the same as the way one sees it at 21 and now at 24. She died. Geojang died. Everyone died. She’s not about to turn into some boring ass “responsible adult”, but she knows there’s more to life than flipping off The Man (so to speak), having vigorous sex with her love, and chasing the next thrill. Gods help her, she actually wants to live to be, well, not old, but a few more years would be nice, you know? She’s not exactly looking to settle down, gods no. But she’s worried about Geojang. It was one of those things where she was being a bit protective at first, but now? When she can clearly see that her love is Not Okay? It’s time to change things up a bit. The full throttle life was getting a bit tedious and boring, anyway.

Zima (Marina Morozov) Power Level: 12; Power Points Spent: 255/255 STR: +6 (16/22), DEX: +8 (20/26), CON: +3 (16), INT: +2 (14), WIS: +3 (16), CHA: +6 (18/22) Tough: +3/+8, Fort: +7, Ref: +10/+14, Will: +12 Skills: Acrobatics 7 (+15), Bluff 14 (+20), Diplomacy 4 (+10), Gather Information 4 (+10), Knowledge (arcane Lore) 13 (+15), Knowledge (theology & philosophy) 8 (+10), Notice 7 (+10), Perform (singing) 9 (+15), Sense Motive 7 (+10), Stealth 7 (+15) Feats: Accurate Attack, Acrobatic Bluff, Attack Focus (melee) 4, Challenge - Improved Feint, Challenge - Improved Taunt, Defensive Attack, Defensive Roll 2, Dodge Focus, Evasion, Improved Critical (Hydro Blast (Blast 12)), Improved Critical 2 (Heavy Blaster Shot (Blast 6)), Improved Critical 2 (Icy Bindings (Snare 12)), Improved Critical 2 (Rapier Strikes (Strike 2)), Improved Initiative, Improved Initiative 3, Move-by Action, Power Attack, Quick Draw, Ritualist, Second Chance (Toughness saves vs. Force), Skill Mastery (Acrobatics, Bluff, KN (arcane lore), Perform (sing)), Takedown Attack, Taunt, Uncanny Dodge (Auditory) Powers: Discreetly Armored Dress (Device 1) (Hard to lose; Subtle (subtle)) Energy Scattering Fabric (Protection 3) (+3 Toughness, Feats: Second Chance (Toughness saves vs. Force); Subtle (subtle)) Edgerunner Communicator (Device 3) (Hard to lose) Long Range Radio (Communication (sense type: radio; Subtle (subtle)) Universal Translator (Comprehend 3) (languages - read all, languages - speak all, languages - understand all) Heavy Blaster Pistol (Device 3) (Easy to lose) Heavy Blaster Shot (Blast 6) (DC 21, Feats: Improved Critical 2 (Heavy Blaster Shot (Blast 6)); Accurate (+2)) Nobellian Hydromancy (Array 13) (default power: blast) Basic Hydromancy (Move Object 12) (Array; Strength: 60, Carry: 17 tons / 34 tons / 51.2 tons / 102.4 tons; Range (perception); Limited Material (Water)) Hydro Blast (Blast 12) (Default; DC 27, Feats: Improved Critical (Hydro Blast (Blast 12)); Variable Descriptor (Narrow group - Ice/Water/Heat (Steam))) Hydro Burst (Blast (Array; DC 23; Burst Area (40-80 ft. radius - General); Progression, Increase Area (area x2), Variable Descriptor (Narrow group - Ice/Water/Heat (Steam))) Hydro Burst (Blast (Array; DC 23; Autofire (interval 2, max +5); Accurate 2 (+4), Variable Descriptor (Narrow group - Ice/Water/Heat (Steam)); Full Power) Hydro Shifting (Transform 5) (Array; affects: narrow > narrow - form of water into other form of water, Transforms: 25 lbs., DC 15; Duration (continuous)) Ice Constructs (Create Object (Array; Max Size: 8x 5' cubes, DC 18; Impervious; Precise, Stationary) Icy Bindings (Snare 12) (Array; DC 22, Feats: Improved Critical 2 (Icy Bindings (Snare 12))) Mist (Obscure (Array; affects: visual senses, Radius: 1000 ft.; Selective Attack) Nobellian Longevity (Features 1) Nobellian Physiology (Container, Passive 3) Nobellian Abilities (Enhanced Trait 6) (Traits: Dexterity +2 (26, +8), Charisma +4 (22, +6)) Nobellian Quickness (Quickness 1+5) ([Stacking ranks: +5], Perform routine tasks at 100x speed) Nobellian Reflexes (Enhanced Trait 5+5) ([Stacking ranks: +5], Attack Bonus +1 (+12), Reflex +1 (+14), Feats: Dodge Focus, Improved Initiative) Nobellian Speed (Speed 1) (Speed: 10 mph, 88 ft./rnd) Starlight Vision (Super-Senses 2) (low-light vision, ultravision) Rapier (Device 3) (Easy to lose) Rapier Strikes (Strike 2) (DC 23, Feats: Improved Critical 2 (Rapier Strikes (Strike 2)); Autofire (interval 2, max +5) [6 extra ranks]; Mighty, Precise, Subtle (subtle)) Support Enchantments (Container, Passive Chronomantic Quickness (Quickness 5) (Perform routine tasks at 50x speed; Stacks with (Nobellian Quickness (Quickness 1+5))) Chronomantic Reflexes (Enhanced Trait 18) (Traits: Attack Bonus +3 (+12), Defense Bonus +3 (+14), Reflex +3 (+14), Feats: Improved Initiative 3) Chronomantic Speed (Speed 5) (Speed: 250 mph, 2200 ft./rnd; Stacks with (Nobellian Reflexes (Enhanced Trait 5+5))) Cryomatic Adhesion (Super-Movement 2) (wall-crawling 2 (full speed); Limited (to Ice Surfaces)) Enhanced Abilities (Enhanced Trait 10) (Traits: Strength +6 (22, +6), Dexterity +4 (26, +8)) Attack Bonus: +8/+12 (Ranged: +8/+12, Melee: +12/+16, Grapple: +18/+22) Attacks: Heavy Blaster Shot (Blast 6), +14 (DC 21), Hydro Blast (Blast 12), +12 (DC 27), Hydro Burst (Blast (DC 23), Hydro Burst (Blast 8), +16 (DC 23), Hydro Shifting (Transform 5), +12 (DC Fort 15), Icy Bindings (Snare 12), +12 (DC Ref/Staged 22), Rapier Strikes (Strike 2), +16 (DC 23), Unarmed Attack, +16 (DC 21) Defense: +11/+14 (Flat-footed: +7), Knockback: -4 Initiative: +24 Languages: Neo-Nobellian Native Totals: Abilities 40 + Skills 20 (80 ranks) + Feats 20 + Powers 124 + Combat 36 + Saves 15 + Drawbacks 0 = 255 Age (as of Jan 2019): At least 100 Earth years (chronological), early 20s (human biological equivalent) Height: 5’ 2” (5’ 6 in usual footwear) Weight: 90 lbs. Ethnicity: Nobellian (Russian equivalent) Hair: White Eyes: Blue Background: Zima doesn’t know. She has no idea. The end. No, seriously. Zima has amnesia. She does not have the faintest idea who Marina Morozov is. It’s not the medical condition, either. She’s had herself checked out. There’s nothing medically wrong with her brain. She woke up naked in a back alley in one of the most wretched hives in the universe, knowing nothing but her own name. She was Zima, alias Marina Morozov. And for some reason, she was clutching a rapier in her left hand. The next few days were, um, interesting. She was left handed, which explained why she was clutching her rapier in that hand. Left handedness was rare in Nobellians, which was the name of her species. As was albinism, which she learned she had after a very painful sunburn and that medical check. She could do magic. Control water and a little of her own time. She knew how to use that rapier. She was a very skilled person when it came to killing people, and apparently used to doing so. She was even an excellent singer. She knew how to function in society. The little things like how to use money, wear clothes, eat with utensils, and socialize without sounding like a clueless idiot. Everything else, such as any personal memories of how these skills and abilities were acquired, was blank. Well, not quite blank. How does one explain almost remembering something? She could feel the shape of the memories. She knew they were there. It was like not having the right holovid player to view a particular file format. She didn’t even know how old she was, for heaven’s sake. Still, she earned passage off that wretched hive of a planet. One would think a simple web search would solve this issue. How hard could it be to find a left handed albino Nobellian woman named Marina Morozov? Apparently? Impossible, as Marina Morozov did not exist. She could find Nobellians with all of her search parameters, but none of them looking anything like what she saw in the mirror. Admittedly, she was an amateur at searching the infoweb. There was nothing to do but find a place to stay and build up funds to pay a professional. And as she didn’t have a legal identity (or at least one that she knew existed) the work she had to take was either mercenary or sexual in nature. You, Dear Reader, would not believe the deviants that would line up around the sector to have their way with a beautiful left handed albino Nobellian woman. No thank you, said Zima. Mercenary work it was. Which, of course, led her to the series of events that teamed her up with Jackie, Esme, and Tetsukaze. Those…things…were quite frankly horrifying and she was all too pleased to assist in dispatching them. And thus were formed the Edgerunners. She needed allies, after all, and these were suitable. It wasn’t all sunshine and roses, of course. Her abilities got plenty of use with the Edgerunners. And the more she used them, the more often she would get quite frankly disturbing flashes of memory. And the more of them she experienced, the more she began to think that the person she had been, well…she wasn’t a very good person at all. Quite monstrous, actually. Furthermore, she began to think she’d never meet anyone who knew her because she killed them all. It is, as stated, a disturbing thought. More disturbing still are the fragments of her original personality that keep popping up. The forgotten part of her seems to be genuinely callous, vicious, cruel, and sadistic, and she can sometimes feel it trying to reassert itself. It frightens the person she is now, who is mostly none of those things. The question of what happens to the person she is now if the old one comes back is quite frankly a terrifying one. So, you know, a lot going on there. Time, however, does not stop moving. Zima was with the Edgerunners on that job which brought Roxy Jett, Geojang, and Mirage into their lives. Her Nobellian Hydromancy was arguably the most effective at neutralizing the airborne nanomachines. Between Zima keeping the team from infection and Jackie shorting out the already affected with those energy blasts of hers, they successfully extracted those three from that planet. And then Roxy had to make a holovid about it and annoy, well, everyone. A remarkably foolish decision, in her view, but so it goes. The Edgerunners went from four members to seven. They could take on larger jobs, which was good. Geojang and Mirage were competent professionals, which was also good. Roxy was, well, learning, which was fine. It was fine. And then it was time to chase Kuros to Jackie’s homeworld. It…didn’t work out, and they kind of died. Dusted, is the terminology being used. But it’s…strange. Esme was indeed the only one who it didn’t happen to. Zima may well be the only one who something entirely different happened to. Naturally, she doesn’t remember it clearly. She turned into ice and snow (not dust), and was only dead in the most technical sense. But she knows she was still aware, somehow. She knew time was passing. Extremely odd. But she was literally unable to think about it while it was happening, and afterward was also fairly hectic, considering it was the final battle of the Endgame and all. Further distracting her was the sudden appearance of three old friends (wait, she had those?) working for Kuros The Conqueror. Alsayph with that sniper scythe she’d made herself (why does she know this?), Tuile the Penambru stealth specialist (seriously, how?), and Harifa the Adroit brawler (Alsyaph’s older sister, and again how?). this was not a fight that came to a conclusion, as Kuros and all of his forces were turned to dust and ash and blew away. Except the aforementioned three, who simply collapsed like puppets with their strings cut. Comatose. For no apparent reason. (Thanks…Medic, was it? What an appropriate codename.) She remembered them. Bits and pieces, almost incoherent. But she remembered them. The trouble was that nobody else did. Mirage couldn’t find any mention of Zima and the three of them singly or in any combination. They seemed to simply not exist. This was, simply put, impossible. Nobellian record keeping is meticulous and borderline fanatical. It is only surpassed by the literally fanatical record keeping of the Sionil Union. Who’d never heard of any of them either. Down to their literal DNA. There weren’t even any familial matches, curse it. So either they didn’t exist (which was impossible because they were physically right here) or they had been systematically and meticulously removed from every record in known space without leaving any trace whatsoever. Including the memories of people who had seen the four or their records. Or, it was the more terrifyingly mysterious third option. That they were never in those records to begin with. Zima cannot even begin to grasp what that might mean. So. The Edgerunners are off to the chaos of a universe without Kuros. Jackie has something she wants to look into. Tetsukaze wants to meet with the Red Ronin and get some medical help that won’t break the bank. And Zima wants to find someone, anyone, who can wake even one of the trio of her “old friends” up. She’s no longer sure she wants her memories back at all, but she would at least like to know who she was. And if she really was the monster that those little snippets of memory she has paint her as. Powers & Tactics: Zima is a Nobellian, a wizard with a variety of spells and supporting enchantments, and carries multiple devices. All of her dresses (she doesn’t wear pants or skirts) are discreetly armored, with a focus on negating blaster fire. She has an Edgerunner communicator with its long ranged radio and universal translator. And she carries two weapons in a Heavy Blaster and her Rapier. The former is because magic is a lot more traceable than a blaster bolt. The aforementioned are all technological, but her Rapier is technically an enchanted object, but Zima doesn’t know what the enchantment is, what it does, or how to activate it, so for now it’s a only pointy metal stick she stabs people with. It’s kind of funny, actually. She’s already partly using the enchantment to deliver multiple strikes per attack and doesn’t realize it because it’s perfectly natural to her. The mind forgets, but the body remembers. As a wizard, she specializes in Nobellian Hydromancy. She does not know if she’s capable of casting other types of spells. Nobellian Hydromancy is different from every other form of hydromancy, hence the special name. As a rule, hydromancers can only generate and/or control liquid water. Some of them do some very creative and special things with that idea, but do not exceed its inherent limitations. Nobellian Hydromancy, however, can generate and control water in all of its forms. Solid ice, liquid water, and water vapor. This expands the potential list of powers/spells a whole hell of a lot. So, not only does she have access to all of the tricks normal hydromancers do, but she also has access to some cryomantic, aeromantic, and even pyromantic effects. She could even, theoretically, use water in its plasma form. Though she lacks any normal way to mitigate the extreme temperature of it, rendering it a poor idea. Steam is hot enough. With that said, anyone who is immune to water based effects would basically negate most of her spells. She’d be stuck using nothing but ice and ice only. Her support enchantments are primarily some relatively light chronomancy, cryomancy, and physical buffs. The physical buffs make her stronger and more agile. The cryomancy lets her stick to ice, including the ice she creates with her spells. The chronomancy is a bit beefier. Her ground speed is faster than most hovercars, her quickness is an even match to it, and her reflexes are heightened. This increases both attack accuracy and attack evasion. This does qualify as relatively light, since proper chronomancers can do a hell of a lot more than just “be fast”. Tactically, Zima primarily operates as a battlefield controller and a bit of a switch hitter. With Ice Constructs can alter the battlefield at will, granting cover and concealment to whoever she wants whenever she wants. With her ground speed and ability to stick to said ice, she can end up in places enemies may not expect. Mist is a more traditional “block the enemies’ view but not her allies’” thing. It can also be very effective, especially when it’s time to get the hell out. Beyond that, Hydro Barrage, Blast, and Burst assure ranged domination. Icy Bindings can be supportive in this endeavor. Hydro Shifting is definitely a utility spell. Don’t underestimate of suddenly turning 25 pounds of ice to steam or vice versa. As stated, the Heavy Blaster is for when her magic is unavailable. Her Rapier, on the other hand, gets more use. Since she has a high stealth bonus, can basically grant herself cover whenever she wants, and can reposition into unexpected places with ease, well…in more closed battlefields she does more rapier stabbing than one might expect. She has Accurate, Defensive, and Power Attack for use at need. Improved Feint and Improved Taunt make her more effective overall in combat. Acrobatic Bluff is available, technically, and Move By Action keeps her mobile. Don’t forget Ritualist, which is generally used to pump up her Nobellian Hydromancy for a bit. As for Power Stunts, she doesn’t do them often, but her list of possible ones is very, very long. Every possible water control trick. Every possible cold control trick that uses ice, including all that use snow (as snowflakes are nothing but tiny ice crystals). Every fire control trick that uses pure heat instead of fire, as she can use steam for similar results. And a large list of wind control tricks, as she can manipulate water vapor in many of the same ways. Personality: Have you ever had a feeling you were sure wasn’t yours? Zima has. Quite a few times now, actually. Though that makes it sound like her past self is another personality lurking under her own, and that’s not accurate. It’s more like she’s a woman at odds with herself. The person she is now is very different from the person she was. A person she can only remember in tiny snatches of memory that vanish when she stops paying attention to them. The person she was appears to have been very, very evil. Transparently psychopathic. However, the person she is now is not. And yet…the fragments of her past self can be seen in her, just significantly lessened. Arrogance. Callousness. Viciousness. Cruelty. Sadism. Her past self appears to have been swimming in such traits. In the modern Zima, they are minor at best, tempered by a fully functioning conscience and compassionate heart. Not that she’d ever admit to the latter, as the aforementioned arrogance is perhaps the one old trait that isn’t quite so minor. Well, she is Nobellian. And a wizard. It’s only to be expected that she’d find admitting any level of weakness a humiliating experience equivalent to the level of weakness involved. She’s quite the sharp tongued princess, as a result. This is kind of a problem, actually, rather than merely an endearing character quirk. Because Zima is scared. Flat out terrified, actually. It’s one thing to look in the mirror, see one’s reflection, and wonder who that person is. It’s quite another to look in that same mirror and not recognize the person in it. Meeting her old trio of allies during the Endgame unlocked memories of them. And her. They were not pleasant, even if as a quartet they were surprisingly kind to each other. And so, for the first time since she woke up in that alley, she wonders what exactly happens to her when whatever is causing her amnesia is broken and her memories return. Does the current Zima simply…go away? That’s kind of a terrifying prospect, actually. Basically, she’s beginning to have one hell of an identity crisis. Mirror what’s this thing I see Who is staring back at me A stranger to my heart has filled my mind Mirror, help me Who am I?

Tetsukaze (Takeo Takeda) Power Level: 14; Power Points Spent: 255/255 STR: +10 (16/30), DEX: +3 (16), CON: +7 (18/24), INT: +1 (12), WIS: +2 (14), CHA: +2 (14) Tough: +7/+16, Fort: +10, Ref: +6/+12, Will: +8 Skills: Acrobatics 7 (+10), Diplomacy 8 (+10), Gather Information 8 (+10), Intimidate 18 (+20), Knowledge (Galactic) 4 (+5), Knowledge (streetwise) 9 (+10), Knowledge (tactics) 14 (+15), Knowledge (theology & philosophy) 4 (+5), Language 1 (+1), Medicine 3 (+5), Notice 8 (+10), Sense Motive 8 (+10), Sleight of Hand 2 (+5), Stealth 7 (+10), Survival 3 (+5) Feats: Accurate Attack, All-Out Attack, Challenge - Improved Demoralize, Challenge - Improved Startle, Defensive Attack, Elusive Target, Endurance (+4), Improved Aim, Improved Critical 2 (Automatic Blaster Pistol (Blast 6)), Improved Critical 2 (Automatic Blaster Rile (Blast 8)), Improved Critical 2 (Heavy Blaster Pistol (Blast 6)), Improved Critical 2 (Katana (Strike 4)), Improved Initiative 3, Improved Sunder, Interpose, Luck 4, Master Plan, Master Plan 2 (tactics), Move-by Action, Power Attack, Precise Shot, Second Chance 2 (Toughness saves vs. Force & Plasma), Skill Mastery (Intimidate, KN (tactics), Survival), Startle, Takedown Attack 2, Uncanny Dodge (Auditory), Weapon Break, Well-Informed Powers: Arsenal of Iron Wind (Device 7) (Easy to lose; Custom 7 (Multiple Weapons 7)) Weapons (Array 14) (default power: blast) Automatic Blaster Pistol (Blast 6) (Array; DC 21, Feats: Improved Critical 2 (Automatic Blaster Pistol (Blast 6)); Autofire (interval 2, max +5); Accurate (+2), Precise) Automatic Blaster Rile (Blast (Default; DC 23, Feats: Improved Critical 2 (Automatic Blaster Rile (Blast 8)); Autofire (interval 2, max +5); Accurate (+2), Precise) Flash Bangs (Dazzle 7) (Array; affects: 1 type + visual - visual & auditory, DC 17; Burst Area (35 ft. radius - General)) Heavy Blaster Pistol (Blast 6) (Array; DC 21, Feats: Improved Critical 2 (Heavy Blaster Pistol (Blast 6)); Accurate (+2), Precise) Katana (Strike 4) (Array; DC 29, Feats: Improved Critical 2 (Katana (Strike 4)); Penetrating [3 extra ranks]; Mighty) Plasma Grenades (Blast 7) (Array; DC 22; Burst Area (35 ft. radius - General), Secondary Effect) Stun Gas Grenades (Stun 7) (Array; DC 17; Cloud Area (35 ft. diameter, lingers - General), Range (ranged)) Thermal Smoke Grenades (Obscure 7) (Array; affects: visual senses, Radius: 500 ft.; Duration (continuous), Total Fade; Fades) Borustan Physiology (Container, Passive 3) Borustan Abilities (Enhanced Trait 13) (Traits: Strength +6 (30, +10), Constitution +6 (24, +7), Feats: Endurance (+4)) Starlight Vision (Super-Senses 2) (low-light vision, ultravision) Cybernetics (Container, Passive 15) Cyber Armor (Protection 6) (+6 Toughness) Cyber Quickness (Quickness 6) (Perform routine tasks at 100x speed) Cyber Reflexes (Enhanced Trait 33) (Traits: Attack Bonus +6 (+14), Defense Bonus +6 (+12), Reflex +6 (+12), Feats: Improved Initiative 3) Cyber Senses (Super-Senses 5) (darkvision, extended (type): Visual 1 (-1 per 100 ft), infravision) Cyber Speed (Speed 3) (Speed: 50 mph, 440 ft./rnd) Cyberarm Might (Super-Strength 7) (+35 STR carry capacity, heavy load: 102.4 tons; +7 STR to some checks) Cyberarms Strength (Enhanced Strength (+8 STR) Edgerunner Communicator (Device 3) (Hard to lose) Long Range Radio (Communication (sense type: radio; Subtle (subtle)) Universal Translator (Comprehend 3) (languages - read all, languages - speak all, languages - understand all) Standard Mil-Spec Armor (Device 1) (Hard to lose) Armor (Protection 3) (+3 Toughness, Feats: Second Chance 2 (Toughness saves vs. Force & Plasma)) Attack Bonus: +8/+14 (Ranged: +8/+14, Melee: +8/+14, Grapple: +18/+31) Attacks: Automatic Blaster Pistol (Blast 6), +16 (DC 21), Automatic Blaster Rile (Blast 8), +16 (DC 23), Flash Bangs (Dazzle 7) (DC Fort/Ref 17), Heavy Blaster Pistol (Blast 6), +16 (DC 21), Katana (Strike 4), +14 (DC 29), Plasma Grenades (Blast 7) (DC 22), Stun Gas Grenades (Stun 7) (DC Fort/Staged 17), Unarmed Attack, +14 (DC 25) Defense: +6/+12 (Flat-footed: +6), Knockback: -8 Initiative: +15 Languages: Neo-Nobellian, Nipporustan Native Totals: Abilities 30 + Skills 26 (104 ranks) + Feats 25 + Powers 134 + Combat 28 + Saves 12 + Drawbacks 0 = 255 Age (as of Jan 2019): 40 (chronological), approx 48 (human biological equivalent) Height: 6’ 10” Weight: 450 lbs Ethnicity: Borustan (Japanese equivalent) Hair: Black Eyes: Dark Brown Background: Nipporustans are one of the 108 Borustan tribes. Even divided by 108, there’s still at least a couple trillion members of each tribe, so no they don’t all know each other. Each tribe’s culture and traditions share the common Borustran traits of aggression and rebellion. But the rest is, oddly enough, a different take on a Nobellian culture. Both have many similarities to past eras of Earth’s Japan, albeit as intergalactic spacefaring civilizations instead of much small medieval kingdoms. The Nihogellians are most similar to the Edo period, which was relatively peaceful and a boom period for art and literature. Though swords and honor are still important, they favor flowers and poetry, not blood and steel. The Nipporustans are basically the opposite, being more similar to the Sengoku (or Warring States) period. They weren’t actually strict adherents of Bushido (having never heard of it for obvious reasons) until an Earth samurai (ironically enough, kidnapped from the Edo period) brought it to them. Sengoku period samurai didn’t follow Bushido at all (as it was more or less made up in the Edo period afterward), so Nipporustan culture had only gotten more interesting in the past few Earth centuries. However, the one thing the Nihogellians and Nipporustans completely share as a prominent part of their cultures is endless political maneuvering. With the former at most it results in social embarrassment. Failing the grand game enough can even have economic consequences for the executive class. But people rarely die from such maneuverings. Nipporustans go to war instead. It is the cowardly Nobellians who don’t put their life’s blood where their mouth is. The problem with this is that they’re just as prone to having leadership that is utterly indifferent to life as anyone else. And those such leaders command are just as prone to being too young and too stupid to know they’re committing atrocities and war crimes instead of heroically defending their own from a menace. One such story is that of the sins of Tetsukaze. Takeo Takeda (the closest translation of his real name to Earth languages) believed, once. He wasn’t special. Put him in a holovid, or a game, and he was just another faceless mook. At least, back then. Now he’s uh, a bit better. But then he was just another bright eyed young Borustan issued a blaster rifle and a katana in service of his tribe. He served for three Earth years before the incident. He was a well respected sergeant, but not officer grade. This was fine. He’d have made an excellent career noncom. There was a clan of Venandi. They had served the Nipporustans faithfully and loyally (for Venandi, anyway) for generations. They owned some land. Had their own town and little Nipporustan style Venandi society. But the endless squabbling of Borustan society brought a new faction into power in the tribe. The Venandi lost the political battle before they ever knew it was happening. Indeed, they remained ignorant up until the end. It’s an old story. The new regime didn’t want any “foreigners” in their great nation. Or tribe, in this case. They’d resist being simply removed, and they had allies who could make things difficult. So instead they were framed for treason. A delegation of clan leaders was sent to address this, but they were betrayed and murdered. At the same time, a force was sent to eradicate their town and everyone in it. This is the force Takeo Takeda was on. Tetsukaze is the nearest Earth translation of his nickname in Nipporustan. In English, it means Iron Wind. Even at 18 years old (which is a little older for a Borustan than a human, but still a young adult) he had acquired a reputation for dynamic swordplay, cutting through enemies like, well, an iron wind. Hence the nickname. Nobody said it was a clever nickname. He believed, in those days. Call it misplaced faith. Call it youthful naiveté. Call it whatever you want. The fact of the matter is that he didn’t see anything wrong with wiping a town full of treasonous, backstabbing traitors off the map. He was a soldier. These were his orders. He carried them out. It sounds colder and more unfeeling than it was. The other fact of the matter is that it wasn’t entirely his fault. He and his unit were exuberant young purveyors of violence. They were given a righteous cause to fight for, wound up, and let loose. In the moment, when events are coming fast and furious, professional soldiers (even out in space) trained to act instead of think. It is later, when buildings are on fire, corpses litter the streets, and things are quiet, that there is time to think. Think about the little inconsistencies in the mission brief and reality. There was no military buildup here. There were no secret comm centers. No weapons stockpiles. This was just a Nipporustan town like any other, except populated mostly by Venandi instead of Borustans. His unit didn’t really care. It’s not like they were Nipporustan, let along Borustan, right? So whatever. Let the brass sort it out. They did their job. The mighty warrior Tetsukaze shouldn’t have been bothered, either. This was a great victory to add to his growing reputation. However, he was also Takeo Takeda. A regular Borustan you might find anywhere in the Confederation. And Takeo saw the bodies of children and the elderly lying in the street like garbage, and treated as much by his fellow soldiers. Some of them were even looting while they could. Scattered shots could be heard in the background as pockets of resistance remained. If the cause truly was righteous, he could live with this. It was a horror, but he could, in fact, live with it. He could. Dammit. But if it wasn’t… He remembers their names, you know. His squad. His brothers. The smallest units weren’t gender integrated. Less for them to fight over. Corporal Saito. His right hand. Corporal Kawashima. The sharpshooter. Corporal Miyazawa. Tech support. And Private Nagase. FNG and medic. You think you know people when you serve with them. Hell, they were supposed to be able to discuss anything with each other. Drop the ranks on the floor and avoid coming to blows if they disagreed on matters. They shared a bond of deep brotherhood, or so he thought. So yeah, he thought he could discuss it with them in that moment. He found out he was the only one who cared. Nagase was just green enough that he still trusted the big brass, if not regular officers. Miyazawa was serving his term, doing his job, getting a nice cushy corpo job with his training, and forgetting everything. Honor didn’t even enter into the equation. Kawashima turned out to be casually xenophobic. They weren’t Borustan, so why did it matter if they were being dishonorable? But it was Saito that broke everything. His right hand. His best friend these last three years was, as it turned out, a Nipporustan tribal supremacist. Virulently xenophobic and racist in the bargain. He’d be all too happy to oppress and, more importantly, enslave his fellow Borustans for the horrible crime of not being born into the Nipporustan tribe. Takeo and Saito disagreed with each other, and no amount of talking was going to solve it. So they solved it the traditional Borustan way. With fists and then weapons. The trouble with this was that Kawashima objected to the use of fists and Miyazawa objected to the use of weapons, and as such both were drawn into the dispute. And by dispute I mean 4 way swordfight between relatively evenly matched opponents. Who, at first, didn’t really want to kill each other. They got angrier, the violence escalated…and the Iron Wind cut down three of his most trusted comrades. He says it that way because he doesn’t remember doing it. He was already decently chromed up at the time, but had shown no signs of cyberpsychosis before that day. The stress must have caused him to snap for the first time. Thus the first of Tetsukaze’s many sins were committed. When the regime that ordered the massacre fell shortly afterward and its deceptions were revealed, it only compounded Takeo’s feelings of guilt, remorse and dishonor. Nagase’s testimony had kept him out of prison, and the fall only made his government want to wash their hands of him even harder. So he was discharged from service before the end of his term. He did consider killing himself. Honorable suicide was a way to solve everything. But he’d need a second, and the only person he could possibly ask was Nagase. Who refused, angry that his former squad leader would even consider such a thing. Neither of those positions are strange in Nipporustan society. There is an continuing debate about when and if ritual suicide is honorable. What changed his position on the subject was Nagase saying that sounded more like something Corporal Saito would say than Sergeant Takeda. Takeo expected to become angry at this comparison, but he did not. He instead became thoughtful, running over the memories of his friend and coming to the realization that he, like everyone else, saw what he wanted to see and little else. He bore no responsibility for what he had done except for what he assigned to himself. He had been deceived. By his government. By Saito. By Kawashima. And a little by Miyazawa. Indeed, times were difficult now, but he could endure. Of course, forgiving one’s self is much easier said that done. Takeo and Nagase parted ways, and while they may have kept in contact, never met in person again. And of course, keeping body and soul together with a skill set that consists of “good at killing people” and “good at leading people who are good at killing people” is uh, difficult. Especially when Takeo’s relatively minor infamy preceded him. So, he fell into the mercenary outlaw trade. Shooting people in the face for money, as the stereotype goes. It’s much more complicated that than, but for a man who believed wholeheartedly in Righteousness, Compassion, and Honor, well…his sins list tallied higher and higher. And that’s when his gradually increasing cyber psychosis episodes didn’t lead to another massacre as the Iron Wind cut down everything in its path. He replaced more and more of his body with cybernetics, which wasn’t helping on that front. He didn’t want to kill himself, but he did want to become numb. Unfeeling. Like all methods of coping with severe emotional distress, it was not really working. And this was the situation when he took that fateful first job with a couple of very different Nobellians and a very unusual Sape named Jackie. The conclusion of that series of events led to the formation of the Edgerunners. Tetsukaze has been with them the entire time. Job after job. He’s been able to finally exercise his Righteousness, Compassion, and Honor more often. They recruited Roxy Jett, Geojang, and Mirage after rescuing them from that blighted galaxy. Roxy shouldn’t have made that video. But at least he’s found something of a kindred spirit in Geojang. He’s acting as somewhat of a mentor figure to the Nobellian, despite them being approximately the same age. He was there for the Eternity War and was dusted along with everyone but Esme. He returned for the Endgame with the rest, as the Iron Wind cut his way through Kuros’s forces like a force of nature. But the biggest blow came after this, when he got the message he’d been missing for most of a year due to being, yanno, dead. He was expecting a message backlog from Nagase. There was only one message for him, however. The initial chaos of the Dusting had claimed now Captain Nagase’s life. He had died as he lived, personifying the Nipporustan virtues of Courage and Compassion. Half the crew of a transport with thousands of passengers on it had turned to dust and crumbled, including the entire bridge complement. It was Captain Nagase’s heroic actions that saved the lives of everyone on that transport and then kept them that way until they could be rescued. Unfortunately, he could not do the same for himself, dying of his own injuries. He had no spouse, children, or family. Only a life devoted to service and one friend to leave all the pay he’d never spent due to that devotion to service. His old squad leader Takeo Takeda, now the infamous mercenary outlaw Tetsukaze. It’s funny the things will make someone decide to finally take care of themselves, isn’t it? The Red Ronin have the expertise to repair/realign/rewhatever his neurology to ease his cyberpsychosis symptoms. Jackie put it on the To Do List. Your Sergeant is sorry, Nagase. Sorry for waiting so long to realize you were carrying your own burdens from that day. He will, as you requested long ago now, continue to live on for however much time he has left. Powers & Tactics: Tetsukaze is a Borustan who is augmented with a hell of a lot of cybernetics, and who carries a hell of a lot of weapons and devices. This is all technological in nature. His cybernetics would perhaps be bleeding edge by Earth standards, but out in the universe they’re not all that special, really. What makes him stand out is the sheer degree of augmentation, to the degree that he at first glance appears to be more machine than Borustan. This is not entirely inaccurate. He has replaced all 4 of his limbs completely, augmented his strength (to triple digit tons) and speed (to at least 50 MPH). Ten times as much speed is technically possible from cybernetics, but generally nobody outside of those who routinely hit the fringes of known space bothers. Hovercars, in leased, rental, or taxi form, are simply too plentiful to spend the money on something so unnecessary. They also make the owner of such fast legs stand out, which is the last thing anyone in the mercenary outlaw trade like Tetsukaze wants. Implanted in his torso are cybernetics that enhance his reflexes and quickness significantly. This gives boosts to both his attack accuracy and dodging ability. Even his eyes have cyber that enhances his vision past Borustan standard. But the part that makes him look like an actual robot are the durable metal plates literally bolted onto his body protecting the vital organs in his torso and the joints on his cyberlimbs. The metal and plastics genuinely outweigh what’s left of his organic body, though on pure size they’re about even. As for his weapons and devices, well, there is his Edgerunner Communicator with its 2000 miles of range and universal translator, the armor from his Army days, and a weapon for almost every occasion. These weapons are the usual assortment of blasters and grenades, plus what every Nipporustan soldier carried to distinguish them from other tribes. A katana. The kidnapped Earth Edo period samurai who brought Bushido to the tribe also brought his sword. While the use of melee weapons like swords wasn’t exactly new to, well, the entire universe (and the katana’s design wasn’t, either) it was the mythologizing of the weapon as part of the warrior’s identity and soul that the Nipporustans went a bit mad for. In the ensuring Earth centuries, such ideas have spread much further than that particular samurai would have ever dreamed of. So, yes, the alien from a distant galaxy has multiple ranged energy weapons, plasma based explosives, and even mild chemical weapons. He’s also got a strip of razor sharp carbon steel/titanium alloy that, with his cybernetic might, can slash just about anything right the hell open without snapping like a twig. Believe it or not, melee weapons made of energy or that vibrate are decidedly unpopular among veteran soldiers and mercenary outlaws. Primarily because such weapons are powered by batteries, which both require recharging and can run out at the most inconvenient moment. And all batteries eventually go bad, requiring replacement. Ranged energy weapons already have those problems, but counter them with well, being ranged. A sharp piece of metal has none of those problems, and if well made, can always be relied upon to deliver death at need. This reliability is the entire point of a backup weapon, as any melee weapon ought to be in either trade. Tactically, Tetsukaze is the frontline of the Edgerunners. His Toughness is very high, and he can soak damage the rest of them, except for Jackie, absolutely can’t. His normal first weapon picked is his Automatic Blaster Rifle. Plasma Grenades, Stun Gas Grenades, and Flash Bangs support his blaster fire. Thermal Smoke can provide an escape when things get too hairy. His weapon of choice, however, is his Katana. It’s just that melee combat is not always an option. He has Accurate, All out, Defensive, and Power Attack to shift his caps around with, Improved Demoralize and Improved Startle elevate his overall effectiveness, and Interpose lets him take hits for allies. Improved Aim can increase his accuracy, as well. Move By Action keeps him mobile. When he can use his Katana, Elusive Target helps me avoid being hit, Improved Sunder and Weapon Break let him destroy opposing weapons with ease, and Takedown Attack 2 is how he got the nickname of “Iron Wind” in the first place. Interestingly, he’s the Edgerunner’s tactican, with Master Plan 2 to elevate their bonuses temporarily if he had a few minutes to plan things out. And Well Informed means that while he may not be the most knowledgeable about a given subject, he knows something. Those last two are surprising from someone who looks like nothing more than dumb muscle. He does not power stunt. Personality: The Eight Virtues of every Nipporustan’s Bushido Code is a bit different, as people are gonna be people, even if they’re aliens. This, however, is the broad strokes. Righteousness: This is one of the complex ones with multiple interpretations. After all, ask any ten people what it means to be righteous and you’ll get ten different answers. At the core, however, is a relatively simple idea. One should maintain their integrity at all times and once a decision is made, do not hesitate to carry it out. Strive to be fair and just at all times. It’s the moral purity virtue. Courage: This one is deceptive. Many think it’s about risking your life in combat, and not much else. Bushido being the code of a warrior, after all. This is not true. Courage is about not faltering in the face of negative consequences, no matter how severe. Yes, it is about facing death at the hands of an enemy. It is also about facing the anger of a friend who has erred or public ridicule for one’s own mistakes. Fear is fear, regardless of the circumstance, and a true warrior will always overcome it. Compassion: This is also known as Benevolence or Kindness, depending on who you ask, which should say a lot about how many interpretations of this one there are. But basically, anyone can be a killer. Or whatever the occupation in question is. It takes someone with Compassion, Benevolence, or Kindness to genuinely do good out there in the universe outside of that. Especially if they’re a killer and not, like, a doctor or something. Those with a high level of skill in their chosen occupation have an obligation to aid, protect, and defend others at every opportunity. If an opportunity does not arise, they go out of their way to find one. Respect: This is another where the surface level (of using proper manners and politeness) is all many understand. This is more properly understood being secure in the knowledge of one’s own abilities. A true warrior has no need to prove their self to anyone. Their pride is not stung by casual insults. They use proper manners and politeness because it is the correct way to treat others and for no other reason. A true warrior’s strength is for real battle, not salving his injured ego with petty cruelties. Even when it is the most difficult, a warrior endures all hardships without complaint. Honesty: This is the third one where the initial meaning is deceptive. Just don’t lie, mean what one says, and do what one says they will do. There is no need for “promises” or “giving one’s word”. If a true warrior says they will do a thing, they will do it. End of discussion, barring a significant change in circumstances that makes the thing impossible where it was not before. And even then, the effort will be made regardless. That’s the surface. The deeper level is being honest with one’s self. To view one’s own actions and feelings without deceptions or excuses. Honor: This, like Righteousness, is something with a different meaning to pretty much everyone. So I’ll only state the core idea. Ultimately, the person one is most accountable to for their words and actions is one’s self. This is the morals and conscience virtue, so you, Dear Reader, can understand exactly how difficult it is to narrow down any further than this. However, many consider not bringing down shame on their friends, family, ancestors, and/or the organization they work for to be a part of it as well. Loyalty: This one would perhaps be better named as Responsibility, as only the surface understanding consists of merely not actively betraying those who have placed their trust in the warrior. No, if the warrior commits to being someone’s ally, he must back them until the end of the line or the bond between them is severed. Such a bond can (and as some say, should) endure through death and beyond. Be it parent and child, soldier and superior officer, or friend and friend, each bond has its own slate of responsibilities that a true warrior will carry out as needed. Even if actual lives are not in the warrior’s care, this does not diminish his responsibilities to the other person. Self-Control: Temperance. Everything in moderation. Don’t be a drug addict, drunk, or a dirty stinking slob. Welcome, again, to the surface level. Going deeper means moderating one’s unhealthy behaviors, which is a whole lot more difficult than simply being careful about intoxicating substances. It’s about not doing anything to such excess that it affects the warrior’s ability to observe the other virtues. Food, sex, games, gossiping, brooding, whatever. A true warrior shows the same care for his body and mind that he does for the bodies and minds of others. These are the things that Tetsukaze believes in and attempts to hold to with everything that he is. His overall lifelong success at this, like for most people, has been mixed at best. But he’s always tried, and with the Edgerunners it’s been an easier road. Of course, this makes him sound a little like an Earth superhero, and…kind of? Except not really. Nipporustan Bushido is much more flexible than the standard superhero creed. It does not discourage killing, and isn’t held to nearly so unyieldingly by most. Tetsukaze is no hero. He’d tell you so himself. He’s just an old warrior, holding on to nothing but his code and hope that life will get better. Cyberpsychosis affects everyone who has it differently. The stereotype is that of violent, rampaging maniacs, but those are merely the ones who catch the news headlines for reasons that should be obvious. The only common trait when it is active is a sudden onset of sociopathy and increased susceptibility to both becoming angry and losing one’s temper. The rest depends on the person who, as should be carefully noted, does not undergo any other type of personality shift. So, when someone is already heavily armed and prone to violently losing one’s temper, three guess what happens when they have a cyberpsychotic episode. Tetsukaze was a professional soldier, not a thug who learned to fight scrapping in back alleys. So while he can rampage just fine, it’s more of a controlled and directed thing and not a direct result of a break. He could somewhat control when he went into and came out off a break, as well. However, he’s slowly losing that ability, which is the problem he wants to see the Red Ronin about. Cyberpsychosis has no known cure, but there are treatments. And he’s come into a little money now. He knows Nagase would approve of him taking care of himself, regardless.

Esme Power Level: 15; Power Points Spent: 300/300 STR: +2 (14), DEX: +5 (18/20), CON: +3 (16), INT: +3 (16), WIS: +5 (20), CHA: +5 (16/20) Tough: +3/+10, Fort: +7, Ref: +15/+20, Will: +12 Skills: Acrobatics 10 (+15), Bluff 10 (+15), Diplomacy 10 (+15), Gather Information 10 (+15), Knowledge (arcane Lore) 2 (+5), Knowledge (current events) 2 (+5), Knowledge (Galactic) 7 (+10), Knowledge (history) 17 (+20), Knowledge (physical sciences) 2 (+5), Knowledge (streetwise) 7 (+10), Knowledge (technology) 2 (+5), Language 6 (+6), Notice 20 (+25), Sense Motive 10 (+15), Stealth 15 (+20), Survival 10 (+15) Feats: Acrobatic Bluff, All-Out Attack, Attack Focus (ranged) 6, Attack Specialization 2 (Anti-Material Blaster Rifle (Blast 10)), Challenge - Improved Acrobatic Bluff, Defensive Attack, Dodge Focus, Evasion 2, Improved Aim, Improved Critical 2 (Anti-Material Blaster Rifle (Blast 10)), Improved Critical 2 (Automatic Blaster Pistol (Blast 6)), Improved Critical 2 (Automatic Blaster Rifle (Blast 8)), Improved Critical 2 (Heavy Blaster Pistol (Blast 6)), Improved Initiative, Improved Initiative 4, Luck 4, Move-by Action, Power Attack, Precise Shot 2, Quick Draw, Second Chance (Toughness saves vs. Force), Skill Mastery (Acrobatics, Notice, Sense Motive, Stealth), Ultimate Effort (Aim), Uncanny Dodge (Auditory) Powers: Blaster Supremacy (Probability Control 1) (Minimum Result: 1; Limited 2 (Blasters)) Edgerunner Communicator (Device 3) (Hard to lose) Long Range Radio (Communication (sense type: radio; Subtle (subtle)) Universal Translator (Comprehend 3) (languages - read all, languages - speak all, languages - understand all) Esme's Outfit (Device 2) (Hard to lose; Subtle (subtle)) Energy Scattering Fabric (Protection 4) (+4 Toughness, Feats: Second Chance (Toughness saves vs. Force); Subtle (subtle)) Integral Grapple Gun (Super-Movement 2) (slow fall, wall-crawling 1 (half speed)) Internal Quintessence (Container, Passive 13) Enhanced Quickness (Quickness 5) (Perform routine tasks at 50x speed; Stacks with (Nobellian Quickness (Quickness 1+5))) Enhanced Recovery (Regeneration 14) (recovery bonus 6 (+6 to recover), recovery rate (bruised) 2 (recover 1 / action), recovery rate (disabled) 2 (recover 1 / hour), recovery rate (injured) 2 (recover 1 / 5 mins), recovery rate (staggered) 2 (recover 1 / 5 mins); Persistent) Enhanced Reflexes (Enhanced Trait 25) (Traits: Attack Bonus +4 (+10), Defense Bonus +4 (+20), Reflex +4 (+20), Evasion 2 +1 (+2), Feats: Improved Initiative 4) Enhanced Resilience (Protection 3) (+3 Toughness) Enhanced Senses (Super-Senses 9) (darkvision, extended (type): Visual 2 (-1 per 1k ft), infravision, tracking: Visual 2 (normal speed)) Enhanced Speed (Speed 2) (Speed: 25 mph, 220 ft./rnd; Stacks with (Nobellian Speed (Speed 1+2))) Quintessence Cloak (Concealment 6) (all aural senses, all visual senses; Blending) Nobellian Immortality (Immunity 1) (aging) Nobellian Physiology (Container, Passive 3) Nobellian Abilities (Enhanced Trait 6) (Traits: Dexterity +2 (20, +5), Charisma +4 (20, +5)) Nobellian Quickness (Quickness 1+5) ([Stacking ranks: +5], Perform routine tasks at 100x speed) Nobellian Reflexes (Enhanced Trait 5) (Traits: Attack Bonus +1 (+10), Reflex +1 (+20), Feats: Dodge Focus, Improved Initiative) Nobellian Speed (Speed 1+2) ([Stacking ranks: +2], Speed: 50 mph, 440 ft./rnd) Starlight Vision (Super-Senses 2) (low-light vision, ultravision) Veteran's Arsenal (Device 9) (Easy to lose; Custom 7 (Multiple Weapons 7)) Weapons (Array 19) (default power: blast) Anti-Material Blaster Rifle (Blast 10) (Default; DC 25, Feats: Improved Critical 2 (Anti-Material Blaster Rifle (Blast 10)); Penetrating [5 ranks only]; Improved Range 4 (2500 ft. incr), Precise, Progression, Increase Range 4 (max range x25, 25000 feet), Subtle 2 (unnoticable)) Automatic Blaster Pistol (Blast 6) (Array; DC 21, Feats: Improved Critical 2 (Automatic Blaster Pistol (Blast 6)); Autofire (interval 2, max +5), Penetrating [3 ranks only]; Improved Range 2 (300 ft. incr), Precise, Progression, Increase Range 2 (max range x5, 3000 feet), Subtle (subtle)) Automatic Blaster Rifle (Blast (Array; DC 23, Feats: Improved Critical 2 (Automatic Blaster Rifle (Blast 8)); Autofire (interval 2, max +5), Penetrating [4 ranks only]; Improved Range 2 (400 ft. incr), Precise, Progression, Increase Range 2 (max range x5, 4000 feet), Subtle (subtle)) Heavy Blaster Pistol (Blast 6) (Array; DC 21, Feats: Improved Critical 2 (Heavy Blaster Pistol (Blast 6)); Penetrating [3 ranks only]; Improved Range 2 (300 ft. incr), Precise, Progression, Increase Range 2 (max range x5, 3000 feet), Subtle (subtle)) Heavy Flash Bangs (Dazzle (Array; affects: 1 type + visual - visual & auditory, DC 18; Burst Area (40 ft. radius - General); Improved Range (200 ft. incr), Progression, Increase Range (max range x2, 2000 feet)) Heavy Plasma Grenades (Blast (Array; DC 23; Burst Area (40 ft. radius - General), Secondary Effect; Improved Range (200 ft. incr), Progression, Increase Range (max range x2, 2000 feet)) Heavy Stun Gas Grenades (Stun (Array; DC 18; Cloud Area (40-80 ft. diameter, lingers - General), Range (ranged); Improved Range (200 ft. incr), Progression, Increase Area (area x2), Progression, Increase Range (max range x2, 2000 feet)) Thermal Smoke Grenades (Obscure (Array; affects: visual senses, Radius: 1000 ft.; Duration (continuous), Total Fade; Fades) Attack Bonus: +5/+10 (Ranged: +11/+16, Melee: +5/+10, Grapple: +7/+12) Attacks: Anti-Material Blaster Rifle (Blast 10), +20 (DC 25), Automatic Blaster Pistol (Blast 6), +16 (DC 21), Automatic Blaster Rifle (Blast 8), +16 (DC 23), Heavy Blaster Pistol (Blast 6), +16 (DC 21), Heavy Flash Bangs (Dazzle (DC Fort/Ref 18), Heavy Plasma Grenades (Blast (DC 23), Heavy Stun Gas Grenades (Stun (DC Fort/Staged 18), Unarmed Attack, +10 (DC 17) Defense: +16/+20 (Flat-footed: +10), Knockback: -5 Initiative: +25 Languages: Neo-Nobellian, Old Nobellian , Old Sionil, Outer Borustan, Outer Ingenti, Querethiel Native, Trade Sionil Totals: Abilities 40 + Skills 35 (140 ranks) + Feats 26 + Powers 138 + Combat 40 + Saves 21 + Drawbacks 0 = 300 Age (as of Jan 2019): Over 25,000 Earth years (chronological), early 20s (human biological equivalent) Height: 5’ 11” Weight: 115 lbs Ethnicity: Nobellian (Vietnamese equivalent) Hair: Black Eyes: Dark Brown Background: Esme is extremely old. Chronologically speaking, that is. She’s a Nobellian Immortal. The real deal. She hasn’t biologically aged so much as a nanosecond since before the Classic Nobellian Renaissance 25 thousand Earth years ago. She was born on Old Nobellia being, well, Old. She predates her people’s invention of space travel. She predates their invention of firearms. This is, in many ways, the source of all her problems. She was not the first Nobellian Immortal, and she was very far from the last. Esme is not the name given to her by her parents. She doesn’t quite remember their names or faces anymore. She’s a little sad about that. Her entire ethnic group was then under the thumb of some Imperial neighbors to the north. It was…an interesting age. Where anyone with skill and daring could make their own names. And Immortals do not know what they are. It only becomes apparent much later. So she became a freedom fighter and revolutionary at a very young age. Learned to harness her internal Quintessence, becoming a highly skilled archer. This was a rare and valued thing in those days, before sheer weight of numbers made those capable reasonably common. However, like all things good and bad, revolutions end. Victoriously, in this case. Her people had their own kingdom again. But the new kingdom had no need of such a skilled warrior, and was additionally leery of keeping a Quintessence adept around at all. Magic users invariably caused or brought down unwanted trouble. So she left home and became a traveling adventurer. The tales from those days could fill a book. They have, in fact. She’s written several memoirs disguised as fiction over the millennia. But of course, even Nobellians eventually start to feel time pressing on them. The trouble with Esme is that she kept moving on from an area after a while. She never witnessed old comrades and friends getting older and settling down, because she simply left for her next adventure. She was still young, right? Well. She wasn’t an idiot. There was no way. After a certain point, not having noticeably aged becomes obvious. So she figured out what she was, even if it took her a little while longer than one would expect. The trouble was that she wasn’t the only one paying attention. She refuses to remember their stupid group name. A random conversation with Jackie gave her the word Illuminati. It fits well enough. They wanted her to be one of them. To control Nobellia from the shadows while living in the lap of luxury. Kings were paupers next to them. And honestly? Nah. She liked her life the way it was, thanks. Ah, to be that young and naïve again. These were not the type of people who took rejection well. She was either with them or she had to be silenced. Permanently. Superb. Esme spent from that hectic day until basically the actual Renaissance (which was at least a few thousand Earth years) hiding from those assholes. Said event, as previously noted, catapaulted the Nobellians into space as explorers and conquerors. And Esme (having learned to use firearms and other modern weapons at the same level of proficiency centuries earlier) was on the front lines. Easiest way to duck a group of assholes is to not be on the same planet they are. This too was a very interesting era, until the First Nobellian Civil War kind of broke everything. She fought in the war, of course. Against the Imperials of that era, who had a few familiar faces in their ranks. Dammit. Of course, this just made her problems kind of…worse. Nobellian Immortality was an open secret by the time of the Renaissance, and continued that way up until the First Civil War. It was known to be theoretically possible, but if anyone had it they weren’t exactly advertising. But the First Civil War blew the lid off of the secret. And, uh. Well. What happened was more or less exactly what one would expect to happen if humans discovered there was a tiny subsection of the species that didn’t age to death. At all. Ever. And kept that shit a secret for the entirely of human history. Yeah. It got ugly. Officially, the new Imperial Dynasty said they didn’t exist. It was all wishes and dreams. Unofficially…most of that Illuminati got assassinated or strapped to a lab table in both magical and scientific varieties. So, instead of a relative handful of people with infinite money looking to have her found and killed, she had most of her own people keeping a wary eye on her to see if she was aging. Obviously, she wasn’t. At all. One can imagine how this made her life extremely dynamic and interesting. Never a dull decade. Nooope. This was, of course, when the other dominant feature of her life started, too. The whole…sole survivor…thing. Team up with a group o fellow mercenary outlaws. Work well with each other for a while. Maybe form some bonds of camaraderie and friendship. And then a mission goes sideways and they all die. With Esme being a sniper, she’s always a significant distance away and hidden from the attackers chasing her team. So escaping? Not difficult. Saving her allies and perhaps even friends? Eventually it’s impossible. She knows it’s just part of the life they lead. The only special part is that she doesn’t get old and physically weak/prone to bad decisions due to age pressure. She’ll never have to take that “one big score before retirement” because she will never be old enough to need to retire. So she kind of gets it. It does not make it any better when another team bites it. But one can get used to anything, given time. And time is one thing Esme has in abundance. She fought in the Second Nobellian Civil War too, of course. Chattel slavery was both morally abhorrent and wildly financially irresponsible now that robots were cheap and plentiful. It was only the Nobellian superiority complex and sheer arrogance that kept it going. The First Civil War had been violent, yes, but the second was outstandingly more violent. The first was an internal rebellion, really. Nobellian against Nobellian. Personal. Intimate. See, in the First all Nobellians more or less they agreed they were better than anyone else and thus deserved better treatment. Think of it as a family feud. Yes, there was a lot of anger. Yes, there was a lot of violence. Yes, a whole lot of people died. But Nobellian society itself didn’t fracture. The Empire as a whole never stopped doing its business of exploring, conquering, and exploiting. It just slowed down for a while. The Second, however, was Imperial Nobellian versus well, everyone else in the Empire. The arrogant bastards who sat above the entire universe as gods among mortals opposing a much more egalitarian philosophy held by a wildly diverse group. This was the war that threw siblings against each other. This was real, genuine hatred. Parts of the military mutinied. Everyone from the richest to the poorest ultimately took up arms in one way or another. The war crimes were numerous and absolutely horrendous. Worlds burned. Stars were snuffed out or exploded. Let’s put this in perspective. The First Civil War didn’t kill a full hundred trillion Nobellians. Yes, there were less of them then, but still. The Second killed almost five hundred trillion Nobellians alone. This was the absolute height of Nobellian power and population. There were over two quadrillion Nobellians before the war started. Nobellian society shattered. Imperial business stopped dead. Hundreds of galaxies convulsed with unholy levels of violence, as the rest of the known universe stared in shock and horror. This is what Esme was in the middle of. It is not something she enjoys talking about. The bright side to the Second War is that all but a scarce few of the tattered remnants of the Illuminati were cast down, killed, or strapped to one of those lab tables. And that scarce few were basically as much on the run now as Esme was. If with more resources to their various names. The shadowed side is that Immortal Hunting was no longer under Imperial control, as nothing Imperial existed anymore. So the mega corporations could literally do whatever they wanted, as long as it wasn’t overt enough for the new Nobellian Federation to notice. So her life got yet more dynamic and interesting. It was one thing to distrust any Nobellian who approached her because they might be an Imperial agent. It’s quite another when literally anyone of any species who approaches her might be a corporate agent. To be fair, her specific physical appearance is not known. Looking like a hundred trillion other Nobellians has benefits. And she changes identities and residences pretty regularly to throw them off the scent. Those parts are easy. But evading detection in other more specific ways is not. She’s older than most corporeal beings in the universe, supernatural or mundane. There are both magical and technological means to detect this. It is fantastically awkward for her to discover she’s being hunted in her current city of residence because the local waste treatment plant installed some new sensors and they pinged an irregularity. Which then got investigated. It’s also a bit awkward when a fledgling mage uses a ritual to contact an ancient being for information…and interrupts her in the middle of a meal. Whether she knows what they want to know (often enough, as it turns out) is beside the damn point. She’s clearly just some random Nobellian and they must’ve botched the spell until they either realize that’s not quite true or discuss the matter with someone who does. Or she lets something a Nobellian of her apparent age could not possibly know slip to someone she shouldn’t. Look, she’s a permanent fugitive unless she wants to die or become a lab rat until she eventually dies of it. The bounty for information leading to the successful capture of an Immortal Nobellian is large enough for most people to literally retire immediately from whatever they were doing. It’s a pain in the ass. So that was Esme’s life up until about ten years ago, when she, Jackie, Tetsukaze, and Zima joined up to root out those red insectoid monsters. Of course she had experience doing it. She’s been running around space killing things since long before the dawn of what passes for human civilization. What doesn’t she have experience tracking and killing? She didn’t tell them that, though. She also didn’t tell them any specifics about the nightmare scenarios she got this specific experience in. Before the general protocol for them becoming uncontainable on a planet was to simply quarantine and then glass the whole thing. Oh, yes. Her very long life has been dynamic and interesting. Very dynamic and very interesting. Like the run where they ended up stuck with Roxy, Geojang, and Mirage on the crew. And yes, Kuros Dusting all of the Edgerunners but her was unsurprising. She’s outlived so many teams it’s simply the expected result now. Still. She helped Spike retrieve the new Fire Crystal as part of undoing all that, and then participated in the final battle of the Endgame with the rest of the Edgerunners and Earth’s heroes. For her it was little more than a shooting gallery. But like all things good and bad, it came to an end. She said her goodbyes to the Icons and the Edgerunners departed Earth, directly into the chaos of a Kuros-free universe. Which, uh, well…there’s obviously a lot more of Esme’s life in the Before Kuros Came column than in the After. But this was a guy who basically could completely ignore his capital dreadnought exploding with him on it. This was a being that seemed to be impossible to meaningfully harm, let alone kill. She knows the list of incredibly powerful combatants (both magical and mundane) he crushed like insects. Sometimes in single combat, sometimes after they ambushed him, and sometimes after he ambushed them. This was Kuros The Goddamn Conqueror, terror of the known universe. If he wanted something, he simply took it without anyone being able to stop him no matter how fiercely they tried. And a small group of barely civilized apes from a backwater planet in an unremarkable galaxy thwarted him three times in the past 60 years. And then, just now, killed him and his entire universe spanning military forces. Saying “What the fuck?!” is deeply inadequate for this situation. Yes, they did it with the nigh infinite cosmic power he’d informed them existed in the first place, but still. The entire known universe lived in fear of his next invasion. The very Edge the Edgerunners take their name from was literally the border between his territory and literally everyone else’s. The only living mortals who remember a time before Kuros are Nobellians. And they’re old as shit. So saying that a suddenly Kuros-free universe is in chaos is a rather dramatic understatement. So. You know. Esme’s life isn’t about to get any less dynamic or interesting any time soon. Especially as Jackie, Tetsukaze, and Zima all have goals they’d like to chase after. Well. At least everyone will be too busy to do any effective Immortal Hunting for a while. Powers & Tactics: Esme has a lot going on. She’s an Immortal Nobellian, who have a few minor advantages over humans. See the Nobellian Federation entry for that. She’s one of The Adroit, using her internal Quintessence (the residual mana every being generates simply by being alive) to magically augment her natural abilities. The closest human approximation is Chi, but it’s not quite the same thing. Chi is functionally excess life force, not mana, and it takes years of martial training to produce more than a trickle. The Adroit can do what they do from birth, and only get stronger and better at it through age and practice. So it should go without saying that Esme is very, very good at what she does. Though even she will admit that she’s not using all of her power anymore. She kind of…doesn’t need it? Natural skill became more than adequate long ago, so she just needs a regular boost any high level Adroit could do rather than her full powers. You know. Basic stuff. Enhanced movement speed, physical quickness, attack accuracy, and attack evasion. Improved natural healing powers and physical resilience. Admittedly, the enhanced to her visual senses (extended range and eliminating the need for natural light to see) are more for a specialist sniper than anything else, but still fairly basic. The one thing that might clue someone in that she’s not a normal Adroit is her Quintessence Cloak. There are Adroit who can chameleonize their skin or make their body better at absorbing sound (thus silencing their movements). That’s high level, but not unusual. You see, The Adroit don’t “cast spells” as such. They channel mana and give themselves magic powers that pointedly never affect anything other than themselves directly. Wizards and sorcerers work in the opposite way. If they change anything about themselves with spellwork, they’re doing it from the outside. And, of course, they can affect whatever they want with their spells. Esme is probably the only Adroit alive who knows that this dividing line is not nearly as sharp as it appears to be. It, like everything involving magic, is blurry. Full of exceptions and “grey areas”. Her Quintessence Cloak is one of these. What it actually does is absorb ambient light and sound, rendering her both invisible and silent as long as she doesn’t move particularly fast. So let’s review. She’s faster than any land animal, can recover from even the most grievous of injuries in under two hours, and can blow an insect’s wings off with any ranged weapon placed into her hands. She’s a dangerous woman. For the record, using more of her powers isn’t an Extra Effort thing. It’s a “meditate off screen in between sessions to spend that at least 60 PP she’s not currently using” thing. In addition to being an Immortal Nobellian and one of The Adroit, she also has a big ol’ bunch of Devices. You know, like any self respecting mercenary outlaw would. There is her Edgerunner Communicator with its 2000 miles of range and universal translator. There’s her Outfit with its increase to resilience and integral grapple gun to get to nice sniper nests. The name is a slight misnomer. She has several Outfits but is obviously only wearing one at any given time. And then there’s her arsenal of custom weaponry. Her baby is her Anti-Material Blaster Rifle. The range on it is honestly ludicrous. The maximum, well…there are smaller mountains. She’s shot aerial transports out of the air. Admittedly while they were taking off or landing, not cruising, but still. Over 4 and a half miles is more range than there is distance to the horizon on most habitable planets. And the hitting power is just nonsense for a commonly available man portable weapon, even with the advanced tech out in the universe. The rest is just an assortment of mostly standard blasters and grenades. The range on these is also enhanced, but not nearly as much. Nothing like having something for all occasions, says Esme. It make seem like a lot to carry, but the blasters are partially collapsible and they’re all made of advanced lightweight materials so they’re not nearly as heavy and awkward as the Earth equivalent of her gear would be. Tactically, Esme is a sniper first. She’s got a hell of a lot of range to work with. So outside of dense urban areas she’s not actually beside the Edgerunners in combat. She’s actually behind them or off to the side, using her Anti-Material Blaster Rifle to cover them in sniper overwatch. Naturally, this isn’t always possible. That’s what all her other weapons are for. Like she says, she’s got something for all occasions. Including the previous, she has 4 different single target attacking Blasters of varying effectiveness, Heavy Plasma Grenades to clear out areas, Heavy Stun Gas Grenades for nonviolent takedowns. Heavy Flash Bangs for aid in hitting and/or escaping, and Thermal Smoke Grenades just for escaping. Her sniping ways are aided and abetted by Quinessence Cloak, Improved Aim, Precise Shot 2, and Ultimate Aim. All Out Power Attack can punch through virtually any amount of armoring. When not sniping, Improved Acrobatic Bluff can help her hit, Defensive Attack is on tap for extra accurate enemies, Move by Action keeps her mobile, and Quick Draw lets her swap weapons effortlessly. Take note of how high her Notice is, and those 4 ranks of Luck. She can power stunt, but she never does. Personality: Esme is very…chill. Calm. Levelheaded. People tend to think of snipers as being either cold or friendly, with no other options available. And to be fair, for the majority this is true. Esme, however, was an archer first. She is neither the cold and solitary killer nor a friendly and gregarious sharpshooter. She is that rarest of things, even in the vastness of the universe. A consummate professional and a born survivor. A cold sniper doesn’t work well with a team, which means when the fecal matter hits the oscillating device there is no one to help them. A friendly sniper dies a little inside every time they lose a teammate and friend to such situations. Die enough inside and eventually there’s nothing left of you. So, saying Esme cares deeply about her current teammates in the Edgerunners would be a lie. The key is to get close enough that they will instinctively protect her, but not too close that it tears her heart out when they inevitably die. Of old age, if nothing else. Esme knows. In less than half a century Jackie, Tetsukaze, and Roxy will be dust on the wind. A miniscule amount of time to someone who has lived as long as she has. Even the centuries Zima, Geojang, and Mirage have left aren’t much compared with the infinite time she has. Yet she would never say it doesn’t matter. That their lives never meant anything. It’s the kind of perspective only an Immortal like her could develop, really. One who stayed among the people instead of lording over them like some kind of god. She’s not a god. She eats. She shits. She bleeds. She’s fully capable of dying through violence, disease, or poison like as anyone else. She just doesn’t age. That’s the only difference between her and the rest of the Edgerunners. Between her and most anyone, really. So people’s lives do matter. They’re not boring. They’re alive. They drink. They swear. They laugh. They fuck. Damn, do Roxy and Geojang ever fuck. It does, however, beg the question. How can one who thinks this way have killed as many people as there are stars in a given galaxy? Well…Esme is a survivor first. High ideals are meaningless to a corpse. The above is not an idealistic attitude. It’s a realistic and practical one. And the reality is that sometimes, if one wants to keep living, someone else has to die for it. Their lives may matter, but that doesn’t make them special or irreplaceable. The only life that’s irreplaceable to Esme is Esme’s. for reasons that should be obvious. She’s not a cynic. She’s seen hope, faith, and camaraderie turn the tide too often for that. But she’s also seem them fail miserably, too. The only thing in the universe a person can always rely on is their self. Everyone and everything else is fundamentally unreliable. The part that makes this a realistic take and not a cynical one is that she knows very well that this unreliability is variable from person to person and thing to thing. Almost always is not the same as always. Neither is mostly, sometimes, or whatever other word one cares to use. To put it more bluntly, it doesn’t matter who you are or how much she likes you. She’s not getting killed or captured for you. She knows her own capabilities. She has a vast amount of experience in various types of combat in various locales. If in her judgement (which isn’t infallible, hence her caution) a given mission, job, or whatever is more likely to get her captured or killed than no, she’s not going to do it. Period. The end. Except. Now there’s Jackie. Just Jackie. The rest of the Edgerunners, well…she’s seen these stories play out a hundred times before, to endings happy, sad, and entirely mundane. In Jackie, Esme has found a genuine friend she can completely trust for the first time in…well, she was still using a bow in those days so you do the math. She still won’t march into certain (or too uncertain) doom, but you know…sometime about Jackie seems to make certain doom impossible. Something about Earth’s…what do them call them again? “Superheroes”? She spent a year on Jackie’s homeworld with these people, who turn the improbable into the probable and the impossible into the possible with incredible ease. Without a thought to risk, recognition, or reward. She wants to call them idiots. She wants to call them every kind of fool in the book. This is not how the universe is supposed to work. The worst of odds can only be dared so often before they catch whoever dares them. But she knows they’re not. Instead she simply feels a little inadequate next to them. And so she understands exactly how Jackie feels all the time. For the first time in literal millennia, Esme doubts. She’s not about to switch her blasters to the stun setting, but for the first time since before she left Old Nobellia she wonders. Is survival alone enough? Could she have done better? Done more? She does not have an answer. Yet.

The Edgerunners Overview They’re all running from something. The name itself comes from their ship, the Edgerunner. The name of their ship comes from what they’ve been doing with it. Traveling (or “running”) the Edge, the barrier zone between the universe spanning empire of Kuros the Conqueror and, well…everyone else. And that name will likely live on for some time despite the disappearance of Kuros and all of his forces. But the name Edgerunner is accurate to each of them on a personal level, too. As stated, they’re all running from something. Jackie’s running from both her past and herself. Esme’s running from the secrets inherent in her very existence. Tetsukaze is running the unforgiveable sins he committed when he was young. Zima literally doesn’t remember what she running from due to her amnesia. Roxy Jett is simply running from the law in the form of the Nega Corps and kind of every major government. Geojang, after years of being a assassin, is running from her own conscience and (for lack of a better word) humanity. And Mirage is running from 1) being a technopath in the first place because 2) most of the top megacorps would be delighted to strap him to a table to figure out how technopathy actually works so they can both duplicate and monetize it. They operate like more or less any other mercenary outlaw group slipping around in the cracks between the great powers. Various people, corporations and mega corporations need deniable assets to get certain things done that they can’t be known to have been behind. Or they just need an extra set of hands. Basically they have money and are willing to pay for assumedly competent assistance. The people with the money work through professional intermediaries, who get in touch with the talent. Like the Edgerunners. Without Jackie, they’d probably live right up to the stereotype such outlaw mercenary groups have. Namely, they shoot people in the face for money. Yanno. Thieves. Kidnappers. Assassins. Terrorists. Not the kind of people anyone decent wants to meet in a dark alley, or anywhere else for that matter. Violent, antisocial psychopaths. Etcetera. Ad nauseam. I could go on, but you get it. Like all stereotypes, it skips over all of the nuance, subtlety, and nagging little inconvenient contradictory details to provide an easily digestible factoid for the masses to unthinkingly swallow. The universe is full of people, and therefore it is full of prejudices both big and small. So yeah, without Jackie they’d have to take jobs that were more unsavory, but much less dangerous. The aforementioned assassinations and violent terrorism for hire. Got to keep body and soul together somehow, right? It isn’t Jackie’s moral code alone that changed things for the Edgerunners. It’s also the fact that she can tank plasma torpedoes, blow big holes in heavily armored battleships, and probably bench press the same ship. Being able to fly is just a sweet bonus. Morality is nice, but without the power to back it up folks just get manipulated, used, and then killed when they become inconvenient. That’s life in the shadows, kids. And we all know what vast power minus any morality looks like, now don’t we? That’s right, the megacorps. So someone with both is rather unique and interesting. With Jackie leading the crew, they don’t need to take those high pay and relatively low risk but you’re a total bastard jobs. They can instead take the other jobs that are high risk and high pay (if you live to get it) and the low pay but high morals jobs. The former can be a little morally…dubious…but at least they’re not, yanno, bastard jobs. And it lets them take more of the latter. Gotta keep body and soul together somehow, right? How the Edgerunners got together is in Jackie’s entry here, so repeating the stories now is unnecessary. The Edgerunners Jackie Esme Tetsukaze Zima Roxy Jett Geojang Mirage

Wilona Wilona was not paying attention. Like, at all. Leon’s rebuke had very clearly stung. The discussion continued as she blanked out a little. Anyone who was expecting a wrathful reply would have been very surprised when she spoke quietly at last. “You know, Leon…” She always called him paperboy, to the degree that basically everyone in the room couldn’t be sure if she knew his name until right now. “Sometimes you’re a jerk.” She then stood up and walked out of the classroom, deaf to anything Mr. Hawke might say. She did not go far, slumping to a seated position on the floor next to the door. A few tears leaked out. She wasn’t stupid, damn it. She knew life on the streets wasn’t all sunshine and rainbows. But what the hell else was she supposed to do when Claremont was over? What the hell was she supposed to do with all the skills and knowledge she had? She didn’t know how to live anywhere else. The rules were all different. She’d have to start all over. She cried lightly and quietly. Naomi Naomi sighed as Wilona left the room. She too, knew that life on the streets was not all sunshine and rainbows. She reached into a pocket and pulled out her checkbook.”Neighbor doesn’t want my money? Do you, Leon?” She was making full eye contact with him for that last question, before ducking her head away again. “Cops don’t need more money, anyway.” She was addressing Wil’s departure by not addressing it. Her partner didn’t like it when people saw her being vulnerable and emotional. Though truth be told, Naomi didn’t like seeing her like that either. Wilona has a certain…romanticism…about life on the streets. It might be best if she found out how wrong she was.

Wilona Wilona rolled her eyes at Leon talking about her adversarial relationship with authority figures. “Bite me, paperboy. I don’t need any money. There’s a dozen soup kitchens in this city where I can catch a free meal. You wouldn’t believe how much grocery and convenience stores throw away. Yeah, they lock the dumpsters now but that’s a not a problem when you can burn ‘em off like me.” She grinned. “The key is not to hit the same ones or stay in the same area too much or you might have the cops waiting and it’s a whole thing.” She shrugged. “I can fly, so wouldn’t be a problem if they did, but it just makes things more complicated later. Descriptions of your face and clothes, and now there’s all these do gooders who just don’t understand that you’re fine, dammit.” She was very clearly lost in the past and not paying attention to what she was saying. “Anyway. There’s a half dozen shelters for young ladies in town, and I got my own little places to sleep when they’re full or I’m not in the mood to deal with do gooders. Probably somebody owns them, but I kinda don’t care. If you clean up your mess and don’t leave anything behind it’s like you were never there. So whatever. Winter isn’t a problem, either. Wharton’s not so far away that I can’t fly over and get some wood to burn.” And everyone was looking at her again. “What? I lived on the streets for my whole life before I came here. I know how to survive.” Yep, she was totally glossing over the fact that theft and trespassing were, you know, crimes. “I mean, Claremont’s nice…but I’m not here for me. I’m here for Naomi. Once we graduate, we can go back to our lives and everyone can finally leave us alone because we won’t be underage anymore. Ain’t that right, Naomi?” Naomi Naomi had been…well, not furiously scribbling, but certainly going at a high pace. She had made this really highly detailed portrait of the 70s Freedom League. How she managed photorealism with colored pencils was a mystery for the ages. But you know how it is. Inspiration eventually runs dry. There’s nothing left to draw. Boredom. Ennui. People were talking about being paid for their hero work. Or using their superpowers. Money meant nothing to Naomi, and not because she had inherited her parents’ billions. At that thought, she was now sad. They may have been distant parents, never close to their daughter, but like any child she had loved them. Still did, honestly. Perhaps not as dearly as some children love their parents, but enough to miss them now that they were gone. She started a new drawing. Her parents, as she remembered them, not from a photograph. Wilona was talking, so Naomi was at least half paying attention. “You forgot my money, Wil. Mom and Dad left me a lot.” This was spoken rather idly, as her attention was half on her new drawing. She decided to add herself between them. Wilona & Naomi Wilona flinched. “Shoot, you’re right. But you know I don’t like reminding you about…” Naomi shrugged without looking away from her drawing. “It’s okay.” “How much was it again? That suit said something like billions?” “Yup.” Naomi said this like it was the most irrelevant thing to her in the universe. Which really wasn't far from the truth. Money is nice. Parents are better. “Huh.” And now Wilona was nonplussed and at an impasse. Oh, boy.

Wilona Ryder’s words had thrown WIlona entirely off. If she had a conversational weakpoint, it was more assuredly appealing to her better nature and conscience. “…damn it.” She exhaled somewhat frustratedly. And while her conversational momentum was disrupted, others had more to add. “Yes, yes, you get it! I don’t mean better, not exactly. But there’s no word I know that fits what I mean. Powerful is too narrow, capable is kinda inadequate for the mightier powers in the world, stronger sounds like it's only abut muscles, and better and superior are too easily used to oppress people, like Ryder just said.” She exhaled frustratedly one more time. “Everyone in this room can do things I can’t and are therefore better than me in some ways. Yanno?” She waved off Ryder or whoever else. “Yeah, yeah, more capable, more powerful, pick your own word you like more whatever already. It’s guys like this Groovy Guru person that don’t get it. Being better in the ways that we are comes with…ugh, I hate this word…responsibilities. Savvy? Because if we are better, than we need to act like it. Nobody’s automatically right about everything because they can burn through steel, flip cars with wind, fly, or whatever else.” Wilona grinned ferociously. Friggin’ nailed it. Naomi Naomi had progressed into no longer entirely paying attention. She was deep, deep into her art zone now. Doodling had become sketching had become coloring. Images danced in her mind’s eye, and her colored pencils raced to keep up. Galatea, Mary Minstrel, and the Groovy Guru had been finished and a new page flipped to. And then another, as she was on the third page this class period. She wasn’t drawing the class exactly as they were. She was currently inspired by some of the US History posters she’d seen in class. So the current discussion was framed in her sketchbook as something happening in a certain building in Philadelphia in June 1776, complete with costume changes for all present. It really was amazing what one could do with colored pencils and an good eraser. Was Wilona drawn as acting with a bit more melodramatically passionate than in reality, and thus in the drawing's starring role? Well. Maybe.

Wilona WIlona frowned. “So we’re just assuming it’s a supremacist group, then? Maybe they’re just meta-positive, you don’t know.” She sighed and rolled her eyes. “Look, fascism is dumb. Antifa for life, savvy? But pretending I’m not better in some ways than some rando walking the street is just as dumb. And lying besides. I can burn through steel, flip cars with wind, and fly. It’s not ‘worrying rhetoric’ that I can do things Joe Sixpack can’t; it’s the truth. But!” She held up a finger. “That doesn’t give me the right to tell our boy Joe how to live his life. Yanno? So of course I’m gonna check the situation out and if they’re talking fascism instead powers are the…best…then I’m shutting ‘em down personally.” Between Neko and Owain, the truth of the matter was revealed. “See? Oh, no. It was a bad guy plot. Oh, no. I sent him to the burn unit for being a fascist. Simple and easy.” Naomi Naomi was still puzzling it over, and she was tired from the talking she’d done already. So mainly she was watching Carmen doodle. It inspired her to pull out her own sketchbook. She wasn’t checked out, but having an opinion on something so subjective was itself, well…kind of a pain. People were different. You couldn’t take a standard approach for every possible friend. Some might get mad at you for talking to them about it. Some might only pretend to listen. Others still might listen for real. And then mind control was involved, too. She was sorry most mind controllers were evil, and tried to let Holly sense that feeling. Whether it worked or not, well. Naomi wasn’t a telepath. At all. She was only good at drawing and being invisible. Said drawings were of the Groovy Guru. Or rather, what that name and those powers inspired in her eccentric artistic mind. 70s psychedelic art in colored pencil, my word. With both Mary Minstrel and Galatea opposing him. Those two had pictures in her history textbook that she remembered well enough to draw with.

Wilona WIlona sighed. “Look, it’s not like I want to hurt people, okay?” Everyone in the room had to know she was damn smart, and that was at vicious odds with her usual temperament. “But survival is survival. I remember when the Terminus came. It was kill or be killed, yanno?” Her expression showed that she knew that “be killed” was the kindest option on that menu. “I’m not saying a random supervillain is that serious, but everybody’s gotta decide where to draw the line. If it’s between some piece of…crap…who’s chosen to be an evil…scumbag…” Wilona was visibly choking back the curse words at this point. “And the people I love, I know where I stand. And it’s not on principle.” She raised her hands up in defense. “Again, I don’t want to hurt anyone. I especially don’t want to kill anyone. I’d regret it for the rest of my life.” Her face went hard. “But I’d regret not protecting my own more. Simple as that.” She exhaled and then grinned. “But that’s what we have teammates for, right? To make sure it doesn’t get to that point? Where it’s solely up to me or somebody that thinks like me? So whatever. Plus you all know me. If I took someone off the planet you would know it was me without question.” She laughed. “Pillar of fire the size of a skyscraper stands out, you know?” Well, that came off a bit more casual than she’d like, but whatever. Naomi Naomi was not capable of making a speech like that. God, no. She was just sitting quietly. Again. Absorbing information. Thinking. Looking like steam was about to shoot out of her ears. She understood were everyone was coming from. That was the hell of it. She’d spent time on the streets. She knew reputation was important. If certain people thought they could walk all over you, they’d do it. She knew if it came down to protecting her own life, she’d kill. Not without hesitation or regret, but she did want to live, dang it. She wasn’t a pacifist, you know? Sometimes protecting the vulnerable meant you had to hurt people. But…”Heroes should be better. The Centurion was.” When you put on the costume and started being a superhero, it was supposed to mean something. Right? “He was first. He was best.” She was explaining it badly. As always words were hard. She made a little noise of frustration. “We. Stand. For. Something.” The punctuation was clearly unintentional. She was struggling to say it right. Again, words were hard. “It matters. A lot.” She didn’t know what else to say. And she wasn’t sure if she’d used up her quota of words for the day already.

Wilona Mr. Hawke has asked the duo of WIlona and Naomi to split up on this one. He wanted them to think for themselves, especially the latter. She had a habit of simply following Wilona’s lead when they were together. WIlona had complained as expected, but it was kind of…perfunctory? So, she was in Owain’s group. She laughed at the prompt. “I don’t have any loved ones to threaten except Naomi. She can handle herself fine. And if not,” She held up her right pointer finger. A flame danced briefly on her customary glove before she put her hand back down. “I’ll deal with ‘em myself.” She exhaled. “But you know, I’m not like you, Owain. An extra crispy tongue and hands would prevent any bullsh-“ She stopped herself, rolling her eyes. “Nonsense they might think up.” Naomi Naomi was simply sitting quietly with Neko, Leon, & Holly. The only loved one she had was WIlona, really. And she couldn’t imagine Wil being in danger from anyone. Mr. James and Mr. Lucien, maybe? Hmm. Well, she liked them fine, but loved ones was stretching it. Plus, you know, it wasn’t like she wanted to hurt anyone. But Leon was speaking. “That’s bad, Leon.” She spoke quietly as usual, but indoors and close as they were it wasn’t as difficult to hear her as usual. Hmm. She needed an answer of her own, though…and now she looked like steam was about to come out of her ears. Because she was having a lot of trouble trying to think of a way to nicely persuade the lady not to do that. Because trusting cops to deal with it or doing something mean to her so she couldn’t do anything were both out. And if Holly was right, the answer couldn't be specific to their powers either. So tying the lady up with some invisible bonds forever wasn't on the table either. “Hide the loved ones, maybe?”

I'm filling in for Fox for the fluffy one is busy with life. He shall return, never fear. After some convos in Discord and a change or three, the time has come. Thou art APPROVED