The Age of Wonders Universe

[SilvercatMoonpaw]

If Tunguska is Roswell, what's Kapustin Yar?

[DaughterofEchoes]

Previously more successful rival program.

In all fairness, the alien tech wouldn't power up until N-day....

[Charles Phipps]

Looking forward to reading about it!

[Phrozen]

I guess it is a toss up for whom is more a insecure child inside: The Divine Leader or Adonis. Though Adonis can do heroic things when it is in his best interest or another villain hits one of his many anger buttons, like taking on the One Above All's cyborgs and pretty much trashing them. (Really, if Adonis was in HED! he would be a Divinos foe)

The thing that confuses Pendulum and others about the Organization is that in no way should work logically or even travel in the same circles. South American drug cartels mixing it up with Indonesian rice exporters and such.

The leadership of Pendulum is great and a varied cast of characters. Mercy Island is neat and I can see Pendulum spinning off an SCP like department beginning with Mercy Island. Of course that department would be the target of extra-dimensional invaders, supervillians, and general chaos.

[EnigmaticOne]

Shimmer

Though she wasn't quite as intelligent as the darling younger brother of the family, Juliet Frazier has always had a rather keen knack for discerning human nature. When Benton was bullied in his early years by somewhat older neighbors who seemed golden boys, Juliet figured things out despite Benton's silence and kicked the stuffing out of them, afterward tenderly bandaging up Benton and treating him to ice cream.

This is a basic summary of what Shimmer is like: a pretty, charming, kindly, caring, generous soul who wouldn't hurt a fly - unless the fly was spreading disease, in which case she'd splatter the bug pronto. Basically, she's not a pushover despite her attitude, and those who deserve punishment get it.

Juliet was the only offspring in the household, living at home while in college, trying to decide on a career choice when her light-based powers, capable of large glowing auras, a protective force field and energy blasts started to become apparent after the CERN accident.

She held off for a few months, until she decided that Adonis was simply too much of a jerk to be trusted to protect society, so she would be a real superhero. Ironically, her team-up with Momentum against Adonis was not her first meeting with the Greek god-compared man. He'd made overtures to her before, but she'd always seen through to what would happen if he didn't get his way.

Momentum is far more attractive to her, and admittedly she's entertaining the notion of dating the hardworking partner of hers. Unfortunately, the specter of Adonis still looms, as released due to 'celebrity parole' (the treatment accorded to people like Paris Hilton & Lindsey Lohan) he has recently made a return and grown more fixated on Shimmer.

Juliet thinks she can handle the man-brat again if need be, Dr. Benton Frazier profoundly disagrees, and in a brotherly protectiveness has pushed for Pendulum to 'neutralize' Adonis, given his sociopathy and definite power. Stretched as the agency is, this hasn't happened, but Benton is already considering sidestepping Commander Adiv's military authority and arranging a MONSTER squad (Metahuman Overall Neutralization Strike & Tactics Emergency Regiment) to independently go after Adonis.

[Phrozen]

Funnily enough I just finished up a write up of Shimmer but didn't get in before your post, which was cool. Oh well, I will tweak and use it for another character. Maybe a villain. Need more of those now. We actually had the same idea that Shimmer is the hot personality while Momentum is the cold personality.

[Charles Phipps]

Shadow Lynx

"Please, another bunch of disgusting brainless thugs willing to carve other people up for a bit of cash. Killing them would be a public service. Let's start with THAT one."
-Typical Shadow Lynch dialogue.

Shadow Lynx has lived an extremely hard life. How hard of a life? Start with an abusive set of parents, move to running away, involve drug addiction, add slavery, and followed that up by being sold to a serial killer. The fact she managed to save herself even before her Nexi powers manifested is a testament to her skill and determination.

When Mister King finally met her, Shadow Lynx had already started putting her unique abilities to use. Specifically, she'd decided to start removing the individuals involved in the slavery ring she'd been abused by (along with other people she viewed to be irredeemable) one member at a time. These weren't pleasant kills, either.

Shadow Lynx is half-insane, determined to strike back at everyone who even remotely reminds her of her abuse. If not for Mister King directing her, she would have long since become a supervillain.

Shadow Lynx's abilities allow her to manifest constructs of darkness that usually take the form of whips, demonic cats, and a pair of swords. She's been frequently known to use her abilities to lift her own shadow in order to gain wuxia-like jumping powers as well as shield herself from bullets.

In short, she's a one-woman-army.

Shadow Lynx's constructs draw from a dark and terrible dimension called The Titanverse. She is unaware that her constructs are sentient, despite them displaying malicious personalities, and employs them liberally.

She rarely mentions her constructs speak to her in her dreams either.

Mister King, being no stranger to violence himself, offered her a place in the Order with the caveat she tone down her massacres. This really hasn't worked all that well as it's usually only the influence of Mister Arcane and Super Dragon Punch Zero that prevents her from going torture-porn on her victims.

Not that most don't deserve it.

The Pendulum has so far turned a blind eye to the activities of Shadow Lynx south of the border, at the request of the Mexican government of all people, however it may come to the point where she's not operating with even the remotest approval of the law soon. In which case, she may be hunted down by her own teammates.

It's something that Mister Arcane dreads because he and she had a brief affair during the start of her team membership.

Shadow Lynx initiated the affair in hopes of manipulating him. She didn't expect him to see through her damage and try to help her cope with it. Ironically, this has prevented her from degenerating to the point of ignoring collateral damage.

Unfortunately, she's stopped listening to him

Shadow Lynx, herself, thinks of the Order as the only people she's ever had she could call friends or family and it bothers her she can't stop. Shadow Lynx covers her deep emotional damage by adopting a haughty imperious personality. She frequently mocks everyone around her and her tongue is never anything but sharp. She is, appropriately enough, still friends with Mister Arcane and considers Mister King a mentor.

She had a nasty break-up with Dark Sun and the two are not on speaking terms. Super Dragon Punch Zero is the only member of the team she actively loathes while treating Foxfire rather gently. Newer members find her reserved and uninterested in knowing them. The exception to this is Fade who she considers to be a worthy ally.

Shadow Lynx's costume consists of a ninja-like set of pajamas with a veil over her face. The veil hides the horrific damage done to her face done by the serial killer who held her hostage. She has no idea that said individual, Shinobi, is still alive.

Ironically, the leader of the Five Psychos is completely unaware of their connection and the two have fought without the other recognizing their victim/abuser.

Shadow Lynx has recently learned to "veil" herself with her shadow powers and go out looking like a model-beautiful Mexican woman in her twenties. Shadow Lynx uses the millions in cartel money she's stolen to travel the world, picking targets and assassinating them the Order might balk at. Some of these targets are extremely influential and powerful people. If this were discovered, Pendulum would immediately demand her head.

Player characters who encounter Shadow Lynx will find her a charming individual but one who is unable to hide her damage after an extended period. Shadow Lynx usually compensates for this by trying to seduce her way out of any problems or lying. She is bisexual and happy to apply her charms to either sex, partially as a means of self-inflicted torture. Curiously, despite her abuse, sex is still one of the few coping means she has.

[Charles Phipps]

El Grande

"THE FORCES OF JUSTICE WILL ALWAYS PREVAIL! WE ARE POWERED BY THE PRAYERS, VITAMINS, AND HEROIC LOVE OF OUR FANS! YEAHHHH!"
-El Grande to the bewilderment of his associates.

Boris Valentino a.k.a El Grande is, in some ways, the opposite of Adonis. A former professional wrestler, El Grande suffered the same fate as many older mid-card wrestlers. He was addicted to painkillers, suffering from numerous chronic conditions, ravaged by steroids, and bankrupt. When his daughter in a car wreck on N-Day, as a result of his gaining superpowers, he completely lost his mind.

Boris Valentino came to believe that his professional wrestling identity of El Grande, a gentle giant Face with almost superhuman-like abilities was actually his true self. He's even come to believe he hails from Parts Unknown, is possibly an alien, and draws his power from the loving support of his fans.

Boris suffers rare moments of lucidity, especially around the Order, and becomes deeply depressed during these times. At least part of him is aware he's play-acting and he desperately wants to atone. Unfortunately, he believes what happened to his daughter was unforgivable.

In fact, of all things, El Grande draws his strength from Mother Earth. While Mister King is skeptical, Mister Arcane has come to the conclusion that El Grande is a geomancer who gains incredible physical strength and invulnerability as long as he's on the ground. When he's firmly planted, he exerts a field around himself that he's able to keep skyscrapers from falling over and able to lift a battleship over his head (he needed scuba gear for that, though).

El Grande is capable of doing other geomancy stunts like healing polluted lakes, rivers, skies, and so on but he hasn't the spiritual background to understand this. If he did, ironically, he could start changing the planet's ecology alone.

Obviously, this gives El Grande an incredible weakness as his power immediately halves when he is lifted off the ground and drains away shortly thereafter. He is also completely powerless on any other planet than Earth-0 or in space. Still, El Grande hasn't gone around advertising this weakness so few villains know this. The exception to this is, ironically, during super-leaps. Due to his background in wrestling, he doesn't see this as leaving the Earth and can move around like The Incredible Hulk with no loss to his power.

Ironically, El Grande could expand his abilities to draw from the entire universe or Nexus but that's way above his pay-grade.

Furthermore, there's some indications he's immortal. When the Murder Machine impaled him on a flag pole, Mister Arcane appealed to the fans of El Grande over a television set as a last ditch effort. Much to everyone's surprise, El Grande pulled himself off and proceeded to beat Murder Machine into next week. He also seems able to gain a temporary boost from having his memorabilia around him, which the WWE has been quietly re-releasing.

Quietly because El Grande isn't seeing a cent of this.

The UFFC has recently hired El Grande as one of their star attractions and made billions in merchandising off of him. Due to El Grande having Pendulum's lawyers behind him, he's got a significant chunk of this that he's given away to charity.

Most of the money is used in his daughter's name to help children suffering from rare diseases and to help underprivileged kids go to college. He doesn't feel it's nearly enough to pay for his sins and prefers to sleep in a ratty trailer than enjoy any of his money.

El Grande is over seven-feet-tall, weighs over four hundred pounds, and is never EVER out of costume. This includes a one piece spandex suit, a huge flamboyant mask, and a long shiny cape. Sometimes, if he's attending a formal occasion for example, he makes sure he puts on his World Heavyweight Championship Belt. A title he only held for a week as part of a promotional gimmick.

Super Dragon Punch Zero is a bit in awe of his teammate, having grown up watching him wrestle. Mister Arcane is oddly protective of the man, considering him a goodhearted but broken soul. Mister King couldn't care less about the man's damage and makes liberal use of him. Shadow Lynx considers him nothing more than a fool while Dark Sun's opinions are...mixed. As for El Grande, himself, he thinks all of his teammates are fellow professional wrestlers.

Who fight crime.

Yeesh.

One thing to note about El Grande is he's fanatically protective of children. While all of the Order are protective, seeing someone under the age of sixteen harmed causes an unstoppable superpowered rage within him. He gains the ability to do things like cause an earthquake with his foot, cause plants to grow into giant beakstalk like weapons, and can totally ignore his normal weakness.

During their mission to Earth-17, El Grande witnessed the tongues of children being cut out so they could be made into slaves and single-handedly devastated the Imperialists First Army. An army which included many Nexi. He's since adopted several of the children and has them cared for in a mansion he's purchased far away from the danger he experiences.

Sadly, he mostly communicates via teleconference because he sees himself as an unfit father,

[Charles Phipps]

Dark Sun

"God people, why does every superhero team have to be composed of complete lunatics?"
-Dark Sun, as usual the only sane woman.

Summer Wilson was playing the part of a vampire extra in Undead Assassin, a decidedly B-budget movie which was the only work she could get as an Asian American actress of decent but not exceptional looks and middling talent. The San Fransisco Native was affected on N-Day like so many others but not in the usual way. Screen King developed his ability to alter reality to the point that people became characters or props came to life. Summer Wilson joined the ranks of the many people bitten by the newly undead star, Byron, who made her one of his numerous slaves.

Thankfully, Byron was more interested in keeping her as eye-candy rather than misusing her.

Summer Wilson maintained her true identity despite the heavy state of hypnosis Byron put her under and was able to adjust when she was freed months later by the Order. Still, she found herself in a whole new world. A world were superpowers, magic, monsters, and more existed.

Oh, and she was a vampire.

Summer barely managed to survive the encounter with the Order as they blew up Byron's makeshift vampire community, killing the majority his kind but failing to destroy their founder. Summer later found refuge with a friendly but psychotic Nexi named Fantasy. Mister King tracked her down and almost staked her before he realized she was surprisingly coherent. Mister King let go with the promise she would never do harm to innocent life.

A lesser mind might have crumbled under this revelation. Indeed, the adjustment to viewing people as sources of blood and biting as equivalent to sex took awhile to get used to. Many other vampires rescued by the Order were so twisted by Byron's abuse and their new hungers they had to be put down. Not Summer, though, she saw opportunity.

Now as the first genuine vampire superstar who isn't a psychopath, Summer has found herself a niche in the Hollywood market. There are crowds of adoring B-positive fans, both male and female, lining up to become her snacks. She's quite terrible on screen but the special effects have never been more realistic. The fact she's not afraid to enhance her charisma with her powers hasn't hurt either.

Everything would have been fine if not for the fact Summer felt guilt about her survival. Wanting to repay the Order for helping her escape Byron, she joined for what she assumed would be a couple of weeks.

That was years ago.

At heart, Summer can't help but want to help people and has discovered she gets more out of fighting criminals and rescuing the oppressed than she ever did acting. That doesn't mean she still doesn't insist she's an actress first and a superhero second but it's becoming more hollow all the time.

To make things even more complex, being a member of the Order has helped her career tremendously. All of her incredibly badly done movies have become cult-classics while she's offered a ridiculous number of roles every day. Dark Sun takes plenty of these but is often called away off-set to fight evil.

Hollywood, so far, just thinks it's the price of good publicity.

Dark Sun is an overtly sexual and somewhat prima-donna-ish member of the team. She's slept with a number of her teammates and enjoys trying to seduce other superheroes. The fact her seduction usually requires a cookie afterward is considered to be a small price to be for the explicit joy of her company.

She hasn't changed appearance but has gained considerable confidence in addition to her "unique" look.

Despite possessing many of the traditional powers of a vampire and few of the weaknesses (since filming in the dark is expensive - she just has to wear sunglasses and heavy clothing due to the "rules" of her movie); Summer didn't particularly like her transformation. The benefits were drastically outweighed by the number of weirdos who wanted her to convert them or drive a stake through her heart.

[Voltron64]

Here's an entertaining thought, one of those insane vampire novel fans was also affected by N-Day.

But rather than turning into a vamp, she instead gained the ability to transform into a Lovecraftian abomination.

http://www.sotatoysonline.com/images/Nyarlathotep-cropped.jpg

[Charles Phipps]

Here's an entertaining thought, one of those insane vampire novel fans was also affected by N-Day.

But rather than turning into a vamp, she instead gained the ability to transform into a Lovecraftian abomination.

You might want to tlink to the image, it's having trouble showing up.

Good idea, though.

[Phrozen]

Starblind

"They may call us Nexi but those scholars who do will not admit the truth. Gods walk on the the Earth, and we are them." ~Starblind recruiting for her crusade.

Amanda Trung who was a child who was never wanted. Her single mother abandoned her at the mall when she was four. Over her life she was handed off from foster home to foster home. Some were abusive, but most ignored her. When she turned 16, she ran away from her foster home. She was reported missing but no one much cared about a foster kid running away. Amanda made her way to New York City and joined that large vagrant population there.

Life on the streets was hard and Amanda's conceptions about how the world worked were set in stone. The strong ruled the weak. If you want something take it by force or steal it. Empathy was a sign of weakness. During her four years of the street Amanda did anything to survive. She learned to fight, steal, beg, and manipulate among other things. Her life on the streets also brought along addictions, first to dull the boredom and pain. Then to shut out the world that was so harsh and cold.

One winters day after N-day, Amanda found strange small purple gem about the size of the dime. Thinking that she could pawn it for some money. When she grasped the gem her mind was completely taken over. Walking like there was nothing else in the world except for her destination. Amanda was heading towards the lake in Central Park and promptly walked right into it disappearing under the water.

Rescue services tried to recover the body as there were plenty of witnesses. The rescue services soon left as night was falling and temperatures were dropping below freezing. Over the night the lake froze over eliminating any chance of finding the body. Since no one reported a woman matching Amanda's description missing the city decided to see if a body would come up in the spring. Amanda's strange disappearance was given a four paragraph article on page five of the New York Times.

On the first day of spring, visitors reported a strange purple glow coming from the center of Central Park lake. The police soon cordoned off the whole lake. At exactly noon out of the center of the lake exploded a figure who shot up into the air about 15 feet. The figure was the former Amanda Trung. Naming herself Starblind, the figure called herself a goddess and the assembled police should bow down in worship. When the police did not immediately do so a bright purple flash erupted from Starblind which blinded the assembled police. With that Starblind flew from New York City down into Mexico.

Starblind claims that she is a goddess and that all Nexi are divine beings. She also claims that the Nexus particle is alive and is the soulpower of god and goddesses that seek out those who will rule the world. She also claims that the Nexus particle that is part of her speaks to her, giving her knowledge far beyond mortals. Starblind is quite clear that the Nexi should be worshipped and held in reverence by humanity. Humanities place in her world view is at the feat of the Nexi as second class citizens at most. Down in Mexico she has a small cult dedicated to her as a star goddess. Amanda demands absolute servitude from the humans in her cult. She will use them and abuse them at her pleasure and they will gladly sacrifice anything for her.

Starblind is a light controller who can shoot blasts of searing purple lasers, bright blinding flashes of light, and illusions. Her light seems to be purple tinged. Her skin is made of many nano sized crystals making her tougher and stronger then a normal person. Her body also absorbs light. Starblind usually wears robes of purple and gold. Her looks are an idealized version of Amanda's but her eyes are shining purple gemstones. Starblind does not answer to the name Amanda Trung saying that Amanda is dead.

[Charles Phipps]

Nice character.

I definitely think she has potential to be an interesting villain for our relatively small group of heroes right now.

I wonder if she's encountered any of the ones we've already met since she operates out of Mexico.

Whatever the case, good job!

[Voltron64]

Developed a god complex as a means of escapism from her hellish life and to cope with her new abilities. It's a possibility at least.

That or she's possessed by some jerkass goddess.

[Phrozen]

That is up to the GM.

Though both would be an equally valid interpretation of what exactly is going on in her head.