Avenger Assembled

Midnight senses that, one way or another, Erde is no longer considered a likely threat by the heroes of the 25th century. It doesn't seem to be for sinister reasons, but it's tough to tell with these people.

Ape with a Power Ring PL: 10 (150) Abilities: 26 pp STR 30 [22] (+10/+6) DEX 14 (+2) CON 20 [16] (+5/+3) INT 12 (+1) WIS 12 (+1) CHA 10 (+0) Combat: 20 pp ATK: +5 (+4 w/Growth, +8 w/Power Ring) DEF: +5 (+4 w/Growth, +10 w Power Ring) Init: +2 Grapple: +16 w/Move Object, +18 w/Growth Saves: 10 pp TOU +10 (+5 Con, +3 Protection, +2 Defensive ROll) FORT +7 (+5 Con, +2) REF +5 (+2 Dex, +3) WILL +7 (+2 Wis, +5) Skills: 48 r=12 pp Climb 4 (+10) Craft (mechanical) 4 (+5) Disguise 0 (+0/+40) Handle Animal 10 (+10) Intimidate 8 (+8/+10 w/size) Languages 2 (French, Swahili; Base: English) Notice 4 (+5) Pilot 8 (+10) Sense Motive 4 (+5) Survival 4 (+5) Feats: 9 pp Animal Empathy Defensive Roll Dodge Focus Move-By Action Power Attack Startle Takedown Attack Track Uncanny Dodge (auditory) Powers: 69 pp Comprehend 2 (speak to and understand animals, Flaw: Simians Only) [2 pp] Device 11 (Power Ring, Hard to Lose, PF: Restricted [simians]) [45 pp] Blast 12 (PFs: Accurate 2) [26+3=29dp] AP: Create Object 8 (Extra: Movable, PFs: Selective, Stationary) AP: Morph 8 (any humanoid; Extra: Continous, PFs: Covers Scent, Precise) AP: Move Object 12 (Heavy Load: 48 tons) (PFs: Accurate 2) Flight 3 (50 MPH) [6dp] Immunity 9 (life support) [9dp] Impervious TOU 10 (Flaw: Limited [Physical]) [5dp] Shield 6 [6dp] Growth 4 (Large size, Extras: Continuous [+1], Flaws: Permanent [-1], PFs: Innate) [13PP] Leaping 1 (2) [1 pp] Protection 3 [3 pp] Speed 1 (10 MPH) [1 pp] Super-Movement 1 (Swinging) [2 pp] Super-Senses 2 (Acute Scent, Low-Light Vision) [2 pp] costs abilities 26 + combat 20 + saves 10 + skills 12/48 + feats 9 + powers 69 = 150 pts ------------------------------------------------------------- Design Notes: Here's a gorilla with a power ring, based on Doc's Powerhouse with a Power Ring build and Ecal's Animal Scientist build, using the standard mechanics we've hammered out for low-level power rings and gorillas around here. Skill-wise she's basically a simian Hal Jordan, a veteran soldier and pilot and skilled fighter, as well as a mighty gorilla who can scramble up walls, throw motorcycles, and generally monkey around when necessary. (That's terrible, of course; gorills are apes, not monkeys!) He can also talk to other apes, even gibbons, orangs, and chimpanzees! (Though you have to be careful about chimps because all they say is terrible swears!) Unlike a lot of power-ring users, her ring doesn't actually make her tougher, it just shields her from attack. She doesn't need much of a Toughness boost that way, she's already as tough as a mighty ape! She flies decently fast with the ring, at least for urban adventures, and can do the usual blasting, lifting heavy objects, and creating energy barriers that your typical power ring users can. One difference is that her ring also lets her disguise herself as a normal human, or close to it anyway; a good way to maintain something of a normal life despite being an ape in a world of men! She works fine as a native hero of Earth-Ape, perhaps one who has relocated here for personal reasons or as part of a hero exchange program, or you could say she's a native hero of my own Gorilla Island. A tweak would be to make her an uplifted 'normal' gorilla; perhaps she escaped from the secret lab where scientists were experimenting on her brain, taking with her a mysterious space artifact they'd been examining in the test chamber next door! Or maybe the ring is what makes her smart, and you can fold some (but not too much!) Intelligence into the ring and explain that it's an artifact that uplifted her. If you don't like the simian stuff, maybe you can make her a member of a giant alien species; this would work pretty well as a Kilowog expy...

Armored Patriot PL: 10 (150) Abilities: 40 pp STR 30/18 (+10/+4) DEX 20 (+5) CON 18 (+4) INT 16 (+3) WIS 14 (+2) CHA 14 (+2) Combat: 24 pp ATK: +6 (+8 Blast/+10 Melee) DEF: +10 (+3 flat-footed) Init: +5 Grapple: +14/+26 Saves: 13 pp TOU +10 (+4 Con, +6 Protection) FORT +8 (+4 Con, +4) REF +8 (+5 Dex, +3) WILL +8 (+2 Wis, +6) Skills: 60 r=15 pp Craft (Electronic) 7 (+10, Skill Mastery) Craft (Mechanical) 7 (+10, Skill Mastery) Diplomacy 8 (+10) Intimidate 8 (+10) Knowledge (Tactics) 7 (+10) Knowledge (Technology) 7 (+10, Skill Mastery) Notice 3 (+5) Sense Motive 8 (+10, Skill Mastery) Survival 5 (+7) Feats: 15 pp Attack Focus: Melee 4 Benefit (Security Clearance) Dodge Focus 4 Evasion Leadership Master Plan 2 Power Attack Skill Mastery (Craft [electronic], Craft [mechanical], Knowledge [technology], Sense Motive]) Takedown Attack Powers: 45 pp Device 11 (Power Armor) (Hard to Lose) (PF: Restricted [voiceprint]) [45 pp] Blast 12 (PF: Accurate) 'laser' [25+2=27dp] AP: Damage 10 (Extras: Selective Attack, Targeted Area [Cone], Flaw: Action [Full], PFs: Accurate 2, Indirect 3) 'missiles' AP: Enhanced STR 12 and Super-Strength 6 (Heavy Load: 48 tons) (PF: Groundstrike) Flight 3 (50 MPH) [6dp] Immunity 5 (disease, environmental radiation, poison, suffocation) [5 pp] Protection 6 (Extra: Impervious) [12dp] Super-Senses 5 (Accurate Extended Radio Sense, Uncanny Dodge [radio]) [5dp] Drawbacks: -4 pp Normal ID (full round action, -4 pp) costs abilities 40 + combat 24 + saves 13 + skills 15/60 + feats 16 + powers 45 - drawbacks 4= 150 pts ------------------------------------------------------ Design Notes: Here's a mashup of a Patriotic Hero and Battlesuit, based on the post-Civil War fake teaser picture of Iron Man wielding Captain America's shield. I think this works just fine as a badass soldier-type inside the latest in top-of-the-line government armor (government-made power armor that isn't very good is something of a staple of the sub-sub-genre; but luckily this guy is badass enough that he's good even in the government-made stuff). He's a solid PL 7 in hand-to-hand without his armor (and given a well-made, high-caliber army weapon, easily capable of being that good with a gun too), but moves up to a nice PL 10 in suit. He's got super-strength, he can fire lasers, and somewhere in there he's got a storm of missiles that can swoop around and take bad guys from behind without hitting any innocent targets around. Thanks to his military training, he's got much higher exotics than your typical battlesuit, though that comes at the cost of a lower INT and fewer skills. He's a gearhead more than a scientist as such. He's a good planner and good leader, though he's not quite as inspiring as those guys who are fighting on the ground level alongside your typical soldier. His suit is rated to stand up to your usual biological/chemical/nuclear weapons, though not really spaceworthy: he's not supposed to be doing that with this government-issued piece of Detroit iron! He's not quite fast enough to keep up with a jet, but there's actually very little aerial combat in most American wars these days; Flight 3 lets him be reasonably effective in urban combat. He's not actually the result of a super-soldier serum, he's strong but not peak human strong, if you want that, reallocate some points or he'll be way too strong inside the suit to meet caps. If you don't like the idea of making him an armored patriot still working for the government, this works just fine as a veteran out of the Army, maybe a mechanic from the military, who put together a suit of power armor on the cheap and went out to go kick some butt on the streets. Letting you drop the various feats derived from working for the governments lets you buy more combat feats, or maybe more abilities that lets you function as a street level guardian.

Sluagh Costumed Adventurer Abilities: 46 pp STR 20 (+5) DEX 24 (+7) CON 20 (+5) INT 14 (+2) WIS 14 (+2) CHA 14 (+2) Combat: 32 pp ATK: +8 (+11 Melee/+15 Unarmed) DEF: +8 (+4 flat-footed) Init: +11 Grapple: +16/+24 w/Elongation Saves: 7 pp TOU +12 (+5 Con, +7 Protection) FORT +7 (+5 Con, +2) REF +7 (+7 Dex) WILL +7 (+2 Wis, +5) Skills: 72 r=18 pp Acrobatics 13 (+20, Skill Mastery) Gather Information 13 (+15, Skill Mastery) Intimidate 13 (+15, Skill Mastery) Investigate 4 (+6) Notice 8 (+10) Sense Motive 8 (+10) Stealth 13 (+20, Skill Mastery) Feats: 17 pp Acrobatic Bluff Attack Focus: Melee 3 Attack Specialization: Unarmed 2 Challenge 2 (Fast Acrobatic Bluff, Fast Startle) Evasion Power Attack Skill Mastery (Acrobatics, Gather Info, Intimidate, Stealth) Startle Takedown Attack Uncanny Dodge (auditory) Well-Informed Powers: 30 pp Comprehend 2 (speak to and understand animals; Flaw: [Nocturnal Only]) [2 pp] Comprehend 1 (Spirits) [2 pp] Impervious TOU 8 (Flaw: Limited [Physical Only]) [4 pp] Protection 7 [7 pp] Sluagh Array [8+1+2+2=13 pp] Elongation 8 (1000 ft) [Dynamic] DAP: Insubstantial 1 (fluid) DAP: Super-Movement 4 (Slithering, Slow Fall, Swinging, Wall-Crawling) Super-Senses 2 (Darkvision) [2 pp] costs abilities 46 + combat 32 + saves 7 + skills 18/72 + feats 17 + powers 30 = 150 pts --------------- Design Notes: Continuing Changeling: The Dreaming builds, here's my build for a sluagh costumed adventurer. I've tried to build this character as a blend of the traditional mythological sluagh, the Scottish spirits of the restless dead, and the creepy, spidery goths that sluagh tended to be in Changeling. Sluagh tend to be the information-gatherers of the fae world thanks to their habit of silently hanging out and watching everything, so I've built him as a good detective and good sneak. (His ability to talk to nocturnal animals like spiders and rats, as well as to ghosts, is a very good ace in the hole compared to your typical cowl builds) He's a very effective build, something like a low-powered, supernatural-flavored elastic hero with strong training in personal combat. Speaking in whispers only is a good Complication, and suitably creepy for a cowl! He's perfectly at home at night, easily capable of functioning in total darkness and of getting around the city almost undetectably to the human eye. He can take hits much better than your typical cowl, his flexible, stretchy body letting him bounce bullets off his chest. One area of specialization he could use is figuring out whether or not he specializes in mundane or arcane crime; buying up either his Streetwise or his Arcane Lore will be very helpful there! As it is, thanks to his high Gather Info he can function in both worlds, but he's not really a master of either. You could give him a vulnerability or weakness relating to cold iron to get more points, assuming you do want to say that he's the result of fae magic at work in the modern world. He could just be a creepy nightmare powered by the dream dimension too, if you don't want the direct connection to the fae world. You could cut the supernatural stuff entirely and just have this be a spooky elastic hero, perhaps with the idea that he's an Eel O'Brien who was completely under Bruce Wayne's tutelage. As it is, origin-wise perhaps he's a mortal man who decided to become what criminals fear in a very real and literal sense.

Captain Isabella PL: 10 (150) Abilities: 50 pp STR 20 (+5) DEX 24 (+7) CON 20 (+5) INT 12 (+1) WIS 14 (+2) CHA 20 (+5) Combat: 32 pp ATK: +8 (+12 melee) DEF: +13 (+4 flat-footed) Init: +7 Grapple: +17 Saves: 10 pp TOU +7 (+5 Con, +2 Defensive Roll) FORT +8 (+5 Con, +3) REF +8 (+7 Dex, +1) WILL +8 (+2 Wis, +6) Skills: 96 r=24 pp Acrobatics 13 (+20, Skill Mastery) Bluff 10 (+15, Skill Mastery) Climb 5 (+10) Diplomacy 10 (+15, Skill Mastery) Drive 3 (+10) Intimidate 5 (+10) Knowledge (Tactics) 9 (+10) Knowldge (Technology) 2 (+3) Languages 2 (Hebrew, Spanish) (Base: English) Notice 8 (+10) Pilot 3 (+10) Sense Motive 13 (+15, Skill Mastery) Stealth 3 (+10) Survival 8 (+10) Feats: 27 pp Acrobatic Bluff Attack Focus: Melee 4 Challenge (Fast Acrobatic Bluff) Defensive Roll Dodge Focus 5 Inspire 5 Master Plan 2 Move-By Action Power Attack Skill Mastery (Acrobatics, Bluff, Diplomacy, Sense Motive) Set-Up Takedown Attack Taunt Track Uncanny Dodge (auditory) Powers: 7 pp Device 2 (Sash) (Easy to Lose, PF: Restricted [+20 Acrobatics]) [7 pp] Leaping 1 (x2) [1dp] Speed 1 (10 MPH) [1dp] Strike 3 (PFs: Extended Reach, Improved Trip, Mighty) [6+2=8dp] AP: Snare 6 (Flaw: Range [Touch]) AP: Super-Movement 3 (Slow Fall, Super-Movement 1 (Wall-Crawling), Swinging) costs abilities 50 + combat 32 + saves 10 + skills 24/96 + feats 27 + powers 7 = 150 pts ------------------------------ Design Notes: Returning to my Phineas and Ferb builds, here's Isabella Garcia-Shapiro, the "girl across the street" who not-so-secretly has a terrible crush on Phineas. I've built her as Captain America with a whip, modeling her as the leader of her ever-loyal troop of Fireside Girls (thinly-disguised Girl Scout expies), capable of handling herself in almost any situation. The mechanics of her whip come from the various demonstrations we see of the sash in use, particularly in the Second Dimension where Isabella is the Dragon (and fashionable for once!) to Candace Flynn, head of the anti-Doofenschmirz Resistance. She's from a blended Mexican-Jewish family (her mom presses matzohburritos on people), so she's comfortable in both Mexico City and Jerusalem, but from all we see her native language does seem to be English. With her Master Plan, Inspire (which we see her carry out in the video I linked above), and Set-Up, she's a great team player, easily capable of leading a team of heroes to victory against impossible odds. She can also drive a robot unicorn straight through a gaggle of robots without any problem, help repair an airplane crashed into Paris, and generally pull off most of the tricks we see her carry out on the show. (The Fireside Girls catching a falling Phineas was clearly a power-stunt in an emergency, as well as a fine example of teamwork) She's a bit more outdoorsy than your typical Cap build, since after all her abilities do stem from being a scout: that's also where she gets her Track! She works just fine as a weapon master, a whip specialist who's also a fine hand-to-hand combatant: particularly with the languages where they are, she could easily be an adaptation of Zorro. She could also be a patriotic hero with just a few changes in her skills; perhaps she's the result of a program that gave super-soldiers weapons besides guns as a way of showing that their sponsor nation doesn't need to give their heroes guns to be successful. (It also might help her get around any international treaties about the use of super-weapons!) She'd be a great native hero of Mexico or Israel, if you want to make her not native to the United States.

Initiative time! Let's try and have this fight with a little more pep. The Alphans go on 14, 15, and 23 The Lor (with slightly better saves!) 3, 8, and 10 Harrier goes on 23, before the Alphan does

"If they are hunters, this is too obvjous," said Harrier doubtfully, with no small experience of beings that hunted each other for sport. "This is some sort of..." And then, at Harrier's word, the sky suddenly turned dark as overhead a starship swarmed into life as its stealth systems disengaged, the massive silver saucer that had once been part of the Grue space fleet decades earlier showing the rust and scars of its decades of life on the second and third-hand space market. In a staccato series of flashes, a half-dozen hunters appeared at ground-level, fearsome-looking, towering bipeds in heavy body armor: some clearly had humanoid lines beneath their black armor, others bulked too tall and had faces too wide to be built anything like a man. As they appeared, Victory's radio piped out to all of them: ""

Rayford opened the door partway, caught by the chain lock, only his face visible as he peered through the crack at the three heroes outside. "Who are you? What do you want?" The child welfare agent didn't look very happy to see them, especially once he recognized them as superheroes. Before the heroes could answer, a high, childish voice came from behind him. "Who is it, Daddy? Is it superheroes?" He called out his assent to someone behind them, "Let them in, Daddy! I want to see!" Rayford closed his eye for a moment, his face tight, before reluctantly unlocking the door and letting the heroes into his house. The Johnson residence was musty and unkempt, smelling like a place where things were swept under the rug rather than thrown away. Johnson himself looked shabby, with a half-week's growth of beard and clothes long-slept in, and only reluctantly did he gesture to let the heroes inside. Waiting for them, and looking much more colorful, was the smiling figure of his daughter Chloe, a perfect-looking little girl without a blonde hair out of place. "Hello!" she said with a perfect shiny smile. "I'm Chloe!"

The Clockwatcher and Professor Danger exchanged a look. With something of a sigh, the clock-carrying man sat down, turning the briefing over to the laser-armed woman in green. Looking considerably more cheerful than the somewhat dour temporal guardian, Danger expostulated, "Well, ah, actually the Observatory is just that, a place for keeping track of time travelers, rather than a going-and-coming place for them." She stood up and pressed a few buttons on the wall, the image smoothly transferring to a picture of a black dome as large as the Hunter estate, perched on a low barren hill beneath an alien grey sky. "That's why we put it on Venus; not much human activity there to interfere with the tachyon matrix!" she added cheerily. "The Observatory won't be focused on the early 21st century," the Clockwatcher spoke up to reassure the heroes' earlier concerns. "With the fallout that's coming from a few months before you, there'd be too much temporal leakage anyway. The only way you'd be able to alter the timeline is if you tamper with the machinery, which I know," he added with a significant look at the others, "is not something any of you will do, or if you fail in your mission. As for someone from a different timeline...well, we're keeping an eye out." He smiled thinly. "If you're worried about the people you've been entangled with recently, that situation has been resolved."

Sharl is doing what he describes himself as doing IC, using the Datalink in his Tronik array to pull it off.

"I'm contacting them now, sir," said Citizen without hesitation at Summers' words. He had his laptop out, the electronic rather than physical one, and was tapping away at the keys, foot resting on his projector. "I sent an emergency message to the local police station via wireless. Right now I'm getting in touch with the Freedom League through Miss Americana's direct line. They say they have magical," he couldn't resist making air quotes at the world, "specialists on retainer for dealing with this. Is everybody okay?" he called out, looking over at Koshiro and the other students who'd taken hits in this last big fight.

The past comes back to haunt our heroes as they deal with a very personal manifestation of the Terminus.

February 2012 Outside of his brief experience with interplanetary kidnapping, Harrier wasn't around much over January. Steve Murdock went to work and socialized with the other security guards at HAX, occasionally volunteering his expertise for experiments that had something to do with the Terminus or extradimensional radiation, but generally he was focused on one particular moment: the evening he'd shared with Gina Evans back in December. In a lifetime walking carefully between the fires of grief and despair, a moment of emotional connection, even friendship, deeper than the casual, too-easy acceptance that so many of the city's heroes so prided themselves on giving him, had been something to reach out for. So every day, instead of his usual evening of watching television or taking extra shifts at HAX, whenever he wasn't needed to help deal with an emergency as Caradoc or Harrier, he walked the streets of Freedom City, triangulating on his goal. He'd done things slow and methodically the way he usually did, carefully comparing his own walking pace to the likely traveling speed of a car in winter, carefully measuring out where likely turns had gone, and generally doing his level best to trace the residence of the mysterious woman he just had to see again. He could just have called Miss Americana, of course, but with how firmly she protected her operator's privacy, he doubted she'd simply hand the number over. No, he'd have to find her and see her again, and tell her that he wanted to have something more, and then...well, after a month of searching and a frank acknowledgement of his own weaknesses, he wasn't sure what he'd do next. Perhaps he'd go to one of the men he knew like Jack of all Blades, Victory, or Gabriel (or perhaps all three!) and try and figure out how a man should court a woman. He'd managed to narrow things down to Hanover, a prosperous district of scientists and engineers, walking past Internet cafes and small bookshops on his hunt, even to a particular block in that neighborhood, but things had gotten much more complicated after that. The houses around here all resembled each other quite strongly, and he hadn't seen Gina's house well enough in the dark to recognize it specifically. If he'd come on his own account, he'd simply have knocked on every door, but he didn't want to draw attention to himself here. He'd had one bad moment a couple of days earlier when he'd picked what he thought was the right house, screwed up his courage, only to find inside a cordial disabled man and his helpful caregiver sibling who'd been nothing but sympathetic but had no idea how to help find a neighbor, especially one who Steve didn't quite dare name. He'd been stopped by the police and questioned, even, his unusual appearance having attracted the wrong sort of attention, but he'd managed to talk his way out of trouble. So he'd come back to this district and this block and was walking it again with his slow, methodical stride, studying every house with increasing frustration. Today looked at first like it wasn't going to be any different than any other day; he'd passed a few community parks with milling crowds unusual for the weather, he'd been conscious of a chill in the air he didn't recognize, but for the moment all that was on his mind was a leaking feeling of unease. Perhaps all of this has been a mistake. Perhaps it wasn't going to work. Not one for giving up despite all hazards, he sat down on the sidewalk on one particular street and began studying the houses, deep in thought.

"Offense and defense, and strategy to go with them. Hmm." Harper paced, or rather swaggered bombastically, as she went up and down the runway, her eyes on the two women. Sharl had made an appearance, more so no one was suspicious of the missing man than anything else, but the humble holographic projection was something anyone on the runway was focused on thanks to the spectacular displays from Lady Laser and Gateway. Having considered carefully for a moment, she finally cocked her head towards her guards, who dragged the terrified prisoner onto the runway to join the new arrivals. "You're right, Lady Laser," the colonel conceded gracefully, "we've had to hold much of our best in reserve these last few days. This man you see is a traitor," she said, indicating the prisoner who was shaking his head vigorously in denial, "A man who betrayed his nation, betrayed his people, betrayed our _cause_ in the name of a foreign terrorist group. He has told us nothing, and denied it all, but we have the evidence we need. How would you suggest we deal with him?" "Please," the man begged, "I am no traitor! Those discs were forged, whatever the camera says! I sent no message!"

Clockwatcher actually could give a detailed answer to that one, at least as much as time and circumstance allowed. "The 2500s, and most eras of comparable technology, use tachyon generators and dispersal fields to create temporal defense grids. Long story short, they're why local unauthorized time travel is impossible. Anyone who tries to jump into an era where a grid is up and running gets shunted back to where they came from within a picosecond of their arrival, leaving a trail big enough to us to follow back if necessary. We think that's one reason our mark had to go so far back." "So what you're saying is," said Mark, putting the pieces together slowly, "You can't probe the alternate timeline too closely because whoever's living on Earth in the other 2500s, they have the same kind of temporal defense network you have. So they know about time travel, and they have your level of technology." He hmmed at that, trying to think about it as Clockwatcher nodded. "What I want to do with your team is put your boots on the ground in the Temporal Observatory," the Clockwatcher went on. "Everything will be locked down so you won't be able to cause a paradox on your own. But you will be able to stop the thief from stealing our artifact and going back to destroy all of our histories." "And the saboteur?" Mark probed delicately. As he'd expected, the local heroes looked uncomfortable at that. Finally, Professor Danger offered, "We're looking into that now. Members of the Legion have been subverted before, but those people....wouldn't work for someone from an alternate quantum timeline."

Edge didn't have that information handy (he rarely did), but he knew Midnight had the pictures and records from the autopsy, so while that was being handled he concentrated on talking to the Russian heroes. "Hey, I was just doing my job," he said, the nature of his work meaning he wasn't even dissembling. "I'm officially not here on UNISON business," he added honestly, "but I'll remember next time I am if you're able to help us out with this." He spread his hands. "As you know, there's still a lot of secrecy about what happened in this country during the Cold War, even about things that have nothing to do with defending Russia." He looked at Morning Star and Crimson Bomb and went on, "Have there been incursions by entities like that in Russia that any of yo are aware of?"

Who's going where? Note that a helpful, if frightened, civilian NPC is there to help answer questions. Sharl is currently flying at Flight 5, normal movement.

Sharl turned and pressed his hands against the wall, his eyes shifting to a glowing green that made his sister blanch uncomfortably: Sieva had seen this before, but she didn't like it much. "I'm interfacing with today's matrix...there's a block up in the plankton processing centers along the coast, one by the broadcast center. another in the oxygen recyclers to the north, and one near militia headquarters. Those have to be where she and her-" Suddenly, an eerie alien wail came from the 'coffee-table' in the center of the room and Sieva's sculpture abruptly winked out. Replacing it was an translucent skyscraper like the other massive buildings in Tronik, Lor script floating in the air around it, flashing by too fast for the translation program to catch up before finally blinking red letters resolved into SECURITY BREACH: SECTOR 87. "Sector 87, that's the...broadcast center!" said Sharl, trying to keep one step ahead of his antagonist. "Damn, she was too fast! We've got to get moving, people!" He crossed to the window Sage had been staring out of and exclaimed "Open!" And sure enough, the transparent plasteel irised open almost organically at his command, exposing them all to the massive industrial metropolis outside, the air cold enough to explain why everyone wore leather jackets hereabouts. "Let's go, so we can-" But for the moment, Rogue still had the initiative, because even as Citizen's chest symbol flared to life in brilliant electric blue, the image of the skyscraper was replaced by an all-too-familiar face: Rogue was snarling and gesturing at the holo-camera, making it look for all the world like she was threatening Corbin before she said, "-and if you turn it on, I'll pulp you as hard as I did them!" There was screaming behind her, and the sound of crunching metal; a scene of industrial carnage just visible behind the leather-clad woman. When the cameraman's nerves stilled, Rogue straightened her jacket and stared into the camera, her eyes invisible behind her heavy shades. "People of Tronik. My name is Rogue." There was an echo in her voice that it took Sharl a terrible moment to realize was coming from outside, from the screens built into the walls of the building. Terribly, she was everywhere. "I am here to tell you that your hero, Citizen, is nothing but a liar in league with the alien savages who have seized control of our future." "C'mon! I know the way!" Ever-impulsive, Sharl responded by rocketing out of the open window towards Sector 87, the air cracking with speed as the electronic teenager flew like the cannonshot he was in his native land. Those who lingered in the building heard the remainder of Rogue's message. "-to tell you that this is the dawn of a new age. An age where we can be emancipated from this alien prison cell and take back a reality that is rightfully ours. Today is the day of our liberation. Today is the day their world will fall!" And with that, the 'line' went dead, the whirling hologram replaced with a pleasant green fog that was the color of the sky on a good day.

"New Freedom's a paradise if you've got superpowers and the smarts to use them right," agreed Sandstone, walking up and down the aisle as she gave the two mercenaries a closer look. "But some people don't like paradise. 'Specially the ones who can't hack it there." She gave them both sharp, piercing looks, but seemed satisfied with what she saw. "We've been having some problems with Europeans lately. You may hear about it, if you make it in." She shrugged, her massive shoulders making a shifting sound beneath her uniform like two sandbags. "As for what tests you take, that's up to Colonel Harper. She and her family have kept the riff-raff out of New Freedom as long as most of the locals have been alive. They have a pretty keen eye." And with that, she went back to flying, leaving the edgy Sui Li to tend to the needs of the passengers. New Freedom didn't look particularly glamorous from the air, even once they'd touched down at the nation's only surface airport: most of the buildings, they knew, were built deeply underground to take advantage of the geothermal heat available thanks to the nearby volcano. Sandstone led the way down the plane's walkway, escorting the mercenaries down onto the black runway where their Jeep escort was waiting for them. The biting Antarctic winds were kept dimmed by weather control powers and machines here; it was no worse than Freedom City in February as they headed for the jeeps. Before they could quite reach them, though, suddenly a group of people exited the Jeeps in a hurry: a contingent of armored guards surrounding the bereted, eyepatch-wearing figure of the Patriotic Colonel in her familiar gaudy-decorated fatigues, and another, smaller group carrying a terrified, struggling man in prisoner's fatigues. Sandstone snapped to attention with respect at the sight of the Colonel, who nodded for her to be at ease. "So. Gateway, Lady Laser, and assistant," said Lian Harper, her voice an accented hiss as she looked the two women up and down. "Your files both say you're the best at what you do. That's good, because this is the best country there is. We're standing on the new age," she went on, a messianic look in her good eye, "a place where men and women with superpowers never need to fear the censor, the bluenose, the coward, the baseline. What can you give this place?"

She fails anyway, so woo!

Go ahead and give me a Bluff check here, Fox. (Since she's telling tall tales in a way Miss A isn't)

"Rick Lucas and the Centurion belong to the 20th century," replied the Clockwatcher levelly, giving Erin, then the two downtime heroes a hard-to-read look as he repeated what had evidently already been said. "Potentially altering their lives via an encounter with a time traveler would have tremendous repercussions for the 21st century and its heroes." He fixed Mark with his gaze, looking sympathetic for a moment, before turning back to the others. "In layman's terms, their destinies have already been established by history. Yours haven't." "That's...that makes sense," said Mark, shooting a look from behind his mask first at the Centurion, then at his father. "In the era we're from, Rick Lucas and the Centurion are heroes of the past. That's why we took the name. To honor that generation." For a moment his hand tightened on the table in front of him, and he was heedless of past and future. "Hey, I'm a hero! Neat." Rick looked quite pleased with himself at that news, though not surprised. "Not as big as you are, sir!" he added immediately to the Centurion with a wink.

Sidhe Weapon Master Abilities: 36 pp STR 14 (+2) DEX 18 (+4) CON 18 (+4) INT 14 (+2) WIS 16 (+3) CHA 26/16 (+8/+3) Combat: 30 pp ATK: +7 (+13 Ranged) (+15 Bow) DEF: +13 (+4 flat-footed) Init: +12 Grapple: +9 Saves: 10 pp TOU +7 (+4 Con, +3 Protection) FORT +7 (+4 Con, +3) REF +7 (+4 Con, +3) WILL +7 (+3 Wis, +4) Skills: 18 pp=72 r Acrobatics 11 (+15, Skill Mastery) Bluff 12 (+20, Skill Mastery) Diplomacy 7 (+15) Knowledge (Arcane Lore) 3 (+5) Knowledge (Theology and Philosophy) 3 (+5) Intimidate 12 (+20, Skill Mastery) Language 1 (English; Base [Celtic]) Notice 12 (+15, Skill Mastery) Stealth 11 (+15) Survival 2 (+5) Feats: 22 pp Accurate Attack Acrobatic Bluff All-Out Attack Attack Focus: Ranged 6 Attack Specialization: Bows 1 Hide in Plain Sight Improved Initiative 2 Luck 2 Move-By Action Power Attack Skill Mastery (Acrobatics, Bluff, Intimidate, Notice) Startle Takedown Attack Taunt Uncanny Dodge (auditory) Powers: 34 pp Damage 3 (Extra: Ranged, PFs: Improved Crit 2, Improved Range 3 [1 5000 ft range increment]. Mighty 2) 'fae longbow' [13 pp] Fae Array [10+2=12 pp] Enhanced Charisma 10 (to CHA 26/+8) AP: Emotion Control 10 (Flaw: Sense-Dependent [visual]) AP: Mind Control 10 (Flaw: Sense-Dependent [visual]) Flight 1 (PF: Subtle) [3 pp] Protection 3 [3 pp] Super-Senses 3 (Vision [extended] 3 (x1000)) [3 pp] costs abilities 36 + combat 30 + saves 10 + skills 18/72 + feats 22 + powers 34 = 150 pts ------------------------------------------------------------- Design Notes: Here's another one in my series of Changeling: The Dreaming conversions; in this case of a sidhe, the lords and ladies of the Changeling universe. The sidhe are jerks in the grand tradition of the Fair Folk, beautiful princes and princesses who destroyed the democratic fae republic that existed up until the 1970s and re-established a nasty monarchy whose dying grip on fae culture is one of the reasons that the Dreaming itself is dying. (At least, depending on your interpretation of the books!) There were some good guy sidhe, though, people who recognized that being nobility sometimes meant you could actually be noble! Taking a lead from the way the sidhe usually fight, as well as Legolas from Lord of the Rings, I've gone ahead and made this guy a fast, beautiful archer with a magic bow that never goes away. He's a great shot, his superhuman visual acuity letting him pick the wings off a fly from hundreds of feet away. His extreme force of personality and incredible good looks let him crush the will of his enemies through a wide variety of ways. (He's also fast enough to reliably fool mindless creatures who otherwise wouldn't be impressed by his supernatural mojo) His max tradeoff may not seem that impressive, but since he can power attack basically every time and do it from a great range, he's a very serious threat in a fight. He hits his caps if he has to pick up a mundane bow for whatever reason, too. Like Doc's Psychic Ninja, his Flight represents the sort of supernatural (in his case magic) physical acuity that lets him walk along snowbanks without sinking in or running up the sides of an elephant. Mechanically, he's similar to Gloriana, another Algernon Files character I like: she was basically Susan from the Chronicles of Narnia as a superhero; a Blitz evacuee who was imbued as a champion of Fae in order to keep the most uncreative Nazis from overrunning Britain: if you do like the Golden Age connection, add more History and/or an Immunity to aging to make him either a legacy character or the original. Otherwise, origins-wise, he works fine as a generic fae, either an ambassador from Avalon (or a castaway), or perhaps he's a changeling all grown up who has balanced his fae heritage with the human world where he lives.

Mark is dropping a nice DC 30 Diplomacy check there as the right hand.

"" said Mark in fluent Russian, the carrot to Midnight and Redbird's stick with smooth grace, "" he went on, indicating the rest of the team to the World War II veteran before them. "