Avenger Assembled

"I was not yet born when my homeworld died." said Harrier, staring again at the door. "Those with powers became drones. Those without, came here. My parents had known the one who gave their world to Omega, and so became his slaves. They thought they were fortunate." Screams of infernal agony rang in his ears, and the stink of blood and death and horror assaulted his nostrils. "The Physician enjoys forcing the patients to sing, Do not allow yourself ot be distracted by that. There can be no distractions here."

"I am...unfamiliar with the dimensional properties of these rooms," said Harrier distractedly, his featureless face moving back and forth with deliberate intent as he scanned the massive ampitheatre of the great front hall. "To travel into the Terminus is to risk the destruction of a world. Once a door is opened, them Omega knows that world, and can send his armies there. This world, though, is special, and safe enough if you take certain..." He turned suddenly and studied Erin. "You are the sole survivor of your world. You are certain of this?"

Harrier walked her through and into a vast steel room, a giant sphere lined with cages on tracks, filled with bustling waves of Nightmare Nurses at his direction. "This room will be like this, but with more...more screaming." He hesitated briefly, then pushed on. "That will change as you push in further and the patients are generally anesthetized. There will be automatic weapons emplacements here, here, and here, that the Nurses will activate if they are unable to subdue you. If they survive your initial engagement with them." He added, striding towards the central shaft. "The Physician works from a laboratory in the center of the tower. He is very focused on what he does. If you rise up this shaft fast enough, you will be able to catch him largely unawares."

"Some tens of thousands. The numbers vary if there has recently been a conquest, or if there has been a rebellion." Harrier looked up at the building and suddenly his armor erupted over his body, a cascade of metal and flesh that rapidly transformed him into a faceless, souless automaton. He felt a little better that way, absurd though it was, behind the shield of armor. "If you enter through the main doors and proceed straight up the main elevator shaft, you will encounter far fewer. The Hospice is designed to keep people in. Not keep them out," he said from behind his armor.

Harrier found himself suddenly wanting to do something other than walk into the Hospice. Instead he made Nightmare Nurses, two flanking the big iron front doors, for Erin to inspect. The robots, she could tell, deserved their names: they looked like menacing combat units with whirring blades at the tips of their hands and long pipettes along their limbs, but far worse than anything was the living human faces, complete with blinking and moving eyes, that sat atop their metal skin. "Cloned tissue." Harrier assured her. "Not living beings. The Physician believes this makes them more approachable to visitors. They are designed to process beings from many different realities, many of whom will have special abilities. They are heavily armed with chemical and physical weapons. One or two would have been able to fight me on even terms before my liberation. I estimate that a minimum of one thousand will be available for the Physician if you do not somehow disable their communications systems."

Inside the holoroom, Murdock went to work fast. He built the Terminus first, providing a physical reality to a place Erin had only seen in blurry movies older than she was, or in the stark series of pictures Mark's father had made and donated to the school before his untimely disappearance. First there was a sky, red and starless, then it was full of black smoke rising from a thousand dark, oddly shaped buildings that rose up like the fingers of a corpse scratching at its coffin. "The Hospice is located near the equator of Nihilor, close to the mouth of the Doom Coil." That was a great red finger that seemed to reach down from the red mass overhead into the earth, as if the ground was devouring the sky itself. "It is neutral territory so close to the Coil, as the Physician prefers not to fight the wars of the other Annihilists and none would fight so close to the Coil for fear of Omega's wrath." He studied the great red finger, his face hard to read. "It is the engine that destroys worlds." The ground beneath their feet was cold metal, and Erin was vaguely conscious of its strange shapes and textures, as if the metal itself was somehow organic. "In ancient days, the Lord of the Terminus slew the ancient gods and used their skin to build his world. Some say they yet live." With a few steps, he began building the low complex of buildings around the Hospice, before that building itself began to rise up, higher and higher, a grim tower over their heads. Harrier was silent as it reached its full height. "I will help you build the interior. Your simulation is...is very evocative."

Harrier stared at Erin, his face and body unmoving, that for a second she thought he was going to refuse, or flee, or do anything else before he said, his voice still flat and calm, "If you have access to a holographic display unit, I will recreate a three-dimensional map for you as best I can. I was only deployed to the Hospice during times of heavy security, but I can tell you all that I recall about its defenses and construction. What forces will you be bringing to bear? How will you make your attack?"

"I am happy to help Freedom City's heroes learn how to defeat the Terminus," said Harrier, still giving her a watchful look. "There is no goal more important." He walked up to her, his footsteps a slow, deliberate tromp on the ground beneath their feet. "If you are a prole, the Helpful Hospice is the worst place in the Terminus," he said bluntly. "When I was your age, I would have gladly taken my life before I fell into the Physician's clutches. Why do you wish to know of such horrors?"

"...here," said Avenger, taking one of his lesser credit cards out of his wallet and handing it to Erin. "There's about a grand in that account, and it won't get wet. Pin is 1895 if you hit a debit machine with it. Take what you need, just tear the account up when you're done." What the hell, it hadn't been his money, he could afford to be generous with it. He shot his wife a look, then said, "We'll talk about this later, honey. I'm just glad you made it back." He put his arm around her, looking down at the baby. "And that we're all together again," he murmured.

Harrier's eyes widened: these were not the questions of an angry woman with no knowledge! "No. Physician Friendly uses Nightmare Nurses, robots of his own design, rather than Omegadrones, for his personal security. He feels Omegadrones do not provide the proper atmosphere for his research." He studied the girl before him, seeing a look in her eyes he'd imagined a thousand times. "I was assigned to heavy combat duties. Extirpating resistance, fighting in the games. The Physician does not engage in either." A wise man would have shut up there, but Harrier was more honest than wise. "I was primarily part of the household of Shadivan Steelgrave and the Madrigal Martinet."

"Yes." Murdock replied without hesitation, studying the girl before him with suspicious eyes. He knew the students here were trained to deal with an Omegadrone, but there was something different about this one. Something a little unsettling. He considered telling her that he'd never visited Prime before his liberation, that whatever she'd lost to the Terminus he hadn't been responsible for. But could he really say things like that, and sleep at night? "My organic brain was not damaged during my liberation. I recall everything that has happened to me."

"Let's melt that ice with the power of heroism!" shouted Mark, waving the flag. "Of friendship, and justice, and liberty! Let's heat things up with the burning power of America!" Even he wasn't usually quite so melodramatic, but something about the setting appealed to his inner muse. He made a gesture, and they were all encapsulated in a cloud of whirling black bubbles that sent them where they needed to go. For those used to Edge's more bizarre powers, everything was normal, but those he hadn't teleported before were struck by the distinct though irrational feeling that they hadn't moved at all, that rather the world around them was changing to put them where they needed to go!

"You cannot hesitate, Prometheus," the half-armored drone was warning the other student as they both practiced with their pikes. "If you are fighting a drone, you will be very lucky if they have simply come to kill you. If you are unlucky, they will take you back, and destroy you again." His voice was quiet and flat, not quite devoid of intonation, but still somehow artificial. He sounded as if he was already inside digitized armor, in fact. "But what if they are free too?" asked Prometheus, his voice innocent and a little worried at the prospect. "If you are free, and I am free, then many more of us could also be liberated. Wouldn't it be murder if I kill a free drone?" "Would a free drone be attacking you?" "...if he thought I had come to take him back, yes!" Prometheus wasn't a smart boy, but that didn't mean he was incapable of thinking. He was in some ways, anyway, a reverse of Mark. "Surely we cannot fear each other so much." "Fear can be healthy," replied Harrier after a moment's pause, honestly not wanting to hurt the other drone's feelings. "Fear can keep you alive. I'm not telling you to attack first," he said thoughtfully, "but if an Omegadrone does attack you, he has taken his life in his hands. Believe me. You're doing them a favor." They worked out for a while more, practicing some fairly lethal-looking manuevers with their power pikes, before class called Prometheus away. He went to change out of his armor, shaking Harrier's hand before departing, Harrier's own armor retreating back inside his body as he watched the boy go. He turned, then, and saw Wander. "If this space is yours, I am finished with it." He put his hand on the post and vaulted out of the ring, landing feet-first with a loud THUD as if he'd fallen thirty feet.

Late November 2010 After an exhaustive background check, Harrier had been granted permission to meet with someone who he'd first heard of some weeks after his arrival on Earth-Prime. Prometheus was like him, an Omegadrone, but free from the power of Omega! But of course Prometheus himself had been terrified at the thought of meeting another drone, and truthfully Harrier had needed to work up his nerve to even ask. But his background had been checked and his mind probed by psychics, and so on the edge of the Claremont campus he'd been introduced to the boy who was Prometheus. It had been heartening and disheartening all at once. Prometheus looked tired and sick outside of his armor, the way all the lesser drones did, and his mind wasn't terribly sharp. Murdock wasn't at all sure what future the boy had...but at least it was the future of a free man, making his own choices and living his own life, and never again forced to kill and die at Omega's whim. Prometheus was a lucky boy; his mind was free of any memories of the Terminus, those circuits destroyed by the powerful gravitic blast that had blasted him free of the control of Omega in the first place. Truthfully, Harrier was a little envious of him. After their meeting, the two drones headed to the gym to work out, something Harrier hadn't had the opportunity to do in months, Prometheus stopping to change into his now-camouflageable armor along the way. Prometheus, like Harrier, was a firm believer in wanting to know how to kill Omegadrones, and Harrier's more recent liberation and his programming as a heavy tactical unit meant that he knew better that most sacred of arts. They stood together in the boxing ring, one in his armor and with Harrier's covering his arms and legs so he could wield his own pike. "Remember. Under the chin. Destroy the brain. Even the heavy units are underarmored there." He said, gesturing with a hard upwards gesture. Prometheus watched avidly, as he always did when taught. Neither drone noticed the heroine watching them from the door.

"Mike, I think you'd better help Alex get dressed," said Mark, peeking out the window. "We're going to get there soon!" Luckily they all had just enough time to dry off and get dressed before the plane entered Dakanan airspace, the king taking that moment to walk back into the passenger compartment to brief the kids on what they could expect. Despite Mark's eager questions, it was still clear that the rest of the evening was going to be luxurious, maybe a little decadent, but there were going to be no lion-monsters. "It will be simple enough," the White Lion promised the teens, the king in full costume but for his hood and mask. "You will be greeted in your war-names, er, codenames in superhero terms, and then introduced to the ruling council of Dakana before the reception at the palace. There will be many dignitaries there, but the environment will be relaxed," he promised. "You are going there so that you can impress them with the quality of America's young heroes; they have invited you so that Dakana may impress you with her beauty." Down below, the gentle, massive slope of Kilimanjaro was clearly visible out the windows as they headed for the capital.

Power Attacking. Taking 10. That's 25 to hit with a DC 30 TOU save assuming he gets his Sneak Attack bonus. (Perhaps by catching them unawares.) Assuming all goes as written, that's an HP for Ultimate Intimidate.

For his part, Avenger showed no hesitation when it came to killing the monsters that had taken his wife away from him. If he was slower than Erin, it was perhaps only because he drew out the fights with the ghosts long enough to see them suffer and hear them shriek before dispatching them. When there was one left, he slammed it into the wall, holding it by the throat with a red fury in his eyes. "Listen to me. I want you to send a message to the power that dispatched you. God you may be; Modrossus you may be. But if you take my wife and son from me, I will hunt you to the ends of the Earth and beyond the fabric of reality and I will rend your flesh from your bones and taste your blood in my mouth for I am Jack Faretti, wife of Taylor Chun, scion of the line of Dracula, and you are nothing but a flickering ghost hiding from a world that's passed you by" He released the ghost. "Now. CRAWL HOME."

When she was through chatting with the representative from the Distinguished Competition about how amusing it was that the Hughes family policed their heir about as well as any other rich family bothered to do, acutely conscious of the fact that Lana Loeb would of course get one of her reporters on the story that a reporter from the Ledger had so unthinking dropped in her lap, Joan walked out onto the grass for the fireworks show and sighed softly. She didn't like parties like this, and it was starting to seem like they didn't like her very much either. And why not? They're a school of fish, she decided with a wry little smile. They're not going to like an octopus in their number. But I can't change what I am, just like it looks like they can't change what they are. But we'll see. It's a long night.

"She's fine," said Mark, and in an instant it was if nothing had ever happened. "Do you ever work with Dr. Henry Farrow?" he asked, naming a famous, if slightly venerable Egyptologist who'd been active in the field many years. "He's an old friend of my family's and I've been to his house a lot. He's mostly over in Egypt, but I think he's done a lot of work in the Holy Land. He actually thinks he's found the site where the Horus first battled Set at the First Cataract of the Nile: if he can get real archeological evidence, he's going to completely reshape our understanding of the mythocultural role that the ancient Egyptian pantheon played in the physical culture of classical Egyptian civilization." He stole a crab rangoon, and quite blatantly too. "I've talked to him about that stuff a couple of times, but I'm more of a modern history guy. Still, a lot of our current superheroes trace their roots back to ancient Egypt, like the Scarab or Beacon."

If anyone wasn't going to get lost in the Void, it was Jack Faretti, mate to the guardian of the Void and all it contained. He smoothly stepped out of the darkness without so much as mussing his hair, holding little Jack Jr. securely in his arms. Wrapped up in a blanket Avenger had secured by ripping off the tablecloth as they went, the little baby was sound asleep. "I think we'd all better go our separate ways," he suggested, his voice a low whisper, "Particularly you, Viktor. How much do I owe you for tonight, Erin?" he asked, reaching neatly into his back pocket.

"You kids have a good time too," said Jack with a wink. Deciding that he didn't want to be one of those bosses, he added, "If anyone calls for us, just take a message. The people who should know where we are already know where we are. If the ghosts start giving you trouble, Erin can show you where the kitchen salt is. They're not harmful, really, they just want attention from the living. The ones covered in blood are just drama queens anyway..." He looked at his watch and shot a look at Taylor. "I think we'd better get out if we want to make the meeting. Bye, Jack Jr!" he said with a wave to his still avidly-drinking baby boy. "See you soon."

"Excellent," said Mark with an approving nod as Trevor and Erin made out. "Yes, yes, I think the two of you have won Truth or Dare!" Still a little wobbly, but for the most part completely sober thanks to the knock on the head, Mark headed over to gather up his clothes. "I suppose we'd better all sober up before we land in Dakana. This is supposed to be one of the fastest jets in the world!" Dramatically, Mark began the process of pulling his costume on. "I'm not as drunk as I thought I was," he said thoughtfully.

Duplicator PL: 10 (150) Abilities: 20 pp STR 26 [10] (+8/+0) DEX 24 [14] (+7/+2) CON 26 [12] (+8/+2) INT 10 (+0) WIS 14 (+2) CHA 18 (+4) Combat: 24 pp ATK: +6 (+12 Unarmed) DEF: +12 (+3 flat-footed) Init: +7 Grapple: +14/+20 Saves : 7 pp TOU +8 (+8 Con) FORT +8 (+8 Con) REF +8 (+7 Dex, +1) WILL +8 (+2 Wis, +6) Skills: 56 r=14 pp Acrobatics 8 (+15) Bluff 11 (+15) Climb 2 (+10) Drive 3 (+10) Intimidate 1 (+5) Knowledge: Civics 5 (+5) Knowledge: History 5 (+5) Language 1 (Russian) (Base: English) Notice 8 (+10) Pilot 2 (+10) Sense Motive 8 (+10) Survival 1 (+3) Feats: 16 pp Acrobatic Bluff, Attack Specialization: Unarmed 3, Dodge Focus 6, Evasion Luck Move-By Action, Power Attack, Takedown Attack, Uncanny Dodge (auditory) Powers: 69 pp Concealment 10 (all senses) (Flaw: Miss Chance Only) [10 pp] Duplication Array 8 (16 pp, PFs: Alternate Powers 4) [20 pp] BE: Add Area [burst] and Selective to Unarmed AP: Add Autofire, Secondary Effect to Unarmed AP: Communication 3 (1000 ft) (auditory) and ESP 3 (1000 ft) (all senses) (PF: Rapid) AP: Quickness 10 (x10000) and Speed 4 (100 MPH) (PFs: Wall Run, Water Run) AP: Super-Strength 4 (Heavy Load: ~6 tons) Enhanced DEX 10 [10 pp] Enhanced CON 12 [12 pp] Enhanced STR 16 [16 pp] Immunity 1 (aging) [1 pp] costs abilities 20 + combat 24 + saves 7 + skills 14/56 + feats 16 + powers 69 = 150 pts -- Design Notes: This is my revamping of my earlier Duplicator build, following up on angrydurf’s concept of a Duplicator without Duplication. Summon (which Duplication is a version of) is a very difficult (though not impossible) power to manage in play, and it has the additional downside of making you spend a lot of points and not be able to do a lot of the things that comic book duplicators can do. This lady, however, doesn’t have that problem. Her powers deserve a full explanation. I figure that she makes duplicates fast, is mentally linked with all of them, and can make ridiculous numbers at the same time. The duplicates all look alike; her concealment doesn’t mean she’s invisible, it just means you can’t tell which is her and which is the ‘duplicatee when you’re attacking her. This lets her send out an ‘army’ to sweep a whole area, easily clearing a room in a standard action; she can also focus that army on one target and do a tremendous amount of damage with a volley of unarmed strikes. She can send out dupes as scouts or as communicators, acting as the ‘nerve center’ of a whole superhero army. Not a bad person to put near your team mastermind in a fight, honestly. She can also project herself very fast in a series of duplications, use that ‘team’ to research and accomplish tasks quickly, and can ‘gang up’ on a single object or person to lift them or it greatly. (That’s actually the origin of the book Duplicator, pulling a car off a trapped person, and I think it’s pretty cool) I kept the Soviet stylings of the original build because I like the concept of the collectivist duplicator: it’s fun! If you like the ‘joke’ of Comrade Collective but don’t want to play an immortal Soviet, switch things up a little: maybe this is a Chinese super-soldier assigned to work with American heroes as a publicity gesture, or perhaps a Cuban doing the same thing. You can get a lot of mileage out of a patriotic ideologue slowly learning that maybe his country is wrong about America and its heroes; that maybe they’re wrong about a lot of things. You can discard that entirely if you want; I do like the origin story of the book Duplicator: a lonely, socially isolated person living in a very rural area, one with so few friends that she decided to make a few of her own to talk to. Duplication is a fun power, and it gives you lots of room for interesting powerstunts. One possible change is to add some kind of Perception Range Move Object to represent your dupes bringing something over to you, as it stands ‘you’ have to join them in muscling things around. OTOH, at least it keeps you from getting all lazy.

Options unfurled in Harrier's mind even as a powerful blow rocked him back, flesh giving way inside his armor. Can't fight him blinded, not like this. Can't see if the light is getting through or if he has senses of his own. Move. Make his mobility a curse. He stepped backwards and his jets roared to life, rocketing him into the darkness. Slow down. Don't take the injuries you want him to take. He thought fast, and pumped his pike, activating the internal sensors within. The ceiling! Blast out as I blasted in; make sure the heroes of the city are aware of the fight. Bring rock down on both of us if I must, the better to make sure it ends. As he heard Vanquisher taking off behind him, Harrier turned and fired a devastating blast into the roof of Freedom City's sewers, blasting a sinkhole in the vacant lot above and sending a cascade of bricks and mortar and pipe down below. I will help repair this, he promised himself as he ducked from the sound of falling debris.

Free Action: Harrier does have one functioning sense. He uses his Detect Weakness on the tunnel walls all around them. (This is a radio sense, so it isn't covered by his blindness). He's looking for a weak spot that's not inside any buildings or under a busy street. 29. Move Action: He flies 250 ft backwards (I figure limiting him to half a standard move makes sense inside a tunnel, while blinbd) Standard Action: Harrier blasts the section he saw, sending a cascade of rubble falling down between himself and Vanquisher. (This will probably open up a small sinkhole in the landscape overhead, giving you a reason to get Victory into the thread: this is City Center, it's a busy area, and someone'll notice a cosmic blast bursting through the ground) His Detect Weakness is not Accurate, so he's got that 50% miss chance...and he does. OK, he'll surge and try again. Heh, I'll wish I'd saved that nat 20! OK, unless you want him to actually roll, he does shoot the ceiling, and causes a collapse that blocks him off from Vanquisher. He'll be fatigued next around. Let me know, and I'll post IC.