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I liked the idea that Ares was the one god hated by all the other gods, so I made the New Olympian version of him a cop.
Martin Spears was born marked by the shield of Ares, and took it as a sign that he was meant to be a police officer when he grew up. He lived in denial of his New Olympian powers and fought day by day to keep his martial desire for war and bloodshed from spilling over into his budding career as a police officer, and both Mount Olympia’s policy of making peace with their abilities and the Pantheon gang’s desire to use their powers for ill served as unwelcome and constant reminders that Martin’s destiny was one of crimson-tinged chaos. So he made it his personal mission to shut down both sides of the growing conflict at any cost. And his affair with a certain promiscuous, under-aged Mount Olympia student hasn’t made Martin’s existence any easier. O how the Greeks do love their irony….Here is a villain from Tina Pallas’ past, her Yakuza academy classmate, Purple Dragon:
Similar to the New Olympians’ birthmarks, Purple Dragon derives his power from a dragon tattoo he was branded with at birth in hopes that he would be the next leader of the fearsome Ryuunin (Dragon Ninja) clan. He is able to focus the energy from his tattoo and forge his sword into a harder, sharper blade, or fire the dragon energy at his enemies in whatever form he chooses.
Having no desire to be either a leader or a slave to destiny, Purple Dragon used his power to slaughter the entire Ryuunin clan, drawing the interest of their Yakuza enemies. Purple Dragon’s only purpose for being enrolled in the Yakuza academy was to fulfill his unending desire to kill, and Tina Pallas’ presence there stood in the way of him achieving that goal. He has no allegiance to any but himself, and will kill Tina Pallas, the entire Yakuza organization, or whoever else crosses his path, if it gets him closer to watching the world burn at his own hand.I’d like to thank Can’tDraw for the pose behind my Athena character, Tina Pallas.
Tina was marked with the olive branch representing Athena. Tina’s power is the ability to summon a suit of energy armor that protects her from even the most destructive of conventional weaponry and provides limited protection against Olympian and Pantheon abilities, including Peter Orcus’ death touch, as well as giving her the ability to fly. The mark of Athena also imbues her with a warrior’s instinct for stealth, strategy, and natural mastery of any given self-defense discipline.
Yearning to discover the nature of her strange gifts, Tina persuaded her parents to let her move to Japan, alone, at the tender age of eight. Her travels in Japan led her to join a martial arts school with an ancient and particularly unorthodox method of instruction; it was a place where ninja were made and broken, a training academy for Yakuza recruits with special talents. With her innate skill, Tina rose to the top of her class, making both allies (Nihonto and Shirudo, a.k.a. Sword and Shield) and enemies (Purple Dragon) for her minimal efforts. But the school failed to provide any enlightenment as to her origins or her purpose in the world (of course, there was also the fact that the Yakuza are evil…), and Tina thought it prudent to put her newly accquired Ninjitsu talents to good use, escaping on penalty of capture and death to the city of Athens, Greece, where a woman named Oracle told her of the goddess Athena and the gods’ efforts to pass on their dying legacy to deserving mortals in Olympia. Oracle also instructed Tina in the use of her armor before giving her a mission to return home to share her knowledge with the other chosen New Olympians.Here’s my Demeter character, wielding her twin-bladed scythe of fire:
Karen Demetrius was marked with the torch of Demeter, giving her pyrokinetic abilities. After losing her home and family in an unexplained fire, Karen was placed with a foster family, but when she came of age her powers began manifesting more uncontrollably than before and she ran away from home. While on the run, Karen crossed paths with a young Javier Zayas, and the two became romantically involved. But he also shared with her the secret of his own power and how he was able to take control of it; in a way, Karen was not only his first love but also his first student.
In present day Olympia, Stephanie Zayas (Javier and Karen’s daughter, and recipient of the mark of Persephone) has joined with Peter Orcus (Hades’ chosen mortal) and the New Pantheon, a neighborhood gang composed of delinquents who were marked by lesser gods. Karen has come to the Mount Olympia Martial Arts Academy to ask Javier’s help in steering their daughter back on the right path.Thanks, Jeimuzu.
I really love the new hair items, and one came in handy when I was designing the head of my Poseidon character for the third time. He’s the only New Olympian so far to have his powers manifest physically.
Trent Aegaeus was born human, but his trident birthmark began to change his appearance when the boy reached puberty, transforming him into an amphibious hybrid with the ability to communicate telepathically with marine life and manipulate the state and form of nearby water (including drawing moisture from the air) to use as a weapon or for short-distance flight. His mutated appearance made the young Trent a social outcast and led him to seek asylum at the Mount Olympia Martial Arts Academy. But as his new form began to manifest more strongly, Trent could no longer live on land and had to be transferred to the Atlantean Lyceum, a school that was initially established by Icthya to help the detained hybrids re-enter Atlantean society in the wake of their failed invasion. In Trent Aegaeus’ time, it has become a sort of finishing school for gifted Atlantean youth. Icthya’s daughter, Amphitrite (who also becomes a member of the post-Meridian Clockwork team under the alias “Binary”) is a student there, and quickly becomes a love interest for the “new fish.” At the Lyceum, Trent learns to control his Poseidon abilities (all the time concealing his birthmark, the true origin of his power, to avoid causing any superstitious uproar among the students and faculty–with the exception of Amphitrite) to the point that he can shapeshift from his amphibian form to human and back again without compromising the integrity of his hydromancy powers.Thanks for the feedback, guys.
Time to roll out another hero team: The New Olympians
Instead of doing the straightforward god interpretations, I thought it’d be interesting to make them ordinary people…sort of. With the gradual decline of polytheistic worship in Greece, the gods abdicated Mount Olympus and traveled to the modern day American city of Olympia, WA, where they gifted their powers to certain chosen mortals in an effort to pass on their dying legacy. Each of the chosen New Olympians was born with a birthmark representing the god they were meant to replace.
As you’ll see, where Clockwork is kind of like my Avengers team, the New Olympians are more akin to the X-Men.
Let’s kick it off with Javier Zayas, the team leader and new bearer of the lightning bolt of Zeus:
Javier Zayas is the oldest New Olympian and team leader. He was chosen by Zeus to become the new king of Olympia, but times have changed since Zeus’ day. Besides, Zeus no longer has a say in the matter. Zayas has seen many strange occurrences around his hometown of Olympia, WA, and in addition to using his fists of thunder and lightning to fight crime in his youth, he now runs a martial arts school with his wife, where he helps other New Olympians cope with their emerging powers through meditation and self-discipline.
Era Campana-Zayas is Javier’s wife and the chosen vessel of Hera’s power. She can channel energy into her fists, giving her enhanced strength. She serves as business manager of her husband’s Mount Olympia Martial Arts Academy, as well as being second-in-command of the New Olympians.Here finally, are the sisters L’Orange in their post-Plague costumes (all six of them now). This incarnation, like when I re-designed Frank Hallows, is meant to address some of the issues with the previous version of the sisters, as well as some story elements I introduced in their Bios that were never given any significance during the Plagues.
First, under Le Cirque’s Powers list, I mentioned “Psychic Immunity.” That was meant as a contrast to Six’s precognition power, so that Six (as well as Lady Icarus, Shanti, and most other psychic heroes) would have been unable to foresee their break-in at HallowGen. It is one effect of the suppression technology that was incorporated into the Circus assassins to keep them under control. This technology (which worked in a modified capacity in Couteau to shut off her five senses and artificially induce her para-spectral senses) effectively blocked the subjects’ memories, psychic potential, and nearly all normal brain activity, essentially rendering them programmable flesh. The Milieu had such faith in their technology that they did not deem it necessary to incorporate a failsafe program, so when the Circus assassins turned on Lucifer, they remained alive long enough for HallowGen’s top robotics and genetics experts to remove all of Milieu’s enhancements, including the psychic suppressors.
The mind is an amazing thing, especially in its ability to adapt to change. With the source of their Le Cirque powers removed, and their psychic potential restored, the sisters’ minds began adapting almost immediately, attempting to replicate their lost Le Cirque abilities as closely as possible.
Une L’Orange (formerly Fouet, a.k.a. “Lashes”) had enhanced strength and agility, and was very skilled with a whip. HallowGen’s top cybernetics experts developed a high-tech prosthetic to replace the lower left arm she lost to Milieu, making her the only L’Orange sister to have a cybernetic augmentation post-Plague. Her newly awakened mind has compensated, turbo-charging her strength and agility to levels that match her old enhancements.
Deux L’Orange (formerly Charade) had the ability to disguise herself and those around her in whatever holographic form she chose, and to project three-dimensional constructs like weapons and geometric shapes (for containment and self-defense). Without her projection equipment, her newly awakened mind has since replicated her projection ability with psychic energy, much like Strong-Arm’s astral arm and Nightshade’s shields.
Trois L’Orange (formerly Tordre) had the ability to contort her body into any configuration and back again. After having her servos and suppressor removed, several nerve transplants and bone grafts, and only weeks of physical therapy (thanks to her newly acquired healing factor), she is able to dislocate any or all of her joints at will and return to normal without risk of internal injury or degeneration of her nerves or connective tissues, which have grown back significantly more elastic than those of the average human.
Quatre L’Orange (formerly Couteau) was given the ability to sense the world around her and perceive her surroundings in different para-spectral wavelengths of her choosing, but at the expense of her five conventional senses. Having been without her senses for so long, they did not return when her suppressor was removed. But her sixth sense remained, enhanced by her newly awakened mind to the point that it was nearly equivalent to the five she had lost, allowing her to “hear” herself speak for the first time. Quatre found she could also manifest blades of psychic energy, a replacement for the energy weapons Milieu had given her.
Cinq L’Orange (formerly Solide) was augmented with superhuman strength. Following the Plague event, she underwent extensive surgery and therapy like her sister Trois, to remove her strength-enhancement technology. Her surgical team was successful, but they could not find a way of removing her titanium-coated skeleton without killing her. Without the psychic suppressor in her brain, Cinq’s mind adapted by increasing her muscle mass and skin density. At a touch, Cinq can now match the physical strength and resilience of whoever she is fighting (and the more people she fights at once, the stronger she gets). This also works with inanimate objects, allowing her to gauge the physical properties of whatever she touches and adapt her body accordingly (eg: for lifting, throwing, pushing, etc). The limits of this new ability have not been tested, but in theory, applying it to anything bigger than a semi truck would be out of the question.Finally, a small improvement to Six L’Orange’s hair, as requested in the Fashion Contest results. I covered up the blank space behind her head with another hair asset. I also addressed the “sword in cane” from her Powers list by re-posing her as follows.
Six L’Orange (formerly the Director of Clockwork) is much the same character-wise. She is still a master swordswoman, a precognitive, and a bane in the existence of organized crime. But with the return of her five sisters, Six has left Clockwork in the wake of the Plagues to help them recuperate from surgery and adjust to their semi-normal lives of free will and their developing psychic powers, as well as catching up on some much-needed family bonding. Her sisters want revenge just as badly as she does, if not more, and once their recovery is complete, Six and her sisters return to Paris to put an end to the Milieu syndicate once and for all. With her sisters’ suppressors removed, Six now has a psychic link with them that allows the six (identical) sisters to communicate with each other over long distances and sense when the others are in danger.The end is here, folks! Almost time to unveil the Being behind the Plague event. But first, another recap:
Lena Black has been fending off a citywide horde of vampirism victims and hunting down Vlad the Impaler. Deus X is occupied with the Hybrid invasion of Atlantis. Tetra has left the team to train with Shanti so that she can get her Ka’Li persona under control. Rush and Lady Icarus are trying to free Fever and Flame Girl from Fire’s influence. Silver, Mad Jack, and Prima are also fighting possessed friends as the Shadow King has turned Shadow, Shield, and Black Marble against them. While two members of the Underworld Circus have broken into HallowGen, trapping Tempora Doce in a time-locked energy box and kidnapping her grandson, Six L’Orange, Frank Hallows, Sword, Hi-N’Un, and Lady Luck have been dealing with Robbie Boyle and the other three Circus assassins, who have bought their employer enough time to transform little Alvin Hallows into The Monster. But The Monster’s appearance has ended the life of Robbie Boyle and forced Clockwork and Le Cirque to choose between working together and dying together. So it seems the Being has been a busy…man?
Name: The Being
Alias: The Devil, Lucifer, Satan, The Beast, King of Hell, Pan, Beelzebub, Father of Lies
Race: Fallen Angel/Demon
Birthplace: Heaven
Powers: Teleportation, Healing factor, Second sight, Psychic/Spiritual influence over others, Inhuman strength, Flight, etc. (what do you expect…he’s frickin’ Satan).
Bio: As we all know, Lucifer was once an Angel who dared to defy God and challenge His power and right to rule Heaven, so God cast him out of Heaven. Lucifer’s fall from Grace left his soul twisted into a demonic presence that was to remain trapped in Hell for eternity. His body was split in two deformed halves: one a lion-like beast with the horns of a ram who roamed the land in search of any souls unwilling to follow God, the other a freakish seven-headed chimera that was unequal parts goat, bear, leopard, and dragon that was banished to the bottom of the sea. Some time in the last century, the three pieces of Lucifer have begun to reunite, and the Being who is the King of Hell has indeed become very busy. He has assembled a group of demons, mortal villains, and otherworldly beasts to challenge the integrity of Earth’s greatest heroes. He has made deals with Fire (to restore her human memories), Couteau (for the return of her senses), Tordre (for a human body), Vlad and the Shadow King (for their own private kingdoms on Earth), and only the Devil knows how many others. He has freed the Atlantean Hybrids from captivity and given them an opportunity for revenge, brought his Vedangan namesake (Beelzebub) back from the dead, and is responsible for turning several heroes to the dark side (including Fever, Flame Girl, Shadow, Shield, Black Marble, and Frank’s son Alvin Hallows), all in his eternal struggle against God to prove that his way (the path of evil) is superior. He will kill Vlad for his insolence, presenting himself to a disillusioned and exhausted Lena Black as her savior, only to later turn her into the new Horseman of Pestilence as a backhanded way of ending her curse.Fire will make a tactical retreat from Rush and Lady Icarus, with Flame Girl and Fever in tow, only to have her Lord recant his promise as punishment for her cowardice. With her cause rendered fruitless, Fire releases the two flaming heroes from her control. But Fever and Flame Girl still feel some strange kinship to their captor, and ask that she help them put a stop to Lucifer. Having been rejected by him, Fire agrees, and Burn Unit is formed.
Shanti will step in on the fight against the Shadow Demons, punching through the gaping maw in the Shadow King’s chest and ending his control over Shadow, Shield, and Black Marble in addition to ending his life. However, the possessed trio retained some of their Shadow Demon powers, and have decided to join Shanti’s team of dichotomous heroes, the Soul Survivors.
Lady Luck will reveal to Six L’Orange that the Le Cirque sisters are her presumably dead sisters, and reveals to her and Frank Hallows that The Monster is their son Alvin, which makes everyone more cautious about engaging him in battle. Everyone, that is, except for Tetra. Having been trained in Shanti’s personal pocket dimension (where an hour in our world is equal to a hundred years, but those in the dimension do not age), Tetra is now in complete control of her Ka’Li energy, and therefore much stronger in her normal form than she was previously. As she fights The Monster with her newly focused power, Frank leaves for HallowGen with Six and three of her sisters in tow, looking for the rest of Le Cirque and a spare power core. With them gone and Lady Luck and the Pharaoh watching from a relatively safe distance, Tetra-Ka’Li can fight unrestrained, and is able to subdue The Monster long enough to rip out the demonic power source, reverting him to a still-adult Alvin Hallows. Tetra is part demon now, so the radiation doesn’t affect her, but the energy core was the only thing keeping Alvin from aging into dust overnight.
At HallowGen, Frank’s group encounter Charade and Tordre, and after a few misguided punches are thrown, Six explains that she is their sister, with Solide backing up her story. Charade then frees Tempora from her prison box. Frank locates the power core he needs, and contacts Lady Icarus (who makes psychic contact with Shanti) to inform her and Rush that Alvin is about to die.
Clockwork (minus Lena Black and Dhanusha), Le Cirque, Burn Unit, and the Soul Survivors all come to Alvin’s aid, with Frank attaching the new power core to his son in hopes that it will keep Alvin alive. But normal technology proves to not be enough. Shanti and Lady Icarus use their knowledge of Angelic blood alchemy to infuse the power core with Grace energy, in much the same way Lucifer used his demonic energy to power the other core. Alvin survived and would retain his ability to transform into The Monster, briefly joining the Soul Survivors before taking his family’s place in the 12 O’Clock spot of the new Post-Meridian Clockwork team.
The heroes’ triumph did not sit well with Lucifer, who appeared to the assembled teams with a vow to end them all, and an ominous threat that their undoing would be at the hands of one of their own. Before he faded back into his soul-chamber in Hell, Lucifer showed them an image of Lena Black, chained up and screaming as she transformed into the new Horseman of Pestilence.The End?And now, the final Plague villain, based on the Death of the Firstborn Son.
Name: The Monster
Alias: Alvin Hallows
Race: Human
Birthplace: Ithaca, NY
Powers: Super-strength, High-density skin, Healing factor, Precognition.
Bio: Alvin Hallows was a baby only hours ago, the firstborn son of Frank Hallows and Six L’Orange. But he was kidnapped by Le Cirque du Milieu and handed off to the Being, who aged the child into an adult in the course of an hour. The Being also infused his energy into the stolen P.A.T.C.H. power core and attached it to Alvin’s chest. The combination of supernatural aging and the demonic energy source transformed Alvin into The Monster, a hulking, mindless man-beast strong enough to give Ka’Li a challenge. But with Tetra off training under Shanti, the team, Robbie Boyle (who tries to injure The Monster with his boiling ability and gets torn apart for his trouble), and the Underworld Circus are defenseless against him.
Now Frank, Six, Sword, Lady Luck, and the Pharaoh must work together with Solide, Fouet (“Lashes”), and Couteau. Their best chance of surviving The Monster’s wrath is to remove the power source, but Lady Luck’s power has revealed The Monster’s true identity, and following a scan of the device, Frank is reluctant to do so because he doesn’t know what effect the further release of demonic energy will have on his son or his team.Next time, I will unveil the Being and give a wrap-up to the Plague event.
And here it is:
While Robbie Boyle and three members of Le Cirque were keeping Clockwork occupied, Tordre and Charade sneaked into HallowGen disguised as Six L’Orange (isn’t it ironic?) and Frank Hallows, at the Being’s behest. You might think they’re there to steal technology to build some ominous doomsday weapon, or to trick out their already impressive accessories with everything necessary to kill the Clockwork heroes and their associates, but you would only be a fraction as correct as you think. They do steal one of Frank’s spare power cores, but Le Cirque’s true mission is to steal a child. More specifically, Alvin Hallows, the infant son of Clockwork leaders Frank Hallows and Six L’Orange. More biblically, their firstborn son, who is being watched over by Tempora, Frank’s mother (see where having a mime who can interfere with time travel comes in handy?). And the Being has plans for baby Alvin that I will unveil in my next post.In the meantime, let’s get back to the Le Cirque portion of our story so I can unveil the final member of the team and give the rest of Clockwork some pagetime.
To quote Indiana Jones (if he were a metamfiezomaiophobe instead of an ophidiophobe): “Mimes…why did it have to be mimes?” Well, Dr. Jones you weirdo, it had to be mimes because I started thinking about what a mime could do if she had powers, and mimes are kind of a French performance art thing so I felt an evil bionic-powered mime would fit in nicely with my Underworld Circus. Perhaps I could make other circus acts into characters, too. But I liked this concept better. So here’s the final member of this incarnation of Le Cirque du Milieu, aptly codenamed “Charade”
Name: Charade
Alias: Deux L’Orange
Race: Human
Birthplace: Paris, France
Powers: Projects solid holograms of any object or person she can think of (up to the size of an entire room), Can mask the appearance of herself and/or anyone in the room with her, Psychic immunity.
Bio: Deux L’Orange’s bio is much the same as her sisters. She was brainwashed and cybernetically enhanced to serve as an assassin for a French organized crime syndicate. The Milieu augmented Charade with holographic technology stolen and modified from the Three-Star General suit, making her a master of disguise. Her holograph implants are powered by Knavium particles, which cause enclosed projections (like a classic mime box or a room) to alter the laws of temporal physics (rendering time travel impossible, for example) and weapon constructs to cut through Knavium alloys and “magical” defenses as easily as through any conventional form of weaponry. With HallowGen’s security disabled, Charade is able to disguise herself and Tordre as Six and Frank, and infiltrate the building without being recognized by biometric scanners.
The real Six and Frank are with Sword, Hi-N’Un, and Lady Luck, dealing with Robbie Boyle and the rest of Le Cirque. But as Six squares off against Lashes, Sword clashes swords with Couteau, Frank matches strength for strength against Solide, and Hi-N’Un and Lady Luck stand off against their old nemesis, Lady Luck can’t help but notice a similarity between Six and the three Circus assassins. She also can’t help thinking they’re making the fight too easy, distracting the five heroes from some larger scheme.Group shot to come soon.
Those heroes being the remains of the anti-Aaron Clockwork team (Silver, Mad Jack, and Shield), in addition to the unlikely duo of Prima and Black Marble. Rush and Lady Icarus are responding to reports of rampaging fire demons, leaving four heroes and a mechanical werewolf to fend off the Shadow Royals, and two of them are about to go bad.
Starting with Black Marble:
Name: Black Marble
Alias: Rivelle D’Mor
Race: Moord’rian (Dark Elf)
Birthplace: Moord’r
Powers: Arcane knowledge, Moord’rian bracelets (details in Bio)
Bio: As queen of an alien elven race, Rivelle inherited a pair of bracelets that allow the wearer to encase their body in an orb of dark light that, though it expands and contracts like rubber, is virtually impervious to non-magical weaponry.
While the orb is active, it allows the wearer of the bracelets to fly at high speeds and can convert the dark matter of space into a breathable atmosphere of their choosing. Theoretically, interplanetary travel can be achieved (perhaps even at warp speeds), but this is not recommended for those with low spiritual energy, as they could become stranded out in space with nothing to breathe.
Queen Rivelle had her threshold put to the test when a diplomacy mission to another planet left her homeworld vulnerable to attack. With no home to return to, Rivelle followed the spirit energy contrail of the attacking vessel to Earth, where she enlisted the aid of several of the planet’s finest heroes in turning back the invasion.
Queen no more, Rivelle must struggle with her new place in the Universe while defending her adoptive homeworld as the Black Marble.
Former Unarian princess Prima’s escape from her homeworld led to Prima’s father, King Priam, attacking and destroying Moord’r and attempting an invasion of Earth. It irked the Black Marble to no end that Prima was inducted into Clockwork despite the danger her actions invited upon Earth and Moord’r, but the two anti-heroes often found themselves working together, much as they are now…but not for long. With her darkness-based powers and lingering ill will towards Prima, Rivelle too became easy prey for the Shadow King and his new Queen, agreeing to become the Black Hole and use her increased power to defeat Prima once and for all.
Name: Black Hole
Alias: Rivelle D’Mor
Race: Shadow Demon/Dark Elf
Birthplace: Moord’r
Powers: Arcane knowledge, Consumes light energy, Healing Factor, Flight.
Bio: Once the respected queen of an alien elven race, Rivelle D’Mor was left without title or homeworld by the reckless former princess of Unaria. Forced to live among commoners on a strange world and work side-by-side with her nemesis, Rivelle has surrendered herself and the power of her Black Marble bracelets to the influence of the Shadow King. As the Black Hole, Rivelle’s bracelet powers have been infused into her body and corrupted by the Shadow King. Where previously Black Marble was able to convert dark matter into atmosphere, the Black Hole’s powers absorb atmosphere and light and convert them into a tangible darkness. She needs no atmosphere to breathe and can fly at will, whereas previously she needed the bracelets’ power to fly. The Shadow King is merely using her to spread darkness across the Earth so that he can claim it as his kingdom.
Likewise, there are other Plague villains looking to establish their own dominion over the planet (Vlad’s vampire army, The Human Frog’s hybrid followers), and plenty of heroes remain to stop them, but like (Queen) Shadow and Black Marble/Black Hole, they are all just chess pieces in a greater game orchestrated by the being that Fire calls her Lord.
As is our final Hero Gone Bad for the moment, Shield:
Name: Shield
Alias: Shirudo
Race: Human
Birthplace: Beijing, China
Powers: Bionically enhanced strength & reflexes, Anti-matter energy shields.
Bio: They may be identical twins, but the women known only as Sword and Shield are as different as night and day. When their mother was pregnant with them, she traveled with their father to Beijing, where he had been transferred in lieu of a job promotion.
But on the day the girls were born, their mother awakened from anesthesia prematurely to find that, though the ultrasound she had had in the United States confirmed twins, only one baby girl awaited her in the nursery. Storming through a back door in the nursery, she found her other child in the process of being euthanized (because in China at that time, mothers were only allowed to bear one child). Running on superhuman, maternal strength and a lioness’ courage, she somehow rendered all the attending doctors unconscious and escaped the hospital with her newborn twin daughters, who were both still very much alive. After much domestic turmoil, she took the girls on a flight out of Beijing, leaving China and her work-focused husband for the relative safety of Japan.
But (a word that would come to spell doom for her and her children) that safety came with a price. One day, a Yakuza enforcer came looking for protection money and, finding her financial situation lacking, took the twins as collateral, killing their mother when she resisted.
The girls were raised by the Yakuza, a childhood utterly devoid of all things childish, and eventually became initiated Yakuza themselves. The fearsome Nihonto (Sword) served as chief enforcer, and Shirudo (Shield) became the Yakuza boss’ personal security guard. Having been mutilated as a baby, the woman now known as Shirudo had long ago been given a bionic suit, fashioned from stolen tech, to help her walk and fight. Over her years with the Yakuza’s tech division, Shirudo quickly learned to repair her own suit and made the defensive modifications that would earn her name and position.
Their lives would change again when Nihonto returned from a mission to find her sister being assaulted by their boss, forcing Nihonto to kill the man and making the two of them targets for the criminal organization that had been their family for so long. They managed to survive daily attempts on their lives thanks to Shirudo’s defensive armor and Nihonto’s incomparable stealth and ruthless fighting style until the day they would cross paths with Strong Arm and Sextant, who had come to Tokyo following a trail of Yakuza activity from the states.
The four form a formidable fighting force to face down their felonious foes, finally freeing the city of a fearsomely fatalistic franchise. So began the formation of Clockwork…
But in this day of conquest-hungry demons and heroes gone bad, having anti-matter weaponry in the presence of three Shadow Demons is not the wisest course of resistance. Like Shadow and Black Marble before her, Shield falls under the influence of the Shadow King, becoming the Shadow Demon known as Nightshade.
Name: Nightshade
Alias: Shirudo, a.k.a. Shield
Race: Human/Shadow Demon
Birthplace: Beijing, China
Powers: Healing factor, Flight, Superhuman strength, Dark energy sheilds
Bio: Shirudo seems to prefer being Nightshade over her previous existence. Endowed with the powers of a Shadow Demon, her natal injuries have been completely healed, rendering her painful bionic armor unnecessary. She is also much stronger and faster than before, and can project energy shields without the use of her armor’s gauntlets. Her shields not only reject light energy, they also allow her to fly and fight offensively. The Shadow King’s influence gave her these abilities so that she could aid Black Hole in spreading the darkness unopposed.@Jeimuzu said:
So creepy and awesome. Love those eyes on the knee caps, cool how all the creepy stuff really pops in the darkness.
Thanks again for the feedback. I thought the eyes would add a little something extra.
It turns out fire and poison aren’t the only things that can make a good hero go bad. Darkness can do it, too. You’ve already met Shadow, but you haven’t yet seen Queen Shadow:
Name: Queen Shadow
Aliases: Jade Kincaid, Shadow
Race: Human/Shadow Demon
Birthplace: New Orleans, Louisiana
Powers: As Shadow, she possesses the ability to blend in to any shadow, and teleport from shadow to shadow by line-of-sight. As Queen Shadow, she possesses all of her powers, plus those of the Shadow King.
Bio: Jade Kincaid, her husband John Kincaid, and his brother, Rush Kincaid, worked for NASA, locating and studying meteor rocks in hopes of discovering new elements. On their last expedition, the trio came into contact with a highly radioactive sample that endowed each of them with powers then beyond their control. John became the flaming hero now known as Fever, Rush gained super-speed, and Jade became Shadow, the team’s new tactical leader.
They soon realized that their powers did not mix well if directed improperly. Any fires generated by Fever would affect the stability and location of any nearby shadows, making it difficult if not impossible for Shadow to use her powers reliably. Likewise, Rush’s super speed, combined with his impulsive, lone wolf nature, could be dangerous in the company of his brother, whose powers could be amplified or weakened by the windshear Rush generates while running at high speed.
A side-effect to mixing Rush’s super-speed and Shadow’s teleportation powers revealed itself when a team of highly trained metahumans (assembled for the sole purpose of defeating Fifth Hour) forced Rush to test the upper limits of his speed in a last-ditch effort to save Shadow from the Sniper’s bullet. He was able to reach Shadow in time and push her out of the way, but she saw the bullet coming and ducked into a nearby shadow as Rush made contact with her, breaking the dimensional barrier and sending them both sprawling into the Shadow Realm where they faced the Shadow King for the first time.
A year has gone by since then, and Shadow, on the run from her possessed husband, is finally realizing the impact their contrasting powers have had on their relationship, and makes her way into the Shadow Realm voluntarily. Emotionally damaged and having darkness-based powers, she makes easy prey for the Shadow King, who exploits her budding loneliness and makes her his Queen. With (Queen) Shadow’s powers at his disposal, the Shadow King is able to cross into our world and begin his conquest. But first he must deal with another group of heroes….
