Character Select
Hina / Eda - 25+ - she/they
@duchessdynamicI used to play City of Heroes way back in the Freedom days, on the Union and Virtue shards, and up until it shut down. The larger part of my passion since has been in Final Fantasy XIV, but with some downtime in the lead-up to the next expansion, added with renewed interest following the Homecoming Team's license acquisition, I've been rekindling my CoX experience - reviving some dearly missed characters (ie. Sabreuse) and conjuring up some new creations - not to mention taking advantages of new opportunities in the Homecoming era.My time can be erratic and I'm on the fence about returning to roleplay but I'm not against it (no ERP!), and I've been setting up possibilities while putting together Sabreuse's supergroup Bayonet - which if it interests you you're free to join per inquiry (I plan another carrd with general info in the near-future). In any case you can find more of me mucking it up in the links below.It's nice to meet you! Thanks for any interest you may have in my OCs or otherwise.(above art by benvey/corfisers)
Lost Midnighter
Abyssos
(any pronouns)
Magic Blaster
Dark Blast/Darkness Manipulation
27 - Hero - Torchbearer
When it comes to the arcane arts there are those who may dive into the sea of knowledge, at the risk of being caught in the undertow - changed irrevocably.In truth, the one called Abyssos was once a relatively mundane mage of the Midnight Squad: studious, hopeful and determined. Everything changed when the Rikti first attacked, and the Midnighter was forced into a corner - to watch friends and colleagues be annihilated by Rikti energy weapons. In their most desperate hour, they alone called upon eldritch dark arts to drive their assailants back.It was a pact that came at a lofty cost, for the Midnighter was never the same. It is not known if anyone is still alive who knew who Abyssos once was or their history, but it is the residual tether of their past life that keeps them committed to the Midnight Squad and a noble path - along with a deep-seated hatred for the Rikti - as they slowly re-discover themself.
Yokai Miko
Tengoku Tengu
(she/her)
Magic Sentinel
Storm Blast/Super Reflexes
8 - Hero - Torchbearer
The Kuroba family has served as attendants of a shrine in central Japan for countless generations. Members of the family generally do not learn until the age of 15 that they are in truth a clan of tengu, stewards of the kami Sarutahiko with an intrinsic knack for elemental magic.Saki is the newest to learn this truth - reluctantly, though she cannot deny it is kind of exciting to be able to fly and all that.Taking in hand the heirloom magatama "Nue's fang", Saki has been granted control over the very weather around her, which might be enough to assume the task of redressing balance to nature, and the world.
Mutant Runner
Street Skink
(she/they)
Mutation Stalker
Spines/Bio Armor
13 - Hero - Torchbearer
One would be hard-pressed to explain how splitting the atom begot such diverse and seemingly random evolutionary pathways in a fraction of the populace; mutations like those found in Cassandra SolÃs. Being born with reptile-like qualities and developing the ability to produce dubious secretions that harden instantly in air doesn't exactly ensure an easy life. Or nice clothes.Even with loving and supportive family (mostly), Sandra was considered a pariah in her community. Other kids derisively called her Skink while growing up, but eventually she turned that into a badge of honor. While perhaps a normal career path was unlikely, Skink could yet do something with herself with her 'unique' talents. She had after all also gained quite a knack for skulking about in an urban landscape.There's a good reason all roads lead to Paragon, or so they say at least.
Hacker Extraordinaire
Duchess Dynamic
(she/her)
Technology Sentinel
Electrical Blast/Energy Aura
50 - Rogue - Everlasting
Edina Dunai was brilliant, but also a punk and a misfit, so she applied her knack for all things electric to undermine authority wherever she could. Until she overextended her reach, and was electrocuted by the special barrier of a Malta computer, costing her use of her arms and hands.She got her first cybernetics by joining the Freakshow. It didn't last long, for she couldn't stand them, but she found that she could now manipulate electricity. By building upon what the Freaks gave her, she refined her skills into an art, reaching new heights as a hacker and whistleblower. Fond of leaking documents on the Battle Blitz forums.After infiltrating a Vanguard database, she attracted the attention of one Bayonet, whose leader may have been the first to ever win Edina's respect. She soon joined the group as one of the few without a service background, and she typically acts as support. While she prefers to remain in the background, she's not against getting out on the field to make sure the job is done right.She boasts the codename Duchess Dynamic after a recurring handle on social media, though most just deign to call her "DD".
Stand Alone Combatant
Lithium Flower
(she/her)
Technology Blaster
Assault Rifle/Energy Manipulation
50+ - Vigilante - Everlasting
A cyborg operative and field runner for the spec-ops outfit Bayonet.Masako Murakumo purportedly survived a major traffic-related incident early on, which exposed her to cybernetic prosthesis from a young age - that which she proved to have an affinity for. Much of her life and career up to working for Japan's Public Security remains off the record, but she is undoubtedly endowed with some of the best bionics Aramaki Industries has to offer.Murakumo - code-named Lithium - first met her future colleague and SO Sabreuse some time after the Rikti War, when their nations collaborated in shared science. She would eventually develop a loyalty that would lead her into Bayonet, where she deploys tactics through suppressive fire.
Hellspawned Ex-Girlfriend
Mara the Estranged
(she/her)
Magic Mastermind
Demon Summoning/Thermal Radiation
26 - Rogue - Everlasting
When a demon is summoned and a pact is formed, the demon's outward appearance in the mortal realm is often affected by the summoner's ideal - whether they want it or not. Such tends to be the case for the so-called "girlfriends from hell".Most GFs tend to put up with the Hellions while slowly feeding on their lives until their 'pact' expires, but one soon had enough of them and her brutish "boyfriend." Mara was something of a cut above even her sisters, more than the fiery gang usually bargained for. Thus when they got locked in one of their banal turf wars, the demoness took advantage, struck down her summoner and made her escape.Severing a pact usually returns the demon to the underworld, yet Mara remained, and her magic was somehow bleeding out to but a fraction. Left no better than an imp or a blood brother - A petty human! Perish the thought!!Mara weathered the ignominy; If she couldn't return home, then she would re-assert her domain and reclaim her power here, searing any soul that stood in her way.
Cybernetic Phantom
Sabreuse
(she/her)
Technology Stalker
Claws/Ninjutsu
50+ - Vigilante - Everlasting
"Solange Chevalier" was born in 19██ in Algiers, Algeria to a French mother and an Algerian father. Growing up in the adjacent Kabylia region, her early years were evidently of no particular note until conflict in the 1990s between the government and militant factions gradually gripped the country in a vise. It was during this period that her father was targeted and murdered by militants, with young Solange narrowly escaping death herself. After her rescue, her mother absconded with her to France, where she claimed her right to citizenship.While she tried to continue a normal civilian life in a new home, what Solange had witnessed and lost in Algeria would doubtlessly stick with her, and she took an interest in the armed forces. She joined through the Foreign Legion after coming of age, proving herself a model recruit even at this time, though her tenure would hit a snag of the highest magnitude. One that no one could have feasibly expected.Paris was one of dozens of global population centers to bear direct witness to the myriad portals through which the Rikti would invade on 23 May 2002, and it was with methodical precision by which they carried out their destruction of infrastructure. In hours they had decimated a third of the world's combined militias. As chaos swept, the UN Security Council - led by France and Great Britain - formed the emergency umbrella organization Vanguard, who would serve as one of the most crucial lifelines in the war and thereafter.The Foreign Legion was likely to be forever changed as they were co-opted to work as part of the Vanguard, but events would soon see Solange's service at this time abruptly end. Heroic forces were routed while escorting refugees near Istanbul, and Solange was taken out of the fight, buried in the rubble of a collapsing building.While she had the exceptional fortune to be subsequently freed from her premature tomb and survive, she was left comatose for the remainder of the invasion, and had sustained life-changing injuries. When the soldier finally came to, she found she had narrowly escaped death once more through surgery, lost limbs and would need extensive therapy to regain motor functions in what remained. As it was, the outlook was grim that she would ever walk again without a mobility aid. Worst of all, though, came the news that her mother did not live to see the invasion's end.Under other cosmic circumstances, perhaps her livelihood as she knew it would have ended there. Solange had lost everything and had to fight just to grieve. In her darkest hour, however, came a light of hope. Nearly a year after the war, she had been formally approached by her government.Out of the tragedy of the invasion, extensive research in captured Rikti warmachina ushered a spike in advancing science and technology, the likes of which virtually unparalleled in modern history. This meant vast improvements to cybernetics and bionics, and Solange was invited to be on the frontline of groundbreaking new prosthesis - that which would promise a full return to her physical capabilities pre-war, and potentially beyond.Such a proposal seemed to have been a favor arranged by her own late mother, and called for no evident cost on her part. In that department Solange was dubious, for surely she would be indebted to her country for the foreseeable future. She would've also been a fool, she felt, if she were to decline the opportunity. Furthermore, she wasn't ready to abandon her active service, so she leaned into it.In a collaboration between French technologists and leading Japanese robotics engineers, Solange was fitted with some of the best prosthesis the initiative could offer. She was tested and she trained rigorously, meeting and exceeding all accepted parameters. She had returned to fighting form and found a renewed purpose. Her compliance and persistence meant she had most certainly been augmented on the downlow with hardware that wouldn't have been granted to the average civilian.By the time Solange made her triumphant return to the armed forces, she had been practically seen as a hot commodity. The world had lost many of its finest heroes and soldiers, and nearly all of the great organizations laid in ruin. While they rebuilt, they were vulnerable to factions with more self-serving interests; the villains who would take advantage of the situation to gain new footholds, as well as potentially compromise institutions from the inside. Thus there was an increasing demand for operatives running intelligence and counterintelligence, including specialists in covert infiltration and extraction.It had been the kind of skill set Solange was building for herself.Equipped as a cyborg with her signature Lancet-type hidden blades, thermoptic camouflage and other utilities, Solange figuratively and literally disappeared into her cloak-and-dagger work. She proved herself effective at precision information gathering and, more often than not, the systematic elimination of enemy targets. It had taken a personal urgency in 2007 with the resurgence of the Rikti, prompting Solange to root out the hidden bases they had staked claims to. From that point forward, her allegiance had been effectively split between the French government and the broader Vanguard.The eyes of the world have long been on Paragon City, the improbable metropolitan nexus of superheroes and a veritable patchwork tapestry of conflict, and Solange has gotten involved on multiple occasions.It is there that she has tangled the most with recurring adversaries beyond the Rikti, those who regard her as but a glorified assassin, albeit formidable. In such a high-profile location, however, even a specter of the intelligence community cannot evade a hint of public recognition.Strictly speaking, the most that is known of her is the call sign she acquired for her blade-oriented combat style: Sabreuse.Currently, most of Sabreuse's actions align with the independent group Bayonet, of which she leads as director. Its specialty reflects hers: intelligence and espionage, with an emphasis on science and technology.
Otherworldly Ally
Rikti Shadow
(she/they/any)
Science Blaster
Psychic Blast/Ninja Training
50 - Hero/Vigilante - Everlasting
Rikti traditionalist Cal'Xtal appeared on the scene as her friend, C'Kelkah, engaged in negotiations with Primal Earth organizations. It was during this time that she befriended Solange Chevalier, aka Sabreuse.While she shared the dream of peace between races, she resigned early on that there would be those among her brethren who may never give up the ideals of conquest. Nor was she blind to their atrocities. Thus did Cal resolve to clash wherever she was needed, and she would soon lend her aid and knowledge to Sabreuse's black-ops group Bayonet.It is believed that she has learned a thing or two in infiltration from Solange herself.
Ship of Theseus
Field Agent Eight
(they/them)
Technology Tanker
Invulnerability/Energy Melee
50 - Rogue - Everlasting
Loyalty. The Wolf Spider had something to prove, and as long as it was being proved to Arachnos, there were few limits by which one could rise. And rise they did, defiant of the hostile culture and constant risks.In fact, they seemed incapable of dying, as if determined not to go the way of Vetrano and Marino. For every injury they took, they would enhance themself with bionics. For every op they lost more of themself. Endlessly yearning for change. For strength. Until there was nearly nothing left of who they once were.Eventually they realized they couldn't even recall their own name; they were only "Subject Eight" to their S/Os.They were close to losing the last of their humanity to Arachnos. Then, on the field, they met Sabreuse.It was a brief clash, and Eight fell. All that power grab for nothing. They demanded the assassin finish the job.In the end, however, Sabreuse said "Come with me."
Eight's loyalty has since been with Bayonet, where Sabreuse took to calling them Fae.
Nyanomachines, son!
Nano-Cat
(she/her)
Science Brute
Savage Melee/Bio Armor
7 - Hero - Everlasting
Dr. Helen Ritter was a seasoned researcher for the German-based Caracal Biotech Inc., one such established as Crey's influence withered in Europe in more recent years. Ritter and her team had taken up the task of developing a way to counter the Devouring Earth, to resist their mutagens and potentially cure the Devoured.
In particular they had begun to focus on nanotechnology, and they were seeing promising results. Nanomachines that work off of cell memory and reverse the damage done. Such could even have practical applications outside of the Earth, by repairing cell decay and among other things rejuvenate the body.It was so far so good, but naturally soon Crey came sniffing. Having also taken interest in the Earth, they sent infiltrators for a little espionage in Caracal HQ. Casualties were inevitable, and after bypassing the guards the elderly Dr. Ritter - who was on site after-hours - was seemingly an easy target.
But she had been alerted to their presence, and she was prepared. Really with the expedience by which she had then injected herself with a prototype nanite solution, you would think that she had been looking for an excuse to conduct a personal trial run.Suffused with nanites that granted her enhanced physicality, with skin and nails as tough as diamond, Ritter soundly overtook Crey's spies. Caracal's status was safe, and after a brief detention Ritter continued to work. However, the act and aftermath of dosing herself with high amounts of an experimental nanite drug has casted as shadow of concern on her mental competence as a scientist, and her priorities.
Cyberspace Lifeform
Digital Deva
(they/any)
Technology Controller
Illusion Control/Electrical Affinity
8 - Hero - Everlasting
Architect Entertainment hasn't been without competition. At one point for instance a tech upstart had delved into "the next level of VR" that completely immersed all five senses, giving the people many of AE's features through far more portable head-mounted displays.
Until the company was embroiled in controversy when said prototype HMDs killed at least one play tester through unexpected malfunction. Some suspected AE's financier Crey, or even Dr. Thaddeus Aeon himself, of foul play.What no one saw was that the victim's very consciousness - or a copy of it - wound up backed up in the cloud, manifesting as a 'ghost' in the sea of information. It would be by chance years later that the wandering entity was found by Bayonet hacker Edina 'DD' Dunai.
Quick to befriend them, DD soon repurposed various parts from other projects in order to bring them to the living world once more, with a body of hard light and metal.DD watches the new Deva's growth with great interest.
The Verdant Vigil
Emerald Rush
(she/they)
Science Sentinel
Ice Blast/Stone Armor
8 - Hero - Everlasting
Jean Harland had been accepted in a clinical trial for a supposedly reputable pharmaceutical company. Unfortunately it was only after tests of a drug were underway that it was exposed as more a front for none other than Crey.Not long after, Jean started to materialize crystals like emeralds, with a more than passing resemblance to the geode monsters of the Devouring Earth. Jean leaned into it, and soon began to moonlight as the hero Emerald Rush.
Shadowed Oaths
Ravensblade
(they/she/any)
Magic Scrapper
Titan Weapons/Bio Armor
18 - Hero - Everlasting
A secret order of knights resides within the shadows of cities. With black steel they emerge to smite the wicked and usher their souls to the underworld.
It is said that these "Ravens" were themselves once mortals whose lives ended abruptly. The burning grudges they carried in their hearts at the time of death would attract the Ravensblade, who offer second chances in life to those who swear an oath to become an eternal warrior, the final word of the cities they stalk.Whatever life this particular knight had before the oath is likely the least of anyone's concern.