RE: Masks 2
08-30-2018, 04:29 AM
(This post was last modified: 08-30-2018, 01:02 PM by Anomaly.)
Name: Elena Amador Herrera
Aliases: Dragonfly.
Date of Birth: 19 February 1993 (adjusted for Circumstances, 19 February 2023)
Place of Birth: Houston, TX
Place of Residence: A cryopod in the long-ruined Ripcara Research Facility, some 10,000 light years from Earth. Built into an asteroid in some uninhabited star system somewhere on the Perseus arm, Ripcara was dedicated to all sorts of highly illegal and illicit experimentation, mostly on kidnapped aliens of all sorts. The survivors tended to end up with strange powers, dangerous implants, and so on, and were typically shoved into indefinite cryostasis until further research could be conducted on them. That or they were sold as brainwashed super-soldiers and the like. Just some really bad stuff.
That all changed about 30 years ago, though, when God visited everyone in the universe simultaneously. It didn’t take long after that event for many of the aliens at Ripcara to become religious fanatics (perhaps they missed the point of God’s visit entirely), and the place tore itself apart. Save for those still frozen in hidden cryopods, the population of the station is almost entirely a bunch of violent, fanatical mutants that used to be researchers. So, it’s not great.
Appearance: At a glance, looks human enough. Specifically, looks like a fairly unassuming Hispanic woman of short stature (5’1”, to give a number), slightly overweight. She has long black hair that pretty much constantly gets in her face, and a pair of gray, metallic eyes that can glow in a variety of colors. Has a variety of thin lines in her skin all across her body, resembling odd tattoos that pulse with a purplish light.
In her Augmented form, only looks human if you really squint. She has elongated limbs and a significantly taller stature (like, 7 feet tall), though she stands in a stooped-over position naturally. Hands become sort of claw-like, and she’s got an extra pair of arms. A set of jetpack-thruster-things in the shape of insectoid wings extend from her back for Flyin’ purposes. Her face also becomes entirely inhuman, as her lower jaw splits into a set of insectoid mandibles and her skull shifts to accommodate several more eyes that shift into place. All this shifting also results in her skin being pulled apart, and generally she takes on the look of a big, glowy, metal monster bug.
Personality: Socially semi-functional, but fairly reserved and a little rude - sometimes on purpose, sometimes by complete accident. Laid-back and generally at ease with close friends and people she trusts, but otherwise maintains a sort of distant demeanor. Quick to anger and incredibly tenacious when she really needs to be. Generally tries to give people a chance, but like, people are dicks sometimes, alright?
Powers, Skills, and/or Resources:
Biography:
Contacts:
Aliases: Dragonfly.
Date of Birth: 19 February 1993 (adjusted for Circumstances, 19 February 2023)
Place of Birth: Houston, TX
Place of Residence: A cryopod in the long-ruined Ripcara Research Facility, some 10,000 light years from Earth. Built into an asteroid in some uninhabited star system somewhere on the Perseus arm, Ripcara was dedicated to all sorts of highly illegal and illicit experimentation, mostly on kidnapped aliens of all sorts. The survivors tended to end up with strange powers, dangerous implants, and so on, and were typically shoved into indefinite cryostasis until further research could be conducted on them. That or they were sold as brainwashed super-soldiers and the like. Just some really bad stuff.
That all changed about 30 years ago, though, when God visited everyone in the universe simultaneously. It didn’t take long after that event for many of the aliens at Ripcara to become religious fanatics (perhaps they missed the point of God’s visit entirely), and the place tore itself apart. Save for those still frozen in hidden cryopods, the population of the station is almost entirely a bunch of violent, fanatical mutants that used to be researchers. So, it’s not great.
Appearance: At a glance, looks human enough. Specifically, looks like a fairly unassuming Hispanic woman of short stature (5’1”, to give a number), slightly overweight. She has long black hair that pretty much constantly gets in her face, and a pair of gray, metallic eyes that can glow in a variety of colors. Has a variety of thin lines in her skin all across her body, resembling odd tattoos that pulse with a purplish light.
In her Augmented form, only looks human if you really squint. She has elongated limbs and a significantly taller stature (like, 7 feet tall), though she stands in a stooped-over position naturally. Hands become sort of claw-like, and she’s got an extra pair of arms. A set of jetpack-thruster-things in the shape of insectoid wings extend from her back for Flyin’ purposes. Her face also becomes entirely inhuman, as her lower jaw splits into a set of insectoid mandibles and her skull shifts to accommodate several more eyes that shift into place. All this shifting also results in her skin being pulled apart, and generally she takes on the look of a big, glowy, metal monster bug.
Personality: Socially semi-functional, but fairly reserved and a little rude - sometimes on purpose, sometimes by complete accident. Laid-back and generally at ease with close friends and people she trusts, but otherwise maintains a sort of distant demeanor. Quick to anger and incredibly tenacious when she really needs to be. Generally tries to give people a chance, but like, people are dicks sometimes, alright?
Powers, Skills, and/or Resources:
Show Content
Spoiler
Powers:
Skills:
Resources:
Powers:
Show Content
Spoiler
Augmented - Alien super-science (i.e. nanites™) replaced nearly her entire body with a technological facsimile of her old self, albeit with some fairly blatant differences. While said technology imitates many biological functions, some were dramatically changed. In a broad sense, she’s generally much stronger and more durable than a human, in addition to more specific augments detailed below. Her brain may or may not be synthetic now, but that’s an existential crisis for later. Besides, it’s got a computer built in and it can access the internet. That’s pretty cool.
Powered - Elena now runs on an alien power core she barely understands, which can be charged either by connecting directly to a power source or by breaking down ingested material and converting it into energy.
Breathless, Heartless, Ageless - Elena’s internal organs have been almost entirely replaced with technically-superior versions. She has no need to breathe or eat (except to power up her power core), and her vital functions are regulated by some sort of viscous black fluid that is pumped automatically to the organic/organic-esque parts of her body. Also, she no longer ages, which would be cool if her systems weren’t degrading anyway.
Stasis - In the absence of power, Elena shuts down completely into a coma-like state. She can survive in this state for quite some time.
Repair Mode - Despite not technically being biological, Elena’s body heals over time as biological tissue might - not really much faster, either. On the upside, she can regenerate limbs and stuff. Slowly.
Heavily Armed - Elena’s augmentations came with a fully-functional second set of arms, which, while they can be retracted… why bother 90% of the time, right?
Form Shift - The crux of Elena’s powerset is to shift forms into one apparently designed for maximum combat utility. This form, resembling some kind of robotic humanoid insect, allows her to fly with some jetpack-esque wings, increases her land speed and physical strength, gives her four arms with some retractable claws, and unlocks the use of the exactly one experimental weapon system that she was actually installed with. The use of this combat form drains her power core extra quickly, though, so she can’t rely on it constantly.
Gravitational Manipulator - As mentioned, only one weapon system was installed in Elena’s body (it’s likely more were intended) - an experimental device that can manipulate gravitational fields. This lets her make objects (or living things) weightless, lift them up, slam them down, pull them around, and so on. This is highly draining on power and barely works at all on especially large things, not to mention the fact that it’s experimental and prone to malfunction. Guess that’s just the price of progress.
Downsides - Unfortunately, every power comes with a drawback or two. The main ones here being that Elena’s experimental augmentations are both unfinished and unstable. The plans were destroyed in the last 30 years and the scientists who worked on the project are either dead or have become fanatical cultists. In short, Elena is not only prone to inconvenient malfunctions, but is also dying slowly. If she can’t find some way to repair the mysterious alien technology she’s now made of, she’s likely to die within the next two or three years. Clock’s ticking.
Augmented - Alien super-science (i.e. nanites™) replaced nearly her entire body with a technological facsimile of her old self, albeit with some fairly blatant differences. While said technology imitates many biological functions, some were dramatically changed. In a broad sense, she’s generally much stronger and more durable than a human, in addition to more specific augments detailed below. Her brain may or may not be synthetic now, but that’s an existential crisis for later. Besides, it’s got a computer built in and it can access the internet. That’s pretty cool.
Powered - Elena now runs on an alien power core she barely understands, which can be charged either by connecting directly to a power source or by breaking down ingested material and converting it into energy.
Breathless, Heartless, Ageless - Elena’s internal organs have been almost entirely replaced with technically-superior versions. She has no need to breathe or eat (except to power up her power core), and her vital functions are regulated by some sort of viscous black fluid that is pumped automatically to the organic/organic-esque parts of her body. Also, she no longer ages, which would be cool if her systems weren’t degrading anyway.
Stasis - In the absence of power, Elena shuts down completely into a coma-like state. She can survive in this state for quite some time.
Repair Mode - Despite not technically being biological, Elena’s body heals over time as biological tissue might - not really much faster, either. On the upside, she can regenerate limbs and stuff. Slowly.
Heavily Armed - Elena’s augmentations came with a fully-functional second set of arms, which, while they can be retracted… why bother 90% of the time, right?
Form Shift - The crux of Elena’s powerset is to shift forms into one apparently designed for maximum combat utility. This form, resembling some kind of robotic humanoid insect, allows her to fly with some jetpack-esque wings, increases her land speed and physical strength, gives her four arms with some retractable claws, and unlocks the use of the exactly one experimental weapon system that she was actually installed with. The use of this combat form drains her power core extra quickly, though, so she can’t rely on it constantly.
Gravitational Manipulator - As mentioned, only one weapon system was installed in Elena’s body (it’s likely more were intended) - an experimental device that can manipulate gravitational fields. This lets her make objects (or living things) weightless, lift them up, slam them down, pull them around, and so on. This is highly draining on power and barely works at all on especially large things, not to mention the fact that it’s experimental and prone to malfunction. Guess that’s just the price of progress.
Downsides - Unfortunately, every power comes with a drawback or two. The main ones here being that Elena’s experimental augmentations are both unfinished and unstable. The plans were destroyed in the last 30 years and the scientists who worked on the project are either dead or have become fanatical cultists. In short, Elena is not only prone to inconvenient malfunctions, but is also dying slowly. If she can’t find some way to repair the mysterious alien technology she’s now made of, she’s likely to die within the next two or three years. Clock’s ticking.
Skills:
Show Content
Spoiler
KNIGHT training - Elena was trained by a secret agency dedicated to thwarting supervillains and such, at least for a short time. She’s competent at shooting and has some training in practical martial arts, so… that’s probably helpful.
Space adventuring - Elena got a couple years of adventures in space under her belt before things went to shit. She has some basic knowledge about various factions out in space, and generally knows how things work out on the cosmic frontiers. She can also fly a spaceship decently and knows about the operation and repair of various Space Technologies. Her knowledge is 30 years out of date, of course.
Linguistics! - Elena had enough time to learn a couple of languages from other worlds during her time in space - just a couple commonly-used trade languages. Sometimes you can’t rely on universal translation bullshit, you know?
Software engineering - This’ll be useful if she needs to get a job on Earth, and also, if languages like C++ are even still used here in the future.
KNIGHT training - Elena was trained by a secret agency dedicated to thwarting supervillains and such, at least for a short time. She’s competent at shooting and has some training in practical martial arts, so… that’s probably helpful.
Space adventuring - Elena got a couple years of adventures in space under her belt before things went to shit. She has some basic knowledge about various factions out in space, and generally knows how things work out on the cosmic frontiers. She can also fly a spaceship decently and knows about the operation and repair of various Space Technologies. Her knowledge is 30 years out of date, of course.
Linguistics! - Elena had enough time to learn a couple of languages from other worlds during her time in space - just a couple commonly-used trade languages. Sometimes you can’t rely on universal translation bullshit, you know?
Software engineering - This’ll be useful if she needs to get a job on Earth, and also, if languages like C++ are even still used here in the future.
Resources:
Show Content
SpoilerLiterally none at this point. She might have to work on this one.
Biography:
Show Content
SpoilerElena’s story begins in 2016 - well, she was born in 1993, but nothing really happened for those first 23 years. She grew up in Texas, went to MIT, and got a degree in computer science that she’d end up barely even using. A chance encounter with a knife-wielding butterfly man left her bleeding in an alleyway, at which point her life was saved by an alien bug symbiote. The Dragonfly was born at that moment, after which she joined a group that was basically the Men in Black, fought some villains, got trapped underwater for a full month, got her girlfriend Katherine (Kat for short) in on the bug superhero action, and fought a whole bunch of alien invaders. Things were pretty alright until the group of total bastards known as STORM attacked her and blew up KNIGHT. She and her girlfriend fled the city and tried to figure out what to do next.
As luck would have it, they stumbled upon a bank robbery being conducted by some sort of alien. With the help of a space detective, they chased him down, beat the crap out of him, and stole his ship. From there they headed to the Hive, the territory of the bug-symbiotes, received upgraded superpowers… and almost immediately realized that they’d basically signed up for an eternal space war with little say in the matter. So, they left their symbiotes behind, stole their ship back after the hive tried to confiscate it, and left their lives behind.
I should clarify at this point that neither of them meant to be away from Earth for over 30 years. It really just happened that way. After fleeing the hive, Elena and Kat (and of course, their pet ferret Puck) had a series of adventures, each more dangerous than the last.
Elena and Kat’s first major adventure involved a group known as the Redshifters, a group of space pirates who hired them to fight some other, nastier space pirates. You know, the difference between the lovable rogue type of pirate and the “pillage, plunder, and do a lot of murder” type of pirate. To be honest, getting involved was a terrible idea, but at the same time… having allies in space was a good idea? And they were generally pretty likable and willing to pay. So. Elena and Kat, backed up by some piratey types, got in a big fight in deep space and blew up the ship of the dreaded pirate Roberts. Yes, she really calls herself that.
The second adventure was significantly longer, as Elena and Kat were hired by some shady types to move some cargo. Which, like. Obviously it’s some kind of mob bullshit, but Elena and Kat were hurting for Space Cash and it’s a bit hard to come by when you’re a couple of humans in a stolen ship out in the big scary galaxy. Unfortunately, after a few deliveries they screwed one up in a major way when the product somehow got blasted out an airlock (a complete accident and not intentional at all). Thus, Elena and Kat had to spend the better part of a year hiding out from the Space Mob, before teaming up with a Space P.I. named Lari Trill to dismantle them entirely.
Having had quite enough of getting involved in beating up criminals, both organized and unorganized, Elena and Kat decided to go for some different contracts. And because they’re a couple dumbasses who will apparently try whatever shit, they went with a monster-hunting contract. They tracked the elusive Striated Voidflenser across a whole sector of space, where it’d been terrorizing (and eating) merchant ships for months, and in a huge, climactic battle, slew the beast after cornering it on an inhospitable, sulfurous world. They kept one of the beast’s titanic teeth as a trophy, but that doesn’t matter much now.
Between notable adventures, they also generally traveled and explored, becoming accustomed to life in space, taking on minor jobs, and just having a good time in space. They always meant to return to Earth, but they were delaying it as much as possible - who knows what Earth might be like with STORM around? (Don’t tell them that STORM lasted about six months, that’d just make them sad).
With a couple years of space exploration, adventuring, and general alien-beating-up under their belts, Elena and Kat decided to take on something a little bigger. Supposedly, shipments of medical supplies to a small frontier station had gone missing, and nobody who had gone to investigate had come back. Which, you know, major red flags there, but the pay was good and they kinda wanted to help people, so they went for it!
Perhaps predictably, the whole thing was a setup. Upon reaching the region of the supposed disappearances, their ship was grabbed in a tractor beam, their weapons systems were disabled, and they were dragged away into a hidden alien research station! From there, Elena and Kat were drugged and experimented on for an indeterminate amount of time, being stuck in cryostasis between experiments.
Unfortunately, God showed up. Elena had a short, bewildered conversation with him and figured out very little about her present state except that she’d be asleep for a while, and also, hey, there’s a real afterlife? That’s neat. The alien researchers, perhaps, didn’t take God’s visit the best, as they quickly descended into an escalating conflict that resulted in the station ultimately being ruled by a fanatical mutant cult. Its inhabitants’ mental states deteriorated over the years, they destroyed most of their records, and many of the subjects left in cryostasis were forgotten entirely.
30 years later… Elena woke up. She’s got some work to do.
As luck would have it, they stumbled upon a bank robbery being conducted by some sort of alien. With the help of a space detective, they chased him down, beat the crap out of him, and stole his ship. From there they headed to the Hive, the territory of the bug-symbiotes, received upgraded superpowers… and almost immediately realized that they’d basically signed up for an eternal space war with little say in the matter. So, they left their symbiotes behind, stole their ship back after the hive tried to confiscate it, and left their lives behind.
I should clarify at this point that neither of them meant to be away from Earth for over 30 years. It really just happened that way. After fleeing the hive, Elena and Kat (and of course, their pet ferret Puck) had a series of adventures, each more dangerous than the last.
Elena and Kat’s first major adventure involved a group known as the Redshifters, a group of space pirates who hired them to fight some other, nastier space pirates. You know, the difference between the lovable rogue type of pirate and the “pillage, plunder, and do a lot of murder” type of pirate. To be honest, getting involved was a terrible idea, but at the same time… having allies in space was a good idea? And they were generally pretty likable and willing to pay. So. Elena and Kat, backed up by some piratey types, got in a big fight in deep space and blew up the ship of the dreaded pirate Roberts. Yes, she really calls herself that.
The second adventure was significantly longer, as Elena and Kat were hired by some shady types to move some cargo. Which, like. Obviously it’s some kind of mob bullshit, but Elena and Kat were hurting for Space Cash and it’s a bit hard to come by when you’re a couple of humans in a stolen ship out in the big scary galaxy. Unfortunately, after a few deliveries they screwed one up in a major way when the product somehow got blasted out an airlock (a complete accident and not intentional at all). Thus, Elena and Kat had to spend the better part of a year hiding out from the Space Mob, before teaming up with a Space P.I. named Lari Trill to dismantle them entirely.
Having had quite enough of getting involved in beating up criminals, both organized and unorganized, Elena and Kat decided to go for some different contracts. And because they’re a couple dumbasses who will apparently try whatever shit, they went with a monster-hunting contract. They tracked the elusive Striated Voidflenser across a whole sector of space, where it’d been terrorizing (and eating) merchant ships for months, and in a huge, climactic battle, slew the beast after cornering it on an inhospitable, sulfurous world. They kept one of the beast’s titanic teeth as a trophy, but that doesn’t matter much now.
Between notable adventures, they also generally traveled and explored, becoming accustomed to life in space, taking on minor jobs, and just having a good time in space. They always meant to return to Earth, but they were delaying it as much as possible - who knows what Earth might be like with STORM around? (Don’t tell them that STORM lasted about six months, that’d just make them sad).
With a couple years of space exploration, adventuring, and general alien-beating-up under their belts, Elena and Kat decided to take on something a little bigger. Supposedly, shipments of medical supplies to a small frontier station had gone missing, and nobody who had gone to investigate had come back. Which, you know, major red flags there, but the pay was good and they kinda wanted to help people, so they went for it!
Perhaps predictably, the whole thing was a setup. Upon reaching the region of the supposed disappearances, their ship was grabbed in a tractor beam, their weapons systems were disabled, and they were dragged away into a hidden alien research station! From there, Elena and Kat were drugged and experimented on for an indeterminate amount of time, being stuck in cryostasis between experiments.
Unfortunately, God showed up. Elena had a short, bewildered conversation with him and figured out very little about her present state except that she’d be asleep for a while, and also, hey, there’s a real afterlife? That’s neat. The alien researchers, perhaps, didn’t take God’s visit the best, as they quickly descended into an escalating conflict that resulted in the station ultimately being ruled by a fanatical mutant cult. Its inhabitants’ mental states deteriorated over the years, they destroyed most of their records, and many of the subjects left in cryostasis were forgotten entirely.
30 years later… Elena woke up. She’s got some work to do.
Contacts:
Show Content
SpoilerThe Two Most Relevant Ones:
Katherine Li - Elena’s girlfriend and companion on her space adventures. Skilled biologist and tailor, better at talking than Elena but not as much of a fighter. She was captured and experimented on just like Elena was, but by a different department of the research station - a department focused more on bioaugmentation than cybernetics. Currently still alive and held in a still-functioning cryostasis block on the other side of the station - though she should be waking up around the same time as Elena. They’re both gonna have to fight their way to each other.
Said experimentation resulted in the development of two distinct and largely unrelated powers. One of those is largely out of her control, as she’s apparently contracted some sort of bizarre alien lycanthropy that makes her occasionally take on the form of some kind of giant, super-strong pangolin-lizard monster. Said form is not mindlessly hostile, and, in fact, retains her intelligence - albeit with some alien instincts that magnify her emotions to excessive levels while making her fiercely protective of her friends and quick to start fights if warranted. She’ll cut a bitch, is what I’m saying. This power was not intended by the lab staff, and was instead cross-contamination from an adjacent cryotube.
The second - and perhaps more interesting - of these powers is some kind of mitosis-esque ability to split into two (or maybe more) perfect copies of herself. How this works, it’s hard to say, but both Kats retain some kind of mental link that lets them perfectly coordinate their actions as though they still had a single mind. This power tends to involuntarily activate whenever she shifts into Big Monster Form, which is less than convenient.
Puck - Elena’s pet ferret. Remarkably, he’s still alive, having also been experimented on and summarily frozen in cryostasis.
Family/Friends from Masks 1:
Julia Herrera Martinez - Mother. Died of old age a few years back.
Ismael Amador Parades - Father. Died when angels descended on the Earth in 2020.
Sancho Amador Herrera - Older brother. Used to be a travelling writer, but has since had to flee to Europe after his writing proved too anti-corporate for the megacorp’s tastes.
Roberta Amador Herrera - Eldest sister. Died in a construction accident while rebuilding after the AI invasion back in 2018.
Ysabel Amador Herrera - Older sister. Unemployed and living in poverty in Boston after her previous employer was bought out and downsized into oblivion. The only member of Elena’s family that she was really that close with.
Naveen Agrawala - Elena’s ever-sleepless computer engineer friend from Boston. Died under suspicious corporate-related circumstances in 2038, a death that was naturally never investigated in any detail.
Anya Ng - An internet friend from Great Bay City, Rhode Island, used to be a writer and street artist back in the day. Now leads a group of anarchist freedom fighters, fighting a mostly-hopeless battle to bring down the megacorp that rules the United States.
Space Contacts:
Lineilssk-Eniris - Former member of the now-disbanded Redshifters. Looks like some kind of large, gray-scaled theropod sort of creature with two heads and a pair of cybernetic arms. She was the ship’s chief engineer, and an expert at patching together machinery that really should have quit working decades ago. Today, she works at a dingy bar on a space station in the lawless frontiers of the galaxy, though she’s not too thrilled about that.
Hedran, aka “Heddy” - Former member of the now-disbanded Redshifters. Looks like a humanoid figure made entirely of purple crystal. He was the Redshifters’ ace pilot, able to pull off all kinds of dangerous maneuvers that really should never have been physically possible. He’s since joined up with a band of unscrupulous mercenaries, probably to escape his crippling gambling debts.
Lari Trill - A space P.I. who teamed up with Elena and Kat to fight the mob. Looks like a four-foot-tall, brightly colored alien bird with a tan trenchcoat, a hat, a scarf, and a lot of guns. Committed to making the galaxy a slightly less shitty place; has some significant psychic powers that they mostly use to make up for the lack of hands.
Kalana Vaiatea - An experienced monster hunter that joined Elena and Kat on their hunt of the Striated Voidflenser. Resembles an eleven-foot-tall, purple-scaled lizard person with four arms and a single eye. She’s big and strong and prefers fistfighting to using weapons in absolutely any circumstance where she can get away with it. Very loud, very friendly, likes to tell stories of her exploits. Disappeared a few years ago while hunting a beast known as the Incendiary Mechworm in some distant corner of the galaxy, but is almost definitely still alive out there.
Vedd the Mighty - An enigmatic figure Elena encountered no less than four times in the course of her travels. Looks like some sort of giant hovering jellyfish with a glowing green mass inside, wearing a wizard robe and hat. The clothing is apparently not for show, considering them showing actual displays of magic. Not particularly pleased about Elena calling them a “space wizard”, but can you really blame her? Their motivations and goals remain a mystery, but they’ve got a habit of showing up about whenever and wherever trouble is about to start.
Acquaintances:
Maria Maldonado Bezos - Just look up a few posts. She and Elena used to send each other animal pictures, so like… they’re basically best friends.
Val - An alien bug symbiote, from space. Elena was his host from 2016-2018, which allowed her to turn into a big dragonfly monster and fight crime. He’s still around, with a new host on Earth.
Crazy Joe - A less-than-popular newscaster from Boston, known for his news program, “CRAZY JOE’S CRAZY SHOW”, in which he would mostly yell over footage of superheroes. Elena was a fan of the show and called in once as the Dragonfly. Today, he continues to run his show underground to an even smaller viewership than ever before. Oddly enough, he doesn’t look like he’s aged a day since last time Elena was around.
Enemies:
Michael Rodriguez (aka Dr. Mantwist) - Elena was the first hero to fight Dr. Mantwist, and she’s… not really a fan, honestly. He’s kind of a dick.
“Steel-Toe” Stabson - The daughter of the infamous mob boss “Stabs” Knifely, who took over the shattered remains of her mother’s criminal empire after Elena and Kat killed her. Looks like of like an alien rat person, wears nice suits and gets her name from the deadly metallic footclaw augments she wears. Scheming and vengeful, she’s had 30 years to rebuild and scheme up revenge against the ones who wronged her. She’s never even considered the possibility that they’re dead, and has been biding her time very patiently.
Flez’k Gruk-Oor - An infamous bounty hunter, known both for his ruthlessness and his unwillingness to ever put on a shirt. Looks like a big humanoid stag beetle, almost as wide as he is tall. He clashed with Elena and Kat on numerous occasions, growing increasingly furious that these hairy bipeds from an uncultured, primitive world were taking on jobs that he’s sure he could have done himself. Favors the use of big, dumb, inconvenient weapons, like laser chainsaws or entire space artillery cannons. Handheld space artillery cannons.
Captain “Riptide” Roberts - Once captain of an infamous pirate ship, before Elena and Kat destroyed it. She got away on an escape pod, but lost everything in the process. A shapeshifter of some sort, who tends to shift shapes frequently enough to make a more detailed description pointless.. She conspired with the Ripcara researchers to have those meddling humans brought in for experimentation, and is pretty much directly at fault for all the experimentation and cryo-freezing that ensued. Today, she’s gotten a new, even bigger pirate ship, and has used it to become the terror of a large sector of the galaxy. Incidentally, her name fromes from a particular piece of Earth fiction that she enjoyed (humans always make fun pirate fiction). Some suspect the title of “Captain Roberts” has been passed between different pirates over the years, but really, that’s just her using different forms.
Katherine Li - Elena’s girlfriend and companion on her space adventures. Skilled biologist and tailor, better at talking than Elena but not as much of a fighter. She was captured and experimented on just like Elena was, but by a different department of the research station - a department focused more on bioaugmentation than cybernetics. Currently still alive and held in a still-functioning cryostasis block on the other side of the station - though she should be waking up around the same time as Elena. They’re both gonna have to fight their way to each other.
Said experimentation resulted in the development of two distinct and largely unrelated powers. One of those is largely out of her control, as she’s apparently contracted some sort of bizarre alien lycanthropy that makes her occasionally take on the form of some kind of giant, super-strong pangolin-lizard monster. Said form is not mindlessly hostile, and, in fact, retains her intelligence - albeit with some alien instincts that magnify her emotions to excessive levels while making her fiercely protective of her friends and quick to start fights if warranted. She’ll cut a bitch, is what I’m saying. This power was not intended by the lab staff, and was instead cross-contamination from an adjacent cryotube.
The second - and perhaps more interesting - of these powers is some kind of mitosis-esque ability to split into two (or maybe more) perfect copies of herself. How this works, it’s hard to say, but both Kats retain some kind of mental link that lets them perfectly coordinate their actions as though they still had a single mind. This power tends to involuntarily activate whenever she shifts into Big Monster Form, which is less than convenient.
Puck - Elena’s pet ferret. Remarkably, he’s still alive, having also been experimented on and summarily frozen in cryostasis.
Family/Friends from Masks 1:
Julia Herrera Martinez - Mother. Died of old age a few years back.
Ismael Amador Parades - Father. Died when angels descended on the Earth in 2020.
Sancho Amador Herrera - Older brother. Used to be a travelling writer, but has since had to flee to Europe after his writing proved too anti-corporate for the megacorp’s tastes.
Roberta Amador Herrera - Eldest sister. Died in a construction accident while rebuilding after the AI invasion back in 2018.
Ysabel Amador Herrera - Older sister. Unemployed and living in poverty in Boston after her previous employer was bought out and downsized into oblivion. The only member of Elena’s family that she was really that close with.
Naveen Agrawala - Elena’s ever-sleepless computer engineer friend from Boston. Died under suspicious corporate-related circumstances in 2038, a death that was naturally never investigated in any detail.
Anya Ng - An internet friend from Great Bay City, Rhode Island, used to be a writer and street artist back in the day. Now leads a group of anarchist freedom fighters, fighting a mostly-hopeless battle to bring down the megacorp that rules the United States.
Space Contacts:
Lineilssk-Eniris - Former member of the now-disbanded Redshifters. Looks like some kind of large, gray-scaled theropod sort of creature with two heads and a pair of cybernetic arms. She was the ship’s chief engineer, and an expert at patching together machinery that really should have quit working decades ago. Today, she works at a dingy bar on a space station in the lawless frontiers of the galaxy, though she’s not too thrilled about that.
Hedran, aka “Heddy” - Former member of the now-disbanded Redshifters. Looks like a humanoid figure made entirely of purple crystal. He was the Redshifters’ ace pilot, able to pull off all kinds of dangerous maneuvers that really should never have been physically possible. He’s since joined up with a band of unscrupulous mercenaries, probably to escape his crippling gambling debts.
Lari Trill - A space P.I. who teamed up with Elena and Kat to fight the mob. Looks like a four-foot-tall, brightly colored alien bird with a tan trenchcoat, a hat, a scarf, and a lot of guns. Committed to making the galaxy a slightly less shitty place; has some significant psychic powers that they mostly use to make up for the lack of hands.
Kalana Vaiatea - An experienced monster hunter that joined Elena and Kat on their hunt of the Striated Voidflenser. Resembles an eleven-foot-tall, purple-scaled lizard person with four arms and a single eye. She’s big and strong and prefers fistfighting to using weapons in absolutely any circumstance where she can get away with it. Very loud, very friendly, likes to tell stories of her exploits. Disappeared a few years ago while hunting a beast known as the Incendiary Mechworm in some distant corner of the galaxy, but is almost definitely still alive out there.
Vedd the Mighty - An enigmatic figure Elena encountered no less than four times in the course of her travels. Looks like some sort of giant hovering jellyfish with a glowing green mass inside, wearing a wizard robe and hat. The clothing is apparently not for show, considering them showing actual displays of magic. Not particularly pleased about Elena calling them a “space wizard”, but can you really blame her? Their motivations and goals remain a mystery, but they’ve got a habit of showing up about whenever and wherever trouble is about to start.
Acquaintances:
Maria Maldonado Bezos - Just look up a few posts. She and Elena used to send each other animal pictures, so like… they’re basically best friends.
Val - An alien bug symbiote, from space. Elena was his host from 2016-2018, which allowed her to turn into a big dragonfly monster and fight crime. He’s still around, with a new host on Earth.
Crazy Joe - A less-than-popular newscaster from Boston, known for his news program, “CRAZY JOE’S CRAZY SHOW”, in which he would mostly yell over footage of superheroes. Elena was a fan of the show and called in once as the Dragonfly. Today, he continues to run his show underground to an even smaller viewership than ever before. Oddly enough, he doesn’t look like he’s aged a day since last time Elena was around.
Enemies:
Michael Rodriguez (aka Dr. Mantwist) - Elena was the first hero to fight Dr. Mantwist, and she’s… not really a fan, honestly. He’s kind of a dick.
“Steel-Toe” Stabson - The daughter of the infamous mob boss “Stabs” Knifely, who took over the shattered remains of her mother’s criminal empire after Elena and Kat killed her. Looks like of like an alien rat person, wears nice suits and gets her name from the deadly metallic footclaw augments she wears. Scheming and vengeful, she’s had 30 years to rebuild and scheme up revenge against the ones who wronged her. She’s never even considered the possibility that they’re dead, and has been biding her time very patiently.
Flez’k Gruk-Oor - An infamous bounty hunter, known both for his ruthlessness and his unwillingness to ever put on a shirt. Looks like a big humanoid stag beetle, almost as wide as he is tall. He clashed with Elena and Kat on numerous occasions, growing increasingly furious that these hairy bipeds from an uncultured, primitive world were taking on jobs that he’s sure he could have done himself. Favors the use of big, dumb, inconvenient weapons, like laser chainsaws or entire space artillery cannons. Handheld space artillery cannons.
Captain “Riptide” Roberts - Once captain of an infamous pirate ship, before Elena and Kat destroyed it. She got away on an escape pod, but lost everything in the process. A shapeshifter of some sort, who tends to shift shapes frequently enough to make a more detailed description pointless.. She conspired with the Ripcara researchers to have those meddling humans brought in for experimentation, and is pretty much directly at fault for all the experimentation and cryo-freezing that ensued. Today, she’s gotten a new, even bigger pirate ship, and has used it to become the terror of a large sector of the galaxy. Incidentally, her name fromes from a particular piece of Earth fiction that she enjoyed (humans always make fun pirate fiction). Some suspect the title of “Captain Roberts” has been passed between different pirates over the years, but really, that’s just her using different forms.