Salutary

From Unofficial Handbook of the Virtue Universe

Jump to: navigation, search

Never judge a book by it's cover. You've heard that before, haven't you? Words to live by, certainly, but most of the time even that isn't enough. Only by reading through the entire book can one truly comprehend the story, and in the company of one such as "Go" this is a lesson often forgotten.

Bound to the will of others that feels greater than her own, coupled with her near perpetual state of joy due to the how and why of her creation, assuming is all too easy and far too common. Most see nothing more than an expected statistic, lumping her in the category of happy-go-lucky healer naive enough to have her picture printed under the word.

Look a little closer. You might be surprised.

Go has but a simple history. She can't tell you what it is. What is she? Someone who can't say what she is. Who made her? Someone who made it so she couldn't tell you their name. But if she could tell you, you would know this:

It's the end of the world! Again. All the capes rush to save the day, ultimately rising to the challenge and making use of their victorious battle cry and dramatic, heroic poses. All is well. Or is it? While Earth may live to see another day, the clueless people who can't walk two feet down the street in Paragon without being mugged aren't exactly in the mood to celebrate. But, hey, it's just small time crime, right?

Places like Kings Row are seen by the majority as a stepping stone. Sure, there are exceptions, but for most? Get in, take the small jobs, make a name for yourself and then forget all about the place. Overlooking a few snatched purses here and there once you start fighting aliens for the fate of the world isn't that surprising. Crime is, however, very much like it's heroic counterpart. Like a rookie cape who climbs up the ladder to bigger and "better" jobs, as do the same criminals who were once viewed as nothing more than an average street thug. But...

There are exceptions in the bad guy world, too. There are those who start on one of these stepping stones and never jump to the next. Example? The man responsible for Go's creation. Kings Row was his base of operations. Because, you see, he was a man with a knack for making people listen. Specifically, those petty street thugs. Ever heard of strength in numbers? It's a rule he lived by. Sure, any old hero might be able to take down one or two, but get a herd of them and even seasoned do-gooders will have some problems. Thing is, those experienced heroes are far too busy saving the world to bother knowing a guy like him even exists, let alone stopping him.

This man wanted nothing on the scale of world domination. Only more money. His jobs ranged from robberies to anything someone could bribe him for. Just so long as it wasn't too noisy. Unfortunately, those silly humans aren't very resistant. He lost men to stray bullets, gang wars and prison. Finding good help is so hard these days. What to do? Build a solider with skin so thick bullets bounce off? No, no. That's far too loud. The better idea, he decided, would be not to replace his employees but simply improve them.

Thus, Go was born. Or, you know, created. The tools of the trade included magic and energy. With outside assistance from the Circle of Thorns (in exchange for lending his new product to them for free), they weaved together a woman who looked like an angel and worked as a hero. No one would suspect that. It took a soul to animate her, but no worries. Taking away free will and cursing her to listen to all his commands fixed that pesky personality that came with it right up. Go, at the time called 'Sondra', was sent off to assist her master's henchmen in his illegal bidding. She healed any wounds; made them stronger, faster and better.

Life was good. For him, anyway. Karma? Psh! Things only got better. Not only was he rolling in dough, but he met a lovely young lady with whom he had three children. Yes, things couldn't have been better until that bus hit him. With her boss roadkill, Sondra's curse took an interesting turn. She began taking orders from everyone. But when the boss man's son and his friend barked a command at her at the same time, she had an unnatural impulse to listen to the heir above that of the other individual. Through a series of tests, Sondra determined that should his entire bloodline cease, so would her curse. The problem? She can't hurt anyone. At least, not on purpose.

How in the world did she get away? You're mistaken. She never did. Still today, she plays the role of a hero while working with whoever for whatever her new 'boss' demands of her. But, she has a plan. All she needs to do is find someone willing to kill the rest of his family for her after they somehow manage to figure this out with her being unable to tell them.

Sure, it's a long shot, but hopeless situations are what she was made for.

"How may I assist you?"

"Understood!"

"What is next?"

If you find yourself in Go's company, you'll eventually hear all these things at least once. Sticking around longer? Well, let's just say you'll hear them a lot. With as much as she talks not many people would suspect her to be the introvert she very much is. Was that a hint of grimace? A bit of a scowl? True, she might be obeying your order without complaint, but that doesn't mean she always agrees with it.

In some aspects, Go is in fact what you would expect from a healer: thoughtful, considerate and empathetic. More often than not people find themselves at ease around her, and to some she is always a favored listener when they've had a bad day. To others, not so much. Her sincerity is hard not to acknowledge, but still some are off put by the the display of cheer following their tale of a comrade falling deathly ill or a fire breaking out and burning down their entire apartment complex. They need not be misled. Rest assured, she has a deep and genuine interest in understanding not only the situation but the feelings of all parties involved.

Intuition is nothing if not her guiding star. Her assigned task may to be a good little helper, but her personal one is a never ending mission to find meaning and value in all things; especially life. Every bit of knowledge, every encounter, even words of those merely passing by are thoroughly evaluated and applied to how they can help her help you.

Do this. Do that.

There's no argument she's flexible. At least, until one of her former orders is violated. In the face of being prompted to go against one such order, she becomes borderline aggressive, refusing to budge even an inch on the issue of considering option B: Break the rules. It is perhaps a twisted form of irony that her refusal to disobey a command is only because of another command and not by choice. No, if she had her way, that stubbornness would be spent on her own value system and not the one forced upon her. Then again, if she had her way she'd be free to do what she wanted and not forced to act like some chipper, stupid lady.

She holds logic in high regard outside of aforementioned conflicts, as well as intelligence. Her free time is spent studying various subjects; favorites include politicians, works of art and biology. There is a keen awareness of what is going on around her at all times, so she's familiar with most people brushing her off as stupid or simply naive. To her frustration there is little time to correct this misconception in between taking orders, but she does so when she can. People find themselves wide-eyed when they learn that yes, she does know all about World War II. Yes, she does know what sex is and how it works. And, yes, she does know when someone is still hung up over a divorce.

Go is sure to know all this because she expects competence from herself and others at all times. Her standards are that of a perfectionist. If there is a time she can slack off, she still won't by choice, and may be harder on herself than anyone will probably ever know.

If she ever manages to free herself... Who knows?

Sometimes, the way she functions seem random and inconsistent, but in truth there is a very particular system she follows because she has to. Being cursed by the person who made you is really a bitch, especially when some of them only help shield their identity further. How does it work? Start with rule number one and go from there...

"The Creator" is to be obeyed unquestionably until his death; in the event of his death, this will pass down to his first born child, and so on.

"The Creator" must be known as such, and their name must never be given to anyone, nor their address, number, gender or anything that might hint toward their identity.

Under no circumstances is Go to willingly and knowingly cause any harm to anyone. (Alas, exploding accidents do happen.)

Under no circumstances is Go to take any order involving sexual contact. (But, if she wants to kiss you, she can.)

Under no circumstances is any order that commands her to be free to be obeyed.

Orders are only to be taken by one individual at a time and these orders are to be followed (barring they don't break any other rules or her 'boss' doesn't summon her) until said individual dismisses her or commands her to stop taking orders.

Once issued an order, Go is to keep asking for more orders until she is either dismissed or told to stop taking orders.

Go is free to exercise reasoning and decision making within the extent of the rules.

Orders that are deemed reasonably impossible are to be ignored in favor of a more efficient one.

The duration of orders have a clock of one hour with the exception of any given by her 'boss'.

Those giving her orders have one minute to issue the next order before Go is free to leave their company. The exception to this is if the previous order was to wait x amount of minutes for the next order.

Go must always try to be happy, and if she can't, she must try to at least sound like she is regardless of what she's saying. No one likes a grumpy healer!

If at any time the rules given by her creator somehow conflict each other, Go is to return to said creator (or his kin) and ask what to do.

Now you know who and what she is. But what does she do, and how does she do it?

Go's powers are similar to her history in the way people often think harder than they need to when the answer, really, is pretty simple. Go is made of a positive, magical energy. Take a deep breath. Take another. Manipulating that energy, controlling it to heal is as easy to her as exhaling is to you. But if you're not magically-inclined enough to understand it's something you can't quite understand, then just imagine a band-aid that, when applied, instantly heals a wound. Each spark of energy is essentially such a band-aid.

What about offensive? Can she take down an evil doer with a mere swing of her fist? Well, no. In fact, her only method of attack isn't really suppose to be an attack at all. Overloading remains one of the most unconquerable issues she faces. Think about leaving that crappy old laptop with who knows how many viruses on for days while running a ton of windows. Uncared for, it just keeps getting slower until it eventually breaks. Go is like that. Except she explodes.

Knowing this, you might think her doomed when she's on the job and the big meat shield in front leaves her with a horde of werewolves then darts off the other way. Thankfully, this isn't the case, because Go can do what she calls "deconstructing"; breaking herself down into small "bubbles" of energy and reforming somewhere else. You know, somewhere she won't be mercilessly gutted by a werewolf.

Oh, did I mention she can fly? Because that's kind of important.

Blaire: After tearing her arms off for no reason other than she asked (as part of an order), Sondra decided Blaire is the right kind of person to help her if she can only a) get him to like her enough and b) figure out how to tell him without actually being able to tell him. He was responsible for her new name, and called her 'leader' as an excuse to stay close to him. Originally, she just wanted to use him to help her. But now she actually might like him. Maybe. Sort of. Shhh!

Javier: After being told by her creator's son to stop addressing Blaire as her leader, Go switched instead to a nice young fellow named Javier. Having known him previously, her hope was he would somehow help her. He did so by telling her to 'hang out more' with Blaire. Unlike said man, Go actually enjoys Javier's company and finds him to be one of the more respectable people who regularly roam Pocket D.

Go got her "new" name after being told to say the first word that came to mind.

Go can (and often does) lie as long as she can find a way around breaking an order to do so.

Although she loves being a hero, Go hates being a healer and secretly wants to be something more "knight-esque" like a swordsmen or an archer.

Go was designed to resemble something angelic to fool people. She has no ties to anything otherworldly (other than the fact she's an energy being) and even her wings (which she can fly without) are just there for vanity.