Tempest Spectre
From Unofficial Handbook of the Virtue Universe
| |
| Tempest Spectre | |
| Player: Confidential | |
| Origin: | Mutant |
|---|---|
| Archetype: | Defender |
| Security Level: | Confidential |
| Personal Data | |
| Real Name: | Aaron Waters |
| Known Aliases: | Aethir Vodnik |
| Species: | Human (Clone) |
| Age: | 26 |
| Height: | 6' |
| Weight: | 205 |
| Eye Color: | Blue |
| Hair Color: | Blonde |
| Biographical Data | |
| Nationality: | Caucasian |
| Occupation: | Book Store Clerk |
| Place of Birth: | Kiev, Russia |
| Base of Operations: | Paragon City |
| Marital Status: | Single/Committed |
| Known Relatives: | Oxana Stepenova (Half-Sister), Alexander Stepanov (Half-Brother/Genetic Source) |
| Known Powers | |
| Rapid manipulation of ambient heat | |
| Known Abilities | |
| Infiltration, Reconnaissance, Espionage, Sabatoge, Hacking, Subversion, Wetwork | |
| Equipment | |
| "Spec" Personal Autonomous Diagnostic Combat Reconnaissance Nanosatellite - Spectator Class; Dark Phantom Battle Suit | |
| No additional information available. | |
Contents |
History
Childhood
Long before the birth of the child who would be ironically named after the brother of Moses, the fallen goddess of ancient Russia named Marena (who hid behind the veneer of a high-level Russian operative) began her plan to create avatars to usher in a new era of godhood to rule humanity with the intent of saving them from themselves. Her process began with attempts at eugenics, producing first the boy named Alexander Stepenov. When this initial attempt resulted in an unforseen (though intriguing) mutation, the dark goddess repeated the process resulting in the "more pure" younger sister named Oxana Stepenova. As the young woman grew and the first prototype, (her older brother), proved to have little practical use of his mutant abilities, Marena re-visited the lessons learned in his birth.
From Alexander's DNA she was able to fashion a mutant child whose abilities began to manifest during infancy. Even more surprising was that this infant was able exercise an instinctive, if somewhat clumsy, degree of control over his mutant abilities even at this young age. The first documented manifestation of his powers occurred when the boy raised the temperature within his crib to keep himself warm when his blanket had been pushed out of reach. Marena decided to place the infant with an American family to better indoctrinate the boy into the society he may one day come to turn against. The family took the boy with the understanding that in the future he would come to work for Marena when he was old enough and would be kept to a strict regimen of training until that time. The family named him Aaron and he grew to adolescense believing he was a gifted child of loving parents. When he was 10 years old Marena introduced herself to the boy and (it seemed) his parents, and offered him training in his abilities as well as many other skills. Excited at the possibility of a life full of adventure he asked his parents to allow him to join her and they conceited, not that they had a choice.
Adolescense
Aaron quickly came to master his abilities under Marena's tuteledge and gained a "big sister" in the form of Oxana Stepenova, who was by then known as the operative Tikhnaya Kosh'Mari. The two were very close as Aaron was an only child and Oxana had been estranged from her own brother for several years. Neither of them were aware of Aaron's true nature as a clone of her older brother, and Marena never brought it upon herself to inform them.
Aaron spent time both at "home" with his parents and in Russia with Marena and her operatives. By Oxana's demand, Aaron was kept from any wetwork missions, though he received training in how to fulfill one. By the time Aaron was 15 years old, he took the name "Tempest Spectre" based on the claim that he moved through missions like a phantom and could use his abilities to generate severely localized storm fronts. He became a specialist in infiltration and other espionage tactics, usually coming and going without his targets ever knowing of his presence. Some of the more physically oriented of the operatives inwardly scoffed at his "soft" approach, but they were kept in line by the threat of violence from his older sister. Unfortunately, his sister would not always be there to save him...and tragedy would befall the young man the same day Oxana took control of her own destiny.
The Rikti Invasion
When the first portals began to form in Moscow, Marena dispatched her operatives (including Aaron and Oxana) to immediately address the invasion and attempt to save as many people as they could. During the onslaught the two became seperated and Oxana watched in dismay as Aaron was cut down by a Rikti Soldier. Oxana decided at that point that she had had enough of Marena's games and chose that moment to flee from her past forever and possibly find her other brother Alexander somewhere in America. She stealthfully escaped the engagement as her former comerades were cut down by the scores.
Perhaps had she remained a while longer, she would have bore witness to Marena's unleashing of a large portion of her godly powers in order to revive a massive number of her fallen soldiers...including Aaron. This, along with Omega Team's gambit, turned the tide of the war in Moscow. Suddenly the Rikti (who were already confused by the Omega Teams actions) were surrounded by warriors they had already slain. In the end the Rikti were pushed back and some measure of order was restored. Out of thanks for saving his life Aaron chose to remain by Marena's side and vowed to somehow find his sister.
Paragon City
As it would turn out, Aaron and Marena wouldn't discover Oxana's location until after she had killed herself. Aaron begged Marena to revive Oxana as she had done for him but Marena kindly refused. She convinced him that too much time had passed between her death and the time Marena could get to the body, but hinted that there were other option. When pressed to explain what was meant by that, the older woman cryptically reminded him to trust her.
Marena located Oxana's body and procured from it a genetic sample. While there in Paragon City she set about recreating a body for her fallen operative. In her own strange way she loved Oxana as much as Aaron did and didn't want to see her lost. During the process (which was taking place in Kiev) she met a young woman in Paragon by the name of Anne Raiche, who she felt could be a fine contribution to her organization and sent for Aaron whose responsibility it would be to entice Anne to join them. Thinking he would do anything to have Oxana back Aaron agreed and joined Marena in Paragon City while a new body was being grown for Oxana in Kiev and Marean set about locating her soul in Hell.
While on assignment in Paragon City he and Anne actually fell in love with one another beyond the confines of the mission's parameters. Marena didn't seem upset by this, for in truth she was intrigued by the possibilities presented by the merging of the two young lovers DNA. It was during this time that Aaron began working at Plato's Books as a clerk.
Corruption
It came to pass that Oxana's soul was placed into the new and uncorrupted body cloned for her from her original. During her "probation" Oxana discovered the truth about Aaron's nature as well as Marena's ultimate plan and warned Marena not to harm him. The warning fell on deaf ears, however, as Marena had achieved what she needed to set her plans in motion: the spirit of a fallen angel. With it, she was able to displace Aaron's soul into a spirit egg and fill the void left with the monstrous spirit of Koshchei the Undying, her ancient divine lover/advesary.
Oxana remained true to her word, however, and returned to Paragon City to enact her vengence against the dark goddess. She learned that it took a good deal of Marena's power to keep Koshchei connected to the foreign body as Aaron was not a worshipper of Koshchei's. On an evening when Marena and Koshchei (digused as Aaron) attempted to convert Anne to their cause, Oxana attacked...putting a bullet through Marena's head. The assault caused Anne to initially stand against Oxana due to her reputation as an assassin for hire and Marena's reputation as a philathropist. When Oxana pointed out that Aaron's body was violently convulsing and his medical transporter was disabled, and asked Anne to get Aaron's body to the hospital before the body died, the young scrapper conceited...vowing that she wouldn't let Oxana get away with the assassination.
Oxana completed the kill by forcing Marena's body out the window in Founder's Falls and into the Red River, but the body quickly dissolved as there was no longer anything holding it together. Aaron's body remained dormant but stable until the spell could be cast to return his captured spirit to his own body. The truth of all that had taken place and the physical corruption left in his body after the violent removal of Koshchei left the young man lost and despondent. Even worse: the corruption began to physically manifest as a black, rocky outer layer reminscent of coal. He changed his name to Tempest Revenanent to denote his darker disposition and appearance and took his anger out on the criminals of Paragon City.
One day, while he was working his civilian job at Plato's Books and in a fairly dark frame of mind, a young coed came to his store being intolerably cheerful and obviously flirting with him. Feeling he was having enough problems just trying to restart his relationship with Anne he wasn't interested in this "Gracie's" flirtations or her stories about how she always seemed to be exceptionally lucky. He sarcastically suggested that if she's so lucky why doesn't she put that luck to good use and save some of the people of Paragon City. To his morbid surprise she thought this was a fantastic idea and decided to start right away. Shocked, and not wanting to be responsibile for hurting someone else, he asked her to wait and explained she couldn't just go in without some sort of protection. He convinced her to let him make some calls through some of his contacts and through them procurred an item called The Spiritus Talea...an item that was believed to be fairly useless but it was the best he could do on such short notice. It was supposed to create a magical weapon based on the spirit of whoever was wielding the rod, but all those who tried to use it only manifested strange, skewed items of no use. Surprisingly enough, in her hands the Talea created a magical bow that shot "arrows" of magical energy. That young woman later became known as the heroine Fortune's Vessel.
Redemption
Reminded of his once optimistic disposition and the joy it brought him to help others, Aaron wanted to work beyond the issues that arose as a result of learning the truth of his birth and the overwhelming sense of betrayal brought on by Marena's actions. Hoping that a change of scenery may help he created (with the assistance of Oxana) the identity of the mercenary bounty hunter named Aethir Vodnik. As Aethir, Aaron was able to direct his negative emotions to some positive end by passing secrets from various criminal organizations into the hands of Longbow, Hero Corps and various supergroups throughout Paragon City, all while earning a reputation among the criminal element of a soldier who was fair to all those who worked for him, but dangerous to any target he took. Under this guise he never utilized any of his mutant abilities, relying solely upon his physical and technical skills learned while employed by Marena.
As it happened, he was shocked one day when he thought he saw Oxana in the Rogue Isles and began to approach her, only to discover that the woman he saw was actually a cyborg, though identical to Oxana in every other way. To his surprise he discovered that this was actually the reborn Marena. It wasn't long before he saw a grotesque version of himself...a mechanized clone that held the spirit of Koshchei.
Though enraged, he took this information to Oxana who concocted a plan to bring about Marena's downfall. Aaron was to endear himself to the dark goddess under the guise of Aethir in hopes of luring her and her cronies into a trap, while Oxana recruited the assistance of the heroes that were the closest to being friends that one such as her could have, as well as a trump card in the form of the Rovers, who were quickly becoming a force to be reckoned with.
The plan was simple: Since death only allowed Marena to enter the body of a worshipper (or an empty vessel, such as the cybornetic clone of Oxana) they would instead lock down her cybornetic body and trap her within the non-functioning form for all time. While back under her employ, Aaron discovered that Marena and her group had mass-produced these cyborg clones...allowing them potentially limitless bodies.
Once Aaron convinced Marena that Oxana and her previous enemies were aquiring a nuclear weapon for the express purpose of elliminating her, the goddess decided to ambush them and end their resistance once and for all. Initally the group of heroes seemed badly outclassed, playing possum while Aaron and Oxana went to the factory to elliminate all the cyborg clones.
In the end the heroes defeated Marena and her cronies, and she was confined within the cyborg body...an eternal prison. Or so they had hoped. Marena mentally triggered a self-destruct mechanism intent on killing all the heroes and freeing herself from the confines of the body she was in. Quick thinking on the part of Malevelyn and Gracie, however, kept the heroes out of the blast radius, though the action nearly cost Malevelyn her life.
Marena was free but unable to function with no known worshippers and has not been heard from since. Aaron and Anne took a vacation away from both Paragon City and the Rogue Isles and, after a time, finally came back to himself, his greatest enemy apparently elliminated.
Return
After his return Aaron didn't immediately go back to crime fighting. Instead he returned to his job at Plato's Bookstore and did some errand work for different organizations around Paragon City. He crossed paths with Gracie again while delivering a magical item to a wealthy older gentleman named Centruoicles Sculpturatus and soon decide to once again re-emerge, this time using the considerable wealth he aquired as the bounty hunter Aethir Vodnik to assemble several technological devices that augmented his many talents and abilities.
Powers and Abilities
Mutant
Aaron has the ability to rapidly manipulate, store, and expel heat energy at will. The most common manifestation of this power is to steal all the heat energy from local water vapor turning it into ice. Previously he would use his stored heat energy to create microwave-like attacks but has since redirected this stored energy to a more personal use (see below). His ability to store unknown amounts of heat energy grants him limited protection to thermal based attacks and extreme temperature enviroments and he can extend this protection as far as 40 feet. This ability also makes him a living battery.
Aaron's familiarity with his powers is so great that he's developed an instinctive control of them, rarely requiring any thought on his part. He instinctively regulates his own body temperature to remain comfortable in enviroments ranging from -20 degrees F to 130 degrees F, at which point he'll begin to progress at the same rate as others (i.e. 150 degrees feels like approx. 90 degrees, while -58 feels like 32 degrees F). In these extreme temperatures Aaron may be seen to "shimmer" or produce a vapor cloud respectively.
He can freeze the water vapor around any object, selectively using this to offer protection to his allies without harming them or suspending his enemies in blocks of ice. Due to his body's self-regulatory nature he is not currently able to extend this protection to himself as he'll simply melt the armor in a matter of moments.
Previously by rapidly draining and expelling heat he was able to create localized storm fronts for various effects, but since that heat energy is being redirected into his armor he no longer uses his abilities in this manner, although he is able to drain all the heat from a large area resulting in various cold fronts.
Physical
Aaron is a highly trained hand to hand combatant with extensive experience in combat sambo. He most often uses the abilities gained in this training to avoid incoming attacks rather than attacking, as he most often relies on his mutant abilities for offense.
As a consequence of his training as an espionage operative Aaron maintains a very high level of physical health, engaging in intense daily exercise. Although not on the same level as his half-sister, she will occasionally visit him to ensure he keeps himself in shape. In order to mask his physical prowess he tends to wear baggy clothes in his civilian identity.
Technical
In his time as an operative, Aaron would most often be utelized for the more technically inclined missions that required knowledge of computer and network systems. As a result Aaron is greatly familiar with various computer languages. Thanks to his connections as Aethir Vodnik, this includes black market information.
Further, he is skilled with the deployment of demolitions devices as well as modular technological trap systems.
Technological Accompaniment
Augmenting his talents are several high-tech devices which aid in his efforts. Chief among these are his robotic companion "Spec" and his body armor/costume.
"Spec"
The Personal Autonomous Diagnostic Combat Reconnaissance Nanosatellite - Spectator Class Drone (PADCeRN Drone) is an AI operated modular data system that transfers combat data directly to the suit worn by Tempest Spectre. This offers a minor degree of vector translations services allowing a greater possibility to dodge incoming attacks. Because it's physical form is easily replacable due to its modular nature, it will occasionaly interpose itself between an attacker and Aaron adding further protection to it's maintainer.
"Spec," as Aaron calls him, is further capable of analyzing and transferring data to the suit worn by Aaron, which shares Spec's AI. Spec can access electronic systems remotely and assist Aaron in many technically related tasks. Spec also controls all computations required by the suit for safe operation.
Despite Spec's robotic nature, the two have a buddy-cop relationship and look after one another.
Dark Phantom Battle Suit
The suit worn by Tempest Spectre is actually a highly advanced armoring system that uses a combination of protections and technology to augment Aaron's abilities and offer surprisingly effective protection to the wearer. The composite nature of the suit is due to the requirement of getting the various parts from different places within the black market, resulting in it's one of a kind nature.
This suit is powered by converting heat energy generated by Aaron's mutant ability into usable power for all required systems. The suit is designed for high maneuverability, stealth operations and maximum utelization of Aaron's abilities.
The battle suit's armor is a combination of non-newtonian liquid armor and light-weight silicon carbide scalar plating. Silicon carbide is heavily used throughout the suits exposed systems for it's high tolerance to varying temperatures.
Among the features of the battle suit are stabilized VTOL rocket boots enabling flight and impressive combat maneuverability.
The silicon carbide gauntlets worn offer not only protection by acting as shields when necessary, but contain systems that constantly draw water vapor out of the air and condences it out of injectors located around the palm. This enables Aaron to rapidly create jagged shards of ice which can be thrown much like daggers. At times of very rapid usage the gauntlets often appear to be overheating, but this ambience is an automated preventive maintenance measure. Though the gauntlets have a particularly high temperature tolerance (greater than the rest of the suit), drawing heat from the atmosphere at so rapid a pace could cause the gauntlets to freeze over, thus the gauntlets heat the air with a minor directed plasma discharge until systems return to normal usage without interfering with the ice-creation systems.
The other parts of the modular battle suit each offer protection to the wearer as well as their internal systems, all controlled through the symbiotic relationship between Aaron and Spec.
