Crimson Vespa
From Unofficial Handbook of the Virtue Universe
| |
| The Crimson Vespa | |
| Player: Jaaboo | |
| Origin: | Technology / Mutant |
|---|---|
| Archetype: | Blaster |
| Security Level: | Confidential |
| Personal Data | |
| Real Name: | Katherine Maddoc |
| Known Aliases: | Kitty, CV, Crim, Kate (she hates this name) |
| Species: | Homo sapiens superior |
| Age: | 20 |
| Height: | 5'7" |
| Weight: | 110 lbs |
| Eye Color: | Blue |
| Hair Color: | Blond |
| Biographical Data | |
| Nationality: | American |
| Occupation: | Personal lab assistant to Alton Jackson III |
| Place of Birth: | Des Moines, IA |
| Base of Operations: | Paragon City, RI |
| Marital Status: | Unmarried, in a relationship with Alton Jackson |
| Known Relatives: | Family in West Des Moines, father Carl, mother Kathleen, two older brothers Carl & Richard |
| Known Powers | |
| Electric conductivity, storage | |
| Known Abilities | |
| Moderate technophilia, clever, has an uncanny (but non-super) ability to understand complex systems in simple terms | |
| Equipment | |
| "Mark Four" Red Jacket armor, a prototype blaster version of Red Jacket, Crimson 'Armor', a light weight set of blaster tools. Both include a neural user interface to the armor which respond to thought as well as voice commands. | |
| Footnotes | |
| None | |
The Crimson Vespa is an Energy/Energy Technology-based Blaster named Katherine "Kitty" Maddoc. Kitty Maddoc also exists as an Electrical/Electric Mutation-based Blaster as well, at a lower level. The personal lab assistant and girlfriend of Alton Jackson III, owner and founder of Vesparen Technologies, Kitty uses the stolen "Mark Four" version of the Red Jacket armor to fight crime as the outlaw vigilante "Crimson Vespa". Her identity is known only to Alton, who hides this fact and promotes the story that Kitty is a vigilante in order to protect her.
Character History
Kitty Maddoc came to Paragon with big dreams but fell in with a bad crowd - the Freakshow. Her life was saved, however, when the Red Jacket found her at a Freakshow rave, begging for someone to take her out of her failed life. Emotionally damaged, fighting off addiction and physically worn out from a frantic lifestyle, Alton Jackson provided for her the right environment in which heal, working as his personal assistant in the Vesparen labs. Kitty found herself in possession of a mind easily able to dissect complex systems and issues, making her help in the lab invaluable.
In time, Kitty and Alton grew close and their relationship turned romantic. However, that soured when Kitty, bored and envious of Alton's double life as a costumed hero, stole a prototype version of the Red Jacket armor to use for her own. While her boss and boyfriend disapproves of her as a hero, he has none the less protected her secret and claimed on behalf of his company that the Crimson Vespa was an obsessed fanatic of Red Jacket using stolen technology, a statement not too far from the truth. Alton has insisted that Red Jacket and Vespa never be seen working together as Red Jacket's affiliations with Alton and his company are well known.
Powers & Abilities
Mutation
Kitty is a mutant, although her mutation is latent and minor. Her body is an electrical conductor, and she carries in her a small amount of electrical current at all times. Her mutation is the unknown key to powering the Crimson Vespa/Mark Four. Her mutation offers her no inherent resistance to electrical attacks, nor does it dull the pain of being shocked. Drawing in electric power and holding it until it integrates with her body is a highly conscious act that requires concentration and physical effort. Electrical "attacks" come too quickly for her to integrate.
Kitty's mutation has begun to evolve slightly, as she recently has been able to project electrical bolts that can sometimes "re-integrate" with her, boosting her own potential. Even without the Crimson Vespa armors on, Kitty is able to defend herself, though not to any great measure.
Crimson Vespa Armor
The Crimson Vespa line of "armors" is a mismatched set of various weapons systems first developed for the Red Jacket. While Alton has had more free reign in design with the Crimson Vespa than he has with Red Jacket due to Kitty's mutation, he has not employed the assistance of his engineers due to Vespa's renegade status. The Crimson Vespa is a "blast" suit, designed around the ranged delivery of high-powered bolts of energy. All Crimson Vespa suits have the same basic weapon systems, Kitty has learned how to use them more effectively as her experience with the suit increases. All Vespa suits have the power to fly as well, typically powered from flight boots. A new development, Alton found it quite easy to embed a neural user interface to the various suits of "armor" that interacts with Kitty's mind directly. The user interface is an artificial intelligence that Kitty has named "Vesparine". Vesparine, or "V" can be uploaded to each suit.
Red Jacket, mk. 4
The Mark Four that Alton has been unsuccessful in powering to meet the specifications of his lightweight Red Jacket armor is piloted and powered by Kitty. Although the Mark Four is bulkier than other Red Jacket armors, it is actually considerably lighter, designed for stealthy, long range engagement. The semi-solid metal can form to its bearer, as long as they are between 5'6" and 6'2". A major difference between the Mark Four and other Red Jacket suits is that its defensive systems have been completely stripped out to help power the weapons system. With Kitty augmenting the weapons system in the "Four", its offensive capabilities are impressive indeed. Crimson Vespa, mk. 2
Secretly, Alton designed a newer version of Crimson Vespa, intended as a gift for Kitty as her career as a hero progressed. Designed with her mutation in mind, Alton was able to make some very interesting developments in the weapons systems of the Mark Four. Removing the armored body, Alton reduced the weapons systems to a cybernetic arm that draws power from Kitty's mutation, and a secondary gauntlet on the left arm that acts as an auxiliary delivery point for the energy blasts. The weapons system is worn over a spandex-like material, also a Vesperan development, that can amplify Kitty's mutation without causing her pain and use her stored energy with greater efficiency. The result is a stylish look that Kitty adores and has become her favorite version.
Weaknesses
The Crimson Vespa armaments offer no defenses to Kitty other than the tactical advantage of flight and the slight amount of evasion that grants her. Therefore she is weak against any attack and must take great care to avoid harm on her own reflexes and timing. Crimson Vespa delivers bolts of force that have severely weaker affects on anything that is resistant to blunt force or energy. Kitty has no other extraordinary weakness but instead carries all the same physical limitations and emotional weaknesses as any other human might.
As A Contact/NPC
Red Jacket #34: Rise of Duvant
Kitty is the primary contact for the user AE arc "Red Jacket #34: Rise of Duvant". In the arc, she appears as a contact and a hostage as "Kitty" Maddoc. As a hostage, once freed, she can use her mutation to deliver attacks in the fight against Sadim. Kitty appears in the third mission suited up as the Crimson Vespa ready to take on the villainous Duvant.
Personality
Kitty is obsessive, clingy and sometimes quite single minded. However, she possesses a good heart and a genuine affection for Alton. She may think he hung the moon but she has got her own two feet on solid ground, discovering within a knack for breaking down complex systems into simplistic terms, an invaluable skill in the lab. Alton prizes her ability to see things he often misses and that has gone a long way to boosting her shattered confidence. Her obsession with Alton makes her very hostile towards advances from other would-be admirers. Kitty is an unabashed technophile, obsessed with gizmos and gadgets and fairly handy with them, although she is not nearly as intelligent as Alton is.
Her time with the Freakshow was brief but it left an indelible scar on her psyche. She was 18, innocent, and thinking of nothing more than a few cheap thrills when she got involved with a few of the guys in the gang. She didn't think that they would drag her down willingly, hoping to break her spirit, to make her one of them. Her joys were often twisted into sick games of domination or torture, and she was very near the verge of collapse when Alton found her. While the focus of working at Vesparen has been healthy, there is a part of her that died during that first year in Paragon and that part burns with the need for closure. Kitty does not consider herself a vengeful person but her need to punish those that prey on the weak has slowly surfaced in her desire to be a hero. When on patrol, Crimson Vespa is a dangerous foe for the Freakshow, meeting her former "friends" with no mercy or leniency.
Relationships
Alton Jackson III
For her, there is little else. Alton is the man who saved her life, saved her sanity and possibly her soul. Kitty is hopelessly devoted to Alton and his mission as the Red Jacket, which has caused considerable strain on their relationship in the past. In recent months, however, her growing confidence has boosted her need for independence which has improved their relationship. Her theft of the Mark Four has certainly put a serious strain on their relationship. While his employees at Vesparen would like nothing more than see Crimson Vespa arrested for the theft and "breaking in" of their lab, Alton has managed to deflect most of their anger and get the charges against Kitty dropped. He has offered no support publicly, opting to maintain Kitty's secret. Vesparen Technologies
As the vigilante Crimson Vespa, Kitty is wanted for industrial espionage, grand theft and destruction of private property for her act of stealing the Vespa armor. Alton has eventually dropped the charges, after Vespa had proven herself a valued crime fighter, though many employees are eager to see Red Jacket catch the thief and take her down a peg. Interestingly enough, while most everyone at the company suspects Alton is the Red Jacket, nobody suspects Kitty to be the Crimson Vespa, and as such, she retains her employment as Alton's personal assistant. Vesparine
The artificial intelligence that acts as a user interface to the Vespa armor. Kitty is free to keep her eyes and mind on a battle while "V" manages the weapons systems and suit, taking instructions from Kitty. Kitty can interact with Vesparine mentally but sometimes chooses to speak out loud to the little voice in her head, adding to the common perception that Vespa is not entirely sane. Freakshow
Kitty fell early into a bad crowd when she first came to Paragon city, getting sexually involved with several of gang's members. Her exposure to the gang lifestyle nearly destroyed her, a fact the older, wiser Kitty now bitterly reflects upon. While not fanatical in her vengeance she holds little back when fighting Freakshow, throwing her all into a conflict with gang members. There are several members of the gang whom she owes a more personal debt to, a cause for concern with Alton - if she will go "too far."
Notes & Character Quirks
Kitty is a fan of bad science fiction movies and Beck. She is deathly afraid of ferrets.
"Vespa" is Latin/Italian for "wasp". The scooters which most people familiarize the word "Vespa" with are named thus because the similarities between the scooter and a wasp - the large rear body attached by a thin waist section, the antenna-like handlebars and the buzzing sound of the early two-stroke engines used. The truly funny thing is - if I ever make another bee-based character I do not think I'll be using the Italian word for "bee" - it is spelled "Ape" (but pronounced Ah-pay)
Crimson draws references from many sources, Samus Aran of Metroid, Witchblade, but the name and quite a bit of her personality is an homage to Haruko of FLCL. During the show Haruko is often referred to as "the Vespa woman", a double pun on her flying Vespa scooter and her "sting", the mark she gives Naota with her guitar. Crimson's sting doesn't make giant robots climb out of anyone though.
