Flora Fairchild
From Unofficial Handbook of the Virtue Universe
| |
| Flora Fairchild | |
| Player: @Twoflower | |
| Origin: | Mutant |
|---|---|
| Archetype: | Dominator |
| Threat Level: | 37 |
| Personal Data | |
| Real Name: | Flora Fairchild |
| Known Aliases: | The Rose, The Thorn |
| Species: | Human / Avatar of the Green |
| Age: | 24 |
| Height: | 5'2" |
| Weight: | 106lb |
| Eye Color: | Green |
| Hair Color: | Green |
| Biographical Data | |
| Nationality: | American |
| Occupation: | Alleged Bio-Terrorist, Gardener |
| Place of Birth: | Florida Everglades |
| Base of Operations: | Mercy Island |
| Marital Status: | Single |
| Known Relatives: | Mother (Lawyer, Former Avatar of the Green, Retired) |
| Known Powers | |
| Nature Empathy | |
| Known Abilities | |
| Home & Garden, Dewey Decimal System, Cower in Fear | |
| Equipment | |
| Floppy sun hat, watering can | |
| No additional information available. | |
Flora Fairchild is a villain entirely by accident and misunderstanding. A kind and gentle soul with a heroic lineage, she has no business being condemned to the Rogue Isles, but she's making do as best she can in hopes of one day proving to the world that she's not a menace. She just wants to go home.
Contents |
Affiliations
Initially "recruited" (if you can call being dragged from her cell in the Zig kicking and screaming by Arachnos recruiting) by Kalinda and the Arachnos Department of Leverage, Flora was put to work on the snake problems of Mercy Island but never really followed up with any Arachnos contacts beyond that, preferring to eke out a living doing odd jobs such as volunteer gardening work and part timing at the Mercy Island Public Library's returns desk. Flora wants nothing to do with any evil organization.
She maintains an open contract with Foxtrot Company, however, because she frequently finds herself in trouble and in need of allies to help her, and because working as a librarian doesn't pay well enough to keep her at a living wage level. Still, she won't go on any missions that require her to kill, or go up against actual heroes -- although she makes an exception for Longbow. (See background.)
Flora has made also friends with magical mercenary Luna Samson, who has taken her in as a roomie. She's also dated Doctor Vyle off and on, as he seems to be a lot like her, a kind and simple person who's been unfairly labeled evil -- although she's unaware that this is simply an act on his behalf.
Recently, Flora has been working near-exclusively with Vanguard, and refers to herself as a hero. And specifically does not refer in any way to her spotty past and criminal record, not wanting any of the "real" heroes to know the truth.
Personality
Flora is the polar opposite of the typical villain -- sweet, kind, gentle, well meaning, and with a genuine compassion for her fellow man. That pretty much marks her as chum for the vicious sharks that circle the islands in search of naive and idealistic young people to twist and corrupt, but thanks to Foxtrot Company, she's managed to stave off most of these predators.
One unfortunate drawback is her apparent blindness to danger. When someone sells her a funny looking tiki mask, she doesn't think "Crap, Banished Pantheon! Burn it!" she thinks "Oh, that would look adorable on the mantle next to that funny Jewel of Hera thing I found!". She was a regular consumer of Diet Crey Cola before (and occasionally after) the discovery it contained mind controlling nanites, and also ran Crey's infamous "OBEY" hypnotic screensaver on her laptop. This has led to severe headaches among her friends more than once as they try to deal with the fallout...
Flora's sunny outlook is actually quite fragile. She knows she's trapped in one of the worst places on earth, she knows the whole world thinks she's some sort of modern day Unabomber, and when reminded of these things depression can set in easily.
Powers & Abilities
The source of Flora's abilities is her link as an Avatar of the Green, a personification of the true will of nature. This is a genetic trait passed down from her mother and her mother's mother, and so on, with the family serving as heroes in the cause of preserving the earth as the "Green Lady". Her mother, a former lawyer and lobbyist for ecological causes, is now retired in Florida and plays golf all day.
Plant Empathy
Flora is able to link psionically with the will of the earth, to summon forth plantlife from seeds she keeps with her at all times, or from the very earth itself. These plants can ensnare her enemies, cause chaos on the battlefield, and even spread a pollen that confuses enemies into attacking each other. Her favorite plant to grow, however, is the tree of life that helps encourage the growth and mending of injuries in her friends.
Audrey
Recently she "gave birth," in a lovecraftian manner of speaking, to a terrifying ambulatory flytrap capable of eating a man whole. Utterly oblivious to the horrific visage she had spawned, she has named her offpsring "Audrey" and insists "she's just a big softie, really." Audrey is, for the most part, a gentle creature, albeit one whose idea of friendly play is to chew on your arm a little. The creature emits audible grumbly purring ("Chrrrr!") but Flora herself can telepathically understand its thoughts.
Psionic Assault
This telepathy is the source of Flora's other major power, the ability to project her mind outward to harm others. Initially terrified that she could use her emotions to hurt people, she's since practiced and refined her power, so that it now has become a non-lethal way to subdue a foe with minimal fuss and minimal damage.
Transformations (Rose & Thorn)
Also worth note -- and the one thing Arachnos would really, really like to get their hands on her for -- is that when pushed too hard in battle and when stressed too much, Flora physically and mentally transforms into one of the two forms of the Avatar of the Green. One, the Thorn, is a hulking beast of wood and vine who roars with anger at the "defilers" who spoil the earth and has NO qualms slaughtering them en masse. The other, the Rose, is a gentle fae-like figure of flower and leaf that is more compassionate to her enemies and subdues them with delicate, precise control of her powers. Flora's abilities are nearly doubled in power when she's transformed, but the transformation doesn't last long, sometimes knocking her fully unconscious afterwards with no awareness of what transpired.
Character History
How Flora, the child of a hero, a young girl with a tie to the goodness of nature ended up on Interpol's most wanted list as a bioterrorist is a comedy of errors indeed...
Flora the Bioterrorist?
She had a peaceful life in Steel Canyon, riding a bike to work at a flower shop, enjoying a simple existence. However, on one unfortunate day, her mutant powers manifested in one impressive burst... flooding Blyde Square completely with vines, covering buildings, snarling up traffic, and causing chaos. There were a few minor injuries, but no fatalities, and Positron was on hand to cut his way through the vines to rescue trapped civilians.
This would've been a footnote in the rise of a hero, except that the mayor's son happened to be driving by in his blinged out 50,000 dollar car when the vines emerged. His ride was totalled, he was furious, and he demanded his father pull some strings to have the one responsible thrown in the Zig.
Flora's trial was a swift and brutal example of how far a little corruption in Paragon can go, with a judge uninterested in the defense's arguments and the media spinning her as a "bioterrorist". To top it all off, her boss from the flower shop, a firm believer that all mutants are abominations before God, purjured himself under oath and said Flora was planning her "evil act" for days beforehand. The verdict came down quickly, and Flora found herself in the zig, awaiting her appeal.
Unfortunately, she also had appeared on Arachnos's list of possible Destined Ones. One prison break later, she was dragged from her cell to the Rogue Islands -- and that was all the proof the media needed that she CLEARLY had criminal ties and now lived in a den of villainy. Flora was officially evil by default.
The Radio
Although she tried to steer clear of trouble in her early days in the isles, she couldn't avoid one particular disaster... the infamous Radio, the bizarre entity that lures in young villains with promises of fame and infamy. It tried to cast its hook on Flora too, and she tried to resist, but her psychic powers only made its voice louder and more grating. Eventually she agreed to do what the radio said if only so it would leave her alone.
Much to her horror, what she thought was a simple sneak-into-paragon theft mission turned out to be the Radio having her plant plague bombs around the city. The media, already having marked her a bioterrorist, continued to hammer that point home. Flora went into hiding afterwards, trying to focus on her life in the isles as a civilian and not as a villain.
Captured by Longbow
Much later on, a Longbow agent sympathetic to her cause offered to take Flora home, by way of the base in Agincourt. Since usually Longbow shot at her on sight, and this was an avenue back to her beloved hometown, Flora agreed.
Unfortunately, this was a trap organized by a Longbow officer seeking to make his stripes taking down the "famous bioterrorist menace of Flora Fairchild." His squad was a bit, shall we say, overenthusiastic in apprehending her, beating her, throwing her in a cell, beating her some more. And to make matters worse, Luminary happened to be visiting that day, was briefly informed of the terrorist capture, even LOOKED in Flora's cell for a few seconds, and did nothing to stop this.
Although Foxtrot rescued Flora, from that day on, she has considerably less compunctions about assaulting Longbow during missions. As Flora sees it, they're a military force acting with no oversight and she intends to bring her case before congress once she gets home to have something done about these rogues. But her outrage goes beyond leaflets and letter writing... when given the chance to fight Luminary, Flora poured herself into the battle, crying out, "You're supposed to be a hero! Why didn't you save me?!"
Again, Flora slipped into seclusion after that. Only after the birth of Audrey and a desire to keep her new child exercised did she resume mission work, but only off and on.
A Vanguard Hero
When the Second Rikti War began, Flora spent the first several days almost locked in the Thorn form, violently defending the Earth from these hideous invaders that threatened to bespoil it. When she finally calmed down and passed out, a Vanguard operative had her transported to the Rikti War Zone.
There, Levantra had a proposition -- work full time with the Vanguard, be a hero, clear your criminal record. Flora had been burned by propositions like this in the past, but with Foxtrot Company throwing its full weight behind the Vanguard, she signed on.
While she doesn't ENJOY war and is actually quite frightened by the Rikti (many of whom have stronger psionic power than her own, underdeveloped power), this has officially put Flora in the "Hero" column on the spreadsheet of life, a fact she revels in. When introducing herself to her "fellow heroes" she always refers to herself as a hero... but omits mention of any of her past criminal activities.
She's hoping to make a clean break, but won't turn her backs on her friends to do it; if she's needed back at the Isles to help out, she'll help out, of course.
(to be continued!)
Trivia
During the early days of COV beta, it was looking like there was little villainry to be found in the game, as most missions faced you off against other villains and even Arachnos itself. Making a 'heroic villain' made a lot of sense. However, with later game arcs including some true villainry and hero crushing action, justifying the actions Flora would need to take in order to, you know, level up became difficult. My hopes are that Issue #10, which she's in perfect range for, will give her an alternative path.
