Metal Maven
From Unofficial Handbook of the Virtue Universe
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| Wearing the Alpha prototype Crey powersuit, Melody Callaghan tests her aim in Vanguard's DPO gunnery range | |
| Metal Maven | |
| Player: | |
| Origin: | Technology |
|---|---|
| Archetype: | Blaster |
| Security Level: | Confidential |
| Personal Data | |
| Real Name: | Melody Callaghan |
| Known Aliases: | She-Shock, Ms. Static, Madame Shock |
| Species: | Former cyborg, now reconstituted human wearing Crey prototype powersuit. |
| Age: | 26 |
| Height: | 6'0" |
| Weight: | 158 pounds |
| Eye Color: | Blue |
| Hair Color: | Blond/brown, short |
| Biographical Data | |
| Nationality: | American |
| Occupation: | Registered hero under the FBSA Technology division and member of Vanguard, former criminal |
| Place of Birth: | City Of Sunrise, Florida |
| Base of Operations: | Talos Island |
| Marital Status: | Single |
| Known Relatives: | Brian "Killer" Callaghan (father, deceased), Mary-ann Callaghan (mother, deceased) |
| Known Powers | |
| Crey Powersuit, code named "Alpha" | |
| Known Abilities | |
| Super speed, super jumping, smashing strength, and the ability to discharge varying charges of electricity | |
| Equipment | |
| Confidential | |
| No additional information available. | |
Contents |
Her In-Game Bio
Description: My name was Melody Callaghan. I used to be one of Paragon City's best models, but I was afraid of losing my looks. A doctor said he could make me beautiful forever, but the guy worked for Crey. I was turned into a cyborg, but a hero named Flash Bug saved me. I retained my mind, but I lost everything else: my fame, my career, and my humanity. I tried to be a superheroine, but I hated how I was being held back by dumb politicians who did not know what they were talking about. I ended up a criminal and ran to the Rogues Isles. A double-cross by a so-called partner in Mercy Isles poisoned my organics. I was dying. When I heard Longbow was gonna kill Doc Quantum because of his morality tests, I figured if I was gonna die, I'll die doing the right thing by bringing the Doc in myself. I saved him, but I was near death when Longbow found me. The eggheads at Vanguard found a way to save my organics. For my actions, I was given my hero license back.
The Cyborg Age
"Me Version 2.0"
Melody Callaghan was not the sharpest pencil in the drawer, but she was once a very good looking young woman. So stunningly beautiful in fact, she was immediately hired by model agency "Paragon Beauty And Fashion" to be a fashion model. She grew accustomed to living the high society life, but began to worry about what would happen to her if she lost her looks and the agency let her go. Apparently someone got wind of her concerns. A doctor, claiming to have a secret cosmetic procedure that would allow her to remain as beautiful as she was now right to old age, made her an offer to undergo his exclusive procedure.
Being both gullible and not terribly bright, Melody immediately agreed without checking on the credentials of the doctor nor speaking with anyone for advice. She showed up at a secret lab in Steel Canyon on October 5th, 2009, fitted with a hospital gown, and told to lie down on a table in the cleanest whitest room she ever seen. The doctor assured her that everything will be okay, and she would undergo a "miraculous transformation"
The doctor was not lying about that phrase. He worked for Crey Corporation as one of the Countess Crey's top bionic and cybernetic surgeons. Melody, who the doctor learned through pilfering medical records from her last hospital stayover for food poisoning, was a perfect candidate to become one of the next generation of Paragon Protectors, a cyborg fighting machine of unbelievable speed and strength, with the power to unleash bolts of electrical discharge.
After being put to sleep, most of Melody's skeletal system was removed and transported over to the 6 foot tall gleaming chassis to be bonded with an titanium inner frame, producing the needed red cells to keep what organs (her brain, heart, somewhat shortened lungs, and her lymphatic, nervous and circulatory systems) alive in her new body. The rest of Melody was discarded.
All was left was to override the mental aspects of Melody with advanced Crey computer programs so she would be an obedient cyborg servant. Thankfully, a superhero named Flash Bug was following up on the disappearance of many Paragon City citizens and stumbled onto the existance of the lab. In an amazing and typically flashy feat of superheroic derring do, Flash Bug shut down the lab and saved Melody Callaghan from the final state of being a cyborg pawn of Crey Corporation.
But the damage was done. Melody was now a cyborg.
Failing To Find A Place In Society
S.E.R.A.P.H. concluded that there was not enough cloneable tissue left in Melody to recreate her old body, at least not without her going through many medical issues for the rest of her life, assuming she even lived that long after the reconstitution procedure finished. It was decided that the cyborg body was doing what it was meant to to keep Melody healthy and alive.
Melody still required a lot of counselling from a psychiatrist to deal with the loss of her humanity, and the support of many heroes, including her rescuer Flash Bug, to help her come to grips. They encouraged her to enlist as a superhero, saying she had the power to make sure no one could be hurt the way she was hurt. Melody agreed and registered, first starting her career as She-Shock, and later as Ms. Static to honor another superhero by the same name who died rescuing apartment tenants from a building fire in Steel Canyon.
She found she was able to handle her new found bionic super speed and agility as easily as her old body, and had a strong handle on the use of her electrical blasts. But she was growing frustated with the way City Hall allowed her to deal with crooks, and the way the justice system seemed to let them go free shortly after she collared them. Whether it was simple frustration at local politicians or something was lost in her humanity from her transformation, she began to change in the way she worked with the superhero community as a whole and City Hall and the FBSA in specific. She began at first by being openly critical of the people at the FBSA and City Hall, but later moved on to becoming more disobedient and began to go her own way when dealing with missions. A followup on a Nemesis assignment led her to conclude Longbow bases were being infiltrated with Nemesis automatons. When she tried to warn Ms. Liberty about the infiltration, she was told her concerns were groundless. That was the last straw that broke her cybernetic back. On September 3rd, 2010, she launched a one-woman attack on one of the bases. While Melody was in fact correct -- there were Longbow officers being replaced with Nemesis automatons as part of a nefarious scheme -- the base was nearly destroyed and Melody had earned the ire of the Freedom Corps, the FBSA and City Hall. When Melody launched a second attack on another Longbow base, further damaging property in her destruction of the automatons, an emergancy meeting between the FBSA and City Hall was held on September 10th, 2010. Within a matter of hours, a vote was held to revoke Melody's license of being a superhero, and she was now considered a criminal.
Melody continued her rampage but was met by a group of superheroes that stopped her in her tracks. She narrowly got away and fled Paragon City. Realizing she had no place to go, she fled to the Rogue Isles and set up a secret hiding place. Taking note of the Longbow stationed there, and blaming them for waht happened to her, she began to engage their bases along Mercy Island.
Madame Shock, and her betrayal by Doctor Midnight
When the original Ms. Static, apparently alive and well despite being presumed dead from the apartment fire in Steel Canyon, launched a court challenge to regain the rights to use her name, Melody changed her own operating name to Madame Shock.
Melody needed a vast amount of money and resources to keep her own body going, courtesy of some dubious scientists, one code-named Doctor Midnight. She commited some bank robberies in Paragon City, the most disasterous one on September 21st, 2010 where several blocks of Talos Island were flattened during her battle with Longbow and the Paragon City police. A growing uproar by the citizens living in that area led to the commission of a task force called "Operation: Iron Maiden Down" on September 26th, 2010. This task force, consisting of four superheroes...Dynamo Defender, SpyderMynde, Atomic Moth, and Omega Cat...was assigned to track down and arrest Melody, and return her for trial in Paragon City.
When they finally caught up with her, the task force engaged Madame Shock in Sharkhead Isles. With the assistance of Longbow soldiers who were also after her, they managed to damage her Crey designed body, but she was able to escape back to Doctor Midnight. The scientist managed to replace the damaged Crey body parts with very advanced technology she never seen before, and gave her a synthetic face that emulated some expressions and emotions. What she did not realize that the parts were Praetorian Clockwork technology and Doctor Midnight was in fact the Praetorian doppleganger of the superhero Event Horizon Man. He was using her as part of their partnership to fund his Resistance Cell as the agent Midnight Law.
On October 3rd, 2010, Doctor Midnight returned Melody back to Talos Island once again to steal some gold bars from a bank. As expected, the Longbow were waiting for her, and she dealt with them easily. She was about to breach the vault when the superhero Cacaphony appeared out of nowhere and tried to explain to her that her path she was now on was not because she was a bad person. The reason why, according to Cacaphony, she was now a villian was one of vengeance, and her need to defy authority was futher evidence of the loss of her humanity at the hands of Crey. Cacaphony also mentioned her own experiences of how she became a hero, after she caused a stage she was singing on during an opera concert to be destroyed. Melody was seriously considering going back with Cacaphony to Paragon City to tell her side of the story, only to be interrupted by Blast Furnace, who wanted the glory of taking in Melody single-handlely. An enraged Melody defeated Blast Furnace and his Longbow contingent, and whirled on Cacaphony to attack her. The two women fought, with Melody finally winning. But Cacaphony got through to her, nevertheless. She didn't want to be a victim of her own vengeance and a pawn for others. She wanted to be her own woman. After tagging the gold bars for teleportation back to Doctor Midnight's base, she radioed in to tell him she was done working with him. When Doctor Midnight threatened to "turn her off", she still held her ground. He decided to let her win this round and told her she was free to go. Melody thought she won, but her freedom came with a price. He secretly activated a self-destruct pod in her body that began to poison Melody's organics. Upon her return to the Rogues Isles, and feeling very sick, she learned from other scientists who maintained her, and that she still trusted, that she was dying.
Redemption
The remaining scientists who worked with her were able to slow the advance of the poison, but it was only a matter of months before she died. Melody was wondering how to wrap up her affairs....destroy herself somehow or return to Paragon City? Her answer came in a secret Rogues Isles newspaper message, reporting Doc Quantum was wanted by the Longbow for his cruel morality tests. Even though he was a hero, Longbow had orders to kill him on sight.
Melody knew the Longbow was wrong in ordering him to be killed on sight, just as they were wrong about the Nemesis automatons in their base. She also realized she was wrong, too. She should never have attacked the Longbow bases just to right a wrong. Cacaphony was right: she was suffering from the loss of her humanity, which was making her do things for the wrong reason. Her solution, instead of yet engaging the Longbow again, was to take Doc Quantum down but surrender both him and her to the Operation: Iron Maiden Down task force that was still looking for her. She reasoned, if she was going to die, let her die doing something right and just for a change. Let her die a hero.
After a pitched battle between her and Doc Quantum and his many traps and gizmos, she won. She radioed the Longbow that were on their way to kill him that she would be arrested by the task force, where both she and Doc Quantum would be tried by the people of Paragon City.
At her trial on January 5th, 2011, Melody Callaghan apologized to the court for her actions and would accept the fate of dying while serving time in the Zigg. The jury returned a verdict of guilty, with 15 years of time in the Zigg. Cacaphony, who recovered from her injuries fighting Melody, pleaded with the court for a lighter sentence, stating her previous transformation into a cyborg by the Crey, her actions in revealing the Longbow automatons and saving the Longbow from a PR nightmare if they did in fact kill Doc Quantum, and her information about Doctor Midnight that revealed the Resistance's plot, should be considered. The judge, in considering this, and realizing that Melody did not have long to live anyways because of the poison in her system, ruled she would serve only nine months.
While being cared for in the prison for her worsening condition, Vanguard, who had experience dealing with Rikti toxins, found an antidote for the poison and administered it to her. She was no longer dying, and served the full time of her nine-month sentence. After her release from the Zigg, she was offered by City Hall a second chance to become a licensed hero once again, under the watchful supervision of Vanguard. Because Vanguard saved her life, and she did not want to go back to the days of her past, she agreed. On November 4th, 2011, 3 days after her release from prison, she registered as Metal Maven and became a member of Vanguard.
"Me Version 2.5"
Melody's cyborg body has been suffering from minor power and mechanical powers since her arrival in the Rogue Isles. She constantly complained of tiring easy and having to voluntarily shut down for a few minutes to reset a part (usually a low-grade part that was neither Crey nor Praetorian) in order to resolve the issue she was having with it. She also felt, because she did not have the sensation of touch, she was living in a glass box.
Since her release from the Zig and her enlistedment, Vanguard has spent a considerable amount of research time trying to understand how every aspect of Melody worked. They finally gathered enough information about her to propose a major disassembly and upgrade of her framework to remove both the Crey and various Rogue Isles parts, replacing them with more reliable Vanguard technology.
Before she underwent the procedure, Melody was shown through a holographic representation of her future design. While she was happy with the improvements and corrections, the engineers of Vanguard got the impression she was not happy with it. When asked, she simply shrugged and said, "It's okay, I guess. I don't know"
It was a Vanguard officer, Sergeant Granger, who was able to find out what was making Melody unhappy:
"Being married to a fashion closet like my wife...and please God don't tell her I called her that...I knew Melody was having issues about her appearance. She was once a model after all. Let's face it: Vanguard builds great tech but it's not artsy-fartsy like the heroes wear. I figured if I asked the right guy who knew about what Melody likes, we'd strike a compromise somewhere."
Granger took the holographpic design printout to Serge of Icon in Steel Canyon to get his opinion:
"Right off the bat, he hated it. He started raving and yelling about it being 'too wobbly'. What the hell does that mean anyways? Anyhow, he snatched the print out of my hands and started yammering away as he scribbled on it. Finally he goes off into the back room and I'm left standing here looking out of place in my Vanguard armor."
Serge of Icon continues with the story:
"Wobbly! Wobbly! Trust Vanguard not to come up with something that would make Melody happy! They all walk around looking like a set of woodwork tools! I took their blah design and spiced it up a bit. A mini-jacket for her shoulders, a holographic emblem for her chest, and a lovely mane of hair that would make every villian drop to their knees at the sight of her!"
Granger finishes the story:
"I thought it was too glam but what do I know? I took it back to the Vanguard DPO and showed Melody. She loved it, went ape over it. She couldn't wait for us to get the upgrade rolling."
Melody was rendered unconscious and the refit -- the first since Doctor Midnight performed work on her in the Rogue Isles -- took 22 hours and 18 minutes without one hitch. The end result was a somewhat lighter yet power-efficent, sleeker, and aethestically pleasing design, with a more human-looking face that emulated human emotion and expressions. As a bonus, Vanguard cybernetic surgeons added touch sensors to her fingertips and face to allow her, for the first time since her transformation into a cyborg by Crey, some sensation of touch she could turn off and on with a thought.
Her Humanity Restored
Melody had the opportunity to deal a crippling blow to those who took away her humanity. She was given the opportunity, working with the FBSA's Janet Kellum, to track down and arrest Countess Crey for all the crimes she and her corporation wrought. Little did she realize what was in store for her...
As Metal Maven, Melody learned of a new armored powersuit the Paragon Protectors were going to wear that was on par with the Vanguard Impervium armor. This made the Paragon Protectors, already a formidable super powered force, even more dangerous. Melody tracked down clues which lead her to the labs that designed the first prototype powersuit, simply called "Alpha". Each lab revealed some information about "Alpha" but something was oddly wrong. It was not until her arrival at the Crey facility that manufactured the armored powersuits did Melody learn the horrible truth: it was a plan to capture her, remove the organics from her cyborg body, then re-incorporate them into a Paragon Protector clone of Melody Callaghan, obediently serving the will of Countess Crey and Crey Corporation. This clone template was made during Melody's transformation into a cyborg on October 5th, 2009.
Countess Crey, already a dangerous and powerful foe with her mental powers, came at Melody wearing the powersuit. The two fought, levelling the facility and Melody narrowly beating Countess Crey, at the expense of her cyborg body. She was mortally wounded and once again dying. To her, though, death did not matter. Countess Crey was captured, and Crey Corporation suffered a massive financial and moral blow of it's own for what was done to her. Mission accomplished. She was ready to join her parents in heaven.
The seizure of Countess Crey and her personal information and assets saved Melody, however. S.E.R.A.P.H. and Vanguard worked together to use Crey's "Project Revenant Hero" and "Project Locke" technique to take Melody's organics and memories out of her now irreperably damaged cyborg body into the Paragon Protector clone. Melody awoke fully human, no longer a cyborg. Her damaged bionics were disposed of in a "funeral service" at the Vanguard DPO.
Melody, now human, went to first her mother and later her father's grave to meditate on the amazing changes. She no longer had her powers and was ready to retire from the superhero business. Reading an inscription left on her father's tombstone (he was a former semi-professional boxer) changed her mind: "Never stop fighting". Melody realized Paragon City still needed heroes for protection from the likes of Crey and other dangers.
The Alpha powersuit, despite suffering some damage from the titanic battle between Countess Crey and Melody, was still operational. Once repaired and refitted with Vanguard and some acquired Praetorian technology from the incursions launched from the Vanguard DPO, Melody continued her war against evil, wearing the Alpha powersuit.
