Outmatched/Mason Lancaster
From Unofficial Handbook of the Virtue Universe
The streets of Kings Row were not a friendly place to be a teenager in the 1980s, especially when you raised yourself. Mason Lancaster’s mother had been killed by police during a botched hostage rescue when he was five, and his father was sent away to prison when he was twelve for robbing a convenience store. Alone on the streets Mason learned how to survive. He wasn’t the biggest or the fastest guy but he was extremely bright, and had an outstanding personality. He could talk the police into letting him leave after a con without the customary bribe, simply by reading them and telling them what they wanted to hear.
When he was eighteen he met a brute named Ernie Connors. He wasn’t the sharpest knife in the drawer, but he knew how to throw a punch. As a promising middleweight boxer Ernie had something that Mason didn't have, a future. It wasn’t hard to get on Ernie’s good side, and once he was there Mason found it easy to declare himself Ernie’s manager. Once Ernie knocked out a seasoned ex-champ the two of them were off and running.
When Ernie landed with the massive Promotion Company of Gein & Crowley Mason got to come along for the ride. Ernie fought his way up the ranks while Mason seemingly sat back and enjoyed the benefits of being Ernie’s best friend. What no one knew was that Mason always skimmed a portion of Ernie’s purse off the top and spent his free time making connections throughout Gein & Crowley. He became great friends with dozens of promising fighters, and even had the management dancing to his tune. So by the time Ernie suffered horrible brain damage in a championship bout Lancaster was able to walk away with a sizable nest egg and a half dozen fighters cleverly stolen from Gein and Crowley all to start his own company.
The late 1990s was a great time to be Mason Lancaster. He was easily one of the most influential boxing promoters in the country. He combined business smarts, a silver tongue, and undeniable eye for talent and parlayed those strengths into a multi-million dollar empire. His fighters were well known for being outstanding shows both inside and outside of the ring, with larger than life personalities. It was often said that Mason crafted these personas for his fighters to increase their marketability.
Mason’s empire began to crumble in 2006 when it was discovered that one of his fighters used a low dosage of the super powered steroid Rage before a championship match. While boxing commissions all over the country tried to make the matter simply go away a single sports reporter for the Paragon Times, Chris Monroe, refused to let the scandal be swept under the rug. During a six month-long investigation Monroe discovered that each and every one of Lancaster’s fighters regularly used performance-enhancing drugs. Not only did he discover this, but he also uncovered proof that Lancaster knew about this policy and supported it by purchasing the drugs via a slush fund. When the news hit the streets Lancaster was finished. To cover themselves the boxing commission acted quickly preventing all of Lancaster’s fighters from ever competing in a reputable fight again. Lancaster himself was barred from any involvement with the sport for life. These acts saved the boxing commission from total destruction later that year before a senate sub-committee. The sport however has yet to recover from the scandal.
Lancaster quickly found himself at the mercy of creditors, and upon the death of one of his former fighters due to a Rage overdose he began to be served with lawsuits. By 2007 the wily man who’d built himself up from a street pun had declared bankruptcy and was living in a run down hotel in Skyway City. He knew that life would only get worse unless he did something drastic.
With the remainder of the money he’d embezzled from the long forgotten Ernie Mason, Mason used all his contacts for one purpose, one hour alone in a warehouse where DATA stored heavy weapons. For the next two weeks he became something of an arms dealer; fencing everything he had stolen, however it quickly became apparent that he wasn’t even going to recoup the money he’d paid in bribes. Alone in his apartment Mason examined the one piece of junk even he couldn’t sell, a cracked crystal rod that had been tagged Praetoria Case 2003. He wished to be anywhere else than in his apartment.
Then in a flash of red light Mason Lancaster found himself sitting in a large metal room. He explored his surroundings and quickly discovered that he was inside of a massive state-of-the-art fortress on a floating island. Mason then used his newfound power to recruit a gang, mostly made up of his ex-fighters. They proceeded to rob at least four banks in the state and escape using the powers contained in the rod. Mason was rich once again, but he knew he could do so much more with his power. One night while drinking with one of his contacts, the idea for Meta-Human Deathmatch was born.
Using the money from the bank jobs Mason bought special weapons, equipment, and recruited dozens of other people. They would use less than lethal weapons to hunt down meta-humans and bring them to Lancaster, who would then use his cosmic energy rod to throw them into his fortress. In the fortress those captured would be video taped fighting off other combatants inside, the fortress’ defensive system, and staving off the fortress’ all too real combat simulator. These trials of survival were shown to crowds of the rich and jaded in dozens of hidden, yet expensively furnished screening halls all over the world.
Lancaster is back on top of the world, he lives in a huge estate outside of Paragon City where he’s guarded by the fighters he used to represent. Meanwhile his hunters shadow and ambush meta-humans of all kinds for his shows, and all the while Mason Lancaster is becoming filthy rich.
