Payback in Spades
From Unofficial Handbook of the Virtue Universe
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| Payback in Spades | |
| Metadata | |
| Player: | @anachrodragon |
|---|---|
| Activity Level: | Regularly Played |
| Origin: | Mutant |
| Archetype: | Brute |
| Powers: | Energy Melee/Electrical Aura |
| Threat Level: | 50 |
| Legal Miscellanea | |
| Full Name: | Riley Reid |
| Known Aliases: | Payback, Riley |
| Age: | mid-20s |
| Occupation: | Gangster |
| Education: | High school dropout, streets of Port Oakes |
| Citizenship: | USA |
| Legal Status: | Criminal |
| Marital Status: | Single |
| Known Relatives: | Estranged from parents/siblings |
| Base of Operations: | Rogue Isles |
| Affiliations: | Gang of Spades |
| Physical Characteristics | |
| Gender: | Male |
| Species: | Human |
| Ethnicity: | Irish |
| Eye Color: | Gray/Green |
| Hair Color: | Red |
| Complexion: | Light |
| Height: | 6' |
| Weight: | 190 lbs |
| Build: | Athletic/Muscular |
| Distinguishing Features: | Prominent facial scar. Uncontrollably wild red hair. |
Payback in Spades was created for a card themed villain group called Gang of Spades. He started out as simply a concept character alt, and grew into my main villain, and one of my very favorite characters.
Influences include:
- Various examples of popular mobster fiction
- Noir crime and cyberpunk stories
- Berserk anime/manga
- The poem The Tiger by William Blake
- and about a million other literature/movie/comic sources where you'd find an emotionally closed off tough guy with a difficult past
Contents |
Affiliations
Payback belongs to the villain group The Gang of Spades, where he is comfortable in his position as lieutenant and right-hand man to the illustrious Face of Spades. While he has no intention of threatening Face's leadership of the gang, they do sometimes quarrel over his stubborn opinions on gang undertakings.
Also joining him in the Gang of Spades is Payback's longtime friend, the mysterious tattooed wizard, Stack of Cards. If Payback is Face's right-hand man, then Stack is the sneaky left hand, with his beguiling mind control powers.
Other members include the unscrupulous mercenary Crazy 8, the 52 Pickup twins, the depraved Black Knave, and Justice Reversed, the evil sister of the tarot-themed hero Arcana Justice.
Personality
Payback goes by his real name, Riley, among friends--however he has few friends. He tries to present himself as reasonable, composed, even sometimes charming. Among his associates he's known for being pragmatic, streetwise, and reliable in a fight. Casual acquaintances will see him as a generally decent guy, if extremely reserved when it comes to personal questions. He also has a rebellious streak, and while it was a lot more evident when he was younger, it still manifests as an almost uncanny ability to push people's buttons. He would say this is by accident; he's not really trying to be a smartass, it just sort of comes out.
As for his enemies, they see his other side, his unmistakable fierce and savage fury. This is driven by the pain of his past, a burning need for revenge, and the ferocious tendencies of his mutant heritage.
His Meyers-Briggs personality type is ISTP
Character History
What he tells people
This is what his in-game bio says:
Riley Reid is reluctant to discuss the details of his past. He'll casually offer that he's from a poor Irish immigrant family, and that as the only mutant, his distinctness was evidenced by his wild red hair. It's also no secret that he was a teenager when his parents gave him to the Family to resolve a debt. As for his mutant powers, he came to them late, and he'll admit that they were the source of as much angst as pride. His few friends know that his years with the Family were troubled, that he has a disfiguring scar to show for it, and that he escaped their clutches with the help of his current gang leader Face of Spades. They know he wants revenge. While among friends his bearing may be composed, even charming at times, an occasional look belies much darker truths. His enemies know him only as Payback in Spades, and see a much different face: one contorted with anger, seeking vengeance for unspoken suffering.
The above is true, but there are a lot of things left unsaid.
What he doesn't tell people
His Family
Riley's early life was ugly. His mother harbored a deep hatred for the rare mutant strain that ran in her family line. Recognizing the signs in her son, she singled him out and treated him cruelly. Riley was the youngest of several kids, and he was always keenly aware of being an outsider compared to his other siblings. He was isolated, punished unreasonably, treated demeaningly. While he had no manifested mutant powers as a child, his "differentness" has always been evidenced by his unnaturally wild red hair, and bright green eyes that flare with his fierce temper.
While it is true that his parents owed money to the Family, Riley knows that they were more than happy to get rid of him, and seized the opportunity when the Family expressed interest.
As an adult looking back, Riley does recognize that he was an angry, defiant teenager, who was starting to show increasing signs of latent mutant powers. He realizes that he must have been difficult to deal with, and that his parents might have even feared him more than hated him. He knows that if he hadn't wound up in the Rogue Isles, things might have turned out much worse when his powers finally did manifest--he would likely have destroyed himself, his family, and others as well. Though he doesn't reflect on his past often, when he does these things weigh on him, and serve to further entangle his feelings and infuriate him. Part of him will always harbor a very deep resentment towards his parents. Their ill-treatment and rejection fuels his rage, as he knows it's part of an intractable problem that no amount of vengeance will resolve.
His Powers
Riley's powers hit him explosively not long after he joined the Family. They caused excruciating pain, seizures, and he was an extreme danger to himself and his surroundings. At the onset he was completely out of control, and had to be drugged to prevent his electrified nerves from killing him. He spent years wrestling with his powers, and even hating them, before he finally came to understand and embrace them.
His powers, to this day, cause him intense pain, but he can for the most part temper it through harnessing anger. They respond to his emotional state, which is one reason for the necessity of remaining emotionally reticent. Though his control has solidified to the point that it is very effective now, Riley recognizes the possibility that he could still be a very real danger to himself and anyone close to him. In light of this, it makes sense that Stack of Cards is the only person he has a close bond with. Their friendship is strengthened by the fact that they can both act as counterpoints to each other's powers.
The Family
Life with the Family was a harsh environment, full of guns, violence, and underhanded schemes. Riley belonged to Guido Verandi's organization, which later became known as the "Mooks." He started low on the totem pole, as something of a captive in the Verandi household. He sort of informally wore the title "read-headed stepchild" until eventually Verandi and his goons managed to beat some compliance into him. He remembers that time as being full of desperation, pain and fear; a slowly dwindling hope of escape; and then the awkward advances of Verandi's teenage daughter, who was only slightly older than him, but far more experienced.
Then with the explosion of his mutant powers coming to life, everything changed.
After that, he became valuable to the Family, much like a dangerous, untested weapon. They started giving him more respect. And Riley, being a young man who had grown up with very little pride or self-respect, started to seek their approval--especially that of his mentor, a conniving underboss named Antonio.
He spent years with the Family, and came to accept and even enjoy the gangster lifestyle. He became well known as an enforcer, and sometimes hit man. He was loyal, willingly participating in acts he even found repellent, things that pushed his own limits and conscience. But still he did them, defying his own judgment.
It was inevitable that he would start to question himself, his role, and the reasons for his actions. Ultimately, he did not betray the Family though, it was more that they betrayed him. He knew too much, started asking too many questions, and was becoming a thorn in the side of Antonio, his previous mentor. It was one of Antonio's schemes that led to his downfall within the Family and almost his demise. Riley confronted Antonio, challenged him over a conspiratorial plot he'd discovered which was designed to lead to intra-Family violence. The confrontation ended with betrayal: Antonio shot him in the chest, and heaved him through a window, leaving him for dead in the alley below.
Now he's angry, angry at the Family for the physical violence, the psychological manipulations, and the exploitation of his powers. He's angry at himself for allowing it for so long. He's furious that he still harbors some respect for the Family, and despite knowing better, he can't shake it. He wants to kill Antonio: a man who was more a father to him than his own father, a man who saved his life multiple times, and tried to kill him once. His worst fear is that when the time comes, he won't be able to do it--that his powers might fail him, leaving him standing naked and helpless in front of an enemy who knows him all too well.
Powers
Energy Melee
He has training in boxing and arena fighting, and uses his fists as a focus for his nerve-generated powers. He relies heavily on mental concentration and sheer nerve, to force his powers to obey him. He hits hard, and tries to stun his opponents before they can bring their full force to bear on him.
Electrical Aura
A product of his mutant nervous system, it gives him an edge in terms of speed and toughness. His electrified nervous system is also intensely painful, but over the years he's learned to channel that pain to further bolster his powers. He is well aware that he's fallible, and that he's not the toughest guy around. He tries to make up for it with speed and fighting smart: stuns, sapping opponents' energy, inciting them into a blind rage.
Weaknesses and Limitations
Mind Affecting Powers
Psychic powers, mind control, anything that touches the sensitive spots in his psyche. All of these things have the potential to make him feel vulnerable, and he does not like to feel vulnerable. He is wary of time travel for the same reason, though he'll reluctantly visit Ouroboros if absolutely necessary.
Magic
His family was Catholic, and although he doesn't adhere to it anymore, it is an artifact of religious upbringing that makes him uneasy about the arcane power, witchcraft and demonology that are so prevalent in the Rogue Isles. He hates fighting Circle of Thorns. He never wants to set foot in Oranbega if he can help it. And that time he had to sacrifice the soul of Akarist almost made him physically ill.
Interpersonal Relationships
The few people who know him well will all agree that his understanding of people's needs and motivations leaves a lot to be desired. He's a smart guy, he's streetwise, he knows how to get jobs done, but somehow psychology just seems to elude him. He tries; he really does try to come off as amiable. But he has a tendency to say the wrong things at the wrong times, or sometimes nothing at all when he should have said something, and his guardedness about his past seems to always get in the way. He relies on his closest friend Stack of Cards, for this kind of insight. Ironically, Stack is a magic wielding Mind Dominator, a combination that is utterly his antithesis, but yet they are as tight as brothers.
Trivia
- He's hounded by persistent rumors of romantic interest in heroes. It is unknown whether he ever was (or currently is) romantically involved with any heroes. It's a topic Stack of Cards teases him about mercilessly, and he vehemently denies.
- His hobby is cooking, especially Italian food. He even watches those awful cooking shows on TV sometimes. He's considered opening a restaurant someday, but his friends keep telling him that no one would eat at a place called "Payback Pasta."
Stories
- The Sum of Your Parts - On the making of a brute. A longish story from Riley's early years, detailing life with the Family, and possibly the most significant event in his life: meeting Stack of Cards.
- Payback in Spades is a Made Man - Just a really short piece I put together after he hit 50.
Artwork
My wonderful and talented husband Londerwost has been kind enough to do several.
