Wabash Limestone
From Unofficial Handbook of the Virtue Universe
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| Wabash Limestone | |
| Wabash Limestone | |
| Player: Zedrik | |
| Origin: | Science |
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| Archetype: | Brute (Stone / Stone) |
| Security Level: | 30 |
| Personal Data | |
| Real Name: | Christopher Alexander Derekson |
| Known Aliases: | Derek Alexander, Alex Topher, Krystal Kuch, Xander Magnus |
| Species: | Human (Altered) |
| Date of Birth: | January 31, 1982 |
| Age: | 28 |
| Height: | 6'3" |
| Weight: | 485 |
| Eye Color: | Brown (Originally olive green) |
| Hair Color: | Brown (Originally raven black) |
| Biographical Data | |
| Nationality: | American |
| Occupation: | Carnival Ride Operator/Thug |
| Place of Birth: | Terre Haute, Indiana |
| Base of Operations: | Rogue Isles |
| Marital Status: | Single |
| Known Relatives: | None known |
| Known Powers | |
| Stone Composition, Limited Stone Manipulation, Limited Stone Creation, Superjump | |
| Known Abilities | |
| Self-Sculpture | |
| Equipment | |
| None | |
| None | |
Contents |
Personality
Dour
Chris rarely displays emotions. This gives him a sullen air, though he is rarely gloomy and he does actually feel. He simply rarely expresses emotional body language.
Sarcastic
Chris is a very sarcastic person. It's sort of a defensive shield, pushing people away so they can't get close.
Dependable
If nothing else can be said about Derek, he is very dependable. If he has agreed to a task, he will most likely carry it out. Extenuating circumstances aside, he will also hold the other party to their part of the bargain as well.
Heartless
While, technically speaking, Chris has no heart, no muscle to pump blood through his veins (which he also doesn't have), most would find the metaphorical heart just as absent. He isn't swayed by sob stories, has on several occasions endangered the lives of children to accomplish his tasks, and has several times resorted to murder to get his job done. There is no indication, however, that he enjoys these things either. He simply seems to be unmoved by them.
Jaded
Chris has seen many terrible things. He was the cause of many of them. This has left the already sullen man quite jaded.
Forms
Chris
The form he sculpted as he was growing up. This is his primary identity as himself, Chris, and his supervillain alias, Wabash Limestone. Is mostly browns, though he managed the red devil head symbol from his days as a carnie, which he still uses on his tee shirt.
Krystal
Magnus
Background
Early Life
Christopher Derekson grew up in the outskirts of a small Indiana city. He was raised by his mother, who got pregnant while drunk at a party and therefore didn't have the slightest clue who his father was. Chris was often left at babysitters and day care houses when he was young, simply staying at home alone when he got older.
When he was eleven, he was involved in a car accident that barely injured him, but killed his mother. After this, he drifted from foster family to foster family. His sullen behavior coupled with his stubborn refusal to do anything he didn't want to do made him a difficult child for foster families to contend with.
Teenage Troubles
When he was thirteen, he was finally placed in a family where both his foster parents had a seemingly infinite amount of patience to handle some rather troubled teens. James and Dori Viederlane also housed six other teenage boys, going so far as to have had a large addition to their house built.
At first, Chris had very little to do with the other kids in the house. He kept to himself and did his own thing. However, several of the other boys attached to this behavior, deeming Chris a very "cool" guy. Despite several attempts to get the others to stay away, this only seemed to attract them more. Soon Chris relented and just let the other hang out with him.
During the next summer vacation, he and his "buddies" and some other kids from school had gone out to an old abandoned Wabash limestone quarry. Some of the older kids brought drinks and smokes and Chris didn't object to partaking himself. Though it was hot, and there was water in the quarry, the water seemed rather murky and most spots had mucky layers on the rock and grimy slime floating on the water. No one wanted to be the first to go in.
After a few moment, though, Chris shrugged, shucked his clothes and waded out into the muck. The others watched, looked at each other, and were about to join him when he let out a yell. He had stepped on a rather sharp piece of metal. That is also when he noticed that much of the area was full of these scraps that appeared to be the rusting remains of barrels. Suffice it to say he limped his way out of the water and one of the older boys from his house took him to a clinic.
The wound was treated, he was given the usual vaccines, was sent home, but needed to stay off his foot for a couple days and make sure it healed. His foster parents spared him the lecture, though James did sit with him and talked to him for a while, despite the fact he pretended to ignore the man.
After his foot healed, he began noticing the area became dry and itchy. He let it go for a few days but finally relented and told his foster parents. They took him to a doctor, who couldn't find anything wrong with the skin and was very puzzled. He prescribed some cream, which Chris applied for days, but didn't help. And the dryness not only spread, but his skin hardened.
Aimless Life
This he hid from his foster family and friends. Eventually his whole lower leg was affected, somewhat disfigured. This prompted him to run away from home, finding an abandoned house to stay in. His leg got heavier as it grew harder. Though his leg was hard as rock, it was just as mobile as if it were flesh. Soon the affliction traveled up his side and across to his other leg.
He spent most days brooding in the basement of the abandoned home or out finding food. As the affliction spread further, he began to cry himself to sleep. It wasn't long before his whole body looked like a rather crude stone statue.
He began drifting from place to place, lest he be found. Stealing food when he could, raiding dumpsters when he had to. After a few months of this scavenging and dodging the police, while he got a glimpse of himself in a window, he walked back to stare at the thing he had become.
He raised his fist in anger to punch out the glass, but caught himself when he noticed that the size of his fist had grown with extra stone. He looked at the fist in amazement then looked at his reflection. He ran to the old abandoned shop he was currently staying at and found a mirror. He stares at himself, the monster, then held up his fist and tried to will it to enlarge again.
Thus began the long process of learning how to sculpt his own form, sloughing off the crude statue form for his true self again. After a while, he struck out into the streets to carve out a new life for himself.
He had no real plan. Just survive. But this time no longer a hidden monster. He eventually wound up selling drugs. He did this rather well, dodging arrest and avoiding attacks by others. He didn't have a steady supplier, however, getting what he could from various sources moving through town. It was one of these sources that offered him something more in life.
The Carny
The carny who supplied his drugs had the misfortune of meeting with Chris at the same time a local supplier's enforcers were nearby. Seeing Chris, the three men wandered over. They were eager to inform Chris in more than words that his activities were not appreciated in town. Chris let them take him so as not to endanger his supplier. Unfortunately, his supplier saw the activity and tried to intervene.
He shot one man, but the other two quickly drew their own weapons and turned and shot the intruder. Chris didn't much care for the man, but it was currently his only supply. When the two men turned back to him, he had already begun coating himself with rock, causing his restraints to fray and snap.
The two thugs didn't know what they were dealing with. They barely had time to glance at each other before Chris had knocked them both out. Chris left them there, alongside their bleeding companion. He went over and saw to his supplier. He took him to a street doc he knew of.
After the doc tended to the man, Chris took him back to the carnival location. His supplier stares at him the entire time, finally asking, "You made of rock, son?" when Chris parked the truck at the site. Chris just gave the guy an odd look and commented, "Yeah, that's me. Pure Wabash limestone."
The carny, called Rooster, invited Chris to speak with his boss, Big Tommy, about a job in the carnival. "Unless you have something keeping you here." To which Chris replied, "No. But I'm only sixteen." The man laughed indicating that Chris had taken on two armed thugs by himself and that he was enough of a man by him. And it wasn't exactly like all the company's activities were entirely legit anyway.
Chris met with Big Tommy, a rather scrawny and nerdy man who acquired his name simply by fathering a son named Tommy. Little Tommy wasn't much older than Chris himself and the two became friends. Or at least the closest to friends that Chris would ever come to.
Chris started out manning a kiddy airplane ride. However, his rather sullen presence and dark aura tended to scare the kids so Big Tommy put him on the Haunted House track. Chris quickly adapted to the operation and learned the mechanical maintenance rather well in a short time. After hours it was often Chris and Little Tommy who were sent to clean up the rides and games areas. Though in truth Chris did most of the work as Little Tommy goofed off.
Chris didn't mind. When the time came for the carnival to pack up, Chris was called into Big Tommy's office to get his pay. Rooster sat across from Big Tommy and looked up at Chris, asking Big Tommy if the boy was a keeper. Big Tommy said he was very impressed with Chris's work. He could arrange a new identity for Chris and starting next site he would be a full-time employee of the carnival.
Chris gladly accepted. Adding some bulk to his form, he looked a bit older. Easily explainable as the result of maturing and working, not an eyebrow was raised. Eventually he sculpted his form to that of a tall, muscular man. He took the name Alex Topher and left his home behind. The years passed and the carnival passed through towns and cities. Alex eventually learned fine detail control on his body, allowing him to go so far as to mimic clothing. He also came to learn to alter his hue from an almost white sandy color to a dark brown.
Wabash Limestone
As the years passed, Little Tommy was being groomed to take over the company so his father could retire. On the night the reigns passed, there was a party. As usual, Alex left the festivities to walk alone along nearby Lake Michigan.
It was here that he was approached by two of the other carnies. They offered him a good share of the profits if he would help them take control of the company. They knew Little Tommy generally stuck Alex with much of the work and thought Alex wouldn't mind a little revenge.
They were wrong. Alex wordlessly begun walking back toward the site to inform Big and little Tommy of the plan. The men cursed at him and offered him compensation for just keeping his mouth shut. Alex, however, didn't even acknowledge their existence.
Informing Alex that they couldn't let him ruin their plans, they each pulled knives. One grabbed his shoulder and tried to turn him around to face them, but he was rather hard to move by force. He silently picked up a nearby sledgehammer and swung it calmly at one man, who dodged the attack. Alex lost control of the swing and his grip slipped, sending the hammer flying.
Thinking their opponent again unarmed, the two men approached with their knives. Alex summoned his stone armor mass when an idea hit him. A stone shaft formed in his hand and one end swelled to resemble a crude hammerhead. He swung this new weapon at one man, knocking him down. The other man hesitated at the changes in Alex and had soon joined his companion on the ground. Alex picked both men up, one over each shoulder, and headed back to the party.
He dropped the men on the ground while the rest of the company stared at him. After informing the others what had happened, Rooster quipped, "Wow, you really weren't kidding..." After this, Alex became something of Little Tommy's personal enforcer. Both within the company and in other pursuits.
Little Tommy, now going by Thomas, made an enemy of a local crime boss at a site. The carnival was attacked early one morning before the carnies were even up and getting things ready. The ruckus woke Alex, who went directly for his boss's trailer. There he knocked out several men, killed one, and grabbed Thomas, telling him that it was probably time to move on.
After dispatching more of the thugs, Alex look about at the battle zone. Most of the carnies were dead. Most of the attackers were unconscious, others were dead, and a few were staring at Alex in fear. Alex coldly informed Thomas that it was probably the best idea to leave.
Thomas protested at first, but he soon came to realize that the company was done. They gathered the survivors, what little they would need from the carnage, and simply left town. The surviving carnies wished each other luck and split ways, Thomas and Alex heading for the east coast.
It was there, in Paragon City that Thomas started up a new venture. Using Alex, now going by Derek Alexander, as his personal enforcer, he gathered a small band of criminals together. Rooster, as Thomas's lieutenant, who had taken to calling the enforcer Wabash Limestone, was just as instrumental in the organizing the drug trade as Derek was in enforcing loyalty.
Soon, however, it was clear that both Rooster and Thomas had themselves become afraid of the stone monster was capable of. Seeing the man dispatch a couple of thugs was one thing, but seeing him dispatch a superpowered hero was another.
He overheard them discussing the matter and misconstrued the chatter as a plot to have him removed. Thus, he removed the threats himself, smashing his mentor and his friend into a gory mess and calmly walking out of the building.
It is then he hitched a ride to the Rogue Isles to find a new purpose in life.
