PlayersPlayer: Harry Baldman
Appearance: a medium-height man in his early twenties, has short, dark brown hair and a fairly handsome face, though it shows telltale signs of weariness and worry. He has a slim build, and he moves and acts very deliberately, particularly when with people he doesn't know.
Biography: Tim is not an evil man, or at least he likes to think so. He's never killed anyone or stolen anything, and the thought of going to prison frightens him, to be honest. He fears a great many things in this world, and he really wouldn't be ashamed to admit it to anybody he doesn't directly work with. It's just that the fear of being nobody at all, of dying in a rathole cold and alone, of never amounting to anything in life, simply isn't something he can live with. Especially not since he got powers - it was just two months ago, during one of his drug-related turns. Man, he hasn't used since that day... at least, not conventionally. He can scarcely even remember it aside from a few impressions, but what he does remember isn't good. Could it have been a sign?
He doesn't know, to be honest. And he knows a lot of things and a lot of people now. He got a head start into "the business" courtesy of his significant other and occasional dealer, Terrance, but that was just a start. He's proven to be not too shabby at getting and passing stuff on. And he's even starting to work toward what one might consider an actual score. Maybe he and Terrance will be able to move to a better place soon if this works out. God, Tim sure hopes so. Whatever money Terrance gets, he spends on "goods" and "expanding the business" (which he's argued with him about on more than one occasion), and his own job has scarcely paid well enough to afford even the tiniest investments so far. He hopes his hard work and effort will pay off. He shudders to think about his future if it doesn't. Terrance likes to live dangerously, Tim is afraid to say.
Class: Dealer (Supply)
Power/Feat: Ritual: through the preparation of a special oil that includes within its list of ingredients such things as cocaine, his own blood and several other not too exotic ingredients (the process itself is quite arcane and Tim isn't sure he can rightly explain it - it's mostly based on intuition and various rituals that feel right, in a process that can take up to twelve hours of time, depending on his mood and clarity of thought) and the application of said oil to his eyes, ears and nostrils, Tim can attain superior magic-assisted intuition that borders on clairvoyance, though it does not last longer than two hours (he usually makes enough oil for three to six proper uses).
Job: he works as a valet at one of the more upscale hotels in town.
Burden: to be able to provide for himself, to do what he is good at, to have a decent life for himself and his roommate/boyfriend/drug dealer (on-and-off in the latter case) Terrance. Terrance is far more assertive than Tim, and has quite the temper, which is paired with a certain lack of patience. Thus, he has not been the most successful man, and his and Tim's relationship has suffered as a result, though not to the point of being actually dysfunctional.
Player: Flying Dice
Biography: Born and raised in the City. William's mother died when he was eleven, after complications in the birth of his little sister, Elizabeth. Their father died of an overdose four years later, but his stash was enough to keep up with food and rent until William managed to get a steady job. He's spent the past six years taking whatever work he can find and pulling off petty heists on the side, trying to stay afloat. He has repeatedly written to the few relatives he knows of, asking for help or a place to stay, but has been refused. By now William is embittered and devoted entirely to getting himself and his sister away from the city, but without money it's damned near impossible.
Will isn't particularly remarkable, he stands 5'8" and weighs in a bit light at 120lbs. He's got shaggy auburn hair, four or five inches long, kept swept back by grime and habitual hand-combing to keep it away from his grey-blue eyes. Working where he does has kept him well-toned, but he doesn't have the build or diet to ever be muscular in the sense that richer folks think of gym-jockeys.
He was badly beaten after trying to rob the wrong gas station, left in an alleyway. After several hours of semi-conscious hallucinations, William pulled himself together enough to make it home. When he woke the next morning, he felt something... different about himself, something lurking inside his mind. Will's been stepped on by life at every turn, and probably would have given up already if he was only in it for himself. But now? Now he has something to hope for, and you know what they say about the deadly disease of hope: all it takes is a single spark.
Class: Robber / Stealth
Power: Spell
Job: Longshoreman.
Burden: Little sister.
Needs: To get the family out of the City, or at least secure their future.
Player: Lawastooshort
Biography: Ben is 5 foot 10, fairly slim, and quite well built - he fits in a little workout at home before and after work most days, when he manages to get up before his daughter, and rides a good six or seven miles across town and then back the days he does work. He works as a sous-chef for Charlie, an Italian guy he's known for nearly a decade, and Charlie knows that sometimes shit comes up for a single parent that means Ben just can't get into work today. Of course, Charlie knows about the other stuff too, and Ben's pretty organised as a dad, and a few of the other families on the block help him out, so it's this other stuff that comes up just as much.
Ben's fairly unremarkable. Pleasant enough face, short black hair, gets his head down and works hard. Quiet kind of guy, serious till you know him, private till you know him very well. Doesn't have much to say but if he does and it's something that affects him he makes it known and won't let himself get pushed around. Like to cook good for his kid, like to cook with her at the weekends when he's off work. Specially chocolate pie. Apart from the pastry though that's a lot less cooking and a lot more bowl-licking...
Ben's daughter's four - Chloe. Got nearly everything but the curls in her hair from her mum; the curls are something every woman in the Miko family's had for as far back as Ben's grandmother can remember. Doesn't really got with the rest of her face. Got her eyes from her mum. Ben reckons she got that goddamned stubbornness from her mother too, but that's just because he's never noticed it in himself. Can get just what she wants out of him before he even knows it too, just like she could.
Anyway, Chloe wasn't even a year old when her mum was killed by one of the big time gang bosses in town, and the little girl doesn't remember a thing about her. Her friends have mums, but then some of them don't have dads, some of them don't have mums either, so it seems kind of normal to her. Or, you know, seemed.
The other morning, at breakfast, Chloe stopped chewing her cornflakes for a few minutes and did the look she does when she's thinking and doesn't know how to ask a question, or doesn't want to.
"Dad," she said, "Are you gonna die?"
"No. Well, not yet. No, you don't have to worry about that."
"When you die, does that mean I won't have a dad anymore?"
"That... yeah. Yes, it does mean you won't have a dad anymore, Chloe. But that won't till I'm even older than grandad, don't worry about it."
"Dad, is that why I don't have a mum anymore?"
Working and bringing up a kid is hard work, and it seemed to Ben that he hadn't really had time to... grieve, he guessed. Now he was gonna fucking grieve. He got out the fine long knife Amy's dad had given him when they got married, and he swore it.
Her family was, way back, from a kind of antiquated warrior tradition. They lived by honour, revenge, all of that. He was going to get revenge, and put his wife to rest.
Class: Thug (Firearms).
Power/Feat: Ritual. Ben's ritual is to travel to his wife's grave and cut open his left palm and reaffirm his vow. From this he derives superhuman reactions.
Job: Sous-chef.
Burden: Four year old daughter and a vow to avenge the death of his wife.
Player: Tsuchigumo550
Class: Hacker, Long Range
Biography:
Derya was abandoned at a very young age, and drifted from orphanage to orphanage. Eventually, at the age of 16, she managed to land a small time job and pay rent and for an internet connection. Smart but lacking money, Derya used the internet to learn after high school, and began to learn... new sources of income. She eventually managed to use illicit activity to upgrade her internet to an unlimited plan, and took online schooling. Able to get just enough schooling for specialized jobs, she quit her old job at a local fast food joint and picked up working at a small computer repair store. While she often works the counter, she's quite valuable at fixing software issues as well.
Power/Feat: Ritual:
Ouroboros Medusae: Derya is able to induce death in someone with a glare. She cannot do this more than once, and must recharge this ability to use it again- only, however, if it works. The target must make eye contact with her and the effect is not instant, however, the person will suffer from sudden heart failure mere moments after receiving her glare. Her signature is that rigor mortis sets in very quickly in those she's killed in this way.
To recharge her ability, she must bleed into a silver basin while chanting a semi-latin incantation. The only parts she's managed to translate involve snakes and the phrase "To the business at hand. As I am, you will be." (Age quot agis. Tu fui, ego eris.)
The incantation takes time, and must be done in darkness. It does not need to be complete darkness, but it should be hard to see at the least.
She dislikes having this ability, but is thankful it can be controlled. She generally tries to keep it at the ready, just in case. She found out about it when she was being mugged and was able to kill him- somehow, her subconscious took over, and guided her through the ritual afterwards. From there, she was able to control her ability.
Job: Computer Repair Store, clerk. Business is fairly rare.
Burden: Derya desperately wants to know why she has such a supernatural ability, and has done large amounts of research on the idea. She's very sure she's somehow connected to Medusa/gorgons as well as snakes in general, but knows nothing else.
She has a very good friend which is addicted to drugs, although nothing hard enough to cause him to no longer function in society. Sometimes, Derya's friend will need to stay for a while in Derya's crappy apartment, most of the time because he ran out of rent or got kicked out of his apartment.
Player: Wolfchild
Biography: Mary, is an IT graduate, unfortunately she was left in the care of her infant sister, when her parents died in a car accident. She stopped climbing the ladder to look after her, but has become disaffected with the city when the culprit was not brought to justice, and her sister started to fall through the cracks of society. Mary started to look for additional funds to help pay for her sister's education, finding them in the grey areas of legality. It did not take long for her figure that because the city did not care for them, that she need not follow it's laws, only her own morality and fell in with a gang of criminals, providing electronic assistance
Class: Hacker, Long Range
Power/Feat: Spell: Time manipulation: can slow down own perceived time, speeding up reactions and purely mental actions
Job: IT in a small business
Burden: Need, To find out The dirty Secrets of all the people at the top of the City; 1 Sister, aged 12
Player: Tiruin
Appearance: A woman of about 5'4" in height, with average proportions for a 25 year old. She has dark brown irises, along with, jet black hair and a wide-V shaped chinline, along with a slim build and a light complexion.
Biography: Of mundane birth, 'Lily' was raised in the hand between poverty and strife--knowledgeable the troubles of modern man from childhood. Due to significant events in her past, leaving it a clouded and bad memory, she developed a philosophical method of rationalizing the world, taking in the intent and direction of events going about her. It was during her 18th birthday when catastrophe struck, which left her with the family she has now--herself, and her sister.
Having finished her collegial studies a few years post-catastrophe, and taking up apprenticeship as a chemist under the local perfumer; her analytical mind and taste for the more subtle and simple pleasures of life helped shape most of her proceeding personality, yet also kept her stable enough to give the lion's share of blessings to her significant other. Her relationship with her sister is an open one-much less the sibling rivalry-and focuses much more on the essence of family. At this time, she kept close to her hobby of percussion and sound harmonics, something which piqued her fancy during her educational years.
In regard to powers or rituals, some concoctions derived by her are of custom make; products borne of test and trial, as well as hypotheses relating to what would appeal to a person, holistically. At the current time, she has taken no life, nor committed any crime of mention.
Class: Robber // Stealth
Feat: Ritual
Aural Extirpation/ Utilizing and concocting a mixture of volatile scents, the resulting mixture --being made of common items, mostly from plant or floral extract--is an amalgam of pleasant odors and aromas that it renders anyone it is applied on to apparently 'not give off any scent'. In truth, the mixture is moderate in nature, affecting the olfactory nerves such that while the person is still vulnerable to the other four senses, any other's sense of smell in the vicinity is blacked out in regard to the wearer.
As a side effect, it strengthens Lily's sense of smell and allows her to trace others' presence nearby, and will fade along with time. Normally the concoction lasts about 3 hours, on a humid or dry day-the climate or weather does not affect the duration except for the presence of water-contact. Contact with any water-form erases the effect of the concoction.
Job: Perfumer
Burden: Younger sister. Age 7. Only living relative in the family. Currently is being sent to a first-class elementary school. 1st Grade.
Needs:
> To find out the reason these powers came about.
> To give my sister a clean, and upright name and standing in society regardless of what society exists around her--to teach her from the wrongs I've committed.
Player: Dwarmin
Appearance: A young woman with short, dark her hair and green eyes. Many tattoos of geometric design can be seen on her arms, back and chest-gears, bricks and power-lines encoded in the blackweave. She has a look of fierce, almost elemental beauty about her.
Biography: Kat has spent most of her life at the behest of forces beyond her control. Her Father, Malcolm Fry, is an overlord of a criminal family-and a powerful sorcerer. He is a man of many vices, and collects bastard children easily...Kat was one such product. As with many of his offspring, he placed a powerful curse on her as soon as she manifested her powers-a dire one way lycanthropy, unreversible-if it should ever progress fully, the subject will become some sort of minor, pathetic animal. The compulsion is simple...she need only obey his every command, or become one of Malcom Fry's pet rats. Much of her young life was spent in training, or performing various tasks of an illegal nature out of fear of this fate. She was never more than a pawn, though...and life as a literal slave grated on her. But, she couldn't strike back...he had too many advantages.
Kat drove from home on a stolen bike, as soon as she found a treatment that could hold back the curse effects-a potion that was unfortunately highly difficult to procure, but freedom is worth every cent. And, she's been driving on ever since. hoping to find a way to shake off the curse completely. In the meantime, she enjoys her freedom while she has it.
Class: Driver (Cars)
Power: City Spirit/Kat can intuitively divine the true nature of the city she lives in. In truth, she is one of the few who can actively perceive and manipulate these 'city elementals', making her akin to a modern day urban Druid. Much as one of days gone by would raise trees and water spirits to defend their interests, Kat could potentially awaken automobiles, stopsigns and even smog clouds-all products of the modern world she lives in. She can physically see into machines, and manipulate them easily-making her a phenomenal driver.
At her current level, though, most of her powers are merely sensory and instinctive.
Job: She works as a pizza delivery woman in her off time-though, this is also a cover for her less honest work...
Burdens: Her Father is a powerful sorcerer and a crime lord who runs his own little demesne in the dark part of the city. She's refused to work for him, but he still occasionally makes demands of her when it amuses him. She may have siblings, but does not know their identities. Kat herself is afflicted with a particularly ugly curse, courtesy of her father-unless she's following his whims, she must regularly take an expensive potion to forestall it's effects. Defying him causes the curse to accelerate quicker.
She still takes care of her mother when she can, a quiet woman who would prefer to have nothing to remind her of what happened, or any connection to her world.
Player: Dorsidwarf
Biography: The guy is about five foot nine, with dark, combed hair, hazel eyes, and a muffler or bandana perpetually covering his lower head. His nose is broken, and a chunk is missing of his ear. Haynes has always been about life in the fast lane. He has been a successful getaway driver on a number of occasions, and is kinda shaky and nervous that the police are 'gonna be after me any day, now!'.
Three months ago, he was driving for the biggest job yet - a four-man stealth heist of a major bank. They got in undetected, got a grand total of 9 million in large bills and gold bar, but tripped the building alarm by accident on the way out. Jakob managed to get them out of the area just in time to avoid the police cars' investigation, but the effort was for nought - one of their contacts filched a few duffel bags of money and went for the police. Luckily, he hadn't given his name, so when the police raid hit the gang hideout, his comrades in crime couldn't give him away. Somehow, he caused a diversionslipped away from the raid without being spotted, and down the road before the police realised they were one perp short. He's been tracking the guy who ratted them out and got his coworkers life sentences across four cities now, eking a living as a taxi driver, trying to work out how sometimes he just does the strange things that got him his freedom.
Class: Driver (Cars)
Power/Feat: Spell.
Job:Taxi driver
Needs: To get revenge: on the rat who turned the gang in, then skipped town with 2.1 million from the big job.