Director Michael 'Phalanx' Sterling
CR 5 (CF 3)
Strengths:
-Special Opps Training (Very skilled with martial arts, military grade weapons, and wilderness survival skills)
-Experienced at Organizing and Commanding Troops in the Field
-Descendant of Hephaestus (Enhanced strength and endurance, able to safely wield the divine weapons of the Greek pantheon)
-Divine Crafts Training (Able to maintain and understand most enchanted gear. Can create enchanted gear with the right materials and tools)
-'Torch of Manchester' (Enchanted TAR-21 Assualt Rifle. Can shoot normal bullets, rubber rounds, bolts of flame, bolts of thunder, and beams of highly lethal underworld energy, all out of one multi-purpose magazine. Can only be safely wielded by Olympic gods and their descendants.)
-Divine Sandals (Grants user a sustained running speed of 70 MPH and a sprinting speed of 240 MPH. Allows sprinting over water or air for short distances. Con only be safely worn by Olympic gods and their descendants.)
Weaknesses:
-Unable to disobey a direct order from the reigning king of Olympus
-Highly Impure blood means that most other users of divine power can disable or shrug off Phalanx's enchantments
Intel:
High Level UK Government Source: 60%
High Level USA Government Source: 40%
High Level China Government Source: 40%
Source at the Divine Court of Zeus: 15%
Source at the Divine Court of Hephaestus: 35%
Source at the Divine Court of Ares: 35%
Mid Level UK Military Source: 60%
High Level Olympus Military Source: 35%
Backstory:
In the year 1999 Captain Michael Sterling lead a crack team of British Special Forces to investigate a strange Quantum disturbance near the summit of Mt. Olympus in Greece. After some prodding around he and his team were sucked through a portal into the realm of the Greek Pantheon. Sterling was the only member of his squad to survive the trip, as it turned out he was a descendant of Hephaestus and thus possessed a small amount of divine blood.
Sterling learned that the disturbance he detected was created by an alien force attempting to invade the home of the gods, after getting over the initial shock and mourning the loss of his men, he agreed to help in exchange for safe passage home once the threat was dealt with. Vanquishing the aliens took several years, and over this time time he studied the art of warfare under Ares and the art of divine smiting under his ancestor Hephaestus.
When the Aliens were vanquished, Sterling was reunited with fellow expedition member Cassandra Flemings, who had been upgraded by Hades in the greek underworld and released back to the world of the living, and was now operating under the code name 'Killer Queen'. Taking the code name 'Phalanx' himself, Sterling and Flemings returned to England just in time for the terrifying Britannica Prime Incident, in which a resource hungry fascist British Empire of steampunk Cyborgs from an alternate earth attacked the UK. Phalanx lead many a mission against the invaders, but the effort seemed futile; More and more land fell to the alternate Brits. The United Hero Front, the predecessor to the JDF, refused to get involved, citing their attempts to negotiate a peace with the inhabitants of Britannica Prime.
Just as all hope seemed lost, the Britannica Prime crisis came to a cataclysmic conclusion. The nations of mainland Europe, fearing that the invaders were planning on crossing the channel to attack them next, launched nuclear strikes against Dover (with South London eating much of the fallout) and Aberdeen, port cities where the invaders were amassing their forces. This strike, although devastating to the people of England and Scotland, won the war almost instantly, as it was revealed that the invading cyborgs possessed a lethal weakness to EMP, and over 98% of the enemy army in the entire UK was killed instantly.
Since the crisis ended, Phalanx has been quietly training British Special Forces, and occasionally taking missions where superhero involvement seems likely; Like most Brits, Sterling blames the inaction of the United Hero Front for the atomic bombing of the UK, and was quick to accept the role of Director of Project Buckler when it was offered to him.
---
First Week of May, 2017: You order Assistant Chief Engineer Richard Smith to begin research on the captured weapons belonging to Crossfire. He agrees to do this, and promises to report back to you at the end of the week.
The rest of the week is spent working with the two prisoners you are most interested in: Anastasia and Prom King.
The daughter of Thanatos proves uncooperative at best. During your attempts to meet with her, she proves bratty, rude, and even a bit distant. She responds poorly to your attempts to apply strict military discipline, refusing to do anything you say, and even daring you to render her a vegetable if you have a problem with her.
Things go much better with Prom King. Even though the deformed young man is American, Derick McIntire always followed the news and it turns out he is both well aware and appreciative of your heroics during the Britannica Prime crisis. You spend the better part of several days talking to and working with him like he was any other 20-something recruit, almost forgetting that Prom King was responsible for butchering his family and most of his senior class in high school before spending three years on the lamb as a henchman to various villains.
During this time you gain several valuable insights on your subject, first being that he already knows how to shoot a rifle, and considers himself a good shot. If you wish to arm the half demon, you would either need to make or order him some sort of custom weapon with a trigger and grip designed for his freakish claws and a huge magazine to spare his limited fine motor skills from having to reload often mid-fight.
You also get a feel for his potential. The American Demonologist who examined Prom King after he was captured reports that it is likely that he will manifest another spurt of powers and phyiscal changes at least once before his 40th birthday. Derick elaborates, informing you that his father dwells in an acidic hell that serves as an afterlife for wicked members of the alien Kalja people. Knowing this, you could likely make him some enchanted gear that could help him better tap into the powers of his infernal bloodline, but you would need the flesh and/or bone of a demon as material to do so. Zeus and company usually track demons from supernatural realms adjacent to their own, so perhaps a visit to the court of an Olympic God is in order.
Alternatively you could track down Abel and Bravo, two Kalja who serve as ace pilots for Project Buckler, and ask them for insight on their ‘hell’. You doubt either is particularly spiritual, but they should be able to point you to some sort of religious figure who might know more about Prom King’s origin and bloodline than even he does.
Halfway through the week, Smith reports back the research on Crossfire’s weapons has stalled. Wraith, your leading officer from China, has ordered the guns locked up and kept away from researchers. Apparently Wraith is an old colleague of Crossfire from her days as a supervillain, and claims that the alien ‘will go ballistic’ if he finds his tech is tampered with. Smith then promptly informs you that before Wraith stopped him, he managed to dissasemble Crossfire’s CX26 "Flyswatter" energy weapon and study some of its more interesting component parts. Wonderful.
Research Assets UpdatedIntel Report-Hephaestus contacts you to rant that the JDF has been trying to recruit one of his half human daughters, a woman named Ashley Black who designs movie sets in Hollywoood for a living, so that they may turn her against the Pantheon.
-Captain Fotiá of the First Olympic Legion reports that the Pantheon of Ancient Egypt is working on a deal to send divinely crafted weapons and gear to Romania, a very pro-JDF nation.
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Topic: (SG/OOC Thread) Project Buckler: You Run a Suicide Squad! (Read 9553 times)