Wearing the Cape 4: Small Town Heroes

by Marion G. Harmon

  Hillwood Academy: There is a lot of trauma in childhood, and teen breakthroughs create their own unique set of problems. Hillwood Academy is a boarding school for teen breakthroughs, many of whom come from bad circumstances or were isolated by their breakthroughs. It is slowly becoming famous for its more illustrious alumni, and a television action-drama has been (loosely) based on it. Hillwood Academy handles students grades 7-12: younger students go to Whitlow’s Academy.

  The Hollywood Knights: There is a term, Hollywood heroes, applied to superhumans who go to LA to act on television and in the movies, playing themselves or, more often, real capes in “biographical” movies. The Hollywood Knights began as a movie cast, but morphed into a team which makes a movie about their “adventures” each year, and the rest of the time acts as a disaster-relief CAI team and does charity events. Its current roster is: Rook (an A Class Atlas-Type and the team leader), Balder (a photokinetic), Starkness (scary), Ceres (a florakinetic), Fire Lily (a pyrokinetic capable of killing fires), Maui (a tattooed Maori shapeshifter). Seven was a member when Astra met him, but he has transferred to the Sentinels.

  Humanity First: Members of Humanity First believe that breakthroughs are a threat to humanity which must be checked by whatever means necessary. More fanatical members believe—against all evidence—that breakthroughs aren’t even human. Their beliefs and activities have been compared to Aryan Nation and other racial supremacist groups.

  Iron Jack: aka John Corrigan. Iron Jack is a transforming A Class Ajax-Type. He is a highly successful Chicago architect, and he experienced his breakthrough on the day of The Event. He became a reserve Sentinel, and has been able to maintain a secret identity because of his ability to unrecognizably transformation himself (in Iron Jack form he looks like a statue of iron plates and rivets). He kept the secret even from his children, which gave Astra a second shock on the day of her own breakthrough.

  Director Kayle: The day of The Event, the President of the United States was aboard Air Force One returning from a campaign trip to LA. Air Force One made a crater and Vice President Kayle was sworn in as President Kayle the same day. President Kayle is the main reason that federal superhuman-restriction laws were not passed in the first weeks after The Event. He created the Department of Superhuman Affairs, built the alliance system that became the new League of Democratic States, and successfully guided the United States through the internal and external chaos that was much of his eight years in office. He hand-picked his successor, Touches Clouds, and shepherded her through her successful presidential bid. She made him Director of the DSA. As the Director, he prefers to work quietly and behind the scenes, but make no mistake—he is one of the great power-players in Washington. Many conspiracy theorists believe him to be a secret superhuman; the only way to explain his amazing success.

  Kitsune: Kitsune is believed to be Yoshi Miyamoto, an old man who disappeared from an elderly care center in Osaka Prefecture. A true shapeshifter, who apparently also has the magic ability to invade dreams and who may actually believe himself to be a spirit-fox, he engineered the war between Villains Inc. and the Outfit to avenge the deaths of his daughter and granddaughter. A thief—or at least someone not adverse to stealing things in pursuit of his goals—Kitsune is wanted in several countries. His current goals and plans are unknown, but he has taken a liking to Astra for no apparent reason. Perhaps she reminds him of his granddaughter.

  Legal Eagle: aka Tommy Brannigan, esquire. Just out of law school, Tommy learned how to fly when his weekend skydiving vacation went horribly wrong. Since flight is his sole power, Tommy went into law instead of trying to become a cape. The media dubbed him Legal Eagle, which he doesn’t mind at all; he quickly carved out a niche serving Chicago’s capes and superhumans, and is on retainer for the Chicago Sentinels and the city’s Guardian teams.

  Lei Zi: Her name means Mother of Storms and comes from Chinese mythology. Lei Zi is an A Class Electrokinetic Type able to fly by electrostatic levitation, suck the power from electrical systems or burn them out with power surges, and draw from the atmosphere’s static charge to generate lightning and ball lightning. She is the daughter of Chinese Nationals who fled China during its collapse into warring states. She served a tour of duty in the US Military, after which Blackstone recruited her to be the new Field Leader of the Chicago Sentinels after the death of Atlas.

  Lunette’s: A bar and club in LA, Lunette’s mostly caters to a breakthrough crowd. Unlike the Fortress, it is not a high-profile establishment and non-breakthroughs usually get turned away by the bouncer at the door; mostly it is a refuge for breakthroughs, capes or otherwise, a place where they can hang out with others who are like them or who at least understand them.

  Marc Léroy: A relative newcomer to New Orleans and reluctant member of the vampire community, Marc Léroy is a bodyguard for hire, fencing master, and owner of the Salle D’Armes, a fencing school and his home. He hides a secret or two of his own.

  Mrs. Lori: Mrs. Lori is one of Chicago’s grande dames, a fearful arbiter of social approval, and was an intimate friend of Mrs. Corrigan’s deceased mother, Hope’s grandmother. She both disapproves and approves of just about everything that Anne Marie and Hope do.

  Mama Marie: Marie Bouchard, “Mama Marie,” is one of New Orleans’ reigning voodoo queens. She is also Jacky’s grandmother. She is a powerful force in the local community and Lieutenant Emerson walks carefully around her. Whether Mama Marie’s voodoo is backed by real breakthrough power is open to question. Best be careful, anyway.

  The Master of Ceremonies: Jacky calls him MC to his face, but it is doubtful anyone else does. Mister Hans Lichter, the self-styled Master of Ceremonies, is the unofficial but very real Boss of New Orleans’ vampires (he pays Darren Tomlin’s retainer). He likes things peaceful, and is willing to go to great lengths to make them so. He also owes Jacky a great debt, despite the fact that she burned down his house, and watches over Acacia and does other favors to repay her. He likes having her around because she scares the other vampires at least as much as he does (she can come at them in the day).

  Megaton: Malcom Scott was just your average high-school student, a bit of an overweight science geek who muscled up and lost two digits worth of pounds during sophomore year and joined the school wrestling team to escape bullying. His breakthrough gave him the power to fly by “blasting” like a rocket and to project powerful destructive blasts in defense—and accidentally killed an innocent bystander. Now a member of the Young Sentinels, Mal seeks redemption as a cape.

  Doctor Mendel: Dr. Alice Mendel is the mental-health counterpart to Dr. Beth; she has been retained by the City of Chicago to vet all of its contracted CAI heroes for mental fitness. Understandably, she has taken advantage of the situation to study superhuman psychology close-up and has written many papers and monographs on the subject.

  Metrocon: “Capecons” are the biggest events in the cape-watcher’s calendar. The biggest annual capecon is Chicago’s Metrocon, which combines with the annual National CAI Conference, training and expo, in the country; three days of serious training and lectures, three days of inter-team competition and fun. New York and LA hold sister-conventions and each year sees is a much wider second tier of smaller capecons across the country hosting regional training and events. Of course fans flock to the capecons to see the capes, buy merchandise, and cosplay, but the conventions are also job-fairs for breakthroughs seeking to introduce themselves to local teams and pass qualifications, and even professional CAI heroes seeking to move up into bigger and more visible teams.

  Michael: An aging mega pop-star who saw his stardom fade in his twenties, Michael experienced a breakthrough the day of the Event which changed him into a human hologram. Now eternally young and able to manipulate his image to change his wardrobe and hairstyle, glow, and even generate visual pyrotechnics, Michael returned to songwriting and the concert-tour circuit with a revitalized career. Unlike Nimbus, although immaterial he can still talk (nobody knows how).

&n
bsp; Detective Paul Negri: A Cajun from Church Pointe Acadia and a New Orleans police detective, Paul is also a lycanthrope; a Benandanti—a Good Walker—shaped by his mother’s Italian legends rather than the local loup-garou stories. Jacky is his “civilian consultant” and window into New Orleans’ vampire community.

  Nimbus: Some transformations are so complete that you are no longer human. Nimbus never related the circumstance, but whatever triggered her breakthrough it transformed her into a being of pure intangible energy. To relate to others, she shaped her body of light into a form approximating the one she had before, appearing like a glowing angelic nude with the details smoothed out for purposes of modesty. She could fly at the speed of light, focus her power to project bolts of incredible energy, and was of course intangible and immune to most forms of physical damage. She was definitely A Class, easily the Sentinels’ deadliest member. She died in the Whittier Base attack, killed by an A Class Projector whose “sonic” attacks disrupted atomic structures of any kind.

  Father Nolan: The pastor of St. Christopher Parish (St. Chris), Father Nolan is also Hope’s spiritual advisor and the senior chaplain for Chicago’s CAI teams. He is a round little priest with penchant for unorthodox homilies and a vice for Double Stuff Oreos. (Author’s note: Father Nolan is my homage to Father Blackie Ryan, the beloved priest and detective made famous by the late Andrew M. Greeley.)

  Orb: A top-shelf private investigator who makes LA her home, Orb is blind and deaf. She is also a breakthrough, her power taking the form of a silvery orb she absolutely mentally controls. It usually floats by her shoulder and she somehow uses it to see, hear, and even speak. Its actual form is malleable, and faced with the need for self-defense she has been known to shape it into a needle-pointed dart capable of driving itself through flesh with absolute precision.

  Origin Chasers: Origin chasers are people who intentionally pursue breakthroughs. Since most breakthroughs occur under stressful or traumatic circumstances, the consequences of not achieving a breakthrough are often damaging if not fatal. Origin chasers have most commonly used physical peril, extreme physical stress or trauma, or psychoactive drugs, to attempt their breakthroughs, and every year thousands of would-be breakthroughs wind up in hospital emergency rooms and morgues.

  Origin Sellers: A new industry has been born which caters to origin chasers. Origin sellers provide “monitored environments” for attempting “safe” breakthroughs. The most ethical origins sellers are “breakthrough boot-camps” which provide their clients several weeks of intense physical stress (known to trigger physical breakthroughs) and “breakthrough retreats” (guru-guided meditative retreats known to trigger mental breakthroughs). These services don’t increase the odds of any specific stressor triggering a breakthrough, but clients are likely to survive them without damage and may even gain physical or mental benefits. The least ethical (and usually black-market) origin sellers push designer drugs which, if they work, are likely to result in psychotic breaks and weird and twisted breakthroughs.

  Ozma: An A Class Merlin-Type, possibly the most powerful supernatural breakthrough known, Ozma believes that she is literally Ozma, the Empress of Oz as portrayed in Frank L. Baum’s famous Oz books. She looks sixteen, acts one hundred, and all of her long-term plans are aimed at reconquering Oz and liberating her people from the Gnome King and the witch Momby. Currently she is a member of the Young Sentinels while she gathers and creates magical resources for her campaign. Her companions are Nox and Nix, two dolls animated by the Powder of Life, and she has recovered many of her magical treasures including her scepter-wand and Magic Belt. One of her favored means of subduing opposition is to turn them into hats.

  The Paladins: Founded by Daniel Nathaniel Allred of Vermont, the Paladins are an anti-government survivalist group with chapters across the country. Since the Event, they have focused on breakthroughs and especially on capes, who they believe plot to seize control of the government and rule as a “master race”. They mostly spend weekends training and stockpiling for The Day They Come For Us, but they have more militant members who believe in taking the fight to the capes first.

  Pieman: A teleporter of unknown class, Pieman is a “performance-villain.” He picks public figures he believes are in need of pie-ing, sends them a lovingly baked pie by courier delivery, then delivers the second pie up to seven days later; in person, in public, to the face. He is wanted in twelve countries, although most law enforcement agencies are not terribly interested in catching him.

  Platoon: aka Tom, New Tom, Willis, the Bobs, etc. Platoon is a Redux-Type breakthrough of unknown magnitude. He is a band of multiple clones with some sort of telepathic group-memory, who provides security and services at the Dome. He is also apparently a highly trained DSA field agent(s), a member of President Touches Clouds’ Secret Service detail, the major-domo at Restormel, and so on. Astra wonders if he/they have a Bob vacationing somewhere for the rest of them. Artemis wonders if he/they are political officers for Director Kayle.

  Prayer for Heroes: St. Michael, defender of man, stand with us in the day of battle. St. Jude, giver of hope, be with us in our desperate hour. St. Christopher, bearer of burdens, lift us when we fall. The author of the Prayer for Heroes is unknown; first circulated on the net, it is now inscribed over many monuments and on a lot of gravestones. It is the unofficial prayer of Catholic superheroes.

  President Touches Clouds: The day of The Event Jennifer Touches Clouds manifested an A Class Aeriokinetic-Type breakthrough, enabling her to generate and control air currents strong enough to allow her to fly and put out fires. She became one of the Sentinels’ founding members, and three years later left the team to go into politics, eventually becoming President Kayle’s successor. America’s first female President, first Native American President, and first superhuman President, she is hugely popular and has continued most of President Kayle’s international and domestic policies unchanged (something which makes conspiracy buffs mutter darkly in their basements).

  Protectors: Protectors is a law-enforcement procedural television series, about a fictional CAI team and the local police and court system, low on character drama and high on first-responder work but also superhuman crimes and court cases. It tends to feature “ripped from the headlines” stories.

  Psijack: aka, Bradley Clark. An unassuming and very successful contract negotiator, Bradley secretly contracted other serves. An A Class Mentalist, he is capable of controlling the emotions and impulses of whole crowd. His only limit appears to be that it takes him awhile to “psijack” a person’s id, and he may require environmental stimuli (a crowd already worked up, for example).

  Restormel: The Hollywood Knight’s headquarters in Beverly Hills, Restormel is shaped vaguely like a white castle tower with crenellations along the edge of the roof—which includes a “flying entrance” and a roof garden. Yeah, it’s a big clubhouse, but it’s a serious base too.

  The Ring: The Ring is an international alliance of terrorist organizations. While diverse in goals and aims, the membership of the Ring has been known to pool resources for joint operations; the biggest operation to-date has been the Whittier Base Attack, which did not go well for them. The biggest Ring players are: the Caliphate, One Land (Chinese nationalist-communists), and Mexico Libre (the rebellion in northern Mexico fronted by the cartels).

  Riptide: A former LA street-villain and a Hydrokinetic-Type who can actually transform into water, Riptide joined the Sentinels after he met them during rescue operations following the California Quake and fought beside them during the Whittier Base Attack. His mother and sister died in the quake, and he is now guardian to his young nephew, Carlos.

  Rush: A college all-star wide receiver, Rush was known for his trademark phrase “What’s the rush?” He was expected to go pro as a first-round NFL draft pick, then he triggered his breakthrough in the final game of his senior year, racing to catch the pass for a final and winning touch-down and turning into a blur. Denied fame in professional football, he train
ed for a year and then “tried out” for the Sentinels. He is an A Class Speedster, able when speeding to accelerate his personal time and live ten times as fast as the clock, and to drop between seconds entirely by jumping into the frozen world of hypertime.

  SaFire: A B Class Atlas-Type, SaFire is a member of the West Side Guardians. Her costumes favor purple-and-pink flames, and she is one of the Fortress’s more flamboyant (and colorful) event hostesses when not on duty. SaFire is a certified EMT who specializes in getting accident-victims to hospitals fast and alive, and Astra admires her tremendously.

  Sakura Wind: Sakura Wind is one of Japan’s rising hero-pop bands, comprised entirely of hero-idols.

  The Sanguinary Boys: The Sanguinary Boys are Chicago’s other supervillain gang (see the Brotherhood). Notable Sanguinaries are Brick, Vacuum, a aerokinetic who could suck the air right out of your lungs, Lighter, a standard pyrokinetic who preferred vodka as a starter, The Surgeon, a slicer with extendable razor-sharp nails and a taste for pain. The bunch of them got taken down by Astra and Artemis in the Great Roundup.

  Seif-al-Din: The Sword of The Faith and the most powerful Caliphate superhuman. A ten-foot giant with the shadows of enormous black angel wings rising from his back, skin glowing in undulating spots of bright and dim light, swinging a great burning sword, Seif-al-Din is at least as powerful as an A Class Atlas or Ajax-Type. He has died twice so far, the second time, at Whittier Base where—after he killed both Ajax and Atlas—Astra hit him in a kinetic strike using herself as the missile and then killed him with his own sword.

  The Sentinels: Atlas, Blackstone, Ajax, and the other founding members of the Chicago Sentinels met during the critical days following the catastrophe of The Event. They founded the Sentinels partly as a public-relations move, but the team became the template for Crisis Aid and Intervention Teams across the country. The Sentinels served abroad, as volunteers with Heroes Without Borders, during the worst of the China War and in the Caliphate War. Sentinels have died in action: Impact, Minuteman, Nimbus, Ajax, and Atlas. Today the Sentinels are the most famous superhero team in the world, with a huge marketing campaign built on them which includes movies, a television action series, a comic and book series, a roleplaying game, shirts, posters, action figures, and plushies.