STARBURST, aka Karra Rosemond
Concept: DNAscendent (see Freedom City 2nd ed.), p. 169)
PL: 9/135 pp HP: 1
Abilities
Strength: 10*/3 Stamina: 10*/3 Agility: 8*/3 Dexterity: 2 Fighting: 8 Intellect: 1 Awareness: 0 Presence: 0
* = enhanced
Advantages:
Agile feint, All-out attack, Diehard, Eidetic memory, Fast grab, Improved critical (unarmed), Improved grab, Improved hold, Improved initiative, Move-by action, Power attack, Takedown 2 = 13 points
Skills:
Acrobatics 8 (+16), Athletics 0 (+10), Deception 0 (+0), Expertise: Historian 4 (+5), Insight 4 (+4), Intimidation 0 (+0), Perception 4 (+4), Persuasion 0 (+0), Ranged combat: Thrown 6 (+8), Stealth 5 (+13) = 14 points
Powers
DNAscendant: Enhanced ability 19 (strength 7, stamina 7, agility 5) = 38 points
Invulnerable: Impervious toughness 9 = 9pts
Immunity: Memory Alteration & Mind Control = 2pts
Flight 5 (60mph) = 10pt
AE: Fast: speed 5 (60mph) = 1pt
Defense:
- Dodge 8
- Parry 8
- Toughness 10
- Fortitude 10
- Will 8
Offense:
Initiative +12
Unarmed +8 Close, Damage 10 (DC25), crit 19-20
(Abilities: 40 + Powers: 60 + Advantages: 13 + Skills: 14 + Defenses: 8 = 135 points)
Complications:
- Motivation–Justice: The scientists and backers responsible for altering her and others against their wills should answer for it. Bonus points if she can right other wrongs along the way.
- Total Recall: Karra’s memories of the DNAscent treatments range from scary (the treatments themselves) to horrifying (gory deaths of other subjects). She still has nightmares and sometimes flashbacks. She is needlephobic & distrustful of medical personnel, making her difficult to treat if she is hurt.
- Enemy: Aaron Welling (No known codename): Karra’s monstrously mutated fellow DNAscendant cannot recall their friendship and only knows she was fighting him when they both escaped the Labyrinth facility. She wants to help Aaron, but he will only attack if he sees her.
- Enemy: Labyrinth DNAscent. They want their fugitive subject back, to study and replicate whatever mental quirk or mutation made her immune to the brainwashing, which would be an advantage in creating supers whose loyalty cannot be broken.
- Weakness: Powers and other effects with “Biological” descriptor do extra degree of effect because of the amount of DNA manipulation Starburst has undergone.
Backstory:
Karra Rosemond thinks “Be careful what you wish for” is the moral of her story, so far. As a young teen, a cousin was the victim of a violent crime and Karra wished that she was a superhero so she could have helped. A decade or so later, she rued that wish, when she was drugged at a friend’s graduation party and woke up in one of the Labyrinth labs (although she never heard the name), one of their latest batch of test subjects.
The scientists had altered the protocol, hoping to expand the success rate for mutations farther from human norms. Instead, it proved painfully fatal to the majority of the subjects. Karra saw a couple of them die.
She and the only other survivor, homeless veteran Aaron Welling received the usual brainwashing–but it didn’t work on Karra! She had always had an amazing memory–which had helped her win a College Week competition of a popular quiz game show a few years back. But neither she nor the Labyrinth team realized she had some natural mental shields. The researchers also didn’t realize they’d given Karra the ability to fly.
Her retained memories and the extra power enabled her to bide her time until an AEGIS raid on the complex, when she helped the agents take out her captors. Because her assistance saved an agent–who was attacke dhte brainwashed and now monstrous-appearing Aaron–AEGIS gave her a little more support than other victims have gotten, including curator of a tiny museum/archive that is a front for one of their projects. In spite of their help, Starburst has mixed feelings towards AEGIS and most of its agents.
While she is grateful, she still resents the callous debriefings she endured. Worse than that, she feels the agency has done little to locate and aid Aaron–a betrayal of a man who served his country.
Wisely, when AEGIS wants her help, the agency sends one of their chaplains, the Reverend Chris Rowe, who, among more traditional pastoral duties, counsels metahumans. He helped Karra cope with becoming Starburst and making a new life after being imprisoned in the lab for over a year, so she trusts him.
Karra took her codename Starburst because it sounded cool. She jokes that it is because, “Villains I hit see a starburst,” which several who have been arrested with her assistance confirm.
Linda Whitson
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