Random Ideas (Input Requested!)

High tech intrigue and Cold War
User avatar
Siege
Site Admin
Posts: 2563
Joined: Mon May 19, 2008 7:03 pm
Location: The Netherlands

Re: Random Ideas (Input Requested!)

Post by Siege »

Image

1926: The opening of the Great Falls anomaly. The New World Order moves to second stage operations.
"Nick Fury. Old-school cold warrior. The original black ops hardcase. Long before I stepped off a C-130 at Da Nang, Fury and his team had set fire to half of Asia." - Frank Castle

For, now De Ruyter's topsails
Off naked Chatham show,
We dare not meet him with our fleet -
And this the Dutchmen know!
Mobius 1
Global Mod
Posts: 1099
Joined: Mon May 19, 2008 11:40 pm
Location: Orlando, FL

Re: Random Ideas (Input Requested!)

Post by Mobius 1 »

Another random pisstake in the world of tomorrow.

CSWNEXT

BACKSTOP

Originally formed in December of 2014 by John Baylor and the Cuban Agent known as Ruz, BACKSTOP was intended as a paramilitary version of N-TET focused on the third world. Aimed towards combating and preventing the abuses smaller nations saw as consequences of the shadow wars of the early 21st century, BACKSTOP saw its peak in 2016 during the Abyss crisis in Africa. By the end of the American Second Secret War, BACKSTOP was largely abandoned, with agents going their separate ways and the intelligence network only being used in isolated circumstances.

This changed in the late 2020s, when the next generation inherited the remnants of the Secret War. Today, BACKSTOP is composed of three exceptional operatives: Ryan Lennox, Lise Bateau, and Jacqueline Jensen. Together, on a battered and customized Shaanxi Y-8 turboprop, they take jobs from the less fortunate across the globe, working for favors and free drinks, to mop up not only the leftovers from their parents’ battles but a new rogues gallery for a new age.

Ryan Lennox: the son of rogue European telekine Anne Lennox and deceased Reaper officer Charles Lennox, Ryan is a fourth generation psionic: an extrasensory, or ‘e-sen’ for short. A natural people person, Ryan can massage his abilities to manipulate the decisions and emotions of anyone he can speak to, which considering how often his mouth is running, is anyone within an audible radius. After spending the first decade of his life in Queens, he was plunged in the cutthroat world of international intrigue when his mother fled in the country in 2014, whereon he spent his teenage years growing up in Africa. Inheriting his mother’s connections as an information broker, Lennox is often the face of BACKSTOP, taking on assignments and interfacing with the decade-old network.

Jacqueline “Fixer” Jensen: the daughter of Ashe Jensen, the former MIDNIGHT operative known as Follow, Jacky didn’t inherit much of her mother’s skill at stealth. Fortunately, she did develop a boisterous need to blow things up – she doesn’t have much of a preference – up. First in part raised by John Baylor as part of a cover assignment from 2002-2008, she and her mother were pulled from the mission when MIDNIGHT began flexing its muscles leading up to the Second Secret War. Trained as an spy from a young age left Jacky eager to finally be free in the ‘real world.’ Fiercely independent, she is perhaps the most combat capable of the new BACKSTOP and the only member still in close contact with the previous generation – Ashe, Baylor, and Jacen Razard.

Lise Bateau: the younger sister of deceased MIDNIGHT mole LJ Bateau, Lise was originally held in leverage for her brother’s loyalty until his death in 2014. Saved from MIDNIGHT custody by Baylor and Razard, Lise lived undercover with her uncle in Britain and was recruited by Jack Ridley into MI6 when she was in her freshman year at Oxford for her rumored savant-like skills with computer security systems. In truth, Lise was the sole friend of COG, a kernel AI created by the late Warrant Officer Peter Fender from a sliver of the AI SICKLE’s code. Partially cyberized by a Soviet goodwill project in 2021, Lise can effectively use COG as a skeleton key to any computer system on the planet – in effect, Lise has a rogue clone of SICKLE in her pocket, and as of 2025 the Soviet unit tasked with hunting down the new proliferation of artificial intelligences on the black market would like to have a very strong word with her.

Enemies and Allies: along with on-and-off again alliances with Jinx and Medley Farley, BACKSTOP has had run-ins with an amnesiatic clone of Chandra Gosely, agents of the New World Order, time-crafting European conspiracies, and most dangerously of all, the ageless man known as Enoch Razaq, the partial inheritor to the more esoteric remnants of WRAITH, in an encounter that nearly left the three young adventurers dead – or worse. Between supervillains and the standard tinpot dictators, mercenary groups leaning on the locals, mutated superbeasts, and simple natural disasters, BACKSTOP is unusually busy for the trio that largely tries to stay on the down-low of the new global paradigm, so much so that they’ve been noticed by the old guard – types the Director of MI6, the head of the Secret Service, and the President of the United States – you know, the sort of people you see at Christmas parties and family reunions.
SHADOW TEMPEST BLACK || STB2: MIDNIGHT PARADOX
The day our skys fe||, the heavens split to create new skies.
User avatar
Siege
Site Admin
Posts: 2563
Joined: Mon May 19, 2008 7:03 pm
Location: The Netherlands

Re: Random Ideas (Input Requested!)

Post by Siege »

:D Love it. Love it, love it. Especially that last line. I like how the WORLD OF TOMORROW is shaping up. It's looking like a time when it's no longer nations duking it out but rather organizations, or even just tiny groups of a-list operators. The future of violence is much more personal, it seems.

Gotta wonder what happens to NTET though, in that world. They were into the tiny smart mob synergy thing before it got hip, after all.

As an aside, I was toying with the idea that when MIR got taken out, roughly half of the satellites (WARPAC and NATO alike) on that side of the planet got fried when the place went boom. That would add to the chaos and confusion on the planet, allow all kinds of people to make off with gadgets as various command and control nets disintegrate, maybe help kick in some SICKLE contingency protocols, and other shenanigans that'd make for a nice story.
"Nick Fury. Old-school cold warrior. The original black ops hardcase. Long before I stepped off a C-130 at Da Nang, Fury and his team had set fire to half of Asia." - Frank Castle

For, now De Ruyter's topsails
Off naked Chatham show,
We dare not meet him with our fleet -
And this the Dutchmen know!
User avatar
Booted Vulture
Posts: 965
Joined: Mon May 19, 2008 9:33 pm

Re: Random Ideas (Input Requested!)

Post by Booted Vulture »

i they accept payment in favours and booze... how do they pay for all this free lance activity?

and why are they all legacy character? nepotismism is a go-go. It's like the MC2 universe. :P
Ah Brother! It's been too long!
Mobius 1
Global Mod
Posts: 1099
Joined: Mon May 19, 2008 11:40 pm
Location: Orlando, FL

Re: Random Ideas (Input Requested!)

Post by Mobius 1 »

SHADOW TEMPEST BLACK || STB2: MIDNIGHT PARADOX
The day our skys fe||, the heavens split to create new skies.
User avatar
Siege
Site Admin
Posts: 2563
Joined: Mon May 19, 2008 7:03 pm
Location: The Netherlands

Re: Random Ideas (Input Requested!)

Post by Siege »

That's something right out of Red Alert :).

Meanwhile in my own mind I'm wondering about a CSW:NEXT provisionally labelled "The Secret of the Black Bishop". The story has two main threads. One set in the immediate aftermath of the Civil War, wherein we follow the former Southern irregular Bedlam Farley as he makes off with a huge stash of Confederate gold in a stolen ironclad (the CSS Black Bishop) just as Richmond falls to Grant's troops. Farley is trying to get to Cuba (which at the time is plagued by an insurrection against Spain) to disappear and start a new life, but is pursued by a vengeful former plantation owner Elijah Carson and Union agents under Marshal Gideon Starr. Cameos by Angus Saint (British blockade runner turned privateer) and Sam Savage as Abraham Lincoln's spymaster with an agenda of her own.

Meanwhile the second storyline twins Jinx and Medley Farley retrace the steps of their illustrious ancestor on present-day communist Cuba in an attempt to find the lost treasure. But just like Bedlam they are pursued by their own nemeses: their father's shadowy enemies, Claudia Rodriguez' state intelligence agency and multi-billionaire Robert Conan Blackwell who are all after the mysterious Black Bishop for their own reason.

The whole thing would be more of a fun romp than SUPER SERIOUS BUSINESS. A story where you can just sit back and enjoy a tropical treasure hunt, snicker about name-dropping, and not worry about the end of the world for a change.
"Nick Fury. Old-school cold warrior. The original black ops hardcase. Long before I stepped off a C-130 at Da Nang, Fury and his team had set fire to half of Asia." - Frank Castle

For, now De Ruyter's topsails
Off naked Chatham show,
We dare not meet him with our fleet -
And this the Dutchmen know!
User avatar
Booted Vulture
Posts: 965
Joined: Mon May 19, 2008 9:33 pm

Re: Random Ideas (Input Requested!)

Post by Booted Vulture »

wooo. that name I made up gets a mention.

That does sounds like a really fun story Siege... Chop chop with it :P. Though again I note the slightly silly back to the future impression i get when multiple generations of the same family have very similar traits. Like all having Chronic Backstabbing Disorder.... ;)
Ah Brother! It's been too long!
User avatar
Siege
Site Admin
Posts: 2563
Joined: Mon May 19, 2008 7:03 pm
Location: The Netherlands

Re: Random Ideas (Input Requested!)

Post by Siege »

The story is definitely designed to be slightly silly, so that's ok :D. I really like the idea of generations of people running into each other again and again - I may have read too much Stephenson. On the other hand it's important to avoid the soap opera 'everything revolves around two feuding families' thing, but this isn't a super serious story anyway so it should be alright.

I wonder if I could sneak a Count Kiralov onto Cuba as a disgraced Russian nobleman with suspiciously communist leanings.
"Nick Fury. Old-school cold warrior. The original black ops hardcase. Long before I stepped off a C-130 at Da Nang, Fury and his team had set fire to half of Asia." - Frank Castle

For, now De Ruyter's topsails
Off naked Chatham show,
We dare not meet him with our fleet -
And this the Dutchmen know!
User avatar
Siege
Site Admin
Posts: 2563
Joined: Mon May 19, 2008 7:03 pm
Location: The Netherlands

Re: Random Ideas (Input Requested!)

Post by Siege »

I want Enoch Razaq to have a crisp female lieutenant just so Verity Drake or somebody else can describe her as "Nazi Mary Poppins" at some point.
"Nick Fury. Old-school cold warrior. The original black ops hardcase. Long before I stepped off a C-130 at Da Nang, Fury and his team had set fire to half of Asia." - Frank Castle

For, now De Ruyter's topsails
Off naked Chatham show,
We dare not meet him with our fleet -
And this the Dutchmen know!
User avatar
Ford Prefect
Posts: 957
Joined: Tue May 20, 2008 11:12 am

Re: Random Ideas (Input Requested!)

Post by Ford Prefect »

The best decisions are based on foppery and whim.
FEEL THESE GUNS ARCHWIND THESE ARE THE GUNS OF THE FLESHY MESSIAH THE TOOLS OF CREATION AND DESTRUCTION THAT WILL ENACT THE LAW OF MAN ACROSS THE UNIVERSE
User avatar
Booted Vulture
Posts: 965
Joined: Mon May 19, 2008 9:33 pm

Re: Random Ideas (Input Requested!)

Post by Booted Vulture »

since Bedlam's a confederate guy he can carry my favourite old west gun; the lematt revolver. 9 rounds plus an inbuilt shotgun.
Ah Brother! It's been too long!
User avatar
Siege
Site Admin
Posts: 2563
Joined: Mon May 19, 2008 7:03 pm
Location: The Netherlands

Re: Random Ideas (Input Requested!)

Post by Siege »

That's a sweet looking gun. That's definitely a good idea.

I'm wondering if it'd be a good idea to have a quotes thread. Like, a place where you could just put up stuff that people said. It'd be a really easy and potentially awesome way to give more personality to people who may not have appeared yet, and dump extra info on the 'verse at the same time. What do y'allz think?
"Nick Fury. Old-school cold warrior. The original black ops hardcase. Long before I stepped off a C-130 at Da Nang, Fury and his team had set fire to half of Asia." - Frank Castle

For, now De Ruyter's topsails
Off naked Chatham show,
We dare not meet him with our fleet -
And this the Dutchmen know!
User avatar
Booted Vulture
Posts: 965
Joined: Mon May 19, 2008 9:33 pm

Re: Random Ideas (Input Requested!)

Post by Booted Vulture »

i dunno. If you create a quotes thread, No-ones going to have to write you one-shots to show off their zingers. :P
Ah Brother! It's been too long!
User avatar
Siege
Site Admin
Posts: 2563
Joined: Mon May 19, 2008 7:03 pm
Location: The Netherlands

Re: Random Ideas (Input Requested!)

Post by Siege »

Well, there's obviously limits to single quotes. 'Cause it'd be, you know, quotes, not entire sequences of cleverly crafted dialog building toward a final one-liner :). At the same side it just seems like an interesting way of showing off characters and setting up events that might leave a reader wondering what's going on, etc.

'Course you're right in that it's a way of avoiding actually writing real story stuff, but it's not like we're delivering massive volumes of prose at it is so I'm not sure how impactful that'd be :).
"Nick Fury. Old-school cold warrior. The original black ops hardcase. Long before I stepped off a C-130 at Da Nang, Fury and his team had set fire to half of Asia." - Frank Castle

For, now De Ruyter's topsails
Off naked Chatham show,
We dare not meet him with our fleet -
And this the Dutchmen know!
User avatar
Booted Vulture
Posts: 965
Joined: Mon May 19, 2008 9:33 pm

Re: Random Ideas (Input Requested!)

Post by Booted Vulture »

yeah well. hope springs eternal.
Ah Brother! It's been too long!
Mobius 1
Global Mod
Posts: 1099
Joined: Mon May 19, 2008 11:40 pm
Location: Orlando, FL

Re: Random Ideas (Input Requested!)

Post by Mobius 1 »

"Hey Kroner, can I get one final quote from you?"
"I'm not the one about to d-"
*shotgun blast*
"Unquote, asshole."
SHADOW TEMPEST BLACK || STB2: MIDNIGHT PARADOX
The day our skys fe||, the heavens split to create new skies.
User avatar
Siege
Site Admin
Posts: 2563
Joined: Mon May 19, 2008 7:03 pm
Location: The Netherlands

Re: Random Ideas (Input Requested!)

Post by Siege »

"You think you impress me? That you scare me? You think nobody ever waved a gun in my face before? [laughs] I fucked more dangerous men than you in prep school. You're just a thug, Taddeus. Simple. Swinish. And predictable. You and your clique of traitors don't know what real power is. We own this planet, colonel. You're all just living on it."
"Nick Fury. Old-school cold warrior. The original black ops hardcase. Long before I stepped off a C-130 at Da Nang, Fury and his team had set fire to half of Asia." - Frank Castle

For, now De Ruyter's topsails
Off naked Chatham show,
We dare not meet him with our fleet -
And this the Dutchmen know!
User avatar
Booted Vulture
Posts: 965
Joined: Mon May 19, 2008 9:33 pm

Re: Random Ideas (Input Requested!)

Post by Booted Vulture »

"Ah, I see. Now you're wondering why I shot you. Really, Baylor, haven't you learnt not to trust anyone yet? As a mutual friend of ours put to me. 'Remember, Remember the fifth of november. Gunpowder. Treason. Plot."
Ah Brother! It's been too long!
User avatar
Siege
Site Admin
Posts: 2563
Joined: Mon May 19, 2008 7:03 pm
Location: The Netherlands

Re: Random Ideas (Input Requested!)

Post by Siege »

See? It's so enticing!

I've this loose idea of a European conspiracy revolving around Monoliths that goes back to at least medieval and possibly Roman times. But whereas the American (and much more modern) New World Order sees alien tech as something to be reverse-engineered and exploited for OBSCENE CORPORATE PROFITZ the Order of the Stygian Key would have a way more religious outlook.

Or perhaps 'religious' is the wrong word; it's more of a philosophical approach to the sort of arcane antediluvian insanity they'd have access to. There's been mention of telekines and guys who do non-Euclydian kung-fu, but I'm playing with the idea that certain ideas may be actively harmful -- like, just thinking certain things means you invite bad (potentially extradimensional) juju right into your head. Which would be a very bad thing indeed.

So the explanation for all the zany templar rites and pseudo-masonic woo-woo practiced by these guys isn't silly ancient superstition, it's actually an abstraction layer: symbols and ritual act as proxies to access whatever craziness is being invoked from, well, wherever. The human mind's ability to understand abstract signs means there's a way to think of something without directly thinking about it, if you will. To use Robert Chambers as an example: if you focus your mind directly on the King in Yellow he's going to fuck you up bigtime, but the Yellow Sign is a way of accessing his bad mojo without tossing him the keys to your mind in the process.

Now obviously CSW is a place of fast jets and silly technothriller splosiuns, and this would conveniently serve to explain why secret wizards haven't taken over the world: their mortality rate is insanely high. Basically the vast majority of the dudes who try and master this shit go irrevocably insane and get put down by black helicopters because their craft is just absurdly dangerous. But a highly select few manage it, and they run one of the world's most creepy conspiracies. Because these half-dozen Inner Circle people aren't after worldly power, they're after crazy shit like becoming immortal elder gods by making pacts with heinous eldritch thingmajigs from the beyond. Shit even the Greys would shy away from because dude, that's something you just don't mess with if you know what's good for you.
"Nick Fury. Old-school cold warrior. The original black ops hardcase. Long before I stepped off a C-130 at Da Nang, Fury and his team had set fire to half of Asia." - Frank Castle

For, now De Ruyter's topsails
Off naked Chatham show,
We dare not meet him with our fleet -
And this the Dutchmen know!
User avatar
Siege
Site Admin
Posts: 2563
Joined: Mon May 19, 2008 7:03 pm
Location: The Netherlands

Re: Random Ideas (Input Requested!)

Post by Siege »

So, assuming for a moment there are Greys out there somewhere... Anybody got any ideas what their objectives might be? Assuming for a moment it's not the usual 'TAKE OVER THE WORLD'?
"Nick Fury. Old-school cold warrior. The original black ops hardcase. Long before I stepped off a C-130 at Da Nang, Fury and his team had set fire to half of Asia." - Frank Castle

For, now De Ruyter's topsails
Off naked Chatham show,
We dare not meet him with our fleet -
And this the Dutchmen know!
Mobius 1
Global Mod
Posts: 1099
Joined: Mon May 19, 2008 11:40 pm
Location: Orlando, FL

Re: Random Ideas (Input Requested!)

Post by Mobius 1 »

I've been playing too much Halo 4 recently, because I totally love the phrase "PASS ON THE MANTLE."
SHADOW TEMPEST BLACK || STB2: MIDNIGHT PARADOX
The day our skys fe||, the heavens split to create new skies.
User avatar
Shroom Man 777
Global Mod
Posts: 4637
Joined: Mon May 19, 2008 7:09 pm
Contact:

Re: Random Ideas (Input Requested!)

Post by Shroom Man 777 »

obligatory haloiding for moby


As for the Greys, you could go with the arguably cliche'd thang where they waged a war against an ancient evil that left relics of themselves all over the galaxy, and currently the present Greys are just doing their own thang while making sure hairless apes don't blunder into some eldritch relic and summon forces of the ancient evil into the galaxy once more. Hypothetically, if those Kroner guys open a portal to Space Hell on Earth, you could see an emergency Grey flotilla hyper into Earth orbit and prepare to make the planet disappear before the resonance cascade completes and unleashes the nastiness or some such.

The arrogant alienoids would totally not be sorry to atomize some primitive primate planet because of the stupid actions of the foolish human shits, and they might've done this to a whole buncha unfortunate worlds already. There could be some Greys who'd think differently and try to educate the lesser races or something, but the wizened council of obnoxious grey pointdexters would just sneer at them.

Of course, from a human POV, the Greys would be universally awe-inspiring with their huge glowy saucers and wizened wisdoms and knowledges and ancient future technology. But in reality, they're a buncha pricks.
Image

"Sometimes Shroomy I wonder if your imagination actually counts as some sort of war crime." - FROD
User avatar
Invictus
Posts: 1306
Joined: Mon May 19, 2008 11:44 pm

Re: Random Ideas (Input Requested!)

Post by Invictus »

Shroom Man 777 wrote:As for the Greys, you could go with the arguably cliche'd thang where they waged a war against an ancient evil that left relics of themselves all over the galaxy, and currently the present Greys are just doing their own thang while making sure hairless apes don't blunder into some eldritch relic and summon forces of the ancient evil into the galaxy once more. Hypothetically, if those Kroner guys open a portal to Space Hell on Earth, you could see an emergency Grey flotilla hyper into Earth orbit and prepare to make the planet disappear before the resonance cascade completes and unleashes the nastiness or some such.

The arrogant alienoids would totally not be sorry to atomize some primitive primate planet because of the stupid actions of the foolish human shits, and they might've done this to a whole buncha unfortunate worlds already. There could be some Greys who'd think differently and try to educate the lesser races or something, but the wizened council of obnoxious grey pointdexters would just sneer at them.

Of course, from a human POV, the Greys would be universally awe-inspiring with their huge glowy saucers and wizened wisdoms and knowledges and ancient future technology. But in reality, they're a buncha pricks.
This feels like it would lead to a The Day the Earth Stood Still kind of situation.
"This explanation posits that external observation leads to the collapse of the quantum wave function. This is another expression of reactionary idealism, and it's indeed the most brazen expression."
-
REBUILD OF COMIX STAGE 1 - Rey Quirino Versus the Dark Heart of the Philippines
"...a literary atrocity against the senses..." - Ford

REBUILD OF COMIX STAGE 2 - Advent Rey Returns: REVERGELTUNG
Coming NEVER
User avatar
Shroom Man 777
Global Mod
Posts: 4637
Joined: Mon May 19, 2008 7:09 pm
Contact:

Re: Random Ideas (Input Requested!)

Post by Shroom Man 777 »

That kind of alien encounter would actually be strangely fitting for the CSW-type setting.
Image

"Sometimes Shroomy I wonder if your imagination actually counts as some sort of war crime." - FROD
User avatar
Siege
Site Admin
Posts: 2563
Joined: Mon May 19, 2008 7:03 pm
Location: The Netherlands

Re: Random Ideas (Input Requested!)

Post by Siege »

So, here's a thing:

CSWNEXT

VOID HOWL

VOID HOWL, also known as SK-13 or informally as Eraser Company, is the transhuman arm of the SHADOW KEY initiative. It is a small, elite and highly classified WEU force of shock (some would say terror) troops set up to handle 'nonstandard' contingencies, specifically confrontations with the DYNAST GOLD pantheon and other weakly godlike entities encountered through the exploration of the off-world gate system. Their job was to prevent, at all costs, the restoration of DYNAST GOLD to full wakefulness, an event which as far as the Initiative could tell would have apocalyptic and eschatalogical consequences for Earth and its immediate cosmic neighborhood.

Encounters with DYNAST GOLD remnants both on-Earth and off over the course of the second half of the 20th century proved that baseline human operators, no matter how well-trained, were woefully unprepared for confrontations with even quasidormant elder beings. The (mercifully few) encounters proved highly lethal to the Initiative's crack troops, and those that did manage to survive brushes with 4th order forces were more often than not deeply traumatized by the experience to the point that it rendered them unsuitable for further field deployment.

This unacceptable drain of tier one assets, combined with the ever-present danger that unsufficiently prepared teams might accidentally escalate a nonstandard encounter to a full wakefulness scenario, endangered the Initiative's off-world exploration: in fact, between 2005 and 2025 a standing executive order from the Director of the European Security Initiative restricted gateway exploration to a handful of worlds known not to be DYNAST GOLD sepulchers. This was a deeply unsatisfying state of affairs to both the SHADOW KEY overseers and the greater WEU security apparatus. Exploration of the gate network and, through it, the study and retrieval of alien technology was considered a priority for the defense of Western Europe, hopefully allowing the WEU to counterbalance Soviet and American weapons systems of increasing technological sophistication.

Enter VOID HOWL and the products ConEurope's black labs. The pan-European defense consortium was succesfully experimenting with metatechnology as early as the late 1990s, as evidenced by its role in the Star Chamber's MIND CRIME operation in 2004. The 2020s however saw the advent of mature 3rd generation paratechnology, and its field deployment in the shape of SK-13. VOID HOWL are a team of elite Initiative volunteers trained to handle the kind of singularly lethal encounter that would shatter and/or kill a baseline human operator.

Though trained and intended at first solely to handle DYNASTY GOLD related crises, ESI directors quickly caught on to the unit's combat efficiency, and Eraser Company was deployed with increasing frequency around the world to combat the slowly proliferating multitude of parahuman operators and rogue hypertech, or simply to further the nebulous goals of Europe's top powerbrokers. SK-13 is the most visible of the SHADOW KEY teams but that is not to say they are a known entity: they don't leave enough survivors for that to be the case. The signs of their passage will be familiar to many of the world's covert agencies however -- those signs being inexplicably failed defenses, smouldering craters and piles of dead bodies. When VOID HOWL strikes, it strikes hard, fast and from unexpected angles, it rarely leaves witnesses to talk about what happened, and it disappears as fast as it's come.


BLANK Claire Angel, codename BLANK, is the youngest member of the team. Ostensibly a slender twenty-something with chestnut hair and oddly forgettable features she doesn't look anywhere near a member of one of the most deadly military outfits on the planet. However all is not as it seems: ConEurope's black labs have bonded BLANK's body on the genetic level to the oily black substance that makes up the monstrous, shapeless Shoggoth'im. The bond allows her to absorb genetic material and shift her appearance into that of any other human. BLANK also can kill by forcibly invading the body of a target, giving the impression of kill-by-touch, and can herself survive grievous wounds that would instantly kill a regular human being.


COMA Salvador Armitage, codename COMA, is the VOID HOWL pointman. He was a highly succesful SIG commando before his assignment to SHADOW KEY. Armitage has been surgically implanted with intravenous dispensers that release a drug derived from an alien plant found on a moon near the galactic core. Once injected into his bloodstream the drug boosts his already impressive reflexes far beyond human standards, allowing him to perform absurd feats of violence with surgical accuracy in an extremely short span of time. Unfortunately the drug is extremely physically dangerous: withdrawal induces incredible pain whereas continued use induces insanity. As a result COMA requires a steady stream of tailored tranquilizers that keep him almost completely sedated outside of combat environments.


ENTER Krysta Mercier, codename ENTER, is a pale woman whose unique perception of the laws of geometry allows her to move through hidden angles, emerging into locked rooms or behind elaborate defenses as if they were never there. Her abilities allow VOID HOWL to bypass strongpoints and ignore security systems, but they are not without risk: the unseen, non-euclidian dimensions through which ENTER moves are home to what she calls the 'dim thinkers', hostile unearthly creatures that take badly to intrusions into their domain. A cybernetic hand and numerous scars where bits and pieces of her got left behind in unseen places attest to bad encounters with these creatures, and there is always the unspoken possibility that they follow her back into 'our' dimensions.


FETTER, no name given, is a third-generation telepath. He was cloned from the genetic material of Johann Grau, the second-gen Star Chamber operative who defected to NTET and thereby busted MIND CRIME in '04. Eleven years later FETTER assassinated Grau in an NTET safehouse during the Secret War; he is the only member of VOID HOWL aware of the fact that their respective identities are fake. Before dying Grau managed to tell him all members of Eraser Company are wholly bio-engineered and imprinted with artificial identities in a ConEurope laboratory. Aware of the strong possibility a telepath would eventually uncover such information however, ConEurope had taken steps to condition him for just such an event. Beside his role as a mind killer FETTER is tasked with maintaining the sanity of the rest of his team through manipulation or blanking of their memories.


HYDRA Kajsa Sinder, codename HYDRA, is VOID HOWL's scout and counter-surveillance specialist. Underneath a shock of red hair the skin on top of her skull is tattooed with branching loops of fractal symbols that look down her temples and down the back of her skull to its base. This pattern is repeated on the bone underneath, in the opposite direction, laser-printed directly onto her cranium. The markings, or more specifically the entropic function of which they are an expression, allow her to deflect and thus resist the mind-bending influences of DYNASTY GOLD entities better than would have otherwise been possible -- although it must be said that "better" does not mean all that much when confronted with the full attention of weakly godlike entities.

The markings do more than that however: they make very hard to observe in general. CCTV renders her presence into an indistinct blur of compression artefacts; audio recordings of her voice suffer extremely bad signal clipping. It is even difficult to keep track of her with the human eye.

As a complete non-entity to telepaths, HYDRA is the only member of VOID HOWL invulnerable to FETTER's abilities. And that is all too well, because otherwise he could learn that unlike the other members HYDRA is not a dedicated ESI commando at all: she is an infiltrator, a member of the occult Order of the Stygian Key to keep an eye on the team. She is some sixty years old, some thirty more than she looks, a sorcerer of the third circle with some rather more impressive abilities than she typically demonstrates.
"Nick Fury. Old-school cold warrior. The original black ops hardcase. Long before I stepped off a C-130 at Da Nang, Fury and his team had set fire to half of Asia." - Frank Castle

For, now De Ruyter's topsails
Off naked Chatham show,
We dare not meet him with our fleet -
And this the Dutchmen know!
Post Reply