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Background
At the dawn of human history, before there were even humans, Earth was visited by the enigmatic, colossal space gods called the Celestials. Continuing their eternal, unfathomable prerogative, the Celestials gathered up a tribe of proto-humans and advanced them into true sentience. Three branches of humanity were created by them: the Deviants, possessed of great power but an unstable genetic template that lead to monstrous forms; the Eternals, also possessing great power but perfect human form and immortality; and humanity; given no powers but with the genetic potential to develop to the level of the Deviants and Eternals. The Deviants were envious of the gifts granted to the Eternals and began a long war of millennia against them, where humanity was often caught inbetween and unaware.
The war between Deviants and Eternals would reach into the modern age, with some Deviants secretly aiding and backing the Axis powers of World War 2. The Eternals responded by seeking out and disrupting Deviant activity, trying to keep the existence of both species hidden from humanity at large. And so it was in 1944 that an Eternal came to the Pacific Islands in secret, disguised as an American soldier, searching for a suspected Deviant base. Along the way, he met a young woman named Alexandra Preston.
Alexandra was born into an old, wealthy family from Long Island. Tired of her pampered life, Alexandra saw the opportunity to escape and find adventure by going against the wishes of her mother and joining the WAVES. She would meet the man she would know as ‘Kenneth Stone’ as the Allied forces were beginning to push into the Pacific Theater to eliminate Japan. The pair grew enamoured with each other, leading to a night of romance. The following day, Kenneth had gone AWOL, secretly leaving to face the Deviant base and protect the Allies forces. Alexandra never knew the true nature or fate of her paramour, only that in the following months, she was pregnant.
Alexandra was discharged from service and returned home, to the disapproval of her mother. To ‘save the Preston name from the disgrace and shame’ of a baby born out of wedlock, a story was crafted that Alexandra had gotten married while serving and her husband had died shortly thereafter in combat.
For most of her life, Christine Preston was a normal girl with a highly inquisitive nature. She was doted on by her mother but sternly guided by her grandmother, leading Christine to secretly hate the high society life as much as her mother had. She was constantly reminded by her grandmother that she would never attract a husband if she constantly showed herself to be smarter than a man. Still, Christine achieved exemplary grades in school that would be laudable if she were a boy. So, when Christine started developing ‘abilities’ as she entered high school, she kept the secret to herself.
Slowly, the teenaged girl was developing extraordinary strength. And control of energy and even light. And then, there was the flying, a power that thrilled Christine to no end. There were lots of ‘accidents’ in those days as Christine adjusted to these abilities, but the quick witted girl was able to come of with explanations that could be passed off as coincidental or teenage clumsiness.
As she practiced these powers, Christine also studied them from a scientific angle, trying to find explanations for why she had them and how they worked. She was a voracious reader, much to her grandmother’s disapproval, most often having her nose buried in scientific books and articles on biology and physics. It was in the published works of Moira MacTaggart that Christine found her answer to what she was: a human mutant. The idea of mutancy was just reaching the general public at the time, and the public reaction further reinforced Christine’s decision to keep her powers hidden.
Recently, Christine graduated near the top of her high school class. Her grades combined with her family’s money and prestige secured her entrance into the Physics program at Columbia University. Secretly, however, Christine has been inspired by heroes like the Avengers and has created a costumed persona to protect the citizens of New York as the luminous Lightwave!
IC Events
Traits
- Strength: Christine possesses a level of strength beyond normal humans, and can lif approximately 5 tons unaided.
- Physiology: Due to her half-Eternal physiology, Christine is highly resistant to heat and cold extremes. Normal extremes of climate temperature don't bother her, and she takes no damage from normal fire (campfire intensity) or ice temperatures down to -75 C. Hotter and colder energies will hurt her. Her skin is also more durable, resisting impacts from the strength level of a prize fighter. She is not bulletproof and will take impact damage from conventional firearms, although the bullets will cause abrasions instead of full penetration. She is immune to all natural, Terrestrial diseases and highly resistant to toxins. She has minor regenerative abilities, recovering from injuries about 3 times as fast as a normal human. Finally, barring catastrophic injury, she is immortal.
- Flight: Christine can fly with a top speed of 500 MPH. She cannot fly in space unaided.
- Photokinesis: Christine has the power to manipulate the properties on light. At her basic level, she can emit light and project daylight-intensity light in a 150' radius. She can create flashes of light that can temporarily blind individual targets for about 10 to 15 seconds. Christine can also cause light to 'solidify' and create constructs of 'hard light'. These constructs have an equivalent strength of around 30 tons lifting capability, pushed to 40 tons with extreme stress and concentration from Christine. She can create cages and force bubbles to contain or protect small groups of people (about 5 bunched together). She can create barricades with the strength of a reinforced concrete wall. Christine can only handle one construct at a time, although with experience, she will gain greater control. She can project and control her constructs at a range of 200'. She can also fire concussive blasts of hard light capable of smashing through a brick wall or denting armor plating, also at a range of about 200'.
- Energy Blasts: Christine can project beams of intense energy from her eyes, capable of cutting or welding normal steel. She is accurate with these blasts out to 50'.
- Empathic Reading: Christine has a the ability to sense emotions and basic intentions in others nearby (50' range). She can sense when someone is lying or concealing something, but not what. She can sense the emotional state of others, but not the source causing such emotions. She can use deduction to guess, such as sensing hostility in a woman looking at her husband talking with another woman, but Christine wouldn't know if the woman was planning on harming her husband.