I'm not entirely happy with this to be honest, it's been primarily written at work in between calls, so if I've screwed up anywhere grammatically, typographically or logically, please do point it out. I'm planning on writing origins for all of my major heroes - Negative Energy is already in the works - but as this one has taken me 2 weeks, don't expect anything soon.
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Many people have said that being on the bottom rung of the corporate ladder at Crey Biotech is the worst job in Paragon City. They're wrong, of course, there are far worse occupations - frankly, most jobs in Paragon come with an unreasonable risk of death, kidnap, experimentation, use in an arcane ritual, zombification, mutation & exposure to lethal radiation - but most would agree that cleaning up after Crey Corp. ranks amongst the least desirable. Nobody really questions what happens to the mess after the Crey "liberate" another lab or have a run-in with one of those troublesome meta-humans, but in most cases it was muggins here who had to sweep it all up. I often wonder why I did it, it certainly wasn't for the fame, money or women; generally speaking a dismembered corpse or a barrel of toxic waste aren't ideal pulling tools. That said, the job had its perks, if I arrived early enough I sometimes got to see heroes in action and the swag, just wow! Heroes were generally very conscientious about "arresting" everyone, but surprisingly poor when it came to clearing up all their gear, except for all those Cryo Pistols - they seemed to be de rigueur in hero circles. The result of all this was that I maintained a very profitable sideline in selling gear on the black market, not to mention some of the gadgets I'd kept for myself - the Personal Forcefield was a godsend when wandering the city at night.
Anyway, I'm getting sidetracked; a couple of years back there was a particularly large "incident" in Crey's Folly - some low level scientist had his brains spread thinly on the pavement by a Nemesis sniper, who was taking pot-shots at Rikti monkeys, and all hell broke loose. It was all out war between the Crey & Nemesis, even the Freaks were laying low and trying to stay out of the way; by the end of it, there must have been 20 or 30 heroes trying to break everything up. I got the call from my boss; the battle was still raging but they wanted us to start the clear up - apparently tidying up some corpses was going to be enough to make everyone forget about the hundred or so Crey shock troops currently engaged in levelling several city blocks and avoid any nasty legal consequences for the Crey Corporation. Still, ours is not to reason why, so I took the train to Brickstown from my luxury 3rd floor bedsit in Kings Row. Upon arrival I flicked on my Cloaking Field Generator and began the oft deadly trek towards the Crey's Folly gate - the journey always made me wonder about the security of the "maximum security" Zig, when you've got hundreds of escaped prisoners roaming the streets of Bricks, just how maximum security can it really be? No wonder they can't keep any of the super villains locked up for more than 30 seconds.
As I entered Crey's, I was greeted by the other members of my team; we were first on the scene, which usually meant plenty of loot and, of course, the worst of the clean-up jobs. Crey's Folly is well known as an environmental disaster area, so it was never really a surprise to come across the occasional cryptically labelled canister with biohazard stickers all over it; normally I'd have chucked it in with the rest of the garbage, but something about it piqued my curiosity and these things were so often worth money to someone, so I stuck it in my bag with the rest of my gear. 6 very long hours of cleaning later, I finally made it back home and set about the arduous task of sorting through all the stuff I'd managed to snag. Very little of it was ever of any use to me personally - what would I want with a bag of mixed Rikti Monkey brains or a container of Vhazilok embalming fluid? - but today there were a couple of success stories. Firstly, my little canister of toxic goodness; noticing the "Keep Refrigerated" label on the bottom, I placed it in my fridge, which in retrospect was probably a really bad move on my part. Also of note was the pressurised Nemesis napalm canister, yet another Personal Forcefield Unit - slightly charred - a Cryo Tank refrigeration unit and what appeared to be part of a Nemesis staff, that one would fetch a pretty penny on the open market. Dumping the useful stuff on the kitchen sideboard, I headed to bed, hoping that the various factions operating within Paragon City would have the decency to behave for a few hours so I could get a decent nights sleep. I was awakened at 4am by yet another shoot-out on the street below, the Skulls, it seemed, would happily take pot-shots at anyone who passed by in the hope of scoring some kind of gang war victory - the inconsiderate bastards. I stumbled downstairs, the lights weren't working, as per usual and I somehow managed to make it to the fridge without knocking over too much stuff on the way. I opened the door, grabbed the first beer can that came to hand and downed it - several seconds later I noticed that even for Fosters the beer tasted like [censored]. Making the second stupid decision of the night, I fumbled around for the matches and lit one; about 10 seconds after I'd realised that I had just imbibed a delicious can of hazardous waste, the panicked waving of my arms managed to ignite the napalm canister sitting on the sideboard, and then everything went white.
I was reliably informed that the explosion resulting from my actions levelled my entire building and caused serious damage to those nearby. When the emergency services arrived, they had found my body in the rubble and very nearly pronounced me DOA before one of the more astute paramedics noticed a very faint pulse. Despite having a body temperature of -7 degrees and a thin layer of frost covering my body, I was remarkably unharmed - the doctors reckoned that my body had gone into some kind of hibernative state during the explosion and subsequent building collapse, which had rendered me almost impervious to damage. A little background research identified the mystery canister as an experimental mutagen destined for the next generation of Paragon Protectors, apparently it was one of many tests that were discarded following unexpected, undesired or severely fatal experimental outcomes. I can tell you, it's quite a shock to be told that you've turned into a human ice cube, especially when it's not actually the most surprising thing to happen to you that day. A few hours after coming around, I sneezed - not inherently surprising, I must admit, but then sneezes rarely ignite spontaneously - and with a little subsequent experimentation discovered that I could conjure fire from my fingers, as well as my nose. They kept me in hospital for a couple of days under observation, before - rather disconcertingly - releasing me back into the wild, sans accommodation, or any possessions, and in need of some serious counselling. In any other city, I'd have spent the next few years on the freak show circuit, probably ending up doing kids parties, but this was Paragon City, where any nutjob with a strange mutation or madcap invention could be a hero and so I took it upon myself to register at City Hall and find myself a slightly more upmarket apartment in Atlas Park - after all, I was going to be a hero, I could afford such extravagances now. My first heroic act did not go quite as planned, the three Hellions who were in the process of mugging a police officer (Seriously, do the Paragon City police department have *any* function at all?), although slightly unnerved by the giant iceblock with flaming hands standing before them, still managed to beat me into submission and steal my wallet. Heroing really isn't quite as straightforward as the professionals make it look. I spent the next 6 months training and learning the ins and outs of my abilities, lowering myself to doing kids parties on the side to supplement my otherwise non-existent income. Using the money I'd made and with a little help from my friends still working at Crey Corp. I managed to put together a serviceable costume, which I'd hoped would make me a little more memorable to all the lucky people whose days I would be saving and after much deliberation, I decided on my new name, something short and simple - after all, what's the point in being a hero if nobody can remember who you are. Now I was ready, I had training, a tasteful costume, a rapier wit & plans to become unimaginably rich - with a first assignment in Outbreak under my belt, a Security Level of 1 and a few words of advice from Ms Liberty, I was ready to make my mark on history...
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