Reichsmaiden
From Unofficial Handbook of the Virtue Universe
[Reconstruction and Ret-Conning Underway to reboot character history]
Does evil ever truly leave your soul? Is it possible, no matter the sin or tragedy, to move on and become a hero? These are the questions asked by Reichsmaiden, both by measure of her existence and by her own mind.
| |
| Reichsmaiden | |
| Reichsmaiden | |
| Player: @Project Cobalt | |
| Origin: | Science |
|---|---|
| Archetype: | Tanker |
| Security Level: | Changing Constantly (Hopefully) |
| Personal Data | |
| Real Name: | Ilsa Austerlitz |
| Known Aliases: | The Aryan Angel, The Fascist Rose |
| Species: | Human |
| Age: | 19 Physically, 70 Mentally |
| Height: | 5' 11 |
| Weight: | 195 lbs. |
| Eye Color: | Blue |
| Hair Color: | Blonde |
| Biographical Data | |
| Nationality: | German |
| Occupation: | Hero, Soldier, Fugitive |
| Place of Birth: | Vienna, Austria |
| Base of Operations: | Paragon City, Rhode Island |
| Marital Status: | None |
| Known Relatives: | Gretel Austerlitz (Daughter, Believed Deceased) |
| Known Powers | |
| Super Strength, Invulnerability, Ageless Body, Flight | |
| Known Abilities | |
| Fluent in several languages, tactical knowledge, combative technical prowess | |
| Equipment | |
| Personal Communicator, Utility Belt | |
| No additional information available. | |
Contents |
[edit] Character History
[edit] "I do not want to be the Hero..."
The woman known to very few as Ilsa Austerlitz was born in January of 1938, and by the end of February, was physically a woman of nineteen years of age. Born of two parents gifted with the position as sires to the Master Aryan Race, Ilsa was raised in a sterile laboratory environment, and grew up incredibly quickly thanks to highly advanced Nazi Scientists and genetic splicing.
By the spring of 1939, Ilsa was fighting in Poland and easing into her role as figurehead for the Third Reich's military efforts. For more than a year, she decimated all who stood against her and proved a devastating addition to an already frighteningly powerful war machine. But, in the late summer of 1940, the meta-humans of Great Britain had joined the war as well, and the Dawn Patrol faced down Reichsmaiden as one cohesive unit.
As she faced the onslaught of her most fearsome challenge, Reichsmaiden found an ally in Captain Axis - the Axis's answer to Statesman, and their most powerful weapon. When the Captain entered the fray, Dawn Patrol was forced to retreat, and Reichsmaiden gained a powerful and passionate friend. The two battled alongside each other off and on, with one premiere exception: Captain Axis would never attend social functions or society dinners. He was not interested in glory or wealth, but in Germany's survival and domination.
Within months, Reichsmaiden and her troops cut a swath to the heart of Great Britain and were poised to deliver the coup de grace to Germany's longest standing enemy. But, when she was nearing victory, Ilsa was called back to Germany on direct orders from the Fuhrer, who had designs on a special operation to end the war once and for all.
[edit] "...I simply do not want to be the villain."
The night of Reichsmaiden's final mission for Nazi Germany has since become the topic of legend. Was she killed by the Fuhrer, who feared her growing power? Was it British Secret Agents who wanted to topple the Nazis' Poster Child? Or, was it Captain Axis, who joined her on the mission and, when the dust had settled, was dead?
The truth in the matter is that the first two are accurate in part. Reichsmaiden returned to Germany to meet with the Fuhrer, once more relishing in the sights and sounds of her homeland. Traveling to meet the Fuhrer in the Death Camp of Auschwitz, Ilsa was exposed to the horrors of the Nazi's true intentions, memories which remain with her to this day.
Captain Axis and the Fuhrer awaited her arrival, and the two had already laid out their plan. The key to defeating the Russians, the only real remaining threat to Germany, was to strike at the heart of their secret Atomic Bomb development program. With their greatest weapon destroyed, Germany would simply march into Russia and take it by force.
Reichsmaiden and Captain Axis departed for Siberia immediately, rekindling their passionate friendship, and soon enough, love affair, before reaching their destination. When they touched down, the two found what they had feared: a complete and ready Atomic Bomb and a massive fortified fortress.
Sneaking into the facility, the two moved swiftly to the Atomic Bomb and disarmed it without being seen; a complex and intricate task, making it all the more impressive. Then, Reichsmaiden brazenly attacked out from the Atomic Bomb Laboratory, killing a large percentage of the Russian Guards before they even knew they were under attack.
Victorious without danger, Reichsmaiden and Captain Axis returned to find that their plane was bombed and destroyed. Stranded in Siberia, the two stole a Russian Plane and made it half-way to Germany before running out of fuel. From their crash-site, they resolved to move on foot to Germany.
It was then, that the true motives of the Fuhrer's plan revealed themselves. British Military, alerted to the attack on the Russian Base by an unknown source, moved north from their position to attack and capture Reichsmaiden and Captain Axis after a massive battle. The two were taken, blindfolded, gagged and bound, to a cemetery just outside of Warsaw.
In the dark of midnight and the uncertainty of defeat, Reichsmaiden was set afire by the British, who then, as she burned, shot and killed Captain Axis. When she had stopped burning, and would not die, the British resolved to torture her and bury her alive. And so, Reichsmaiden was left for dead, burned alive, shot dozens of times, and buried alive with the corpse of Captain Axis.
For sixty years, no one saw Reichsmaiden publicly, with history saying that she died during the war under unknown circumstances.
[edit] Rebirth
For what seemed like a dark and hellish eternity, Reichsmaiden was buried under several tons of earth. Deep under the ground, she struggled and fought to stay alive and sane, to stay focused on escape and to put from her mind that she was mere inches from the corpse of the only man she had ever loved.
For months, she clawed at the inside of the pine box she was imprisoned inside of, and finally she escaped. After a lengthy and bloody struggle, her fingers torn and bleeding, her face and body caked in blood and dirt and ashes, she emerged from under the mound of earth that the British had made her grave.
She lurched from the cemetary, limbs atrophied from months of disuse, and found her way slowly to a nearby village. The burnt remnants of her uniform were not enough to tip off the villagers, who welcomed her and gave her shelter, hiding her from those who might notice her re-emergence.
She remained in the village for months, becoming Ilsa Austerlitz more than Reichsmaiden, and finding a home and a surrogate family. But life was never so simple, and Reichsmaiden was her past and her identity - and it would catch up with her.
The CIA, having eyes and ears in Eastern Europe, heard tell of her awakening, and resolved to track her, capture her, and punish her for her crimes. Moving quickly, they struck the village she lived in, killing everyone and burning it to the ground to flush her out.
She fought them, butchering her would-be captors, and escaping. Ilsa Austerlitz was never the person that she could be - she always would be, and always must be, Reichsmaiden.
[edit] Sins of the Mother
Reichsmaiden crossed the Atlantic to escape the CIA's manhunt for her, ending her journey in Brazil. There, she discovered what had, due to her unique physiology, been a mystery up until that point. Due to her affair with Captain Axis, Reichsmaiden was pregnant.
Five months later, Ilsa gave birth to a daughter she named Gretel. For two years, Ilsa and Gretel fled the CIA, leaving a trail of broken would-be captors in their wake. Reichsmaiden would live and move among the people of South America for two years before the CIA tracked them down and trapped them in an inescapable situation.
Trapped within a burning mine-shaft as the CIA brought the walls down around them, Reichsmaiden sheltered Gretel and killed her way through the ranks of her captors to reach a jeep and escape. It was then that Reichsmaiden assured her status as a monster in both her own eyes, and those of her enemies.
Fleeing from the CIA, Reichsmaiden tossed whole pieces of the car to slow her captors or speed her escape. Then, when there was nothing left to throw, Ilsa saw her young daughter, frightened, holding onto her mother. Reichsmaiden's mind was torn between survival and her instincts as a mother, and her survival won out.
Gretel Austerlitz was nearly three years old in the year of 1948 when her mother threw her from the back of a speeding jeep. She died on impact to the ground, and Reichsmaiden will never forgive herself for Gretel's death.
After this, Reichsmaiden fought and hid for thirty years without being seen by anyone other than the CIA Agents she killed in retaliation. Her tactics increased in their brutality with each passing encounter, and soon enough, the CIA stopped hounding her. The exact details of the final encounter between Reichsmaiden and the CIA Anti-Superhuman Squad that was sent to find her are unknown, but the aftermath is certain.
On the morning of August 22nd, 1978, Agent Sean Flannery of the CIA received a transmission from one of his agents in the field who had gone to assure the safety of a squad they had lost contact with the previous night. What Flannery heard shook him to his very core.
"I... I don't even know how someone -could- do this... they're strung up in the trees.. and, oh god... I... she took them apart, sir. I.. I've -never- seen anything this horrible... Morrisey is... he's still -alive-... and he... oh god..."
The transmission was punctuated by a gunshot; the agent in the field taking his own life from the horror of what he had discovered.
[edit] Secret Life
Ilsa Austerlitz was not seen in public for the next twenty-seven years, living in South America and finding herself from coast to coast and, eventually, in America. She had a series of misadventures, none of which are known or contributed to her life or her personality in any way.
Then, in 2005, Reichsmaiden reappeared for the first time in decades, donning her uniform to fight crime in San Fransisco for time. Within a year, she had become a force to be reckoned with on the West Coast, and the scourge of several high-profile criminal syndicates deemed untouchable due to their political power and influence.
[edit] Personality
Reichsmaiden is stern and stoic on the outside; the perfect soldier who cares for nothing but the tactical solution and that she walks away from the fight with all of her team-mates intact if she can possibly help it.
Beneath the harsh facade lies a soulful and caring woman who can't help but try to solve other people's problems and be their shoulder to cry on. Reichsmaiden tries very hard to bear the burdens of others, and this usually winds her up in trouble with the very people she's trying to protect.
Ilsa also has a remarkable sense of humor, which is only shown explicitly to those very close to her. She is quite often seen as cold and harsh, but at times, when she feels most comfortable, she can be warm and bright individual with a truly caring spirit.
A large part of Reichsmaiden's identity is her search for redemption and the constant path of danger and tragedy it takes her on. She has many sins to answer for, and continually grapples with the idea that anyone, even someone who has committed as many atrocities as she has, can be redeemed. When she is alone at night after waking from another nightmare, she often wonders whether her quest for salvation is a vain pursuit, or if it's truly meaningful and worthwhile.
[edit] Combat Persona
What makes Reichsmaiden so dangerous and so nigh invincible is a combination of physical powers and mental training. In combat, Reichsmaiden is cold and calculating, believing firmly that a perfect soldier does what is necessary regardless of emotional involvement.
Reichsmaiden during combat is an emotionless weapon, a soldier of the highest calibre who does not question her actions and does whatever is necessary to win and achieve her goal. She will welcome the aid of team-mates and allies, but not at the expense of the tactical advantage. If she feels that a team-mate or ally is emotionally unstable or a danger to the mission or objective, Reichsmaiden will usually deny the team-mate the ability to participate, or filling that, incapacitate the team-mate until the mission is complete.
[edit] Politics
Reichsmaiden is, as one would expect, a fervent fascist supporter. That being said, her ideal fascist world order is one of "forced utopia" - the idea that when the right person or persons is in charge, and using their power fully and authoritatively, there exists no need for personal freedoms. She believes that the Nazi regime based on hate and destruction was a fool's errand, and that in order for Fascism to truly better mankind, it must be unbiased, totally equal control.
Whether Reichsmaiden believes deep down that she should be the one to rule such a Fascist State remains to be seen. Although she has often said she has no interest in leadership, she also has said that the ideal leader for the world order she wishes to establish would be a leader who could not die.
[edit] Powers and Abilities
[edit] Super-Powers
Thanks to the genetic splicing and other experiments performed on her, Reichsmaiden is physically a woman of nineteen permanently, and will never die of old age.
Reichsmaiden has natural resiliency greater than a hundred times that of a human being in peak physical condition. She has withstood tank blasts, torpedoes, being burned alive, the pressure of diving miles under the ocean's surface, and many more ordeals. As she gains more experience and undergoes more tests and missions, she gains more knowledge of her precise limits.
In addition to her vastly increased levels of resistance, Ilsa also is capable of lifting upwards of six metric tonnes in weight and ripping through almost any metal with the exception of impervium with relative ease. While her strength does not come simply, smaller feats of strength that seem incredible to others are mundane to her.
Other side effects of the experiments performed upon her by Nazi Scientists are the ability to fly under her own power, and the heightening of the senses of smelling, hearing, and sight.
[edit] Equipment and Abilities
Apart from her fantastic plethora of powers and heightened senses, Reichsmaiden was also given an incredibly complex and advanced Communicator, and several uniforms made of incredibly resistant materials, which she has since learned to replicate.
Also carried everywhere she goes is her utility belt, containing radio equipment, medical and surgery tools, a general purpose multi-tool and portable blow-torch, among other supplies.
Reichsmaiden is a tactical prodigy, and an incredibly skilled hand-to-hand combatant. She has been trained in a wide array of different martial arts and weapon forms, as well as having acquired a number of new disciplines during her time as a fugitive.
In addition to the sense of how to lead and how to think tactically, Reichsmaiden can also size up an opponent within minutes of meeting them - assess a weakness, and then use that weakness to destroy them. In any given situation, she has been capable of six-to-seven different strategies which will cause death, and a multitude of others that will cause pain or disable her opponent entirely.
[edit] Social Training
Reichsmaiden was, as a leading member of the German Military, part of a program to bring culture and propriety to the German Upper-Class. As such, she is a skilled dancer, musician, sportsman, and drink-mixer.
Reichsmaiden is a prima ballerina, an expert in many forms of classical dance, plays the Clarinet and Double Bass as well as the Violin. She is a skilled fencer, equestrian, and polo-player. She has a near encyclopedic knowledge of cocktail mixing and alchohols, although she rarely drinks.
[edit] Weaknesses
In all, Reichsmaiden has weaknesses like those of a normal human being; she can be gassed, suffocated, poisoned, and drowned. The difference comes from the fact that a massive application of each would be required to truly affect her.
[edit] Trivia
- Austerlitz is a name of Polish descent, meaning her parents were either Polish in origin, or that Reichsmaiden took the name as a pseudonym and has simply held onto it all these years.
- Reichsmaiden's Theme Song is "My List" by The Killers
- Inspirations for Reichsmaiden include Supergirl and Emma Frost, as well as Superman: Red Son, Jason Isaacs' character from The Patriot, and fellow City of Heroes characters Misako and Rhinemaiden.
Categories: Character | Hero | Tanker | Female | Incarcerated
