MoM App
〈 PLAYER INFO 〉
NAME: Marion
AGE: 18+
JOURNAL:![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
unification
IM / EMAIL: hopeverse (AIM)
PLURK:![[plurk.com profile]](https://plurk.com/favicon.ico)
infiniteprayer
RETURNING: No
〈 CHARACTER INFO 〉
CHARACTER NAME: Zod-Ur. The "Ur" part is never stated by him in dialogue, but I'm assuming it's his surname given his father is Jax-Ur. Naming traditions of Krypton have the second part of a name as the family name ("Kal-El" meaning Kal of House El.)
CHARACTER AGE: 13 years old. He's called a teenager a couple times in dialogue, but given his appearance it's safe to say he's a young one.
SERIES: DC Comics Earth-12. Specifically Justice League Beyond 2.0, which is a sequel to the original JL Beyond comic and takes place a year after that comic ends.
CHRONOLOGY: Justice League Beyond 2.0 #16, which translates into the end of Batman Beyond Universe #8 in print and the end of the "System Override" arc. Since JLB 2.0 is a Digital First comic I prefer to use the former as far as numbering.
CLASS: Hero, though with a slight Anti-Hero leaning because of his upbringing.
HOUSING: I'm ok with random and I'd prefer either Maurita Falls or De Chima for location. If neither of those work out then Heropa is ok.
BACKGROUND:
As a background to Beyond I'll link this, since the show acts as the setting of the comic as well. The comics are written keeping the DCAU/Timm-verse universe in mind and are set officially in Earth-12 according to DC's Multiversity guide. The comic makes frequent references to DCAU material and concepts as well, using the same base JL team from the Batman Beyond episode The Call while adding on new members in the comics. Zod is one of these new members. The main thing to know is that the year is currently 2042 and the future is a much more technologically advanced place than before. The majority of the standard Justice League have either passed away or retired, with only few exceptions. Of the original seven members of the JL only Superman remains on the team, with Batman, Wonder Woman, Flash, Green Lantern, Hawkgirl and Martian Manhunter either retired or deceased. Members like Big Barda and Mister Miracle are still on, while children of former League members like Aquagirl (Aquaman's daughter) and Warhawk (Green Lantern and Hawkgirl's son) taking after their parents.
Apart from the five mentioned above the other members are Batman (Terry McGinnis), Green Lantern (Kai-Ro), Flash (Danica Williams), Captain Marvel (Billy Batson) and Micron (no name given.) It's a relatively small League, though there are implied to be many reserve members who are called on if needed.
As for Zod himself, he is a new element in the comics and something of an outlier. He was raised in the Phantom Zone by the warlord Jax-Ur after being kidnapped by Brainiac, the former and now rogue supercomputer of Krypton, from his true parents: Justice Lord Superman of Earth-50 and Wonder Woman of Earth-12. Wonder Woman left Earth-12 to live in on Earth-50 after falling in love with Lord Batman, but in a bloody confrontation Lord Batman was killed by Lord Wonder Woman. Wonder Woman in turn killed Lord Wonder Woman in revenge. To quell what could be a war against rebels and supporters of the Lord's government, Lord Superman and Wonder Woman agreed to marry as a means of creating unity despite how much they loathed each other. Lord Superman wanted an heir for the future and Wonder Woman agreed, only because she wanted the child to grow to become better than his father with her influence and ideology taught to him. The two basically agreed to expose their child to both of their ideologies and see which he would chose and rule with when he came of age. During Brainiac's invasion of their world he kidnapped Zod, who was only recently born, and found a means of delivering him to Jax-Ur in the Phantom Zone.
However Zod doesn't know any of that at the time of point he's being pulled from. For the time being he assumes he is Jax-Ur's biological son and that his mother is just not around for whatever reason. Jax-Ur raised him with an iron fist and demanded complete loyalty, emotionally manipulating Zod's normally meek nature and even hitting him if he did not perform to expectations. Brainiac also altered Zod's mind with his technology and granted him latent technopathy powers, possibly increasing his overall intelligence as well. Growing up in the Phantom Zone meant growing up around the worst criminals of Krypton, who regularly scorned him but did not do much else because they regarded Jax-Ur as their leader. It wasn't a healthy or safe environment is the gist, but it was all that Zod knew and he considered it to be completely normal (though he still hated it, it was "normal" to him) until he met Superman and the Justice League.
Basically Superman went into the Phantom Zone to investigate new irregularities to his powers, which he believed were caused by someone inside that area, and he met Zod. It turns out Zod manipulated Kryptonian technology to crash into the sun, on Jax-Ur's orders, and caused it to affect the solar energy that Superman absorbed into his cells. Jax-Ur's plan was for Superman to enter the Phantom Zone and then use Zod to control his set of robot duplicates to get the projector to open again, allowing all the Kryptonian war criminals to escape to Earth and take it over. After a lengthy fight with Jax-Ur, which ended with the warlord being defeated, Superman offered to release Zod from the Phantom Zone because he was born and raised there and not a criminal placed inside. Despite the fear of his father still existing, Zod agreed to go with Superman and be free on Earth. When he announced his name was Zod some of the older league members became concerned, as he shares the name with the famous General Zod (who in Earth-12 is a famous traitor of Krypton's past, though was not sentenced to the Phantom Zone.) Zod is aware of a General Zod existing that he was named for, but is not fully aware of that Zod's actions that led him to be regarded as a traitor. Suffice to say, the canon makes clear that he is not in any way related to General Zod aside from the name.
There's not much time to breathe though. A short time after (about a week later I say) Brainiac launches an attack on Earth. His plan is to manipulate a technologically dependent Earth and essentially "become" the planet, by integrating himself into its entire mass. Zod plays a background role in the story, relegated to protecting the civilians who aren't brainwashed by Brainiac that Superman shelters in the Fortress of Solitude. The major role he does play before that happens is fooling Brainiac into giving him vital information on his plans, by pretending to betray the League after Brainiac tries to play on Zod's insecurities.
Overall he has a friendly relationship with the Justice League so far, as some openly say they consider him to be part of their family and trust him despite his origins. He regards them in similar, openly calling them his family to Brainiac, but is still trying to cope with a more normal and less threatening environment than the Phantom Zone. His most friendly relations are with the younger members of the team, such as Batman, Green Lantern, Flash and Captain Marvel though he also gets long well with Mister Miracle and Aquagirl. There is Superman of course, who thinks fondly of Zod and treats him similar to how he treated Kara Zor-El in the past. Basically like family, though not yet on the verge of a father-son relationship.
Some members are not so trusting. Warhawk and Bruce Wayne openly consider the possibility that Zod could be a traitor in waiting, but he tries not to let such suspicious opinions bother him. All he tries to be is as good a person as he can be, whether or not anyone around him wants to accept him as such.
PERSONALITY:
General Zod was a feared Kryptonian general of the past. Charismatic, commanding, and with large ego he had many ambitions to take over Krypton. What happened to the traitor who was caught by Krypton's council is never known, but his name lived on to his followers who considered him to be a powerful and ideal leader to help in expanding Krypton's rule over space. It is no surprise then that when Jax-Ur, another Kryptonian warlord and traitor who acted with General Zod's ambitions in mind, obtained a son of his own he named him after that same general. However if anything is clear about the child, the only firm relation Zod and General Zod share is their name.
Zod is shown early as a meek boy who was raised in the Phantom Zone his entire life, surrounded by Krypton's worst war criminals, with a father who intended to train him to become a powerful warrior much like his namesake was in the past. His meekness is not a result of his personality, but something that developed from the abusive environment he lived in and crippled his ability to socially develop. This is a child who has had no positive influence in his life before encountering the Justice League and normalized abuse because he could literally never be exposed to anything else, due to being trapped in the Phantom Zone. There were no friends or family or anyone who ever liked or loved him -- the only one who cared was his father, but only in the sense that Zod was useful to him. Though we don't get an in-depth description of Zod's life before Superman found him in the Phantom Zone, it is clear from the way Jax-Ur treats Zod in a few short issues that there is no real love between the two. Zod fears his father and his fear is why he obeys his father's will - throwing a satellite into the sun, controlling Superman's robot duplicates, all done because he's afraid of the consequences if he didn't. Jax-Ur saw Zod not as a son, but as someone to raise in the image he desired and demanded for his own plans to take over Earth.
That's not to say he doesn't hope for something different, just because he normalized Jax-Ur's abusiveness and his situation as "just the way things are." He didn't want to be in the Phantom Zone and would often question if his father really cared and loved him, but what exactly could he do? There's no way to escape the Zone and, the way he rationalized it, being the son of a criminal could be offense enough to justify him being there. The only thing he could do was accept his life as it was and follow his father's orders to avoid being hurt by someone obviously stronger than him. With every act of aggression made, Zod believed for a long time that his father's abuse came because of his disobedience and weakness. That not being prone to aggression or anger made him weak and that the abuse would stop if he obeyed and became stronger. While his father did not love him and Zod knew it, he still wanted his father's approval in some small way. It was only after leaving did he fully realize that he really was just a pawn, a cog in Jax-Ur's plans, and that there was never any hope for approval or love.
Against all his expectations, Superman offers to free Zod from the Phantom Zone and the League takes him in readily as a new family. The idea of the Justice League, especially Superman, wanting to bring him to Earth confounds him completely. His father had always told him that Superman was his enemy and he accepted that as the truth, because to question otherwise would lead to getting yelled at and hit. When Jax-Ur stops attacking Superman to hit him for hesitating to kill Flash with a Superman robot, Superman comes to his defense immediately and protects him. That someone would stand up for him shocks him, because why would someone Jax-Ur claimed to be an enemy defend him? The majority of the League treat him with unconditional kindness and it's nice, but tense because he has no idea how to take such positive outlooks on him. He's never been treated kindly and it shows from his pensive looks, the way he interprets a prank as punishment for a small mistake, and the way he stares longingly at a father playing with his children in the snow.
He doesn't have much time to adopt to this new life before Brainiac attacks, but it's in that story that the other parts of his personality that were suppressed by fear of abuse begin to show. While he is still meek at times, he is also grows to be more outspoken when he feels his voice needs to be heard and is shown to be clever and stubborn as well. As the story progresses and the situation goes from bad to even worse he become notably short-spoken with Warhawk, dismissing the hero's suspicions of him being a traitor, where before he tolerated and lowered his head when they were made. He engages with Brainiac and shows that he can be fairly deceptive as well, making Brainiac believe that he bought into the lies about the League not caring about him in order to get information. It would have been easy to believe Brainiac's manipulative lies, all of which played on his insecurities, but he does genuinely trust the League because they're the first good thing to ever happen to him. The first people to care about him and not want to use or hurt him. He openly calls them his family and doesn't want that to change. Though he is new to fighting evil with the League he seeks to prove that he is worthy of being among them and even accepts Warhawk's rare praise with a wide smile, despite the earlier tension between them. Deep down Zod craves the approval of others, especially the League, because he wants to be accepted and thought of as a worthy hero to the people who essentially adopted him.
Still there is a darker side to Zod that comes from how he was raised. Though he seems meek and easy to takedown, he still had to adapt to living in the harsh environment he was raised in. Jax-Ur taught him how to fight, though only with his fists because the Zone restricted all of the powers they get them absorbing solar energy, and Zod isn't afraid to get rough in a fight. He is not a natural optimist and usually expects the worst and prepares for it because he is a survivalist at heart, having to defend himself from crazed war criminals and his father's beating his entire life. Simply put, he is not ignorant to the horrors of the life he lived and has learned many lessons from them, both good and bad. He learned it's easier to stay quiet and observe before speaking, than open yourself up if you aren't ready for the damage that could come. He also learned that being weak is to invite punishment and death, though he still doesn't believe in killing people as seen when he couldn't bring himself to kill Flash.
Though it hasn't happened yet from the time he's being pulled from, when Zod learns the truth of his origins during the Lord arc he snaps into complete anger, which is absolutely a shift from how reserved and quiet he normally is. It confirms everything both thought and feared: that he was not only raised as a pawn, but born as one too. Born to be a political tool for his biological parents and then raised to be a weapon in his adopted father's ambitions for domination. Even when Wonder Woman apologies to him for it, he doesn't accept her apology and refutes her as his mother and any attempt she makes at atonement. It's not because he doesn't think she's apologetic, but because he doesn't want people to cry about their problems when he was raised around murderers and grew up in a prison his whole life. That he was born to be part of an ideological war that he had no part of, and then given to a man who abused and instilled fear in him for so long -- he sees no reason to grant her pity or take her apology because it won't change what happened to him. He doesn't want to accept her apology and make her feel better because he thinks she deserves to not have closure or forgiveness for trying to use him, just in a different way than he ultimately was used. It is not something he does out of cruelty, but an anger that still rages inside him for all the suffering and abuse he went through.
And that's the crux of Zod's main motivation in life -- freedom. He wants to be free. Free to live a real life, leaving the horrible past he had behind. He doesn't want to be constrained or defined by what his father did or what his biological parents wanted, he wants to do what he wants. Not to be a pawn of other people, but to make his own decisions and live without fear. For so long he lived with fear and abuse and it crippled him emotionally for a very long time. Though it'll never go away and there are things he still has to teach himself to not do, like apologizing for the most minor infractions or learning to have a sense of humor, he wants to have a better life now that he can. The freedom he dreamed of has been granted and he wants to dedicate it to doing what he wants. To being happy and not having to do something solely because other people want him to do it. While he has a lot of learning ahead of him and there are still many behaviors that stick with him from the situation he was in, Zod has a personal sense of pride that he can express for the first time and wants to be someone that he can be proud of.
POWER:
Solar Energy Absorption: Much like Superman, Zod can absorb the rays of the sun and his body is super-charged by them and give him a number of powers from it. He has super strength, has skin that can deflect bullets and take a lot of damage before it begins to hurt, has heat and x-ray vision and can fly. Since he is young and has only just begun to be exposed to the sun as of very recent, his powers are still fairly underdeveloped and haven't been used much. He shows little issue using these powers despite being new to them.
As a Kryptonian he has an assumed negative reaction to Kryptonite, a radioactive material that weakens him quickly when in his presence and could kill him through prolonged exposure. Also weak to magic because magic is basically the strongest type of power in DC Comics and even Superman isn't very resistant to it, so I'll assume the same for Zod. Naturally his powers cannot work in places where he can't soak up solar energy into his cells. He may be able to use his powers for a short time, but once his cells have burned out the energy in them he won't have them until he gets back under sunlight.
Technopathy: Unique to Zod compared to other Kryptonians, he has the ability to control technology due to Brainiac altering his mind as a baby. Demonstrations of his power include hurdling an old Kryptonian satellite into the sun, controlling Superman's robots and making them act to his will and making old pieces of metal hover in the air by controlling electric impulses. It's inferred that he controls things outside of the Phantom Zone thanks to a monitor that Brainiac installed showing visuals from Earth, which means Zod can control the machines he uses just by being able to see them in some capacity. He even manages to connect with Brainiac's systems and receive some important information on his plans before breaking control with ease, so it's safe to say he can also mentally absorb information from technology too. This is a power he has been trained in for a long time, considering he can juggle controlling multiple Superman robots at once and make them all fight uniquely to what he wants them to do.
Now because this power is kind of unusable in the setting as the canon defines it (i.e. limited only to Kryptonian technology), I want to modestly boost his power using game mechanics so that it has some functional use in the game. In addition to Kryptonian tech he can also control Earth technology, though not any technology that doesn't originate from those two worlds. He can make machines turn on and off like flicking a switch, and retain his ability to absorb computerized data by touching a machine that has it via assimilation similar to what Brainiac does. So if he touched a phone he could absorb all the messages and numbers stored on it, or touching a computer would let him sort and download any information from it into his mind. The process would not be automatic and the easiest comparison to make is a computer downloading a file from the internet - it'll take a measurable amount of time dependent on how much information he's downloading into his mind and too much at once will not be feasible without proper training.
I'm fine with blocking the info absorption so he can't just grab sensitive government information that could break the game, unless done with explicit permission, and I'll seek player permission as well if he has the ability to control something they have or absorb data that they would rather he not. I'd also like his technopathy to let him unlock encrypted conversations on the network, with permission from the player(s) in question.
〈 CHARACTER SAMPLES 〉
COMMUNITY POST (VOICE) SAMPLE: Testdrive thread. If there's not enough I also have a couple meme threads.
LOGS POST (PROSE) SAMPLE:
'Focus on the target. Picture manipulating it to your whims only with the use of your mind. Then force it to do so in reality.'
That was one of the many ill-advised lines his father bore into his head since he was young, always before he began practicing his telekinetic powers. Back then it gave him a headache, even with the headband amplifying his latent powers, but he tried to push the dull pain back. Years later it doesn't hurt anymore, but the memory is still uncomfortable. Still he pushes that back the same way he pushed back that dull throb.
Tonight he practices on the cars outside his home, making sure everyone in the house is either out or asleep before going outside. None of them are his of course, but he wishes to see how much he can control them from just looking at one from the outside. He recognizes the legality of it is dubious, but it's at night and he thinks the police would have better things to do anyway. Enough crime goes on here to keep them occupied from the looks of it and night in particular is active. ...Besides, it isn't like he's really going to be stealing it. Just making it turn on.
Slowly he draws a breath and focuses on a dark red car, mentally tapping into the inner-mechanics of the machine. Gently is mind moves it and pushes it to pulsate to activation and the machine responds with a rumble of the engine coming to life. One step. Next he tries to make other parts it move. The blinkers turn on without trouble, the bright blaring lights almost resembling a large pair of mechanical eyes, and the inside lights within the car click on to illuminate the cushy inside. The hover mechanic switches into gear and the car lifts from the sidewalk a couple inches. For a moment he loses focus and the windshield wipers briefly turn on. Zod quickly works to regain control and turns them off.
His mind maps the machine and analyzes the cogs and wires he can turn and send flickers through. However that only lasts for a moment before he lets it go, tuning out his mind and letting the car turn off. It gently thuds back down to the ground and the engine shuts down, alongside the blinkers and inner lights. Once it's fully gone he sucks in and lets out a deep breath, the weight of the car's machinations no longer on his mind. Even for how much he hates his father, he can't say the callous way he told him to use his powers weren't helpful to some small degree. It's a matter of the application - for good or evil.
FINAL NOTES: As far as inventory goes, I'd like Zod to have both his hero outfit and Kryptonian-styled garb brought with him. Additionally I want to request his Brainiac headgear come with him as well, even though he left it in the Phantom Zone. He won't be inclined to wear the headgear for a while, but its designed to boost his latent technopath powers. It isn't physically in his possession anymore, so if that's a problem then I'm cool with it not being brought.
NAME: Marion
AGE: 18+
JOURNAL:
unificationIM / EMAIL: hopeverse (AIM)
PLURK:
RETURNING: No
〈 CHARACTER INFO 〉
CHARACTER NAME: Zod-Ur. The "Ur" part is never stated by him in dialogue, but I'm assuming it's his surname given his father is Jax-Ur. Naming traditions of Krypton have the second part of a name as the family name ("Kal-El" meaning Kal of House El.)
CHARACTER AGE: 13 years old. He's called a teenager a couple times in dialogue, but given his appearance it's safe to say he's a young one.
SERIES: DC Comics Earth-12. Specifically Justice League Beyond 2.0, which is a sequel to the original JL Beyond comic and takes place a year after that comic ends.
CHRONOLOGY: Justice League Beyond 2.0 #16, which translates into the end of Batman Beyond Universe #8 in print and the end of the "System Override" arc. Since JLB 2.0 is a Digital First comic I prefer to use the former as far as numbering.
CLASS: Hero, though with a slight Anti-Hero leaning because of his upbringing.
HOUSING: I'm ok with random and I'd prefer either Maurita Falls or De Chima for location. If neither of those work out then Heropa is ok.
BACKGROUND:
As a background to Beyond I'll link this, since the show acts as the setting of the comic as well. The comics are written keeping the DCAU/Timm-verse universe in mind and are set officially in Earth-12 according to DC's Multiversity guide. The comic makes frequent references to DCAU material and concepts as well, using the same base JL team from the Batman Beyond episode The Call while adding on new members in the comics. Zod is one of these new members. The main thing to know is that the year is currently 2042 and the future is a much more technologically advanced place than before. The majority of the standard Justice League have either passed away or retired, with only few exceptions. Of the original seven members of the JL only Superman remains on the team, with Batman, Wonder Woman, Flash, Green Lantern, Hawkgirl and Martian Manhunter either retired or deceased. Members like Big Barda and Mister Miracle are still on, while children of former League members like Aquagirl (Aquaman's daughter) and Warhawk (Green Lantern and Hawkgirl's son) taking after their parents.
Apart from the five mentioned above the other members are Batman (Terry McGinnis), Green Lantern (Kai-Ro), Flash (Danica Williams), Captain Marvel (Billy Batson) and Micron (no name given.) It's a relatively small League, though there are implied to be many reserve members who are called on if needed.
As for Zod himself, he is a new element in the comics and something of an outlier. He was raised in the Phantom Zone by the warlord Jax-Ur after being kidnapped by Brainiac, the former and now rogue supercomputer of Krypton, from his true parents: Justice Lord Superman of Earth-50 and Wonder Woman of Earth-12. Wonder Woman left Earth-12 to live in on Earth-50 after falling in love with Lord Batman, but in a bloody confrontation Lord Batman was killed by Lord Wonder Woman. Wonder Woman in turn killed Lord Wonder Woman in revenge. To quell what could be a war against rebels and supporters of the Lord's government, Lord Superman and Wonder Woman agreed to marry as a means of creating unity despite how much they loathed each other. Lord Superman wanted an heir for the future and Wonder Woman agreed, only because she wanted the child to grow to become better than his father with her influence and ideology taught to him. The two basically agreed to expose their child to both of their ideologies and see which he would chose and rule with when he came of age. During Brainiac's invasion of their world he kidnapped Zod, who was only recently born, and found a means of delivering him to Jax-Ur in the Phantom Zone.
However Zod doesn't know any of that at the time of point he's being pulled from. For the time being he assumes he is Jax-Ur's biological son and that his mother is just not around for whatever reason. Jax-Ur raised him with an iron fist and demanded complete loyalty, emotionally manipulating Zod's normally meek nature and even hitting him if he did not perform to expectations. Brainiac also altered Zod's mind with his technology and granted him latent technopathy powers, possibly increasing his overall intelligence as well. Growing up in the Phantom Zone meant growing up around the worst criminals of Krypton, who regularly scorned him but did not do much else because they regarded Jax-Ur as their leader. It wasn't a healthy or safe environment is the gist, but it was all that Zod knew and he considered it to be completely normal (though he still hated it, it was "normal" to him) until he met Superman and the Justice League.
Basically Superman went into the Phantom Zone to investigate new irregularities to his powers, which he believed were caused by someone inside that area, and he met Zod. It turns out Zod manipulated Kryptonian technology to crash into the sun, on Jax-Ur's orders, and caused it to affect the solar energy that Superman absorbed into his cells. Jax-Ur's plan was for Superman to enter the Phantom Zone and then use Zod to control his set of robot duplicates to get the projector to open again, allowing all the Kryptonian war criminals to escape to Earth and take it over. After a lengthy fight with Jax-Ur, which ended with the warlord being defeated, Superman offered to release Zod from the Phantom Zone because he was born and raised there and not a criminal placed inside. Despite the fear of his father still existing, Zod agreed to go with Superman and be free on Earth. When he announced his name was Zod some of the older league members became concerned, as he shares the name with the famous General Zod (who in Earth-12 is a famous traitor of Krypton's past, though was not sentenced to the Phantom Zone.) Zod is aware of a General Zod existing that he was named for, but is not fully aware of that Zod's actions that led him to be regarded as a traitor. Suffice to say, the canon makes clear that he is not in any way related to General Zod aside from the name.
There's not much time to breathe though. A short time after (about a week later I say) Brainiac launches an attack on Earth. His plan is to manipulate a technologically dependent Earth and essentially "become" the planet, by integrating himself into its entire mass. Zod plays a background role in the story, relegated to protecting the civilians who aren't brainwashed by Brainiac that Superman shelters in the Fortress of Solitude. The major role he does play before that happens is fooling Brainiac into giving him vital information on his plans, by pretending to betray the League after Brainiac tries to play on Zod's insecurities.
Overall he has a friendly relationship with the Justice League so far, as some openly say they consider him to be part of their family and trust him despite his origins. He regards them in similar, openly calling them his family to Brainiac, but is still trying to cope with a more normal and less threatening environment than the Phantom Zone. His most friendly relations are with the younger members of the team, such as Batman, Green Lantern, Flash and Captain Marvel though he also gets long well with Mister Miracle and Aquagirl. There is Superman of course, who thinks fondly of Zod and treats him similar to how he treated Kara Zor-El in the past. Basically like family, though not yet on the verge of a father-son relationship.
Some members are not so trusting. Warhawk and Bruce Wayne openly consider the possibility that Zod could be a traitor in waiting, but he tries not to let such suspicious opinions bother him. All he tries to be is as good a person as he can be, whether or not anyone around him wants to accept him as such.
PERSONALITY:
General Zod was a feared Kryptonian general of the past. Charismatic, commanding, and with large ego he had many ambitions to take over Krypton. What happened to the traitor who was caught by Krypton's council is never known, but his name lived on to his followers who considered him to be a powerful and ideal leader to help in expanding Krypton's rule over space. It is no surprise then that when Jax-Ur, another Kryptonian warlord and traitor who acted with General Zod's ambitions in mind, obtained a son of his own he named him after that same general. However if anything is clear about the child, the only firm relation Zod and General Zod share is their name.
Zod is shown early as a meek boy who was raised in the Phantom Zone his entire life, surrounded by Krypton's worst war criminals, with a father who intended to train him to become a powerful warrior much like his namesake was in the past. His meekness is not a result of his personality, but something that developed from the abusive environment he lived in and crippled his ability to socially develop. This is a child who has had no positive influence in his life before encountering the Justice League and normalized abuse because he could literally never be exposed to anything else, due to being trapped in the Phantom Zone. There were no friends or family or anyone who ever liked or loved him -- the only one who cared was his father, but only in the sense that Zod was useful to him. Though we don't get an in-depth description of Zod's life before Superman found him in the Phantom Zone, it is clear from the way Jax-Ur treats Zod in a few short issues that there is no real love between the two. Zod fears his father and his fear is why he obeys his father's will - throwing a satellite into the sun, controlling Superman's robot duplicates, all done because he's afraid of the consequences if he didn't. Jax-Ur saw Zod not as a son, but as someone to raise in the image he desired and demanded for his own plans to take over Earth.
That's not to say he doesn't hope for something different, just because he normalized Jax-Ur's abusiveness and his situation as "just the way things are." He didn't want to be in the Phantom Zone and would often question if his father really cared and loved him, but what exactly could he do? There's no way to escape the Zone and, the way he rationalized it, being the son of a criminal could be offense enough to justify him being there. The only thing he could do was accept his life as it was and follow his father's orders to avoid being hurt by someone obviously stronger than him. With every act of aggression made, Zod believed for a long time that his father's abuse came because of his disobedience and weakness. That not being prone to aggression or anger made him weak and that the abuse would stop if he obeyed and became stronger. While his father did not love him and Zod knew it, he still wanted his father's approval in some small way. It was only after leaving did he fully realize that he really was just a pawn, a cog in Jax-Ur's plans, and that there was never any hope for approval or love.
Against all his expectations, Superman offers to free Zod from the Phantom Zone and the League takes him in readily as a new family. The idea of the Justice League, especially Superman, wanting to bring him to Earth confounds him completely. His father had always told him that Superman was his enemy and he accepted that as the truth, because to question otherwise would lead to getting yelled at and hit. When Jax-Ur stops attacking Superman to hit him for hesitating to kill Flash with a Superman robot, Superman comes to his defense immediately and protects him. That someone would stand up for him shocks him, because why would someone Jax-Ur claimed to be an enemy defend him? The majority of the League treat him with unconditional kindness and it's nice, but tense because he has no idea how to take such positive outlooks on him. He's never been treated kindly and it shows from his pensive looks, the way he interprets a prank as punishment for a small mistake, and the way he stares longingly at a father playing with his children in the snow.
He doesn't have much time to adopt to this new life before Brainiac attacks, but it's in that story that the other parts of his personality that were suppressed by fear of abuse begin to show. While he is still meek at times, he is also grows to be more outspoken when he feels his voice needs to be heard and is shown to be clever and stubborn as well. As the story progresses and the situation goes from bad to even worse he become notably short-spoken with Warhawk, dismissing the hero's suspicions of him being a traitor, where before he tolerated and lowered his head when they were made. He engages with Brainiac and shows that he can be fairly deceptive as well, making Brainiac believe that he bought into the lies about the League not caring about him in order to get information. It would have been easy to believe Brainiac's manipulative lies, all of which played on his insecurities, but he does genuinely trust the League because they're the first good thing to ever happen to him. The first people to care about him and not want to use or hurt him. He openly calls them his family and doesn't want that to change. Though he is new to fighting evil with the League he seeks to prove that he is worthy of being among them and even accepts Warhawk's rare praise with a wide smile, despite the earlier tension between them. Deep down Zod craves the approval of others, especially the League, because he wants to be accepted and thought of as a worthy hero to the people who essentially adopted him.
Still there is a darker side to Zod that comes from how he was raised. Though he seems meek and easy to takedown, he still had to adapt to living in the harsh environment he was raised in. Jax-Ur taught him how to fight, though only with his fists because the Zone restricted all of the powers they get them absorbing solar energy, and Zod isn't afraid to get rough in a fight. He is not a natural optimist and usually expects the worst and prepares for it because he is a survivalist at heart, having to defend himself from crazed war criminals and his father's beating his entire life. Simply put, he is not ignorant to the horrors of the life he lived and has learned many lessons from them, both good and bad. He learned it's easier to stay quiet and observe before speaking, than open yourself up if you aren't ready for the damage that could come. He also learned that being weak is to invite punishment and death, though he still doesn't believe in killing people as seen when he couldn't bring himself to kill Flash.
Though it hasn't happened yet from the time he's being pulled from, when Zod learns the truth of his origins during the Lord arc he snaps into complete anger, which is absolutely a shift from how reserved and quiet he normally is. It confirms everything both thought and feared: that he was not only raised as a pawn, but born as one too. Born to be a political tool for his biological parents and then raised to be a weapon in his adopted father's ambitions for domination. Even when Wonder Woman apologies to him for it, he doesn't accept her apology and refutes her as his mother and any attempt she makes at atonement. It's not because he doesn't think she's apologetic, but because he doesn't want people to cry about their problems when he was raised around murderers and grew up in a prison his whole life. That he was born to be part of an ideological war that he had no part of, and then given to a man who abused and instilled fear in him for so long -- he sees no reason to grant her pity or take her apology because it won't change what happened to him. He doesn't want to accept her apology and make her feel better because he thinks she deserves to not have closure or forgiveness for trying to use him, just in a different way than he ultimately was used. It is not something he does out of cruelty, but an anger that still rages inside him for all the suffering and abuse he went through.
And that's the crux of Zod's main motivation in life -- freedom. He wants to be free. Free to live a real life, leaving the horrible past he had behind. He doesn't want to be constrained or defined by what his father did or what his biological parents wanted, he wants to do what he wants. Not to be a pawn of other people, but to make his own decisions and live without fear. For so long he lived with fear and abuse and it crippled him emotionally for a very long time. Though it'll never go away and there are things he still has to teach himself to not do, like apologizing for the most minor infractions or learning to have a sense of humor, he wants to have a better life now that he can. The freedom he dreamed of has been granted and he wants to dedicate it to doing what he wants. To being happy and not having to do something solely because other people want him to do it. While he has a lot of learning ahead of him and there are still many behaviors that stick with him from the situation he was in, Zod has a personal sense of pride that he can express for the first time and wants to be someone that he can be proud of.
POWER:
Solar Energy Absorption: Much like Superman, Zod can absorb the rays of the sun and his body is super-charged by them and give him a number of powers from it. He has super strength, has skin that can deflect bullets and take a lot of damage before it begins to hurt, has heat and x-ray vision and can fly. Since he is young and has only just begun to be exposed to the sun as of very recent, his powers are still fairly underdeveloped and haven't been used much. He shows little issue using these powers despite being new to them.
As a Kryptonian he has an assumed negative reaction to Kryptonite, a radioactive material that weakens him quickly when in his presence and could kill him through prolonged exposure. Also weak to magic because magic is basically the strongest type of power in DC Comics and even Superman isn't very resistant to it, so I'll assume the same for Zod. Naturally his powers cannot work in places where he can't soak up solar energy into his cells. He may be able to use his powers for a short time, but once his cells have burned out the energy in them he won't have them until he gets back under sunlight.
Technopathy: Unique to Zod compared to other Kryptonians, he has the ability to control technology due to Brainiac altering his mind as a baby. Demonstrations of his power include hurdling an old Kryptonian satellite into the sun, controlling Superman's robots and making them act to his will and making old pieces of metal hover in the air by controlling electric impulses. It's inferred that he controls things outside of the Phantom Zone thanks to a monitor that Brainiac installed showing visuals from Earth, which means Zod can control the machines he uses just by being able to see them in some capacity. He even manages to connect with Brainiac's systems and receive some important information on his plans before breaking control with ease, so it's safe to say he can also mentally absorb information from technology too. This is a power he has been trained in for a long time, considering he can juggle controlling multiple Superman robots at once and make them all fight uniquely to what he wants them to do.
Now because this power is kind of unusable in the setting as the canon defines it (i.e. limited only to Kryptonian technology), I want to modestly boost his power using game mechanics so that it has some functional use in the game. In addition to Kryptonian tech he can also control Earth technology, though not any technology that doesn't originate from those two worlds. He can make machines turn on and off like flicking a switch, and retain his ability to absorb computerized data by touching a machine that has it via assimilation similar to what Brainiac does. So if he touched a phone he could absorb all the messages and numbers stored on it, or touching a computer would let him sort and download any information from it into his mind. The process would not be automatic and the easiest comparison to make is a computer downloading a file from the internet - it'll take a measurable amount of time dependent on how much information he's downloading into his mind and too much at once will not be feasible without proper training.
I'm fine with blocking the info absorption so he can't just grab sensitive government information that could break the game, unless done with explicit permission, and I'll seek player permission as well if he has the ability to control something they have or absorb data that they would rather he not. I'd also like his technopathy to let him unlock encrypted conversations on the network, with permission from the player(s) in question.
〈 CHARACTER SAMPLES 〉
COMMUNITY POST (VOICE) SAMPLE: Testdrive thread. If there's not enough I also have a couple meme threads.
LOGS POST (PROSE) SAMPLE:
'Focus on the target. Picture manipulating it to your whims only with the use of your mind. Then force it to do so in reality.'
That was one of the many ill-advised lines his father bore into his head since he was young, always before he began practicing his telekinetic powers. Back then it gave him a headache, even with the headband amplifying his latent powers, but he tried to push the dull pain back. Years later it doesn't hurt anymore, but the memory is still uncomfortable. Still he pushes that back the same way he pushed back that dull throb.
Tonight he practices on the cars outside his home, making sure everyone in the house is either out or asleep before going outside. None of them are his of course, but he wishes to see how much he can control them from just looking at one from the outside. He recognizes the legality of it is dubious, but it's at night and he thinks the police would have better things to do anyway. Enough crime goes on here to keep them occupied from the looks of it and night in particular is active. ...Besides, it isn't like he's really going to be stealing it. Just making it turn on.
Slowly he draws a breath and focuses on a dark red car, mentally tapping into the inner-mechanics of the machine. Gently is mind moves it and pushes it to pulsate to activation and the machine responds with a rumble of the engine coming to life. One step. Next he tries to make other parts it move. The blinkers turn on without trouble, the bright blaring lights almost resembling a large pair of mechanical eyes, and the inside lights within the car click on to illuminate the cushy inside. The hover mechanic switches into gear and the car lifts from the sidewalk a couple inches. For a moment he loses focus and the windshield wipers briefly turn on. Zod quickly works to regain control and turns them off.
His mind maps the machine and analyzes the cogs and wires he can turn and send flickers through. However that only lasts for a moment before he lets it go, tuning out his mind and letting the car turn off. It gently thuds back down to the ground and the engine shuts down, alongside the blinkers and inner lights. Once it's fully gone he sucks in and lets out a deep breath, the weight of the car's machinations no longer on his mind. Even for how much he hates his father, he can't say the callous way he told him to use his powers weren't helpful to some small degree. It's a matter of the application - for good or evil.
FINAL NOTES: As far as inventory goes, I'd like Zod to have both his hero outfit and Kryptonian-styled garb brought with him. Additionally I want to request his Brainiac headgear come with him as well, even though he left it in the Phantom Zone. He won't be inclined to wear the headgear for a while, but its designed to boost his latent technopath powers. It isn't physically in his possession anymore, so if that's a problem then I'm cool with it not being brought.
