A young gunslinging vigilante, mainly devoted to breaking up gangs and organized crime; not so much the super-powered maniac set. Urban crimefighter just starting to make a name for himself, even though he seems to care less for publicity.
Personality
Rico is in many ways an incomplete person. He does not have many memories or experiences to use as a basis for judgements, so he sometimes makes snap judgements, or incorrect assumptions about common-place situations. He has enough basic info implanted in him or surviving from the quirky cloning process that he can get by in the normal world from day to day with little mishap - he just occassionally hits a snag.
His baseline is a brave and competant young dude with boundless confidence in himself and his abilities. He's not one for complex plans and long-term goals. In, Out, Accomplish the Mission Goals. That's his basic vision of life, writ large. It also means he needs some guidance and leadership. He's becomming more and more independent and capable of solo action, but it's been a hard several months of work to get that far.
Background
As far as Rico knows, his story is a simple if strange one: he was a normal athletic college dude until he was abducted and forced into a secret black ops genetics project. His genetic code was compatible with being grafted with animal DNA to produce a hybrid organism, with strength and fitness far beyond normal humans. He broke free of his captors' mind control on a mission, and he has been trying to put his life back together ever since. Seeing as he had these powers, it wasn't hard to convince him to become a costumed vigilante.
His DNA was tweaked considerably, bringing him close to the human ideal of strength and speed, with the full power of a grown Siberian Tiger on top of that.
The purpose was to create super-soldiers, but docile ones. The animal DNA supposedly opened them up to better training and less independent thought. That combined with conditioning to be servile and submissive ensured that this time, yes, this time, there would not be a horrible breakout where the subjects rebelled and destroyed everything.
Then there was a horrible breakout where the subjects rebelled and destroyed everything.
Rico returned from his mission, his mind once again his own, to find the Agenda base trashed and looted. He escaped the chaos and found himself on his own. He was able to find two of the Agenda mission caches, providing him with money, ID, and sufficient materials for a deep cover background -- but he knows it's just a fabrication. He also obtained weapons, materials for his hi-tech costume, and more.
He has vague memories of his previous life but nothing more. He's checked, and he's not in any of the missing persons databases. If anyone is still looking for a missing student, they stopped some time ago.
SKILLS
Burglary - Competent Level
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Firearms - Competent Level
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Martial Arts - Competent Level
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Military Lore - Competent Level
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ABILITIES
Tech: Costume - Enhanced Level
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Black Tiger's costume is a self-healing, semi-morphable nanotech carbon composite that provides enhance ballistic and blade protection, moderate protection against blunt trauma. The costume is 'smart' in that it can heal even major damage to itself, tighten and shift as needed to support broken bones or provide a tourniquet, etc. The costume provides some environmental protection (it can shift to a full bodyglove config), regulating heating and cooling, is resistant to acid, fire, and corrosive chemicals. It can shift to several predefined templates, usually: Costume, Casual, Formal, Uniform, Minimal, and Maximum coverage. Other templates can be installed but it takes some pretty sophisticated computer equipment to do that.
Tech: Guns - Enhanced Level
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Black Tiger normally carries two custom guns. Each is capable of adapting itself to multiple forms and types of standard and custom ammo. The normal type of ammo it uses is a caseless .306 caliber bullet. Other standard loads he uses are stun, electric, and glue, though others are available. Each gun also has a micro-launcher underneath to fire compact netting, large stun loads, and small custom grenade loads. Granades tend to he a sticky high-explosive, a sticky cutting charge, a sticky acid charge, and a high-grade electrical load capable of taking down an elephant, or disabling most vehicles that rely on an electrical system.
Tech: Mask - Enhanced Level
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Black Tiger's cowl has a high-range comm suite built in, so he can receive and transmit on most broadcast bands, and is equipped with multiple pinhole cameras for recording.
Power: Tiger-Endurance - Enhanced Level
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Black Tiger can endure hours of sustained physical effort before he begins to tire. His pain resistance is nothing short of incredible. While his healing ability is remarkable compared to a baseline human, he doesn't have 'regeneration'. His ability to resist poisons and drugs is significantly enhanced - it takes about five times the amount a normal human does to affect him.
Power: Tiger-Senses - Enhanced Level
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Black Tiger has animal-grade senses in the hearing/sight/smell groups. He has enhanced night vision that isn't affected by normal light.
Power: Tiger-Speed - Enhanced Level
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Black Tiger can run at 30-40 mph for short distances. He can run at top human speeds for an indefinite amount of time.
Power: Tiger-Strength - Enhanced Level
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Black Tiger can lift approximately 5,000 pounds with applied effort, break through a moderate brick wall with some sustained effort, or toss a small car. He can leap upwards approximately 30 feet or across at roughly double that with a running start.
ADVANTAGES
The variety of genetic cocktails and other treatments that gave him his powers falls under the generic term 'beast soldier serum'. This was an attempt to graft animal characteristics to a human frame, and it worked for the most part. It's main effects are detailed under powers, but the Serum also provides several small benefits. It greatly slows aging and greatly speeds healing and tissue growth. It makes the user almost immune to most diseases and poisons. He is immune to the effects of ionizing radiation, but he can still be burned by weaponized versions. He can operate at top efficiency for days at a time without sleep, food or water, though he requires all of these eventually. He can hold his breath for 20 minutes and still engage in strenuous physical activity. He has heightened senses, detailed elsewhere. He also has an almost perfect memory.
Much of Black Tiger's equipment is highly advanced technology. He obtained these from raiding Agenda mission caches hidden all over the world. The Agenda has a number of missing or forgotten caches of tech; some they know about, some they do not. Black Tiger knows the locations of some caches he has not raided yet, but those could be compromised, trapped, or empty if he uses that resource.
WEAKNESSES
All of Black Tiger's superhuman abilities come from the genetic cocktail known as the Beast-Soldier Serum, whereby humans were granted with enhanced animal traits. As such, his entire slate of super-human abilities can be reduced or removed by things that reduce or remove the Serum in his system. This also means others can gain various animal abilities by draining the Serum from him by means of draining his blood, sweat, semen, etc.
'Never create a weapon you cannot turn off' is a maxim of military tech development, and it goes double when you start making your own superhumans. Unknown to him, he's very susceptible to most forms of thought control, including hypnosis, telepathic invasion, etc. etc. He's also implanted with at least two code phrases: one that turns off his super-powers, and another that places him in a hyper-receptive state ready for mental programming. There are probably others. His imprinting was incomplete at best, so there are a lot of holes in his mind for people to exploit if they ever uncover certain classified documents about the process or his training. Somewhat of a mixed blessing, those same holes mean he can at least attempt to resist this weakness...for a short time.
As an Agenda operative, Black Tiger just had a lot number and various mission code names. Since his escape, Black Tiger has been trying to create a separate civilian ID of his own. He has the resources from a couple of Agenda mission caches, which let him create a solid enough ID that he can get a day job, at least. He wears a mask to protect that ID.
Black Tiger was created by The Agenda, using stolen or disabowed CADMUS genetic alteration technology. Anyone able to track CADMUS genetic anomolies would be able to track him. The Agenda frequently gets raided, almost destroyed, but always seems to bounce back. When they do so, they often try to recover their previous experiments and operatives, either to brainwash them again or to harvest them for future use. The Agenda is a secret and radical organization, with operatives, friends, and funding in unexpected places.
