Who are you? Joseph Achilles Leverett
xxxxx►►We'll call you... Samson
Aren't you a little young?
xxxxx 23
Under the Tights... Male
xxxxx►►Define Your Love Life as...
xxxxx Heterosexual.
If We Size You Up...
Politely stated: Bulky. Honestly stated: Overweight
What Do You Look Like Behind the Mask?
xxxxxHeight:
xxxxx 5'4”
xxxxxWeight:
xxxxx 210 lbs
xxxxxEyes:
xxxxx Brown
xxxxxHair:
xxxxx Brown
What's Your Style?
xxxxx
Joseph obviously wears clothing that is loose fitting and cheap. Not because of any particular need to hide his weight problem, but as a result of his powers. Most of his clothing is generic, consider blank T-shirts and khaki cargo pants. He doesn't like to stand out, and because of his simple clothing, he tends to succeed.
xxxxx►►What Defines You...
xxxxx
Other than his obvious weight problem, Joseph's palms and fingers are scarred red, as if he had rested them in a fire, gaining something close to second or even third degree burns. It is probably the most notable thing about him, enough so that he keeps his hands in his pockets as much as possible.
How Schooled Are You?
xxxxx
Went to private school in Europe, but never went into college. Not for any lack of skill or knowledge, just lack of motivation. Joseph has a fair mind for how the law works and some skill at planning and executing various jobs that encompass villainy, but he has never been anywhere near mastermind level.
Got a Day Job?
Joseph works at the local scrap yard. He is a one-man dismantler. His job tends towards taking apart the larger or more sturdy items that need less delicacy than, say, a mechanic, but are worth more in smaller parts rather than being crushed and remelted. He has been working there for two years and seems to enjoy the mindless monotony and relative safety for those around him.
Morals and Philosophy?
While Joseph might have been born in a world of superheroes and supervillains, he doesn't see anything but a universe of humanity. He doesn't particularly like society at large, but he accepts social norms when he can and does not have any desire for a world without law. Law and order separates society from animals. He is, by no means, a saint, but he gives to a couple of charities every year, helps people when they ask for directions, and even tips 20 percent. He doesn't believe in karma, or fate, or higher powers, just the social contract that binds people together in civilization.
He doesn't justify his actions to those who ask. He is a product of his environment and believes that, just as society is built to withstand the magnanimity of good Samaritans, society is built to withstand the criminal heart within any human. He does villainy because he feels it is just as much a part of him as is any goodhearted nature he has. It is allows him to strike out at a society who blesses some and curses others. He doesn't like to admit it either, but it is partially because he has been always been a bit too meek for his own good, and has always submitted to his mother's guidance.
On a day to day basis, Joseph is a relatively calm, friendly soul, if not particularly loquacious or outgoing. He doesn't accept offers from coworkers to go to lunch or bowling; he doesn't talk to his neighbors; he doesn't go to bars and look for dates. He will make the occasional joke or two, tending towards sardonic wry humor, more willing to be self-deprecating than make jokes about others.
What's So Super About You?
xxxxx
Joseph has super strength, simply stated. He can lift about three tons, and use that strength as any human could. The issue is rarely whether or not Joseph is strong enough in most cases.
The real issue is “Does Joseph have the leverage?” Joseph is strong enough to punch through a brick wall, yes. However, he does not have the traction to keep himself still. When he punches the wall straight on, his shoes slide on the concrete below him before the mortar and brick break. If he pounds down on the floor, it doesn't crack beneath him, he is launched upwards. Joseph is a slave to physics, and it is more often a burden than one might think. Joseph has found some ways of getting around this issue, but it usually involves thing such as weighting his “costume” or wearing leaden shoes at work.
Another prerequisite to his powers that he is extremely resilient and hard to hurt through pure physical blows. This means that his skeleton doesn't break when he cracks his knuckles, or he doesn't tear his skin when he stretches. He could take getting hit by a car going sixty well, without any broken bones. That is, of course, when he recovers from the concussion. Being shot is extremely unpleasant and certainly penetrates the skin, but not nearly as deeply as most humans, though it is certainly debilitating. He is not much more resistant to pain than most other heroes, so if he gets shot or hit somewhere delicate, he is going to sit down and stop fighting for a while.
xxxxx►►How'd You Get soo Special?
In the end, Joseph has no idea, himself. His mother never told him who his father was, and he had no interests in pursuing the issue himself. He might have inherited the powers genetically. The powers might have conceivably been a side effect of some of his mother's work, being a nominally well-known mastermind.
While his body's individual cells and bones appear to be stronger than the average human's, there is no way to explain his strength and resilience through biology alone. There is possibly some sort of psychic component to his skills, or possibly some extra-strange physics that affect his body.
The very secret truth is, Joseph is the seventeenth grandson of a deity long forgotten in mortal realms. The deity, who has tried innumerable times to become part of any pantheon, is the deity of subtlety. The problem is, the deity "subtle-ed" himself out of all his followers and out of living or dead memory. Basically bereft of any powers beyond the basics given to those who can claim godhood, he has sort of given up, Just occasionally going to Earth and sowing wild oats, (Only allowed on the most boring day of history in any given millennium) he has prayed (Yes, gods also pray for things) for a prodigal child to bring back his glory. Of course, being a god of subtlety, his genetics have neatly hopped generation after generation, until hitting a most inauspicious of generations, the seventeenth generation.
xxxxx►►Nobody's Perfect
As mentioned, Joseph cannot outright lift a car. It wouldn't be too hard to tip it over, but he simply does not have the leverage or balance needed to lift something that heavy. He could probably pull the door off, but only if it was already open and he had time to twist it back and forth for a few seconds, which doesn't happen often in a fight. If he gets hit by a large object, he is subject to momentum and goes flying backwards as anyone of his girth might.
As for his resilience, he is not immune to physical harm either. He can be burned, as his hands prove, and is no more resistant to electricity, poison, or psychic powers than anyone else. Joseph can be knocked unconscious just like anyone else with the right amount of force. He is not particularly fast and fights hand-to-hand as if he is afraid of hitting someone too hard.
What Do You Use?
If Joseph is fighting with something, it is usually improvised. He has been working on a “costume” that has weighted cubes on it, which could be pulled off and thrown, but he hasn't gotten very far yet.
Where Did You Come From?
The child of a super-villainess of small repute, Joseph has always seen the world through awkwardly tinted glasses. His mother doted on him constantly, even giving up villainy for a number of years to move to Europe so that he could go to school. She also moved to Europe to get out of the statute of limitations for a few of her crimes state-side. This was how Joseph grew up. His mother and he would watch the news about various global crimes and she would comment on how something was done stupidly, or how she knew this or that villain.
When Joseph started to develop powers, she was absolutely delighted, and wanted him to practice his powers early on. She was the one who gave him the pseudonym of “Samson” and he has never been able to break free of it since, as she soon told all her other villainy buddies about her son's powers and name. He pretty much had his life guided by his mother from a young age, though he grew up distancing himself from his mother's politics and opinions. She tried to make him into someone who worshiped the wrong side of the law. Instead she got a young man who respected the both rights and wrongs of law, and who quietly despised his mother.
She forced “criminal” training on him and occasionally told him to plan and execute some small crime. After her approval, he was to go commit said crime. He succeeded most of the time, having inherited her gift for devious conniving, but not her will to use it. The last time she told him to commit a crime involved him killing someone. In his anger at the idea that she would force him to this, he spent time bending and re-bending a stretch of rebar, forming the four foot long length into a very hot bar of a foot and a half. An hour of bending the bar in a blind rage had burned his hands heavily, leaving the scars seen today. He still had to kill the woman his mother assigned to him.
During this, Joseph learned the hard way that he should never use his full strength on a human. He had punched a security guard in the jaw hard while braced against a wall. Joseph saw the guard's jaw shatter and some of her skin tear. Joseph saw the sudden fear and pain in the guard's eyes, and the massive amounts of blood where he punched her and the broken bone coming out the other side of the woman's face. It is a sight that haunts and terrifies him to this day.
He didn't so much as move to Megalopolis as he fled to it a few months after her turned eighteen. He knew his mother would track him down. That wasn't the point. The point was to prove his independence, which she saw as a good thing and let him go on his way. This didn't keep her from meddling in his personal affairs from afar, however. While he got the job at the scrap yard and the apartment settled in, he was contacted by an anonymous source telling him about a “few lucrative and fulfilling jobs that might be suitable for a young enterprising individual such as himself”. Sent from a friend of his mother, no doubt.
It goaded him to see her, even now, trying to keep herself in his life. For Joseph, however, he had learned long ago that bending metals was far easier than refusing to bend to his mother's wishes. So, on occasion, he would take a job or two as long as he didn't have to kill any one with his bare hands.
He also learned in the last five years that he would gain weight if he didn't spend hours a day at the gym, working off whatever gave him his strength. It has led to him gaining something like sixty to seventy pounds, though it has stabilized for the last year or so. He simply prays he never gains any more strength, for fear of how much more weight he would gain. He likes how he looks now, unassuming and normal.
