the Witness
| Strength 0x |
Agility 0x |
Intellect 4x |
Willpower 3c |
| Hand Size: Edge: |
2 (10) 0 |
Powers:
Enhanced Senses / Paranormal Detection (w): while he can see and hear the world around him, the only thing that Nelson can actually feel is the emergence of paranormal powers and their presence in those around him - other than that, he feels nothing. This power functions for him at intensity 8.
Flight (a): no longer bound by the traditional, understood laws of physics, Nelson has the power to move about in any of the three dimensions - he may even be able to cross time and the dimensional barriers, but has never demonstrated such motive prowess. He can fly at intensity 8 speeds (375 mph).
Invisibility (i): having no physical substance whatsoever, Nelson is both invisible and inaudible. Aside from the use of the appropriate extrasensory powers, Nelson is completely undetectable to the world around him, effectively being invisible (and inaudible) at intensity 25.
Invulnerability to Aging, Energy Attacks, and Physical Attacks (s): being a disembodied, paranormal consciousness, Nelson is essentially immune to the effects of the world around him. Assuming any attack forms directed at his person are not of magic, psionic, or deionic origin, he can ignore them altogether.
Mind Control / Possession (w): Nelson can only wield this stunt of the mind control power in very limited circumstances - namely, if used against a person that can astrally (or otherwise) project all or part of his or her consciousness somehow, and then only if they are unconscious or 'out of body'.
If these conditions are met, Nelson can try to commandeer their body if he desires, though he is loathe to do so. This power works at intensity 8, which means he cannot take over exceptionally powerful psychics, but those of lesser power are theoretically at his mercy, if Nelson feels he must 'take over'.
Equipment:
(none)
Hindrances:
Non-Corporeal: as a disembodied consciousness, Nelson cannot interact with the physical world, and as such, has seen his Strength and Agility permanently reduced to zero (0). Should he somehow gain control of someone's physical frame, however, he can utilize their physical ability scores.
Skills:
Finance (w): his only known skill, this talent describes Nelson's career as a computer software salesman; he didn't necessarily know how to program software, or even use it much, but he definitely knew enough about it to sell it to the common man - or big companies, which'd be the bigger score.
Observation (w): since he naturally has a whole lot of time on his hands, it is assumed that Nelson has honed his observational abilities to a fine degree - it's literally all he has to do, after all. This grants him a reduced difficulty when using his sensory powers - or when simply looking around.
Calling:
Explorer: since there's precious little else he can do with the veritable eternity laying before him, Nelson has accepted his role as an unseen observer of life on earth. He rarely stays in any one location, flitting about from place to place as he watches things occur - some rather significant, others less so.
Costume:
Being immaterial, Nelson requires no costume, per se. However, his mental image doesn't feel 'decent' wandering about naked, so he mentally formed an outfit around himself consisting of a long trench coat over a collared shirt, trousers, and 'leather' shoes, complemented with a nice fedora.
Personality:
Nelson was a loving family man before the accident that disembodied him. He's tried to come to grips with his current state of existence, but has had trouble - particularly with the whole loneliness portion of it all. However, he seems to have finally contented himself with being an unseen witness of world events.
Real Name: Nelson Kohler
Occupation: wanderer, former computer software salesman
Legal Status: American citizen, legally dead.
Marital Status: married (technically speaking)
Alias(es), if any: none
Group Affiliation: none
Height: 6'
Hair: sort of greenish (formerly brown - and graying)
Eyes: sort of greenish (formerly brown)
Weight: 0 lbs (formerly 175 lbs)
Other Distinguishing Characteristics: though immaterial, Nelson has constructed a psychic image of himself, in the outfit described above. The odd thing about said image is that it is consistently a sort of greenish color; while he can change his outward appearance (as it were), he cannot change his hue.
Story:
Fatally injured in an automobile accident immediately after being disoriented by the White Event, software salesman Nelson Kohler found that when his family disconnected him from life support, he was still alive; despite the fact that his body lay beneath him, Nelson was still wholly conscious.
While he could see and hear the world around him, he couldn't feel anything, for he was completely intangible - a veritable ghost. This was no supernatural experience, however; no, this was a direct result of the White Event's mutagenic energies, energies that gave him the power to leave his body behind.
He didn't know this until his death, of course. As he tried to come to grips with his strange new existence, Nelson discovered that he did in fact feel a bizarre sensation - and was inexorably drawn to it. Arriving on the scene of a quiet retirement home, he witnessed the awakening of Lenore Fenzl's paranormal powers.
Afterwards, Nelson found the sensation that drew him there had subsided, at least until a like feeling pulled him elsewhere. After witnessing unseen the emergence of paranormal abilities in Stephanie Harrington, Dennis Cuzinski, Charlotte Beck, David Landers, and Jeffrey Walters, Nelson saw a pattern forming.
He realized that he was doomed to witness this strange phenomenon for the rest of his life, since he was drawn to the sensation of these powers emerging like a moth to open flames. Of course, he didn't like this, since he wound up being the one amongst them all who was denied a physical existence.
Vowing to find a paranormal capable of ending his anguish, he continued to follow his urgings from the world without, and eventually happened upon Randy O'Brien, who seemed capable of sending bits of his own consciousness outside his body, as sort of semi-sentient shadows of his own personality.
While he found this intriguing, the thought occurred to Nelson that he may not be a passive observer of these events so much as a catalyst of strange behavior, so he fled to his own grave, which had been filled during his wanderings across the Wisconsin countryside, and entered his very own corpse.
As he moped over his fate, Nelson was accosted in his own grave by the strange, shadowy guy he'd seen wandering around Randy during his hospital rounds, and begged it to end his life. When the antibody refused, Nelson grew desperate, and attacked the being, finding that he could, in fact, affect it!
Apparently, while immaterial, he could affect beings that were in a similar state of being!
However, in his rage he had severely injured the antibody before him, a fact that horrified Nelson. Hoping to ensure that he hadn't killed Randy, Nelson returned to the man's hospital, and tried to determine if he was okay. Failing this, he entered Randy's body, hoping to see what was wrong from the inside.
To his amazement, Nelson found that he could actually control Randy's body, and indulged himself by moving about for awhile, until Randy's antibody returned to its home - and found it occupied. Suddenly high on life, Nelson refused to hand Randy's body over... until he realized he was in the wrong.
He then abandoned Randy's body, vowing to never act so selfishly in the future. In fact, he decreed (to no one in particular) that from now on, if it was his lot in life to be a mere Witness of events, he would live with the hand that fate has dealt him, for what else could he do, really??
As such, Nelson witness a countless number of formerly ordinary humans manifest strange, sometimes horrifying paranormal abilities, and did so for over a year. However, near the end of 1987, something happened; Nelson found himself drawn towards Pittsburgh in the most powerful way.
Literally unable to resist this urge, Nelson allowed it to take him along for the ride, and he stopped miles over the city proper, where he saw Ken Connell (though he didn't know it at the time), as the man prepared to rid himself of the Star Brand. As Ken prepared to transfer it into a gym weight, Nelson saw the truth.
He knew that Ken must NOT do what he planned to, but it was too late. As Ken transferred the Star Brand into his weight lifting implement, the thing detonated most spectacularly, tearing Ken's body apart and leaving nothing but the charred ruin of a city in its wake - though this was not apparent at first.
Nelson discovered this truth later, as he explored the devastation below him. At first, everything looked fine to him, but then the populace attacked him en masse - at least, what appeared to be the populace. The countless souls that mobbed him were just that, souls torn asunder by Ken's colossal blunder.
The problem was, of course, that once the illusion of normalcy was gone, all Nelson saw was the smoldering crater that was Pittsburgh. Returning to investigate this horror, he encountered Jenny Swensen, who was looking for survivors in the crater with her Spitfire armor.
The weird thing was that she actually saw him!
When she called out to him, though, he felt compelled to hide; he couldn't even explain it himself, but perhaps after being unseen for so long, Nelson couldn't deal with actual human contact. Regardless, Jenny flew off empty-handed, and Nelson was left alone in the horror of the former Pittsburgh.
However, at least he found a purpose for his strange existence - he vowed to ensure that the man who destroyed this city was dead... and if he wasn't, he would find a way to ensure that he paid for killing so many innocents. He then left the smoldering ruins of Pittsburgh, and began his search.
As he looked for Connell's corpse, however, Nelson discovered that he was not unchanged by the destruction of Pittsburgh. All the souls that had mobbed him had apparently been contained within his consciousness somehow, and they were clamoring at him to return to the place of their death.
Thus did Nelson return to the so-called Pitt. Upon his arrival, he found that a small portion of the suburbs outside of the former city had been restored to an apparently normal state. Exploring the site in amazement, he found that the area had been repaired by a man with the same power as Ken Connell!
Watching the old man act, he witnessed his attempt to repair the damage that Connell had caused in creating the Pitt, and when the old man did so, Nelson felt the psychic energy that the million souls within him contained ripped asunder, their memories being used to return the city to its former glory!
At least, that's how it appeared at first. Though the souls that Nelson had carried within him were now gone, their memories were not, and he recognized every single corner of the city upon viewing it. It looked perfect, until you checked the edges, at which point you could tell it wasn't real.
The restored Pittsburgh was only an illusion, a ghostly projection created from the memories of millions of dead souls. Finding that the old man who built this in an attempt to restore Pittsburgh could see him, Nelson approached him and told him the truth, that even his amazing power couldn't repair this tragedy.
As Jacob Burnsley (the old man) left in defeat, Nelson was himself left to his own devices. Left to watch this fleeting image of a city restored slowly fade away. Having been relieved of the consciousnesses of those that had been slain there, though, Nelson was finally free to leave the Pitt for good.
What he did after this is as of yet unknown...
Extra Goodies: