the Angel

Powers:

(none)

Equipment:

Cape of Mercury (a): while he originally wore a red cape as a simple part of his costume, Thomas eventually gained this mystic item as a reward after a particularly harrowing adventure. This cape allows Thomas to defy gravity, giving him the power of (intensity 6) flight - at 150 m.p.h. airspeed.

Hindrances:

Physically Disabled: at an undisclosed point in the past, Thomas lost the ability to walk, and has been wheelchair-bound ever since - a bad thing when villains comes calling in a foul mood. He suffers from an Agility score of zero (0) for the purposes of movement and combat.

Skills:

Acrobatics (a): even before he acquired the Cape of Mercury, Thomas was rather efficient in his movements while on one of his many adventures. As such, he should receive one level difficulty reduction in any action meant to dodge attacks or lower falling damage.

Boxing (s): on adventures, Thomas relies on fisticuffs to get him through most battles, at least when he doesn't hit foes with anything laying about the room. He can divide his pre-cardplay action score between two unarmed melee attacks, the last of which occurs as a contingent action.

Criminology (i): raised from infancy in a prison, Thomas is well-versed in how the criminal mind works, and intimately understands the behavior of criminals. This skill aids the man in actions where he wishes to determine what a villain may be up to - and how he's going about his business.

Espionage (i): a master sleuth by choice, Thomas is truly at home when investigating some mystery or another. As such, he should receive a difficulty reduction on actions required whenever looking for the clues necessary to solve a crime, to learn secret information from villains, and so on.

Linguistics (i): Thomas has demonstrated a mastery of various languages, in addition to his own. Supplementing his English tongue, Thomas has shown a knowledge of Greek (both modern and ancient), and likely knows how to use several additional languages fluently.

Martial Arts (a): a master of unarmed combat, Thomas knows many fighting styles. He may use his Strength or Agility scores in unarmed melee - even for trumping! It also lets him make actions to catch thrown items at a reduced difficulty level, thus negating thrown item damage in some cases.

Medicine (i): one of his lesser known skills, Thomas is quite a good doctor. He can perform an average difficulty Intellect action to restore a card of lost health to a body who fell unconscious in the previous exchange, and can perform life-saving surgical techniques (though not in battle)!

Occult (i): various investigations Thomas has undertaken can be classified only as 'weird'. Most of these involved all kinds of bizarre cults, mystic villains, and overall unexplained phenomenon. Thomas is well-versed in such paranormal activity, receiving a reduced difficulty on related actions.

Calling:

Adventurer: while some of his adventures seem to be in far-off locations, Thomas isn't motivated to explore such places so much as he is to see new things, to solve mysteries in action, and to use his skills to aid others - it's a win-win lifestyle choice!

Costume:

While adventuring as the high-flying Angel, Thomas wore a primarily blue costume. This consisted of blue, stretch fabric trousers, blue trunks, blue boots with yellow, criss-crossed bands on them, a blue stretch fabric shirt with yellow cuffs and yellow wings on the chest, and his trusty red Cape.

Personality:

Thomas is a dapper fellow, one who felt the need to use his extensive knowledge for the betterment of his fellow man - and had all kinds of fun adventures while doing so. He was a true hero at heart, brave enough to fight his foes bare-handed, and spent his considerable fortune doing so.

Real Name: Thomas Halloway
Occupation: adventurer
Legal Status: citizen of the United States with no known criminal record
Marital Status: single
Alias(es), if any: none
Group Affiliation: leader of the Scourge of the Underworld organization, former member of the V-Battalion

Height: 6'
Hair: brown, later gray
Eyes: brown
Weight: 170 lbs
Other Distinguishing Characteristics: Thomas wears a pencil-thin moustache at all times.

Story:

When Thomas' mother died in childbirth, his father, a prison warden, apparently went a bit off the deep end. Instead of doing what normal men would do in such conditions, the man decided to raise his son in secrecy and isolation, within the prison he himself managed!

This made for a peculiar childhood indeed. Of course, his father did the best he could by Thomas, bringing in experts from various fields to educate him on, well, everything. In addition to this, Thomas learned various secrets from the inmates of his father's prison, who gave him the 'keys' to the underworld.

After saving an inmate from his untimely execution in the prison, Thomas is dubbed 'the Angel' by the man he saved, not to mention other inmates who were also doomed to a similar fate. This stuck with the man, who became fascinated with those winged creatures of legend.

Once he was old enough to leave his curious (to say the least) childhood home, Thomas decided that he wanted to use his skills to help others, and he had many, many skills to offer his fellow man. To this end, he became a costumed vigilante - supposedly the very first in his era.

Sticking with 'the Angel' as his alias, Thomas chose a costume he felt appropriate, and then began to solve various mysteries as they arose, both mundane and occult. He fought a very large group of weirdo villains, such as the armless Tiger Man and Fritz von Bock, Master of Disguise!

On one such adventure, Thomas was given the Cape of Mercury by a 4,000 year old woman after rescuing her from an underground city. Thomas then used this cape to further enhance his reputation as the Angel, being able to actually swoop in on would-be Nazis, criminals, and occult freaks.

Thomas continued his crusade against crime up until the onset of America's involvement in World War II, and he didn't stop then - the crimes he fought just tended to take on a more international flavor. In addition to America's scum, he even mixed it up with Nazis now and then!

Shortly after the end of the War, Thomas was recruited into a new, international group of heroes upon the collapse of the All-Winners Squad. This group, the V-Battalion, began by hunting down escaped Nazi war criminals, but would ultimately face all manner of bizarre threats.

One of the group's founders, he served on its Penance Council for a time, participating in all manner of actions against criminals mundane and spectacular. He maintained a membership with this group until, while chasing down a criminal, an innocent civilian was gunned down.

Disgusted with both himself and the criminal element, Thomas retired from adventuring. Of course, crime never goes away, no matter how much you try to pretend otherwise. As such, Thomas saw a need for a more... final solution to a growing problem of super villains nationwide.

To this end he founded a group of assassins known as the Scourge of the Underworld. Though not an active participant in their slayings, Thomas was the mastermind behind this group, and his highly trained operatives managed to kill a very large number of villains over the years.

They would pick off one here and another there, as time allowed, culminating in a massacre in The Bar With No Name, where eighteen separate super villains fell to one of the Scourges. Though they continued on for years, none of their successes were quite so wild as this one.

In time, the U.S. Agent began to investigate the whole Scourge organization, and ultimately found out that Thomas was the brains behind it. Of course, being filthy rich the man managed to avoid doing any time for his crimes; an impeccable reputation and an army of lawyers helped there.

Shortly after his brother, Simon, was slain by the villainous Zeitgeist. As it turned out, while Thomas had given up adventuring as the Angel, his brother had taken on the role - and when Zeitgeist decided to terminate the first super hero 'ever', he went after poor, homeless Simon.

It is unknown why Simon was living in the wild when his brother, Thomas, was still exceedingly rich; a possible fallout had occurred between the two, particularly since the whole point of retiring was to go into obscurity. But, realizing his error, Zeitgeist came after Thomas.

Arriving with Vormund, the former Hauptmann Deutschland, this madman tried to accuse the former Angel of murders he himself had committed in South America, but as it turned out, Captain America himself turned up to foil this plot, and Vorumnd did away with the Zeitgeist himself.

What pies Thomas has gotten his hands into after this debacle have yet to be revealed.

Extra Goodies: