Toro

Strength        Agility         Intellect       Willpower
5d              4x              3c              3x

Hand Size:      4 (25)
Edge:           2

Powers:

Fire Control (i): Thomas can generate large amounts of fire at will, inflicting intensity 10 energy damage per strike. These fiery assaults take the form of miniature fireballs, which Thomas can fling at anyone within three areas of his person. But that's not all.

He can also manipulate existing flames, raising their intensity up to 10 or lowering them by a like amount, which will likely extinguish all but the hottest of flames (such as those used by the Human Torch). To date, Thomas has demonstrated the following power stunts:

* Fire Restraints (i): if he can make a successful average difficulty fire control (agility) action against an opponent, Thomas can restrain him or her with a cage, dome, wall (or whatever) of fire. These flaming restraints inflicts no damage unless said target tries to escape.

* Flame Shapes (i): Thomas can generate shapes of flame, like fiery letters in the sky, big fiery monsters, and the like, with this power stunt. Such shapes will remain in existence for as long as Thomas concentrates on them, plus one full aura duration.

* Flight (i): by projecting his flames behind himself, Thomas can achieve the effect of flight, though this is limited to a flight speed of 5, as opposed to his maximum power intensity of 10. While not the speed of sound, this is nonetheless quite fast...

Energy Sheath / Fire (a): Thomas, while he uses his fire control powers, is constantly covered by a sheath of writhing flames. While the sheath is active, Thomas has intensity 10 resistance to any sort of physical or energy attack (instead of his normal strength-based defense).

Resistance to Fire and Heat (s): Thomas has been shown to be highly resistant to all sources of fire and heat. In game terms, consider this resistance to be +10 in scope, making Thomas immune to all but the most powerful of fiery attacks (such the Human Torch's)!

Hindrances:

(none)

Skills:

Boxing (s): Thomas has been trained in the fine art of unarmed melee combat by Bucky. As such, he can divide his total action score by two, and use this total for two unarmed melee attacks, the second of which will occur as a contingent action.

Energy Control (i): Thomas has been extensively trained in the use of his fire control powers by the Human Torch. As such, he makes all actions with this power (save for his fiery energy blasts) at one difficulty level lower than is normally required.

Trivia / Comic Books (i): when he wasn't Invading or Kid Commando-ing or otherwise fighting crime, Thomas made sure he enjoyed a handful or two of comics in his down time. If asked a question about them, he can answer at one difficulty level lower than is normally necessary.

Calling:

Youthful Exuberance, later changing to Protector: Thomas began as a very enthusiastic hero, going out of his way to get involved in super-heroic antics for the sheer joy of it. Over time, his attitudes have matured considerably, and uses his abilities to help others only if needed.

Costume:

Thomas wore a very... minimalist costume while fighting the forces of Evil - but then, his powers are good at wrecking clothes, and you almost never see him without his sheath active in a fight, anyway. His costume includes dark green shorts and boots, presumably made of asbestos.

Personality:

Though cocky in battle, Thomas is pretty down to earth and centered despite the bizarre life he has led; perhaps growing up amongst all the weirdness he has, he relishes in mundanity. He's nonetheless a heroic man and will gladly act to help others should the need arise.

Real Name: Thomas Raymond
Occupation: adventurer, former circus fire-eater
Legal Status: American citizen with no criminal record, legally deceased
Marital Status: married
Alias(es), if any: none
Group Affiliation: former member of the Invaders, former member of the the Kid Commandos, former member of the the All-Winners Squad

Height: 5' 11"
Hair: blue
Eyes: brown
Weight: 170 lbs
Other Distinguishing Characteristics: none

Story:

Even before he was born, Thomas' history was somewhat odd thanks to his parents. You see, his father Fred was an expert in asbestos flame-proofing, and worked with Professor Phineas T. Horton - creator of the Human Torch and other oddball androids like Volton and Adam II.

Prolonged exposure to asbestos had given the poor man cancer. Meanwhile, his mother Nora was a scientist who experimented with various nuclear compounds, including radium. Of course radiation shielding wasn't what it is these days, and her dedicated work had made her ill.

Despite their physical ailments, the two were blessed with a son, Thomas, who they tended to call Toro - a reminder of the romantic bull fights they'd seen down in Mexico. They weren't able to raise him as they would've liked though, thanks to their scientific connections.

You see, they were targeted by the Asbestos Girl, a criminal mastermind who set fires in the course of her crimes and needed the Raymonds' expertise in building a Human Torch-proof suit. Suspecting she would try something like this, the Human Torch showed up to chase her off.

All too easily, the Asbestos Girl harbored a grudge, and as such she arranged a terrible demise for the Thomas family. Causing a train they were riding to derail shortly thereafter, Fred and Nora were killed in the subsequent blaze - but Thomas survived just fine.

As it turned out, he was completely immune to the fire and heat which has claimed his parents. Found by a traveling circus, Thomas was taken in by Tom and Ellie Alexander, the circus' fire eaters, who thought he'd make a great addition to the traveling show's nightly performance.

News spread about the fire-proof Thomas though, and both the Human Torch and the Asbestos Girl came looking for him. After dealing with his would-be nemesis, the Torch found Thomas at the circus, and his mere proximity caused the youth to ignite - his powers fully manifested at last.

Taking him under his wing, the Human Torch became Thomas' legal guardian, and the two eventually developed a sort of crime-fighting partnership; in other words, Thomas was the Human Torch's side kick - but he didn't mind second billing because he was just glad to help people.

With the outbreak of World War II, Thomas and the Human Torch felt a need to lend their country a hand, and wound up forming the mighty Invaders with both Captain America and his own side kick, Bucky, and Namor - the Sub-Mariner! Thomas was a member for the duration of the War.

When he wasn't engaged in side-projects like the Kid Commandos, at least. Or keeping up with the latest comics. Or ogling girls. Hey, the guy was still a teenager, after all. Of course once the War was over, the need for heroes remained, and Thomas didn't shy away from this.

Alongside the Human Torch, he joined up with the All-Winners Squad, fighting bizarre villains and heading off disasters as the world recovered from the War. When the Squad eventually went its separate ways, Thomas and the Torch resumed acting as a crime-fighting duo.

This lasted until '49, when criminals made off with the Human Torch, having neutralized both heroes' powers with stolen Soviet Solution X-R. Toro couldn't find his cohort for several years, at which point they resumed crime-fighting until the Torch seemingly lost control of his powers.

Thinking him dead, Thomas retired from super heroics and settled down. He got married to his lovely wife, Ann, and tried to lead a normal life - though this was ultimately not to be. After the Human Torch was reanimated by the Mad Thinker, the Fantastic Four put him down.

While attending a funeral for the hero, Toro was drugged and abducted by that fiend, who brainwashed Thomas into thinking he was, in fact, the Human Torch himself. Setting him against Namor, the Mad Thinker's plot was foiled when over time, Thomas shrugged off the effects of his drugs.

Enraged, he went after the villain, who fled in one of his aircraft. Flying up through the jet's rocket tubes, Thomas detonated the craft, though the Mad Thinker himself managed to escape certain doom. Unlike Thomas himself, who seemed to perish in this incident.

Of course many people believe that he may've simply faked his death, in order to resume a life in obscurity. In fact, when a 'Mister Raymond' appeared to assist the Power Pack with his fiery powers, it's quite possible that we've seen proof of this, but the world may never know... 

Either way, the point has been rendered moot by, of all people, a resurrected Bucky. He himself used the cosmic cube while he held it momentarily (in the past) to bring Toro back to life in his current time - in order to prevent any sort of changes to the time stream.

So, once all the reality alterations the World War II Red Skull inflicted on causality were fixed, and the heroes who'd traveled back to stop them were home, Thomas spontaneously rose from the grave, only to be greeted by the original, otherworldly Vision.

This being stated that someone had gone to great lengths to bring him back from the dead, and wanted him to see the modern era for himself. He then walked off with Thomas, apparently to acclimatize the man to our modern day and age - he'd been dead for quite a while, after all...