Day of the Octopus OOC

[Kareeah_Indaga]

Hero ID: Sleeper
Sleeper is the seventh spawn of the Venom symbiote. His parent was bonded to Eddie Brock at the time and the two of them raised him, keeping Sleeper at home and refusing to find him a host out of fear that Sleeper would turn out like his older siblings – destructive at best and another Carnage at worst.

That lasted until the Venom symbiote’s first host, a Kree man named Tel-Kar, arrived on Earth. While initially friendly, Tel-Kar quickly showed his true colors and abducted baby Sleeper to blackmail the Venom symbiote into leaving Eddie to bond with him, then left Earth in search of a Skrull superweapon. Sleeper bonded with Eddie to allow both of them to accompany a Skrull woman named M’lanz off planet, and the three of them caught up with Tel-Kar and retrieved the Venom symbiote before returning to Earth. However Tel-Kar managed to sneak aboard M’lanz’s ship and return to Earth with them, and ambushed Eddie and both symbiotes. A fight ensued, which ended when Sleeper lobotomized Tel-Kar and took over his body. After some parting words Sleeper left home and has been roaming Earth ever since.

Spoiler: Note

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The above is basically the plot of Venom: First Host.

Affiliations:
Solo: d8
Buddy: d10
Team: d6

Sleeper is young, confident (some might say overconfident) and independent. This coupled with the reputation of the Klyntar species on Earth being at best spotty thanks to his parent’s past history as a supervillain and rampages from Sleeper’s older siblings (especially Carnage) means that most heroes wouldn’t seek him out for a team-up and Sleeper isn’t going to bother to seek them out in turn. Beyond that, while the Venom symbiote and Eddie Brock managed to instill some sense of morals into Sleeper he is still a carnivorous alien goo monster and it shows.

Distinctions:
Spawn of Venom – Thanks to being the youngest in a family of symbiotes that frequently leans supervillain, Sleeper has to deal with the fallout in the form of general public fear and most of the superpowered set knowing the primary Klyntar weaknesses of fire and sound, not to mention unscrupulous types who would love to get their hands on a power boost regardless of said power boost’s feelings on the matter. On the flip side, if he needs to threaten to start biting off heads to get someone to cooperate, no one will doubt his ability to do so. This also covers all the miscellaneous quirks of being a Klyntar – hive mind with their own species, codex use, racial memory etc.
Youthful Arrogance – Sleeper is still quite young by Klyntar standards, and the success of his singular mission to rescue the Venom symbiote has given him a possibly inflated opinion of his own abilities. What seems to be justified confidence in some cases is rashness in others, and Sleeper doesn’t have the personal experience to know when to back down or back out.
Host: Tel-Kar – Tel-Kar is/was a Kree spy, officially a deserter but in actuality put through intensive training and genetically modified to be bonded to a Klyntar symbiote for infiltration purposes. That symbiote was the Venom symbiote, and they were separated after Tel-Kar broke his cover while spying on the Skrulls. Tel-Kar eventually tracked Venom down and blackmailed the symbiote into returning to him for the purpose of retrieving a Skrull bioweapon, but was ultimately thwarted. He is currently a lobotomized meat puppet which Sleeper is using as a host.

Power Set:
Klyntar Symbiote –
Enhanced Durability D8, Superhuman Reflexes D10, Enhanced Stamina D8, Superhuman Strength D10, Wallcrawling D6, Chemokinesis D10, Invisibility D10, Shapeshifting D8, Webslinging D6

SFX: Chemicals: Add a D6 and step up your effect die by +1 when creating chemical-related assets or inflicting chemical-related complications.
SFX: Multipower: Use two or more Symbiote powers in your dice pool, at -1 step for each additional power.
SFX: See Invisible: Spend a plot point to prevent enemies from benefiting from an asset related to being invisible.
Limit: Fire and Sonic Vulnerability: When making a reaction against fire-based or sonic-based actions, you take emotional stress equal to the effect die of the attack, regardless of whether you also take physical stress.
Limit: Stronger Together: If Sleeper does not have a host, shutdown Superhuman Strength.

Symbiotic Bond -
If you spend XP to unlock a Watcher character, you can choose to have them become a temporary host (at the Watcher's discretion, some characters may not be willing to serve as a host). Change your third distinction to reference the character and gain access to their power sets and specialties. This lasts until you leave them or until the end of the Event (unless they agree to become your permanent host).

Specialties:
Acrobatic D10
Covert D8
Combat D8
Cosmic D8
Menace D8

Milestone 1:
1 XP: When you investigate potential trouble or an otherwise noteworthy incident.
3 XP: When you barge into a fight in progress.
10 XP: When you get captured and separated from your host, and either manage to escape or have to be rescued.

Milestone 2:
1 XP: When you consider another character’s merits as a host.
3 XP: When you accompany a potential host on a mission.
10 XP: When you select a new host and bond with them.

Spoiler: Note

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Ideal host guidelines:

• Human or something of equivalent intelligence (stray dogs are fine on a temporary basis, but Sleeper wants someone he can talk to).
• Must be at least somewhat heroic in temperament (bare minimum: no worse than Eddie Brock).
• Does not have to be an existing superhero, but does need to be willing to become one (otherwise Sleeper would just find a nice cancer patient).
• Superpowers are not required; Sleeper is quite confident in his own abilities.
• Needs to be a WILLING host (this is probably going to be the sticking point).

Current universe comic book background:

In the days immediately following First Host Sleeper squatted in abandoned buildings and occasionally homeless shelters, moving around a lot; Tel-Kar’s body didn’t come with any Earth-relevant paperwork much less a house, but as Sleeper could shield the body from the worst of the elements, and hadn’t decided where he wanted to ultimately end up anyway, this was a mild inconvenience.

But a few days after leaving home, Sleeper encountered a drug dealer trying to push a new street drug outside the shelter he’d spent the night at. Sleeper sent the dealer packing but let them ‘escape’, following them invisibly and with careful use of tracer chemicals.

After a day or so Sleeper tracked the dealer to Hell’s Kitchen. Mid-interrogation Daredevil arrived, having been tracking the drugs from a different angle. The latter’s super hearing meant he knew what was going on, thus avoiding the usual method of greeting between new and unfamiliar superheroes ((Fight! Fight! Fight! )), but immediately afterwards followed a tense conversation in which Daredevil tried, in his usual manner, to convince Sleeper to leave Hell’s Kitchen and Sleeper made it clear he was in no way interested in doing that.

The pair nevertheless managed to separate without coming to blows, but Daredevil spent the next few nights trying not-so-subtly to keep Sleeper out of the area. Given Matt had to work during the day and Sleeper didn’t, this wasn’t very successful. It even backfired somewhat: as Sleeper was sneaking around invisibly he now wanted to know how Daredevil was noticing him* on top of going after the drug dealers.

But after a few days (and thanks in part to a daylight rescue Matt had been stuck in court for) Daredevil finally admitted that Sleeper’s help was useful and the effort wasted trying to keep him from getting involved was better spent tracking down the bad guys, and agreed to let him help…with one important ground rule: no killing. Figuring the sorts of foes that Daredevil would normally be taking on would be no serious threat to himself – and anyway this was the sort of behavior his parents would approve of - Sleeper agreed easily. Things went much faster after that, with the pair of them able to keep tabs on notable cartel members day and night.

Unfortunately the earlier sparring between the two had given the cartel time to figure out who and what was after them. When the pair launched an assault on one of the cartel’s manufacturing bases, it went badly: Daredevil was grievously injured and Sleeper wasn’t much better off. To Sleeper’s irritation, Daredevil refused to let the symbiote heal him, or even administer painkillers. When Sleeper asked scathingly if the latter would prefer to be taken to a hospital, Daredevil responded that he knew of a place…

…and that was how Sleeper was introduced to Claire.**

All told it’s been a few weeks – maybe a month or two, but not more than that – since First Host. Sleeper has spent the time since the failed assault hunting down cartel members, refilling Claire’s medication supplies, and quietly scoping out the superheroes who come by for clandestine treatment in case one of them might make a better host than Tel-Kar. Daredevil is still recovering, and may or may not have been super-glued to whatever Claire uses for a hospital bed to keep him from doing anything stupid while he recovers. Claire herself is still a little uneasy around Sleeper, but the free medication means she doesn’t have to beg borrow or steal it from other sources, when he’s around he can generally be counted on to act as an orderly, and he hasn’t eaten anyone in front of her yet, so she keeps a bed open for him to crash on when he needs it and once warned him off when a group of shady people came looking for him.

Spoiler: Notes

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*I think at one point in the real-world comics Spidey and Daredevil traded secret identities, but I have no idea on the timeline for that, and I think it got retconned away anyway.

For this universe, explanations for this surprising Sleeper could include but are not limited to: Spidey bonding with Venom before meeting DD so that particular memory wasn’t passed on, DD and Spidey just never trading secret identities in the first place, or Sleeper knowing about the super senses and just being surprised because his ego thought he was hiding well enough they didn’t matter.

**Or whoever Night Nurse is in this universe.

Plot Points: 2
Stress: d6 Physical, d8 Emotional
XP: 2