Maillardet's Foundation for the Future of Humanity

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^⌈ THINGS TO KNOW ABOUT: _⌋ Ernest Wright

Name: Ernest Wright

Moniker: Champ (formerly “Li’l Champ”, but then puberty happened)

Band Color: Orange

Classification: Alpha

Abilities: Super strength and inhuman durability.

Relatives: John Wright (father), Gloria Goldstein (mother, estranged)

Birthplace: Foundation, Oregon

Bio: Ernest is a good kid. When people talk about him, that is usually the first thing that they say: he’s a good kid, and his father should be proud of him. John is unquestionably proud of him, but it nettles Ernest whenever someone says that to him. It’s a reminder that he only has one parent around to be proud of him. His mother is still alive, but he isn’t allowed to see her. She calls a couple of times a year—-on his birthday, without fail—-but he has never seen her face to face. He was taken from her almost immediately after he was born.

It wasn’t that Gloria didn’t want to be a mother, though. A pink-band poster, Gloria’s powers are passive, beyond her control. She produces pheromones, and people react to them—-both sexes, no matter their orientation. Technically, Gloria is considered a villainess. She used her powers to influence people, and definitely made a profit off it. She was more or less an accidental villain, though. She grew up pampered, because people wanted to please her. Since the pheromones are not something that she controls, it was years before someone figured out that she was a posthuman—-and when they told her, it was news to her. The first person to put it together was John Wright, and he figured it out because he was wholly immune. He was the first person physically capable of having an honest conversation with Gloria. It was also the first time that anyone had ever argued with her, or told her no. It was new. It was kind of exciting. She was smitten. But since there was no “off” switch for her powers, no way to make people stop being attracted to her like moths to a flame, the “villainess” angle kept building. The Foundation was not happy about his little fling with Femme Fatale—-their words, not his; he married Gloria, and was faithful to her—-so they decided that this was a sign that he’d succumbed to her influence.

Their marriage was annulled. When Gloria protested, saying that she hadn’t done anything, and that her powers didn’t work on John, her word held no weight. Of course John would agree that they didn’t work on him, if she told him to say that. The truth didn’t matter. John didn’t step forward and give them proof of why he was immune—-he was too scared. That cowardice haunted him. He wouldn’t tell them that he wasn’t a true poster, but he did tell them that she was pregnant. He’d hoped that they’d treat her better if they knew that she was carrying the child of one of their most celebrated heroes, but it backfired. Gloria was moved to solitary confinement in an airtight cell in Foundation. She was treated like she was under quarantine. By that point, most of the fight had left her. She carried their son, gave birth to him alone, and then watched the doctors take him away. Ostensibly, it was an attempt to prevent incest, but both John and Gloria knew that the baby was as immune as his father.

Growing up with an inexplicably missing mother and a superstar superhero for a father wasn’t easy, but Ernest didn’t complain. Really, he is an agreeable boy. He inherited John’s love of the good hero archetype, but his adoration of the concept isn’t an abstract. When he thinks about heroes, he thinks about his dad. He has been his sidekick since he was nine, but he doesn’t see himself as good as his father is. He’s absolutely terrified of the day when he outgrows the title of Champ, because the Commander’s shoes are too damn big to fill. He doesn’t want to disappoint anyone, especially not John, so he buckles down and tries his hardest. As one of the top three students in his class, his hardest is better than he lets himself believe.

Ernest art by minuiko!

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^⌈ THINGS TO KNOW ABOUT: _⌋ Clay Dillinger

Name: Clay Dillinger

Moniker: Bystander

Band Color: Blue

Classification: Alpha

Abilities: Light manipulation

Relatives: Herbert Dillinger (twin brother, missing), Sandra Dillinger (mother), Dustin Dillinger (father)

Birthplace: Buffalo, New York

Bio: Like most postertwins, Herbert and Clay Dillinger had two branches of a similar power. Both could consciously manipulate light in order to create illusions, but Herbert’s made people see things that weren’t there, and Clay’s made it so that people didn’t see things that are there. The novelty of their powers translated easily to the entertainment industry—-not every poster uses their abilities for day-saving, after all. Their parents got them into magic at an early age, and the boys took to it like fish to water. The combination of their powers made for a hell of a “magic” show, so the Dashing Dillingers started making quite a name for themselves. Herb was the real showman of the two, but the disappearing acts were Clay’s specialty.

Sadly, Herbert pulled a disappearing act of his own when they was still quite young. One day when Clay was sick in bed, Herb never came home from school. The Dillingers searched for him for months—-offering rewards, tears, and pleas to the general public in hopes of getting their magical little boy back. Since posthumans are generally more likely to have twins, he received all sorts of condolences from people who could hardly imagine a world without their twin. For Clay, that attention was new and somewhat addicting. He missed Herb, but it was nice to be the twin that everyone saw first.

His parents divorced two years after Herb disappeared, but they both decided that it would be easier for everyone if Clay went to a boarding school in lieu of split custody. In truth, it was difficult for them to be around their son. Clay had been a quiet, submissive boy, but after Herb went missing, Clay’s personality flipped. He took on his brother’s mannerisms, pulling on his bravado and charm to a truly unsettling degree. He was trying to be him—-trying to be the gregarious, friendly boy that his twin had been. They couldn’t live with a living, breathing ghost of Herb. It tore apart their marriage, and in the end, was too much for either of them to handle. Further testing confirmed that he was an Alpha, so Foundation took him with open arms. Clay saw the Academy as an opportunity—-a springboard. The top performers were recruited by large corporations and big-name teams, so he works to be noticed. To be seen. Because eventually, it’ll get him a top billing.

Clay art by artmaggiezine!

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^⌈ THINGS TO KNOW ABOUT: _⌋ Amira bint Balqis

Name: Amira bint Balqis

Moniker: The Queen

Band Color: Purple

Classification: Alpha

Abilities: Mnemokinesis. Amira can manipulate existent memories, or create entirely new ones. She tends to do more of the former than the latter, since created memories don’t always ring true. The conflict can be harmful, and Amira is as careful and respectful with her powers as she can be. Even if the person whose memories she’s altering isn’t a friendly, she genuinely does not want to put them through that particular hell. Given her powerset, she has Eidetic memory. Amira can’t forget things—-including the things that she erases from the minds of others. It’s always difficult for her when people ask her to erase memories, because easing their pain means taking on those memories herself. Outside of mission needs, erasing memories is never something that she does lightly. She’ll only do it if the experiences they went through are so mentally overwhelming, they can’t function while carrying them.

Relatives: Rashid (father, deceased), Desta (mother, deceased), Corbin (husband, deceased), Marshal (stepson, estranged), Ellie (adopted daughter, estranged), Matt (son, deceased), Malek (son)

Birthplace: Beirut, Lebanon

Bio: For many posterchildren, the first signs of their gifts are explosive and impossible to ignore. Amira was unique in that her abilities would have been unexplored for years if not for her father, Rashid. A Lebanese businessman, Rashid had been blessed with two great loves: his wife, Desta, and their daughter, Amira. Desta was a strikingly beautiful Ethiopian woman, and Amira had taken after her in looks and poise—-something that was bittersweet for Rashid after Desta’s death. He considered his daughter a blessing, and treated her as such. Signs of her gifts were fleeting at first, easily dismissed—-her memory was sharp, and she picked up new things quickly. Every parent believes that their child is special, but the way she quietly but intensely regarded the world around her made Rashid believe that she processed and understood more than the usual five year old girl did. One day, he caught Amira inspecting each individual piece of the chess set in his study. Laughing at her peculiar curiosity, Rashid asked her if she wanted to learn how to play. Amira nodded, so they spent most of the morning going over the rules and goals of the game.

And Amira beat him. The first time, he told himself that it was because he was going easy on her, even suggesting moves. The second time, he told himself it was a fluke. The third time, Rashid could no longer ignore his daughter’s aptitude. He never beat Amira in a game of chess—-not even once. Once she had absorbed the rules of the game, she exercised the functions of each piece to their fullest. Rashid started Amira on a steady diet of increasingly difficult logic games and literature; she picked up languages and abstract concepts with uncanny easy. The challenges delighted her. When she realized that her father couldn’t beat her, Amira sought out new opponents. Interestingly, she did not relish in defeating others. What she craved was the stimulation of the match itself. Before and after every game she played, she thanked her opponent for taking the time to teach her. Before the games, most people were delighted. Afterward, they were perplexed by the fact that a polite, quiet little girl had taken their king in brutally few moves.

Rashid didn’t push her to engage, but when nine-year-old Amira announced that she wanted to participate in a chess tournament, he supported her. It was an adult tournament, mostly comprised of older men, but Amira was undaunted. They let her participate out of the novelty of a little girl wanting to play. Needless to say, Amira dominanted, emerging as the overall champion. This feat turned her into an overnight sensation, but Rashid cautioned her against getting swept into it. She was gifted, but that gift had come from Allah. He encouraged her to use those gifts, but in such a way as to honor their faith. The attention that Amira’s abilities garnered was global. When a British intelligence agency contacted Rashid and offered to give Amira the training and education she richly deserved, he accepted it. They moved to London, and the agency began grooming her for a future position with them. They had never encountered a sharper strategic mind—-truly, the teenage Muslim girl made some of their more seasoned operatives look green at best and clueless at worst. Because of that intelligence, Amira recognized what they were grooming her for. Their methods condoned—-if not full-out encouraged—-the swift elimination of perceived enemies. That went against everything that she believed in. She knew that the only thing keeping her from being pushed to order tactical executions was her age.

Her salvation came in an unlikely package. Amira’s real power lies in her ability to interpret and control information, so she used the agency’s spread to gather information on people like her—-the growing number of posthumans using their gifts for the greater good. Two American posters kept popping up on her radar: Corbin Underwood and John Wright, the Rook and the Knight. Initially, it was their monikers that caught her attention—-she couldn’t help but remember her father’s chess set—-but it was the pattern of their actions that held her attention. They were utterly erratic. They didn’t know what they were doing. It was obvious that they were trying to make a difference, but they didn’t go about it anywhere near the right way. She kept tabs on them, but she never expected to meet them face-to-face.

And when she did, she realized that her assessment had been incorrect. Amira had seen the oftentimes bloody trail that they left in their wake and had assumed that they were no better than the agency that wanted to use her. The first time that she looked into Corbin’s eyes, she saw raw, frustrated helplessness. It wasn’t that he wanted to kill—-he simply saw no alternatives. He was the only one of the two with blood on his hands, and it was clear that he heaped that on himself out of some misguided notion that he deserved to be a monster. The Knight and the Rook were more than just pieces to move across the board. They were men looking for direction, heroes looking for alternatives. She could give them both, she knew. So Amira left the agency and became their Queen. With her leadership, the Set became one of the most celebrated public teams in America.

For the most part, Amira has retired. She no longer serves on an active team, choosing instead to spend her time teaching the next generation of heroes. In spite of all her skills, her adult life has been colored by loss. Her first son, Matt, was barely four years old when he was murdered. Marshal, her stepson, chose to turn his back on everything she had taught him, going down the bloody path of vengeance—-and taking Ellie down it with him. Falling back into vigilantism claimed Corbin’s life, too. Malek, her youngest, is the only family she has left. Amira could not save Corbin, but she is determined to see their son become a hero.

Amira art by chyldea!

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^⌈ THINGS TO KNOW ABOUT: _⌋ June Hovick

Name: June Hovick

Moniker: Ringmaster

Band Color: Red

Classification: Beta

Abilities: Pyrokinetic Creature Creation

Relatives: Marcy Hovick (mother) and Gerald Hovick (father)

Birthplace: NYC, New York

Bio: June is a very curvy lady, and her habit of wearing corsets emphasizes that fact. She flaunts it as a tactical advantage. Before she came to the Academy, she was not comfortable with herself or her body in any way. Being too big, or too smart, or too anything made her a target. Growing up, she felt that she was forever The Fat Girl, and she used her sharp sarcasm to keep people away. Opening herself to the inevitable weight jokes wasn’t going to happen. Unfortunately, the mouthiness that kept people from saying things about her size pretty much drove everyone else away, too. There was a fine line between sarcastic wit and reflexive meanness, and she had yet to master it. She convinced herself that all intelligent people are unhappy, and that she just had the misfortune of being too much of everything. People liked her better when she toned herself down, a blander, safer June, and she resented humanity at large for that. She didn’t want to be like the skinny, seemingly-vacuous popular girls. She wanted to be herself, even when she didn’t really like herself. The meanness was a self-perpetuating cycle, so June just buried herself in literature, usually seeking out Russian protagonists far more miserable than she was. She enjoyed fashion design, but thought it was for skinny girls. She enjoyed military history and debate, but thought it was for smarter girls. June didn’t see herself as any of the things she wanted to be.

Her posthuman ability kicked in late. During a rainstorm that brought a power outage with it, her mother sent her into the basement to find candles. June didn’t like the basement on a good day, in full light, but she wouldn’t admit to being a fraidy-cat. Backing down was not in her nature. She took her time with the stairs down into the completely dark and terrifying basement, but froze before she could get to the bottom. She got caught between her fear and her stubbornness, and she wished that she had some light; she could deal with the basement if she had a little bit of light, she told herself. That’s when she ignited for the first time. It was a firefly—-a literal one. It rested in her palm, a timid candle-like glow, but it didn’t burn her. Curious, she made another. In short order, the basement was full of tiny motes of flame. They swarmed around her, lighting up the darkness.

June convinced her parents to let her go to the Academy. At fifteen, she was older than most of the first-year third block students, but she didn’t mind. The Academy gave her the opportunity to try again—-to start over and be a new June. A June that wasn’t as mean or bitter. A June that liked herself. A June that was a superhero. Before joining the Academy, she wore too-big clothes and an unapproachable glare. The school gave her a clean slate, so she redefined herself as someone who was proud of herself. She wears burlesque-inspired outfits, most of which she designs and sews herself. Paired with her fondness of conjuring flaming tigers, her style and attitude reminded a certain circus boy of the big top—-and thus, the Ringmaster was born.

The Academy was afraid that she would be a liability in the field, given her lack of training (and claims that running gives her hives). Her powers were relatively new and untested, and it became clear early on that June was contrary to her very core. She didn’t take ‘no’s well, and that could end badly for her. They paired her with an Alpha that had been at the Academy since the first block—-someone who would graduate no matter how poor a partner June ended up being. The decision would have been a difficult one for the Foundation staff if one of the Alpha students hadn’t volunteered to be June’s partner. Ernest Wright, the extraordinarily talented only son of the Commander, wanted to work with her. He’d met her during the new student campus tour, and he’d seen something in June that’d charmed him. It ended up being a decision that radically altered both of their trajectories.

June art by jetay!

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^⌈ THINGS TO KNOW ABOUT: _⌋ Maksim Mikhailovich Petrov

Name: Maksim Mikhailovich Petrov

Moniker: Sideshow

Band Color: Green

Classification: Beta

Abilities: Enhanced Bioelectricmagnetism. He can store and manipulate the bioelectric energy that living organic matter produces, on top of being able to generate an astonishing amount of it himself. He has to be careful to only pull a little at a time from people, because it’d be easy to pull enough to stop their heart. Additionally, Maks inherited his father’s contortionism, a gymnast from the time he could roll over. His childhood nickname was Jellybones, because he does bendy things that people with a skeleton should not be able to do. When he’s charged, he gives off light. It’s not a steady glow—-he trails little blue motes, so when he does flips and shit, the arc trails are impressive.

Relatives: Yuri (mother, deceased), Misha (father, deceased)

Birthplace: Gibsonton, Florida

Bio: Born in Gibsonton—-aka “Gibtown”, the only city with residential zoning laws that allow you to park an elephant in your driveway if you feel like it—-Maks was a late-winter addition to the circus just before the beginning of a new season. His early life had a cycle: traveling through most of the year, then wintering in a fairly sheltered, showbiz-oriented community. Some people think that he took the moniker “Sideshow” as a disparaging jab at his family’s history and hometown, but Maks did it to honor them. Since the advent of television, the legacy of the sideshow has been relegated to nostalgia. For generations, his family have been circus, so Maks can document the rise and fall of big top entertainment through his genealogy. Growing up during the aforementioned fall, he has dealt with outsiders claiming that the “freaks” were being exploited, then watched the same people treat the now-unemployed and unmarketable entertainers as freaks. They still took pictures and judged them, but now they did it for free. All the judgement, no payout. Maks is the first poster in his family, but his community embraced it. He was just a different kind of different, and that was okay. As such, he has a unique view of what it means to be special—-to be posthuman, to be an outsider, to just be someone different.

His mother was the strong woman, his father an acrobat. Their parents had moved them from Europe in the mid-20th century, making Maks second generation Russian-American. The circus had been the safe haven for his great-to-the-nth grandparents, so to witness the art form sputter and die under the weight of modernity was heartbreaking. Their generations-old circus went out of business when Maks was twelve. They settled in Gibtown permanently, but he lost his parents within the year—-his mother to a heart attack, then his depressed father to an accident. He wanted to stay with his extended circus family, but they saw no future for him in Florida. He was too gifted, his personality too big, for him to be anything but a performer. The community raised the funds to send him to Foundation and made him promise to give them a hell of a show.

Maks art by jetay!

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^⌈ THINGS TO KNOW ABOUT: _⌋ Ofelia D

Name: Ofelia D

Moniker: Red Sky

Band Color: Red

Classification: Beta

Abilities: Hydrokinesis; sea lion physiology

Relatives: Unknown; Rosemary Aberdeen (adopted mother/guardian)

Birthplace: Unknown

Bio: In a lot of ways, Ofelia’s story is a reverse mermaid’s tale. As a child, Ofelia was found swimming up the shortest river in the world: the D River in Lincoln City, Oregon. Instead of coming out of the ocean and into the arms of a land-locked human, Ofelia was found by Rosemary Aberdeen, a fellow hydrokinetic posthuman. The odds of that were quite high, actually—-Lincoln City had a concentration of “merfolk”, due to the usefulness of their abilities in the fishing industry. Foundation had been one of the first dedicated posthuman communities, but it was far from being the last. In fact, there are some poster communities that feel that Foundation is detrimental to the long term human/poster relations. In Lincoln City, the humans and posters are happy neighbors, working in the tourism and fishing industries side by side. Many hydrokinetic posthumans have physical “deformities” connected to their powers—-gills, fins, flippers—-and banded together to protect their own from a largely unkind world. Rosemary adopted Ofelia, giving her a healthy, normal childhood.

But Ofelia didn’t want to stay on the coast forever. Unlike her adopted family members, she had no intention of running a kite shop or catching fish. She wanted to do more with her gifts. She wanted to be a hero. Rosemary could not afford to send her to Maillardet’s, so Ofelia had to make her way on her own. After multiple tries and letter after letter, she earned one of the few scholarships to the school.

Ofelia has the ability to manipulate water—-something that is almost always classified as an Alpha power—-but it comes with physical “deformities” that have made it difficult to fit in with baseliners. The classification system was set up by humans, so a lot of stock is put into whether or not the posterchild looks and acts like they do. Instead of being a typical mermaid, Ofelia resembles a Californian Sea Lion more closely than a beguiling piscine siren. She’s heavier, because she needs bodyfat for cold coastal water, and she has long fingers and webbing between her first joints. Like a sea lion, she has tapetum lucida—-the membrane in the eye that makes cats and dogs’ eyes shine in low light. As such, she has excellent night vision, and enjoys going on moonlight swims with her extended adopted family. The most precious of her possessions is a cranberry fishing float (similar to this) that washed up with her. When she made the decision to go to Foundation, she brought it with her to remind her of home during the week. It’s difficult for many posterchildren with a connection to a certain landscape—-be it ocean, snow, air, desert, or something else—-to feel comfortable with the endless nice weather in the Foundation forest—-but Ofelia rarely complains about the lack of saltwater. She isn’t of the mind that being at the school is supposed to be easy.

She is quiet but driven, someone who learned early on that very little will be given to her. What her family lacks in wealth and worldliness, they more than make up in supportiveness. Having that kind of support gave her a rare confidence for a poster whose abilities have physical manifestations that put her apart from baseline humanity. Every weekend, Ofelia goes home to Lincoln City to see her mother, aunts, uncles, and cousins. To say that they’re proud of her is a gross understatement. For them, Ofelia works her hardest.

Ofelia art by gabzilla-z!

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^⌈ THINGS TO KNOW ABOUT: _⌋ Ellie Lark

Name: Elouise “Ellie” Lark

Moniker: Lark

Band Color: Green

Classification: Gamma

Abilities: Solar Manipulation

Relatives: Unknown; Marshal Underwood (adopted brother/guardian)

Birthplace: Unknown

Bio: Marshal Underwood found Ellie on a cold, wet October night. He’d been patrolling with his father, the Little Bird to his Rook, when he’d heard a child crying. Thinking that crime was afoot, he followed the sound to an alley-facing back stoop. He found a little girl sitting there—-a little girl with six limbs. The small, stubby growths on her back were covered in sodden gray down, soft as a baby chick’s fuzz. She was around three or four years old, completely soaked, and clearly suffering from hypothermia. She wasn’t shivering, her lips were bluish, and she seemed disoriented and confused. Due to his training, Marshal knew that if he didn’t act quickly, it was likely that the toddler would die. So he took off his cape, wrapped her in it, and screamed for Rook.

The nice thing about being a public hero is that when you walk into an emergency room and say you need a doctor, you get results very quickly. Corbin was able to get her the medical help that saved her life, but he was at a loss as what to do after that. He tried to track down her biological parents, but even with the full use of Maillardet’s network, he couldn’t locate them. No one had reported a winged child missing. No one ever stepped up to claim Ellie. Corbin knew what would happen if she was shuttled off to an orphanage. Posterchildren don’t do well in poster/human mixed orphanages. Posters have a higher adoption rate, but only ones with marketable (see also: exploitable) abilities. Since Ellie couldn’t pass for human, Corbin worried that giving her up would be tantamount to feeding her to the wolves. Marshal was so charmed by her, the decision was ultimately out of Corbin’s hands. He couldn’t adopt her, though. As a BPHA-approved hero, his identity, as well as the identities of his family members, were public knowledge. He didn’t want that kind of exposure, knowing that the public wouldn’t be kind, so he kept it as quiet as possible. It wasn’t a decision born of shame—-it was an attempt to protect her.

In spite of all that, Ellie was a cheerful child. Her unofficial last name came from the coloring of her wings as much as it came from her disposition; Ellie epitomizes the saying “happy as a lark”. She naturally wakes up a little bit before dawn, her internal clock running on solar batteries. If dawn’s visible, she’ll position herself so she can catch the first rays. If not, she goes straight to making breakfast, usually singing “Here Comes the Sun” to herself. She’s a glass-half-full kind of person. She doesn’t have any real memories of her life before the Underwoods found her, so her sense of identity is tied to the broken-up little family that brought her in out of the rain. She more or less imprinted on Marshal, so wherever he went, she followed him like a duckling. Following him out to patrol was never an option, so she learned how to help in other ways. She has stitched up more wounds than she likes to think about. Since Marshal protected her, she did the same for him whenever he needed it. When he crossed the line and left home, he didn’t ask her to come with him. He didn’t want to make her choose between him and his father, but as far as Ellie was concerned, it wasn’t a choice in the first place. Wherever Marshal went, she followed. Somewhere along the way, she’d started taking care of him more than he took care of her, and she refused to let him think that he was alone.

Marshal was furiously protective of both of his siblings—-so much so, he resented Mal when he showed up in their lives. Ellie had still been young when they lost Matt, so Mal’s resemblance to him didn’t bother her as much as it did Marshal. In fact, Ellie pitied Mal. Marshal flew off the handle completely when he saw a new Little Bird at Rook’s side. The first time he met the brother he hadn’t known about, he directed all of his betrayal and anger squarely at Mal. Ellie knew what it was like to be an unexpected and unwanted child, so while Marshal and Corbin had their first talk in years (re: they yelled at each other), she pulled Mal aside. He seemed stunned and ashamed, confused as to why Marshal was so angry with him. The only thing Mal had done wrong was look like Matt would have, had he had the chance to grow up. His sudden appearance ripped the scabs off of a lot of old wounds, and everyone was so wrapped up in the anger they couldn’t let go of, Mal didn’t have a chance. Knowing that it’d be some time before Marshal and Corbin yelled/punched themselves out, Ellie took Mal out for a burger. Since he’d been born and raised on the Foundation campus, he’d never eaten unhealthy food before. The look of startled glee on Mal’s face when he tried his first milkshake is among Ellie’s favorite memories. They didn’t see each other often, but whenever she got a chance to visit, they’d get milkshakes.

Their friendship ended with Corbin’s death. Mal went back to Foundation, and that was that.

Ellie art by minuiko!

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^⌈ THINGS TO KNOW ABOUT: _⌋ Mal Underwood

Name: Malek “Mal” Underwood

Moniker: Kinglet

Band Color: Blue

Classification: Alpha

Abilities: Traumatic Event Negation

Relatives: Corbin Underwood (father, deceased), Amira bint Balqis (mother), Matt Underwood (brother, deceased), Marshal Underwood (half-brother, estranged)

Birthplace: Foundation, Oregon

Bio: Mal is almost the definition of a legacy poster. His parents were Amira bint Balqis (the Queen) and Corbin Underwood (the Rook), two-thirds of the original Set trinity. As the youngest of three sons, Mal had the misfortune of being born into the Underwood family after tragedy had torn them apart. Corbin and Amira’s first child together, Matt, was murdered by a hood when he was only four years old. Corbin’s eldest son and first sidekick, Marshal, had turned his back on his father and fallen into vigilantism as a result.

The back-to-back losses of Marshal and Matt changed Corbin, and not for the better. At the beginning of his career, the Rook had been the definition of a vigilante. Each member of the Set had a different view on what it meant to be a hero: Amira believed that it meant changing the socioeconomic factors that drive need-based crimes, John believed that it meant bodily putting himself between innocents and harm’s way, and Corbin believed it meant eliminating predators. This earned the Rook a ferocious rogues’ gallery, so when he gave up vigilantism for a public team—-and his marriage to Amira—-his enemies leapt upon the opportunity to destroy everything that he held dear. It broke him. When Amira realized that she was pregnant again, she did not tell her estranged husband. He was too hurt, too raw, to provide a safe environment for their child. Amira chose to give birth to Malek in Foundation—-it’s isolated, locked down, and safe. Until he was ten years old, he did not leave the facility—-not even once.

But as he grew older, Mal wanted to know the rest of his family. His mother told him that if he did well in the first block, he would be eligible for the Academy equivalent to studying abroad: a role as a sidekick. There were only a couple of heroes that had the experience necessary to provide for and train a sidekick, but the Rook was one of them. With that goal in mind, Mal did what no one else had thought possible: he achieved a perfect score of 50/50. His mother had a long, hard talk with his father, and Mal was cleared for active public duty. He took on the name Little Bird, which had been Marshal’s original moniker, and joined Rook as a street-level hero.

Shortly after Mal arrived in Portland, father and son dropped off the grid. Corbin took Mal and disappeared. It was almost three years before either of them were seen again—-and unfortunately, it was because the Rook was once again acting as a vigilante. He returned to crimefighting, but without a moniker or a mask. Vigilantism is not allowed, and it was clear that the Rook had gone back to his dark roots. The Foundation was forced to send out a strike team, afraid of the influence he was having on his son. Corbin fought, violently resisting arrest, and had to be taken down.

After his father’s funeral, Mal was sent back to the Academy. Though he had witnessed the execution, he refused to speak of it. John tried to get him into counseling, but Amira maintained that Malek merely needed time to process the ordeal and the loss.

His return to Foundation is both highly anticipated and feared. Malek is a wildcard, and he will be watched very carefully.

Mal art by artmaggiezine!

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