White Zephyr

Real Name: Alice Menendez
Hero Name: White Zephyr
Title: None, other than ‘That freak security chick!’ when she has to take care of business at the warehouse
Alignment: Neutral Good
Age: 20
Gender: Female
Race: Mixed race (a mixture of the following races: Spanish, African, Peruvian-Japanese, and Native South American)
Hair: Long, light brunette hair threaded out into well-kept thinly braided dreadlocks, or tied up in a pony tail with bangs which she quickly threads together with her superhuman speed for her Zephyr identity. In her normal attire, she lets her hair down.
Eyes: Reddish-Brown (looks dark red in sunlight)
Height: 5’4”
Weight: 96 lbs
Blood type: O+




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Alice is a slender, bronze skinned natural beauty who is a bit racially androgenous, especially depending on how much sunlight she is getting. Her soft, rounded facial features give away different elements of her ancestry, be it African, Asian/Indian, or Caucasian. When her wavy hair is down, one can see her caucasian and asian features more, but when her hair is braided or in a ponytail, her African features can be seen through her dark, bronze skin and her jawline. Although very pretty, Alice tooka  bit of a backseat in the popularity rankings at her school; she rarely dressed immodestly or gaudily to stand out in school, wasn't much of the charismatic gossip, and was often dwarfed by the, on average, vastly taller classmates, but would still garner attention and some friends (some of whom attached to her out of envy).

She has joined the ranks of minimalists, a small subculture of neatfreaks, life tip, and lifestyle organizers and has taken it on as a new style and dresses accordingly.  This lifestyle is a bit of compensation for the cluttered way she lived several years ago. When she is casual or at home, Alice is into the minimalist style with simple T-shirt, sneakers, jeans, natural, and quick makeup to lightly accentuate her looks. When walking through uptown or shopping in a town nearby, she'll wear ecclectic, simple dresses or formal shirts and pants to any fancy occasions. She has removed most of her piercings, with the exception of a few earrings in the upper regions of her ear lobes.

For her hand-crafted costume, Alice takes on a more symbolic look, with an adapted version of her schoolgirl uniform from her years in Brazil. She doesn't need to cover her face, because her powers drastically change the hue of her skin enough to throw most off her trail. The tan vest of her uniform is elongated and now made of hard leather, providing a bit of knife protection. Red lining and frills in triangular patterns are sewn into her white skirt and shirt sleeves provide for an enhanced, youthful elegance to what was once a pretty, but a bit too plain of a design. She matches the white and red with the same combination of pattern in white and red pantyhose and gloves and then matches the tan jacket with brown, patterned, dressy moccasins. She doesn't just use this costume to hide her identity in times of crime and danger, but also to explore the city and dabble in the few marginally classy night life scenes still intact in the spiritually besieged city. Her outfit isn't the most extravagant, but it serves the dual purpose of making her seem otherworldly while in action,  but also to be dressed up well enough to provide a breath of aesthetic fresh air to the environment of Detroit. The attire exudes her ideal mixture of strength through beauty and creativity. It helps her to have hope in one day being the person that she and her abuelo and abuela can be proud of.

Her last outfit would be her security outfit for work. It comes with a few handy supplies and weapons, but she is unable to use her speed to avoid being exposed.



   Alice is an introverted, but not necessarily shy person. She won’t be the first to chime in, but give her enough of a reason, and she will. Because she is a bit vain, she uses her ability to handle more solitude than most millennials as a confidence builder, enjoying the image of the 'cool girl'. It does draw from her true personality, which is more of an eccentric, artist type, but she can't help but use her aesthetic blend of edgy attitude and unique looks for a bit of attention. She is still very much a kid.

 What keeps her from straying down the path of a complete narcissist is the values instilled in her from her upbringing. She has gained quite a big, and soft heart from the love of her authority figures. Alice still looks up to her grandparents and the family friend and parish pastor, Fr. Nathan. The hellish atmosphere of Detroit and an urban, hormone infused bevy of just recently graduated high school acquaintances really push the limits of the traditional values, but she hasn't turned into a complete party animal. She can, however, play with fire when particularly tempted to fit in or explore the night life which can get her caught up in the wrong crowd and parties. Sometimes she is tempted to try drugs, drink too much, or shoplift by various compadres, and she has fallen to some of these a few times, but she fortunately hasn't gotten caught up in anything super addictive. She keeps trying to hold on to a balanced, sober life despite slip ups, although the fear of her being caught grows even more with the addition of her new abilities. 

  She feels like her new security job is a breath of fresh air and has given her a minor hope in forging a new life for herself. After the discovery of the nano-compound pills, life has ironically given Alice more of a special identity than she could dream of, but now that there is danger and responsibility with these powers she feels like a complete hypocrite. 

 All of the time posing to be cool and aloof feels like time wasted, and her bubble of fake confidence is being burst in slow motion. She is much more of a survivor in the city than a vigilante or superhero, and she is coming to terms with the fact that she isn't as brave or chill under pressure as she thinks. She does have a fighting spirit, but it is far from perfect.


     



Alice is a girl who steps between two different worlds, her birthplace in Brazil and her current hometown of Detroit. The former had been just as dangerous as the latter, but there was a lot of good balancing the bad, with culture and beauty around many street corners. Detroit, on the other hand, is smothered by a horrific cloud of despair and lack of purpose that is much worse than the crime. If anything, crime and vice is something many people do to escape the creepy reality that they are living in a ghost town. 

Because of her and her grandparents' migration into America when she was 11, Alice carries quite a bit of her past and her culture in her confused psyche, and still experiences the harrowing shock of trying to forge her own identity. She remembers her life in Brazil, torn between her parents trying to support their fledgling party store and competing with corporations. She remembers her grandparents who would take her on walks throughout their estate, showing her beauty and peace and a sense of home that she had never felt before. Lastly, she remembered when the world between her parents and grandparents were torn asunder when her parents decided for it to be best that she grow up and learn in America. Alice was torn apart, because she had not been spared the truth of her parents' dwindling finances, an omission of truth that proved more costly than they had expected.

Her grandparents agreed to take care of her in America, while her parents worked to make ends meet. Something funny happened in this exchange, Alice found herself a bit severed emotionally from both grandparents and parents, with her ideal, future world of love shattered with the harsh reality of their emigration to Detroit. Her grandparents busied themselves expanding their clothing line into the States, while Alice and her brother Francesco attended school. Alice's grades suffered while Francesco's stayed decent, and, as time went on she suddenly found herself in junior year with poor grades and surrounded by bad company.

  Spoiled and with prospects of her future looking bleak, Alice, in tears of shame, courageously opened up to her parents about her failures, with which the kind grandparents understood, forgave, and quickly put behind them. Her confession gave her great liberation, but she still had the arduous task of rebuilding herself. She also had the problem that, deep down, she really didn't want to go to college, due to her not trusting herself in that scene, and was not interested in working with her grandparents as she didn't feel like living off their dime any more. She decided to forge her own path and look for jobs.

She found a security job at the other side of town, decently tucked away in the outskirts, similar to her abuelo and abuela's home, and she naively assumed it would be a relatively safe and quiet job, due to the distance from the troublesome areas of the city.

 Her life became lonelier, with her unable to take much solace from her minor social media popularity, or from her workplace, inhabited with a rather aloof stoner of a boss, who occasionally would crack a few jokes before taking a nap, playing video games, or creepily checking security cams without blinking. She would try to kill boredom by walking around the premises while listening to music, podcasts, or just the eerie silence found between Detroit trees. It was quiet, lonesome work, even for one with her disposition, but it was one of the few decent jobs available. After a year of of patrolling, trouble emerged as thieves and vandalists gained wind of the unsullied region in the outskirts where the warehouse was located. At first, there were a few curious trespassers that Alice, armed with a kevlar vest, could quickly warn or intimidate off the premises. As winter came with its frigid, sub-zero cold, however, the occurrences became much stranger. Hoodlums began circling the snow-covered corporate lawns, forcing Alice to sortie out and look for them, only for them to be nowhere in sight. The sightings steadily increased in number until February, where a big break-in happened, only discovered because Alice had left her scarf in a cubby hole.

 On the screen, she saw the intruder in storeroom four, an unlikely room, since it was in the heart of the warehouse and the most secure of all. After a sweaty few minutes of deciding the horrid police response time of Detroit wouldn't be worth it, she decided to go in herself with gun drawn and flashlight on, shaking in anticipation with every step, until he reached the masked man cracking open boxes with a crowbar. The man seemed as frightened as she,and as he turned around he pulled off his mask, showing a young, conflicted Dan, a highschool classmate of hers. Dan was one who everyone either ignored or mocked, due to his very average, passive presence and his creepy reputation and anti-social behavior. Dan quickly confessed what he was up to and how this was his biggest break yet; what was in the crates would pay well. 

Alice facing down an awkward guy like Dan really took a load off Alice's proverbial security shoulders and she was able to assume a tough girl act, tell him to knock off his pathetic attempts to hit on her while confessing, and lay down while she called the police. Dan continued discussing and explaining himself as he seemingly complied. He tried to take advantage of Alice letting her guard down and then rushed to grab her gun and tackle her. In the sudden panic, Alice accidentally pulled the trigger, missing Dan, but striking one of the crates. A thick steam burst out of the crates, very much similar to dry ice, but darker and more ominous. Both of the horrified very young adults succumbed to a trance of nightmares and pain as their bodies changed at a molecular level. Alice awoke to a suffocating mist. She was forced to groggily spend the rest of the night strategically opening up various rooms to let the mist dissipate. Dan was nowhere to be found. After letting out the mist she returned to the crates and looked inside to find a punctured box of capsule containers, much like those found in a health food store. Only a single pill of the unnamed bottles was punctured, which implied that a single pill struck with a bullet could cause that much mist. After feeling the exhilarating transformation, curiosity got the best of her and she bagged a few pills before reporting the break in.

   A few weeks later she finds herself experimenting with the drug's properties by going on runs with the compound in her system. Her mind and body seems to work on a completely different level, and her body produces the nanoparticles through her sweat, allowing her to make more capsules for use. Her excitement, however, is dampened by the cautious secrecy she hides this drug and the mystery of where it came from. Dan's disappearance and his ability to reach the innermost room undetected also puzzles her, but she continues the job as if nothing happened. Apparently, the police and her boss are perfectly content to pretend as well.


1. Reaction
2. Agility
3. Endurance
4. Strength




Alice receives her powers from swallowing a “Nano-synthetic Water-10 Crystal” pill that enhances her mind and body in various ways for a period of time. Her body acts more like a single organism than a human body. Her joints become more lubricated and the connection between her brain and body intensifies. Her skin becomes pale, a drastic change from her natural color. With this transformation, she actually becomes a bit of a limited speedster, with a few quirks.

First Main Power : Superhuman speed - Alice is a low level speedster with speed that gives her enough clout to be a decent street level hero. She can casually move as fast or faster than the best martial artists and athletes can muster in combat, her movements too agile and quick to be considered within human capability . With high difficulty, she can dodge small arms fire and, to normal street opponents, she seems almost impossible to hit in hand to hand combat. She can accelerate almost instantly in bounds of up to 40 mph and can hit a top speed of 110 mph within several seconds. She can hold onto the top speed for an hour, the full allotted time her powers remain active. With this power, there are a few subset abilities to be mentioned.


Enhanced striking strength - Because she can move so fast, she can use her speed to punch and kick as hard or harder than elite fighters in higher weight classes than her. She calls this the 'Bruce Lee' effect. She prefers to fight defensively, and trip up or outwit her opponent, but if push comes to shove, she can seriously maim men much bigger than her. She doesn't know if she has killing power because she only wants to disable, if it can be helped, and too much uncontrolled power can send her reeling as well.


A great cardio workout! - Getting in the insane workout can put Alice's body in shock, but it can over time increase her overall mental and physical health and fitness, giving her a lot more energy and confidence. She could eventually reach a point where she could hold her own rather well against bigger and stronger opponents without her powers. 


Enhanced durability - Her improved musculature, skeletal,nervous system, and joint function helps her to survive blunt force attacks, depending on how well she braces for it. Her body does not tear itself apart from the sheer force jolting through it and can survive crash landing from a bad use of power at around 60 mph - from roughly a ton of force. When she is not braced or careful, her durability still makes her tougher than most girls her age, able to take many severe blunt force hits from weapons and fists without getting knocked out. The durability works more as a shock absorber than a brick wall, so she will be pushed back rather than having the crowbars bend on her chest like Superman. Her weakest point is her head, which can take greater trauma, but still can be hurt rather easily like normal human heads.

Second Main Power: Hyper Thought - The chemical in her system doesn't just speed up her body, but also dramatically boosts her mind, so much so that it can be considered as a separate power. The information processing improvement is vital for her to use her powers effectively (seeing in slow motion like the X-men movies' Quicksilver), but she can also use it on her own without speeding. In the time that she has she can very quickly formulate plans, learn new skills or concepts, employ clever tactics, and assess complex situations. It's hard to say she becomes an outright genius during this time,as geniuses have unique creative sides to their thinking, but the raw mental computing power is definitely there. This power can be used for three hours instead of one, if she is not using her speed in that spanse of time.





Limited Durability - Her powers do no favors for her when it comes to surviving fatal piercing wounds, posion, magic, extreme temperatures, etc.


Limited time- Alice only has an hour of speed enhancement  before the chemicals wear off and three hours of hyperthought if she doesn't use speed for a large spanse of time. For speed, it takes three more hours for cooldown and recuperation, in which she must have a rather large meal for replenishment. For thought, it takes an hour of cool down before using it again, with only a healthy light meal needed (usually with lots of vitamins and healthy fats).


Electric sensitivity - Electricity on much lower current levels can really mess her up and send her into convulsions since her altered body is so conductive.


Depersonalization Disorder/Hallucinogenic breakthroughs- If Alice doesn't keep her emotions in check, or if she thinks too deeply on something, she can lose her normal state of consciousness and go on quite a dark or distracting mental ride. A slobbering, trance like state is probably not the best mentality for stopping a convenience store robbery.


Calorie underload - In order to not also experience depersonalization, unconsciousness, or even death, Alice has to eat a lot before and after the usage. After she uses it, she is naturally ravenous, but she is underweight and not a big fan of food, so she often forgets to prepare. This can cause her power to fluctuate and even stall with horrendous timing.

 Exhaustion : At Alice's current fitness, if she uses her physical speedster powers nonstop for at least 40 minutes, she will be almost overwhelmed with exhaustion and hunger afterwards. This is why she usually uses the ability in bursts.

Lack of skill - She doesn't possess much hand to hand training other than a few kickboxing moves, and a former dance repertoire that keeps her agile ,so she fights rather defensively. Furthermore, a very skilled opponent could trick her with feints, counters, and tricks.

Slow motion Vision - The world around her moves slower but not to the point where everything seems to be at a standstill. There are times where she can see something coming and have no chance to dodge.

Voluntary, not involuntary reaction - Alice has to control where she goes and how she moves. Therefore, she can still be blindsided and surprised by something she hasn't yet sensed.

Spontaneous crash landing - If Alice doesn't mentally prepare for a jump, an attack or any high speed maneuver, the remaining momentum can send her flying into some pretty non-ideal places. Her body can take more punishment, but it is still a great hazard if she is not careful.

Slippery floors and surfaces - These make her speed almost completely ineffective.

Anxiety and Stress - Without a calm mind, Alice can make some big mistakes.





Water-10 Nano Pills - She has a bottle of these secretly stashed away in her ratty apartment room. She knows the process to replenish them, which is to dissolve the contents in a jar of water, have the nanomachines absorb and convert the water into the right compound and then use a syringe to pour it carefully into a capsule. It's truly a painstaking process. She is currently working on another bottle, but it will probably take more than a month

Security supplies from the job : First aid kit, hand gun, bulletproof vest, flashlight, and a taser.

Home supplies: roller blades, bicycle, and a smartphone.

Costume: The tan hard leather vest she wears provides decent knife protection for the torso.






 

 Fire was one of the truly underrated beauties found in the world. It could change or stay the same, and yet be entrancing in its own unique way in each place it was found. Jake really didn’t understand his own fascination with it, but he always ended up close to it, even in the urban landscape of Newark. Yesterday, it was watching a flame from the smokestack of a natural gas plant, but today it was the simple rays of the setting sun setting ablaze the colors of autumn leaves. 


“Aaaah…” Jake adjusted his scarf and continued to ignore the texts and calls of Mrs. Brinski, the orphanage caretaker. Did that lady really have to be so controlling and paranoid? He saved two childrens' lives, as well as his own a few times, so by now she should have understood that he was an adult man perfectly capable of fending for himself. Sure, there was a time where he guided the field trip into a gang shootout and they had to duck for cover, but how was he supposed to know the Crips would recognize him in the Camden aquarium of all places? They must have been on a field trip too. Besides, it was only 7:30, far too early for the curfewed bedtime.


 After twenty more minutes of peace away from the stuffy and overcrowded orphanage, he at last checked for her messages. He raised his eyebrows when he saw it was a police alert. 


 “Serial cannibal killer at large… high speed police chase… amber alert…?? What kind of nut job is this clown??”


  His hair stood on end as he realized the wind that had been recently blowing across his neck for the past few seconds, wasn’t really a wind, but bated breath. He turned around slowly and gulped. 


  “Can I help you, sir?” he said with his most timid, pleading voice possible. The psychotic monster of a man kicked Feng through the bench with a force strong enough to splinter its back side and send the teenager rolling several feet onto the park’s grass. Quickly picking himself, Jake studied his assailant: matted hair, hatchet, large build, fingerless gloves, and the five o’ clock shadow. Oh yes, everything fell under the 80’s movie crazed homeless man stereotype. The only question was why a hobo would be this deranged so suddenly.  Jake ducked and rolled out of the hatchet’s wild, but quick swing and decided to forget those kinds of worthless questions for now. He didn’t let the dodge go to waste and aimed a low mule kick to the back of the man’s knee once he was crouched and at the right distance. 


 The enraged lunatic almost roared in frustration and savagery and turned around, frothing at the mouth as if a harmless kick was equivalent to Jake kicking his pet hobo dog as hard as possible. He then charged, aiming to knock the boy to the ground. Jake readied, lifted his arm and stepped in, letting the hobo’s momentum surrender his own back as an opening to a more punishing spinning back kick to the kidney. Jake then ducked as the horror movie hobo swung his axe in a wide arc, barely faltering from the kick. This pause in offense from Jake was quickly disturbed as, with aggressive spring in his step, he continued angular Ba Gua Zhang kung fu footwork technique known as circle walking with a left straight punch to the temple and swayed straight around another swing of the axe. Jake thought he was in control, but the opposite was actually true. He was treating the deliriously enraged and insane man like the much more common hothead, overconfident bully. Thus, when the punches had not nearly as much effect as he liked, he chose a straight front kick to the torso instead of a more grounded attach like a wheel punch. The hatchet hobo’s waist swiveled a bit as the left side of his chest caught the force of the kick, but the lunatic continued his charge, and before Jake could set up for his next move, Hobo Harry was on him like white on rice.


   “Oh shi-”, he barely uttered as the brute knocked him over and immediately pressed all his weight into a killing blow.


    The axe blade was biting into his shoulder, making him unable to completely push back against the handle that was simultaneously choking him. Jake yelled as he realized his life was most likely over in a matter of minutes. This was what he got for being cocky once again. He needed to go all out immediately. With a cry, his body slightly shimmered, slightly distorted the light of the sunset around them and added an aqua hue to the scenery around them. First, a distraction. A helmet formed around his head as well as a red, silk scarf around his mouth. Once the madman let up just a bit due to this surprise, Jake unleashed the hardest headbutt he could muster, brought up his knee and turned to the side, flipping his assailant onto his back. The hobo in turn kicked him away and swung once again with remarkable speed, almost forcing Jake to jump back dramatically, although he was the one now on his feet. These new street drugs could give temporary vitality and agility that almost rivaled his chi augmentation. It just wasn’t fair, and to be honest, it was a bit scary how close to the miraculous science was now getting. 


    “Alright, hotshot, my cover’s blown! You just had to ruin a Sunday evening, didn’t you?!...Wait a minute, if you’re higher than the International Space Station right now, that means no one will believe a word you say! Haha- heheheh I might just get away with this one! Well, Mr. Hyde you picked the wrong day to be an axe killer.”


  Jake swung a glowing, blue right hand and in it appeared a beautifully crafted, jade-colored Chinese short sword.


  “Your move, bucko,” he taunted as he sneered a dirty sneer. The delirious man howled once again and instinctually continued his standard assault. Suddenly, Jake pulled his left hand from his back and pointed it at the rampaging beast. A green metal arbalest rested in his palm, with his finger on the trigger. 


  “See ya!”. Within a second, a magic arrow impaled the killer, leaving no trace of a wound. Clutching his chest in shock, the maniac slowed, unsure of why he felt such pain and what was going on. And yet, he continued.


  “Oh hellll no,” Jake groaned. This guy had serious issues. 


“Hm… well.. two can play at this game!” The sword and arbalest dissipated and he summoned his own battle axe and charged as well. Taking advantage of the weakened evildoer, he swung his axe straight for the hatchet, cutting it in twain. Bewildered, the man looked down at his sundered weapon and then saw nothing but stars as a spinning tornado kick caught his head with a direct hit. Finally, the giant was felled with a few slashes of the short sword to his limbs, paralyzing him for a good two minutes, just enough time for Jake to chain him up to what was left of the park bench. 


      Left with no choice, Jake called the police and waited for them to arrive. He felt proud of himself, and wondered if he should meet them in his armor and at last show off who he was to the public. Smiling and wiping his mouth, he winced as the adrenaline tapered off a bit and looked down at his hurting left shoulder.


“My jacket!” he yelled in despair. He had ‘borrowed’ this one from Mark’s wardrobe. The jig was up, it was going to be summer school all over again. There was no way he was going to get home in time for the final curfew hour with a shoulder wound and a ruined leather jacket. At this rate, he was ready to search on Indeed and Craigslist for foster parents.  He smirked and turned away, trying to shake off his annoyance. Suddenly, his nose picked up a particularly heavenly, and wondrous scent.


"Pancakes?..."


There was a crepe' stand that had strangely materialized to the right of him without him noticing. The traditional French chef at the stand, exquisitely dressed for the urban landscape, smiled, delicately balancing his curled moustache with a warm, inviting grin.


"Breakfast is ready son!"


"Son?"


Suddenly Jake woke up with a start. 


"JAKE COME DOWN. BREAKFAST IS READY!" yelled Nancy from the orphanage door. Jake groaned as he realized it was a dream. That's what he got for being too excited from getting his red belt last Friday. Rubbing his eyes, he proceeded back to boring orphanage life.