[ ooc | application for abaxrpg ]
player information.
name: Lii
are you over 18?: Yup, about four years over.
personal lj: derptacular
email/msn/aim/plurk/etc: email: lii.lionheart@gmail.com | AIM: derpsexual | Plurk: tyrantrave
characters in abax: N/A
in character information.
name: Emily Madsen
age: 21
sex: Female
race: Human
height: 5’3”
weight: 125 lbs.
canon point: End of written history
previous cr: from ilpromenade:
Ichigo Kurosaki [savior_n_black]: Ichigo’s like a little brother to her, and like many siblings, they fight. Both are stubborn and bull-headed when it comes to things, and it doesn’t help that parts of their pasts overlap in some instances. Madsen herself is proud of him for taking the more difficult path in dealing with inner darkness, but at the same time she’s still frustrated with his “PROTECT ALL THE THINGS” complex, especially when it extends to her - she can take care of herself just fine, thanks. When they’re not arguing, though, they get along fairly well.
They co-founded Promenade’s Fight Club as a means to not only get an idea of what others in the city could do fighting-wise, but also as a means to vent frustrations and tensions safely and without people getting into trouble for it. Ichigo was also the only one at Promenade that she willingly confided in about her brother’s predicament. Madsen’s one of the first ones to call Ichigo on his bullshit, and isn’t afraid to smack him around to prove a point.
Rukia Kuchiki [snowwhitesoul]: Madsen and Rukia originally bonded due to both having to deal with Ichigo’s antics, but as time passed, the came to respect each others’ abilities and strengths as fighters. She and Rukia became leaders of the Resistance under Rebecca Crane after Tony Stark left, and when Becca left, they were in charge of organizing the groups, whose main goal was not only finding a way home, but also preparing for any more random attacks due to the dream city’s influence.
Hichigo Shirosaki [holeheart]: Ichigo’s Hollow, at first, Madsen was incredibly wary of him due to his nature reminding her of Gemini and that whole fiasco, but once she saw that there was more to him past the bloodthirsty nature, she was more willing to talk to him. It was surprising to find out that Shiro was more level-headed than Ichigo at times, and sometimes that helped when they were dealing with another standoff between herself and Ichigo.
However, due to the dream city’s influence and the timespan between when she was last at the city and her current canon point before coming into Abax (a good 3-4 months), some of her memories from her time in Promenade are fuzzy and disjointed.
Madsen’s tags on the main comm page
Tags on the log comm
physical appearance: At first glance, Madsen looks like your average American girl-next-door. She stands a bit on the short side at 5’3” and 125 lbs., with an athletic, toned frame from all the fighting and running she had done over the last few years. Once you start peeling away layers of clothing, however, you can see the various smattering of scars on her body from fighting, the most prominent being one stretching across her right shoulder, a jagged line running across her back from her left shoulder blade to her right hip, and the most recent addition: a circular indentation on her chest that remains of the wound that nearly killed her.
She’s got dark brown hair, usually tied back, but when left loose, hangs to about her shoulder blades. Her bangs frame her face, and due to the power shift she experienced recently, what were once brown eyes have now turned permanently golden.
Her usual attire consists of things that are comfortable and easy to move around in, but she does have a penchant for dressing in some pretty snazzy outfits when the mood strikes her. And she almost always wears a belt and sheathing system that allows her to carry her swords around.
world information:
* Over the course of the evolution of humanity, there has been a secret war brewing between the forces of light and darkness, however, with the continued passage of time, there has been a mutual agreement between the groups, who have had help from the likes of demons, phoenixes, and even those that would be considered gods in the eyes of the mundane to stay out of each others’ business and try to keep a balance between the two, seeing that a surplus of one or the other has brought about nothing but trouble.
* Remnants of these forces are seen today in small scattered groups across the the globe, and also in mainstream society expressed in “empowered individuals”. Supernatural entities still exist as well, but they have blended in with the whole of society to prevent any further panic and clashes, and the legends of the great wars between the forces of light and dark became that - legend.
* There are still problems that sometimes come up with empowered individuals, and if they are cause simply through hubris or through something greater, nobody really knows. However, various governments have developed what came to be known as “Empowered Individual Combat Units” (EICU for short) in order to combat this. Think of them as a superhuman police force.
history:
So to start off with, Emily herself is the daughter of a former Army captain - leader of one of the EICU units I mentioned earlier. When she and her brother Jake were born, Ben was ready in case this two kids ended up having the same abilities he did, and trained them both in basic self-defense as well as techniques to control their powers when the time came.
She was accepted into the Academy of Hart (a famous national institution for empowered students) during high school, and after some convincing (moreso for her mom than her dad or Jake, who was at the police academy at the time), she left for the campus. Everything seemed to be going well, she was starting to learn how to wield swords as her combat speciality, and life went on.
Junior year came around, and that was when things started to change drastically.
[ZERO]
That year, for Homecoming, there was a twist for King and Queen nominations: they decided to reverse the roles, with the Homecoming "King" and the female members of the court sporting male formal-wear while the guys and the "Queen" had to dress in drag. A few weeks before the student body had to vote and decide, some strange things started happening.
A small group of students, herself included, had witnessed things that they shouldn't have. In Madsen's case, she saw foul play afoot during a sparring match between the other two candidates for King by way of a mysterious masked figure sabotaging the sparring session. She and the others were just about to confront the Chief of Student Security (who was well-liked within the school and was a friend of hers) when he was kidnapped by a cloaked figure wearing an orange mask.
However, what he had left behind was a vital clue: The Chief had already been investigating the group that was responsible for this and the creatures that were attacking the students. This was the beginning of a conspiracy that nearly tore them all apart. A couple days after the Chief had been kidnapped, shadow creatures attacked the campus, and more data regarding their enemies had been unearthed and interpreted. What they found out was shocking to everyone. Some previous students that had gone missing were actually some of the converted monsters.
Due to the attack, Madsen had confronted who would be considered to be the strongest student on campus, Ryusei, and had asked him (more like begged, really) to train her in sword arts as well as to try and help her control her pyrokinesis better. Ryusei was a master of elemental attacks and weaponry, so he was the most logical choice to come to while this whole fiasco was happening. Much to her surprise, he accepted, and in the interim between the initial kidnapping of Volente and the first Masquerade attack, he put her through a rigorous training regiment to hone her skills.
It was after this that the same four people that were about to confront Volente with their testimonies (Madsen, “Chibi”, Renai, and Watty) faced the first of the Masquerade: The Orange Masque of Deception. As the name insinuated, she was a master illusionist. Much to their horror, they found out that this terrible person was none other than a fellow student of theirs. What was worse was that Madsen had fallen for one of her illusions earlier: she was one of the combatants that was 'injured' during the sparring match. Enraged, the quartet fought her. Unfortunately there was no way they could honestly even reason with her during the fight, and ultimately Madsen ended up running her former classmate through with her sword.
This was only the first in a string of bloody battles and also the beginning of something much more twisted.
Grieving and feeling remorse for what she had done, despite the fact that she knew she was only trying to protect the other students, Madsen began to start spiraling. The resulting despair and other dark feelings in her were already beginning to manifest, and somehow, it was able to create a separate being within her that surfaced during their third battle with the Masquerade, against the Emerald Masque of Deception. The others started noticing she was getting more aggressive with her tactics, and that her eyes would flash and change color from their normal brown a to sickly yellow color.
After the fight with the Emerald Masque, she met up with Plasmos, a close friend of hers who had been in a coma before the attacks. She offered to let him stay with her to help protect him, and the two talked about what had happened along with the fact that they might be falling for each other, a fact they hadn’t really thought much about until the attacks started happening.
The next morning, another attack occurred, this time instigated by the Crimson Masque of Anathema. Plasmos, Madsen, and the other members of the Revealers moved to the athletic building where they had confronted the Emerald Masque earlier, knowing from Crimson's words that this was to be their battleground. However, during the fight, it was revealed that through epic hax that the Crimson Masque had placed dormant control cells within Plasmos's and Renai's bodies, which would only awaken when the Masque called for it.
And called it he did. While Chibi was dealing with her psychotic best friend, Madsen had to fight off Plasmos on her own while Watty went after the Masque. After some not-so-pleasant things happened (including how both Chibi and Renai were killed by the Masque, and Gemini [the manifestation of her despairing feelings] coming out), she collapsed from exhaustion before the battle even ended. Thankfully the mysterious masked woman known as DeFalco, a mysterious upperclassman that had unmatched fighting capabilities, had come down and assisted Watty in defeating the Crimson Masque while Plasmos got Madsen out of there.
She woke up again in Plasmos's room, and nearly freaked out because of earlier events. There was some explanation and a bit of freaking out, but things worked out in the end, and they even made a new friend along the way. While they were cleaning up, a student who hadn't evacuated just yet was still wandering around and stumbled upon them. After nearly beating the crap out of her for scaring them, the trio then left to investigate some more, Madsen and Lumi going together. While they were out searching, she heard someone she recognized almost immediately- Sharry, the acting Chief of Student Security while Volente was missing. After saving her life, Madsen took the passed-out Sharry up to the Chief's office, only to leave her as she sensed energy that was familiar and yet deadly at the same time- Ryusei's.
Turns out that Plasmos had found DeFalco and was interrogating her about the recent events when Ryusei showed up, and in a fit of rage, had attacked Plasmos, thinking he was trying to harm DeFalco. Madsen rushed to the scene and yelled for her sensei to drop him immediately. He obliged, and the two ended up fighting, Ryusei calling for her to prove how much she has grown as a fighter since they last sparred.
During the fight, Ryusei had her trapped and would probably have suffocated her if she hadn't allowed Gemini to come out and catch him off-guard. They fought for a while before Plasmos stepped in again, noticing that Madsen and Gemini were fighting each other for control. When Madsen regained control, both Ryusei and Plasmos were gone. Getting a hold of herself, she realized that she left Sharry alone back in the Chief's office and sprinted back there as fast as she could.
Unfortunately, the sight she would come to see was one that would haunt her dreams for a while. Sharry had been brutally murdered, and she knew that if she hadn't left, there might've been a chance she would've survived.
Unfortunately, there was little time for grieving, as Ryusei had found her and the two began to fight again. It was actually a fairly close battle until the Violet Masque had shown up, knocking Madsen out with barely any effort at all, which considering her state as of that point, wasn’t terribly difficult, before fighting Ryusei.
After resting for a few days and recovering, Madsen and Plasmos had found a new lead that led the duo to a network of catacombs under the school. It was there that they had met up with Volente, to their relief, who was unscathed despite the wild goose chase they were subjected to throughout the attacks.
However, this wouldn't be happy for long, as they had found out that he was the Violet Masque all along. He had trapped them in the room with him, and the only way out was to kill him. Madsen, hurt and furious over the betrayal, had stepped up to fight him personally. Unfortunately, Volente had a trick up his sleeve. Using his abilities, he was able to draw Gemini out of her body, and the creature that was formerly in her body was ready to fight her for total control. Plasmos fought Volente alone until DeFalco and Ryusei ended up bursting in, DeFalco ultimately killing him. Also, Madsen had triumphed over her inner darkness, killing Gemini once and for all.
However, it was during this time that the quartet had found out that the members of the Masquerade were being manipulated by their leader- they honestly had no intention of going after anyone like this. Furious, Madsen strode forward, her flames burning brighter than ever before.
The group eventually faced the White Masque, coming out victorious, mostly thanks to a last-resort attack initiated by Madsen and DeFalco. The attack called for the one who would be using it to have suffered extreme emotional pain. Still angry over what had all happened, including the revelation that the other members of the Masquerade were being manipulated by the one in front of them, Madsen stepped up and was more than willing to take the chance. She and DeFalco teamed up for the attack, taking down the leader of the Masquerade, although he had left them with another mystery on their hands, telling the group that he was paid by someone else in order to do all this, but had died without revealing his employer's identity, much to the chagrin of the others.
Despite the success of the attack, because of a counter from the White Masque, Madsen had earned a large gash moving diagonally down her back from her left shoulder to her right hip. She had to spend the last few weeks of what would've been the spring term in the hospital to recover, although with everything that the doctors had done for her, they couldn't repair the wound completely, and now she has a scar in that spot to remind her of the sacrifices that had occurred to bring about peace.
Not like she wasn't reminded of them already, though.
During her stay at the hospital, the Board of Directors for the school had mailed her, congratulating her and the others for foiling the plot and potentially saving not only the Academy, but possibly the entire world. She was also then offered the job of taking over Volente's former position as Chief of Student Security once the school was rebuilt and reopened, to which she accepted. She was going to make sure that another tragedy like this would never happen again.
[ASCENSION]
Turns out that there was a secondary campus, and she left for there after some family drama (mostly involving her mother not wanting her to go back and Madsen being forced to go to the hospital thanks to her old injuries before leaving) and isolation training to keep control of her powers. She had arrived late, but thankfully, the school recognized it as a "family emergency" and didn't reprimand her for being a week late to classes. After getting settled in, it seemed that the fighting would begin again, this time, from within.
During the night of her return, a figure later revealed to be White Masque (who had somehow come back from the dead) attacked the girls in the dorm, forcing them to become trapped within their own dreams. The guys (including Plasmos and several of the others) were forced to attack him while the girls found out that all their dreams were connected and stuck together in order to survive the hellish nightmares that had been placed upon them.
Things went on normally for a time, until the Dean of the school himself decided to stop by for a visit, giving an assembly. One would think that things wouldn't go wrong there, right?
Nope. So Kresoveer (the Dean) comes in and talks to the students about the importance of survival in this world and mentions the legends of the old wars that had passed. He then demonstrates that sort of power by summoning a larger shadow creatures, one that the others that were involved in the ZERO Incident (as the previous fighting had been come to be called) hadn’t even seen, and they were considered to be the most experienced out of the entire student body due to their involvement. He then summons flames that not even Madsen, who was considered to be one of the more powerful fighters in the Academy as far as pyromancy was concerned, could control. The fire and monsters that had shown up had completely destroyed the weaker students, leaving only a select few (Madsen included) there to stare in horror at what had just happened.
Kresoveer then gave them a choice: join him in his quest to “forever purge the worlds of darkness” or die.
Not one student that survived said yes to his offer to join him.
Kresoveer proceeded to use a powerful time-stop spell in order to turn them into living statues, but the school’s security system kicked in, preventing him from doing that. A few select students escaped his wrath, the rest frozen by the weakened spell, which would be slowly weakened over time.
That’s the last thing Madsen remembered before she woke to the smell of rotting, charred flesh.
[CRUSADE]
It had been two years since that day, although nobody knew about that until later. When Madsen and the others had woke up, they were surprised to find out that a few of their own had arrived to help, saying that they were in danger- Kresoveer had sent in a hundred SWAT gunmen to kill them all. Within the group that was helping out was Takeshi, who, after watching him fight and speak to the others, Madsen found out was actually her old teacher, Ryusei.
But there wasn’t much time for happy reunions, especially with the SWAT teams incoming. Madsen did her part to incapacitate as many as possible, making sure not to kill any of them. She also found out her brother’s friend, Nate Talbot, was one of the SWAT members, only by nearly beating him within an inch of his life. He helped her defend herself as she tried to figure out a plan of attack, only to be taken down by one of his own squad members. Furious, she then took out the rest of the group before escaping with the others.
Once there, she talked with Takeshi to confirm who he really was, then was shunted with the others into an abandoned hotel to hear what Veronica (Volente’s sister and the leader of the rag-tag rebel group that was assembled now) had to say. It was then that she and the others realized that Kresoveer was the one that hired White Masque to infiltrate the Masquerade, and that the group was actually supposed to be the guardians of the student population, acting as a “shadow police” to keep any monsters or overlaying influences out. They also believed in the aspect of balance over light or darkness being the dominant element.
Hearing this, Madsen had a mental breakdown, leaving the meeting immediately to try and calm herself down. Takeshi, sensing the wavering spirit of his former student, followed, and with a somewhat literal kick in the ass, got her going again, enough for her to actually show that, and I quote, “her mastery of fire had surpassed his own”. However, during their spar, they were interrupted by Veronica, who was dragging along the other students. It seemed that during their fight, a Patron of the Crusade, one of Kresoveer’s elite, had attempted to snipe one of their fellow students, Kota. Unsure of where they were supposed to be going, Madsen followed the others through a portal system set up by Veronica....
...and into chaos. The group was supposed to have gone through the portal to the apparent “headquarters” for the group, but they had ended up getting into a fairly sticky situation, with an attempted murder and general chaos ruling the area. Madsen ended up screaming orders, leader instincts kicking in, and she and Takeshi were at least able to split them into three groups: one to take care of the monsters that were rampaging, one to evacuate the citizens, and another to go after the would-be murderer.
Madsen and Kota ended up going after the murderer, fighting him into a draw before he withdrew, momentarily giving the group some time to collect their bearings and try to figure out what exactly was going on at this point.
However, before she could do anything to help, the Patrons decided to pay a visit to the group, and with a new target in mind- Madsen herself. She quickly moved away from the others, hoping to draw her attackers away from them so they could take a break and recover. It's during this time that Dante, another student, jumps in and begins to assist her, handing her a first aid kit as well as keeping the odds somewhat more even. During the fight, she's taunted and her right arm is injured due to gunshots and cuts to the point that it's practically useless, backing her into a corner before an unlikely savior shows up -
- her older brother, Jake. He stopped the attack just in time to chastise his comrades for attacking her in the first place. Also, during this incident, Plasmos's alter ego, Spade, takes over as a self-defense mechanism and takes the Patrons' sniper hostage. It was a standoff, if the Patrons attacked, Spade would most definitely kill Crystal, but if they did, the Patrons wouldn't hesitate to attack the others, sans Madsen. Furious, she snaps (in a sense), yelling at Jake before promising the others that she wouldn't even dare let them harm her comrades, even if they spared her out of respect for Jake.
But before anyone could respond, the group was transported again, this time to a safer location - the penthouse of a secret “sponsor” of the kids, though they never did get the chance to find out who he was.
Surprisingly, when they woke up, all injuries were healed, including Madsen’s mangled arm. It was also at this point that she confronted Spade as to what he had done, since they still had Crystal with them. While the two were arguing, Dante appeared at the tail end of the argument, asking Madsen if she would teach him how to do shunpo as well as how to control his flames better. She didn’t say anything at first if only because she was still annoyed with Spade’s behavior, but once he left the area, she acknowledged Dante’s offer. Flattered and a little proud of herself, she accepted, taking him outside to train in the alleyways while the others went after a Heartless outbreak that had occurred in the city.
What they didn't realize until the duo arrived, although Madsen could sense him in the area- was that Jake was actually controlling some minor-level monsters in an attempt to lure the Soldiers out, then get rid of them before they became too much of a threat. Madsen carved her way through them so that she could confront her older brother head-on. She was then stopped by Spade, who warned her about the incoming monster that Takeshi was trying to defeat.
She then (reluctantly, mind you) leaves Spade to fight both Jake and Luc, taking Dante with her in order to fight alongside Takeshi. After some catching up and sarcasm, the trio had the giant monster on the ropes - up until Madsen noticed something. Jake and Luc were gone, and Spade wasn't moving from his spot below. Enraged, she went down to check on him, only to see that Plas had finally taken control again, and he was bleeding out from injuries that the two had inflicted.
It was then that she swore she'd take down Kresoveer, no matter the cost.
In light of recent events, Veronica called an emergency meeting, appointing a taskforce in order to try and teach the newer people within the group the ropes as well as to try and gain some semblance of a fighting force. This group included Madsen, Dante, Takeshi, Kieve, Tana, and Kell. Shortly before they were transported, the Soldiers held an impromptu memorial service for Plasmos, swearing that they wouldn't let his sacrifice be in vain.
During this time, her training mostly included ways to try and strengthen her defenses, especially considering the fact that she had no magical talent to speak of; which was actually a standard for the group. Most of the fighters were more adept in manipulating certain elements [Madsen and Dante with fire, Kell with electricity, Bunq with wind, Reese with ki/chi/life energy, Kieve was a shapeshifter, etc.] or were good at using certain types of weapons.
But before the year would close, Madsen and crew would end up mounting a direct attack against Kresoveer himself, to which end she had actually cornered him when Jake showed up to interfere with the attack. While arguing, Jake had realized what his sister was trying to tell him all along, and when presented with the choice of continuing to aid Kresoveer or helping her, he chose his family. Needless to say, Kresoveer wasn't too happy about the whole thing, and nearly killed the pair if it weren't for Jake jumping in at the last minute to intercept the attack [and receiving a nice scar in the process].
At this point, the group backed off, and are now in hiding while they recuperate from the attack.
The major casualty count was as follows during this last fight: Takeshi was injured severely from Frank's last-ditch attack, Veronica was killed, and Dante and Bunq tag-teamed to defeat Kain, one of Kresoveer’s top lieutenants and one of the main attackers against Madsen when they were targeting her (they found out later that it was a means to lure Takeshi out because Jake had been deliberately fed false information about his sister’s sensei) and he was left for dead during the mission. (THIS IS ACTUALLY IMPORTANT TO REMEMBER - EVERYONE THOUGHT HE WAS DEAD UNTIL THE SCHOOL MISSION.)
Since she was part of the attack squad, she feels partially responsible for the poor result of the mission, as does Jake since he's the lead intelligence officer. Both of them do their usual “we can't face the others during this” schtick and about this point that the younger Madsen sibling decides to go off on her own to train to get stronger. While the two of them are moping, Takeshi pretty much comes over and smacks the doubt from Lii via an impromptu sparring match.
Unsurprisingly, it works.
During their fight, she mentions the fact that she wants to get stronger so that they can be ready for the next time things went down. She needed to find ways to protect those that she had left, including her parents, who were evacuated in order to protect them from the Patrons, who were now calling themselves "The Holy Order of the Luminous Knights". The Soldiers, in retaliation, changed their name from "Soldiers of Light" to "The Alliance of Heroes".
Through that, Takeshi, being the holder of infinite wisdom (okay not really, he just heard rumors and thought it'd be a good learning experience for her even if by this point they aren't teacher and student anymore), gives her a set of coordinates. He also tells her that if Jake was going to go on a rampage and yell at people for the whole fiasco, he'd take the fall, since it technically was his idea in the first place.
[REDEMPTION]
So she packs up and heads out, but lets the others know what she's doing via a group-wide meeting, leaving before anyone can try convincing her otherwise.
During her time jumping between locations, she does encounter some minor groups of the Order that are either in the area or trying to tail her, most of which she dispatches of quickly. Eventually she reaches the area that Takeshi had indicated on the paper, finding that it's actually part of a underground network of tunnels and a central temple.
In the middle of this search, she is confronted by Luc, who she finds out is the one who actually killed her boyfriend instead of Jake, as she initially thought. She successfully defeats him and “avenges” her boyfriend - though she doesn't kill him, she just knocks him the hell out and delivers him to a hospital. She then does some further exploring before heading to a “central area” and seeing a large tablet. When Madsen touches the tablet, there's flashes of memories that definitely don't belong to her, and an echoing voice in her head -
“Are you willing to take the burden?”
At first, she doesn't get the implication, and ends up meditating over what she saw and heard. It honestly takes her about a day or so to think over things, and once she gets back, there's another flash of memory, then Nithal himself talks through the tablet once again:
“Are you sure you want to continue fighting?”
“I have to finish what I started.”
“While I understand that, if you decided to unseal this tablet, there will be consequences that you will have to deal with. The burden of this might end up killing you. Are you still sure you want to do this?”
“... I am.”
Once he's sure of her resolve, Nithal gives her some of what he can figure out about how to unseal the tablet. At first, she's hesitant, but after speaking with Nithal a few more times, she's sure of her judgment in trusting him. She then unseals the tablet by following Nithal's directions, and the phoenix emerges in his normal form. They talk for a little while longer, where he reveals that his powers were still cut down due to being sealed. He still won't tell her why he was sealed or who did it right away, but she figures to at least give him some time. The two of them end up entering a contract now that Nithal knows about her resolve to keep fighting.
The rest of the year is mostly dedicated to them wandering and her trying to learn how to control her new abilities and try to get some answers out of Nithal. Madsen also keeps in contact with the other members of the Alliance through encrypted video-chats.
Around the time of the one-year anniversary of the big battle where Veronica was killed and Takeshi was critically injured, she and Nithal head back to the main HQ for the Alliance. However, shortly after they get back, a contingency of Order soldiers get there to try and drive them out. Madsen ends up fighting off one of the leaders in order to keep them from getting to the group she was leading, which culminates in her synching and eventually driving him off with Nithal’s help.
Afterward, she ends up talking with Takeshi and catching up with him over drinks before their next mission: infiltrating the old Academy. However, during the mission, Kain is shown to be alive and well, and kills both Dante and Bunq (his “Soul Brother” and a wind master). Madsen actually doesn't know what happened until after they get back, but she does get the vibe that something isn't right beforehand.
She's back in the main ship at the end of the mission, pissed as all hell that the whole thing didn't go as planned (and that's putting it lightly) - and ends up asking a few of the newbies to come with her so that they can start getting the battle experience they need to. So she and some of the older members of the group start to train the recruits in order to try and keep up with everything - and it’s during one of these training missions that things start to finally come to a head.
After getting intel that Kain wasn’t actually working with Kresoveer, he was working as an independent agent, Jake goes to confront him for answers as to why he was attacking the Alliance and if their old deal of him not attacking his sister still held. Jake then finds out why Kain’s had such an obsession with the group - Crystal was one of the casualties of the last major battle the year before, but due to her position as a sniper, she wasn’t found until much later after the battle was over. Kain had survived the attacks on him from Dante and Bunq, and losing the one person he cared about turned him into a man with nothing left to lose. Knowing that Emily herself was one of the main figureheads of the group due to her experience in the original ZERO Incident and her connections with the main group, she was a prime target, completely disregarding the original deal he had made with her, mostly due to the fact that Jake was no longer a member of the Order anyway. Jake apologizes for the incident, because he knew Crystal as a coworker and didn’t honestly want her to be dragged into the crossfire like she was.
The two then fight, and the group that the younger Madsen sibling was leading comes upon the area where Jake and Kain are fighting. They rush in, but by the time they make it there, Jake has been run through and Kain is nowhere in sight. Emily is understandably furious, and orders the rookies to get him to a medic ASAP while she goes ahead and acts as point to “make sure Kain’s not in the area”. (translation: Get out of here with Jake and pray that bastard Kain is still around, I’m taking him out here and now.)
This launches into a cat-and-mouse game with Emily and Kain, where the two are chasing each other for a good hour or so before they finally confront each other face-to-face. Despite Nithal’s warnings about how rushing in blindly would prevent any sort of synchronization due to her increasing rage at Kain for what he had done, she went in anyway, swords drawn and anger clouding her mind. Growling at his partner’s recklessness, Nithal ends up flying back to the others, telling a couple of the “senior” rookies to come with him so that they can try and stop Madsen before she does something incredibly stupid.
When they arrive, Nithal stays true to form with techniques he had learned from his previous time as an assassin and sneaks around while the others go in ahead, shifting into his human form just in time to see Kain knock a bloodied Madsen into a wall and nearly impale her on it if it weren’t for a concussive blast from her when she grabbed his arm.
Nithal takes the opportunity to strike while the rookies drag off the unwilling Madsen, but once she sees the look in his eyes alongside his words (“Go. Your brother wouldn’t want you wasting your life for an empty vengeance.”), she willingly lets the others help her. Nithal then fights Kain on his own, and utters a line that is the epitome of Precision F-Strike:
“If she dies because of this, I swear I will hunt you down and put you in your fucking grave.”
(Normally, Nithal’s very soft-spoken and pretty much never swears. So it’s a huge dissonance to hear him say something like this.)
Unfortunately, even with all the abilities that the group had at their disposal, Jake bled out before they could give him proper treatment.
Madsen was devastated once she found out the news, and it took a combined effort of several of her closest comrades within the Alliance, a couple of the rookies she was training, and one Ava Lockheart, a newer recruit that had come to the Alliance through being forcibly separated from her own older sister, who was a member of the Order. Ava was a shy person, but very kind, and was willing to sit with her and talk about what had happened.
Once Madsen had recovered, the leaders of the Alliance held a meeting to try and bring about a proper end to this madness once and for all. Realizing that taking the fight to Kresoveer’s territory was a bad idea considering what happened the last time they did so, they hatched a plan to lure him and the other members of his military group to their side of things and even out the playing field a bit.
They ended up planting intel of unearthing a way to channel the power of an ancient weapon, where they would be, and who all would be there. All that needed to happen was confirmation of the false intel being given and then to set the stage. Everyone was divided into respective teams in order to be ready for the impending battle, with Madsen and Takeshi co-leading those on the front lines.
The fight turned out better than originally planned, and soon enough, they were fighting Kresoveer himself. Madsen and Nithal also had done something that they were not able to do up until this point in terms of synchronization: they were able to synch up 100%, their bodies and souls working in perfect harmony in order to fight and try to restore the balance. During the fight, Kresoveer attempted to infuriate Madsen by bringing up all the people that had died so far during the confrontations and telling her that what he was doing was for the greater good, but she wouldn’t have any of it, only relenting after getting blasted at close range in the chest. Takeshi and Kieve jumped in to take over for her while Ava was keeping guard to make sure that nobody else tried interfering while Madsen attempted to heal herself, but the wound was bleeding faster than she could heal. She slips into a state of half-consciousness, where she and Nithal talk about everything that has happened so far, and Nithal reveals the reasons why he was sealed in the first place: he had become too selfish, not caring about his original mission to try and watch over the balance between light and dark from the shadows, and it was up to his own brother, Amadi, to stop him before things got out of hand. The brothers confronted each other, and Nithal was eventually sealed. It’s at this point that he muses about how different things could’ve been, and without giving Madsen a chance to protest, channels his powers into her, entrusting her to finish her mission and to do what he could not: give people hope for the future.
By this point, Madsen opens her eyes and has recovered, much to everyone’s surprise. A combined effort of Takeshi, Kieve, Hellis, Tana, and Kell had taken Kresoveer out, and when she wakes up, the others are standing there and ready to help her up.
It had taken over five years, but the war was finally coming to an end - with their leader gone, the Order was eventually forced to dissolve, and various individuals were taken in for questioning. As for Madsen? She ended up visiting her parents once she was recovered, and expressed her desire to join a similar unit to the one her father was a part of, to make sure that nothing like this would ever happen again.
personality: When we first meet Madsen, she's quiet, laid-back, and a bit shy. While being no-nonsense to most, to the people that know her fairly well, she's a bit of a spitfire and with an impressive snarky streak. With the trauma of the Masquerade attacks looming over her head, she became distant, bottling up and hiding her emotions. This lead to the creation of “Gemini”, a literal manifestation of her fears and darkest feelings. It wasn't until she met others that she felt she could trust that she began to open up again.
Despite the fact that she's laid-back most of the time, she has an incredibly explosive temper when provoked. Coupled with her stubborn streak, it makes her a force to be reckoned with. She has several particular rage buttons, mostly connected to her family, close comrades, and her former state when Gemini was in her body. Another major rage button is the man that was indirectly and directly responsible for the whole fiasco in the first place. While Madsen doesn't consider herself to be a vengeful person, she does deem it necessary to punish Kresoveer for what he had done to her and her comrades. Kain was also added to this group after he had murdered Jake. She was already mad at him for killing her student and his best friend, but going after her brother was the last straw.
At her core, Madsen is the type of person who is willing to do anything and everything within her power to make things right. With a stubborn streak a mile wide, a compassionate nature, and a strong sense of justice, she has been picked time and time again as a combat leader within the group. “Grabbing a sword and charging headlong” has been her M.O. up until recently, and especially thanks to her cross-world training that she has realized as such and is trying her utmost to change it. Yes, she is still very much driven by impulses and instincts, but she does try to take the time to plan out a strategy, and has shown the ability to come up with new strategies on the fly during battle. Her time with Nithal has helped her cool her head a bit, giving her an opportunity to try and put more strategy into her battle tactics. Even so, she’s usually put in the front lines, and prefers to act as point for most operations.
To put it bluntly, Madsen also has a hero complex - if there's someone in trouble, she's usually right there to try and help them out. This, despite being a reflection of how she was raised, has proven to be a bitch and a half to work around, especially when coupled with her stubborn streak. Time has tempered this, making her a bit more jaded, though she does prefer to act out to make sure that there are the least amount of casualties possible, but she knows that sometimes you can’t save everyone, and though it’s painful, sometimes it can’t be helped.
Madsen’s fiercely loyal to her comrades, friends and beliefs, and it's somewhat difficult to shake it without something major happening. She has thrown herself into danger more than a few times because of this as well [i.e. the confrontation with her, Jake, and Kresoveer]. She honestly tries to adhere to her father's teachings, and has been known to turn what he has taught her into inspiring speeches and strategies for the others to work with.
abilities/powers: Madsen’s main power is that of pyrokinesis - the ability to control and manipulate flames. This is a genetic trait, passed down from her father and also was expressed in her older brother before his death. Her sub-abilities include:
Create Fire: Just what the package says, folks. Madsen can create fire from nothing, as long as the starting point is touching some part of her body.
Absorb Fire: By absorbing flames into her body, Madsen can add them to her own attacks and prevent others from getting burned at the same time. Depending on the amount and the intensity, this can get a little tricky, and she must redirect it eventually (within a few minutes usually) before it could potentially kill her.
Fire Strike: By allowing flames to engulf her limbs and sword, she adds physical power to her attacks. This allows for flaming shockwaves, BURN KNUCKLE fiery punches, and the like.
Explosive Touch: Merely by touching her opponent and focusing, she can create explosions from the point that she touches. Great for distractions.
Due to her training from Takeshi, she is an incredibly accomplished swordfighter, and is considered to be one of the best in the Alliance. Her current sword set is a paired set, given to her as a gift from Takeshi before she set out on her training mission and met Nithal. She uses multiple sword styles, preferring to dabble in multiple schools rather than specialize in one. [i.e. iaido, kendo, dual-wielding]
Now that Nithal has given given her his powers/energy in order to keep her alive, there has been a boost to Madsen’s pyrokinesis abilities, as well as the fact that she actually has a healing factor now. She originally was more of a Glass Cannon in terms of build, but now has evolved into more of a Lightning Bruiser. She can still die and get injured, yes, but it is difficult.
first person sample: [Hi Abax, have a very irritated looking young woman holding her toe tag in one hand as she gives the feed a flat glare.]
Cute. Like I haven’t had enough shit to deal with already? [She has a hand at her forehead, shutting her eyes.]
So much for thinking that dream thing was the last of it … [There’s a few moments pause before she blinks, frowning at the toe tag.]
At least I don’t … I know it wasn’t this morbid. I’ve already dealt with more than my share of near-death experiences.
[She stares at the tag for a moment, and it catches on fire. This doesn’t seem to phase her all that much, and she flicks it away before looking to the feed again.]
Whatever. If anyone’s got an idea of what the hell’s going on or even better, a way out, feel free to let me know.
third person sample: “Sounds good. I'm not exactly in top form right now anyway... had a little run-in before getting on the ship.” Just thinking about that fiasco made Madsen shudder visibly, her amiable demeanor dropping for a moment, a deep scowl etched on her features. She definitely didn't like that situation one bit - or the fact that this guy apparently knew some of the allies that she had made. She would have to have a nice little chat with a couple of them later on, and by “chat”, we mean “punch them in the face for fraternizing with the enemy”.
“But it's still acting up? Shit, I don't think even my back was that bad for that long,” she added, taking a long swig of her beer. As a reminder to the fact, the scar running across her back throbbed for a split second. Battle scars were to be the reminders of their past and what they had to go through, apparently. Each one had its own story to tell. Though, thinking about it, the large, circular scar on Takeshi’s chest was just painful to look at sometimes. How he had survived that attack from Frank was nothing short of a motherfucking miracle. Then again, they did have their share of miracles - after all, she was able to secure a contract with a phoenix. Though sometimes she wondered if that was too little, too late - only to be reprimanded with a sharp pain in her temple, reminding her that even though Nithal wasn't saying anything, he still could hear what she was thinking.
case no: N/A, feel free to randomize as you see fit! :3
And here, have a pretty picture of Madsen's PB (Briana Evigan) as compensation for reading through this whole long piece of tl;dr:
name: Lii
are you over 18?: Yup, about four years over.
personal lj: derptacular
email/msn/aim/plurk/etc: email: lii.lionheart@gmail.com | AIM: derpsexual | Plurk: tyrantrave
characters in abax: N/A
in character information.
name: Emily Madsen
age: 21
sex: Female
race: Human
height: 5’3”
weight: 125 lbs.
canon point: End of written history
previous cr: from ilpromenade:
Ichigo Kurosaki [savior_n_black]: Ichigo’s like a little brother to her, and like many siblings, they fight. Both are stubborn and bull-headed when it comes to things, and it doesn’t help that parts of their pasts overlap in some instances. Madsen herself is proud of him for taking the more difficult path in dealing with inner darkness, but at the same time she’s still frustrated with his “PROTECT ALL THE THINGS” complex, especially when it extends to her - she can take care of herself just fine, thanks. When they’re not arguing, though, they get along fairly well.
They co-founded Promenade’s Fight Club as a means to not only get an idea of what others in the city could do fighting-wise, but also as a means to vent frustrations and tensions safely and without people getting into trouble for it. Ichigo was also the only one at Promenade that she willingly confided in about her brother’s predicament. Madsen’s one of the first ones to call Ichigo on his bullshit, and isn’t afraid to smack him around to prove a point.
Rukia Kuchiki [snowwhitesoul]: Madsen and Rukia originally bonded due to both having to deal with Ichigo’s antics, but as time passed, the came to respect each others’ abilities and strengths as fighters. She and Rukia became leaders of the Resistance under Rebecca Crane after Tony Stark left, and when Becca left, they were in charge of organizing the groups, whose main goal was not only finding a way home, but also preparing for any more random attacks due to the dream city’s influence.
Hichigo Shirosaki [holeheart]: Ichigo’s Hollow, at first, Madsen was incredibly wary of him due to his nature reminding her of Gemini and that whole fiasco, but once she saw that there was more to him past the bloodthirsty nature, she was more willing to talk to him. It was surprising to find out that Shiro was more level-headed than Ichigo at times, and sometimes that helped when they were dealing with another standoff between herself and Ichigo.
However, due to the dream city’s influence and the timespan between when she was last at the city and her current canon point before coming into Abax (a good 3-4 months), some of her memories from her time in Promenade are fuzzy and disjointed.
Madsen’s tags on the main comm page
Tags on the log comm
physical appearance: At first glance, Madsen looks like your average American girl-next-door. She stands a bit on the short side at 5’3” and 125 lbs., with an athletic, toned frame from all the fighting and running she had done over the last few years. Once you start peeling away layers of clothing, however, you can see the various smattering of scars on her body from fighting, the most prominent being one stretching across her right shoulder, a jagged line running across her back from her left shoulder blade to her right hip, and the most recent addition: a circular indentation on her chest that remains of the wound that nearly killed her.
She’s got dark brown hair, usually tied back, but when left loose, hangs to about her shoulder blades. Her bangs frame her face, and due to the power shift she experienced recently, what were once brown eyes have now turned permanently golden.
Her usual attire consists of things that are comfortable and easy to move around in, but she does have a penchant for dressing in some pretty snazzy outfits when the mood strikes her. And she almost always wears a belt and sheathing system that allows her to carry her swords around.
world information:
* Over the course of the evolution of humanity, there has been a secret war brewing between the forces of light and darkness, however, with the continued passage of time, there has been a mutual agreement between the groups, who have had help from the likes of demons, phoenixes, and even those that would be considered gods in the eyes of the mundane to stay out of each others’ business and try to keep a balance between the two, seeing that a surplus of one or the other has brought about nothing but trouble.
* Remnants of these forces are seen today in small scattered groups across the the globe, and also in mainstream society expressed in “empowered individuals”. Supernatural entities still exist as well, but they have blended in with the whole of society to prevent any further panic and clashes, and the legends of the great wars between the forces of light and dark became that - legend.
* There are still problems that sometimes come up with empowered individuals, and if they are cause simply through hubris or through something greater, nobody really knows. However, various governments have developed what came to be known as “Empowered Individual Combat Units” (EICU for short) in order to combat this. Think of them as a superhuman police force.
history:
So to start off with, Emily herself is the daughter of a former Army captain - leader of one of the EICU units I mentioned earlier. When she and her brother Jake were born, Ben was ready in case this two kids ended up having the same abilities he did, and trained them both in basic self-defense as well as techniques to control their powers when the time came.
She was accepted into the Academy of Hart (a famous national institution for empowered students) during high school, and after some convincing (moreso for her mom than her dad or Jake, who was at the police academy at the time), she left for the campus. Everything seemed to be going well, she was starting to learn how to wield swords as her combat speciality, and life went on.
Junior year came around, and that was when things started to change drastically.
[ZERO]
That year, for Homecoming, there was a twist for King and Queen nominations: they decided to reverse the roles, with the Homecoming "King" and the female members of the court sporting male formal-wear while the guys and the "Queen" had to dress in drag. A few weeks before the student body had to vote and decide, some strange things started happening.
A small group of students, herself included, had witnessed things that they shouldn't have. In Madsen's case, she saw foul play afoot during a sparring match between the other two candidates for King by way of a mysterious masked figure sabotaging the sparring session. She and the others were just about to confront the Chief of Student Security (who was well-liked within the school and was a friend of hers) when he was kidnapped by a cloaked figure wearing an orange mask.
However, what he had left behind was a vital clue: The Chief had already been investigating the group that was responsible for this and the creatures that were attacking the students. This was the beginning of a conspiracy that nearly tore them all apart. A couple days after the Chief had been kidnapped, shadow creatures attacked the campus, and more data regarding their enemies had been unearthed and interpreted. What they found out was shocking to everyone. Some previous students that had gone missing were actually some of the converted monsters.
Due to the attack, Madsen had confronted who would be considered to be the strongest student on campus, Ryusei, and had asked him (more like begged, really) to train her in sword arts as well as to try and help her control her pyrokinesis better. Ryusei was a master of elemental attacks and weaponry, so he was the most logical choice to come to while this whole fiasco was happening. Much to her surprise, he accepted, and in the interim between the initial kidnapping of Volente and the first Masquerade attack, he put her through a rigorous training regiment to hone her skills.
It was after this that the same four people that were about to confront Volente with their testimonies (Madsen, “Chibi”, Renai, and Watty) faced the first of the Masquerade: The Orange Masque of Deception. As the name insinuated, she was a master illusionist. Much to their horror, they found out that this terrible person was none other than a fellow student of theirs. What was worse was that Madsen had fallen for one of her illusions earlier: she was one of the combatants that was 'injured' during the sparring match. Enraged, the quartet fought her. Unfortunately there was no way they could honestly even reason with her during the fight, and ultimately Madsen ended up running her former classmate through with her sword.
This was only the first in a string of bloody battles and also the beginning of something much more twisted.
Grieving and feeling remorse for what she had done, despite the fact that she knew she was only trying to protect the other students, Madsen began to start spiraling. The resulting despair and other dark feelings in her were already beginning to manifest, and somehow, it was able to create a separate being within her that surfaced during their third battle with the Masquerade, against the Emerald Masque of Deception. The others started noticing she was getting more aggressive with her tactics, and that her eyes would flash and change color from their normal brown a to sickly yellow color.
After the fight with the Emerald Masque, she met up with Plasmos, a close friend of hers who had been in a coma before the attacks. She offered to let him stay with her to help protect him, and the two talked about what had happened along with the fact that they might be falling for each other, a fact they hadn’t really thought much about until the attacks started happening.
The next morning, another attack occurred, this time instigated by the Crimson Masque of Anathema. Plasmos, Madsen, and the other members of the Revealers moved to the athletic building where they had confronted the Emerald Masque earlier, knowing from Crimson's words that this was to be their battleground. However, during the fight, it was revealed that through epic hax that the Crimson Masque had placed dormant control cells within Plasmos's and Renai's bodies, which would only awaken when the Masque called for it.
And called it he did. While Chibi was dealing with her psychotic best friend, Madsen had to fight off Plasmos on her own while Watty went after the Masque. After some not-so-pleasant things happened (including how both Chibi and Renai were killed by the Masque, and Gemini [the manifestation of her despairing feelings] coming out), she collapsed from exhaustion before the battle even ended. Thankfully the mysterious masked woman known as DeFalco, a mysterious upperclassman that had unmatched fighting capabilities, had come down and assisted Watty in defeating the Crimson Masque while Plasmos got Madsen out of there.
She woke up again in Plasmos's room, and nearly freaked out because of earlier events. There was some explanation and a bit of freaking out, but things worked out in the end, and they even made a new friend along the way. While they were cleaning up, a student who hadn't evacuated just yet was still wandering around and stumbled upon them. After nearly beating the crap out of her for scaring them, the trio then left to investigate some more, Madsen and Lumi going together. While they were out searching, she heard someone she recognized almost immediately- Sharry, the acting Chief of Student Security while Volente was missing. After saving her life, Madsen took the passed-out Sharry up to the Chief's office, only to leave her as she sensed energy that was familiar and yet deadly at the same time- Ryusei's.
Turns out that Plasmos had found DeFalco and was interrogating her about the recent events when Ryusei showed up, and in a fit of rage, had attacked Plasmos, thinking he was trying to harm DeFalco. Madsen rushed to the scene and yelled for her sensei to drop him immediately. He obliged, and the two ended up fighting, Ryusei calling for her to prove how much she has grown as a fighter since they last sparred.
During the fight, Ryusei had her trapped and would probably have suffocated her if she hadn't allowed Gemini to come out and catch him off-guard. They fought for a while before Plasmos stepped in again, noticing that Madsen and Gemini were fighting each other for control. When Madsen regained control, both Ryusei and Plasmos were gone. Getting a hold of herself, she realized that she left Sharry alone back in the Chief's office and sprinted back there as fast as she could.
Unfortunately, the sight she would come to see was one that would haunt her dreams for a while. Sharry had been brutally murdered, and she knew that if she hadn't left, there might've been a chance she would've survived.
Unfortunately, there was little time for grieving, as Ryusei had found her and the two began to fight again. It was actually a fairly close battle until the Violet Masque had shown up, knocking Madsen out with barely any effort at all, which considering her state as of that point, wasn’t terribly difficult, before fighting Ryusei.
After resting for a few days and recovering, Madsen and Plasmos had found a new lead that led the duo to a network of catacombs under the school. It was there that they had met up with Volente, to their relief, who was unscathed despite the wild goose chase they were subjected to throughout the attacks.
However, this wouldn't be happy for long, as they had found out that he was the Violet Masque all along. He had trapped them in the room with him, and the only way out was to kill him. Madsen, hurt and furious over the betrayal, had stepped up to fight him personally. Unfortunately, Volente had a trick up his sleeve. Using his abilities, he was able to draw Gemini out of her body, and the creature that was formerly in her body was ready to fight her for total control. Plasmos fought Volente alone until DeFalco and Ryusei ended up bursting in, DeFalco ultimately killing him. Also, Madsen had triumphed over her inner darkness, killing Gemini once and for all.
However, it was during this time that the quartet had found out that the members of the Masquerade were being manipulated by their leader- they honestly had no intention of going after anyone like this. Furious, Madsen strode forward, her flames burning brighter than ever before.
The group eventually faced the White Masque, coming out victorious, mostly thanks to a last-resort attack initiated by Madsen and DeFalco. The attack called for the one who would be using it to have suffered extreme emotional pain. Still angry over what had all happened, including the revelation that the other members of the Masquerade were being manipulated by the one in front of them, Madsen stepped up and was more than willing to take the chance. She and DeFalco teamed up for the attack, taking down the leader of the Masquerade, although he had left them with another mystery on their hands, telling the group that he was paid by someone else in order to do all this, but had died without revealing his employer's identity, much to the chagrin of the others.
Despite the success of the attack, because of a counter from the White Masque, Madsen had earned a large gash moving diagonally down her back from her left shoulder to her right hip. She had to spend the last few weeks of what would've been the spring term in the hospital to recover, although with everything that the doctors had done for her, they couldn't repair the wound completely, and now she has a scar in that spot to remind her of the sacrifices that had occurred to bring about peace.
Not like she wasn't reminded of them already, though.
During her stay at the hospital, the Board of Directors for the school had mailed her, congratulating her and the others for foiling the plot and potentially saving not only the Academy, but possibly the entire world. She was also then offered the job of taking over Volente's former position as Chief of Student Security once the school was rebuilt and reopened, to which she accepted. She was going to make sure that another tragedy like this would never happen again.
[ASCENSION]
Turns out that there was a secondary campus, and she left for there after some family drama (mostly involving her mother not wanting her to go back and Madsen being forced to go to the hospital thanks to her old injuries before leaving) and isolation training to keep control of her powers. She had arrived late, but thankfully, the school recognized it as a "family emergency" and didn't reprimand her for being a week late to classes. After getting settled in, it seemed that the fighting would begin again, this time, from within.
During the night of her return, a figure later revealed to be White Masque (who had somehow come back from the dead) attacked the girls in the dorm, forcing them to become trapped within their own dreams. The guys (including Plasmos and several of the others) were forced to attack him while the girls found out that all their dreams were connected and stuck together in order to survive the hellish nightmares that had been placed upon them.
Things went on normally for a time, until the Dean of the school himself decided to stop by for a visit, giving an assembly. One would think that things wouldn't go wrong there, right?
Nope. So Kresoveer (the Dean) comes in and talks to the students about the importance of survival in this world and mentions the legends of the old wars that had passed. He then demonstrates that sort of power by summoning a larger shadow creatures, one that the others that were involved in the ZERO Incident (as the previous fighting had been come to be called) hadn’t even seen, and they were considered to be the most experienced out of the entire student body due to their involvement. He then summons flames that not even Madsen, who was considered to be one of the more powerful fighters in the Academy as far as pyromancy was concerned, could control. The fire and monsters that had shown up had completely destroyed the weaker students, leaving only a select few (Madsen included) there to stare in horror at what had just happened.
Kresoveer then gave them a choice: join him in his quest to “forever purge the worlds of darkness” or die.
Not one student that survived said yes to his offer to join him.
Kresoveer proceeded to use a powerful time-stop spell in order to turn them into living statues, but the school’s security system kicked in, preventing him from doing that. A few select students escaped his wrath, the rest frozen by the weakened spell, which would be slowly weakened over time.
That’s the last thing Madsen remembered before she woke to the smell of rotting, charred flesh.
[CRUSADE]
It had been two years since that day, although nobody knew about that until later. When Madsen and the others had woke up, they were surprised to find out that a few of their own had arrived to help, saying that they were in danger- Kresoveer had sent in a hundred SWAT gunmen to kill them all. Within the group that was helping out was Takeshi, who, after watching him fight and speak to the others, Madsen found out was actually her old teacher, Ryusei.
But there wasn’t much time for happy reunions, especially with the SWAT teams incoming. Madsen did her part to incapacitate as many as possible, making sure not to kill any of them. She also found out her brother’s friend, Nate Talbot, was one of the SWAT members, only by nearly beating him within an inch of his life. He helped her defend herself as she tried to figure out a plan of attack, only to be taken down by one of his own squad members. Furious, she then took out the rest of the group before escaping with the others.
Once there, she talked with Takeshi to confirm who he really was, then was shunted with the others into an abandoned hotel to hear what Veronica (Volente’s sister and the leader of the rag-tag rebel group that was assembled now) had to say. It was then that she and the others realized that Kresoveer was the one that hired White Masque to infiltrate the Masquerade, and that the group was actually supposed to be the guardians of the student population, acting as a “shadow police” to keep any monsters or overlaying influences out. They also believed in the aspect of balance over light or darkness being the dominant element.
Hearing this, Madsen had a mental breakdown, leaving the meeting immediately to try and calm herself down. Takeshi, sensing the wavering spirit of his former student, followed, and with a somewhat literal kick in the ass, got her going again, enough for her to actually show that, and I quote, “her mastery of fire had surpassed his own”. However, during their spar, they were interrupted by Veronica, who was dragging along the other students. It seemed that during their fight, a Patron of the Crusade, one of Kresoveer’s elite, had attempted to snipe one of their fellow students, Kota. Unsure of where they were supposed to be going, Madsen followed the others through a portal system set up by Veronica....
...and into chaos. The group was supposed to have gone through the portal to the apparent “headquarters” for the group, but they had ended up getting into a fairly sticky situation, with an attempted murder and general chaos ruling the area. Madsen ended up screaming orders, leader instincts kicking in, and she and Takeshi were at least able to split them into three groups: one to take care of the monsters that were rampaging, one to evacuate the citizens, and another to go after the would-be murderer.
Madsen and Kota ended up going after the murderer, fighting him into a draw before he withdrew, momentarily giving the group some time to collect their bearings and try to figure out what exactly was going on at this point.
However, before she could do anything to help, the Patrons decided to pay a visit to the group, and with a new target in mind- Madsen herself. She quickly moved away from the others, hoping to draw her attackers away from them so they could take a break and recover. It's during this time that Dante, another student, jumps in and begins to assist her, handing her a first aid kit as well as keeping the odds somewhat more even. During the fight, she's taunted and her right arm is injured due to gunshots and cuts to the point that it's practically useless, backing her into a corner before an unlikely savior shows up -
- her older brother, Jake. He stopped the attack just in time to chastise his comrades for attacking her in the first place. Also, during this incident, Plasmos's alter ego, Spade, takes over as a self-defense mechanism and takes the Patrons' sniper hostage. It was a standoff, if the Patrons attacked, Spade would most definitely kill Crystal, but if they did, the Patrons wouldn't hesitate to attack the others, sans Madsen. Furious, she snaps (in a sense), yelling at Jake before promising the others that she wouldn't even dare let them harm her comrades, even if they spared her out of respect for Jake.
But before anyone could respond, the group was transported again, this time to a safer location - the penthouse of a secret “sponsor” of the kids, though they never did get the chance to find out who he was.
Surprisingly, when they woke up, all injuries were healed, including Madsen’s mangled arm. It was also at this point that she confronted Spade as to what he had done, since they still had Crystal with them. While the two were arguing, Dante appeared at the tail end of the argument, asking Madsen if she would teach him how to do shunpo as well as how to control his flames better. She didn’t say anything at first if only because she was still annoyed with Spade’s behavior, but once he left the area, she acknowledged Dante’s offer. Flattered and a little proud of herself, she accepted, taking him outside to train in the alleyways while the others went after a Heartless outbreak that had occurred in the city.
What they didn't realize until the duo arrived, although Madsen could sense him in the area- was that Jake was actually controlling some minor-level monsters in an attempt to lure the Soldiers out, then get rid of them before they became too much of a threat. Madsen carved her way through them so that she could confront her older brother head-on. She was then stopped by Spade, who warned her about the incoming monster that Takeshi was trying to defeat.
She then (reluctantly, mind you) leaves Spade to fight both Jake and Luc, taking Dante with her in order to fight alongside Takeshi. After some catching up and sarcasm, the trio had the giant monster on the ropes - up until Madsen noticed something. Jake and Luc were gone, and Spade wasn't moving from his spot below. Enraged, she went down to check on him, only to see that Plas had finally taken control again, and he was bleeding out from injuries that the two had inflicted.
It was then that she swore she'd take down Kresoveer, no matter the cost.
In light of recent events, Veronica called an emergency meeting, appointing a taskforce in order to try and teach the newer people within the group the ropes as well as to try and gain some semblance of a fighting force. This group included Madsen, Dante, Takeshi, Kieve, Tana, and Kell. Shortly before they were transported, the Soldiers held an impromptu memorial service for Plasmos, swearing that they wouldn't let his sacrifice be in vain.
During this time, her training mostly included ways to try and strengthen her defenses, especially considering the fact that she had no magical talent to speak of; which was actually a standard for the group. Most of the fighters were more adept in manipulating certain elements [Madsen and Dante with fire, Kell with electricity, Bunq with wind, Reese with ki/chi/life energy, Kieve was a shapeshifter, etc.] or were good at using certain types of weapons.
But before the year would close, Madsen and crew would end up mounting a direct attack against Kresoveer himself, to which end she had actually cornered him when Jake showed up to interfere with the attack. While arguing, Jake had realized what his sister was trying to tell him all along, and when presented with the choice of continuing to aid Kresoveer or helping her, he chose his family. Needless to say, Kresoveer wasn't too happy about the whole thing, and nearly killed the pair if it weren't for Jake jumping in at the last minute to intercept the attack [and receiving a nice scar in the process].
At this point, the group backed off, and are now in hiding while they recuperate from the attack.
The major casualty count was as follows during this last fight: Takeshi was injured severely from Frank's last-ditch attack, Veronica was killed, and Dante and Bunq tag-teamed to defeat Kain, one of Kresoveer’s top lieutenants and one of the main attackers against Madsen when they were targeting her (they found out later that it was a means to lure Takeshi out because Jake had been deliberately fed false information about his sister’s sensei) and he was left for dead during the mission. (THIS IS ACTUALLY IMPORTANT TO REMEMBER - EVERYONE THOUGHT HE WAS DEAD UNTIL THE SCHOOL MISSION.)
Since she was part of the attack squad, she feels partially responsible for the poor result of the mission, as does Jake since he's the lead intelligence officer. Both of them do their usual “we can't face the others during this” schtick and about this point that the younger Madsen sibling decides to go off on her own to train to get stronger. While the two of them are moping, Takeshi pretty much comes over and smacks the doubt from Lii via an impromptu sparring match.
Unsurprisingly, it works.
During their fight, she mentions the fact that she wants to get stronger so that they can be ready for the next time things went down. She needed to find ways to protect those that she had left, including her parents, who were evacuated in order to protect them from the Patrons, who were now calling themselves "The Holy Order of the Luminous Knights". The Soldiers, in retaliation, changed their name from "Soldiers of Light" to "The Alliance of Heroes".
Through that, Takeshi, being the holder of infinite wisdom (okay not really, he just heard rumors and thought it'd be a good learning experience for her even if by this point they aren't teacher and student anymore), gives her a set of coordinates. He also tells her that if Jake was going to go on a rampage and yell at people for the whole fiasco, he'd take the fall, since it technically was his idea in the first place.
[REDEMPTION]
So she packs up and heads out, but lets the others know what she's doing via a group-wide meeting, leaving before anyone can try convincing her otherwise.
During her time jumping between locations, she does encounter some minor groups of the Order that are either in the area or trying to tail her, most of which she dispatches of quickly. Eventually she reaches the area that Takeshi had indicated on the paper, finding that it's actually part of a underground network of tunnels and a central temple.
In the middle of this search, she is confronted by Luc, who she finds out is the one who actually killed her boyfriend instead of Jake, as she initially thought. She successfully defeats him and “avenges” her boyfriend - though she doesn't kill him, she just knocks him the hell out and delivers him to a hospital. She then does some further exploring before heading to a “central area” and seeing a large tablet. When Madsen touches the tablet, there's flashes of memories that definitely don't belong to her, and an echoing voice in her head -
“Are you willing to take the burden?”
At first, she doesn't get the implication, and ends up meditating over what she saw and heard. It honestly takes her about a day or so to think over things, and once she gets back, there's another flash of memory, then Nithal himself talks through the tablet once again:
“Are you sure you want to continue fighting?”
“I have to finish what I started.”
“While I understand that, if you decided to unseal this tablet, there will be consequences that you will have to deal with. The burden of this might end up killing you. Are you still sure you want to do this?”
“... I am.”
Once he's sure of her resolve, Nithal gives her some of what he can figure out about how to unseal the tablet. At first, she's hesitant, but after speaking with Nithal a few more times, she's sure of her judgment in trusting him. She then unseals the tablet by following Nithal's directions, and the phoenix emerges in his normal form. They talk for a little while longer, where he reveals that his powers were still cut down due to being sealed. He still won't tell her why he was sealed or who did it right away, but she figures to at least give him some time. The two of them end up entering a contract now that Nithal knows about her resolve to keep fighting.
The rest of the year is mostly dedicated to them wandering and her trying to learn how to control her new abilities and try to get some answers out of Nithal. Madsen also keeps in contact with the other members of the Alliance through encrypted video-chats.
Around the time of the one-year anniversary of the big battle where Veronica was killed and Takeshi was critically injured, she and Nithal head back to the main HQ for the Alliance. However, shortly after they get back, a contingency of Order soldiers get there to try and drive them out. Madsen ends up fighting off one of the leaders in order to keep them from getting to the group she was leading, which culminates in her synching and eventually driving him off with Nithal’s help.
Afterward, she ends up talking with Takeshi and catching up with him over drinks before their next mission: infiltrating the old Academy. However, during the mission, Kain is shown to be alive and well, and kills both Dante and Bunq (his “Soul Brother” and a wind master). Madsen actually doesn't know what happened until after they get back, but she does get the vibe that something isn't right beforehand.
She's back in the main ship at the end of the mission, pissed as all hell that the whole thing didn't go as planned (and that's putting it lightly) - and ends up asking a few of the newbies to come with her so that they can start getting the battle experience they need to. So she and some of the older members of the group start to train the recruits in order to try and keep up with everything - and it’s during one of these training missions that things start to finally come to a head.
After getting intel that Kain wasn’t actually working with Kresoveer, he was working as an independent agent, Jake goes to confront him for answers as to why he was attacking the Alliance and if their old deal of him not attacking his sister still held. Jake then finds out why Kain’s had such an obsession with the group - Crystal was one of the casualties of the last major battle the year before, but due to her position as a sniper, she wasn’t found until much later after the battle was over. Kain had survived the attacks on him from Dante and Bunq, and losing the one person he cared about turned him into a man with nothing left to lose. Knowing that Emily herself was one of the main figureheads of the group due to her experience in the original ZERO Incident and her connections with the main group, she was a prime target, completely disregarding the original deal he had made with her, mostly due to the fact that Jake was no longer a member of the Order anyway. Jake apologizes for the incident, because he knew Crystal as a coworker and didn’t honestly want her to be dragged into the crossfire like she was.
The two then fight, and the group that the younger Madsen sibling was leading comes upon the area where Jake and Kain are fighting. They rush in, but by the time they make it there, Jake has been run through and Kain is nowhere in sight. Emily is understandably furious, and orders the rookies to get him to a medic ASAP while she goes ahead and acts as point to “make sure Kain’s not in the area”. (translation: Get out of here with Jake and pray that bastard Kain is still around, I’m taking him out here and now.)
This launches into a cat-and-mouse game with Emily and Kain, where the two are chasing each other for a good hour or so before they finally confront each other face-to-face. Despite Nithal’s warnings about how rushing in blindly would prevent any sort of synchronization due to her increasing rage at Kain for what he had done, she went in anyway, swords drawn and anger clouding her mind. Growling at his partner’s recklessness, Nithal ends up flying back to the others, telling a couple of the “senior” rookies to come with him so that they can try and stop Madsen before she does something incredibly stupid.
When they arrive, Nithal stays true to form with techniques he had learned from his previous time as an assassin and sneaks around while the others go in ahead, shifting into his human form just in time to see Kain knock a bloodied Madsen into a wall and nearly impale her on it if it weren’t for a concussive blast from her when she grabbed his arm.
Nithal takes the opportunity to strike while the rookies drag off the unwilling Madsen, but once she sees the look in his eyes alongside his words (“Go. Your brother wouldn’t want you wasting your life for an empty vengeance.”), she willingly lets the others help her. Nithal then fights Kain on his own, and utters a line that is the epitome of Precision F-Strike:
“If she dies because of this, I swear I will hunt you down and put you in your fucking grave.”
(Normally, Nithal’s very soft-spoken and pretty much never swears. So it’s a huge dissonance to hear him say something like this.)
Unfortunately, even with all the abilities that the group had at their disposal, Jake bled out before they could give him proper treatment.
Madsen was devastated once she found out the news, and it took a combined effort of several of her closest comrades within the Alliance, a couple of the rookies she was training, and one Ava Lockheart, a newer recruit that had come to the Alliance through being forcibly separated from her own older sister, who was a member of the Order. Ava was a shy person, but very kind, and was willing to sit with her and talk about what had happened.
Once Madsen had recovered, the leaders of the Alliance held a meeting to try and bring about a proper end to this madness once and for all. Realizing that taking the fight to Kresoveer’s territory was a bad idea considering what happened the last time they did so, they hatched a plan to lure him and the other members of his military group to their side of things and even out the playing field a bit.
They ended up planting intel of unearthing a way to channel the power of an ancient weapon, where they would be, and who all would be there. All that needed to happen was confirmation of the false intel being given and then to set the stage. Everyone was divided into respective teams in order to be ready for the impending battle, with Madsen and Takeshi co-leading those on the front lines.
The fight turned out better than originally planned, and soon enough, they were fighting Kresoveer himself. Madsen and Nithal also had done something that they were not able to do up until this point in terms of synchronization: they were able to synch up 100%, their bodies and souls working in perfect harmony in order to fight and try to restore the balance. During the fight, Kresoveer attempted to infuriate Madsen by bringing up all the people that had died so far during the confrontations and telling her that what he was doing was for the greater good, but she wouldn’t have any of it, only relenting after getting blasted at close range in the chest. Takeshi and Kieve jumped in to take over for her while Ava was keeping guard to make sure that nobody else tried interfering while Madsen attempted to heal herself, but the wound was bleeding faster than she could heal. She slips into a state of half-consciousness, where she and Nithal talk about everything that has happened so far, and Nithal reveals the reasons why he was sealed in the first place: he had become too selfish, not caring about his original mission to try and watch over the balance between light and dark from the shadows, and it was up to his own brother, Amadi, to stop him before things got out of hand. The brothers confronted each other, and Nithal was eventually sealed. It’s at this point that he muses about how different things could’ve been, and without giving Madsen a chance to protest, channels his powers into her, entrusting her to finish her mission and to do what he could not: give people hope for the future.
By this point, Madsen opens her eyes and has recovered, much to everyone’s surprise. A combined effort of Takeshi, Kieve, Hellis, Tana, and Kell had taken Kresoveer out, and when she wakes up, the others are standing there and ready to help her up.
It had taken over five years, but the war was finally coming to an end - with their leader gone, the Order was eventually forced to dissolve, and various individuals were taken in for questioning. As for Madsen? She ended up visiting her parents once she was recovered, and expressed her desire to join a similar unit to the one her father was a part of, to make sure that nothing like this would ever happen again.
personality: When we first meet Madsen, she's quiet, laid-back, and a bit shy. While being no-nonsense to most, to the people that know her fairly well, she's a bit of a spitfire and with an impressive snarky streak. With the trauma of the Masquerade attacks looming over her head, she became distant, bottling up and hiding her emotions. This lead to the creation of “Gemini”, a literal manifestation of her fears and darkest feelings. It wasn't until she met others that she felt she could trust that she began to open up again.
Despite the fact that she's laid-back most of the time, she has an incredibly explosive temper when provoked. Coupled with her stubborn streak, it makes her a force to be reckoned with. She has several particular rage buttons, mostly connected to her family, close comrades, and her former state when Gemini was in her body. Another major rage button is the man that was indirectly and directly responsible for the whole fiasco in the first place. While Madsen doesn't consider herself to be a vengeful person, she does deem it necessary to punish Kresoveer for what he had done to her and her comrades. Kain was also added to this group after he had murdered Jake. She was already mad at him for killing her student and his best friend, but going after her brother was the last straw.
At her core, Madsen is the type of person who is willing to do anything and everything within her power to make things right. With a stubborn streak a mile wide, a compassionate nature, and a strong sense of justice, she has been picked time and time again as a combat leader within the group. “Grabbing a sword and charging headlong” has been her M.O. up until recently, and especially thanks to her cross-world training that she has realized as such and is trying her utmost to change it. Yes, she is still very much driven by impulses and instincts, but she does try to take the time to plan out a strategy, and has shown the ability to come up with new strategies on the fly during battle. Her time with Nithal has helped her cool her head a bit, giving her an opportunity to try and put more strategy into her battle tactics. Even so, she’s usually put in the front lines, and prefers to act as point for most operations.
To put it bluntly, Madsen also has a hero complex - if there's someone in trouble, she's usually right there to try and help them out. This, despite being a reflection of how she was raised, has proven to be a bitch and a half to work around, especially when coupled with her stubborn streak. Time has tempered this, making her a bit more jaded, though she does prefer to act out to make sure that there are the least amount of casualties possible, but she knows that sometimes you can’t save everyone, and though it’s painful, sometimes it can’t be helped.
Madsen’s fiercely loyal to her comrades, friends and beliefs, and it's somewhat difficult to shake it without something major happening. She has thrown herself into danger more than a few times because of this as well [i.e. the confrontation with her, Jake, and Kresoveer]. She honestly tries to adhere to her father's teachings, and has been known to turn what he has taught her into inspiring speeches and strategies for the others to work with.
abilities/powers: Madsen’s main power is that of pyrokinesis - the ability to control and manipulate flames. This is a genetic trait, passed down from her father and also was expressed in her older brother before his death. Her sub-abilities include:
Create Fire: Just what the package says, folks. Madsen can create fire from nothing, as long as the starting point is touching some part of her body.
Absorb Fire: By absorbing flames into her body, Madsen can add them to her own attacks and prevent others from getting burned at the same time. Depending on the amount and the intensity, this can get a little tricky, and she must redirect it eventually (within a few minutes usually) before it could potentially kill her.
Fire Strike: By allowing flames to engulf her limbs and sword, she adds physical power to her attacks. This allows for flaming shockwaves, BURN KNUCKLE fiery punches, and the like.
Explosive Touch: Merely by touching her opponent and focusing, she can create explosions from the point that she touches. Great for distractions.
Due to her training from Takeshi, she is an incredibly accomplished swordfighter, and is considered to be one of the best in the Alliance. Her current sword set is a paired set, given to her as a gift from Takeshi before she set out on her training mission and met Nithal. She uses multiple sword styles, preferring to dabble in multiple schools rather than specialize in one. [i.e. iaido, kendo, dual-wielding]
Now that Nithal has given given her his powers/energy in order to keep her alive, there has been a boost to Madsen’s pyrokinesis abilities, as well as the fact that she actually has a healing factor now. She originally was more of a Glass Cannon in terms of build, but now has evolved into more of a Lightning Bruiser. She can still die and get injured, yes, but it is difficult.
first person sample: [Hi Abax, have a very irritated looking young woman holding her toe tag in one hand as she gives the feed a flat glare.]
Cute. Like I haven’t had enough shit to deal with already? [She has a hand at her forehead, shutting her eyes.]
So much for thinking that dream thing was the last of it … [There’s a few moments pause before she blinks, frowning at the toe tag.]
At least I don’t … I know it wasn’t this morbid. I’ve already dealt with more than my share of near-death experiences.
[She stares at the tag for a moment, and it catches on fire. This doesn’t seem to phase her all that much, and she flicks it away before looking to the feed again.]
Whatever. If anyone’s got an idea of what the hell’s going on or even better, a way out, feel free to let me know.
third person sample: “Sounds good. I'm not exactly in top form right now anyway... had a little run-in before getting on the ship.” Just thinking about that fiasco made Madsen shudder visibly, her amiable demeanor dropping for a moment, a deep scowl etched on her features. She definitely didn't like that situation one bit - or the fact that this guy apparently knew some of the allies that she had made. She would have to have a nice little chat with a couple of them later on, and by “chat”, we mean “punch them in the face for fraternizing with the enemy”.
“But it's still acting up? Shit, I don't think even my back was that bad for that long,” she added, taking a long swig of her beer. As a reminder to the fact, the scar running across her back throbbed for a split second. Battle scars were to be the reminders of their past and what they had to go through, apparently. Each one had its own story to tell. Though, thinking about it, the large, circular scar on Takeshi’s chest was just painful to look at sometimes. How he had survived that attack from Frank was nothing short of a motherfucking miracle. Then again, they did have their share of miracles - after all, she was able to secure a contract with a phoenix. Though sometimes she wondered if that was too little, too late - only to be reprimanded with a sharp pain in her temple, reminding her that even though Nithal wasn't saying anything, he still could hear what she was thinking.
case no: N/A, feel free to randomize as you see fit! :3
And here, have a pretty picture of Madsen's PB (Briana Evigan) as compensation for reading through this whole long piece of tl;dr: