Character: Saphrix

Saphrix

Saphrix comes from the Liosse Clan of Stalkers, who dwell in the Deep Woods. Although most Stalkers work alone, the Liosse clan is one of the few organized Stalker communities on Desia. However, true to Stalker form, the Liosse Clan's community revolves entirely around teaching and learning subtlety and misdirection. Saphrix showed tremendous talent and finesse even at a young age; so much so that she caught the eye of Master Sioro, the most skilled warrior on the northern continent. Master Sioro took Saphrix in and trained her starting at age seven. Today, she is only 22 years old but is now revered as one of the most skilled blade dancers of the entire Stalker race. Rather than using the customary Stalker daggers, Saphrix developed a new fighting style using arm-mounted blades, granting free use of the hands in combat.

When the Progeny crashed to the planet's surface, Saphrix used her skills to move undetected while observing and tracking Garry's forces. She began picking off bots one by one, but Garry quickly grew tired of hunting something he could not detect, so he sent in a legion of bots to clear out the entire Deep Woods, assuming that without a thick forest to hide in, Saphrix would be left a sitting duck. She and the Liosse clan have been fighting back, but the forests are being cut deeper and deeper. Soon, Saphrix and her tribe will have nowhere to go.

Character: Sacred Atom

Sacred Atom

Thousands of years ago, the Channelers were a simple race, dwelling on the Sumiria Archipelago as sea-faring fishermen. In those days, Atom was a young merchant who had set up shop on the shores, frequently trading with the local undersea-dwelling Gluaglian tribes. One day, the Gluaglians brought a strange, bluish crystal to Atom's shop. It had a pristine purity to it, and it seemed to catch the light in such a way that made it glow. Atom offered to purchase the crystal so he could examine it further.

He took the crystal home and kept it secret as best he could. He soon became obsessed with the thing. The more he was around it, the stronger he felt. And the crystal's luminescent glow seemed to get brighter and brighter the more he was around it. It was almost as if it knew when he was near.

Atom went to the Gluaglians and offered his life savings in exchange for as many of the crystals as they could find. To his surprise (and joy), they came back with armfuls of the things. Atom bundled them up and secreted them away to his home. But fearing his fortune would be discovered, he migrated to a small nearby island and took up shelter in a cave, surrounding himself with his crystalline companions. He spent the next thirty years studying the crystals and obsessing over them. He came to understand that the crystals rejuvinated him and seemed to prevent him from aging or feeling hunger or pain. And with enough concentration, the crystals allowed him the ability to manipulate water molecules. He could create steam from the humidity in the air, or create vortexes in the sea. He could even direct the water molecules in the air to create wind and currents, which allowed him to fly. But he also discovered that the crystals seemed to store his life essence within them, so that if he were to get too far away from them, he became weak and wracked with pain. If he was away from the crystals for too long, he would surely die.

It was then that Atom decided to ensure his immortality and strength by embedding the essence crystals into his own body. The self-surgery was traumatic and amateur, and Atom lost his legs due to infection by the time he had finished. When he had finished, he was forever changed. His blood ran blue with crystal dust, and he glowed with the light of dozens of essence crystals emerging from his skin. His eyes were no longer black but instead surged with a glowing white light, as if they were a window to the soul of the crystals he had buried in his body.

As Atom gracefully floated on air currents back into the village, thirty years after he had departed, hundreds of his fellow Channelers crowded around, awestruck. They all thought he had died at sea, yet he had returned with supernatural power and immortality.

Atom believed that the essence crystals held the key to solving hunger, pain, and war. He wanted to spread his message and teach about the power he had discovered, but he wanted to ensure that it did not fall into the wrong hands. He chose a handful of worthy disciples and spent the next fifty years teaching them all he knew. From then on, Atom returned every fifty years to select a new handful of disciples.

Today, Atom is now revered as Sacred Atom, and he has thousands of disciples who have all embedded essence crystals into their bodies. Although none have attained the power Atom wields, each of his disciples is honorable and good at heart, just as he had anticipated. Sacred Atom now resides somewhere out on the sea, and he and his disciples serve as protectors of the secrets of the essence crystals, only unveiling them to those who are worthy and pure of heart.

Character: RA1-VYN

RA1-VYN

RA1-VYN, known by the Progeny's crew as "Raivyn", was built by Dr. Coz to serve as his research assistant. Because she has no need for sleep or food, Raivyn spends 100% of her time in either the medical bay or the botanical research wing of the Progeny, setting up experiments and collecting mountains of data for Dr. Coz. Most recently, Raivyn has been beaming up alien plant specimens from the Desian surface, supplying Dr. Coz with a near-endless supply of research topics.

Raivyn is programmed with a perpetual curiosity generator. She doesn't always ask the right questions, but she certainly asks a lot of them. She has been dubbed a "smartass" by many of the Progeny's crew because of her tendency to respond to questions with still more questions. She also has an overclocked loyalty chip and a turbocharged sarcastic algorithm generator, giving her a unique personality among the bots aboard the Progeny. Unlike most of the bots, Raivyn does not answer to G-M550. She is entirely self-contained and has a perpetually-evolving security system, making her memory impossible to hack. Dr. Coz has entrusted all of his research secrets to Raivyn, knowing that they will be safe in her memory banks.

Raivyn will be accompanying Dr. Coz to the Desian surface to set up a research laboratory. Thanks to Raivyn's help, Dr. Coz has discovered some incredibly potent healing properties in some of Desia's plant species, and he intends to replicate those properties to revolutionize medical technology. Raivyn will likely be instrumental in accomplishing this daunting tast.

Character Bio: Dan Palladian

New character added to the SB: Characters page!

Dan Palladian

When you have enough influence, a suit is no longer necessary.

Dan Palladian was born into humble beginnings on the Progeny. His family was at the bottom of the economic ladder, although Dan's early obsession with the ancient art of film production drove him to feverishly pursue his dream of directing his own movies. He started with a second-hand camera and editing software he programmed himself at the age of eight, and by the time he was in his early twenties, he was one of the eminent entertainers of the Progeny. Everyone had their place in ship's economy, and Dan had found his niche in using the power of film to keep the passengers laughing, crying, and everything in between.

Dan was a savvy businessman and a great salesman; his quick wit and snappy one-liners could force a chuckle out of even the most hard-hearted of the Progeny's populace. He eventually bought out all of the cinemas on the ship and used the proceeds to fuel his film production enterprise. Through his business contacts  he became close with nearly every major player on the ship, and even Captain Moore attended the occasional Dan Palladian romantic comedy.

Dan's true cinematic love was action movies, and as an avid martial artist, he choreographed all of his action films' fight scenes and even acted in many of them. He loved to tug at the audience's heart strings by playing a character who died heroically while sacrificing himself for a noble cause, and he always cast himself in such roles when the opportunity arose.

Through one of his "chick flicks" he met Paige Ellsworth, the lead actress. They hit it off so well that they were married before the film entered post-production. Dan has been looking forward to the upcoming colonization operation, and he has a documentary film in the works, chronicling the events leading up to the historic event. Perhaps he'll create another action movie once he arrives on the planet's surface.

Character Bio: Chief Engineer James Daniels

New bio for one of the heroes! Added to the SB: Characters page at the top.

Chief Engineer James Daniels

Justice has a fist. And khakis.

James Daniels became the Progeny's Chief Engineer at the age of 18, becoming the first person to master the entire workings of the ship before the age of 40, and his title has gone uncontested for the past 35 years. A quiet introvert whose mind is constantly churning with math formulas and brilliant inventions, Daniels is regularly testing out new prototypes in his large laboratory. He has such confidence in his technical expertise that he often tests his inventions on himself, sometimes with unusual results, and his fascination with the manipulation of time and gravity have led to some intriguing devices which have yet to be thoroughly tested. His most recent project is the aerial combat suit built for Captain Moore.

It's Daniels's job to keep the ship and its control computer, G-M550, humming and running smoothly, forcing it to operate at maximum efficiency so that the human race may last as long as possible while drifting through space. Or rather, that was his job -- right up until G-M550 morphed into Garry, went rogue, and shattered the entire colonization operation.

Daniels was one of the last of the crew to board the escape pods, and his pod has landed somewhere in the far north of planet Desia. If Captain Moore intends to establish any semblance of a rescue operation, he will most certainly require Daniels's assistance.