Toro [Tom Raymond] (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
flamingshortshorts) wrote2035-03-15 11:24 am
flamingshortshorts) wrote2035-03-15 11:24 am
Entry tags:
- app,
- ooc,
- tu shanshu
[OOC] App for ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
tushanshu
Player Information:
Name: Kathrine
Age: over 18
Contact: spkathrine[@]gmail.com / plurk: chocolateisbrainfood
Game Cast: Kaldur’ahm /apologiesmyking | Most Recent AC
Character Information:
Name: Tom “Toro the Flaming Kid” Raymond
Canon: Marvel 616
Canon Point: mid-1949, after being sprayed with the chemical that made him catatonic when he was kidnapped by the Russians.
Age: 25
Reference: Marvel 616 Universe | WWII by Marvel | Toro Raymond
Setting:
This is Earth. It may even look like a very familiar Earth to those who know what the Earth of the 1940s was like, but it is not our Earth. This is an Earth with Marvels. Superhumans, vigilante heroes, aliens, time-travelers, technological and scientific advances that our world can only dream about. That is the Earth of the Universe 616 among the vast infinity of universes that make up the multi-verse.
The Age of Marvels had come in the late 1930s, the rise of Superhumans taking a front-center involvement in the comings and goings of the world in such a way that not only were they acknowledged, but the media couldn’t get enough of them. No, they weren’t well-received at first—thought of as monsters, humans who didn’t know how to listen to the law, or even as the ones causing the trouble more than trying to stop it—but save the day enough times and the public opinion might just start swaying in your favor.
When Professor Phineas T. Horton tried to figure out the workings of the human body in the 1920s and 30s, he had no idea what DNA even was. That scientific discovery hadn’t occurred yet. But that didn’t deter him in the least. He knew what muscles, tendons, organs, and tissue looked like. He knew how they worked in relation to each other to create a functioning body and he had his own ideas of how cells worked to make them. So he took polymer synthetics and plastic compositions and created his own cells with minute microchip-like programming in them to influence how they would form and made his own DNA. He shaped and formed them together until he made a human body fitting what he expected a human to be, even to the point of including a brain and a heart. But Horton didn’t know just what he had accomplished. He had created life, but he didn’t know exactly what kind of life. It was a scientific impossibility, but he had accomplished it. He created the first Synthetic Man. The first android in history.
He never realized the flaw in his reasoning was how cells took oxygen from the lungs and converted it into energy. Horton’s man-made cells were too efficient, so efficient that just having oxygen nearby to absorb (whether in the lungs or in the air around him) was enough to cause combustion in the cells, turning it right into energy with massive output to be hot enough to turn the android into a living Human Torch. Jim Hammond became the first modern Marvel, a living, thinking android who could burst into flames created by a science only one man knew, and the Age of Marvels had arrived even if the media and public very much wanted to go about like nothing had happened—like nothing had changed.
But it wasn’t just science that was making the Marvels of the world. Under the sea there was the vast kingdom of Atlantis, where Namor, who the media would dub The Sub-mariner, hailed from. Namor’s unique heritage as half-human, half-Atlantean led to him being not only a half-breed, but also gave him the ability to fly and wings on his feet that no one could explain. He was one of the first mutants of the Age, a human with special abilities or differences caused by the natural genetic enhancement of having an active “x-gene,” (not the oldest of mutants, as a few did exist in time before then, but the first that the media knew of), even though the word “mutant” wouldn’t exist for another twenty or so years. Atlanteans had lived separate for thousands of years from the surface world, but as the humans became more aggressive and inconsiderate of their use of the sea (dropping bombs for testing and discarding garbage in it as they saw fit), Atlanteans were more and more often suffering from their behavior and Namor sought to travel to the surface world and make humans pay for their transgressions. He even went so far as to flood Manhattan and was only stopped through the efforts of Captain America and other heroes stepping in to protect the civilians while The Human Torch fought him in the skies. He would be someone that Torch would go up against more than once. It was one of the biggest sellers of newspapers of the day.
And this is the point when media and public approval of the Marvels/Superhumans began to change. Seeing how so many of them came out to protect humans and curb the damage from the flood greatly influenced their perceptions of them. The Human Torch became one of the most well-known Superheroes of the day and it was in trying to find out more about who he truly was as an android, he sought out other people who had worked with Horton, including Fred and Nora Raymond. He found out that their son, Tom (who they had nicknamed Toro in memory of their honeymoon in Mexico), had an immunity to flames even at a very young age, to the point he would pull hot potatoes out of fires for fun and had gone into a burning house to save a neighbors dog with his clothes being the only thing singed. They were both sickly, Nora suffering a terminal illness due to radiation poisoning from her research with it that left her deteriorating rapidly, and Fred suffering from what was likely mesothelioma as he was one of the most renown researchers and engineers of using asbestos for technological and architectural development. They refused Jim and wanted him to leave, knowing who he was from being in the media and worried his presence might influence their own son. They decided to leave New York and go to Mexico for another visit before Nora died only to have their train derailed and wrecked because of the Asbestos Lady wanting to retaliate against Fred for refusing to build her new asbestos-based weapons.
Toro was the only one who survived because in an instinctive act of self-preservation his powers activated and he burst into flames, burning everyone in the car with him, but melting through the wall of enough to fit himself through and make it to safety. He tried to go back into the car to save his parents, but couldn’t find them (likely due to their bodies being too burned for recognition). It would be a traveling circus that found Toro and took him in, Tom and Ellie Alexander, the fire-eaters, seeing potential in him and becoming his foster parents. It would be months later that Jim would find Toro again and Jim’s very presence caused Toro to burst into flames, his Horton Cells reacting to Tom’s powers and making them manifest. Jim would become his legal guardian, something that would likely never occur in our own world considering Jim technically has no records and no normal form of income beyond being a superhero on call by the police, but in this universe with Jim being the only person capable of truly helping Toro control his powers (and also making it easier for the government to keep an eye on him themselves since it’s harder to follow a traveling circus), Jim’s candidacy for guardianship wasn’t contested as much as it could have been.
What neither knew at the time was that Toro’s powers were fire-based because of his mother Nora working as the assistant to Professor Horton in the 20s where she was exposed to the Horton Cells still in development and they assimilated themselves into her own system. After she became pregnant she transferred them to her unborn child, but because he was a mutant, the cells attached themselves to Tom’s x-gene, manipulating how his powers would develop. This wouldn’t be the only time that Horton Cells would influence abilities of another person either. During World War II, Jim gave a blood transfusion of his own blood to Jacqueline Falsworth to save her life, the Horton Cells in her body giving her super speed (and later restoring her body’s youth and halting her aging after a second transfusion). In so many ways, the rise of Marvels was happening at a much faster pace now and the media was using it their advantage to sensationalize the public.
The U.S. government was taking notice, too. In their own efforts to create the perfect human specimen they used the Super Soldier Serum to take a weak, illness-ridden young man who wouldn’t even pass military enlistment health requirements and turned him into the most physically fit human in existence. Steve Rogers became Captain America, the perfect model of American patriotism and propaganda to strike fear and caution into the Axis forces before the U.S. had even taken steps to officially join World War II. The Super Soldier Serum and Captain America would become such an obsession that people (individuals, secret government organizations, even cults) would spend decades trying to replicate it, to various degrees of success and failure. And it was with the fact that only one Super Soldier came out of Project Rebirth that the government realized that they needed another symbol, Captain America couldn’t work alone. And thus came Bucky, a teenager partner to raise the spirits of America Youth, who was also trained by some of the most expert teams that the government could throw him at to be the perfect, unassuming assassin. Using an underage operative to kill on the battlefield or behind enemy lines wasn’t even half as far as the government was willing to go.
The U.S. government saw the potential of using Superhumans to work for them just as much as other countries (England, Germany, Japan, etc) did, but it wasn’t until Pearl Harbor happened that they saw what a necessity it was. They realized they could take these Superhumans, put them on the battlefields of World War II and make a difference. They didn’t just need to create an army of Super Soldiers when they had Superhumans that could use. And so they did. The Invaders (Captain America, The Human Torch, The Sub-mariner, Bucky, Toro, and various side members in America and Europe) became the poster team for the war effort, promoting patriotism and recruit to fight the good fight against the Axis. They even used the young teenage partners of Captain America and The Human Torch, Bucky and Toro the Flaming Kid, to work as propaganda models for American youth in opposition the Nazi Youth Camps, encouraging them to support the War Effort and enlist when they “came of age” (and maybe before then, considering Bucky and Toro weren’t even of legal age themselves when it first started). They even had two teams of their own, the Young Allies who were a group of teens being trained by the military in various ways to think and act like soldiers/operatives even before they could go into war, and the Kid Commandos, their team with two other Superhuman teens, Golden Girl and The Human Top. The Invaders wasn’t the only Superhuman team, either. To combat problems at home and deal with Nazi spies infiltrating in the U.S., Bucky and Patriot, Jeff Mace, founded the Liberty Legion, which was made up of several heroes spanning across the country. In England there was the brief team of the Crusaders (which was truly a Nazi plot to discredit the Invaders with another team by tricking British Superheroes into thinking they were working for the Crown).
This is an Earth where Superhumans really did change the playing field of the war. Weapons had to get bigger, more destructive, to go up against them. HYDRA originally started as the secret Nazi science and technology division that focused on alternative forms of weaponry (sorcery, the occult, and including some very unethical experiments done on animals and humans), but it went on to become the cult following of the Red Skull another product of the Super Soldier Serum Gone Very Wrong. The Invaders would spend most of the next four years fighting on U.S. soil and abroad and HYDRA’s various weapons and science-altered humans would be some of their worst enemies. And to keep the morale of the War Effort high in the United States, the government even permitted the publishing of comic books detailing the “heroic tales” of many of the heroes, especially those working for them. They were mostly fabricated, embellished, events twisted to fit the government’s best interests, to the point where some people still considered them fact to this day but it’s widely known they were more than half fiction.
When Captain America and Bucky disappeared in April 1945 (not long after the death of President Roosevelt) on Zemo’s island, the Human Torch and Toro were Germany trying to stop the latest plot of the Nazis that would decimate large populated cities in various countries. It was the last throw down of the Nazis, their troops worn down and beaten back on all fronts and Hitler’s last option was to set off missiles that would destroy most of Western Europe and the eastern seaboard of the United States. Jim Hammond tried to talk sense into him, but instead had to set him on fire just to stop him. He, Toro, and Namor returned home to find that Captain America and Bucky were M.I.A. (considered Killed in Action). The government had to make a decision on what this would mean for the image of the War in America. Italy was under control, Hitler was gone and Germany had surrendered, but Japan was still a threat. So instead of revealing the truth to the public, they asked William “Bill” Naslund and Fred Davis to take on the roles of being Cap and Bucky, hiding the truth from Americans until decades later. This deception would continue through the end of the war and even into the post-War era of comparable peace and prosperity.
With the War over the Invaders were no longer needed, but instead the members joined by Miss America, The Whizzer, and then later by Angel and the Blonde Phantom, came together to become the All-Winners Squad. This Superhero team played more to the public and also worked closely with the government as the Invaders had before. It was in 1946 when Professor Horton became an important figure again for trying to recreate his own genius in making another android. One that would be even better than Jim Hammond, which he called Adam II. But Adam II had more than just a mind of his own, he wanted power, control, and for artificial humans to rule the world. He began making his own breed of androids, an army that was subservient to his will and would do anything he asked. He intended to assassinate Senator John F. Kennedy and replace him with an android double but the All-Winners stopped him at the expense of Bill Naslund’s life. Again, Captain America was dead and with the tension between the U.S. and the communist Soviet Union rising, the government saw the need for Captain America even more.
Patriot, Jeff Mace, became the next Captain America and would remain so until he quit in 1949, but the All-Winners would disband even before that. The second Bucky, Fred David, was shot stopping and armed robbery and Captain America left the team so it wasn’t long after that the entire team disbanded to fulfill their separate goals. The suspicion and pressure from the U.S. government didn’t help. The Red Scare is in full swing and Communists are being seen everywhere, even amongst the heroes. Several have been accused or are suspected and as the government becomes stricter, the media falls more in line with it and heroes became a less favorable if they aren’t toeing the line. The government wanted more ways to control them and the heroes who rebelled found themselves often on the outs with the media and the public.
This is also a time of organized crime being extremely powerful in cities where money talks and violence can get you what you want. The U.S. government tried to build task forces and organizations to combat it, but it was still very prevalent, with some of the mobs and mafias having direct ties or connections to the USSR. The Soviet Union sells technology and chemicals to the mob as a means of testing and is working on various projects of their own to go up against the still fabled Super Soldier Serum of the United States (even though no one had been subjected to the Serum by the U.S. government in almost 10 years, the propaganda also spoke otherwise). Department X was a secret program designed to create the greatest operatives they could that would be completely loyal to the Soviet Union. The Red Room was the department most closely associated with the training and brainwashing of these select operatives. They were working on their own form of the Super Soldier Serum, which ended up creating the Black Widow Ops, a line of female assassin operatives, and other various projects (including influences later in the Weapon X project that would turn Logan into the Wolverine). The U.S. was vigilante to the point of paranoia about the possibility of communist infiltration and influence in the United States, but they weren’t even aware of half of what Russia had in the works.
Personality:
At first look, Tom is generally what people would call a “good guy.” He’s normally polite, if a bit cocky, helpful, cares about people, knows right from wrong, and all that good stuff. He grew up with sickly parents who were both exposed to dangerous chemicals due to their work as scientists and researchers and he cared about them, greatly. Even though they weren’t the richest family, living off of a very modest income, he didn’t lack for all of the important things. Still, because of the hardships that his family went through financially and, especially, with his mother’s rapidly declining health, Toro came to understand early on that life isn’t always the kindest to good people, like his parents.
But even a good guy can have rough edges. Living through the train wreck that killed his parents left Toro with survivor’s guilt and believing that he was the cause of the crash (which he wasn’t, but his flames did kill quite a few people when he accidentally activated his powers). His parents and everyone else on the train were dead, but he wasn’t, so it had to be his fault and the fault of the powers he had that his parents were so afraid of, because those powers meant that he was somehow different and dangerous. The words “mutant” and “homo superior” didn’t exist back then so all Tom knew what that there was something wrong about him that no one could ever explain. Even after meeting Jim Hammond and later on learning the truth about Lady Asbestos’ culpability for his parents’ deaths, Toro would never stop believing that who he is—what he is—cursed them somehow.
As he aged, Tom came into full control of his powers (or as much control as he could get of them considering how his emotional state affects them) and it helped him to fear himself less. Instead, he focused on using his powers to help people, just as his mentor, Jim Hammond, did. His relationship with Jim was one of the strongest bonds he had after he had lost everything else and it shaped the way he looked at the world. Jim didn’t understand everything about human beings, because as an android he learned human emotions through observation and mimicry. Toro became one of the biggest models he followed because of their constant companionship, while in turn, Toro tried to be more understanding and open to the world because that was how Jim approached things. He wanted to make Jim proud of him, tried to live up to the legacy Jim had set before him even years after his death. It doesn’t always work, as Toro is more cynical and less optimistic than Jim, but he tries anyway. He also, as he gets older begins to get over some of his shyness around girls, although this is usually only when he’s being “Toro.” When he’s just being regular Tom Raymond, away from the battlegrounds and promotional tours and turning himself into a human bonfire, he reverts back to being awkward and doesn’t know how to act in more personal settings. Bucky had to push him to dance with a girl he’s been keeping an eye on for over a year just because Tom couldn’t bring himself to go talk to her on his own and years later it hasn’t really changed that he can interact with pretty girls so much easier when he’s being a hero versus being a normal guy.
Toro may not be the smartest guy around, and he has a tendency to ramble about things people really don’t want to hear, but he is intuitive and learns on his feet. He doesn’t like to jump into situations without thinking things through or to go against orders—as a teenager, it was usually Bucky who did that and Toro who followed after him, arguing that they shouldn’t do it the entire time—but he does have a temper. He argues with Namor and Bucky and doesn’t mind pointing out when a plan is likely to go very poorly, and his temper at times even gets him into trouble because he forgets to stop and look at the situation, but one of the most important aspects about Toro is his loyalty. Even if he thinks a friend is going down the wrong path, he’ll either try to steer them from it, or he’ll be right there beside them. He’s lost so many people in his life already that he’ll do anything to keep the ones he still has. A good example of this is even after the war, when a new villain, Isbisa, is going around destroying museums and relics, a clue is left to purposefully make the All-Winners Squad think Namor is allied with Isbisa. The rest of the All-Winners turn on Namor, even Jim, but Toro refuses to believe it and sets out after Namor to help him prove his innocence, despite the fact they don’t get along that often. That’s just the kind of person Toro is.
Toro is still, despite his at times cynical outlook, protective of humans in general (this does not include Nazis or supervillains). But even though the world as a whole is his concern, his priority is usually those he considers his friends and loved ones, because Toro has already lost enough people that he cares about. He could argue with a friend more times than they get along, but Toro will still consider them important. When he and his friends in the Young Allies were making an appearance for a war bonds drive, the program director refused to remove a blown up cover of one of the propaganda comics that were being published about them—despite the fact it included a disparaging caricature of one of the members, Washington Jones. Toro’s solution? Burn the poster down. He doesn’t stand for discrimination or racism in general, but having it happen to one of his friends really gets to him. He knows the world isn’t a perfect place, but that doesn’t mean he’s going to just let it go and think he can’t make a difference. To Tom, it’s all about making that difference, even if it’s not a big one.
Waking up in a place like Tu Shanshu would surprise Toro to the point that his first thought would be that it was a trap by one of the All-Winners Squad’s enemies. He would think that they found a way to force him into this place to get him out of the picture. At the same time, Toro is an open-minded person and wouldn’t think the kedan explaining things to him they were lying through their teeth either. Other dimensions, life from other planets, and time-travel aren’t exactly new to him, but he hasn’t traveled to another dimension himself before (well…not that he remembers). Being stuck on a giant turtle swimming through a huge ocean is not Toro’s idea of a good time, so he’d complain a bit to anyone who would listen, but it wouldn’t last. He’s a curious guy, so Toro would want to get to know the place, which would curb his bad temper. He wouldn’t be exactly happy, but he would try to put a less terrible spin on being trapped with no way home.
Appearance: Tom is about 5’8”, with black hair, blue eyes, and an athletic build. He’s 25 years old, but looks to be even younger because his mutant abilities began to slow down and even at times regress his body’s aging process after he came into full breadth of them. It’s very easy for him to be mistaken for 18 or around that age.
Abilities:
Toro is immune to the affects of extreme heat himself and thus never burns, but this does leave him some weakness to water and extreme colds. He has the ability to control “ambient heat energy,” raising the heat in the air, controlling fires, putting them out, absorbing heat into himself, and the ability to raise his body heat to the point of combustion—thus turning himself into a living “torch.” Using this ability he is capable of flying on the hydrogen atoms created, heating air until it bursts into flames and even “sky-writing” where the flames become words or weapons that he can control with enough concentration (like fireballs). While in his Human Torch form, he is also able to recognize changes in heat energy in the air, even to the point of recognizing figures hidden or obscured in them.
He also has a naturally high body temperature that causes him to get cold easily and is more prone to getting sick if left too long in wet/damp locations. All of his external fire powers are impossible to use without oxygen in the air around him. When Tom flames on, he also heals majority of wounds to his body, much like what one would experience if they cauterized their own wounds. This doesn’t heal things such as broken bones, but it does heal gunshot wounds (if the bullet has been removed), deep lacerations to his skin, and internal bleeding. He’s also very flexible and has a talent for untying knots with his teeth while tied up.
Inventory: His uniform (not his military one, but his normal green short shorts and knee high boots).
Suite: Wood Sector. Despite being a “firebug,” Toro’s not a high strung or “fiery” person in the way that most people might think. He’s emotional and passionate, and is ready to argue with someone if he thinks they are just plain wrong, but he’s also very accepting of other people’s differences. He tries not to judge people on appearance alone. He’s a bit absent-minded and rambles about information that people don’t care about or don’t want to hear at times (think TMI). He can be extremely stubborn, but again, it comes down to things he believes in and a little about his pride and how he hates being shown up by other people in areas he considers himself good at. He’s a very active guy and hates being stuck in one place—a bit of a carryover from his traveling circus foster parents. He likes being up and moving and doing things over waiting for things to happen to him. He’s not that concerned about money either, having been raised by parents with a modest income, so the low-income Wood Sector would be fine for him.
In-Character Samples:
Third Person:
It’s not the first parade they’ve ever been asked to do. Parades are run-of-the-mill for the All-Winners, even more than they’d been for the Invaders back in the day. Back in the day, Toro snorts to himself—it wasn’t even that long ago, but the War feels like a lifetime, something that couldn’t have happened to them in the here and now. America still remembers, but it’s changed so much. Torch sends him a curious look, that silent communication they’ve perfect over the years but Toro just shrugs back at him and shakes his head. It’s not that big of a deal, really, why even bring it up?
There’s on the top of the flat high surface of the float that is covered in red, white, and blue ribbon and music blaring to lead them through the center of the city. It’s the pageantry of the 4th of July that Toro has never been able to get enough of. The people and the sounds, the way everyone comes together to show their patriotism—whether they do any other day of the year doesn’t matter when the enthusiasm and presence of the crowds gets everyone going—the way the kids watch them with big wide eyes even if their parents might be a little more wary. The papers have been on the outs with them for a couple of weeks, so of course what they’ve been printing hasn’t been the most flattering.
Not that Toro’s going to let that get to him today. Today is a day to remember what they’re here for and why they do what they do. Cap would have said—
--But Captain America isn’t here. “Bucky” either. Jeff left the team months ago and Fred…
Better than he can say for Steve, Bucky, and Bill. But today’s not a day for talking about that either. Just a day for thinking about until he wondered what he was even doing here anymore.
A hand on his shoulder makes him look up and over to Jim’s smile that he can tell is more than concerned. Toro’s waving and smiling, but he’s never been that good at hiding anything from Pappy, even when he was trying.
“Today is a good day for remembering the good things that brought us here, even as we remember what prices were paid,” Jim says it easily and Toro is always kind of surprised at how much Jim’s matured over the years. To think that just seven years ago, he and Namor would have been arguing like they’d dumped mud on each other’s new shoes just because they looked at each other funny. Guess change isn’t always a bad thing.
There’s a “humph” from a few feet away and Toro knows that Namor is listening even if he doesn’t respond. He’s not waving either but really who makes ol’ Fishstick do anything? Toro would like to think that was his way of saying, “Yes, Torch, you’re right,” but it could have just as easily have been Namor remembering that yes, he really did have to breathe air and couldn’t fill his lungs with blatant stubborn arrogance alone. Never could tell with him.
Maddie and Bob are sitting in the stars-and-stripes painted convertible about thirty yards in front of the float, waving and smiling while discreetly continuing whatever conversation they have going on between them. He wishes they would have joined them. The Whizzer was always good for a laugh during these things. Toro would have to make his own fun.
“Time for the ol’ Razzle Dazzle,” he sends Jim a crooked grin. “We should be wowing ‘em, not waving like the Queen of England.”
Namor’s response was “Excitable welp, you still can’t stand still for longer than the time it takes to decide to do something else.” Toro just grinned and reached out to purposefully give Namor a friendly smack on the back as his hands began to warm up.
“Oh come on, Fishbreath,” he tells him. “One of these you’re going to have to stop acting like I’m still sixteen.”
“Perhaps once you’ve earned the regard by proving you have,” which was as good as getting a “one day” from Namor as he’d ever get.
“Yeah, yeah,” Toro huffs but it’s in good humor. “Meanwhile you can sit her looking like you forgot to go to the bathroom before we left on this trip and I’ll be giving them crowds a good show.” The almost sneer on Namor’s face was enough to make Toro laugh out loud before jumping into the air, his entire body being shrouded by flames. He raised the heat to float up higher into the air looking down at the crowds below that were completely all eyes on him. And that was just the way he wanted it.
He flew around for a minute, leaving a swirls of smoke in his wake and then finally adds a bit of flare to it, a star here, a stripe there. By the time he was done there was a huge flaming flag “waving” in the wind and written right over it was “God Bless America.” For good measure he even threw a couple fireballs up behind it, making them explode like fireworks without all the extra colors.
The crowds went wild and for a while he could forget and take in the praise and adulation. Being here at least was better than not having anywhere else to go.
Network:
[Toro is a bit haggard from waking up from what he last remembered and finding himself in the grand hall of some other world—really, other dimensions? And here he had thought he’d never see one for himself—but not knowing how he had gotten there. The kedan had explained some to him, but they couldn’t tell him what had happened to Pappy. He sits in the chair in front of the console and works on figuring out how the computer works because it’s not like the ones he knows. Everything is just—too different. But if he’s here, maybe someone else he knows is, too.]
Guess now I can check “traveling to another dimension” off my list of things to do before I retire. [Have a guy who looks like he’s barely into adulthood—just don’t judge the book by its cover. He runs his hand through his hair, his laugh is a bit awkward, tired.] “Get stuck on another world” wasn’t on there, but you learn to deal with the curveballs.
Torch, if you’re here, too, give me a yell, okay? [He really wants to make sure he’s okay. He doesn’t know what happened to him after they were both sprayed with that chemical. There was a fog, like he was seeing everything in a haze and couldn’t do anything about it. Torch—he doesn’t know what they did to him.]
To everyone else…Name’s Toro—not that probably means much to anybody here if we are all from a bunch of different worlds—and it’s a…really something to be here. I didn’t even know they could get computers this small and still make ‘em do anything worthwhile. Keep expecting to find a room that’s got the real one hidden somewhere and this one is just for show.
Name: Kathrine
Age: over 18
Contact: spkathrine[@]gmail.com / plurk: chocolateisbrainfood
Game Cast: Kaldur’ahm /
apologiesmyking | Most Recent ACCharacter Information:
Name: Tom “Toro the Flaming Kid” Raymond
Canon: Marvel 616
Canon Point: mid-1949, after being sprayed with the chemical that made him catatonic when he was kidnapped by the Russians.
Age: 25
Reference: Marvel 616 Universe | WWII by Marvel | Toro Raymond
Setting:
This is Earth. It may even look like a very familiar Earth to those who know what the Earth of the 1940s was like, but it is not our Earth. This is an Earth with Marvels. Superhumans, vigilante heroes, aliens, time-travelers, technological and scientific advances that our world can only dream about. That is the Earth of the Universe 616 among the vast infinity of universes that make up the multi-verse.
The Age of Marvels had come in the late 1930s, the rise of Superhumans taking a front-center involvement in the comings and goings of the world in such a way that not only were they acknowledged, but the media couldn’t get enough of them. No, they weren’t well-received at first—thought of as monsters, humans who didn’t know how to listen to the law, or even as the ones causing the trouble more than trying to stop it—but save the day enough times and the public opinion might just start swaying in your favor.
When Professor Phineas T. Horton tried to figure out the workings of the human body in the 1920s and 30s, he had no idea what DNA even was. That scientific discovery hadn’t occurred yet. But that didn’t deter him in the least. He knew what muscles, tendons, organs, and tissue looked like. He knew how they worked in relation to each other to create a functioning body and he had his own ideas of how cells worked to make them. So he took polymer synthetics and plastic compositions and created his own cells with minute microchip-like programming in them to influence how they would form and made his own DNA. He shaped and formed them together until he made a human body fitting what he expected a human to be, even to the point of including a brain and a heart. But Horton didn’t know just what he had accomplished. He had created life, but he didn’t know exactly what kind of life. It was a scientific impossibility, but he had accomplished it. He created the first Synthetic Man. The first android in history.
He never realized the flaw in his reasoning was how cells took oxygen from the lungs and converted it into energy. Horton’s man-made cells were too efficient, so efficient that just having oxygen nearby to absorb (whether in the lungs or in the air around him) was enough to cause combustion in the cells, turning it right into energy with massive output to be hot enough to turn the android into a living Human Torch. Jim Hammond became the first modern Marvel, a living, thinking android who could burst into flames created by a science only one man knew, and the Age of Marvels had arrived even if the media and public very much wanted to go about like nothing had happened—like nothing had changed.
But it wasn’t just science that was making the Marvels of the world. Under the sea there was the vast kingdom of Atlantis, where Namor, who the media would dub The Sub-mariner, hailed from. Namor’s unique heritage as half-human, half-Atlantean led to him being not only a half-breed, but also gave him the ability to fly and wings on his feet that no one could explain. He was one of the first mutants of the Age, a human with special abilities or differences caused by the natural genetic enhancement of having an active “x-gene,” (not the oldest of mutants, as a few did exist in time before then, but the first that the media knew of), even though the word “mutant” wouldn’t exist for another twenty or so years. Atlanteans had lived separate for thousands of years from the surface world, but as the humans became more aggressive and inconsiderate of their use of the sea (dropping bombs for testing and discarding garbage in it as they saw fit), Atlanteans were more and more often suffering from their behavior and Namor sought to travel to the surface world and make humans pay for their transgressions. He even went so far as to flood Manhattan and was only stopped through the efforts of Captain America and other heroes stepping in to protect the civilians while The Human Torch fought him in the skies. He would be someone that Torch would go up against more than once. It was one of the biggest sellers of newspapers of the day.
And this is the point when media and public approval of the Marvels/Superhumans began to change. Seeing how so many of them came out to protect humans and curb the damage from the flood greatly influenced their perceptions of them. The Human Torch became one of the most well-known Superheroes of the day and it was in trying to find out more about who he truly was as an android, he sought out other people who had worked with Horton, including Fred and Nora Raymond. He found out that their son, Tom (who they had nicknamed Toro in memory of their honeymoon in Mexico), had an immunity to flames even at a very young age, to the point he would pull hot potatoes out of fires for fun and had gone into a burning house to save a neighbors dog with his clothes being the only thing singed. They were both sickly, Nora suffering a terminal illness due to radiation poisoning from her research with it that left her deteriorating rapidly, and Fred suffering from what was likely mesothelioma as he was one of the most renown researchers and engineers of using asbestos for technological and architectural development. They refused Jim and wanted him to leave, knowing who he was from being in the media and worried his presence might influence their own son. They decided to leave New York and go to Mexico for another visit before Nora died only to have their train derailed and wrecked because of the Asbestos Lady wanting to retaliate against Fred for refusing to build her new asbestos-based weapons.
Toro was the only one who survived because in an instinctive act of self-preservation his powers activated and he burst into flames, burning everyone in the car with him, but melting through the wall of enough to fit himself through and make it to safety. He tried to go back into the car to save his parents, but couldn’t find them (likely due to their bodies being too burned for recognition). It would be a traveling circus that found Toro and took him in, Tom and Ellie Alexander, the fire-eaters, seeing potential in him and becoming his foster parents. It would be months later that Jim would find Toro again and Jim’s very presence caused Toro to burst into flames, his Horton Cells reacting to Tom’s powers and making them manifest. Jim would become his legal guardian, something that would likely never occur in our own world considering Jim technically has no records and no normal form of income beyond being a superhero on call by the police, but in this universe with Jim being the only person capable of truly helping Toro control his powers (and also making it easier for the government to keep an eye on him themselves since it’s harder to follow a traveling circus), Jim’s candidacy for guardianship wasn’t contested as much as it could have been.
What neither knew at the time was that Toro’s powers were fire-based because of his mother Nora working as the assistant to Professor Horton in the 20s where she was exposed to the Horton Cells still in development and they assimilated themselves into her own system. After she became pregnant she transferred them to her unborn child, but because he was a mutant, the cells attached themselves to Tom’s x-gene, manipulating how his powers would develop. This wouldn’t be the only time that Horton Cells would influence abilities of another person either. During World War II, Jim gave a blood transfusion of his own blood to Jacqueline Falsworth to save her life, the Horton Cells in her body giving her super speed (and later restoring her body’s youth and halting her aging after a second transfusion). In so many ways, the rise of Marvels was happening at a much faster pace now and the media was using it their advantage to sensationalize the public.
The U.S. government was taking notice, too. In their own efforts to create the perfect human specimen they used the Super Soldier Serum to take a weak, illness-ridden young man who wouldn’t even pass military enlistment health requirements and turned him into the most physically fit human in existence. Steve Rogers became Captain America, the perfect model of American patriotism and propaganda to strike fear and caution into the Axis forces before the U.S. had even taken steps to officially join World War II. The Super Soldier Serum and Captain America would become such an obsession that people (individuals, secret government organizations, even cults) would spend decades trying to replicate it, to various degrees of success and failure. And it was with the fact that only one Super Soldier came out of Project Rebirth that the government realized that they needed another symbol, Captain America couldn’t work alone. And thus came Bucky, a teenager partner to raise the spirits of America Youth, who was also trained by some of the most expert teams that the government could throw him at to be the perfect, unassuming assassin. Using an underage operative to kill on the battlefield or behind enemy lines wasn’t even half as far as the government was willing to go.
The U.S. government saw the potential of using Superhumans to work for them just as much as other countries (England, Germany, Japan, etc) did, but it wasn’t until Pearl Harbor happened that they saw what a necessity it was. They realized they could take these Superhumans, put them on the battlefields of World War II and make a difference. They didn’t just need to create an army of Super Soldiers when they had Superhumans that could use. And so they did. The Invaders (Captain America, The Human Torch, The Sub-mariner, Bucky, Toro, and various side members in America and Europe) became the poster team for the war effort, promoting patriotism and recruit to fight the good fight against the Axis. They even used the young teenage partners of Captain America and The Human Torch, Bucky and Toro the Flaming Kid, to work as propaganda models for American youth in opposition the Nazi Youth Camps, encouraging them to support the War Effort and enlist when they “came of age” (and maybe before then, considering Bucky and Toro weren’t even of legal age themselves when it first started). They even had two teams of their own, the Young Allies who were a group of teens being trained by the military in various ways to think and act like soldiers/operatives even before they could go into war, and the Kid Commandos, their team with two other Superhuman teens, Golden Girl and The Human Top. The Invaders wasn’t the only Superhuman team, either. To combat problems at home and deal with Nazi spies infiltrating in the U.S., Bucky and Patriot, Jeff Mace, founded the Liberty Legion, which was made up of several heroes spanning across the country. In England there was the brief team of the Crusaders (which was truly a Nazi plot to discredit the Invaders with another team by tricking British Superheroes into thinking they were working for the Crown).
This is an Earth where Superhumans really did change the playing field of the war. Weapons had to get bigger, more destructive, to go up against them. HYDRA originally started as the secret Nazi science and technology division that focused on alternative forms of weaponry (sorcery, the occult, and including some very unethical experiments done on animals and humans), but it went on to become the cult following of the Red Skull another product of the Super Soldier Serum Gone Very Wrong. The Invaders would spend most of the next four years fighting on U.S. soil and abroad and HYDRA’s various weapons and science-altered humans would be some of their worst enemies. And to keep the morale of the War Effort high in the United States, the government even permitted the publishing of comic books detailing the “heroic tales” of many of the heroes, especially those working for them. They were mostly fabricated, embellished, events twisted to fit the government’s best interests, to the point where some people still considered them fact to this day but it’s widely known they were more than half fiction.
When Captain America and Bucky disappeared in April 1945 (not long after the death of President Roosevelt) on Zemo’s island, the Human Torch and Toro were Germany trying to stop the latest plot of the Nazis that would decimate large populated cities in various countries. It was the last throw down of the Nazis, their troops worn down and beaten back on all fronts and Hitler’s last option was to set off missiles that would destroy most of Western Europe and the eastern seaboard of the United States. Jim Hammond tried to talk sense into him, but instead had to set him on fire just to stop him. He, Toro, and Namor returned home to find that Captain America and Bucky were M.I.A. (considered Killed in Action). The government had to make a decision on what this would mean for the image of the War in America. Italy was under control, Hitler was gone and Germany had surrendered, but Japan was still a threat. So instead of revealing the truth to the public, they asked William “Bill” Naslund and Fred Davis to take on the roles of being Cap and Bucky, hiding the truth from Americans until decades later. This deception would continue through the end of the war and even into the post-War era of comparable peace and prosperity.
With the War over the Invaders were no longer needed, but instead the members joined by Miss America, The Whizzer, and then later by Angel and the Blonde Phantom, came together to become the All-Winners Squad. This Superhero team played more to the public and also worked closely with the government as the Invaders had before. It was in 1946 when Professor Horton became an important figure again for trying to recreate his own genius in making another android. One that would be even better than Jim Hammond, which he called Adam II. But Adam II had more than just a mind of his own, he wanted power, control, and for artificial humans to rule the world. He began making his own breed of androids, an army that was subservient to his will and would do anything he asked. He intended to assassinate Senator John F. Kennedy and replace him with an android double but the All-Winners stopped him at the expense of Bill Naslund’s life. Again, Captain America was dead and with the tension between the U.S. and the communist Soviet Union rising, the government saw the need for Captain America even more.
Patriot, Jeff Mace, became the next Captain America and would remain so until he quit in 1949, but the All-Winners would disband even before that. The second Bucky, Fred David, was shot stopping and armed robbery and Captain America left the team so it wasn’t long after that the entire team disbanded to fulfill their separate goals. The suspicion and pressure from the U.S. government didn’t help. The Red Scare is in full swing and Communists are being seen everywhere, even amongst the heroes. Several have been accused or are suspected and as the government becomes stricter, the media falls more in line with it and heroes became a less favorable if they aren’t toeing the line. The government wanted more ways to control them and the heroes who rebelled found themselves often on the outs with the media and the public.
This is also a time of organized crime being extremely powerful in cities where money talks and violence can get you what you want. The U.S. government tried to build task forces and organizations to combat it, but it was still very prevalent, with some of the mobs and mafias having direct ties or connections to the USSR. The Soviet Union sells technology and chemicals to the mob as a means of testing and is working on various projects of their own to go up against the still fabled Super Soldier Serum of the United States (even though no one had been subjected to the Serum by the U.S. government in almost 10 years, the propaganda also spoke otherwise). Department X was a secret program designed to create the greatest operatives they could that would be completely loyal to the Soviet Union. The Red Room was the department most closely associated with the training and brainwashing of these select operatives. They were working on their own form of the Super Soldier Serum, which ended up creating the Black Widow Ops, a line of female assassin operatives, and other various projects (including influences later in the Weapon X project that would turn Logan into the Wolverine). The U.S. was vigilante to the point of paranoia about the possibility of communist infiltration and influence in the United States, but they weren’t even aware of half of what Russia had in the works.
Personality:
At first look, Tom is generally what people would call a “good guy.” He’s normally polite, if a bit cocky, helpful, cares about people, knows right from wrong, and all that good stuff. He grew up with sickly parents who were both exposed to dangerous chemicals due to their work as scientists and researchers and he cared about them, greatly. Even though they weren’t the richest family, living off of a very modest income, he didn’t lack for all of the important things. Still, because of the hardships that his family went through financially and, especially, with his mother’s rapidly declining health, Toro came to understand early on that life isn’t always the kindest to good people, like his parents.
But even a good guy can have rough edges. Living through the train wreck that killed his parents left Toro with survivor’s guilt and believing that he was the cause of the crash (which he wasn’t, but his flames did kill quite a few people when he accidentally activated his powers). His parents and everyone else on the train were dead, but he wasn’t, so it had to be his fault and the fault of the powers he had that his parents were so afraid of, because those powers meant that he was somehow different and dangerous. The words “mutant” and “homo superior” didn’t exist back then so all Tom knew what that there was something wrong about him that no one could ever explain. Even after meeting Jim Hammond and later on learning the truth about Lady Asbestos’ culpability for his parents’ deaths, Toro would never stop believing that who he is—what he is—cursed them somehow.
As he aged, Tom came into full control of his powers (or as much control as he could get of them considering how his emotional state affects them) and it helped him to fear himself less. Instead, he focused on using his powers to help people, just as his mentor, Jim Hammond, did. His relationship with Jim was one of the strongest bonds he had after he had lost everything else and it shaped the way he looked at the world. Jim didn’t understand everything about human beings, because as an android he learned human emotions through observation and mimicry. Toro became one of the biggest models he followed because of their constant companionship, while in turn, Toro tried to be more understanding and open to the world because that was how Jim approached things. He wanted to make Jim proud of him, tried to live up to the legacy Jim had set before him even years after his death. It doesn’t always work, as Toro is more cynical and less optimistic than Jim, but he tries anyway. He also, as he gets older begins to get over some of his shyness around girls, although this is usually only when he’s being “Toro.” When he’s just being regular Tom Raymond, away from the battlegrounds and promotional tours and turning himself into a human bonfire, he reverts back to being awkward and doesn’t know how to act in more personal settings. Bucky had to push him to dance with a girl he’s been keeping an eye on for over a year just because Tom couldn’t bring himself to go talk to her on his own and years later it hasn’t really changed that he can interact with pretty girls so much easier when he’s being a hero versus being a normal guy.
Toro may not be the smartest guy around, and he has a tendency to ramble about things people really don’t want to hear, but he is intuitive and learns on his feet. He doesn’t like to jump into situations without thinking things through or to go against orders—as a teenager, it was usually Bucky who did that and Toro who followed after him, arguing that they shouldn’t do it the entire time—but he does have a temper. He argues with Namor and Bucky and doesn’t mind pointing out when a plan is likely to go very poorly, and his temper at times even gets him into trouble because he forgets to stop and look at the situation, but one of the most important aspects about Toro is his loyalty. Even if he thinks a friend is going down the wrong path, he’ll either try to steer them from it, or he’ll be right there beside them. He’s lost so many people in his life already that he’ll do anything to keep the ones he still has. A good example of this is even after the war, when a new villain, Isbisa, is going around destroying museums and relics, a clue is left to purposefully make the All-Winners Squad think Namor is allied with Isbisa. The rest of the All-Winners turn on Namor, even Jim, but Toro refuses to believe it and sets out after Namor to help him prove his innocence, despite the fact they don’t get along that often. That’s just the kind of person Toro is.
Toro is still, despite his at times cynical outlook, protective of humans in general (this does not include Nazis or supervillains). But even though the world as a whole is his concern, his priority is usually those he considers his friends and loved ones, because Toro has already lost enough people that he cares about. He could argue with a friend more times than they get along, but Toro will still consider them important. When he and his friends in the Young Allies were making an appearance for a war bonds drive, the program director refused to remove a blown up cover of one of the propaganda comics that were being published about them—despite the fact it included a disparaging caricature of one of the members, Washington Jones. Toro’s solution? Burn the poster down. He doesn’t stand for discrimination or racism in general, but having it happen to one of his friends really gets to him. He knows the world isn’t a perfect place, but that doesn’t mean he’s going to just let it go and think he can’t make a difference. To Tom, it’s all about making that difference, even if it’s not a big one.
Waking up in a place like Tu Shanshu would surprise Toro to the point that his first thought would be that it was a trap by one of the All-Winners Squad’s enemies. He would think that they found a way to force him into this place to get him out of the picture. At the same time, Toro is an open-minded person and wouldn’t think the kedan explaining things to him they were lying through their teeth either. Other dimensions, life from other planets, and time-travel aren’t exactly new to him, but he hasn’t traveled to another dimension himself before (well…not that he remembers). Being stuck on a giant turtle swimming through a huge ocean is not Toro’s idea of a good time, so he’d complain a bit to anyone who would listen, but it wouldn’t last. He’s a curious guy, so Toro would want to get to know the place, which would curb his bad temper. He wouldn’t be exactly happy, but he would try to put a less terrible spin on being trapped with no way home.
Appearance: Tom is about 5’8”, with black hair, blue eyes, and an athletic build. He’s 25 years old, but looks to be even younger because his mutant abilities began to slow down and even at times regress his body’s aging process after he came into full breadth of them. It’s very easy for him to be mistaken for 18 or around that age.
Abilities:
Toro is immune to the affects of extreme heat himself and thus never burns, but this does leave him some weakness to water and extreme colds. He has the ability to control “ambient heat energy,” raising the heat in the air, controlling fires, putting them out, absorbing heat into himself, and the ability to raise his body heat to the point of combustion—thus turning himself into a living “torch.” Using this ability he is capable of flying on the hydrogen atoms created, heating air until it bursts into flames and even “sky-writing” where the flames become words or weapons that he can control with enough concentration (like fireballs). While in his Human Torch form, he is also able to recognize changes in heat energy in the air, even to the point of recognizing figures hidden or obscured in them.
He also has a naturally high body temperature that causes him to get cold easily and is more prone to getting sick if left too long in wet/damp locations. All of his external fire powers are impossible to use without oxygen in the air around him. When Tom flames on, he also heals majority of wounds to his body, much like what one would experience if they cauterized their own wounds. This doesn’t heal things such as broken bones, but it does heal gunshot wounds (if the bullet has been removed), deep lacerations to his skin, and internal bleeding. He’s also very flexible and has a talent for untying knots with his teeth while tied up.
Inventory: His uniform (not his military one, but his normal green short shorts and knee high boots).
Suite: Wood Sector. Despite being a “firebug,” Toro’s not a high strung or “fiery” person in the way that most people might think. He’s emotional and passionate, and is ready to argue with someone if he thinks they are just plain wrong, but he’s also very accepting of other people’s differences. He tries not to judge people on appearance alone. He’s a bit absent-minded and rambles about information that people don’t care about or don’t want to hear at times (think TMI). He can be extremely stubborn, but again, it comes down to things he believes in and a little about his pride and how he hates being shown up by other people in areas he considers himself good at. He’s a very active guy and hates being stuck in one place—a bit of a carryover from his traveling circus foster parents. He likes being up and moving and doing things over waiting for things to happen to him. He’s not that concerned about money either, having been raised by parents with a modest income, so the low-income Wood Sector would be fine for him.
In-Character Samples:
Third Person:
It’s not the first parade they’ve ever been asked to do. Parades are run-of-the-mill for the All-Winners, even more than they’d been for the Invaders back in the day. Back in the day, Toro snorts to himself—it wasn’t even that long ago, but the War feels like a lifetime, something that couldn’t have happened to them in the here and now. America still remembers, but it’s changed so much. Torch sends him a curious look, that silent communication they’ve perfect over the years but Toro just shrugs back at him and shakes his head. It’s not that big of a deal, really, why even bring it up?
There’s on the top of the flat high surface of the float that is covered in red, white, and blue ribbon and music blaring to lead them through the center of the city. It’s the pageantry of the 4th of July that Toro has never been able to get enough of. The people and the sounds, the way everyone comes together to show their patriotism—whether they do any other day of the year doesn’t matter when the enthusiasm and presence of the crowds gets everyone going—the way the kids watch them with big wide eyes even if their parents might be a little more wary. The papers have been on the outs with them for a couple of weeks, so of course what they’ve been printing hasn’t been the most flattering.
Not that Toro’s going to let that get to him today. Today is a day to remember what they’re here for and why they do what they do. Cap would have said—
--But Captain America isn’t here. “Bucky” either. Jeff left the team months ago and Fred…
Better than he can say for Steve, Bucky, and Bill. But today’s not a day for talking about that either. Just a day for thinking about until he wondered what he was even doing here anymore.
A hand on his shoulder makes him look up and over to Jim’s smile that he can tell is more than concerned. Toro’s waving and smiling, but he’s never been that good at hiding anything from Pappy, even when he was trying.
“Today is a good day for remembering the good things that brought us here, even as we remember what prices were paid,” Jim says it easily and Toro is always kind of surprised at how much Jim’s matured over the years. To think that just seven years ago, he and Namor would have been arguing like they’d dumped mud on each other’s new shoes just because they looked at each other funny. Guess change isn’t always a bad thing.
There’s a “humph” from a few feet away and Toro knows that Namor is listening even if he doesn’t respond. He’s not waving either but really who makes ol’ Fishstick do anything? Toro would like to think that was his way of saying, “Yes, Torch, you’re right,” but it could have just as easily have been Namor remembering that yes, he really did have to breathe air and couldn’t fill his lungs with blatant stubborn arrogance alone. Never could tell with him.
Maddie and Bob are sitting in the stars-and-stripes painted convertible about thirty yards in front of the float, waving and smiling while discreetly continuing whatever conversation they have going on between them. He wishes they would have joined them. The Whizzer was always good for a laugh during these things. Toro would have to make his own fun.
“Time for the ol’ Razzle Dazzle,” he sends Jim a crooked grin. “We should be wowing ‘em, not waving like the Queen of England.”
Namor’s response was “Excitable welp, you still can’t stand still for longer than the time it takes to decide to do something else.” Toro just grinned and reached out to purposefully give Namor a friendly smack on the back as his hands began to warm up.
“Oh come on, Fishbreath,” he tells him. “One of these you’re going to have to stop acting like I’m still sixteen.”
“Perhaps once you’ve earned the regard by proving you have,” which was as good as getting a “one day” from Namor as he’d ever get.
“Yeah, yeah,” Toro huffs but it’s in good humor. “Meanwhile you can sit her looking like you forgot to go to the bathroom before we left on this trip and I’ll be giving them crowds a good show.” The almost sneer on Namor’s face was enough to make Toro laugh out loud before jumping into the air, his entire body being shrouded by flames. He raised the heat to float up higher into the air looking down at the crowds below that were completely all eyes on him. And that was just the way he wanted it.
He flew around for a minute, leaving a swirls of smoke in his wake and then finally adds a bit of flare to it, a star here, a stripe there. By the time he was done there was a huge flaming flag “waving” in the wind and written right over it was “God Bless America.” For good measure he even threw a couple fireballs up behind it, making them explode like fireworks without all the extra colors.
The crowds went wild and for a while he could forget and take in the praise and adulation. Being here at least was better than not having anywhere else to go.
Network:
[Toro is a bit haggard from waking up from what he last remembered and finding himself in the grand hall of some other world—really, other dimensions? And here he had thought he’d never see one for himself—but not knowing how he had gotten there. The kedan had explained some to him, but they couldn’t tell him what had happened to Pappy. He sits in the chair in front of the console and works on figuring out how the computer works because it’s not like the ones he knows. Everything is just—too different. But if he’s here, maybe someone else he knows is, too.]
Guess now I can check “traveling to another dimension” off my list of things to do before I retire. [Have a guy who looks like he’s barely into adulthood—just don’t judge the book by its cover. He runs his hand through his hair, his laugh is a bit awkward, tired.] “Get stuck on another world” wasn’t on there, but you learn to deal with the curveballs.
Torch, if you’re here, too, give me a yell, okay? [He really wants to make sure he’s okay. He doesn’t know what happened to him after they were both sprayed with that chemical. There was a fog, like he was seeing everything in a haze and couldn’t do anything about it. Torch—he doesn’t know what they did to him.]
To everyone else…Name’s Toro—not that probably means much to anybody here if we are all from a bunch of different worlds—and it’s a…really something to be here. I didn’t even know they could get computers this small and still make ‘em do anything worthwhile. Keep expecting to find a room that’s got the real one hidden somewhere and this one is just for show.