Melt

Melt
Melt, when not an animate pile of acid
Author	/u/TheBluestHedgeroo
Civilian name	Nicole Parsons
Alignment	Villain
Affiliation	Affiliation::Furies ({{{location}}})[[Category:{{{location}}} characters]]
Status	Active

Minimal information would be known to the general public beyond rumored sightings of a “walking flesh-puddle”. Assuming different law enforcement branches properly communicate, they would know her civilian identity to be a recent (roughly a month ago, as of May) medium-security prison escapee.

Character Sheet

Appearance

Melt's gory-ass changer form

In Civvies: Tall and toned, with a very distinctive haircut and a near-permanent snarl. Commonly wears cheap and ill-fitting clothing under a big comfy green jacket. Costume is pretty much this with a cheap domino mask.

While under 2nd stage of her power: Almost no distinctive details remain, save her proportions. Flesh-paste loosely hangs off bone, with exposed skeleton sometimes visible in places where the paste has dripped off or otherwise been removed by combat. Paste visibly adheres to itself and to a lesser extent, the skeleton.

Equipment and Resources

Pretty much nil, beyond the clothes she stole from a department store and a few twenties from the register. Also has a pretty thicc length of pipe, if needed to hit people with.

Skills and Specializations

-Adept in a self-taught style of hand-to-hand combat based on grappling and limiting the movement of her opponents.

-Experienced in intimidating others, both via nasty oratory and shows of force.

-Pretty good understanding of anatomy, which is helpful for deciding where to melt on an opponent to best injure/inhibit them and to see what is missing when she reconstitutes her body.

Mentality

Prideful, vain, blunt, and aggressive to a fault, Nicole is highly devoted to the concept of “true strength”, loosely defined by herself as living life entirely uninhibited by the wishes and efforts of others (“Do what you wish, to whomever you wish.”). In practice, this means acting impulsively without much concern for the consequences of said actions, Despite this, she will often respect the wishes of those she believes to have proven themselves to be stronger than her. Is extremely blunt in all of her dealings and actions, seeing deception and lying as an abhorrent form of weakness. Has a reverence to the act of cannibalism.

In short, wholly devoted to a highly aggressive and strange philosophy of her own making.

Power

At any point in time, Melt can shift the entirety of her organs, tissue, muscle fiber, and other miscellaneous flesh into a corrosive and highly adhesive paste with a variable density and consistency (hereafter referred to as Flesh-Paste). Only her skeleton (which fuses together) and brain remain untouched by the change, although her senses are unaffected by the loss of sensory organs. It is a near certainty that any melee weapon or fist that strikes this paste will become coated with it, and may have to be pulled free of her flesh-paste if said weapon or fist penetrates enough. The acidic effects of this paste are somewhat weak, but grow in strength based on how much of the object’s surface area is covered in the paste (a bit of flesh-paste on the knuckles might eat through a layer of skin or three, but an entire fist coated with it will melt right down to the bone within fifteen minutes if not removed). Flesh-paste can be painfully washed off with very hot water in a pinch, and the acidic effects of said paste can be slowed and counteracted by adding a lot of basic solution (drain cleaner, baking soda, etc)

Melt’s power has three distinct “stages”, which will be elaborated on below:

1st) (Initial Change) Lasts for three minutes on average after Melt initially activates her power, in which all her flesh begins to quickly convert to the corrosive paste.Change happens inside-out, so deeper tissues (closest to the bone) are converted first and surface tissues are converted last. Mobility is heavily impaired during this stage (due to the flesh-paste starting out as a thick clump, needing to be “broken up” a bit by movements), although Melt retains her appearance and ability to speak. Flesh-paste during this stage is a similar density and consistency to freshly poured cement, which heavily reduces the impact of melee weapons (often stopping them entirely before they can reach the skeleton) Applying fire or seriously disrupting the flesh-paste during this stage will allow the instant advance to Stage 2.

2nd) (Real Puddle Hours) Can theoretically last indefinitely, in practice is ended by her death or willful advance to Stage 3. Beginning is marked by her flesh beginning to visibly melt and flow together, appearing to loosely hang off the body in some places. Arms may begin to develop whip-like tendrils on the end. In this state, her mobility is back to that of a baseline human with seemingly infinite stamina, being able to retain a sprinting pace nearly indefinitely. Flesh-paste that drips off the body (or that is otherwise removed) can be gathered and slapped back on the body. In addition, flesh of others melted by said corrosive paste can be added into her body without issue. Consistency of the paste starts to heavily degrade the longer she remains in the state, to the point where the corrosive paste could be torn through like wet tissue paper after an hour spent in the state. Thus, protection from blows and melee weapons similarly degrade to the point where the skeleton itself can be struck with ease.

3rd) (Reconstitution) If Melt has at least 2/3rds of her initial mass in flesh-paste still on her body, she can instantly shift back to her human form (from either stage 1 or 2). If any of her initial mass is missing, some of the resulting human bits will become degraded and damaged, most commonly organs. In extreme cases (less than 3/4ths of initial mass remains), she could be reconfigured missing up to both eyes, one kidney, and one lung, although this more often presents itself as severe scarring on her skin, minor cataracts, and missing teeth. Said missing/damaged pieces may only be restored by the addition of molten flesh during the next 2nd stage. Her changer state is locked out for a solid hour after reconstituting herself, the paste needing to settle back together before next use.

Misc)

-Reconstitution is “anchored” around the skeletal system. If a given bone/entire section of her body is completely shattered or severed from her skeleton during the first or second stage, the associated body part(s) will not be fully restored (or restored at all, depending on how severe the damage is) when she reconstitutes her body. Bones may only be restored via gathering a significant quantity of biomass from her victims in future second-stages, requiring the total flesh of five average adults to restore the entire skeletal system in a given limb. If the skeletal injury would be lethal if reconstructed without that part, (skull, spine, entire ribcage, or entire pelvis is completely destroyed, for example), Melt would perish.

-Fire and other sources of extreme heat cause the flesh-paste to melt and lose consistency much more quickly than usual (even forcing the paste to melt off the body if hot enough), sources of cold will cause the flesh-paste to retain consistency for a longer period of time and even freeze the paste solid if said source is cold enough.

-Her own skeletal system is unaffected by the corrosive aspect of the paste, her clothing and mask are affected by the paste.

-Her power and body violently rejects parahuman healing and prothesises, producing paste even outside of her Changer form to melt away added flesh or implanted systems.

Trigger type (Single Trigger, Brute/Changer)

Backstory

Nicole was sentenced to the Washington State Penitentiary at the age of 23 when her laundry list of assaults, robberies, and extortions as the enforcer of a drug-running ring were discovered and prosecuted. She took on a similar role in the prison hierarchy, more often using her words and fearsome image than her fists to shake people down, and kinda settled into her cushy role.

Two years later, that cushy role was beginning to wear thin. The newcomers could no longer be put in their place with snarls and barked threats, and her image was beginning to suffer for it. She knew the new whelps just needed a proper show of force to be put in their place, and planned to beat the most vocal newbie down in the middle of the canteen.

Two minutes later, she was bleeding from a half-dozen shiv wounds and her half-conscious body was carted off to the infirmary in full view of the entire cellblock.

She triggered when those wounds became infected, when she saw the naked pity and contempt in the eyes of other patients where she once saw fear, and when her intimidating image wasted away in a cheap cot, eaten alive by bacteria within and harsh judgement without.

Since then, she has managed to escape with two dozen of her fellow inmates after a successful riot, recuperated and reflected, and decided to prove herself in that hellhole cape Mecca/port city of Ashton.