Fungus under the ice
Tomorrow becomes today.
If the beat goes on
When the song is gone,
Harmony finds her way.”
Context
This character is an original creation. We often call these “homemades” or “homebrewed” – think home cooking or craft beer.
Many of these characters were created to take part in tabletop role-playing game sessions. Others were invented as a creative writing exercise, often as part of a community event.
Advertisement
Background
- Known Relatives: None.
- Group Affiliation: None.
- Base Of Operations: None (Dimension of Nightshades?).
History
The Fungus from Under the Ice was the first case tackled by the New York City chapter of the JLA Reserves. A US Meteorological Service installation had suddenly broken off contact without explanation. A JLA team consisting of Minuteman, Silberspinnin, Leopard’s Paw, Tiger Boyar, and Azaell were sent to northern Greenland to investigate.
Upon arrival, they found the base apparently isolated except for a single young woman named Elizabeth Pearson. When they interrogated her, they noticed that she would only speak to one person at a time. After about an hour, the realized that she was profoundly deaf and an accomplished lip-reader.
A further reconnaissance of the installation by Minuteman and Tiger Boyar (The JLA NYC reserves had adopted the old JLS two-man sub-team system) discovered some personnel standing immobile. They carried the personnel back to their makeshift headquarters, where a psychic probe by Silberspinnin revealed some sort of possession or control placed upon them.
Azaell exorcised the as yet unknown influence, and the two men were debriefed, to little avail. They only remembered events up to the communication break.
Advertisement
Azaell and Leopard’s Paw set off to investigate the installation hangar while Minuteman and Tiger Boyar went for the laboratories. The rest of the installation’s crew was found in the hangar, apparently outfitting helicopters for flight (a hazardous undertaking in November). They were unresponsive to any attempts at communication.
Before Azaell could attempt to exorcise them, an ear-splitting shriek filled the compound as Minuteman and Tiger Boyar entered the laboratory.
Exorcism
Every normal person in the compound except for Elizabeth stiffened and began to move towards the laboratory. What is more, Silberspinnin fell under the sway of the unknown entity and rocketed to the laboratory at top flight speed, knocking over several people with her sonic boom.
Azaell and Leopard’s Paw closed the hangar doors and, while Azaell drove vehicles in front of the building exits, Leopard’s Paw took on the speed of a cheetah to get to the lab.
At the lab, Minuteman and Tiger Boyar got to their feet in time to see Silberspinnin create a stone wall in front of herself and the laboratory door. Tiger Boyar ripped through the wall with his claws and was singed by a bolt of fire launched at him by Silberspinnin. Minuteman dove through the hole and subdued the mind-controlled sorceress with a little jiu-jutsu while she was shooting at Tiger Boyar.
In the meantime, Leopard’s Paw had taken on the strength of a blue whale and broken a hole in the rear wall of the lab. In the lab she saw three people setting up electric heaters around an enormous lump of something. She dashed in, threw the heaters out, and smashed the lump.
With this action, and the freezing wind Leopard’s Paw brought in with her, the personnel of the installation seemed to recover from their bizarre behavior.
During the cleanup, Azaell conducted some short experiments upon a fragment of the lump. He exposed it to a small flame, and was amazed at its rate of growth (which he halted with a large snowball). Silberspinnin attempted to communicate with the lump via various forms of telepathy, but it appeared to be immune to any such efforts.
Realizing that such an entity posed an enormous potential threat no matter who might end up in control of it, Azaell banished all fragments of it to the Dimension of Nightshades, where he reasoned that it would be the most “at home”, given its apparently fungal nature.
The motivations and origins of the Fungus are still unknown. The report of its powers and abilities are speculations based upon debriefings of JLA NYC Reserves members.
Game Stats — DC Heroes RPG
Tell me more about the game stats
The Fungus from Under the Ice
| Dex: – | Str: – | Bod: 7+ | Motivation: unknown |
| Int: 10 | Wil: 15 | Min: 18 | Occupation: Fungus |
| Inf: 06 | Aur: 04 | Spi: 08 | Resources {or Wealth}: None |
| Init: 016 | HPs: 00 |
Powers:
Control: 18, Invulnerability: 20, Growth: **, Energy Absorbtion: 30, Telepathy: 18.
Bonuses and Limitations:
- Control has Area Effect. The AP radius of the Control Area Effect is equal to the AP of active Growth plus seven. The AP of Control that can be used is limited to no more than twice the AP of Growth that have been activated.
- The Fungus’s Body AP is equal to the AP of Growth plus its base Body (Growth adds to Physical Current Condition).
- Invulnerability appears to function even after the Fungus is dead. Invulnerability functions vs. Mental and Mystical damage.
- There may be no ultimate limit on the fungus’s Growth aside from the AP of heat that can be applied to it at a time.
- Telepathy only functions upon creatures that the Fungus is currently Controlling (used for delivering information to the Fungus).
- The Telepathy actually uses some kind of hypersonic signal and can be blocked by soundproofing. Control requires that the character be able to hear (the effect seems to be transmitted via barely audible sonics). The profoundly deaf are immune to the fungus’s Control.
- Energy Absorbtion only works against heat and fire.
- Growth does not add to STR.
- Growth requires a heat source to activate. Every AP of heat absorbed by the Fungus at one time activates one AP of Growth.
- The Fungus’s weight and volume are equal to the number of AP of growth that are active.
- The active AP Growth can be reduced by inflicting physical damage upon the Fungus. Every reduction of the Fungus’s current Physical Condition past the first seven points of damage removes a level of Growth and all attendant bonuses.
Advantages:
Iron Will. Miscellaneous: The Fungus is completely immune to all Social Interaction.
Drawbacks:
Loss Vulnerability (All Powers and Attributes) whenever ambient temperature is lower than freezing point of water. Attack Vulnerability (2 column shifts) vs. cold or ice attacks. Physical Restriction: The Fungus is incapable of communication (even telepathic) except with beings it Controls, and then only to give commands and receive sensory input ; CPR (The Fungus is incapable of any physical action), CPR (The Fungus is apparently insensate on its own, except for rudimentary senses of touch and taste/smell and relies upon the senses of creatures under its Control power).