Hyperdog

Context

Top Ten was a 1999-2001 series by Alan Moore and Gene Ha. It was successful enough to get a few spin-off limited series – mostly on strength of its quality, and Moore’s name.

It takes place in a strange mega-city where almost everyone has some super-hero-like powers or assets, and the culture comes from living in a comic book world. Most stories follow police detectives working this difficult beat, the titular Top Ten precinct. They use a TV-style police procedural format.

Background

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Neopolis

Neopolis is a town in Florida, on the same Earth as Tom Strong. It was created when it was noticed after WWII that science heroes tended to somehow greatly increase the number of fellow science heroes, science villains, monsters, supernatural things, etc. where they were operating.

Thus, Neopolis was a place where all the weirdness could live without bothering other people.

It was built on plans drawn mostly by captured Nazi super-scientists and assorted mad scientist-type villains. Although the architecture is extremely varied (as are the vehicles, people, businesses, etc), some elements are still reminiscent of National Socialist architecture.

Neopolis is a pretty big city. It’s not unlike Manhattan or Gotham. But since many things and people can fly, Neopolis is much taller and built to accommodate three-dimensional traffic.

Everyone has one or more super-powers or one or several piece of unique and advanced equipment in Neopolis, and most everyone has picked a science hero name for themselves.

When aliens, gods, robots, giant monsters, etc. visit they tend to come to Neopolis, following the law of sympathy.

The general tech level seems on par with Judge Dredd’s Mega-City one, with numerous aberrations.

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Transdimensional activity

Likewise, when contact was made with parallel realities, it occurred in Neopolis. The city is part of a system of at least 134 parallels, which are interconnected by a system of paying public transport. It resembles a train station.

Each parallel is quite different, but all seem fantastic.

• One was a Classical place with lots of Satyrs, Fauns, Centaurs, etc. and the equivalent of New York City all in modernized Classical architecture. It is called Nova Roma and seems to be the hub of the administrative systems and public transit system.
• One was a somewhat absurd generic fantasy place.>/li>
• One (“Turingville”) is populated by highly advanced robotic AIs.
• One is a Steampunk  Victorian parallel.
• One is populated by mechanosaurs.

The parallels seem to work much like Torg’s cosms . They have varying tech axiom levels (for instance electricity cannot work in Smax’s native dimension), social axiom levels, etc. as well as a set of narrative rules. Neopolis’ axioms and rules are super-hero ones, and thus fit nicely with the normal DC Heroes RPG rules and Genre Rules.

Similar reality and narrative rules have been discovered by Tom Strong when he investigated parallels on his own.

Discipline and punish

The Precinct Ten police station (aka “Top Ten”) is part of a centralized, multiversal police force, which issues them their budgets and policies and to whom they report. The H.Q. of that police force seems to be Nova Roma, aka Grand Central.

Although it covers an entire town, Top Ten is considered to just be a precinct station in terms of staffing , organization, ranks, etc.. This system was adopted in the mid-1980s after more than 25 years of failure at policing the highly chaotic town. The cops from other Earths had the experience that the Earthlings were missing.

One of the main points of the multiversal system is to view Neopolis as a single place extending not only in four physical dimensions, but also vibrating along the fifth. Most realities have their own equivalent of Neopolis. That is how each version of Neopolis ends up being considered a precinct in a greater whole, a virtual, transdimensional city.

Of course, the heavy traffic across the various versions of Neopolis has both made them all even weirder, but has also given them a common identity and subtle commonalities in culture.

Powers and Abilities

The Hyperdog is a cerebrally uplifted  dog. His intelligence and speech are fully human-level, and he has an excellent understanding of human culture, language and psychology.

Whenever he is working, he slips his canine body into a tall robotic exoskeleton . This allows him to act as a full humanoid, and provides superhuman strength and durability.

Kemlo is a people person. He is very good with words and good vibes. As Girl One sarcastically commented, it must be the cold nose and brown puppy eyes.

History

Very little is known about Sergeant Caesar’s past before he became a cop.

Description

Kemlo is a Doberman Pinscher.

He usually wears tourist-style clothes. Meaning wide pants, a big open shirt with South Pacific motifs, a silly T-shirt (his most common one is black with “DOG” in white letters) and perhaps even a small straw hat.

Personality

Kemlo is an outgoing, friendly dog and a smooth operator. He is always considerate and respectful, and excels at avoiding any hint of conflict. He can easily defuse tense situations or soothe wounded persons. He always appears as an ally for everyone.

While he is a genuinely nice and concerned guy, Kemlo can be a bit of a devious and manipulative pooch in matters of love. When he’s not on duty, he’s a normal intelligent dog. He once said that once he went home and left his robotic body he did normal dog stuff, such as scratching and running around.

He enjoys being a comedian and being the center of attention. His morning daily briefing and work dispatch always includes a bit of comedic routine and a few stand up jokes. But he’s not self-centered, and has proven he was willing to sacrifice himself for random civilians when facing an horrible alien monster.

Quotes

“Dogs don’t make judgements like that. You seem to be a good person.”

Dust Devil (protesting a lousy assignment): “Heck, why don’t you just cut off our manhoods now and be done with it ?”
Kemlo: “Because I’ve taken a vow never to hurt anything smaller than I am, Duane.”

DC Universe History

DC’s closest equivalent to Neopolis might be Superbia, the high-tech city built by the Ultramarines and hovering high above the ruins of Monte Video. The opening of relations with other realities might explain why things have been very quiet there.

There’s prolly a source of uplifted animals in the DCU, but none come to mind ATM.

By Sébastien Andrivet.

Source of Character: Top Ten series by Alan Moore.

Helper(s): Roy Cowan, Max Maloney.