Morbius

Morbius (Scenesys ID: 7055)
Quote
"Gaze your fill, human...Morbius the Living Vampire(tm) will be the last sight your miserable eyes behold!"
Profile
Full Name:	Michael Morbius
Gender:	Male
Species:	Metahuman
Theme:	Marvel (VFC)
Occupation:	Nobel Prize-Winning Biochemist
Citizenship:	Greek / United States of America (Dual Citizenship)
Residence:	Anywhere DArk
Education:	Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Status:	Dropped
Groups:	Hench, Midnight Sons, Street Level-OOC
Other Information
Apparent Age:	56	Actual Age:	56
Date of Birth	15 October 1970	Actor:	Peter Steele
Height:	177.8 cm	Weight:	77 kg
Hair Color:	Black	Eye Color:	Red
Theme Song:	"Suspended in Dusk" by Type O Negative

Profile

Michael Morbius used to be on top of the world. From humble origins, Michael quickly showed himself to be a child prodigy. When he eventually became a biochemist after MIT, he in fact became a minor celebrity, and controversial goth icon. (Imagine winning a Nobel Prize and becoming a face on shirts sold at Hot Topic, all at the age of 25. Imagine what that would do to your ego...and your bank account.)

But what comes up, must come down. A blood condition led to fear. Fear led to desperation. And desperation led to risky science, that of course, turned him into...this. A monster. A freak. Now he is Morbius...the living Vampire! And now, he must...feed.

Sheet

Description

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Recognizable, yet alien. Living, yet dead. Morbius stands here, his neck craned downward, his black uniform clinging to his skinny, chalk-white form. His hair is long and black, usually coming down to the bottom of his neck and most often hanging in his face, when it's not tucked behind his pointed ears. Along his chin is a soul patch that leads to a goatee leading down, and that appears to be it for his facial hair. His face is ghoulish and warped, the cheekbones impossibly big, the cheeks gaunt and frail looking, and his nose is short and pulled upward, resembling a bat's ugly pug-like face. His blood-red eyes possess only the tiniest dots for pupils, and his thin eyebrows are perpetually arched downward in anger or melancholy.

His costume is skin-tight and a shade of bluish black that's a bit lighter than his hair, though with red interior on the tall collar. Honestly, it looks like a strange mix between 'Dracula' and 'Elvis Presley', though only the barest of hints from each. Hanging from the arm of the sleeves are a pair of bat-like wings, the same shade of red as his collar, and matching the red sash/belt around his waist. Another note about those sleeves, is they end a few inches past the elbow, and lead to a pair of slender chalk-white arms, soft wrists and hands that look like they weren't used for very much hard work. As lovely as the hands are, however, the effect is somewhat ruined by his nails, which seem to have come forward in a pair of absolutely lethal looking, jet-black claws. They glisten in the light, and look about as dangerous as a big cat's claws might be.

The skin-tight costume continues all the way down as leggings that are just as tight as the top. These go all the way down, into a pair of stiff, black leather boots, glossy and a more 'pure' shade of black than his suit. These boots are fastened by a large number of tight belts and silver buckles, laced up tight. They appear to be platforms, which add a few inches to his overall height.

History

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For Michael, science was a way to escape a horrible world. Born in Greece to a single mother and living in an appalling level of poverty, life was not easy for the intensely serious young man. Smaller than most bullies, and blamed for defending himself for the few weaker ones, Michael's one option was to wall himself off from the world, hardening his heart at an early age and focusing purely on his school work.

By the time he got into MIT, he'd already gained a reputation for being somewhat of a wunderkind when it came to blood. He was so recognized for his brilliance that while still in school he did the absolute impossible, and actually won a Nobel Prize for his work. Already a hotshot around campus and already a popular new sight around various gothic-themed night clubs, this boosted his ego to astronomical heights. Of course he signed the deals that were waved in front of his face, becoming the new face of Raybans sunglasses for a week before it was discovered he couldn't act to save his life, and that didn't stop him from getting his face put on t-shirts that were sold at Hot Topic for much more than they were worth. It was controversial, his cashing in like this, but he still remembered growing up with nothing and being looked down on by the world. As far as he was concerned he was still owed by that same world.

And as if to prove him right? The world took from him some more. He discovered that in an ironic twist, his own blood was tainted, something genetic from his father meant he did not have long for this world. Death and the thought of it was something he couldn't accept, looking in the mirror and seeing his own rockstar good looks fading, it lead to an act of desperation on his part. A theoretical treatment plan that involved the use of a vampire bat's blood, something he and his colleagues had deemed 'too risky' back when he was happy(supposedly) and healthy. Well now the situation was different, now he felt his back against the wall, and felt the fire beneath his feet. The exact details of the procedure have been lost to time, but when he was finished, he felt...normal, like nothing had changed.

He went to bed disappointed, but soon he'd learn there were worse things to be than disappointed. His body changed, morphed, turned into something terrible. His mind, already dealing with the recent stress of his mortality, soon snapped as he realized he had become something less than human, something more akin to the freaks that come into hospitals and medical universities for study every so often, Morbius was now one of those as far as he could tell.

He soon vanished off the face of the earth for many years, and nobody's been noticing the occasional missing homeless or runaway. But soon, the world is going to notice Michael's return in a big way, one way or another...

Personality

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Morbius is a creature of hardship, and if you don't believe that just ask him. Just make sure you have plenty of time to listen to him go on and on.

He's a brilliant man, he still is even after the accident. He's also very serious, and very involved with himself. He is the sort of person who would have a picture of himself on a wall somewhere.

And deep down, Morbius is a coward. He makes no attempts to self reflect, he has no interest in what he might see. He does not ever want to take responsibility, does not ever want to shoulder any part of a burden. If this were a hundred years ago and if he were a younger lad, he would be wrestling his shadow and watching Wendy grow old in a window.

Except, unlike Peter, Morbius will never beat his shadow.

Abilities

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BLOOD IS THE LIFE
Morbius is somewhere between living and dead, or so he's convinced himself. Normal food tastes foul, and his stomach usually rejects it if he tries to consume any. Sometimes, the rejection is violent, much like his rejection of his own responsibility.

Fortunately for the Living Vampire, he has alternate solutions for sustaining himself and gaining nutrients. The first method is the most direct, and that's blood. Much like his namesake, he is capable of drinking blood and this tends to supercharge his body, filling his own veins after bleeding through the membrane of his stomach, and generally acts like a stimulant and antidepressant to a limited extent. When feeding in this manner, he usually only needs to drink some of their blood. There's no set scientific amount, but in general once he drinks as much as a bloodbank would take, he will be sated for one or two nights. If he wants he could drink far more than that, but his body will only accept so much plasma before he rejects it and it becomes a waste.

He has another method of feeding, a bit less messy than drawing and drinking blood. By placing both palms across the flesh of an opponent and staring directly into their eyes(or otherwise making a mental connection to them through speech or some other method), Morbius can link himself to a victim psychically and feed off of their very "life force", in a way that nourishes him much the same way that blood does. The drug-like 'rush' he feels is much stronger and it boosts his related vampiric powers faster, but it also fades quicker than physical blood. This method is also more involved than just using his fangs, so sometimes in an emergency situation it just isn't viable. It also isn't likely to work on someone with an iron will, unless it does in a specific situation for plot reasons. Feeding in this method does not take as long and fills him up faster than physical blood, but it only lasts twenty four hours at the most, and usually only lasts about twelve hours or so. After being 'fed' on in this manner, a victim may respond any number of ways. A mentally strong or especially willful person might suffer something akin to 'Monday morning blues', finding themselves melancholy for a few hours before bouncing back. An especially fragile or weak victim(Or someone who is especially superstitious or especially frightened of vampires or some similar phobia) might find themselves in a sudden bout of severe depression, or may find themselves suffering repeat nightmares of the experience. And hypothetically, if Morbius repeatedly attacked someone in this manner, they might even die. It would have to be weeks or months of continuous attacks, but it is technically possible.

BLOODSIGHT
Morbius can choose to see people's heat signatures, and can even see these signatures through walls that are at least several inches thick. He can only see these in about a thirty foot radius, but it gives him an edge when it comes to detecting possible prey.

NATURAL WEAPONS
Morbius has a pair of ultra-sharp incisors, that at will can extend and grow into monstrous lion-sized fangs, and the rest of his teeth sort of follow suit. Additionally, when in this form he can extend his mouth and open his jaw freakishly wide, allowing him to clamp down and bite nearly anything reasonable. His fangs and teeth in this mode are strong enough to puncture bone, and his bite force is strong enough to shatter it, should he so wish.

Additionally his already impressive claws can grow to about nine inches in length, and themselves are sharp enough to shred flesh and meat to ribbons in seconds. They can even tear through tougher materials, like cloth and most soft leathers.

PSEUDO-VAMPIRISM
Though he became what he is via science rather than via vampirism, he has a few things in common with his namesake. Through a combination of his transformed mutated body and latent psionic ability that he's never understood, Morbius has the following gifts:

• Superhuman Strength: Depending on how much blood or life force Morbius has ingested or absorbed, Morbius usually has incredible strength. At his strongest, he can lift up to 1,500 lbs.
• Superhuman Speed: Morbius could outrun Usain Bolt in his prime, and could easily keep pace with a cheetah if he were so inclined.
• Superhuman Stamina: Morbius rarely gets tired, he could run or jump or fight all day if he wanted to, without so much as breaking a sweat. He can keep this up for about seven hours or so, until having to take a short rest. Or, he could feed off someone and be good as new. He's got options.
• Superhuman Agility/Balance/Reflexes: Morbius never loses his equilibrium anymore. He could do yoga or acrobatics on top of a speeding car and never fall over. And he always lands on his feet, unless he doesn't want to. And he doesn't exactly have a 'Spidey Sense', but he can easily deflect or get out of the way of many different sorts of attacks.
• Superhuman Senses: Morbius can see in the dark with perfect clarity, and can smell blood and an open wound from at least forty miles away. What's more, he can even differentiate between different blood trails.

It should be noted that all of these descriptions are set at their 'maximum' potential, but Morbius could possibly be weaker at any given moment. Generally if he wants to have all of these capabilities, he needs to feed off of either life force, or directly ingest the blood of living creatures. These feeding methods are mentioned in greater detail in 'The Blood Is The Life'. Please turn this tape over.

PSIONIC FLIGHT
Tapping into latent psionic energies, Morbius is able to defy the laws of gravity itself, and take to the air in flight. He can only go at about 35 miles per hour, so it's certainly not as fast an option as running along the ground. But verticality and air superiority are huge advantages all the same. Not to mention, he can slow his descent when falling, any time he wants. Which means no matter how high up he is, if he wants to get down all he needs to do is jump.

PSIONIC-GAZE
By tapping into his latent psionic abilities, Morbius can stare into the eyes of a weak-willed person or creature, and dominate their minds through a series of hypnotic bombardment. The effect lasts a number of hours, during which Morbius can feed to his contentment without interruption. Using this ability makes his psychic feeding even stronger and more potent, and is what lets it last at least 24 hours. He can also feed the 'old fashioned way' which will snap them out of the hypnosis, but by then it's usually too late. He can also give people extremely limited commands, though the emphasis is on 'limited'. Someone under this control could open a door handle, hand over an object or answer very simple yes or no questions, but anything that requires complex thought(like hacking a computer or remembering a password) will be beyond them.

Morbius can only use this ability on one person at a time, and for it to work he needs to look someone directly in the eyes. A photograph or video feed of his eyes won't cut it, they need to both be in the physical space, although it will work through panes of glass or other clear, physical barriers. In theory it might even work through something like a one-way mirror, but Morbius would need to be aware that the person is there. This is something he intentionally has to try to do, so no accidental hypnotisms here.

It should be noted, that people of stronger wills can fight against this ability, and a big enough shock to the mind will usually snap the victim out of it anyway.

(And obviously, this is a consent-based ability. This isn't happening unless we as players think it would make for a great story, or a great complication in a person's life.)

REGENERATION
Morbius can recover from injuries rather rapidly. Gunshots and other 'serious' damage he'll recuperate from in an hour(or minutes if nothing too vital is hit), whereas serious, organ-disrupting massive injuries might take a number of days or weeks for him to fully recuperate from. Of course, if he can feed from life force of some sort, then he can heal from even this sort of damage in minutes.

Curious note regarding his regeneration, he's discovered that he can regrow broken fangs and claws, but cannot regrow things such as fingers or arms, or eyes. He can however reattach them. And most useful, is there's no time limit on when he can do this. Even if a body part of his was shriveled and useless, the application of enough blood on the wound or in the part in question causes it to regrow to the point where it is good as new. Even though he normally has no use for bone marrow, it's proven to be extremely useful in this regard, his body responds to the stuff powerfully.

UPSIDE DOWN

Morbius does not get dizzy from being upside down, or from spinning or twirling in the air.

Skills

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CUTTING EDGE TECH
Morbius was a scientist before going into hiding, and he's kept himself up to date in terms of computers and other forms of technology. He's not exactly a master hacker, but he understands code and programming well enough to be fluent. Yes, he could build you a website. No, he is not going to.

Stop asking.

LANGUAGES
Morbius speaks English, Greek, Spanish, multiple forms of code, German and Portuguese

LIKE A SURGEON
While it wasn't his specific area of expertise, Morbius had all the potential to be a great surgeon, and almost went into that field before deciding on hematology. As it is, since becoming a creature of the night, he's gotten tons of practice as a surgeon since then. Whether with a knife or scalpel, or whether with his own fangs and claws, Morbius knows which areas are the 'worst' to cut(and thus the best areas in a fight).

OPPORTUNISTIC
Morbius is not any kind of martial artist, but since becoming a creature of the night, he has had to defend himself. He can brawl and fight like any good wild animal, but even with his strength and superpowers, he'd be no match for a dedicated vigilante or crime-fighter under normal conditions.

But Morbius is crafty and tricky, able to see any opportunity to escape, or blindside an opponent who would normally have the better of him. And once he has the edge, his dark unholy gifts are dangerous weapons to deal with, indeed.

SNEAKY
Morbius is a predator, but he's just as much a scavenger. There are things in this world that are bigger and stronger than him, and there are situations where he might not want to reveal himself right away. In these situations, he is highly adept at sticking to the shadows, at moving without making any noise(and yes, he can even sneak in the sort of platform shoes he prefers wearing). He can be perfectly still and unnoticed until he wishes to strike or leave.

WEIRD SCIENCE

Biochemistry is defined as "the branch of science concerned with the chemical and physicochemical processes that occur within living organisms.". Morbius, when he was practicing, was the absolute best in this field, bar none. He was so good that he won a Nobel prize, and still, even all these years later, there's yet to be anyone as distinguished as him in this field. Morbius' specialty was in hematology, but he has an incredible grasp of so many fields of science that it's a wonder he could just pick one profession.

Resources

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BLOOD BANK
Within his lair, he keeps a few fridges hooked up and connected, and keeps them filled with emergency plasma that he steals from local hospitals if he needs any in a hurry. He would prefer direct life force, or at least hot pumping blood from a living person if push came to shove, but if it's an emergency...

He also has the necessary materials to drain blood from someone, if he for some reason wanted to bring them to his lair and strap them down for the extraction process. He likely won't have the time to do this, but hey just in case.

DISENFRANCHISED
Morbius has always had a way to speaking to those certain few who are fed up with society. Now that he is a full on criminal who needs to do crime in order to live or exist, his followers tend to be fellow criminals, those who are willing to put on masks and break stuff in order to do his bidding. He doesn't typically work with others, but if he needs to do larger heists, he does have access to very low level, low-trained thugs. The extent of their usefulness may be swinging a tire iron or breaking store windows, but that may be all he needs.

LIMITED FUNDS
As a self funded villain, he does not have access to very much. But he did save quite a bit of his old Hot Topic money, and has been wise enough in his spending to have a bit of currency to work with. He's able to purchase clothes or ski masks or whatever he might need for a job. And though he himself has no understanding or training in firearms, he knows where to purchase them on the underground market, if he truly felt he needed them.

UNDERGROUND LAIR

Underneath the old subway systems between Gotham and New York, Morbius has set up a little lair for himself where he can sleep, change clothes and angst about his own damnation at his leisure. He's even set up a miniature lab where he can do limited amounts of science should he wish it, though he needs to steal from larger places, if he wishes to do larger science.

Weaknesses

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AVOID THE LIGHT
In 'Psychosomatic' it was detailed how in a certain emotional and mental state, Morbius might actually take damage from direct sunlight, but even if he were in a 'healthy' place, sun and extremely bright UV light wouldn't be too great for him anyway. For his sensitive eyes such light is blinding and painful, and the heat across his flesh will give him extreme sunburn that look more like burns if he does not find a source of darkness. These burns will fade after feeding or just enough time spent in the shadows.

BLOODSTARVED
If starved of blood and life energy, Morbius becomes weak, sickly, and at his most dangerous and desperate. In this state, all of his other 'vampiric' abilities are muted except for a little bit of strength and his claws and fangs, and his own intellect and reason become clouded and murky until he can clear that fog. In this state he also might not have the patience to drain a person's life energy, and will most likely resort to attacking someone physically, or taking advantage of a freshly dead body if one is made available to him. At his most desperate he may even resort to feeding on rats, pigeons, and small pets. This blood is barely nutritious and is revolting, but it will keep him from starving to death.

On the topic of death...it's actually unknown if he would die if deprived of blood. He is still a living creature, so possibly he might? Presumably he would fall into some sort of pseudo-diabetic coma first. Which would be bad for him.

COWARDLY
Morbius does not want to die, or go to jail, or have any of that nonsense happen. If he feels overwhelmed by a situation he will attempt to flee or run.

PSYCHOSOMATIC
Morbius is not a vampire. Morbius is not a vampire. Morbius...is not a vampire.

We can repeat it all we want, and somewhere on an intellectual level, Morbius understands that he is not strictly speaking a vampire, that he is something created by science. But his own ego and his own psychic impression of himself means that he can be affected by the weaknesses of a vampire, if he is in a low or dark enough emotional state. Essentially, his penchant for melancholy and bouts of deep depression are especially dangerous given his unknown psionic powers are what turned him into this vampiric creature, his belief in himself as a creature of the night causes him to suffer as one if he doesn't snap out of it and realize there is no scientific basis to this.

If he doesn't snap out of it, he can find himself unable to cross running water or unable to enter homes unless invited. He is sometimes unable to see his own reflection, subconsciously ignoring it as if he were invisible, and if he is deep enough in the delusion, he can be burned by silver and holy water, and find himself burning in direct sunlight as if it could kill him. And, perhaps if he is in this deep unhealthy state? Perhaps it could! He can even be staked, where he will fall into a catatonic state and subconsciously block his own regeneration unless the stake is removed by someone else...or unless he can wake up from the placebo world he has built for himself.

WHAT ABOUT ME?

Morbius is an inherently selfish person, taking from others with no intent of ever giving back. To him, this has all been the 24/7 Morbius Show, and he has no intent of giving writing or directing credit to anyone else. He has no intention of ever taking responsibility for anything he does, never has any interest in apologizing. He's only ever the one that should be apologized to, at least if you were to ask him.

Logs

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Title	Date	Scene Summary
A Morbid Welcome	April 1st, 2019	Morbius is brought under the employ of LexCorp; unofficially.
Put through the paces	March 24th, 2019	Morbius is put through a number of carefully planned tests to profile him, and is subdued by Deadshot and Lex after he tries to fight back.
Peacekeepers: Final Testing	March 21st, 2019	Project Peacekeeper is put up against serious competition in final testing. Lex finds a number of design issues to iron out.

Cutscenes

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Gallery

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