Heroes Are Made #8: Mind Over Matter
I came up with this next character while I was at work, pushing a line of (probably too many) shopping carts with one hand. At the time, there was a Psychics contest brewing over at Heromachine.
Traditionally, psychic power is stuff like telekinesis, mind-reading, fortune-telling, pyrokinesis, and other powers that specifically have to do with mental ability. So I thought it was a novel concept to have a psychic who could manifest his power physically.
I put sufficient psychic energy (so to speak) into creating, shading, and otherwise realizing this character that he qualified for the Psychics contest polls that week. Meet Strong-Arm:
Name: Strong-Arm
Alias: Terrence Armstrong
Team Affiliations: Sixth Street Sinners, The Enforcers, Clockwork (reserve member)
Race: Human
Birthplace: London, England
Powers: Mentally enhanced strength, bulletproof astral arm.
Bio: Terrence Armstrong was always powerful for his age. As a boy, he once tipped a car that had fallen on his father, who had been working on it at the time. As a mixed-race child, Terry was already a target for his less tolerant peers. But it got worse when kids at school heard about his father's accident and what Terry had done to save him. They called him a freak, often attacking and beating him even though they knew not to mess with a ten-year-old who could lift a car. Young Terry endured the name-calling and abuse for several months, hoping that, like all children, their focus would switch to some other target.
But when his father passed away from complications stemming from the accident, the stress and pain grew too much for him. That day, Terry ran away from home, eventually winding up in a bad part of town, where the local gang hid him from police and the foster system.
Terry would grow up to be an enforcer for the Sixth Street Sinners, the gang that had since become his family, taking the nickname Strong-Arm because of his ability to channel his mental energy into superhuman physical strength. As his powers grew, he discovered he could manifest his psychic strength as a giant arm that he could use to lift anything, or even increase the density of the astral arm to the point that it became bulletproof.
One day, Terrence was sent to intimidate a bookmaker who owed the Sinners a large sum of money. As he was about to beat some sense into the man, a little boy walked in on them. It was the bookie’s son, and the sight of him stopped Terrence in his tracks. Having been beaten as a child, Terrence recognized a look on the boy’s face that he had felt on his own face during those long ago beatings.
With that encounter, Terrence decided to turn over a new leaf, and made it his personal mission to stand up against organized crime, starting with the Sixth Street Sinners.
In his career, Strong-Arm’s former gang affiliation and his extreme crime-fighting methods have brought him toe-to-toe with Sextant on many occasions, usually ending with the pair teaming up against some greater common enemy.
Traditionally, psychic power is stuff like telekinesis, mind-reading, fortune-telling, pyrokinesis, and other powers that specifically have to do with mental ability. So I thought it was a novel concept to have a psychic who could manifest his power physically.
I put sufficient psychic energy (so to speak) into creating, shading, and otherwise realizing this character that he qualified for the Psychics contest polls that week. Meet Strong-Arm:
Alias: Terrence Armstrong
Team Affiliations: Sixth Street Sinners, The Enforcers, Clockwork (reserve member)
Race: Human
Birthplace: London, England
Powers: Mentally enhanced strength, bulletproof astral arm.
Bio: Terrence Armstrong was always powerful for his age. As a boy, he once tipped a car that had fallen on his father, who had been working on it at the time. As a mixed-race child, Terry was already a target for his less tolerant peers. But it got worse when kids at school heard about his father's accident and what Terry had done to save him. They called him a freak, often attacking and beating him even though they knew not to mess with a ten-year-old who could lift a car. Young Terry endured the name-calling and abuse for several months, hoping that, like all children, their focus would switch to some other target.
But when his father passed away from complications stemming from the accident, the stress and pain grew too much for him. That day, Terry ran away from home, eventually winding up in a bad part of town, where the local gang hid him from police and the foster system.
Terry would grow up to be an enforcer for the Sixth Street Sinners, the gang that had since become his family, taking the nickname Strong-Arm because of his ability to channel his mental energy into superhuman physical strength. As his powers grew, he discovered he could manifest his psychic strength as a giant arm that he could use to lift anything, or even increase the density of the astral arm to the point that it became bulletproof.
One day, Terrence was sent to intimidate a bookmaker who owed the Sinners a large sum of money. As he was about to beat some sense into the man, a little boy walked in on them. It was the bookie’s son, and the sight of him stopped Terrence in his tracks. Having been beaten as a child, Terrence recognized a look on the boy’s face that he had felt on his own face during those long ago beatings.
With that encounter, Terrence decided to turn over a new leaf, and made it his personal mission to stand up against organized crime, starting with the Sixth Street Sinners.
In his career, Strong-Arm’s former gang affiliation and his extreme crime-fighting methods have brought him toe-to-toe with Sextant on many occasions, usually ending with the pair teaming up against some greater common enemy.
My birthday's coming up soon, so I hope to have a review of Amazing Spider-Man 2 that's Just the Ticket for you, I'll show you why working on the day I turn thirty makes me a candidate for Employee Of the Month in a new Ticket Stubs, and I encourage you to stay tuned for more heroes from my head, supers from my skull, and capes from my cranium. THWIPP! SNIKT! KLUDD! and goodnight, you OnomatoPOWians!
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