Mary – Don’t call her crazy to her face. Several years ago Mary was a professional soldier who volunteered for an upgrade program dubbed “Project Dragonfly”. The project upgraded the subjects with enhanced strength, speed and combat ability.
It didn’t go well for Mary.
Shortly after the upgrades Mary started seeing things… insane things. A world of melting walls and living fire, vortexes of thought and colored radio waves, sentient metaphors and beings that existed in an invisible layer of reality. She could communicate with these beings. She made deals with some of them.
Or she had simply gone insane.
Either way she was useless to the project and the military so she was cut loose and vanished shortly thereafter.
A few years later she re-emerged in the New York area of Megalopolis as a “freelancer” specializing in bounty hunting and search and rescue. Her upgrades give her an advantage in competing against other freelancers, Lawcom and her targets… most of the time. She can still see the weird layer of reality and her trinity of supernatural advisors helps … most of the time.
Or she could just be crazy and very lucky.
Or a bit of both.
Glimmer – An aspiring magician Glimmer lived a life full of illusion; he performed them for audiences, could create them with the holographic projector upgrades, and he secretly desired to be a freelancer –living a life of adventure, action and flip one-liners. But that illusion, cultivated by a childhood of action movies and comic scans eluded him.
Until he met Mary. He helped her in a job, saving her life and rescuing a roomful of hostages. For some crazy reason she offered him a gig as her assistant. For some crazy reason he took it.
Now, as her protégé, he hunts criminals and terrorists. He’s fought for his life, saved lives and occasionally gets the girl too. He’s gotten to live that life of action and heroism he always dreamed of.
It’s shattered every illusion he’s ever had.
Tweek – Mary’s tech support and resident “data stud” (as he calls himself), Tweek lives on the fringe of the city and deep inside an alternate world himself. Constantly linked to the data sea and immersed in hacker culture, Tweek’s grasp of reality is loose at best.
It doesn’t help that he is also a heavy user of the designer drug “Sync” which allows him to imprint any stimulus he is experiencing while on it; Narco-rap, Raymond Chandler novels, cooking shows. He changes personalities like a couch potato changes channels. It tends to make him a bit erratic face to face but when he’s behind the holo-board it gives him a focus that’s made him one of the best hackers in the world. And many enemies that he’s not really aware of.
Richtor O’Dell – Another “Freelancer”, Richtor O’Dell is a competitor, ally, and occasional lover of Mary’s. He often intersects with Mary either by accident or design and they make quite a good team… when they’re not getting in each other’s way. He claims to not have upgrades and any tech scan that’s been done to him confirms this—but he’s too quick/strong/ good to just be a regular. He tracks his targets with a predator’s grace and focus. He is a deft fighter with his katana, guns and martial arts. Richtor has a taste for irony and being a wise-ass, broadcasting both with glib remarks during fights and his selection of t-shirts. Richtor is also connected to many underground groups with varying agendas, most of them having a strong anarchist or chaotic philosophy. He leaves next to no virtual footprint, practically impossible in this age, and seems to know more about Mary than he’s letting on. Mary’s trinity apparently give him a pass… well they haven’t given him a thumbs down but they haven’t really approved either.
A wildcard in the game; Richtor is many things, possibly even trustworthy.
Roswell, Loki and Hoax – Mary’s trinity of supernatural advisors, they appear together or separately depending on the situation and which aspect of Mary wants to deal with them. Roswell – A proper English gentleman straight out of a Magritte painting, he talks the most. He appears when the rational side of Mary needs strength and guidance. Loki – A small green imp with sharp teeth and a demented sense of humor. Random and desperate acts produce surprising dividends when he shows up. Hoax – A mousy girl in a black-and-white striped dress who never speaks. She usually points Mary out of danger and leaves nothing but death in her wake.
Those who know about the trinity each have different theory – Aliens, Ultra-terrestrials, the figments of a traumatized mind…
Sometimes even Mary isn’t sure.
