Annabeth Black's abilities

Annabeth Black was an extremely powerful and dangerous young mutant. She was a mistress of the Darkness, an incredibly skillful duelist, and a prodigious Shielder and Mind invader. Annabeth was considered a *"borderline genius"* and her prodigious dueling skill was proven by her many victories over numerous talented individuals, including legendary superhero Baby Intelligence.

## Fencing

Annabeth Black's fencing skills were formidable. She mastered the third form of sword combat, Soresu, and had some skill in Form V. Black was also a practitioner of dual combat. Because she was not skilled in unarmed combat, Black preferred to use her powers, which were deadly, whenever possible.

## Powers

Annabeth Black was an extremely powerful Dark mutant, and displayed particular proficiency with stealth and casting lightning. Trained as a NoHead, Annabeth's lifestyle encouraged her to focus more on her intellect than her strength. She was noted to be a *"borderline genius"*; her intelligence and ideas of strategy and tactics were considerable. She had particular proficiency in espionage, often donning a cloak for the job. This allowed her to initiate Ken's death and discover a breaking point to poison the waterhole of Philadelphia without being caught. However, her fighting skills were still considerable in their adequacy.

Like her master, Annabeth could cast Death beams in quick succession without any regard for the lives she chose to extinguish. During the Battle of the Fifth NoHead Base, she effortlessly hit a Roman soldier with a Death beam, also showing she had quick reaction time. She also survived an encounter with Frank and several other police when in Pennsylvania and emerged unscathed (apart from brief influence from brain worms) during the Battle of California, being the only NoHead Recruit to not take any hits.

In addition to her combat skills, Annabeth was very skilled in stealth and infiltration which she learned from Cassidy. Annabeth could also turn invisible, something that was difficult to master and was even impossible for certain NoHead Masters. Black was also proficient in telekinesis, which she used to great effect, even when she was younger. She used this tactic to bring down Ronald Noace in Kansas, ripping apart the wooden platforms in their battleground and flinging waves of debris at the officer from all sides. She was also skilled at piloting, as she was able to patrol Pennsylvania without a trace.

As a quarter-Klemm, Annabeth Black had the unnerving ability to attract men with her beauty. Although her ability was not as strong as that of a full Klemm, she was still able to make herself ravishing enough to completely overwhelm unsuspecting individuals if she wanted to. She was also known to use her beauty and her dark powers to seduce people into giving information. Her greater enemies aside, Black was considered charming by most people who met her, and was able to inspire others to follow her, including the Lord of the North, which is no small feat considering the Prime Minister initially had no loyalty to anyone.

Black's unerring ability to conceal her own thoughts and feelings from external penetration proved to be useful to her. Annabeth was also a skilled mind reader; Baby Intelligence was able to do nothing to stop her probing him. With the fact that he was strong enough to resist being probed by Mr. Stupid NoHead, and had an Intelligence Quotient of 295, this is no mean feat. Likewise, Bartholomew Gales often felt as if Annabeth had the ability to read minds even before learning what the art was. Annabeth probed Bartholomew constantly while attempting to teach him to block out his mind in their private lessons. Annabeth also possessed the ability to see her friends when they were near, even if they were not in her physical sight. She used this to learn that Darren Slade had gone to Baby Intelligence for help, and he is preparing to become an insurgent. Annabeth quickly realized that Darren had defected from the NoHead cause, which made her upset.

## Other abilities

Annabeth was also skilled at playing the board game Monopoly, coming out ahead in several matches with Alice Shinner.

## Weaknesses

Although she was a very intelligent woman, Black could be easily distracted. She also seemed to fall short when it came to unarmed fighting, as she was somewhat wimpy as a result of physical inactivity.