Kari Zel

> **"'***The Oracles told us that our purpose in life was serving Demeter’s will. But the Old Man taught me something different... that the value of one’s life is determined by how many people you help.***"** Kari Zel, Beyond The Impossible #111
>
>

## Physical description

### Eye color

Blue

Kari Zel (*ˈkɑri* ˈzɛlIPA , Καρι Ζελ in Myridian) is the first extraterrestrial member of the Vanguard. A survivor of the Demeter tyrannical rule over her planet Myridia and a thrill-seeker at heart, Kari uses her power to create thousands of duplicates of herself to help her team and explore Earth's culture.

## Biography

Born on planet Myridia under the tyrannical rule of the Oracles, worshippers of the goddess Demeter, Kari was orphaned when she was just five years old. Rescued and raised by Old Man Vor, she lived most of her life on the run from the theocracy.  A skilled martial artist and a survivor at hearth, her Myridian heritage gives her the power to create thousands of duplicates of herself.
After Noriko's fight with Demeter she joined the Vanguard and embraced her new life on Earth, one of the many, many, many lives she has at once.

## Powers

Myridian bodies have been enhanced from baseline human, thanks to genetic engineering.  Kari's duplication powers come from the Drylon artifact called the Monolith, deep under the surface of Myridia. Anyone born on Myridia shares the same powers.

**Myridian physiology:** Kari's strenght, durability, stamina and reflexes are about three times those of a woman her age in peak physical condition.

**Fast learning:** Like all Myridians, Kari is naturally adept at gathering information from her various bodies and integrating them. She's able to learn a foreign language in a few months and has mastered several martial arts, both from Myridia and Earth

**Body duplication:** Kari can create exact duplicates of her body with almost no mental effort. Each duplicate is a perfect copy of her body at the moment of the duplication; it will then be completely separate and independent from her. Each duplicate can create new duplicates, without permission from the original Kari.

**Duplicate disintegration:** Duplicates will disintegrate if subject to enough force to cause an injury; the duplicate will feel pain before disappearing, but it will not be shared by other duplicates. By minimal mental effort, Kari can make her duplicates disappear at will. She doesn’t need physical contact to do so. Duplicates can self-disintegrate at will, without permission from the original Kari.

**Duplicate integration:** By re-absorbing duplicates into her body, Kari instantly learns all the knowledge and experience gathered by the duplicate. She needs physical contact in order to re-absorb a duplicate.

**Clothes duplication:** Kari can only duplicate her own body and cannot duplicate any object she’s carrying. Only specifically tailored Myridian clothes can be duplicated.

**Neural Transmitter:** Designed by Noriko Null, a small device implanted in her skull that lets Kari receive and transmit her thoughts via radio waves to the rest of the Vanguard

**Battle Bracelets:** Designed by Noriko Null, they access Kari's duplication powers and allow her to recreate specially designed weapons, at the cost of reducing the number of duplicates she can create.

**Shotgun Bracelets:** Designed by Noriko Null, they greatly increase the kinetic energy of the user's punches

## Weaknesses

**Limited duplicates:** The maximum limit of duplicates that can exist at the same time is 10.000; it doesn’t make any difference if the duplicates are created by Kari or by another duplicate. Attempting to generate more duplicates after the limit has been reached causes her to collapse from exhaustion.

**Limited duplicate durability:** Duplicates disintegrate after receiving enough force to cause an injury.

**Original body:** The true Kari is vital to the existance of the duplicates: if she's killed, they disappear. The original body is still mortal; anything that would kill a human would be fatal.

**Agony Ring:** Kari's powers can be disabled by a torture device called the Agony Ring, which prevents her from creating any more duplicates and provides agonizing pain if she tries

**Recklessness:** Kari's duplicates know their lives can be expendable and may jump into trouble thinking they're safe because they've first made another backup duplicate

## Trivia

* Together with Quantum, Kari is the only other member of the Vanguard with a secret identity. Her rarely-used public identity is Legion, and when operating on Earth she covers her face with the helmet of a Myridian armor
* While her original body usually lives in New York, she has hundreds of duplicates all over the world and on other planets
* Like most Myridians, Kari is openly bisexual and very blunt about it, much to Noriko's annoyance
* Not counting gods, Kari has lost in hand-to-hand combat only with the Mist.
* She has asked most of the regular cast to have sex with her, with only Quantum accepting. She only neglected to ask Bob Null, on Noriko's request.
* "Zel" is her mother's last name, since Myridian families are matrilinear

## Defining episodes

* Beyond The Impossible #22, "Seeing double": meets Quantum and Vesta
* Beyond The Impossible #32, "The day of the godless lightning": final confrontation with Demeter
* Beyond The Impossible #35, "Fighting space gods doesn’t pay the bills": arrives on Earth
* Beyond The Impossible #98, "Hope and fear": fights Abyss
* Beyond The Impossible #113, "Home again": returns to Myridia
* Beyond The Impossible #118, "House call": fights the Mist
* Beyond The Impossible #170, "Nailed it": final confrontation with Talas Khanos
* Beyond The Impossible #231, "You are cordially invited": marries Kiros

## References

1. ↑ Beyond The Impossible #156
2. ↑ Beyond The Impossible #78
3. ↑ Beyond The Impossible #50
4. ↑ Beyond The Impossible #125
5. ↑ Beyond The Impossible #233
6. ↑ Beyond The Impossible #44