John Abel

John Abel is a grouchy guy who is much older than he looks.

## Biography

Subject 1-Beta, ARGUS file

July 28th 1990: Erik Strauss breaches containment of Fort Tartarus through unknown means. Strauss reaches the village of Yellow Creek near Fort Tartarus before absence is noted by Dr. Evans. Within a 17 hour period Strauss engages in sexual intercourse with Elizabeth Abel, unbeknownst to handlers attempting recovery.

April 9th 1991: Elizabeth Abel gives birth to John Abel in Robbinsville, North Carolina.

December 4th 1994: FOA investigators uncover circumstances of July 28th 1990, possibility of Strauss siring child is unlikely, investigation continues. Strauss is not informed of possibility.

September 13th 1996: Elizabeth Abel’s location is finally ascertained by FOA investigators, locating her in the outskirts of Bryson City, North Carolina squatting in rundown home. Mission is approved within 27 minutes of request, ARGUS operators eliminate Elizabeth Abel, Child is never found. 22% of DNA samples from home are matched with Strauss’s DNA, Child’s samples contain high level of Ichor concentration.

Tennessee Department of Child Services, Case File 753482

February 19th 2000: Chattanooga Police Sergeant Anthony Balkiros discovers lone child in Chattanooga alley, child identifies himself as John and willingly enters Sgt. Balkiros’s vehicle. Questioning reveals John to be an Orphan, John does not disclose how he became Orphaned. John is entered into Alfred Goodell’s home for troubled youth.

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[10:36 PM]

June 21st 2002: John Abel is placed into the foster care of Frederick and Layla Mariano, joining their fellow foster children siblings Percy and Peyton O’Cabe.

October 11th 2005: Chattanooga City Police temporarily detain John Abel for the assault of fellow student Darrel Connors at Howard Middle school. Abel immediately admits to the crime, declaring he had been trying to end Connors bullying of his foster brother Percy. Connors is severely injured in the fight, requiring emergency medical care at nearby Memorial Hospital. The Connors and Mariano families quickly settle the matter out of court, the Mariano’s agreeing to pay the required medical bills. Both Frederick and Layla Mariano decline to have Abel taken out of their fosterage.

Subject 1-Beta, ARGUS file

October 18th 2005: Fingerprints belonging to a John Abel in Chattanooga, Tennessee are interred into the Automatic Fingerprint Identification System. These fingerprints match with the partially reconstructed fingerprints of Subject 1-Beta. ARGUS investigators begin to pursue this lead.

Unidentified Anomaly: Code Temporal, FOA Anomaly Database

December 21st 2005: First recorded instance of Anomaly occurs at Chattanooga Wells Fargo. Unidentified Subject is recorded entering the Wells Fargo with an empty bag and in next frame leaving with a full bag. The Wells Fargo later reported a discrepancy of sixty thousand bills that day. There is no sign of either video tampering nor super speed.

Subject 1-Beta, ARGUS file

December 23rd 2005: ARGUS investigators confirm the identify of John Abel to be missing child from the events of September 13th 1996. John Abel is found to be under the  fosterage of Frederick and Layla Mariano, two other children are also fostered by the Mariano’s. Request for Approval of operation is sent to Director [Censored].

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Chattanooga Police Department, Summary of Deputy Elijah Hoffman’s Report

December 25th 2005: Off-Duty Deputy Elijah Hoffman is called by family friends Frederick and Layla Mariano to search for their foster son John Abel. According to the Mariano’s Abel had ‘disappeared’ after a lengthy dispute over the payment of Medical bills relating to the assault of Darrel Connors. Deputy Hoffman proceeds to begin searching for the teenager, without reporting the disappearance.

Subject 1-Beta, ARGUS file

December 25th 2005: Approval for Operation is approved by Director [Censored]. Operatives are deployed to the Mariano residence within hours. Operatives breach Mariano residence at 11:13pm, family is quickly detained, Subject 1-Beta is not present. Family is interrogated by operatives, Subject 1-Beta is stated to have disappeared earlier in the day, Mariano family is dispatched. Radio contact ceases with Operatives at 11:57pm, there is no further contact from any ARGUS agents present.

Chattanooga Police Department, Summary of Deputy Elijah Hoffman’s Report

December 26th 2005: Deputy Hoffman returns to the Mariano residence early in the morning, Hoffman quickly spots signs of forced entry into the home. Hoffman enters into the Mariano residence and discovers the corpses of Frederick and Layla Mariano, their foster children Percy and Peyton O’Cabe aswell as four other unidentified armed individuals. Deputy Hoffman proceeds to call for backup and evacuate the home. Forensics declares the death of the Mariano’s to be from fatal gunshot wounds from the unidentified intruders. The intruders are declared to have all died from spontaneous full cardiac arrest. The missing John Abel is never found. Further investigation is interrupted by the case being taken over by the Federal Office of the Abnormal.

[10:37 PM]

Unidentified Anomaly: Code Temporal, FOA Anomaly Database

August 7th 2009: Several robberies in the manner of December 21st 2005 in the greater Minneapolis metropolitan area, the subject in question appears to be a young adult of similar features. A total of 13.6 million dollars in cash is reported missing from the respective establishments.

March 20th 2017: An ancient crocodilian, Deinosuchus suddenly materializes in the FOA San Francisco office. Thirteen casualties are reported before the creature is neutralized by gunfire.

## Physical Appearance

Unremarkable and Forgettable, Gaunt and Wiry, greying stubble and fading brown. John Abel is a true avatar of the average, as mundane and unassuming as a random bystander. He appears a man entering into the monotony of middle age, yet his eyes carry the weight of lifetimes.

## Personality

Suffering and experience weather away all in time, the greatest mountain worn to a pebble, the very stars fading into dim echoes of glory. The passions of life itself becoming nothing more than cold apathy to existence. Yet in the deep something stirs, an old rage against those who had wronged him long ago. A renewed drive for vengeance, without care for the consequences it will wrought.

## Relationships

All who have cared for John Abel are gone, through the ravages of time or fate, or the dark cruelty of man.

## Powers

* Regeneration: John is possessed of a moderate healing factor, which enables him to fully recover from the majority of wounds within a matter of days. John can withstand injuries that would incapacitate or kill ordinary humans, being able to lose large amounts of blood, suffer badly broken bones, or fairly severe burns without passing out. His healing is not strong enough to prevent scarring, however, and severe injuries require surgery to properly mend, as his wounds are not self-correcting.
* Timespace Manipulation: John's primary ability is the power to manipulate the fabric of time and space, bending it to his whims.
	+ Clairvoyance: John is able to extend his senses across distances without traversing them, allowing him to observe distant locations without being present there. John can also peer into the past (though with a great deal more effort), observing events that transpired in any location he is present in or extending his senses to. It usually takes John some moments to find times and places unfamiliar to him, though he can instantly begin observing ones he is already familiar with. Three primary drawbacks exist to this power; the first being that it detaches his senses from his body, making him vulnerable to attack while his focus is elsewhere if he peers there for longer than the brief instant needed to hone in on a target for timespace travel. The second is that John's senses being extended to a distant location also brings with it his mental presence, which can be discerned by telepaths whose powers allow them to do so. The last limitation is that he cannot peer into the future.
	+ Delayed Aging: Due to temporal alterations to his body, John ages extremely slowly, approximately twenty times slower than the standard human.
	+ Density Manipulation: John is able to manipulate the density of objects. He can render objects supremely difficult to destroy by increasing their density, or make them intangible. John is able to merge two objects together by manipulating their density, and can control whether or not the molecules occupying the same space are harmlessly dissipated, allowing him to restrain people within solid objects, or cause to allow a violent reaction as multiple objects are made to occupy the same space at the same time, with the flimsier object usually being destroyed. Denser objects, and the energy fields of superhumanly resilient metahumans, are more difficult to manipulate in this manner. Additionally, this power requires conscious effort to exert, and as soon as he shifts focus, anything John is effecting instantly revert to its ordinary density.
		- Phasing: By manipulating his own body density, John is able to pass through solid objects, or let them pass through him.
	+ Telekinesis: Through the manipulation of space, John is able to telekinetically move objects within his field of perception. He is able to exert telekinetic force potent enough to lift or crush tanks or level small buildings. His level of precision leaves a great deal to be desired, as John's telekinesis primarily takes the form of directional force, which makes it hard to manipulate objects with any degree of dexterity.
	+ Teleportation: John is able to teleport anywhere on the planet, requiring only a brief instant to hone in on a chosen location. John's teleportation involves him disappearing and reappearing completely silently, with his spatial distortion abilities stabilizing the air that would usually be displaced by sudden appearances or disappearances. John is also able to take other objects with him when he teleports, so long as he is aware of their presence. More massive objects, or objects permeated with energy fields that increase their durability, such as certain metahumans, are more difficult for him to move.
		- Apportation: John is able to send people and objects within his presence to other locations, or summon distant objects to himself. With a great deal of effort, John can send things in far off places to locations where he is not present, though this requires intense focus, as he must employ his Clairvoyance to send his senses to at least two distant places, making it almost impossible to focus on what is going on with his body while doing so.
	+ Time Acceleration: John is able to accelerate the passage of a targeted object through time. This can be used to speed up the running of a computer, make individuals perform tasks faster, or even cause objects to decompose rapidly. At his peak, John can accelerate the flow of time to around ten years per second. John cannot use this ability on his own body, as he serves as the anchoring force through which the time flow is altered. This ability cannot be used at the same time as Time Deceleration or Reversal, meaning he must cease employing it to use one of the others.
	+ Time Deceleration: John is able to slow the passage of a targeted object through time. He can use this power for a variety of effects, such as slowing bullets, making the movements of an individual become sluggish, or delaying the timer of a bomb. At his peak, John can decelerate the flow of time to one second per ten years, allowing him to for all intents and purposes, freeze an object in place. John cannot use this ability on his own body, as he serves as the anchoring force through which the time flow is altered. This ability cannot be used at the same time as Time Acceleration or Reversal, meaning he must cease employing it to use one of the others.
	+ Time Reversal: John is able to reverse the flow of time around a specifically targeted object. This is primarily used to repair damaged machinery, restore decayed objects, or undo the wounds other individuals have suffered. At his peak, John can reverse the flow of time so that ten years are undone per second. John cannot use this ability on his own body, as he serves as the anchoring force through which the time flow is altered. This ability cannot be used at the same time as Time Deceleration or Acceleration, meaning he must cease employing it to use one of the others.
	+ Time Stop: John is able to halt his passage through the flow of time, keeping himself and any person or object he takes with them trapped in a frozen moment. Any object he interacts with will be brought into the time stop automatically, and exit as the interaction ceases. Elsewise, John is able to simply will anything nearby into the time stop, and they remain there so long as he wills them to, and can move about freely, though like John, any object they interact with will also be brought into the effect. The instant John ends the time stop on himself, anything he took with him will also resume into the ordinary flow of time, starting off again the moment the time stop was initiated. John is also only able to maintain the effect for a limited period. At most, his record of maintaining the time stop is twelve hours, to the perceptions of those within it.
	+ Time Travel: John is able to travel through time, and is able to take people or objects with him as he does so, in a manner similar to his teleportation. Unlike the latter, John cannot send objects through time without himself accompanying them. The act of time travel is the most draining of all John's abilities, and temporarily disables most of his other abilities whenever he employs it; and the further he travels, the longer this reduction. For every year John travels through time, his powers are disabled for approximately one minute. Additionally, there are several further limitations to this ability. John cannot travel to any time period where he exists already, and is simply barred from doing so. Attempting to pass into a period further in the future than he has already existed is possible, but extremely difficult, as John's Clairvoyance does not extend into the future.