Volt

Ben Richardson, often more known by his handle 'Volt' is a British neo mercenary and bounty hunter, who works on and off for The Guild and who is one of the core members of the VALER organisation.

He is the older brother of Wildstar and Aurora and grandson to Skyren.

Known for his unusual personality and somewhat unstable behaviour. He is in a relationship with the Aeon prince Anri Sera and is openly pansexual, Volt is the arch nemesis of magi and mezzite user Zeroth.

### **History**

#### **The Early Years**

Born in the seaside town of Hastings in England Ben had a sickly childhood and was bullied because of his heterochromia, with one eye electric blue and the other an unusual crimson colour, they were in fact to be a precursor to his neonism on his 13th birthday.

Even before his powers activated Ben's birthday was a little odd, a gift from his grandmother and his parents; an 18th century edo-period katana named Kaminari, which apparently had origins with a travelling relative who ended up in Japan during the 1730's.

His electrical power first manifested during his birthday party in Bexhill swimming pool where three uninvited guests; bullies from his school, crashed the party and almost drowned him, the trauma activated his neones and the boy emitted a pulse of electricity that killed the three boys.

Luckily for others Ben and his bullies were the only people in the water at the time, however his best friend Brendan was shocked as he barely dipped his foot in the shallow end, blowing him backwards, but not killing him.

The deaths were blamed on faulty, exposed wiring from a pool light but Ben was unconscious for days, but was quickly given the all clear and sent home, where he revealed to his friend his ability to create electricity, fearing nevertheless he would be terrified. Brendan, however was fascinated, and even more so when Ben showed Brendan another new power which enabled him to fly, by levitating from his bedroom floor.

Ben spent many months being paranoid and being terrified of his own powers, after realising he had killed three boys, with neos still unheard of at the time Ben had no idea if he was the only one of his kind, but Brendan truly helped him stay grounded. It was in fact Brendan who suggested to Ben the idea of becoming a 'superhero' in the first place, eventually the two became Rebel and Blades, with Brendan using his impressive rollerblading skills and honing them with unique martial arts practices that the two began to learn, Ben deciding to take lessons in kendo and kenjutsu, inspired by his sword.

Ben later changed his code-name to Volt and the duo began patrolling their hometown in homemade outfits for a few years, encountering other unusual criminals such as Heatwave and another powered boy, Fume.

When they were 15 Ben's aggressiveness began to drive the two apart and Brendan saw a dark side of his friend he didn't like, soon Brendan had moved to another town as his father moved jobs shortly before Ben joined the local college to study graphics and art.

#### **The Dark Year**

When he was 16 Ben grew depressed and began to drink and smoke marijuana, having little real friends, he stopped patrolling the town for almost a year and tried to commit suicide by flying up as high as he could, until he could barely breathe, but when his heart stopped his body somehow mysteriously restarted it, Volt fell, unable to concentrate on flying, and he began to have hallucinations, seeing dragons in the clouds and hear a voice in the thunder, seemingly passing through a stormy vortex a swallowed by a gaping dragon maw. The boy closed his eyes, but when he opened them again there was nothing below him but ocean and managed to stabilise himself and slow down enough that he crashed into the sea relatively safe, however the strange event made him feel odd, it changed him and he decided to take another year at college.

#### **The College Years**

When Volt was 17 he met James Greenwood as an American from New York and the two became good friends, especially after Ben saw James use powers of his own, superstrength and limited invisibility and got back into vigilantism for a while, with James choosing the name 'Fantom'. Whilst admitting that college was a massive waste of time for them both began formulating ideas to start up a business in America that they could both benefit from, finding the idea of non-paid vigilantism and 'superheroism' unrealistic. Before they set their plans in motion Ben chose to 'come out' to his parents, which utterly shocked them, but kept the idea of using their powers to fight crime in James' hometown Harlem, in the Big Apple herself, instead claimed they were going to start a band.

Indeed, this was not a total lie, James could drum and Ben had been playing the guitar as long as he had been practising kendo, Volt's sword would have to remain in the UK until he could sneak it across the ocean. Before they began their business Fantom had an idea of 'testing' their powers and skills and first headed to New Mexico to catch a few criminals before heading to New York. Their exercise gained them experience and worked in their favour.

#### **The Mavericks Foundation**

After first arriving in New York by the time they were both 19, James took over his great uncle's old betting shop in a side-alley in the Bronx and they began to set up shop and Volt attained an American work visa. Around this time various government agencies were secretly monitoring them.

### **Personality**

Volt's personality has changed considerably from his early days as a bullied schoolboy, growing from a wary and paranoid kid to a somewhat aggressive and typically 'anti-hero' man, Volt's hatred of bullies and refusal to follow orders has made it difficult for him to form relationships, or work as a team, especially after the fall of the Mavericks and the Manhattan Incident, even within VALER he is something of a lone wolf, only truly working well with Anri, and will often still go out and do private missions.

He has grown to be also somewhat 'weird' in a number of ways, ways that Leo and Robin often point to him actually having serious sociopathic issues, and certainly a degree of ADD, as well as his worrying enjoyment of fighting, violence and downright impetuous nature. Despite his imposing and maniacal attitude Volt is actually a very caring and highly protective individual, as well as being highly intelligent, although he admittedly tends to hide this on purpose to make people think he is underestimated. In fact, Volt loves to mess with people's heads, and this works in his favour during a fight, enabling to think out side the box and use unorthodox methods.

### **Powers and Abilities**

Volt is a neohuman with a series of ‘n-genes’ or 'neones' that grant him a number of superhuman attributes;

#### **Powers**

**Electrogenic Quintessence**: Volt has the ability to generate massive amounts of electrical energy and control electrical fields and charged particles without the need to absorb it from exterior sources. The source of this energy is both subatomic and transdimensional in nature, drawn directly from the 6th Dimension via his own body's atomic matrix, the same higher dimension where Taranis was banished. This form of electricity was particularly destructive and did not always follow the laws of standard electromagnetism, particularly in it's focused state, meaning that even through conductive materials such as metal or water, his energy will follow the path Volt intends, rather than than path of least resistance, even after it has left his influence.

* **Electrical Discharges:** Volt could channel and unleash bolts and blasts of ultrahigh voltage electricity, either focused through his hands, fists or thrown from his body in general. He could channel it through metal and superheat it or throw off arcs of energy. Volt could form fields of energy around him if his hands were tied and direct it with his mind, or use it for defensive purposes; although he admits his defence is one of his weaknesses as he uses this power so offensively. He can control the amps and voltage of the current he discharges to allow him a number of different types of projection. Recently he has learned to create "electron bolts", compressed, short-range but highly destructive charged particle constructs that causes subatomic bonds to destabilize, allowing his energy to cut through nearly anything.

* **Limited** **Tactile Electromagnetism:** He has a limited ability to control metal by electromagnetising it with his own energy by touch; however he would have very little control over the actual structure of the object, limited to slightly bending or lifting the metal, but has used this ability to lift objects as large as buses, boats and passenger jets with all of his effort. Volt has stopped objects as large as buses by catching them in this manner, and in theory could cause bullets to deflect from his skin as soon as they strike him; however this would require monumentous concentration to allow him to react faster than a bullet, and even then it is unlikely that all the kinetic energy would be dispersed. As such he prefers to use his reactions with his sword to create reflective sweeping effects as he spins it.
* **Enhanced Strikes:** By shifting the energy inside his body into focus points such as his arms and fists, or his knees and feet, he can increase the potency of his punches and kicks enough so that they can strike with enough force to break steel and prevent him from injuring himself in the process, allowing him to fight hand-to-hand with super-strong opponents. He can also use tactile electrical attacks such as shocks and paralysing “bites” with his fingers.
* **Enhanced Reactions and Agility:** The electrical activity in his body and brain make his neurokinetic activity extremely fast and responsive, making him an unparalleled opponent in a fight. He can use electricity to increase his running speed but this causes strain on his muscles when used for more than 4 or 5 seconds and only does so in short inter-battle bursts, preferring to rely on his flight power for speed.
* **Enhanced Stamina:** Volt's quintessent electrical activity gives him a relentlessly superhuman amount of stamina allowing him to push himself physically and mentally, enough to endure extreme pain and huge amounts of activity way beyond what a normal human is capable of.
* **Enhanced Strength and Durability:** Years of generating and changeling massive electrical energies have hardened his muscles and skin to superhuman strengths and resistances even when not outwardly generating energy, allowing him to lift around 5 tonnes.
* **Supercharging:** He can temporarily boost his strength further by flushing his muscular structure with electrical energy, pumping his muscles allowing him to lift varying weights varying between 9 to 15 tonnes, though he believes he can probably go higher. When in this mode his body is far more reactive physically and can run at blinding speeds for as long as he can sustain the supercharge as well as automatically increasing his flight speed to hypersonic by infusing with his PTK field. Volt also recalls his senses being particularly heightened for a short time.  Afterwards he often feels a degree of pain for up to three days throughout his body and experiences painful spasms and twitches in this recovery time, and Volt rarely uses this ability.
* **Electrical Immunity:** Volt is virtually immune to extremely high voltages of electricity; however as his ability to generate it exists beyond his bodies own generating capacity, which of course he does not know, he must be wary when generating overly-powerful discharges. As of yet there is no voltage that exists from exterior sources that he isn’t immune to, putting his immunity beyond the 300 megavolt range.

* **Electroreception**: He can sense electrical fields via interactions with his own field and can sense the presence of anything, or anyone that possesses such fields.
* **Electrokinesis:** Volt’s central nervous system creates a massive electrical field around him which he can mentally control allowing a deal of influence over his own electricity and exterior charged particles as well as giving him sensory powers. He can manipulate any electrical energy in his near vicinity via his field, directing its flow or creating electrical constructs such as swords or spears, although these are limited in sustainment by his concentration and rarely does so.
* **Limited** **Technokinesis:** He can cause the activation/deactivation and malfunction of any electronics that he can sense. The device must have a source of electricity within it for Volt to control or at least the ability to hold a charge, but he can act as a battery if he is in physical contact with the device and carefully regulates his power. He is learning to propagate his energy via his field allowing him to charge without being in contact with the object; this may also allow him ranged electromagnetism.

**Personal Telekinesis:**  In addition, Volt can also create a close-rendering, invisible personal-telekinetic field throughout his body and over his skin that gives him a number of associated abilities. At first he had to concentrate to use this ability for extended periods during his teenage years, that would actively drain him to exhaustion. Over time the strength and sustainment of this ability has grown and today the field exists at a near-unconscious level, enabling him to use it with barely any effort or concentration.

* **Flight:** Volt can hover, levitate and propel himself through the air at supersonic speeds through force of will, whilst granting him resistances to the rigours of such speeds and heights and allowing oxygen flow. He can move in any direction with incredible agility, in any position or hang motionless in the air for hours without tiring; his flight is now so second nature to him that he barely has to concentrate to stay airborne.
* **Superspeed:** Reacting instantaneously with his mental command allows his flight speed and acceleration to be extremely potent, allowing him to accelerate and decelerate at extreme speeds whilst being protected from the negative stresses and forces, and granting him superior agility in the air. In short flits his speed is often said in resembling teleportation. He can currently fly at Mach 3.7 but believes he can go faster.
* **Bolstered Strength and Durability:** His field enhances his physical biology further without supercharging which can protect him from some forms of impact; while he isn't bulletproof by any means, as this field is more geared towards movement and dissipating energy, the field permeates and tightly binds his cells and molecules and can withstand blunt impacts and will dissipate the kinetic force of his own body, especially whilst in motion, this also gives him vastly increased striking power even without the use of his electrical abilities and can lift weights near 10 tonnes with ease. Today the field seems to continuously bulk his cells and skin even when he is not concentrating on it.
* **Telepathic Resistance:** He has an unconscious ability to be highly resistant to telepathy in various forms; with psychics such as Darq finding it difficult or impossible to read his mind and why Zeroth has found it nearly impossible to absorb negative emotion from him; this ability is strongest when he uses his personal telekinesis, but it is actually thought to have formed between a subtle, unconscious interaction of both his natural EM interference interacting with his personal telekinesis within his brain, forming a form of defensive static. However it is not impossible to get through, and with much effort, and with the aid of Volt himself trying to "lower his defences", the intelligent mezzite Lex and Robin have briefly been able to enter his thoughts to aid him in retrieving lost memories. It is also noted it's much easier to gain access to Volt's mind whilst he is unconscious.

**Receptive Empathy:** Volt also has a subtle ability to detect emotions from a distance which manifested during his time with Darq, however this ability is inherently minimal and works only at a distance of a few meters; however it works in a unique way with his own senses and perception, particularly it can enable him to 'understand' people to such a degree he can tell if people are lying, or sense how people are really feeling; this is more easier to sense if it is a strong emotion such as nervousness or fear. Volt, however has to actively switch on and concentrate on this ability.

#### **Abilities**

**Swordsmanship Master:** Volt is trained in kenjutsu and kendo techniques and extremely talented in the use of his katana Kaminari, using it with unbridled skill and speed.

**Master Hand-to-hand Combatant:** Is very skilled in various martial arts styles, mixing the styles of Shaolin Kung Fu with eagle and tiger claw into his own unique brand that he calls Thunderfist.

**Skilled Tracker:** His years of bounty hunting gives him an edge in locating targets and gathering information.

**Master Mercenary:** Volt has learned various tactical and fighting skills from being a mercenary, working for governmental, military and private forces the world over.

**Skilled Tactician:** Being in constant battles and wars, Volt has learned a great deal about enemy movements and his environment, using his quick-thinking and unique ability to thrive on knife-edge decisions to his advantage.

**Navigation Expert:** His ability to fly has pushed him to become exceedingly skilled at navigating over long distances, at first limited by knowledge of his local environment, the more he explored the more he familiarised himself with the world from both the ground and air, giving him a unique, 3d perspective on his environment even without the use of augmented reality shades.

**Musician:** He knows how to play the electric guitar and can sing.

**Accent Mimicry:** A somewhat unusual skill to emulate different accents near-perfectly and, to a lesser extent even impersonate others, has allowed him to avoid detection by recording devices or mislead others, which will often aid him in hunting.

**Jack-of-all-Trades:** Before becoming a mercenary, he worked various small jobs for short periods of time during his teenage years, ranging from supermarket general assistant to assistant butcher, kitchen porter, a phone shop, and for Brendan's uncle's mobile cleaning business; this has allowed him to blend in during his later jobs as mercenary and for VALER whilst hunting villains and terrorists.

**Artist:** Volt is very skilled at drawing and sketching, creating character designs and scifi technology and landscapes as a hobby. No one knew he has such skills and is perhaps the only thing he gets embarrassed about when people ask, and as such tries to keep his art skills a secret. He and Drath are said to be working on a VALER webcomic.

### Weapons and Equipment

**ARAL-S:** A pair of shades created for Volt by Gyzmo mainly for navigation across the world, but did also serve in analysing events and targets. Newer versions of the ARAL based on Gyzmo's prototype were produced by Drath and Teddy that were more resistant to Volt's energies and movement.

**DD9 Supersonic:** A unique phone created by Drath for VALER, Volt's is bespoke to be more resistant to his powers and work at extremely high altitudes.

**Fang:** A small combat knife he keeps on the back of his belt that he kept from his time working with the British Army and has since personalised, which he finds particularly useful at on-field tasks such as cutting or jimmying open doors or windows without being too overt with his powers. Has been known to energise and throw this, but as it isn't alloyed with kinzium the blade would likely melt if exposed to too much of his energy.

**Kaminari:** His famed katana that he often uses on missions when he can to aid him in close-range combat; the sword actually improves his defensive capabilities as he can use it to create sweeping shield-like reflective effects. He can energise the blade's unique metal alloy without it melting, allowing him to cut through almost anything. The weapon is secured to Volt via a three-way strap that keeps it tight to his body at all times.

**Shockproof Clothing**: Most of his clothes are designed to be highly resistant to high electromagnetic radiation and electrical burns, particularly specialised gloves created by Charlie, though his telekinetic energy can also aid in this with his regular clothing.

* **Trenchcoats:** More recent versions were created for Volt by Charlie, his infamous long trenchcoats serve more than just Volt's personal fashion statement, but serve to protect him from harm, both resistant to and working with his powers; properly synched his coats are highly bullet and impact resistant as well as thermo-regulating.

**Tactical Shades:** A pair of highly bespoke sunglasses designed to stay on his face during extreme movement and combat, heavily reduce glare from strong sunlight and reflective surfaces; these have been upgraded to function as augmented reality systems.

### **Taranis**

Taranis is a being that inhabits the White Realm from which Volt draws his energy, a higher dimensional state of radiant energy that is said to be the true source of all energy in the entire universe. Taranis first began to sense and commune with Volt when he was 20 from the White Realm, via what was described by Taranis as a 'miniature black hole of energy' from Taranis' view in the 6th dimension; the other side of which was Volt's body. It was later discovered that Taranis was the spirit of a halfbreed Human/Aeon Dragon who was praised as a God in Bronze Age Europe, with his father being the Aeon Dragon known as Xeus and further investigation concluded that Volt is an ancient descendant of both Xeus and Taranis himself, one of the reasons why Taranis felt such a strong connection with Volt.

Taranis' spirit was banished to the 6th dimension during ancient battle on Aeos where Taranis tried to invade the planet, blinding Anri in the process.

* **Telempathic Link:** Volt has an empathic link with Taranis, to such a degree that he can receive emotions from him and translated them in to actual words and pictures like a form of empathic telepathy.
* **Power Restriction:** Taranis became Volt’s power regulator and at any time was powerful enough to tone-down Volt’s power if he thought it would damage him, although Volt can fight against it, it would most likely be in vain.
* **Limited** **Possession:** Taranis is able to possess Volt’s body for a short period, allowing him to talk with others, but had little control over Volt's actions.

### **Limitations and Weaknesses**

Curiously, although the potential for Volt’s energy generation is at first realisation limitless and almost god-like, it seems to be extremely limited by his own mortal body and mind, and limited also in quantum state to only electrons and positrons rather than all the potential energies of the White Realm.

His ability to control and shape this energy is limited by the internal pressure and focus he must maintain to balance generation of energy with making sure he doesn’t go overboard as well as his own emotional state.

Volt's tactile telekinesis by no means makes him bulletproof and is mostly, currently geared towards flying and propulsion, and the protective assistance that his field produces against certain temperatures and atmospheric forces; sharp, high-speed projectiles and extremely powerful superhuman strikes can damage him.

Volt has recently been diagnosed with Attention Deficit Disorder, as such he craves action and is bored extremely easily; this often exacerbates his belligerence and enjoyment of battle, and sometimes goes out of his way to 'make things more interesting' when faced with mundane jobs such as paperwork or cleaning, this includes practical jokes and increasingly unusual behaviour that lead many to question his overall sanity.