Woods

* USMC
* Black Ops
* Requiem
* Ad Astra
* Post-AA

  – **Elias Chase** to **Amelia Williams**.

**Woods**, also known as **Recon**  and briefly as **Leopard**, is a former marine turned special operations soldier, mercenary, and cyberpunk. Possessing a cybernetically enhanced physiology and a penchant for Marlboro Reds, Woods would gain acclaim and fortune for his military exploits. Along with titles such as "He Who Watches Over All", "Future Soldier," and "The Sniper Among Rifles."

Woods was one of fifteen who was experimented on by the CIA's newest operation, Project Crusader. His body was graphed to anachronistic cybernetics due to a recently government-discovered parallel dimension dubbed Paradise Lost. Woods and the other survivors, now dubbed Maruta, were formed into what became known as Black Ops. Here, Woods was routinely tasked with stopping nuclear arms and exploring the unknown dimension of Paradise Lost.

Later, a member of Black Ops would lobby their military record and form a branch of the CIA called Requiem, which Woods joined. However, Woods would leave following the Nacht der Untoten incident, eventually wind up with the USSF, and was recruited to a space task force called Ad Astra. After dealing with a hostile alien race, Woods returned to Requiem to seek out Dr. Harrison Maxis, the orchestrator of the Nacht der Untoten incident, once more.

## **Appearance**

Woods is a man with exceptional physical fitness. He has a height of approximately 5'9" and a generally muscular yet slender build. He deliberately keeps his physique slim to enhance his agility and combat ability, allowing him to achieve more with less effort.

Since Woods has only been seen as an adult, it is unknown what he looked like in his younger years. Woods usually has salt and pepper hair with gray strands between his black hair. In addition to his base hair, Woods typically has an evident stubble and occasionally sports a beard, but he likes to keep it well-groomed. Alongside this, his haircut is routine, cutting the sides and back down to the skin and keeping the top short.

As a USMC operative, Woods wore standard military gear, including a ballistic vest and combat pants. However, he was given a darkened body suit with a utility belt and armor layers when he joined Black Ops. He adopted his signature headband during this period.

Interestingly, all other outfits Woods has worn after Black Ops are simply variations of this original outfit. The only significant change is when he joins Requiem and Woods changes his headband to blue. However, he switches it back to black when he enters Ad Astra. Another difference is that his Ad Astra suit has more cybernetic padding for armor against the vacuum of space.

## **Personality**

Woods is a compelling individual. Much of his early life was classified and scrubbed from databases when he joined Black Ops; it is even unknown if his real name is Woods. However, regardless of not having a past, Woods has much of a personality and is far from autonomous. He jokes, not often, but he does. Woods talks about movies and pop culture during stakeouts or missions when nothing is happening. He is charismatically infectious, able to get even the most stoic of soldiers to talk and joke in the face of danger or among his squad mates.

Woods will talk about anything as he abhors silence unless it is necessary. Psychological evaluations reveal that it is due to the noise-induced trauma that he has survived throughout the years that Woods needs noise to function. This need for noise is apparent as he will play music for his squad whenever they are doing workouts, lounging around, and sometimes even during missions. His music playing is why some people he's worked with have called him "Jukebox."

He is very caring and goes to great lengths to preserve human life. While not opposed to killing, Woods dislikes killing unless it is the only way. Woods will often utilize non-lethal rounds that incapacitate targets but do not kill them. This is an admirable quality that Requiem holds in high regard, but there are exceptions to his dislike of killing. Whenever Woods encountered the aliens onboard the Omega-1, he killed them because he was forced to. In the end, Woods is a humanitarian.

He dabbles in vices as Woods enjoys cigarettes and alcohol, but since gaining abilities, Woods doesn't feel the effects of alcohol anymore. However, he still drinks it for the taste. Surprisingly, Woods somehow stays in impeccable physical condition despite his horrible eating habits, which have been commented on by several people. Regardless, Woods is trying. He struggles like anyone else, but he tries to do good for people with a history of doing wrong and tries to be a better person than how he sees himself, a science experiment to be used as a blunt instrument.

## **History**

*Click on the images above to see the respective histories.*

## **Attributes**

**Regenerative Healing Factor**: Due to Woods' experimentation in Project Crusader, he gained an unrivaled, highly experimental, and extremely potent healing factor, which heightened his physiology and mental processing. Any damaged parts of his body heal within seconds of sustaining the injury, even forcing embedded foreign objects out to heal correctly, such as bullets, shrapnel, and more. Woods' healing factor has allowed him to survive explosions, gunshots, nuclear fallout, and even being torn apart by extra-dimensional energies.

The healing factor also grants Woods a litany of other abilities that are off-shoots or casualties of the power. Woods cannot die by any normal means; his body will resurrect itself if he flatlines. Decapitation doesn't work as he will grow a new head, or his body will find his head and reattach it. His unkillable nature has granted Woods a pseudo-immortality because he stopped physically aging the day he gained the ability. He stopped aging because his body is actively filtering out and killing the aging cells to keep his body at peak condition and health.

His agelessness is part of a more significant cycle because Woods' body doesn't allow toxins to exist within his body. Certain ones, such as fatigue, must be there for the body to function. However, cancer from smoking or alcohol doesn't affect him, leading to Woods having an extremely powerful tolerance to substances that otherwise would render ordinary people discombobulated. These substances include toxic gases, radiation, medical liquids, and more. However, his toxic immunity doesn't stop here, as his body has become adaptable to any situation, allowing Woods to exist in all climates without discomfort (the notable exception being space because... it's literally space).

All of this further extends to his stamina, which is seemingly boundless. Woods can exert himself for prolonged periods with an unfound upper limit. While he still needs to eat and sleep, Woods can exist for much longer without needing substance or sleep and be in combat for days or weeks before starting to feel the effects of fatigue, truly making Woods the perfect soldier.

### **Abilities**

Woods is primarily known for his sharpshooter ability. Out of every group he has been a part of, Woods has routinely been the go-to firearms specialist and often utilized in the field as overwatch. His exploits are legendary, and he is a highly sought-after sniper, able to hit targets from entire states away with certain conditions. It is uncanny how Woods is with pistols and DMRs or Sniper Rifles, having used a litany of them, but his preference is a DMR for both long-range and short-range combat.

Furthermore, Woods is also an excellent driver. His driving capacity has been shown repeatedly, as every time he and his team are near vehicles, he is typically the one driving or handling vehicles. His expertise is also sought for knowledge as Woods is often asked about exfiltration vehicles for missions, for which he gives recommendations. His vehicle knowledge also extends to mechanics, as Woods was a vehicle mechanic in the USMC before joining Black Ops. In his civilian life, Woods drives a customized 1996 Toyota Supra RZ.

Outside of driving and shooting, Woods is a capable hand-to-hand combatant. While he isn't the greatest and relies more on firearms than his CQC training, Woods isn't SOL regarding combat. He has been trained by the USMC, Black Ops, members of Requiem, and later, instructed how to fight in zero gravity by the USSF. While many of his peers are better combatants, Woods is capable enough to dispatch an entire group of people. But for all his skills, Woods is a shooter first, a driver second, and a combatant third.

Another significant aspect of Woods' skills is that he is a highly trained and resounding spy. His espionage and stealth ability rank highly amongst the greats, able to disappear from view without needing external sources. He could sneak up on a Selven, even with their enhanced senses. Woods has repeatedly been shown to be able to sneak up on people, disappear from a room without anyone realizing, blend in with the civilian population, and hide in an empty room by clinging to the ceiling.

### **Weaknesses**

While on the surface, Woods seems unkillable and unstoppable, this is untrue. Woods was not born with his abilities but granted them, which altered his genes. Woods could be killed if his healing factor was scientifically removed from him.

Another way to kill him is the same way he got his powers, the Paradise Lost Dimension. All "Maruta," people experimented on via Paradise Lost, are highly weak to a strange substance from that dimension called "Compound 85." If exposed to it in any capacity, whether liquid, refined metal, or raw form, Marutas lose their abilities and slowly begin to die.

Another part of Paradise Lost that Woods recently discovered is a blade Dr. Harrison Maxis found. It hails from Edo Period Japan, where the first outbreak of Paradise Lost occurred, and a Ronin infused Compound 85 into a blade, which then became known as "Fantomu Desu." Due to the katana being condensed C85, it doesn't affect Woods when he is near it, but it can kill him if used against him.