Guardian 12
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"Invention is more than a science, it is an art." - Adam Monroe/Guardian 12 Adam Monroe (A.K.A. Guardian 12) Is a scientist with a talent for robotics and advanced physics. An MIT graduate, he currently works as a technician for the White Star Avenger Initiative.
Contents
Appearance
At first glance one would notice Adam has a slim build with moderately-sized muscles. Standing almost 6ft tall with clean-cut brown hair with blonde highlights. His face is smewhat rounded, his eyes are an emerald-green and surrounding his mouth is a thin brown goatee. His left hand has a coarser, more leather-like texture than his right. In the few instances where his left forearm is exposed several sockets can be seen. He is constantly cheerful and wears a grey casual jacket and grey trousers. Whenever he smiles the right corner of his mouth lifts up and his right eyebrow moves upward. When concentrating he supports his chin under his forfinger and thumb, curling the rest of his hand underneath and perks his right eyebrow.
History
Childhood & Early life
Adam Monroe was born as the second son to Jason and Sandra Monroe on August 15th 1979. From birth he was seen as a child prodigy and lived a life in the suburbs of Denver, Colorado. He first gained notice by the intellectual community when at the age of twelve he won first prize at Albert Cross Elementary school science fair for building a working, if simple, bipedal robot. It was no surprise that during his school years he was bullied and picked on for his intelligence and lack of physical prowess (something his older brother Paul excelled in).
At the age of 15 he was granted scholarship to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and enroled in nanotechnology and advanced physics. While studying under Professor Karen Everett hebecame a highly valued student excelling in his subjects and constantly making the dean's list year after year. He finally graduated with a Summa Cum Laude Doctorates on July 18th 1998.
Life in the military
It was not long after he left university that he became jealous of his brother's success in the United States Army. Adam decided to sign up in the U.S. army corps of engineers only five months after graduation. He was mainly stationed in the middle-east during his 5-year long service. He was proud of what he was doing for his country but yearned to see the open combat his brother would constantly talk about. After five years of service he finally had a chance to see such action.
On December 5th 2003 he was assigned to a fire-team investigating reports of terroists hiding in a remote village in Egypt. Upon arrival the group was pinned down by small-arms fire. They had soon discovered a training camp and the seven of them decided to assult the main building. Once inside they were led into a large room surrouded by a single balcony; when the lights were turned on the room was filled with soldiers aiming directly at the team, their commander was with them. Adam watched as his team were shot down one-by-one, in a bid of heroism Adam pulled the pin from a grenade and threw it to the terrorist commander. As the grenade went off the entire burilding began to collapse with bewildered soldiers running left-right-and-centre. Four of the team were dead and one severely injured. While carrying the dead and dying outside Adam was cut off from his only surviving squad member by falling rubble. as he shielded himself a chunck of ceiling landed on his left hand, crushing the bone.
It would take three days before rescue teams arrived. Adam had sustained himself on the ration packs he hand one of his dead squad members had in their packs and kept from insanity by drawing in the dust and earth. After spending a week in hospital he was discharged from the corps due to his injuries. He insisted that he stay in the military and was reassigned as a military scientist back in the States. Originally remorseful he became comfortable and realised that being a scientist was his true calling.
One of the first projects he worked on was a replacement hand. The final product was almost indistinguishable and the machine's dexterity was comparable to a regular human hand. He also worked on several larger projects along with improving present technology.
Scientific Pursuits and projects
In 2005 Adam Monroe was assigned to Project Greenskin, his dissertation on miniaturisation and synthetic muscles had convinced directors to grant him permission for project Guardian - a research project into the practical uses of a powered exoskeleton and to develop a safer way for soldiers to fight and contain Grond - Officially there were four major versions of the armour, none were too succeessful. Adam was constantly at odds with Project Greenskin's Director Kaufman who simply wanted 'results' and insisted the project focus on weapons and armour rather than sophistication. Adam eventually decided enough was enough and resigned on March 10th 2010 as the project lead, citing that he was designing a "weapon of sophistication, not Kaufman's idea of a man-shaped tank" along with consideration that Kaufman had watched too many robot cartoons as a boy.
Monroe, looking for work, agreed to sign up to the White Star Avengers Initiative in mid-2010. Monroe continued to work for the U.S. Goverment as an external scientist and frequents the labs at MIT to this day. On October 5th 2010 Adam signed up to lead project Odin; a top-secret research project that involved the creation of a wormhole, however he unexpectedly left the project in November.
Personality
Although he is capable of compassion, Adam is highly obsessive when it comes to research, bordering on the reclusive. He is higly analytical and considers anything - no matter how impossible or reality-bending - to be a result of some scientific property of physics. This obession includes finding real-world evidence for magic (He fervantly believes in the principle by Arthur C. Clarke that 'magic' is just a word to describe the unexplained or unexplainable). Unfortunately this dedication has led to him drawing suspicion or becoming alienated when around non-humans or metahumans. His apparently cold dedication to science may cause some to wonder of he can distinguish between a living person and scientific oddity or statistic although deep down this is never the case.
He has been known to drop everything he was doing - including periods when he is supposed to relax - to pursue a scientific observation; be it an energy reading, physical property or anomoly. He then takes a sample if he can and retreats to his laboratory for days or months at a time to study it. He only comes out once satisfied with a result.
Along with this Adam considers the Guardian project and subsequent armours his magnus opum, his finest work, and would do anything to preserve it. To the point where he has rejected astronomical sums of money to sell the desgins for fear the U.S. Army would simply 'bulk up his work of art'.
Abilities and Equipment
Monroe is a textbook genious with an IQ of 136 and has always been fascinated with technology. His determination to the pursuit of science is so great that he has been known to retreat into a lab and never come out without a result (wich can be days or even months at a time). He has been known to find patterns and connections where others cannot.
His main strength is one of his powered armour suits (of which there are six versions). Within the suit he becomes stronger, tougher and highly resistant to any mental abilities.
Armour versions
There are a total of six suits of powered armour, four of which were purely developed under Project Guardian, one of which was half-finished when Monroe resigned from the project and one designed and built by Monroe himself. For the first four the nicknames were given by soldiers who watched either the development or testing of the version. the nicknames of versions V and VI were named by Monroe himself to describe the armour's key properties. All suits were powered by gradually more sophisticated microfusion cores (all developed by Monroe and his scientists).
MkI 'Skeleton'
The prototype phase, none were ever sent against Grond due to being a framework. The purpose of the MkI was to establish the project's framework technology, it was famous within the base for being highly unreliable and broke down frequently.
MkII 'Brick'
The first armoured version although lacking in booster rockets the later versions posessed. Named after the heavy armour that was bolted to its frame. Unfortunately during the field tests Grond himself kept throwing the suits at the base as cubes with the pilots being heavily mutilated. Later versions of the MkII used basic A.I. programming but were simply more susceptible to being crushed and thrown by Grond (post-testing conclusions believed that the algorithms were not advanced enough to avoid geting crushed).
MkIII 'Grondotron'
The largest of the armour versions, measuring a maximum of 24ft in height. this version was named in relation to it's size and the properties it shared with the MkII, it was also equipped with several ranged weapons including three linked gatling guns, shoulder-mounted missile launchers and a chest-mounted particle beam. Boosters were also fitted to the machine's legs and feet. This was the version the director was most proud of claiming it 'the best mech ever'. Contrary to the name this version was crewed and capable of rudimentary hand-to-hand combat. The machine itself was rather expensive with Adam himself saying he preferred men in armour rather than a man-shaped tank.
MkIV 'Tank-man'
This version was one of the most successful due to added improvements in mobility and target-tracking (soldiers joked there should be no need for target tracking due to Grond's size). The machine was primarily designed in response to a comment by Adam of how the armour would be used once Grond is contained or dead (if possible). This version was more similar in size to the MkI & II along with more concealed weaponry. PRIMUS had considered deploying the mech in warzones and against supervillans. Despite it's success over the MKIII this was the last version officially tested under project Guardian.
MkV 'Iron warrior'
This version was only partially developed before Adam resigned from the project, he took the blueprints and without the lead scientist the project decided to improve on the MkIII & IV (Director Kaufman insited these were a big success). This version was similar to the Mk IV but it included extra features such as a basic psycic scrambler and advanced targeting. It was with this armour that he took the alias 'Guardian 12' After the project and the age he claimed fame as a talented roboticist. Without military directors he was free to modify the suit to fit his needs instead of a general soldier template.
MkVI 'skinsuit'
The first suit Adam produced on his own, named for the fact fact it is far slimmer and more steamlined than other models. As a complete overhaul the armour changed from fixed plates to a mosaic pattern of reactive plates. When an impact is due the plates at the impact site would lock creating a solid barrier at any point but providing complete freedom of movement when loose. The scanners are automatic meaning the pilot does not have to know about the attack to counter it. It also features a more advanced psycic scrambler providing a high resitance to psycic attacks and links.
Other Equipment
Artificial Hand
The incident which left Adam without a left hand has played to his advantage. Soon after recovery he was not content with a plastic or wooden prosthetic hand so he designed a synthetic hand. This hand is as equally dextrous as a noromal human hand and is covered with a latex patent of Adam's own design that resembles human skin very closely. He has made many upgrades to his hand to accompany his armour and can use it as an interface linkup to see and use the upgrades from his suit's HUD. Other upgrades include:
Geiger Counter: capable of measuring all forms of radiation both traditional and exotic, along with measuring Adam's current level of radiation exposure.
Computer Interface Device: Allowis direct access to a computer terminal and is equipped with advanced hacking and decryption algorithms.
Hands-free Communicator: Direct linkup to a sub-vocal earpiece.
Diagnostic equipment: Measures Adam's own vital signs, warning him if one or more becomes abnormal.
Lab Interface: When combined with a handset he can manipulate hologram interfaces within his lab.
Advanced Neural Interface: Adam does not need to adjust settings with buttons but can control the systems via an improved connection to his central nervous system.
Nanotechnology
Along with the armour Adam uses a swarm of custom-built nanomachines for a variety of purposes; this varies from reconstruction and examination to surgery and control in experiments. Programmed with comparatively simple algorithms Adam has taken several stemps to ensure the machines don't ever go rogue. He has also deveoped nanomachine canisters, storage units the size of a mobile phone to store and deploy a single swarm. Several of these canisters have been integrated into comparments of his armour and can be attached to various sites on the body via a strap.
Trivia
- Adam's favourite drink is the manhattan cocktail - in fact it's the only drink he orders at bars and clubs aside from coffee.
- When outside a cafe or in club lounges he can usually be found working on a datapad.
- His thoughts on joining the Corps of Enginners constantly shifts between: a rash and stupid product of sibling rivalry, the dumbest choice in his entire life, and the defining point that had made him what he is today.
- He is rarely - if ever - seen wearing a t-shirt or anything that would expose his forearms, this is because there are three small sockets on his left forearm.
- He is a fan of Battlestar Galactica.
- He still keeps the robot he had made for the science fair during the 6th grade.
Hooks
- Adam Monroe is a repected graduate of MIT and maintains contact with his old teachers
- Since leaving project Guardian he has been selling technology he has developed ranging from nanomachines amd cybernetics to wetware and microfusion.
- He has appeared inside 'Popular Scientist' magazine more than once and was on the cover of the April 2008 issue.
- he has been the guest speaker at more than one scientists' convention in the last few years, mainly conducting speeches on cybernetics and nanotechnology.
Other's Views
Feel free to add your own character's views and opinions.
