Angela Barton was a more or less typical young corporate business analyst working for BizSmartz, a mid-sized consulting firm specializing in market analysis and "forward investments". She was competent at her job and made a decent living and had a passable if not terribly exciting existence.
However, the sporadic migraines she had always suffered from since puberty started to worsen and happen with more frequency, and it eventually got to the point where she was missing a lot of work. Eventually she was let go and found herself freefalling into limbo. Luckily for her she was approached by a somewhat shifty guy called Lannigan who claimed to be interested in employing her services on special purpose "Research and Analysis" contracts of a confidential nature. Suspicious, but low on creds and options, Angela agreed and soon found herself periodically doing deep research into specific corporations, market shifts, and stock-loss statements among other things for Lannigan. It didnt take her long to figure out that the companies she was doing research on often seemed to suffer some kind of negative effects within days or weeks of her having given Lannigan her findings. Her research was being used somehow to target companies for some kind of shady business.
Meanwhile her headaches became almost constant, and sometimes she felt like she could even hear what sounded like voices in her head when she looked at people...almost as if she could read their thoughts. And a couple of times when speaking with others she felt like they were actually compelled to obey her requests to double bag her grocerys or hold the elevator door rather than simply complying from free will. Or maybe she was just going crazy.
When the Shiba Sec-Force tag and bag team tried to yank her off the street on her way back from running some errands, everyone involved was in for a nasty surprise. Startled by the black van that careened to a halt on the curb beside her and the three black suited men that jumped out of it and tried to grab her, Angela's subconscious took over and lashed out. The first man to touch her dropped to the ground twitching. The second pulled a gun but was summarily hurled back into the side of the van, leaving a nice dent and sliding down unconscious, and the third managed to grab her but willfully obliged when commanded to "LET GO OF ME!".
Angela fled the scene in the confusion and wisely did not return to her apartment. Lannigan eventually found her, and she commanded him to tell her what was going on; seemingly against his will he told her that Shiba had figured out that information used to enable a Run that disrupted a major deliverable timetable originated from Angela and wanted revenge. Now Angela had a price on her head, and over the next several weeks found herself fleeing or fighting for her life on many occassions, and in the process came to understand and rely on the fact that she had Metahuman mental powers. On the plus side the more she used her powers, the headaches faded away to nothing.
Eventually the costs involved for Shiba exceeded the value and they called off their dogs for the time being, but Angela had earned herself some street cred in the process of standing off teams of Shiba hit goons. She was approached by a veteran Runner named Unger who was always on the lookout for new talent, and invited to participate in a Run he was putting together. Filled with new found confidence and able to tell that Unger was legit with a mind probe, Angela agreed.
Angela, given the street name "Vesper" by her teammates, was very successful as a Runner and soon joined with four other Runners who commonly did runs together with or for Unger to form an exclusive group. Taking the name The Omega Five the group proceeded to rocket up the charts into the upper echelon of Runners over the next eleven years doing one high profile job after another. In addition to developing huge street cred and media buzz, Angela also entered into a fiery relationship with another Omegan, the Meta called Bruiser somewhere along the way.
Along with the rest of the Omega Five she was on the hitlists of many a MegaCorps but they had well-proven that there was no ROI to be had in coming after them casually -- only serious players need bother. And so it was that several MegaCorps sec-forces got together and cooperated in a rare joint initiative led by the famed "Counter Insurgency and Reperations" specialist known as "Ahab". They came after the Omega Five in force, waging a full scale shadow war against them. The conflict played out in several acts, but in the end Dropout, Yuletide, and Tarbaby were dead, and only the teams two scrappers (and coincidentally both Metas) Vesper and Bruiser remained alive -- and Vesper only made it out of the final throwdown because Bruiser shielded her with his impenetrable body and carried her out, running through walls and leaping across rooftops and other amazing feats to evade capture. Bruiser managed to get to a safehouse where Dropout kept one of his vehicles, a well armored Urban Assault Vehicle, and drove it through hails of gunfire to safety.
Months have passed and the two survivors have laid low. Bruiser is content to take this as a sign that its time to retire, something he's been thinking of for a long time now, but Vesper is determined to continue, to rebuild the team, and take the fight back to the MegaCorps. In particular she wants revenge on Ahab. Marco reluctantly goes along with it out of love, but restrains her more extreme impulses. Together they are carefully looking for potential new joins; currently they are eyeballing the duo Fortress and Callidus (late of the Runner team Delta-V) who are coincidentally also both Metas. However, Bruiser and Vesper already cover the "scrapper" role very well; they need the softer skills such as a dedicated Driver, a Hacker or Breaker, and a Facilitator of some kind. Lacking those kinds of skills, the Omega team wouldn't be very effective as just a line up full of heavy beaters. |
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