((lvl 40 stalker, infinity. Always happy to team))
"Shocking New Menace Robs Bank. Again."
The headline was attention getting, but lost a little power with the bad pun. In smaller type the story noted that 'Electron Volts' had robbed another bank and was still at large. The Rogue Island police was warning that the villain appeared to be armed with electrified fists and should be considered extremely dangerous.
Within one of the many scattered caves of the isles a small, unimposing male Asian tossed down the newspaper with a lopsided grin. As he looked out over the surf he spent a moment thinking about where to spend some of his newly acquired wealth. Dreaming about fast cars and beautiful women on his arm helped keep away the dark dream of the night before.
The bad dreams were always hovering on the edge of his consciousness. He has tried many medications (legal and not-so-much), meditation techniques and even black magic to drive them from his mind. All his attempts had been to no avail. Sleep remained his true enemy.
The dreams always started the same. A mysterious figure in a plain white lab coat, his face covered with a mask, looking uninterestedly on as Ramsmei twitched and shrieked in pain. A powerful hum fills the room as giant capacitors and transformers store up and discharge unimaginable voltages into his always hurting body. The only words spoken are "More electron volts" as dials are turned up and the pain increases.
Ramsmei had been born a happy child into a large family. His family were citizens of beautiful Cambodia. A county with lush vegetation and time honed Buddhist traditions. His family was moderately prosperous and included many siblings, aunts, uncles and cousins by the score.
It wasn't until decades later Raksmei Loun even knew the name, "Khmer Rouge," and the reason his parents sold everything; all that they owned.His wise father and loving mother had gathered the family. All of it. Brother, sister, cousin, aunt and uncle. Bribes were placed and finally the captain of a tramp cargo ship was found who was willing, for a very steep price, to take them all to America. The family planed to seek political asylum.
The captain was a small time hustler with a different plan. He was one of those petty souls who believed the world owed him prosperity and hadn't paid up yet. The kind of soulless person who really would sell his mother for the right price.
The Loun family would not learn until it was far too late that the man they trusted for their salvation had already sold them all into slavery the day they boarded his ship.
In the Rogue Isles many things the rest of the world finds disgusting and abhorrent are legal and even flourish. Slavery is almost mild compared to what is allowed to take place under the rule of Arachnos and Lord Recluse.
Drugged just before arrival in the States, the Loun family woke up in one of Aracnos' secret labs. A brilliant but twisted mind ran the lab. The term "sadistic mad scientist" isn't really adequate.
With the sole exception of Raksmei, the Loun family was condemned to a painful existence as one of the 'infected': those poor individuals who have been experimented on and dumped in a shanty town to fend for themselves with their genetic damage and mutations.
Raksmei has no clue what the twisted chemicals and viral vectors with genetic payload were supposed to accomplish. The sadist in charge may have only been testing their toxicity to humans, or how much pain they could inflict. Whatever the goal might have been, in Raksmei's personal genome something evolved. He developed unprecedented abilities to generate, control and discharge electricity.
At first it was only a spark or two, like petting a cat on a dry winter day. That was enough to get him noticed for further experimentation. He was kept in an insulated cell by night, but at least for the first time in years he was getting almost decent food. They wanted to keep test subject echo-echo-four-one-niner alive. Day time was a decent into the red haze of pain. Strapped to a table, hooked up to generators and transformers designed to power a small factory, always hearing "More Electron Volts.'
The generators powering Ramsmei's pain and suffering had a finite limit. Day after day, body wracked in pain, he slowly learned to channel and even hold energy within himself. After months of intense torture and pain Ramsmei had learned to smell the voltage and see the amps. A new Synesthesiac perception had developed and electricity had become his life's blood. Reversing the direction of the current and forcing megawatts of energy into equipment designed to give punishment rather than take it, Ramsmei overloaded the test machinery then took his revenge on the staff at the laboratory.
Upon the discarded newspaper a back page story was now showing. The Rogue Island Police were seeking any witnesses to a bizarre accident. A Captain John Smith, retired from running a small cargo ship around the orient, had been a resident of Cap Au Diablo these past five years. His body had been found on the docs last night with massive electrical burns on a bench that was far from any active power lines or equipment.
((lvl 40 stalker, infinity. Always happy to team))
"Shocking New Menace Robs Bank. Again."
The headline was attention getting, but lost a little power with the bad pun. In smaller type the story noted that 'Electron Volts' had robbed another bank and was still at large. The Rogue Island police was warning that the villain appeared to be armed with electrified fists and should be considered extremely dangerous.
Within one of the many scattered caves of the isles a small, unimposing male Asian tossed down the newspaper with a lopsided grin. As he looked out over the surf he spent a moment thinking about where to spend some of his newly acquired wealth. Dreaming about fast cars and beautiful women on his arm helped keep away the dark dream of the night before.
The bad dreams were always hovering on the edge of his consciousness. He has tried many medications (legal and not-so-much), meditation techniques and even black magic to drive them from his mind. All his attempts had been to no avail. Sleep remained his true enemy.
The dreams always started the same. A mysterious figure in a plain white lab coat, his face covered with a mask, looking uninterestedly on as Ramsmei twitched and shrieked in pain. A powerful hum fills the room as giant capacitors and transformers store up and discharge unimaginable voltages into his always hurting body. The only words spoken are "More electron volts" as dials are turned up and the pain increases.
Ramsmei had been born a happy child into a large family. His family were citizens of beautiful Cambodia. A county with lush vegetation and time honed Buddhist traditions. His family was moderately prosperous and included many siblings, aunts, uncles and cousins by the score.
It wasn't until decades later Raksmei Loun even knew the name, "Khmer Rouge," and the reason his parents sold everything; all that they owned.His wise father and loving mother had gathered the family. All of it. Brother, sister, cousin, aunt and uncle. Bribes were placed and finally the captain of a tramp cargo ship was found who was willing, for a very steep price, to take them all to America. The family planed to seek political asylum.
The captain was a small time hustler with a different plan. He was one of those petty souls who believed the world owed him prosperity and hadn't paid up yet. The kind of soulless person who really would sell his mother for the right price.
The Loun family would not learn until it was far too late that the man they trusted for their salvation had already sold them all into slavery the day they boarded his ship.
In the Rogue Isles many things the rest of the world finds disgusting and abhorrent are legal and even flourish. Slavery is almost mild compared to what is allowed to take place under the rule of Arachnos and Lord Recluse.
Drugged just before arrival in the States, the Loun family woke up in one of Aracnos' secret labs. A brilliant but twisted mind ran the lab. The term "sadistic mad scientist" isn't really adequate.
With the sole exception of Raksmei, the Loun family was condemned to a painful existence as one of the 'infected': those poor individuals who have been experimented on and dumped in a shanty town to fend for themselves with their genetic damage and mutations.
Raksmei has no clue what the twisted chemicals and viral vectors with genetic payload were supposed to accomplish. The sadist in charge may have only been testing their toxicity to humans, or how much pain they could inflict. Whatever the goal might have been, in Raksmei's personal genome something evolved. He developed unprecedented abilities to generate, control and discharge electricity.
At first it was only a spark or two, like petting a cat on a dry winter day. That was enough to get him noticed for further experimentation. He was kept in an insulated cell by night, but at least for the first time in years he was getting almost decent food. They wanted to keep test subject echo-echo-four-one-niner alive. Day time was a decent into the red haze of pain. Strapped to a table, hooked up to generators and transformers designed to power a small factory, always hearing "More Electron Volts.'
The generators powering Ramsmei's pain and suffering had a finite limit. Day after day, body wracked in pain, he slowly learned to channel and even hold energy within himself. After months of intense torture and pain Ramsmei had learned to smell the voltage and see the amps. A new Synesthesiac perception had developed and electricity had become his life's blood. Reversing the direction of the current and forcing megawatts of energy into equipment designed to give punishment rather than take it, Ramsmei overloaded the test machinery then took his revenge on the staff at the laboratory.
Upon the discarded newspaper a back page story was now showing. The Rogue Island Police were seeking any witnesses to a bizarre accident. A Captain John Smith, retired from running a small cargo ship around the orient, had been a resident of Cap Au Diablo these past five years. His body had been found on the docs last night with massive electrical burns on a bench that was far from any active power lines or equipment.