Janie Gunn
From Unofficial Handbook of the Virtue Universe
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| Click for full image | |
| Janie Gunn | |
| Player: Shadur | |
| Origin: | Magic |
|---|---|
| Archetype: | Mastermind |
| Threat Level: | 44 |
| Personal Data | |
| Real Name: | Janie Gunn |
| Known Aliases: | Janie |
| Species: | Human |
| Age: | 19 |
| Height: | 160 cm |
| Weight: | Confidential |
| Eye Color: | Blue |
| Hair Color: | Red |
| Biographical Data | |
| Nationality: | Sealand |
| Occupation: | Mercenary |
| Place of Birth: | Paragon City, USA |
| Base of Operations: | Confidential |
| Marital Status: | Confidential |
| Known Relatives: | Jamie Gunn (Brother) |
| Known Powers | |
| Chronomancy | |
| Known Abilities | |
| Confidential | |
| Equipment | |
| Magical custom-built handguns; disguise amulet | |
| No additional information available. | |
Janie's got a gun
Janie's got a gun
Her dog day's just begun
Her whole world's come undone...
-- Aerosmith, "Janie's Got A Gun"
(Player's note: I originally wanted Janie's backstory to match the lyrics of the Aerosmith song more closely, but I never managed to get the writing flow or explain her abilities. Eventually I concluded that a heavily traumatized abuse victim wasn't nearly as interesting or fun to play as I'd thought and I modified the backstory to what it is now.)
Contents |
Affiliations
Supergroup: Foxtrot Company
General appearance and looks
Janie's Irish ancestry is very evident in both her looks and her accent (not to mention her temper). She would probably look a lot prettier than she generally does if she weren't scowling so often. Her most prominent feature is the ugly scar running down her breastbone to her solar plexus and along her right lower rib that perpetually oozes tendrils of shadow that crawl along her skin and extend from her body wherever her skin is exposed to the air.
History
Backstory: Before the Isles
Janie is the daughter of a third-generation Irish immigrant living in Paragon City, and had a reasonably normal (aside from such minor interruptions as the Rikti War) childhood until her father ended up a "civilian casualty" during a fight between a hero with poor situational awareness training and a 5th Column battle droid.
Chris Jenkins, attorney-at-law and professional vulture, offered his services to her mother in extracting damages from the city -- and when they were awarded, took 90% of them as his 'fee' and legally prohibited any member of the family from discussing the matter with anyone.
Her mother, already shattered from the loss of her husband, broke down completely and turned to alcoholism, leaving Janie and her brother, Jamie, to fend for themselves.
Jamie realized that someone was going to have to bring in money to support the family and applied to the PPD academy. Janie - already furious with "the system" - did not take it well, and his announcement that he'd been accepted turned into a full-on screaming match.
Jamie left for the Academy two days later; Janie joined the Hellions the day after, only to discover that, if anything, life as a Hellion Girlfriend was even less interesting than watching her mother drink herself stupid. Still, she wasn't about to admit to herself that she'd only done this to try and get her brother's attention again, so she kept hanging on, until one night when the guys were holding another one of their drunken shooting contests, she asked to be allowed to compete - and promptly trounced all of them, including her boyfriend, Scorch.
Hellions tend to be sore losers. Scorch definitely was, and decided the best way to show his displeasure was the ol' cold shoulder treatment - which backfired when she started befriending several of the hangers-on, who'd approached her for some shooting lessons.
Infuriated at what he considered usurpation of his authority, and still fuming over his earlier humiliation, Scorch decided to use Janie as a sacrifice to the demonic entities in exchange for greater power.
The ritual went wrong, however, and instead Janie wound up with the power he'd intended to gain for himself - not that he lived long enough to appreciate it. By the time a hero, alerted to the disturbance by MAGI, arrived on the scene Janie was the only survivor - and as she was naked, covered in blood, and standing over a mangled corpse he didn't waste time asking what had happened before knocking her unconscious and transporting her to the Zig.
(See also: Janie Gunn/Zig-Transcript for details)
The Early Days: Mercy Island, Kalinda, Foxtrot
After Janie was 'rescued' (whether she wanted it or not) from the Zig by Arachnos, she was immediately brought before Kalinda, who offered her the usual deal of "the opportunity to prove yourself" by doing Arachnos' bidding. Janie promptly offered Kalinda the opportunity to perform an anatomically impossible act and stomped off.
Shortly afterwards, she encountered Burke, who was willing to pay her and refer her to some other contacts if she did a few jobs for him, an offer that she definitely preferred. On one of those jobs, she was partnered with Luna Samson, who hinted that she had a line to a reliable ammunition supplier.
Luna later discussed Janie with Foxtrot Romeo, who after some digging learned that the Malta group still had an interest in the girl, and Charly decided to offer Janie a place in Foxtrot Company.
Living and Learning: Seer Marino, The Legacy Chain, Leviathan
Now backed by Foxtrot's resources and contacts, Janie had little trouble finding jobs that suited her - preferably ones that only involved violence applied to people who, in her opinion, deserved it, such as the Hellions, the Family and the Council - as well as Arachnos forces on those occasions that an opportunity presented itself. (TBC)
Hunting demons: Hardcase, Sonata, St. Martial
Trust and Treachery: Grandville, Ghost Widow, Phipps
Personality
Abrasive to the point of hostility, especially to anyone she doesn't know. Janie has a lot of anger to work through, both at the world and at herself, and her experiences with her ex-boyfriend have taught her not to trust easily. Her instincts generally tend towards violent responses - essentially, shoot first and discuss whether shooting was a good idea later - and something inside her is always willing to encourage her darker impulses.
She does fiercely defend what few friends she has, and still cares about her brother even though she still harbors resentment over how he left home.
Powers
Gunplay
Janie has always had a talent for - and a love of - firearms, something she used to share with her brother. The unforgiving brutality of daily life in the Rogue Isles sharpened - and hardened - her into a gunfighter with very few equals indeed.
Janie's gang
Jimmy, Dave, Blaze, Harv, Mal and Drake, Janie's friends from her Hellion days, followed her to the Isles and watch out for her - and she for them. While not massively impressive separately, they're a formidable force when together under Janie's leadership.
Chronomancy
Janie's own magical affinity is for time. While she can't travel through it (yet - if that word even means anything situations like this), she can manipulate the flow of time in her vicinity to do almost whatever she wants it to do, and to hell with such outdated notions as causality or relativity.
Soul magic
Under Ghost Widow's tutelage, Janie has learned partial control of the dark energies seeping out of her soul at a constant rate. While her friends are divided as to whether this is a good or a bad thing, the fact remains that they make her far more effective in combat.
Travel
One of the few "general purpose" spells Luna has managed to teach her is the ability to fly.
Weaknesses and Limitations
Janie's biggest weakness has always been her tendency to let her temper at the spur of the moment do the thinking, coupled with the muleheaded stubborn pride that too often persuades her to persevere in a bad situation rather than admit that she was being an idiot. While she is aware of just how many bad situations this has gotten her into, she has so far had only very limited success with reining it in.
While Janie may not be stupid and certainly not naïve -- life on the Isles tends to be very short for people suffering from either trait -- she has something of a history of making spectacularly bad judgement calls (see also her temper, above).
Her abrasive attitude and her tendency to draw her guns at the drop of a hat tend to discourage people from socializing with her. While she doesn't generally object to being left alone, brooding alone in a crowded bar doesn't help her mood any either.
Enemies
The Legacy Chain
The Legacy Chain has very specific and very vocal opinions on how magic should be used, and they have made more than one attempt at capturing Janie and forcing her (for her own good, of course) to modify her behavior. Unfortunately for them, her growing powers rapidly outstripped their ability to match, so these days they keep her file in the "too powerful to handle - leave alone for now" folder.
Malta
The Malta Group dislike giving up on a potential new recruit, and take offense at said putative recruit telling them she's not interested by torching several of their assets. Smart money suggests that they're not done with her just yet...
Westin Phipps
While Phipps is perfectly used to be called an utterly despicable treacherous slimy backstabbing monster - and in fact, considers it a compliment - staring down the barrels of two guns less than an inch from his eyes and knowing that the person holding them would pull the triggers without caring about the consequences for even a second was more disquieting than he cares to admit. He wants her dead or her spirit crushed to erase the memory. Fortunately for Janie, he has extreme limits to his authority for direct action... But that doesn't mean he can't make her life difficult in a thousand small, petty ways if he so chooses. And he so chooses.
Trivia
- Janie is reluctant to wear any kind of clothing that covers or obscures the scar on her chest because the way those tendrils crawl along her skin until they finally ooze out at the neckline made her feel queasy.
- The disguise amulet she uses to change her apparent dress style was crafted and given to her by Luna in an effort by the latter to maintain some self control.
- Janie could work to improve her accent. She just chooses not to.
- Part of Janie's practice at controlling her temper involves going to a bar, drinking, and refusing to rise to the bait when the inevitable bar fight ensues.
- In the hypothetical Virtue movie, the part of Janie would be filled by taking a time machine back to 1994 and pulling Hilary Swank off the set of The Next Karate Kid.
