Father Time
| F Rm 30 |
A Ex 20 |
S In 40 |
E Am 50 |
R Mn 75 |
I Sh X 150 |
P Un 100 |
Res Am 50 |
Pop Sh 0 |
| Health: Karma: |
140 325 |
Origin:
As are his fellow Elders of the Universe, Father Time is a being so obsessed with his chosen field of study, temporal mechanics, that his overwhelming devotion to it has actually extended his lifespan indefinitely. His age has also granted him the Power Primordial!
Known Powers:
Immortality: thanks to his driving passion to understand time, both actual and potential, Father Time has effectively become immortal. He can be killed by being brought to zero (0) Health and Shift 0 Endurance, but he will eventually recover from any injury or demise.
Unless he somehow loses his passion for time itself, that is. Furthermore, the machinations of the Grand Master have barred him from Death's realm. In other words, Father Time effectively has this power twice. For him to pass permanently, two things would have to happen.
He would have to a) lose his interest in time, and b) somehow have Death convinced to kill him - and keep him dead - or else he'll eventually return. And neither are really that likely to happen any time soon, when you get down to it.
Power Primordial: as do the other Elders, Father Time has access to the Power Primordial, the energies loosed by the Big Bang itself. Though able to produce virtually any effects with it, Father Time has only demonstrated the following thus far:
* Environmental Independence: tapping the Power Primordial to handle the sundry needs of a physical existence, Father Time has done away with such base needs. Possessing this power at Class 5000 rank, he no longer needs to breathe, eat or drink to sustain his life.
* Future Control: in addition to traversing the millennia, Father Time has the ability to reach into time and manipulate upcoming events to suit his whims. He may do this with Amazing (50) ability, giving him up to five minutes with which to rewire the path of fate.
* History Control: similarly, this ability allows Father Time to reorder previous events on a small scale to suit his needs, often by making something un-happen. Wielding this ability at Remarkable (30) rank, he may revise (or 'retcon') up to a month of history at will.
* Invulnerability: the Power Primordial has granted Father Time protection from a very wide array of threats. He effectively possesses complete immunity to Disease, Energy, Pressure Variance, and Poison assaults of any stripe.
* Telepathy: Father Time has not done great things with this ability, mostly wielding it to communicate with others who are in the void or, as is usually the case, no longer speak his dead language. He possesses this power at Feeble (2) rank, at least.
* Time Travel: Father Time has the power to traverse vast gulfs of time in an instant. Wielding this potent power at Class 1000 rank, he may move one billion years through time in either direction - and that's just with each individual leap into the time stream!
This signature power also includes a variant of dimensional transit, in that Father Time can traverse multiple, potential pasts and futures as well as 'our' timeline. This lets him ponder alternate histories as well as eras that may or may not come to pass.
Limitations / Enhancements:
(none)
Equipment:
Scythe: this seemingly ordinary hooked, two-handed blade is a weapon Father Time has adopted in his emulation of the original man who bore the name - and as a part of his own fascination with legendary figures. He can use it to inflict Edged Attack damage in melee.
Furthermore, it appears to be the focus that Father Time needs to open his doorways into times both actual and perceived. Father Time can of course attempt to do so without this material focus, but he must pass a FEAT to do so at Shift 0 rank.
Quirks:
Mania / Monomania 3: his love for temporal mechanics is so great that Father Time pursues it to the exclusion of all else in life - and it shows whenever you try to talk to him. He is at his Psyche -6 CS to resist talking about anything related to his chosen art in any situation.
Talents:
Physics / Temporal Mechanics 3: Father Time knows just about everything there is to know in this area of scientific expertise; he's had billions and billions of years (possibly overlapped, no less) to study it. His Reason score should be considered +3 CS in temporal matters.
Physics: as a necessary aside to his one true passion, Father Time has actually developed a practical understanding of the laws of physics in our universe - the better to observe phenomena through time. His Reason in relation to physics-based FEATs is +1 CS higher than noted above.
Contacts:
Father Time is one of the Elders of the Universe, a collection of extremely old beings that are all the last member of their respective species - and immortal due to their obsessive pursuit of their greatest passion. He can rely upon his fellows for aid should he ask it of them.
Costume:
Father Time has adopted a costume that is a vague homage to the Timely hero of the same name. It includes a light blue bodysuit (save for the orange lower torso) with a clock on the chest, orange buccaneer boots, orange steel wrist bands, and a large, orange cloak.
Personality:
As is the case with most of his fellow Elders, Father Time shares a passion for his art which may be described as 'monomaniacal' - and he loves to talk about it. He's also shown a particular fascination for 'potential histories', realms of legend and heroic archetypes.
Real Name: unrevealed
Occupation: temporal mechanic
Legal Status: citizen of an unknown, dead world
Marital Status: (very) single
Alias(es), if any: none
Group Affiliation: Elders of the Universe
Height: unknown
Hair: unknown, possibly white
Eyes: white
Weight: unknown, but bulky
Other Distinguishing Characteristics: Father Time wears a full, white beard and moustache under that obscuring cloak of his.
Story:
Little has been revealed about the past of the entity now known as Father Time. It is known that, as a mere mortal, he was obsessed with learning the intricacies of time, and studied them unceasingly. So much so, in fact, that he had use for little else in his life.
Over time, Father Time's passion for his beloved interest was so great that, somehow, it extended his very life span. While his contemporaries were born and died off as normal, he persisted on the world of his birth, his aging process halted completely.
Not that the man has led a particularly linear experience. As a lover and devotee to the study of time, he has spent untold eons in eras that were not his own, his body out of sync with time as we know it, so he may actually be the oldest of the Elders.
He's had more time to explore his art in; after all, when you can re-use the same years over and over, you can cram in even more learning! At first using mere equipment for his travels, Father Time eventually gained full access to the Power Primordial, the universe's original energies.
He acquired this as, over time, he evolved into a so-called Elder of the Universe. While his passion for time has kept him alive, his very species itself has otherwise died out, leaving him alone amongst his kind to continue on. And continue on he does!
While his so-called brothers have mostly been involved in various plots to acquire greater power for themselves, Father Time has simply studied his chosen art ever further; perhaps his 'bonus time' has given him longer to realize the frivolity of the other Elders' aims.
Either way, he has taken to studying potential pasts and futures with particularly keen interest. Potential futures of course are those which can happen due to events in the present, but potential pasts, that's where things get interesting in a causal sense.
While the past is supposedly known to us, who really knows in a multi-dimensional sense just how mutable it can be? In a universe of quantum flux like ours, the sheer odds of the past being changed into something else that leads to our present is definitely possible.
And Father Time relishes the opportunity to study these possibilities. This quest has brought him to earth, in fact, as the world seems to draw Elders here over time when it intersects with their interests. For example, Father Time finds our past simply exquisite.
Our legends! Our heroes! All the things that made our world great, Father Time exults in. Peering into pasts both real and imagined, he discovered many things to admire, particularly amongst those of the American stripe. And this is what got him mixed up with Captain America.
You see Father Time thought, on the eve of the man's 50th anniversary as the Sentinel of Liberty, it was time he passed from being a mere mortal to a national legend, and lured him into a doorway from the present into some surreal, not-quite past.
There, Captain America wound up meeting various figures of American legend, such as Paul Bunyan, Johnny Appleseed, Pecos Bill, and even John Henry. Of course, the Captain wasn't quite done with his life just yet, and had no intention of leaving the world of mortal man.
Testing him in battle, Father Time found the Captain's spirit indefatigable, and thus returned him to his proper place and time, changing the fine details ever so slightly to make him think his friend Hawkeye had been playing a prank on him in a Father Time costume.
Which sort of made sense, since Father Time (Elder) had taken on the guise of Father Time (Timely hero), possibly out of admiration for the archetype that fellow represented. Of course, the Captain still remembered being dragged into some legendary past.
He nonetheless shrugged it off, and attended a big party the Avengers threw for him. Watching him leave, Father Time then departed for places - and times - unknown to mere mortal men. He seemingly passed out of human awareness until the end of the multiverse itself.
Upon its eventual return, Father Time was drawn to the point where creation died and was reborn: Battleworld. There, outside of conventional time and space, within the desiccated ruin of what remained of previous causality, was a cache of newly formed Power Primordial!
Arriving with numerous other Elders, Father Time vied against them for it in a Contest of Champions, and drew his fighters from all of known space-time. Things had changed a bit, though, so his picks weren't enough to keep him in the running for the Power Primordial very long.
Defeated, Father Time left Battleworld before many of his fellow Elders, who were put in quite a bind when their chosen Champions turned the tables on them. Resuming his travels through time and space once more, it is unknown when Father Time will return to plague mankind.
Or anyone else, for that matter!
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