Shard

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Shards are fragments of Entites that serve as the source of parahuman powers.

Overview

Trigger Events

After an Entity has finished preparing a Shard, it will let the Shard loose, plot for the Shard's arrival, as well as plotting the location it will arrive in and its future host. The Shard will lock on to the host, get a grasp on the host's personality and summarily allow that portion of itself to die and burn out to form the Corona Pollentia. It will then sit dormant for a time, unless the time of the Shard's arrival coincided with the host's trigger event.

When a trigger event happens, the Shard recognizes the event from the state of the host, from context and from the flood of stress responses. It then reads the host to find out who they are and how they respond to situations before reading the situation for itself and accessing what form the danger takes.

The Shard then discards everything it doesn't need, distilling itself down to one efficient, case-specific task, suited to the host. Where the Shard isn't already programmed with inherent safeties and limitations it will use the host's stored knowledge to generate a grasp of what it needs to do.

If there are additional hosts present during the host's Trigger Event, and they are actively using their powers, then the Shard can "ping" off the others and exchange information. This generally allows the host to gain some kind of additional ability that they would not have had otherwise.

If multiple hosts undergo a Trigger Event at the same time, then a multiple trigger will occur. In such an event, several people will get powers at once. Most often, this will result in multiple parahumans who have an array of minor powers that share a concurrent theme. The powers most often compliment one another, or at least work in similar ways.

Multiple triggers are meant for the end-game of the Cycle, serving to stress-test powers as well as compare and contrast the smaller powers.

Second Trigger

The Shard draws from context and explores and/or conceptualizes new uses for its powers. The Shard begins splitting off to find a new, but similar host - piggybacking off the original Shard's context and experience - but then a major event prompts to catalyze and consolidate in the current host instead.

If the Shard is in an adult before finding its way to the child, it can begin this splitting-off process (generally requiring time or a degree of stress to allow for the maturation).

Second triggers are exceedingly rare, and generally do more harm than good; second triggers rarely serve as flat power boosts for the host.

Effects on Host

The effects that Shards have on their hosts are dependent on several factors, including but not limited to: age of the host, the host's personality, the host's trigger event, how much the host embraces the Shard's need for conflict and the nature of the Shard itself.