Withdrawal

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<infobox> <title source="name"><default>Withdrawal</default></title>

<image source="Image"></image> <image source="image"></image> <group><header>Basic Information</header> <label>Civilian Name</label> <label>Aliases</label> <label>Gender</label><default>Unknown</default> <label>Death</label> <label>Age</label><default>Unknown</default> <label>Post-timeskip</label> <label>Ward start</label> <label>Relations</label> <label>Family</label></group> <group><header>Professional Status</header> <label>Occupation</label> <label>Classification</label> <label>Unique Features</label> <label>Alignment</label>

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<label>Location</label> <label>Teams</label> <label>Previous Team(s)</label> <label>Base of Operations</label></group> <group><header>First Appearance</header> <label>Worm Debut</label> <label>Ward Debut</label></group> </infobox>Withdrawal is a young man trying to be a hero with his friends, The Major Malfunctions.

Personality

He was protective of his teammates, particularly Finale.<ref>“If you’re confused about any of it, I’ll explain after,” Withdrawal said, again, his voice muffled slightly by his mask.

“I think I got it,” Finale said, with a smile. She gave Caryatid another hug before hopping down. Behind her, her teammate resumed a more mortal form, everything about her relaxing and transitioning to its regular variant. - Excerpt from Beacon 8.8</ref> He was determined to be a hero, and was eager to work with other teams.<ref>“We’ll figure it out,” Withdrawal told her. To me, he said, “We’ll do it. You can count on us.”

The conviction and determination caught me off guard. “This isn’t paid work, I want to make sure you know.” - Excerpt from Beacon 8.8</ref><ref>“Because there are some things that you can only see face to face, like how genuine someone is or if they’re interested in the mission.”

“We’re interested,” he said, with barely a breath’s span between my statement ending and his starting.- Excerpt from Beacon 8.8</ref>

Appearance

Withdrawal was in between Caryatid and Finale in height, but wore a set of pseudo-power armor that Antares described as an "agility frame"; the frame consisted of spray-painted metal bars which seemed to buckle under its own weight, which offered little actual defense but possessed mechanical feet and arms that extended his limbs by two feet. Withdrawal also wore a simple mask comprised of a plate of metal with glowing pink eyes, attached to a rubbery hood.<ref name=8.8e1>The guy was the tinker of the group, it looked like- and it was good they had one, given the ‘malfunction’ part of the group’s name. He would have been between the two girls in height, except for his suit. I hesitated to call it power armor, exactly. Power armor implied armor that was heavy enough that it needed machine power to move- remove that power and the tinker was stuck. The stuck part probably held true, but this guy had no armor.

No, if I had to come up with a term for this guy, I would have called it an agility frame. It didn’t thicken his body, but stretched it out, with an mechanical extension adding two feet to his legs, long mechanical gloves that started at his wrists extending the arms much the same way, and a lightweight set of bars and discs providing the bare minimum of strength to hoist what looked like a syringe filled with maybe ten gallons of pink fluid. The syringe’s needle wasn’t the only mount at the front of the fluid’s case, and various other tools or attachments surrounded the front end of the cylinder, all in metal of varying shades, glosses, and textures.

The frame was made on a budget, given how the spray paint had settled on different pieces in different ways, and it was almost buckling between the guy’s lean weight and the weight of the cylinder, to the point that the line of mechanical foot to calf to thigh formed a curve, not a straight line. His mask was a simple one, a circular plate of metal with eyeholes cut out, worn over a hood of something rubbery that clung to his head. The eyes glowed pink. - Excerpt from Beacon 8.8</ref>

On a different occasion, Withdrawal's costume glowed teal rather than pink.<ref>I glanced at Withdrawal, who was standing off to one side, glowing teal tonight, not pink. He’d welcome the chance to get some experience, to help out good guys. Hopefully we could get him contacts. - Excerpt from Polarize 10.3</ref>

Abilities and Powers

Some sort of Tinker ability, the exact "species" of tinker he fits into is unknown.

His powerset originates from the mobile habitats and nanofluid of an alien molluscoid species that were used to explore a low-gravity moon and facilitate adaption with the species living on said moon. Stasis-inducing nano-goop was initially used for maintenance purposes and later modified and deployed in attempt to protect the core of planet and break that cycle.<ref>Heavens 12.all</ref>

Equipment

Besides his pseudo-armor, Withdrawal carried a large syringe connected to a heavy vat of odd pink liquid. <ref name=8.8e1/>

Equipment Features

Agility Frame - A kind of power armor which served to extend his limbs; though the oiled frame<ref name=9.4e1>Two pink circles gave away Withdrawal’s location. The lenses of his mask glowed neon in the gloom, as did some of the oils of his costume. I raised a hand, and he raised his. He was quick and silent as he approached, moving on three limbs while holding his giant syringe with the fourth. The syringe attachment looked more like a nozzle, today. - Excerpt from Gleaming 9.4</ref> appeared unstable and threatened to break as he moved, it seemed to give him some mobility.<ref>And the frame- it was last to start moving my way, but first to arrive, by only a second or two. It lurched, lunging a few steps, putting one leg out forward, letting the leg telescope somewhat with springs clearly at work as suspension absorbed the frame’s full weight, wobbling like it might give way. The entire body swayed and shifted to compensate as pink liquid sloshed in the oversized syringe while it proceeded to lurch into motion again. Excerpt from Beacon 8.8</ref> Fluid Vat - This multi gallon vat is first seen with a syringe. However in addition to a needle it has a variety of other attachments mounted at the front of the liquid's case.<ref name=8.8e1/> The Pink fluid - has numerous non-Newtonian properties. He can use it as a beacon, and as a kind of specialized traction surface and trampoline.<ref name=9.4e2>I saw the syringe appear in a similar way, the fluid going from dark to pink, bubbling visibly, until it was as neon pink as anything else. He moved it like a baton, waving us over. [...] The Malfunctions seemed to hear my thoughts, because I saw Withdrawal enter the fray. He moved at high speeds, skidding on wet and icy road, and hefted his syringe that wasn’t a syringe anymore. The contents of the syringe sprayed over a wall. He skated to it, then skated up the slick of spray. He bounded off of it, then landed smack-dab in the middle of a large group. - Excerpt from Gleaming 9.4</ref>

History

Background

Withdrawal triggered young, the same year as his teammate Caryatid. He met his teammates online, and dropped out of school to form a team with them.<ref>“We got in touch online. All of us got our powers young- it was Caryatid and me at first. Finale a year later. We had different names then, obviously,” Withdrawal said. - Excerpt from Beacon 8.7</ref> Though they faced limited success as a hero team, they did manage to stay together over the course of six years.<ref name="8.8 2">A painfully slow search online brought up some images of kid heroes with terrible costumes. They’d been small timers before Gold Morning, small town ‘heroes’ who’d rotated between three middle-of-nowhere towns in North Dakota looking for villains or criminals. Four years of activity and they hadn’t found any.

It would have been easy to dismiss them, or to disparage them. They had dropped out of school to be heroes and had no wins. The lack of education was clear in the spelling errors. It worried me a bit that their referral had come from ‘Super Magic Dream Parade’, the loopy team from Boston, who had apparently heard about what we were doing and passed on word.

The Major Malfunctions were teenagers now and they’d been kids when they’d triggered. They’d stayed heroes across six years, and they’d stayed together. - Excerpt from Beacon 8.7</ref>

Gold Morning

He survived Gold Morning, but was presumably forcibly recruited like everyone else to end it.

Post-Fallen fall

The Major Malfunctions were stationed near a tent city when Breakthrough contacted the team and offered them to work within their growing network of hero teams.<ref>My destination was a tent city. Most in the tent cities had already departed for more secure accommodations, but new people were coming in regularly, and there was a stubborn holdout. As I flew over, I could see the efforts that were being made to patch the problem. Rigid black sheets of insulation were being laid against the sides of tents with yellow fabric, tents were being moved together and connected, and equipment was being brought in- truckloads of what might have been heaters or furnaces. - Excerpt from Beacon 8.8</ref><ref name="8.8 2" /> Withdrawal was present at their subsequent meeting with Victoria.

Stumbled on Teacher's plot.<ref>Gleaming 9.3</ref>

Post-Goddess' Takeover

Withdrawal was present during The Wardens attempt to stop March from reaching Brockton Bay time-bubbles. He tried to intercept March alongside Tempera, but got mauled and left for dead.<ref>Heavens 12.all</ref>

Trivia

• Name likely has to do with his tinkerings.

References

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