Skyline (Hero)
Code-name: Skyline
Full Name: Peter Stoltz
Faction: none
For some Heroes their new lives are shaped by the pain of tragedy, while others are called to the fight against evil by their own personal crusades. A very rare few can say their new lives as heroes began simply because they were there.
Peter Stoltz was a physics major at Pulp City University, working as a lab assistant to Professor Beeching in the field of inertial physics.
Using alien metals recovered by Heavy Metal from a downed Ulthar Patriaship, Beeching had struck on a process of layering various charged sheets of the mysterious alloys to create a field that appeared to dampen or magnify the force of gravity in a highly localized area. Stoltz would then secretly test the various prototypes in rooftop sprints across the Pulp City skyline.
It was on one of these test runs that Stoltz’s new life suddenly began. Flashing across the rooftops in a modified impact-resistant suit, and clutching a balancing device (a six foot pole with an inertial generator housed at each end), Stoltz heard a desperate scream from an alley below. As Stoltz in his persona as Skyline subsequently said in an interview with the Pulp City Planet:
“I heard that scream, and something just took over. Before I knew it I had thrown myself off a six-story building. The impact suit made the fall as soft as bouncing on a feather bed. I hit the street right behind this thug standing over some poor girl, and just let him have it with my staff. Sucker flew straight through a dumpster! I saved the day and I’ve never looked back since.”
From that night on, Stoltz has operated under the guise of Skyline. Carrying the device he now calls the Spring-staff and wearing the second generation of Beeching’s inertia suit, Skyline is now a familiar, if fleeting image against the night-time panorama of Pulp City. His methods may be questioned by the police, and allegations of violence bordering on brutality are often laid at his feet, but to the common citizen he’s a local guy making good, giving the criminal filth of the city the treatment that they richly deserve.
Skyline is like a light in the darkness. Maybe that is why he and Jade Hawk were drawn together….
***
Equipment: Skyline has a black cowl, with bulbous goggles tinged yellow. It covers his full head apart from his mouth and chin. His inertia suit is made of a black synthetic material, and is banded around the biceps, forearms, thighs, shins and torso. These are the metallic layers that produce the gravitic fields. These are also present in his shoes (giving Skyline slightly thickened soles). His gloves have pads on the palms that produce strong gravitic fields to enable him to adhere to any surface. There is a stylized horizon of Pulp City in a strong silver line across his chest. The Spring-staff is a 6 foot metallic rod, with a black synthetic sheathing over the gravitic generators at each end (which provide approximately a foot of cover each).