Pete Wisdom

{{CharacterPage
 * image2=Pete01.jpg
 * image1=Wisdom-art5.jpg
 * caption=
 * fullname=Peter Paul Winston Wisdom
 * aka=Pete Wisdom, Ian Chesterton
 * codename=
 * position=Agent of SHIELD
 * age=28
 * race=Mutant
 * role=Anti-Hero
 * type=Marvel FC

Pete Wisdom TXT: zombies suck Pete Wisdom TXT: fyi Amethyst TXT: pete shut up about halloween there is an actual zombie outbreak in the basement here Pete Wisdom TXT: btw dont come here i am still covered in gore Amethyst TXT: ...oh
 * quote=Actual IC Text Messages


 * overview=Peter Paul Winston Wisdom is a jerk. Formerly of British Intel and hailing from W.H.O., MI-6, and Black Air, he is currently employed by S.H.I.E.L.D.

He tries to focus on blowing up things that are wrong, but frequently finds himself in the middle of patently ridiculous situations involving magic and/or aliens and occasionally dinosaurs; he will never actually admit it, but he is, though not magic himself, something of an expert on occidental occult matters.

Erm, he is also Princess Amethyst's sworn liegeman when he is on Gemworld. It is a long story.

Pete also writes pop songs under the pseudonym 'Ian Chesterton' for Dazzler to turn into iTunes hits. Shut up.

Old logs from the last iteration of this MUSH are at the bottom of this page; I consider them to be part of my continuity, even though other people's roles in them may have been retconned out due to hypertime.


 * sheet=

Character Sheet

Abilities: Power

Hotknives: 6

Abilities: Skill

Black Ops: 7, Dangerous Sports: 4, Fistfighting: 3, Intellect: 3, Investigation: 7, Marksmanship: 5, Memory & Telepaths, Multilingual, Perception: 6, Pilot: 4, Scholar: 5, Streetwise: 4, Toughness: 3, Willpower: 7

Abilities: Gear

Sidearm: 1

Advantages: Friends & Allies Reputation (good)

Flaws: Allergic to Dragons, Family, Jerk, Metabolism, Pottymouth, Pride, Reputation (bad), Smoker

Languages: English

Abilities

Gear: Sidearm (1)

Walther P99 semiautomatic pistol, standard issue for Intelligence Officers in MI-6. It has an effective range of 60m, and is fed by a 9x19 Parabellum 16-round detachable box magazine.

Power: Hotknives (6)

Hotknives! Pete undoubtedly did not come up with the name. He has the ability to extend and/or shoot or throw shards of super-hot plasma from his fingertips. He has terribly precise aim with them.

Skill: Black Ops (7)

Pete's been in a number of subdivisions of British Intelligence since his last year of university, most recently a paranormal-focused sub-branch of MI-6. This means he has the standard field training and reflexes of an active operative who's good enough to stay alive, as well as the skills generally associated with SIS Minders.

That's where he *started*. A number of the assignments Wisdom's been on in his last few years of service to the Crown have consisted of things like 'wipe this terrorist base off the map' and 'steal this McGuffin and kill the group attempting to control it' or 'blow up this entire airstrip and the cartels using it'. He's a very good assassin, has a reputation for being someone not to cross, lest one get one's face ripped off; he is well known in the intel and mercenary community because he's been involved in 'shit, all the witnesses need to die' scenarios on both sides of what's technically the law today. He's extraordinarily good at wrecking absolutely everything and walking away from explosions without looking back at them.

Skill: Dangerous Sports (4)

He can speed through central London (!!) in a car with one stone door while people are shooting at said car WHILE the car's got a ticking bomb in it, and then drive the car off an open bridge and jump out before it goes over. He can also hotwire cars, escape from cars that've fallen into water, escape from speeding cars, break into cars, ram other cars without crashing and burning, jack a car that's in motion, pull e-break 180s, and steal helicopters.

Skill: Fistfighting (3)

If Pete's angry enough not to be thinking clearly (to remember he's supposed to be ranged), or if his back is against the wall, he's been in enough fights (where he generally got beat to a pulp but did damage doing it) to know generally when to block or duck and where to look for exposed targets. And, uh, hit them.

Skill: Intellect (3)

Though Wisdom's not a certified genius, he's certainly gifted well beyond the average, able to grasp complex problems and come up with at least several viable solutions extremely quickly. He's very good, also, at finding patterns and nigh-intuitively extrapolating data from them with a mixture of knowledge and experience.

Skill: Investigation (7)

This is the art of taking seemingly-unrelated information, putting it in a stack on your desk, reading through it with a patterning filter attached to your brain, finding a pattern, following it to its logical conclusions, predicting the likelihoods of said conclusions, and potentially attempting to interrupt the process in a bid to prevent said conclusions. It involves research, field work, research analysis, data comparison, trailing people, hitting up informants, eavesdropping, hanging around libraries and police stations, finding witnesses, and... basically, all the stuff you'd expect either a spy or a private detective to do. Or even a police detective. But probably not a hotel detective.

Skill: Marksmanship (5)

Limitation: 3 dice if he is not shooting something designed to be shot. Or just throwing something. It's aiming firearms (or fire-hands lol) that he's good with.

Wisdom is a seasoned field operative in secret intelligence. As such, he is skilled in the use of firearms. Since he's never been, and never /will/ be, an unstoppable tank, he's taught himself by necessity for even longer than that to use anything he can get his hands on as something to throw at someone trying to kill him.

Skill: Memory & Telepaths

While Wisdom's not got an eidetic or photographic memory, he *has* been trained in the mnemonic method of loci, also known as the 'Memory Palace' or 'journey method'. This not only has the benefit of enabling him to remember things perfectly when he decides he needs to remember them, but it also allows him to call up and arrange memories at will. If he finds himself under psychic attack or telepathic probing, he can choose which memories to bury and which to push to the fore, as armor or distraction.

Skill: Multilingual

Pete can speak/read/follow English (obviously), Welsh, French (including several patois and dialects), and Urdu. He can read and speak (but follow only with difficulty) German, Russian, Spanish, and Thai. He can read but has trouble following or speaking Icelandic. The first four are the result of his childhood and adolescence; the penultimate four were totally Rosetta Stone prior to going on assignment; the last is purely because he's an enormous dork and has the driving need to understand the phonetic roots of the non-lexical vocables in the albums of Sigur Ros.

Skill: Perception (6)

MI-6 and Black Air training cranked up the perception of someone who was already pretty savvy to an almost paranoid level of awareness of what's going on around him. Not only is he more likely to detect an ambush, he's capable of taking one look at the visible part of a scenario and determining a hierarchy of emergency on very little foreknowledge.

Skill: Pilot (4)

Pete has an up-to-date pilot's license, and is trained in the use of helicopters and small aircraft. This does not include weird superscience or alien technology. Don't ask him to fly a hovercraft, for instance. Or a Shi'ar raid ship.

Skill: Scholar (5)

If you read A LOT of books, and only half of them are fiction, then you wind up knowing A LOT of things. If you're really into politics, history, sociology, political and sociological history, lots of other ologies and ories, and you *really enjoy* understanding the way people work, and the world you live in, then you end up knowing craploads more than even the above A LOT. If you've spent the better part of your life on assignments that require you to learn other languages and other societal mores, then that opens up whole other categories of A LOT that most people don't even know exist.

Skill: Streetwise (4)

Our Hero here may have been born in Essex and lived there his formative years, but his dad was a cop that was in charge of investigating serial killers before there was a department for it. He grew up in the ass-end of London, heard the 'how to get caught' side from his dad, and did the 'pain in the ass rebel punk' thing as a teenager. Seeing as he was very much blue collar, he wasn't just slumming. He knows from how to deal with rough parts of town, socially.

Skill: Toughness (3)

Though Pete is squishy and skinny, he can take a hell of a beating and still remain functional, often to his detriment. He just sort of ignores pain if he has to, remaining conscious past what's reasonable for someone of his build.

Skill: Willpower (7)

Unfaltering and unshakable in the face of any 'normal' human experience -- and even some forms of psychic attack (detailed in the 'Memory & Telepaths' advantage). Pete's been tortured and unbroken before; he's had his mind rooted around in and managed to keep his secret thoughts secret by a combination of will and training; he doesn't give up even if he thinks he's going to die, even if he thinks that everyone he loves is going to die; even if he's under extreme emotional and physical assault. He can have unthinkable things flung at him, face horrors very few people have known, and remain resolute where most people would run or go mad.

Advantages

Advantage: Friends & Allies

Just as he's made powerful enemies, Wisdom's made steadfast friends and loyal friends -- when you risk your career and your life to help someone, sometimes they wind up willing to do the same for you. He's even done things for people who he's antagonistic with, but who now owe him favors -- and are likely to seek his help again, because of what they know he's capable of.

Advantage: Reputation (good)

Two sides to every coin. Wisdom may be a contender for Worst Employee Ever, but there are reasons he's still employed. He has a reputation for being impossible to buy off, and has proven his willingness to do What Needs Doing regardless of the cost to himself-- for instance, stopping an attempt on Queen Elizabeth II's life by defeating and taking into custody his long-term girlfriend. Or stealing a government helicopter to get a man to the hospital. Or taking three bullets to save a stranger's life (and she turned out to be the daughter of the head of Criminal Intelligence). Or killing every single person in a terrorist base the size of a small town. (Yes: this is throwing Shoot the Dog in there with Bastard with a Heart of Gold, Tropers!)

Flaws

Flaw: Allergic to Dragons

Whether or not he's aware of it, Pete has an allergy to dragons. Especially purple ones. They make him break out in righteous indignation and murderous intent.

Flaw: Family

His father's an insane retired police inspector, and his sister's an occultist catburglar who has a bad habit of channelling Atlantean priests. His mother was shot in a random spree killing. Pete doesn't talk about them much, but odds are good his sister or his father will disrupt his existence again sooner or later.

Flaw: Jerk

Caustic, snarky, jaded, unfiltered, and generally thoroughly unnecessary potshots: Wisdom's worst social failing. Unless he's talking with normal people or trying to get information, the guy has a really hard time keeping his comments to himself. Especially when he's unimpressed. Or being coerced. Or dealing with people in costumes.

Flaw: Metabolism

Pete has to eat almost as much as a speedster in order to function: his power burns like the heart of the sun, and damn does it burn calories. So he eats often and frequently with little in the way of table manners. (They slow things down.)

Flaw: Pottymouth

Lots of bad words unless Pete self-censors for great justice (or extenuating circumstances, like being around someone genuinely nice).

Flaw: Pride

Yeah, all right, most men won't ask for directions. Wisdom won't ask for help if he's lost, out of gas, on ANOTHER PLANET, his HEAD is on fire, someone's just spilt lighter fluid on his clothes, all of the food on the other planet is made of CYANIDE, he's got an inhibitor on, and there's a DALEK WITH LEGS chasing him. He has to be forced to take help. Unless it's from a friend he knows he won't owe because it's a friends thing and he-- you know. 'I'd do the same for ___'.

Flaw: Reputation (bad)

Two sides to every coin. Pete Wisdom is a whistleblower. This has earned him a lot of powerful enemies, who are thankfully mostly incarcerated, and it's earned him a very very black mark on his social record in the intelligence community.

Flaw: Smoker

Social *and* physical disadvantage! If he'd only quit smoking, he'd have a lot more endurance. And more people willing to deal with him on purpose. And if he'd done it earlier, would have got far fewer ASBOs in the aughts.


 * associations=

Assorted Defenders, Magic Types, and Wait, What?

 * history=I've been a jackass from since the day I was born. Probably because I spent most of my childhood at my father's elbow, which was not a good place to be unless you liked being alternately strangled by alcohol fumes or actually thrown up on, or if you liked to look at autopsy photos. See, Da was a special inspector for New Scotland Yard, until he went completely mad. Which is what will happen if you have a photographic memory and decide that what you want to spend your life doing is looking into serial killers. And Mum leaving Da, and Da's getting fired, are so interrelated that I can't actually remember which happened first -- which prompted the other.

For a change of pace, I'd sometimes spend time with my older sister. She was born a change of pace. To put it charitably. Da went mad; Romany started mad. Spending time with her was on a level with shifting into reverse from fifth gear -- every five minutes. I was very happy when she picked up burglary as a habit. It was much more sane and normal than the spinning and vomiting generally associated with possession. Like in the Exorcist. By the time I was ten, when Mum told me Romany would be watching me, I knew that that actually meant I'd be being chanted over by the spirit of a long-dead Atlantean priest, and trying very hard to get away. Burglary at least meant I knew what she was saying.

Da and Mum finally broke it off for good when I was somewhere in my teens, and I lived with my da. Here's where the shit really hits -- I got in a fight with my mum, she said some horrible things, about Da and about me, so I was still mad at her and decided not to go visit her at her house that week. So of course that day she got shot by a spree killer. Da blamed me. I didn't have a job. Luckily, this was around the time I was finishing secondary school -- so I went to university. Studied Genosha. Lots of history and world politics. When I graduated, the Weird Happenings Organisation recruited me pretty much immediately. First off, they were interested in my knowledge and understanding of Genosha. Second, they were fascinated by the fact that I could fucking shoot fire from my hands.

That lot was all right. They just wanted to know how it worked. While I was working for them, primarily doing a lot of research analysis and occasionally hunting vampires -- don't ask. There was a lot of other shit going on around then. Shit like the entire psi division of STRIKE getting mangled as a unit, and then picked off as individuals. Somewhere in the middle of all this, Captain Britain, who'd been gone for a good long time (after screaming some lunacy about psychic attack and jumping out of a plane, thereby blowing his supposedly secret identity) -- anyroad, while I'm with WHO, Braddock comes back out of nowhere, disappears again, shows up again, and Jim Jaspers got elected.

And that's when they say reality broke. Personally, I think it broke the second we got someone calling himself Captain Britain.

I wouldn't know how broken it was anyway. I spent the entire thing drunk out of my mind. One day I woke up, and I was twenty-four, and the UK had a plethora of bizarre-looking metahuman children that weren't mutants, and no one knew quite what to do about this. Because of STRIKE's having been crushed into the dirt, the dodgier hearts reformed under a new name: the Resource Control Executive, or RCX, which was formed expressly for the purpose of exploiting Warpies for government benefit.

Without me even paying attention, I sort of got absorbed into its beginnings. After all, they wanted me for the same reasons WHO did. There was a lot of sensationalism surrounding Captain Britain and Captain UK -- Captain Britain at this point being Betsy -- and I really could've cared less, I was busy getting horrified by RCX's treatment of the Warpies. I filed a formal complaint, which has NEVER done me any good, and it was shelved and I was reassigned. This time the drink of choice was tequila, and the location was Reykjavik. Met my mate, Culley, on that trip; he'd got stuck as my partner because the brass figured he'd cure my conscience for me, was his theory-- I figured it was because he'd eaten a baby in a past life.

Roundabout the time I was really starting to hate myself for the things I'd started doing in service to evil bastards in service of the Crown, Captain Britain killed the bastard who had blinded his sister. I don't think it's particularly surprising, then, that I started dating Sari St. Hubbins. She was blonde, homicidal, loony, and fantastic in bed. I was mildly suicidal, addicted to adrenaline, all sorts of fucked in the head anyway, and just turning twenty-five. We were a perfect match. I'm amazed I survived to arrest her for taking a contract that was out on the Queen. I still believe I win at 'worst ways to break up'.

The personal thanks of Her Majesty was very good for getting reassigned to MI-6 proper. The backlash from my resubmitting the complaint about RCX with a /MI-6/ -- being a whistleblower -- was very good for getting dumped in the *new* replacement for WHO and the RCX, Black Air. It was just as stupid, and just as evil, as it sounded: this past year, after I did some more really horrible things that usually occupy entire squads of well-armed Marines, I turned *them* in to MI-6 for developing anti-mutant bioweaponry to sell to private interests.

The thanks of MI-6 was very thin-lipped indeed. They suggested I might wish to retire. SHIELD suggested I might wish to work for them instead. I let the brass deal with the paperwork, and hoped for the best.

= Gallery =

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