Cressida Wolfram

Though she was only able to use this with intention before MAPs, this ability is now permanently 'on.' Incessant, it requires the wearing of long gloves, full sleeves and pants to prevent overstimulation. Unexpected touch is only tolerable in the company of people she trusts, with histories which no longer surprise her. Cress obtains historical visions, memory and sensory data concerning an object or being which she contacts with an uncovered part of her body, generally her hands. If she does this intentionally, she can seek specific data. Otherwise, what she receives is random.

NOTE: With strangers and new acquaintances, touch shows her the most outstanding events of a person's life first, which often includes any injury or significant trauma a person may have endured. This is extremely stressful, and painful for her to undergo. However, it's also a useful screening mechanism. Ex: if a subject is a criminal and sustained injury during a violent B&E, she learns this quickly, and will steer clear. Without red flags, and with time and patience, these extremes mellow. Unless she chooses to, she never experiences a memory twice. If she focuses while maintaining contact, she can trigger memory in the host, forcing, or allowing them to relive a memory in vivid detail.

With objects, she may gain an assortment of information, including the item's usage history, origin, previous locations, events that have transpired around the object, etc. With living beings, she relives memory as the target recalls it (so this may be inaccurate with damaged minds) from a first person vantage point, complete with all sensory data. She does not gain insight into the thoughts, feelings or emotions of the subject unless she has a Link with them (below), which leads to a far more intense psychic 'retelling' of what it felt to be the subject within that specific memory. If unprepared, visions can shock or stun her temporarily, as can particularly strong sensation, even when she's prepared. For example, if she receives a memory wherein the originator was stabbed and fell unconscious, she would experience the same pain, and likely the subsequent unconsciousness. She jokingly calls this 'Seers' Woe.'

Considered an anomalous subcategory of telepathy, she can form Telepathic Links between herself, and up to twenty subjects simultaneously. She acts as a relay for real-time sharing of speech, thoughts, emotions, and feelings to all to whom she's linked, or between a selected group, regardless of distance. Though other sensory input could be shared this way, she intentionally blocks it while working, unless there is benefit. This isn't a recreational bond for her. Once established, an asset has constant access to her both in and off mission, should they wish, and vice versa. It takes ten minutes of sustained contact to gently establish the initial Link, and a great deal of focus and effort; she ferrets around in a subject's consciousness until she finds a psychic 'IP Address' which she can remember and retain, unique to each individual. She can establish a Link instantly, but it causes great pain and an instant, roaring headache for both parties. Links can be sustained indefinitely, as long as each individual is in physical proximity to her (100M) a few times monthly. Additional subjects beyond the twenty will negate her access to the subject seen least recently. Renewing an expired Link is far easier than starting from scratch.

Like a network walkie talkie, the Hive function can be turned on and off. It can be used for up to four hours consistently without overstraining her. Without thirty minutes of rest between sessions, she'll start a slow functional decline, resulting in other sensory input leaking into the shared feed. If pushed to over twelve hours, this may lead to confusion, sensory overlap (touch, taste, smell), synesthesia, shared pain, disorientation, double vision, and hallucinations (these are actually random memories, broadcast from linked individuals).

If she herself comes under enough strain or injury to shake her mental control, linked individuals may experience her pain or distress. Alternately, Cress is constantly in danger while linked assets are in the field. For example, if a Linked asset was captured and tortured, the extremes of pain and emotional disturbance would likely break through her mental firewalls after a certain amount of resistance, at which point she'd feel the whole experience as though it were happening to her. This happened once, three years ago. She had to be kept in an induced coma for a week while the asset was rescued, to prevent her from sustaining brain and nerve damage.

Lastly, while the Hive function is of most interest to OM, this also functions as traditional telepathy. It allows her to read or sense the thoughts of others within 100M, and communicate back and forth, regardless of whether or not she is Linked to them. Neither emotions nor feelings are exchanged with the unlinked. A subject with specific resistances to psychic abilities will be exempt to this, and appear as a blank spot in her mental landscape. Like her psychometry, this is active by default and needs to be suppressed, or it will tire and disorient her, but not injure. Migraines, physical pain, poor sleep and excessive work hours make it difficult to do so.

A precognitive ability induced and determined by the use of sound, Cress can tap into the future -up to 12 hours from the present hour- by singing or humming at a base C Major. It seems to be an odd reversal of her psychometric abilities, linked to a beloved hobby she relied on to get her through some of the most difficult nights at MAPs. This is a true synesthesia; the sound she makes changes shape in her mental landscape; forming color, pattern and complex geometries which she understands as the design of things to come. Although rarely needed for missions, it does sometimes come in handy when other means of knowing which action to take next, fail. She can keep the synesthesia from her linked teammates when rested, and operating normally. Odd color, sound and interference will sometimes start to leak through to them, as described above, when she's overworked or injured. If her first two abilities have seen recent, heavy use, this ability either fails entirely, or starts to show her terrifying slim probabilities or falsehoods, which can be differently problematic.

A few conditions: She must be in contact with something relevant to the future she wishes to view. IE - if she wants to see a specific person's probability of surviving a mission, she has to be touching them, or something which belongs to them, while using this ability. If she wants to view a specific location, she must either be present in it, or contacting something from, or related to that place. Her synesthesia will only show her the 'prime future.' If she should do something to change the outcome, she won't be able to see the changes she affects. IE - if someone is meant to be fatally shot and she warns them to spare them, she won't be able to see the immediate or longerterm repercussions. This opens a host of ethical and practical problems, especially in the field, over which she sometimes has to make tough calls, balancing a difficult future over the possibility of creating something worse via intervention.

This is a 'last resort,' caution-to-the-wind tossing of the gauntlet which she has successfully applied to humans less than ten times in her career. Unless in dire straits approaching a 'no win' situation, she'll do all she can to avoid use. It's volatile, functions as a biological virus and is therefore a hellish nightmare to control, and is extremely dangerous for her should she be overtaken by it - potentially lethal. However, in a scenario where either she or the team may be overwhelmed, facing capture or imminent harm, this can be a great help.

Cress can override the thoughts and consciousness of fauna, humans and metahumans within 100M of her with a neural psychic virus. This allies said individuals to her cause and mindset without question. They become thralls, while still in possession of their full thinking, feeling and physical capability. This makes an effected target an extension of her will, but she doesn't control how individuals go about meeting her objectives. She can only communicate with them telepathically and hope to direct them in ideal ways. Beyond her suggestion, they'll work to meet her (and now their) goals in whichever ways they normally would. This can be useful (an infected mind may think around a problem in a novel way) or it can get very ugly. (Ex: if she infects a mass murderer with the goal of getting her out of building, he may thoughtlessly slaughter his way out.) Seven humans (metahumans count as three for one) can be allied. The smaller and simpler the fauna, the more may be infected. Increasing with each up to seven, each 'thrall' augments the potency of her other abilities (this can either be a blessing, or a problem). Beyond seven, all abilities -including her control over enthralled individuals- weaken progressively.

It's vital that she monitors this like an overlord; each thrall transmits the virus to new individuals via touch unless she continually blocks their ability to do so. The virus wants to spread, to propagate to new hosts. If an enthralled subject were to rush through a crowd and touch a few dozen people without oversight, she'd be immediately smothered. Mirroring her Hive Mind, if more than twenty individuals share the virus, this ability breaks down and causes significant backlash. The collected strength of the enthralled consciousness would turn on her. She'd be forced to dispel the virus. This causes severe pain, a brutal headache and possible cerebral bleeding. At worst, she'd be knocked out or rendered catatonic for a few hours, to a week. The only time she was hospitalized for this, Camelot's Med staff suggested that a viral spread of more than thirty-five would almost surely kill her.

While she can apply the virus telepathically given time and a lower stress environment, it's most effectively transmitted through skin-to-skin contact. At first, the effected individual is confused, will continue to be hostile (if they were already) but calms and becomes compliant within five seconds. The effect lasts as long as the individual remains in range, until Cress dispels the virus, or is too injured or exhausted to maintain it.

On very few occasions, Cress has read a single person so extensively via her psychometry that no major memories exist, unviewed, to surprise or overwhelm her if she were to touch, or was touched by them, or their belongings. While her psychometry is always subtly active, even with these people, this state allows her to function around them with fair normalcy. Also consequently, the link between herself and these people is much, much stronger than those casually linked with a single viewed memory. The link takes seven to eight weeks to decay without proximity, sensory and memory sharing is stronger, telepathy is clearer, and a loose sense of communion or synchronicity exists between them, likely related to her Hive Mind. If she were separated from one of these people for a long time, during which the other person experienced major life events, those memories would need to be read to re-enstate this once reunited. Other Relevant Skills:

Extremely limited hand to hand combat experience. Basic marksmanship and maintenance of a pistol and SMG. Speaks Fluent Russian and conversationally capable French. Literary, copy and editing skills. Three years in modern and ballet in flats, ten on pointe. A strong sense of direction and urban navigation. Very fine, classically trained Mezzo Soprano singing voice. Can recite a large percentage of Through the Looking Glass from memory. Accidental comedy inaccurate meme references. Weirdly, a crack shot with a slingshot (childhood gag). Note: cannot drive an automobile, but can make do with a golf cart well enough.