Villain Design Studio: The Phantom Hornet

[dans]

So in one of my stories I referred to a female villain named the Phantom Hornet; anyone what to help with the villain design? Here's what I am considering...

The Phantom Hornet was a female mystery villain appeared in Chicago around the end of World War II. She could fly with mechanical wings, had two different types of 'stingers', one located on each wrist - darts from one wrist and electrical discharge from the other. Her costume provides her with 360 degree vision, and also the ability to walk on vertical surfaces. She has a radio controlled hornet in her belt.

I don't know if she shrinks or not or who she is in real life, why she's a villain or where she got her powers. Maybe she worked in a shipyard during the war, and got fired when the war was over because they wanted to hire men instead.

[redsycorax]

Melissa Armitage was a former war worker. She'd always been a tomboy and even did civil engineering classes at university before the Depression intervened. Before the Second World War, she assisted her husband in a graphic desgin business. During the war, she graduated to production manager at a munitions and civil engineering factory. However, fate played a cruel hand and at the D-Day Landings in Normandy in 1944, her husband was shot, leading his legs crippled. Melissa had to become the family breadwinner, but the layoffs of female workers led her to fear for her future and those of her family. And so, one night, she covertly photographed a prototype exoskeleton, artificial wings and a 360 degree all-vision helmet. In order to help pay for her husband's medical costs, Melissa had to turn to crime. In her case, it was a matter of tragic necessity rather than outright malice, but she does feel bitter and angry about her dismissal in favour of younger, less experienced men without her family responsibilities.

[dans]

not bad at all! Exoskeleton probably makes her more resistant to damage and stronger than a normal person. Sounds like a character to sympathize with. I think she is going to only rob shipyards, at least to start, and she will limit her thefts to cover family expenses, and her main claim to being a 'super' villain will be that she always manages to get away, rather than because she commits heinous or over the top crimes. So the police will be very frustrated, the papers will be playing her up big time, and Captain Catapult may have misconceptions when he starts fighting her.

[dans]

So here's an update, incorporating most of what Red suggested...

Melissa Armitage was a former war worker. She'd always been a tomboy and even did civil engineering classes at university before the Depression intervened. Before the Second World War, she assisted her husband in his machine shop. At the beginning of the war, she got a job as a machinist at a Chicago shipyard, and soon was promoted to Production Manager. However, fate played a cruel hand and at the D-Day Landings in Normandy in 1944, her husband was shot, leaving his legs crippled. Melissa had to become the family breadwinner, but she was laid off after the war ended - after all, what man would work for a woman manager?

For a short time, she'd been involved in a high priority low publicity design operation in her plant; only she and scientist Vic Karle knew what the project was about. She was the only person in the factory Karle trusted enough to work with. The project was terminated and shortly afterward, Via and Melissa were also terminated. That night, Karle stole the only prototype exoskeleton and burned the shop to destroy all the documents and other work artifacts. He then gave the prototype to Melissa, and he retired to Hawaii. The Prototype had artificial wings, the capability to stick to walls, the helmet provided some ultra-enhanced sensory capabilities (The ability to sense vibrations, acute smell, electric current and magnetic fields). As well, there were some built-in tools that Melissa was able to adapt as weapons (a spot welder and a device that can shoot small darts).

In order to help pay for her husband's medical costs, Melissa had to turn to crime, and she adapted the exoskeleton to a Hornet motif and adopted the identity of the Phantom Hornet. In her case, it was a matter of tragic necessity rather than outright malice, but she does feel bitter and angry about her dismissal in favor of younger, less experienced men without her family responsibilities.

The Phantom Hornet steals as much money as she finds in the safes of the companies she robs. She has been keeping some of that money (what she thinks of as 'her share') and anonymously donating the rest to a number of charities that support women, children, and the disabled. She is active in women's causes as Melissa and in either identity, she will intervene if she sees women or children being abused.

Initially she stole only from shipyards that had summarily laid off their female war workers, but she has begun robbing other defense industry companies who treated their war-time women workers the same way.

It wasn't long until the police figured out her MO and also the pattern to her thefts, and set a trap for her. She easily escaped from this 'inescapable' trap, and the battle between the Phantom Hornet and the police began. The traps became ever more elaborate and more and more resources were dedicated, and still she always easily escaped, and the newspapers made a big thing out of it, and eventually it even became a political issue.

Shortly after Captain Catapult cleaned up Big Butch Brawler's gang, the mayor of Chicago made a public appeal to Captain Catapult to help the police stop the Phantom Hornet...

[johnreiter902]

I don't think she should shrink. That's more of a silver age thing

[redsycorax]

Complicating matters- women in the same situation tend to support what Phantom Hornet is doing. She does not kill security guards and other incidental workers and prevents those she works alongside from doing likewise- due to what happened to her husband on D-Day, she is strongly opposed to behaving in a way that would lead to disabling injuries and insufficient public aid for others. She has also been known to actively intervene when she encounters domestic violence cases when women and children are getting battered.

[dans]

Well, there were a couple shrinking heroes / heroines in the Golden Age, but I agree, she can't shrink. And I like the addition that she will probably intervene if she sees scenes of abuse and violence against women and children. She may even be a crusader in her civilian identity...


To Melissa Armitage, who called herself the Phantom Hornet, it was 'just another night'. That actually bothered her more than a little; she'd been brought up 'right' in a 'good family' and had always been considered a 'nice girl' - if more than a bit of a tomboy - and now she was making front page news as 'The Untouchable Thief!' - currently considered Public Enemy Number 1 in Chicago. 'But it's their own damn faults!' she thought, shouting in her mind to overwhelm the fainter voice of her conscience. 'If they hadn't dumped me on the street like trash as soon as the war was over, I'd still have a job and be able to pay Randy's medical bills. But I'll be damned if I'm gonna starve or let him die when I can do something about it!'

To the Chicago police, it was more than 'just another night'; it was the night they expected to restore their reputation by capturing (or killing, preferably) the sneak thief who'd been escaping them for almost three months. The Untouchable Thief had escaped them for over and over again and they were tired of reading about it in the papers, over and over again. The trap was baited; if the thief struck in any one of half a dozen locations, the trap would snap shut. Every man on the CPD was mobilized tonight, with backup supplied by the FBI and the Secret Service.

[dans]

I figured out the prototype flying suit. I'm changing the name of the scientist to Vic Karle, and the flying suit was being designed to do inspection and minor maintenance in shipyards. It can fly and stick to walls because that is easier than putting up scaffolding when you need to inspect something high in the air (like the hull of a ship in drydock). It has a built in spot welder for fixing tiny welding jobs, and a device that shoots paint darts to mark spots that need more inspection or work than the suit can provide. It has additional senses (low light vision, electrical and magnetic sensing) to search for hidden construction flaws that are not visible to human eyes. It also includes a built in air supply if required to function briefly underwater.

When the war ended, funding for the project was canceled and Vic was told he was being released as an unnecessary expense. That day, he gave Melissa the prototype before he destroyed all his papers and other artifacts and then retired to Hawaii. Melissa modified it to suit the Phantom Hornet motif.