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Fighting: |
Pr |
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Gd |
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Ty |
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Pr |
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Rm |
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Intuition: |
Ex |
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Ex |
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Health: |
24 |
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Karma: |
70 |
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Pr (Rm when employed) |
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Popularity: |
-10 |
Real Name: Karl Malus
Occupation: Former surgeon, now criminal research scientist
Legal Status: Citizen of the United States with a criminal record.
Identity: Malus does not use a dual identity
Place of Birth: Mud Butte, South Dakota
Marital Status: Single
Known Relatives: None
Base of Operations: Los Angeles area
Past Group Affiliations: Former employee of Power Broker, Inc.
Known Powers:
None
Talents:
Dr. Malus’s degree is in biology, and he has Incredible reason in that field. His knowledge of chemistry and radiology gives him Amazing reason in the study of superhuman physical structure and genetic manipulation techniques.
Contacts:
Malus has contacts with the Corporation, and with Power Brokers, Inc. (now defunct), and possibly other high-tech criminal organizations (such as AIM, HYDRA).
Role-Playing Notes:
Malus is a typical mad scientist who cares nothing for the people on whom he experiments, only for him self. Malus’s chief goal is to get rich using his process of augmenting human abilities, a process which has led to tragedy for many of the test subjects. Malus is a cowardly man who does not want to get anywhere near superheroes, but whose activities inevitably involve them. It is not likely that he will give up his experiments, and any changes in them will be to improve the effectiveness of the superbeings, not decrease the hazards to the participants.
History:
Dr. Karl Malus was fascinated by the subject of superhuman powers since the first time he read a newspaper account of the Fantastic Four. Upon graduating with a degree in biology from the University of California at Los Angeles, he applied to various institutions for a grant to study supernormal capacities in depth. Unable to get any funding through legal means, Malus contacted certain wealthy investors active in the Los Angeles underworld. They set him up with a laboratory facility he immodestly called the Institute for Supranormality Research, despite the fact that he comprised its entire staff. The underworld provided him with human test subjects to experiment upon, usually individuals the mob sought to liquidate. Malus hoped eventually to find an individual who already had superhuman powers he could study. In the course of research, Malus came up with a number of special toxins and other chemical-based weaponry which he sold to such Los Angeles criminals as the Enforcer.
Malus’s first recorded encounter with a superhuman being occurred when the criminal Fly sought out Malus to bolster his waning powers. Malus sent the Fly to steal some special equipment, but the theft led the Fly into battle with the original Spider-Woman. Malus determined to transfer the Spider-Woman’s powers into the Fly. He lured her to his laboratory by stealing the comatose body of the Spider-Woman’s then-partner, criminologist Scott McDowell, who had been stricken by one of the Enforcer’s toxic bullets. After the Spider-Woman defeated the Fly, Malus offered to resuscitate McDowell in exchange for lenient treatment. While reviving him, Malus injected McDowell with an extract of the Fly’s blood, which days later caused McDowell’s body temporarily to develop certain of the Fly’s superhuman powers.
McDowell donned a costume Malus anonymously sent him and for several days wore it, calling himself the Hornet. Malus wanted McDowell to capture the Spider-Woman for study, but the ploy failed, and McDowell eventually returned to normal. About the same time, Jack Russell, unaware of Malus’s criminal connections, contacted Malus in hope of finding a chemical means to curb his rampages as a werewolf on the three nights of the full moon. Malus instead placed a control-collar device on him which enabled him to force the Werewolf to battle Spider-Woman. When Spider-Woman freed the Werewolf, he attacked Malus, wounding him.
Upon his recovery, Malus served only a short sentence before being paroled. He returned to his laboratory to continue his experiments. The dancer calling himself Daddy Longlegs, who had ingested some of the growth formula invented by Henry Pym, sought Malus’s help to cure him of his freakish condition. In treating him, Malus acquired a sample of Pym’s serum taken from Daddy Longlegs’ blood. When Erik Josten, the original Power Man, came to Malus for a means to renew the superhuman strength that the original Baron Zemo had given him, Malus decided to give Josten the Pym growth compound in addition to his strength-augmenting treatment. Hoping to finally have a superhuman accomplice, Malus gave Josten a new costume and suggested he call himself Goliath. Goliath was too powerful for Malus to control, how ever, and he abandoned him.
Malus later acquired yet another test subject when an ex-convict named Antonio Rodriguez request ed Malus’s help to cure his wife of an undiagnosed ailment. Malus agreed if Rodriguez would submit to treatment. Malus transferred genetic material from an armadillo into Rodriguez’s body, transforming him into a human armadillo. Malus then dispatched Armadillo to free Goliath from the custody of the West Coast Avengers, hoping to assemble a team of henchmen. Captain America defeated the Armadillo, however, and alerted the authorities to Malus’s parole-violating activities.
While serving another short term in prison, Malus was contacted by Power Broker, Inc., a mysterious underworld corporation whose major business is the supplying of super human manpower to various clients. Malus agreed to join the company in return for getting out of jail. Power Broker, Inc., now supplies Malus and his fellow criminal scientists with all of the test subjects they can man age. One of Power Broker, Inc.’s major sources of clients is wrestlers who wish to have their strength augmented so they can qualify for the new Unlimited Class Wrestling Federation.
Malus utilizes the process by which he restored Erik Josten’s strength to augment the power of the wrestlers. To ensure that the wrestlers keep paying twenty percent of their earnings to Power Broker, Inc., Malus has been administering a highly addictive synthetic drug to the wrestlers, who are told they will die without the drug to stabilize their power, but in reality they will only experience intense withdrawal symptoms. Only five out of ten persons who undergo the treatment emerge with superhuman strength; the rest become brain-damaged or physically disfigured. Among those treated who escaped addiction is Sharon Ventura, who became the new Ms. Marvel.
Malus’s experiments were discovered by Captain America, who exposed them to legal authorities, with the help of Demolition Man and Night Shift. Malus was arrested and is currently in prison.