M'Onel

© DC Comics / Used without permission

Origin: Unearthly
Real Name: Lar Gand
First Appearance: Superboy #89 [DC Comics June 1961]
                            Character created by Robert Bernstein and George Papp

ABILITIES

Prowess 5 {Good}
Coordination 5 {Good}
Strength 9 {Fantastic}
Intellect 5 {Good}
Awareness 5 {Good}
Willpower 6 {Great}

Stamina: 15
Determination: 1

SPECIALTIES

Area ["Phantom Zone"] Expert
Electronics
History
Leadership
Science Expert 

POWERS

Blast ["Heat Vision"] 7 {Incredible}
Damage Resistance ["Invulnerability"] 9 {Fantastic}
Flight 8 {Amazing}
Life Support 4 {Fair}
       Breathing
       Cold
       Radiation
       Vacuum
Supersenses 7 {Incredible}
       Additional Sense ["Infravision"]
       Additional Sense ["Penetration Vision", Limit: Blocked (lead)]
       Additional Sense ["Ultrasonic Hearing"]
       Extended Hearing ["Ultra Hearing"] 2

       Extended Vision ["Ultra Vision"] 2

EQUIPMENT

Legion Flight Ring 

QUALITIES

. Iconic: Very famous for having "seeded" many worlds
. Solar-Powered (yellow sun grants him powers, red sun cancels them)
. Vulnerable to lead (mitigated by the constant usage of Brainiac 5's serum)

 Points: 77

ORIGIN STORY:

Lar Gand, known variously as M'Onel, Mon-El or Valor, is a Daxamite, an alien from the planet Daxam. Exploring the galaxy, he landed on Krypton, but was immediately warned by Jor-El of the planet's imminent destruction and was given a map to Earth. He then went into suspended animation. After a few years, he landed on Earth and met Superboy. Although Gand suffered from amnesia upon landing on Earth, he and Superboy became good friends. Under Earth's yellow sun, he had powers like those of Superman; this led Superboy to believe that Gand might be his heretofore unknown long-lost brother. Superboy named the amnesiac alien "M'Onel": "Mon" because he landed on Earth on a Monday, and "El" for Superboy's own Kryptonian family name. Monel is also a metallic alloy, an appropriate name for the brother of the man (or boy) of steel.

M'Onel moved into the Kent home and created his own human secret identity (Bob Cobb) to integrate into Superboy's hometown of Smallville; when in alien garb, he accompanied Superboy on his heroic feats. However, when M’Onel failed to experience pain during an unnoticed inadvertent exposure to kryptonite (which is radioactively poisonous to all Kryptonians), Superboy suspected M’Onel was deliberately pretending to be a Kryptonian for some nefarious purpose. Understandably infuriated over what he believed to be a deliberate manipulation of his desire for ties to his original Kryptonian family, Superboy created a fake kryptonite meteorite made of lead and, when M’Onel was debilitated in his presence, Superboy believed his reaction to be proof of deception. However, M’Onel turned out to be in genuine pain because, in a remarkable piece of irony, Daxamites are highly sensitive to lead, even more so than Kryptonians are to kryptonite; whereas Kryptonians can recover from kryptonite poisoning if removed from exposure in time, even a small amount of lead exposure causes fatal, irreversible poisoning to Daxamites. Having regained his memories of meeting Jor-El and of his true nature, "M’Onel" was dying, so a guilt-ridden Superboy transported him into the extradimensional Phantom Zone until a cure could be found. Gand spent one thousand years as a poisoned, insubstantial, telepathic phantom, able to watch everything that happened in the outside world, but unable to affect it in the slightest.

In the 30th century, Saturn Girl created a temporary antidote to this poisoning allowing him to be released from the Zone for brief periods of time. During this period, he was considered an honorary Legionnaire. Brainiac 5 later created a permanent antidote, based on Saturn Girl's serum, with the addition of Kryptonite.

After passing his Legion test (including inventing flight ring metal) under the name "Marvel Lad", Lar Gand then joined the Legion of Super-Heroes, using the "M’Onel" moniker Superboy had given him. During this time, he was considered one of the Legion's big 3 (along with Superboy and Ultra Boy). In fact, his Daxamite abilities coupled with his immunity to the effects of Kryptonite and lead (and later, red solar radiation) made him the most powerful of all the Legionnaires. He served two terms as leader. Lar fell in love with Umbra (Tasmia Mallor), but the pair has had a rocky relationship despite their love for each other.

Converted characters, most of the times, unavoidably exceeds the 45-point limitation that the ICONS Superpowered Roleplaying Game core book recommends and it was revised, according to the ICONS Great Power book. I would like to thank Chris Heard, Jonathan Brock, Bill Olander and Steve Kenson himself for the kind help on discussing and helping me to sort out my doubts about Supersenses. The origin story is based on the pre-Zero hour version of the character. I also decided to keep the original name of the powers, according recommendation of Steve Kenson in ICONS Great Power book. Streamlined, once again, according to ICONS Superpowered Roleplaying: The Assembled Edition.