Legion World Forums LEGION CLUBHOUSE The Legion of Super-Heroes Literal Legion

In some universe, there's a team where the Legion are quite literally their code-names!

The Founders are;

Lightning Lad. This Legionnaire is a powerful entity composed entirely of electrical plasma energy, that can bind itself via magnetic fields into the form of a humanoid male (usually...). Whether or not this is 'his' natural state, or he was once a biological humanoid of flesh and blood is unclear, but he's now a 'living lightning bolt,' and may not be able to hit you with 1.21 gigawatts and transport you through time, but he can certainly light you up!

Cosmic Boy. Mysterious linch-pin of the team, a swirling aperture opens at unpredictable intervals, and a tiny spacesuited figure can sometimes be seen, as if far away from the man-shaped void surrounding him. With properties involving deep space, and some undefined extrasensory powers, 'Cosmic Boy' warns of impending dangers, and can force those touching the event horizon surrounding his personal singularity to experience the conditions of deep space, or even transport them there! Attacks launched at him simply are absorbed, and fly off into deep space, except for rare times when they 'destablize the aperture' and he temporarily disappears, for a seemingly-random time, ranging from minutes to months! (He seems to have an uncertain relationship with linear time, and will sometimes refer to someone he just met as an old friend, or not seem to know at all someone whom he's interacted with for years...)

Saturn Girl. Well, she's not *literally* the planet Saturn, that would be silly! (But see Sun Boy...) She's a large lass, built for the high-gravity of the gas-mining habitats around Saturn, with the great strength and toughness that would suggest, but her true powers are her 'Saturn's Rings' of orbiting material she uses offensively and defensively, using her unique telekinetic gifts (which are less precise than some, specializing in seizing up heavy items and putting them into 'orbit' around herself, or flinging them like meteors at distant foes, but far more powerful than most!).

There are many others, but of the non-Founders, the one to immediately note is Lightning Lass, since she is sometimes recorded as a separate Legionnaire. She is not, technically. Sometimes the energetic entity known as Lightning Lad assumes the shape of a woman's body, and answers to Lightning Lass. (Their electrically-transmitted 'voice' similarly changes, as does their demeanor.) Whether Lad or Lass, they do not seem to recognize or acknowledge any reference to these gender-changes, and their teammates have learned to roll with it. It's hardly the strangest thing about the Literal Legion!

Phantom Girl - Tinya is not literally a phantom herserlf, but the slender pale young girl with her large expressive eyes and waterfall of night-black hair is surrounded by them, it seems. The only survivor of a failed colony settlement, Tinya sometimes seems to have extrasensory powers, or access to supernatural information, or even telekinetic gifts, but this is because her family remains with her, now almost a decade after the deaths of their physical bodies. Perhaps some unusual trait of the world they'd settled upon caused their spiritual essences to remain bound to their last surviving relative, and now the 'ghosts' of her parents, her older brother and her uncle all accompany her, sharing their knowledge and their minor 'ghostly' talents for affecting items in the physical world, in her adventures, now that they are all free of their doomed home. Phantom Girl has also demonstrated the ability to communicate with other spiritual entities, and non-corporeal life-forms, so perhaps it wasn't her world that caused her family's spirits to linger, but some property of Tinya herself...

Triplicate Girls - like many Carggites, Lu, Li and Lo were born identical triplets. Unlike most, they were born quantum-entangled, which each sharing both the mind and physical characteristics of the other two, so that any one of them can be three times as strong, tough or smart as a normal girl (a normal highly athletic, insanely competitive overachiever who is smart-as-a-whip, that is!). As a strange side-effect of this quantum-entanglement, there is a subtle sensation drawing the three together, and while they can separate, even by great distances, they always remain mentally linked in real time, and at any time, one can 'give in' to the pull and be instantly transported across space to the location of one of her sisters!

Element Lad - this young man joined the Legion under another name, as he involuntarily transformed to iron, and was named Ferro Lad. He was a Legionnaire for two years under this name, a literal man of iron, with the strength and durability that would imply, until Brainiac 5 developed a technique that allowed him to revert to flesh and blood again. His powers have expanded, and now he can transform his body into *any* pure element (although iron remains his favorite form), and has changed his name to represent that spiritual growth.

Colossal Boy - a battle across the timelines led to the wicked magician Mordru animating the Colossus of Rhodes to stomp on the meddling Legionnaires that opposed him, but the spirit he awakened within it rebelled before striking a lethal blow, and instead turned on Mordu himself, helping the Legion to foil his scheme to change the past! With his parting blow, Mordru took back the magic that had given life to 'Colossal Boy,' and he crumbled into rubble. The Legion returned to the future, only to find Colossal Boy there, waiting for them. At some point over the last 1000 years, the dregs of magic that lay within the individual stones of his destroyed body had aged like fine wine, and the debris slowly pulled itself together and reformed, and now, ten centuries later, he was ready to experience al the world and it's adventures that a sixty foot stone statue can, that is...

Violet - a vegetal life form from the planet Imsk, Violet's body is as hard as wood, and yet flexible, covered with toxic thorns and topped with magnificent purple petals, where many humanoids instead have hair. She exults in the sun on her skin, and the earth beneath her feet, and the rain soaking across her body, and is somewhat wild by nature, fighting with a silent fury with her thorny claws (and their paralytic venom), and also exuding a potent choking pollen from her head, that leaves unprotected human foes gasping for breath and all-but-helpless before her. Violet is mute, like all her species, communicating via pheremones that have proven difficult to translate, but is no 'shrinking violet,' being a sensualist through and through, living life as large as she can, and wishing to sample all of this universe outside of the jungles of Imsk she can.

Sun Boy - this white dwarf star is barely larger than Jupiter, and fully sapient and capable of controlling it's own wanderings through the universe (and communicating long-distance by manipulating it's own electromagnetic emissions, although the Legion has constructed it a 'Flight Ring' of massive size that circles entirely around it, and allows both improved control of it's gravitational lensing for control, and FTL communications with it's team-mates). Unlike the rest of the Legion, Sun Boy cannot enter Earth's solar system without the increased light, radiation and gravity wreaking havoc on Earth and her solar system colonies, so he remains in the Oort perimeter, close enough to bring his bulk to bear on any Legion crisis that comes from beyond our solar system, or in wait to travel to any other deep space crisis that warrants his involvement.

Star Boy - well, Sun Boy is already a literal star, and even in the Literal Legion, we can't have two heroes with the exact same powers, so Star Boy is that other kind of star, a superhumanly capable celebrity, and the prime influencer / decider / arbiter of what's cool and what's drool on his native Xanthu, where million's turn in every day to his 24/7 (well, 20/10, but they have different hours of the day and days of the week there) livecast to learn what to watch and where to eat and who to vote for. His relentless celebrity results from a strange supernatural confluence at the time of his birth that resulted in him being all things to all people. Everyone finds something to like about him, and his only real friends are those who are immune to his power and can honestly disagree with, or even criticize him, such as Dream Girl, who may or may not share his infatuation with him (she's playing it cool, but she *does* visit his dreams more than most...).

Dream Girl - 'a dream to some, a nightmare, to others!' Dream Girl has no corporeal existence, as far as anyone knows (maybe she does have a sleeping body, on her homeworld of Naltor, which nobody has ever heard of?). She appears in the dreams of various Legionnaires, sometimes many at once, to deliver surreal warnings about dangers present, past and to come, and also haunts the dreams of some of their recurring foes, garnering intelligence she uses to sow these pearls of enlightenment. She tends to speak in a dream-like manner, with frequent uses of colorful imagery or complex allegory, so that her exact meaning can sometimes be hard to decipher, until it all becomes clear in hindsight.

Timber Wolf - is a sapient Timber Wolf, an Earth-animal otherwise thought to be extinct. It can, with effort, communicate on a nearly telepathic level, through projected images and empathic feelings, but possesses no language other than that of it's species. Through these communications, it has conveyed, with difficulty, that it is an emissary of the Red, sent to help the Legion first to fight a threat to the Earth's ecosystem itself, and remaining because so many of the threats they face endanger the world, or her creatures, that it simply makes sense to continue the mission. Timber Wolf doesn't otherwise appear to possess any powers beyond those of an above-average specimen of it's species (although it's hard to say, since nobody has ever seen a real Timber Wolf for centuries, to compare it to), but it does appear to be functionally immortal, as it has 'died' several times in past Legion missions, and wandered out of the nearest wilderness zone anywhere from days to, in one memorable case, *minutes* later. 'The Red' also appears to be able to produce more than one protector of this sort, as the invasion of an alien plant-based ecosystem resulted in Timber Wolf howling and *thousands* of timber wolves pouring out of nearby wilderness zones to tear up and destroy the fast-growing invasive alien foliage! (All but the original 'Timber Wolf' then wandered away and vanished, afterwards.) The opposite of Sun Boy, who never visits Earth, Timber Wolf never leaves the planet.

Princess Projectra - her highness has the royal power to repel the rabble away from herself, and has developed it far beyond the Orandan royal family's normal protective function, to be able to launch herself high into the sky (and land safely hundreds of yards away, light as a feather), or to target a single individual and eject them bodily from her presence, or even to 'give someone a gift' and cause a small hand held object to fly from her hand at bullet-like speeds! Her choice to further expand her repertoire shocking new (non-traditional) ways of using the royal projection powers, and to do so among the filthy peasants of the Legion, has scandalized her peers on Orando, which only makes it all the more fun, for her. She makes some high-minded mention to audiences back home of setting an example of noblesse obligue and making the universe a safer place for Orandans and blah-blah, but really, she just likes not having to spend two hours every morning being primped into an uncomfortable new royal outfit and coached through another day of tedious meetings and appearances and events. Plus she *is* doing far more good in the universe as a Legionnaire, than as royal-appendage number eleventy-seven of the already superfluously large royal family.

These are amazing, Set, very inventive! That power upgrade for Triplicate Girl could have been done in the context of any Legion version to date. Neil Gaiman had a story with sentient suns and our Sol was the new kid, but this Sun Boy is a lot more alien. I like the personality change for Star Boy to go with his name and the funny aspect of Projectra's power. Hope you continue. Shadow Lass would be easy but Mon-el? Might have to go with Valor. although there's an alloy named monel.

Well yeah, the alloy. But surely the adventures of Monofiliment Elephant and the Super Pets is the more obvious choice?

Thanks, glad you're enjoying them! I just wanted some variants for the fun of it, and I first thought of it with Cosmic Boy (and to a lesser extent, Saturn Girl), who really didn't have anything to do with 'Cosmic' (and little to do with 'Saturn'). And it just sort of spiralled from there. Chameleon Boy an actual chameleon, Timber Wolf an actual timber wolf, Sun Boy an actual *sun,* Dream Girl a literal dream...


Phew, dodged that bullet, I was *this* close to posting that exact thought!

(Not really.)

Brainiac 5 is the latest in a long line of reconfigurations as the Brainiac construct re-imagines itself over the centuries. In the past it had been a legendary super-villain, hostile to organic life, but as of it's latest revision, Brainiac 5 considers himself a caretaker of organic life, the wellspring from which synthetic life itself springs, as vital to the 'evolution' of his species as bacteria are to organic humanoid life (an unflattering comparison, to be sure, but exactly the sort he tends to make, being... undiplomatic.). From his enormous ship, still shaped like a humanoid skull with many tentacles (he has been advised to perhaps modify it's appearance to something less genocide-y, and promises to 'get around to it'), he coordinates the activities of the Literal Legion, as well as the United Planets, and, while nobody is entirely comfortable with how dependent they have become on him, it is Brainiac's enormous intellect and apparently unlimited data processing and storage power, that keeps the United Planets communications system in real-time connection, the economy running, etc. as he, single-handedly (or, single-mindedly?) serves as the 'Internet' for a third of the galactic spiral...

Shadow Lass one half of a dualistic entity from Talokk VIII, Shadow Lass is a shadow in the shape of a woman, a bold silhouette of a person, that somehow conveys the full force of a grown woman (from a world that has a slightly greater gravitational field than Earth, making her surprisingly strong for her 'size,' if not superhumanly so, while remaining selectively incorporeal, as hard to strike in return as the shadow she appears to be. She moves at incredible speed, but only across surfaces, moving like a two-dimensional shadow of a person, and depending on circumstances (lighting, in particular), she can sometimes appear to be far larger than normal, or even in multiple places at once! (But she is also at the whim of light sources, and can sometimes find herself unable to effectively materialize...)

Light Lass no relation to Lightning Lass, mentioned above, Light Lass is the other half of the dualistic entity from Talokk VIII, an image of light, usually appearing in any reflective surface, and moving from mirror to polished metal to the surface of water, effortlessly leaping from reflection to reflection. She can, like her 'dark half,' exert the physical strength of a normal (Talokkian) woman, and, unlike her shadow-self, can seize others and drag them into a reflective surface, either fighting them inside this 'mirror-verse,' or flitting to another reflective surface within visual range and levng them trapped until A) the reflective surface is damaged or destroyed or B) the lighting conditions change so that the reflective surface no longer shows a reflection, at which point they are violently expelled (and usually disoriented for a short time). If *she* is similarly 'trapped' by the reflective surface in which she appears being darkened, she has no corporeal form to be expelled, but merely is shunted to the next reflective surface within visual range, or, if none are available, remains 'stuck in the dark,' waiting for someone to shine a light on the reflective surface, so that she can reappear.

Chemical King a former ruler from the world of Phlon, Chemical King was indeed elected King (a title used regardless of the gender identity of the 'King'), and served as such for a 6 month term, and, like all Phlonnian 'Kings,' retains the title for life, so that he is one of (currently) seventy-four living 'Kings' (only one of whom is the current 'King') of Phlon. Chemical King has the power to create any chemical formula that he knows of, secreting it from his hands, or his saliva, or even his tears, as desired, in startling quantities. This ability is available to all Phlonnian Kings, and is one of the reasons why the Phlonnian people cycle through Kings so rapidly, to spread this 'royal' gift around, for the benefit of all Phlonnians. Thanks to a continuing lifelong course in chemistry, Chemical Kng can create adhesives, amphetamines, sedatives, medicines, incendiaries, explosives, corrosives, anaesthetics, lubricants, etc. aplenty, and has been known to create chemical compounds with properties that would astonish 21st century science, such as liquids that harden into a crystalline solid, absorb heat and generate ice, dissolve into vast clouds of vapor, or cause material coated to become translucent!