Characters / Recoil

Doctor Ruth Goldstein

• Flight: Theoretically, she should be able to fly by projecting a stream of molten metal from her feet. Thus inflicting Toasted Buns on everyone else.
• Hand Blast: She can shoot white-hot molten steel (~5000 F) (mingled with plasma, just for fun) from her hands.
• Walking Spoiler: The reveal of her other identity is a major turning point in the fic, to the point where the narration (both from Taylor's perspective and from third-person perspective) stops calling her Doctor Goldstein and starts calling her Aster.

Sergeant James Mc Martin Kinsey

• Badass in Distress
  • In Part 3-1, he's under Nice Guy's influence, until Taylor beats him up and kills Nice Guy.
  • In Part 4-10, he's abducted in order to coerce Taylor into going on a date with Marquis. It doesn't work out.
• Badass Normal: No powers at all, but he still manages to fight through Valefor's powers in order to save Taylor's life. He later reveals he took her idea regarding self-hypnosis to implant a message within his psyche everyday that he will kill anyone who tries to harm Taylor.
• Battle Butler: As Taylor's orderly, he's functionally the military equivalent of a butler, while also being the only unpowered person capable of beating her in a fight.
• Brains and Brawn: The Taylor/Kinsey teamup. He's big and tough, and she's smart, although he's certainly not Dumb Muscle.
• Fighting from the Inside: According to Taylor, he was fighting against Nice Guy's powers, which is the reason she could beat him in a fight.
• Hand Cannon: He carries one.
• I Owe You My Life: Literally, no. Professionally speaking, yes; he was facing discharge after the Nice Guy incident, and Taylor took him on as her orderly. Also, it's Word of Author that if she hadn't taken him on, he would've eaten a bullet not long after leaving the service.
• Ignored Enamored Underling: Absolutely subverted. As Taylor's orderly, Kinsey is aware (and actively conceals the fact) that she's got an on-again off-again illegal relationship with Andrea. There is strong indication that he's got more than professional feelings toward her ... BUT. He's still absolutely loyal to her. She is, of course, his superior officer, so regulations say NO.
• One-Man Army: He teaches hand to hand combat. In Part 4-10, he takes on several Marquis men, and kills one before he is subdued.
• Sergeant Rock

Andrea Campbell

• But Not Too Bi: She prefers women, but will flirt with guys. And sometimes do much more.
• Cuddle Bug: She's very physical.
• The Cutie: If anyone can pull off 'innocently sexy', it's her.
• Ethical Slut: Andrea enjoys sex, a lot. She also has zero sense of shame. But she won't break up someone else's relationship.
• Experimented in College: Before she went away to school, she considered herself straight. Boy, did she learn a lot.
• Genki Girl
  "Yay!"
  "Moose!"
  "Darn tootin'."
• If It's You, It's Okay
  • Taylor is straight. Andrea is gay. Somehow, they make it work.
  • Andrea is (mainly) girl-oriented. Kinsey is very male. She doesn't care in the slightest.
• Living Emotional Crutch: She has been this to Taylor, on occasion (it's part of why their relationship works).
• Please Put Some Clothes On: In Part 4-11, Andrea answers the door wearing not much in the way of clothing. The police officers make this request of her.
• Plucky Comic Relief: With an accent on 'comic relief'. She can pass for The Ditz or the Cloudcuckoolander with little difficulty; silly is her natural state of being. If she's actually being serious, you know the situation is dire.
  Kinsey offered me the last piece of fish; I declined, so he ate it. Andrea stuffed her mouth with fries again, and bounced up to take the remains of our meal to the nearest garbage can. While she was doing this, Kinsey took the opportunity to lean in toward me.
  “Ma'am,” he murmured, “it strikes me that your friend is brighter than she seems.”
  “Oh, I know,” I replied, just as softly. “I've known for years. Don't ever assume she doesn't know something, just because you didn't tell her.”
  “But why does she put on the bimbo act?” he asked, his eyebrows drawing together; mild frustration, I guessed. I got the impression that he'd wanted to add 'brainless' in there, but had left it out due to tact.
  I grinned. “I don't think it's an act.”
• The Reliable One: She's the one Taylor picked to run her financial empire ... and she's doing a pretty good job of it.
• Slut-Shaming: absolutely averted. The most that happens is that Franklin (Gladys' other half) is somewhat boggled that she's so casual about picking up girls from a college bar (and that's only because she's supposed to be in a relationship with Taylor).

Kari Schultz

• Children Forced to Kill: She's just fourteen, and normally, she wouldn't even consider killing someone. But desperate times ...
• Ear Ache: When up against a Brute intent on killing her, she kills him with a metal spike through the ear canal and into the brain.
• Extra-ore-dinary: She's a parahuman with the ability to manipulate metal.
• I Just Want to Be Normal: She really doesn't want these powers. Unfortunately, other people wanted her for them ...
• Puberty Superpower: She was fourteen when she manifested powers.
• Near-Rape Experience: She's kidnapped for use as breeding stock for parahumans. Fortunately, her designated 'partner' isn't actually into that.
• Took a Level in Badass: When she's got no means of escape, she looks like a Damsel in Distress. Give her some metal and watch out.

Roberto Garcia (aka Aguijón)

• Driven to Villainy: He didn't think he had a choice after he committed murder.
• Even Evil Has Standards: He's joined an Apocalypse Cult and has been ordered to breed new parahumans for the cause, but he won't resort to rape.
• Eye Scream: When fighting a Brute, he uses his power to target the guy's only vulnerable spot.
• Gratuitous Spanish: Played straight. He's the son of a Mexican migrant worker. Spanish is his first language.
• Hand Blast: He can fire multiple projectiles from his hands. These take tiny chunks out of whatever he shoots them at. He can also guide them into the target.
• Manslaughter Provocation: His father was murdered before his eyes.

Robert Gordon

• Burger Fool: Forced to work a fast-food job after being discharged from the PRT. It's revealed that Calvert has been sabotaging all his job interviews to make the man amenable to his job offer.
• Butt-Monkey: Due to his vendetta against Taylor, he suffers one humiliation after another and goes from a Captain in the PRT and senior intelligence officer to working at a fast-food joint with a teenage boss.
• Evil Is Petty: Gordon's entire vendetta against Taylor traces back to her refusing to sleep with him, resulting in him doing everything he could to destroy her career.
• Horrible Judge of Character: Gordon believes Taylor has absolutely no business being in the intelligence division, let alone having so much sway with the wider PRT, chalking her accomplishments up to luck and favoritism. He immediately trusts Mama Mathers and refuses to hear anything bad about her even after she's revealed to be a Master, and he instantly jumps on a job offer from Calvert seeing him as a kindred spirit.
• Moral Myopia: In his mind, Taylor revealing his very real stash of contraband and crimes is a horrible miscarriage of justice, but him faking evidence of crimes by her is fully justified because "she must be guilty of something".
• Never My Fault: Gordon's vendetta against Taylor that started over the fact that she wouldn't sleep with him ultimately gets him court-martialed, and only gets off with a other-than-honorable discharge rather than jail time because some of his crimes were done while Mastered (which only happened because he ignored Taylor's protocols on how to avoid, detect and/or resist Mastering). He still thinks everything is Taylor's fault.
• Selective Obliviousness:
  • He'll never admit that Taylor actually is good at her job or that the esteem others hold her in is based on her own merit rather than Sleeping Their Way to the Top. As a result, he completely ignores the Snow Protocols designed to protect against Masters and Strangers, getting him ensnared by Mama Mathers and her son.
  • Gordon refuses to believe that Christine and Elijah Mathers were Masters even after he's told that dozens of people came forward after they were killed, citing that they had been mastered by them and unable to speak about it. He even insists they must have heard about Taylor's actions and tried to either get in her good books or justify something they did, despite the fact several came forward within minutes of their deaths, long before they could have learned of said deaths.
• Unknown Rival: It takes Taylor quite some time to learn that Gordon hates her and views her as his arch-enemy, even as she casually bests him every time he attempts to challenge her.