Foundation's Children is a collaborative work between The Hail Stormer and Ironcommando
It is a few years into the future, and technology is ever improving. Behind the scenes, things aren't as simple- a huge, secretive organization known as the Foundation is conducting unethical experiments on various subjects they can get their hands on.
This story focuses on three subjects of the Foundation who managed to escape. Zircon, a Humanoid Alien whose ship had crashed on Earth and was experimented on by the Physics Division, Iris, a girl who was kidnapped and made into a Winged Humanoid with Psychic Powers, and "Reaper", a young man whose brain was extracted and placed into a robot after being duped into a programme.
Story Tropes
- Phlebotinum Rebel: The three main characters are these.
Main Characters
"Reaper" (Model Thanatos)
- Accidental Hero: During a non-VR mission, he fired a Macross Missile Massacre at a bridge. Said attack blew up the truck that Iris was captive in, freeing her.
- Blow You Away: His jet propulsion systems can be used to fire out blasts of wind. These don't hurt much but do produce good amounts of Knock Back.
- Combat Pragmatist: Knows a lot of underhanded and sneaky tactics to even a fight. He notes that he would not be able to beat Zircon or Iris or most of his former team in a head-on fight, but also states that he will not pull a fair fight in a life and death scenario.
- Cool Plane: Can transform into a stealth jet.
- Fighter, Mage, Thief: The Thief of the main trio, attacking with stealth and underhand techniques, and is a Fragile Speedster.
- Green-Eyed Monster: Is pretty damn envious of his Always Second Best position in the VR Team.
- Hard Light: Thanatos' Clone Drones are drones that project one.
- Healing Factor: When not in combat, his nanomachines will regenerate him and his systems.
- Homing Lasers: His homing missiles get upgraded to be able to fire this, similar to Procyon.
- Knight, Knave, and Squire: Zig-zagged. While his fighting style is underhanded and Combat Pragmatist like the knave, his goal and reasons for fighting are a noble, more selfless cause to take down the Foundation- a trait of the Knight.
- Laser Blade: Is equipped with two plasma blades that can easily help him cut through most materials with great ease.
- Invisibility Cloak: Has a stealth system that allows him to become invisible to the naked eye as well as to other machines.
- I Know Madden Kombat: Much of his fighting skill was learned through video games.
- Macross Missile Massacre: Has two variants- small missiles that are more numerous, and larger missiles which are less numerous but have a greater explosion.
- Ninja Pirate Zombie Robot: He's basically a Ninja Zombie Robot Airplane.
- The Reveal: It's revealed quite late into the story that his name is Pierce Rayfer.
- Revenge: One of his motivations is to take down the Foundation for pulling their unethical stuff on innocent victims like the VR Team, Iris and Zircon.
- Revenge Before Reason: There's quite a few times where his feelings of revenge towards the Foundation make him do stuff that compromise the group's safety.
- Smoke Out: His "Clone Drones" have the ability to explode into nanomachine smoke that have a variety of effects, usually causing drowsiness or paralysis, or just to obscure vision.
- Stealth Expert: Thanks to having cloaking tech and experience at playing stealth games, he's pretty good at being the team's stealth/intel.
- Stepford Smiler: Underneath his rather cool, laid back and happy exterior is actually a rather bitter and vengeful individual. He keeps happy in order to mask it.
- Super-Reflexes: Thanks to robotic processors, he gets these. Is later shown to be due to slowed-down time when in danger, with a convenient Press X to Not Die sequence.
- Toxic Friend Influence: To the kid Procyon"We're going to need to break in and steal some stuff from the Foundation.""But breaking in and stealing stuff is a bad thing, and I'm a good boy!""Well, you see, these guys we're stealing stuff from are bad guys, so stealing from bad guys is a good thing!"
- Weak, but Skilled: Of the trio. He's not as strong as Zircon and his abilities are less destructive than Iris, but he's very cunning and skilled in a fight and never fights head on.
IT Division
Tropes Pertaining to the VR Team
- Nanomachines: Allows the entire group to regenerate slowly when not in combat, by repairing themselves.
- Tongue-Tied: They're not allowed to communicate out their real name, or else an Explosive Leash in their brain will trigger and destroy them. Typhoon finds this out the hard way when he tries to write his real name out with a laser.
- Transforming Mecha: All of the VR Team have a vehicular and a humanoid form which they can transform into at will.
- Weak, but Skilled: Compared to the MYTHOS unit and the escaped aliens, they aren't as strong in terms of power, but make up for it in skill, weaponry, and tactics.
- Wetware CPU: All of them are linked to a human brain which does communications for them.
"Ace" (Model Helios)
- The Ace: Like his namesake suggests, he's the best at pretty much everything in the VR Team
- The Leader: First in command of the VR Team.
- Detachment Combat: Each of his head/body/limbs are detachable and can be independently controlled.
- Immune to Mind Control: After Procyon defects from the team, he gets fitted with counter-hacking tech to prevent himself from being hacked.
- Kill Sat: Uses these to transmit his brain signals from a secret base to him. They're also used to drop extremely powerful blasts from above.
- Pride: Looks down on the other members of the team and does not hesitate to remind them why he is the leader.
- Playing with Fire: While he doesn't have any flame-shooting weapons per se, a good number of his weapons involve heat rays and microwaves.
- Wrong Genre Savvy: Thinks he's some Hot-Blooded shonen mecha hero. He's far from it, and is in fact completely deluded..
"Marina" (Model Nereid)
- Blob Monster: She's made of a water-like nanomachine based substance.
- Cool Boat: Transforms into a hydrofoil/speedboat machine.
- Making a Splash: Her nano-gel has the ability to manipulate water.
- Immune to Mind Control: After Procyon defects from the team, she gets fitted with counter-hacking tech to prevent herself from being hacked.
- Yandere: Violently protective towards Ace. She even attacks Reaper who tried to hit on her, and once Ace disses her later on, she helps the protagonists defeat Ace so that he "can be with her forever".
"Siege" (Model Titan)
- The Big Guy: Heaviest firepower and defence of the VR team, but not too intelligent.
- The Bully: Attempts to pick on the other members of the team.
- Butt-Monkey: He gets beaten up by almost everyone. Including Procyon!
- Dumb Muscle: The most idiotic of the group, and it shows.
- Immune to Mind Control: After Procyon defects from the team, he gets fitted with counter-hacking tech to prevent himself from being hacked.
- Fire-Breathing Weapon: Carries a flamethrower.
- Forgot About His Powers: Happens pretty damn often- he's not very bright and tends to even forget about his functions.
- Tank Goodness: His vehicle mode is a tank.
- Unskilled, but Strong: Compared to the rest of the team. He's a powerhouse, but his strategy of "blindly firing in all directions", while strong against mooks, sucks against stronger targets.
"Glitch" (Model Procyon)
- Attack Drone: Can store up to 8 of them. Subverted in that they don't attack, but they help as defence.
- Doppelgänger Spin: His attack drones can project doppelgangers of himself.
- Cheerful Child: Being a kid, he's very active and cheerful.
- Child Prodigy: He's only 10 and he's an expert in programming, technology, and hacking!
- Cool Bike: Transforms into a bike with Hard Light wheels.
- Hard Light: A lot of his abilities revolve around this, especially his projectors that put up defensive shields.
- Homing Lasers: His primary ranged attack are a swarm of up to 8 lock-on lasers.
- Immune to Mind Control: Is fitted with natural hacking immunity.
- Invisibility Cloak: Has a stealth system that allows him to become invisible to the naked eye as well as to other machines.
- Lazy Bum: A lot of the time, he'd rather be playing his own videogames or doing hacking for fun than helping the team out, and the team has to scold him for it.
- Playful Hacker: Has a cheerful kid personality and sometimes hacks stuff for fun and giggles."I could make the stock market crash if I wanted to!"
- Shock and Awe: Most of his powers and weapons are electricity-based.
- Support Party Member: Isn't all that good in a fight, but he is valuable when it comes to intel gathering, hacking, as well as stealth.
"Typhoon" (Model Zephyr)
- Future Copter: His vehicle form is a futuristi attack helicopter.
- Greed: The only reason why he joined this was so he could be funded money in a publicity stunt and nothing much else.
- Only in It for the Money: See Greed above.
- Sacrificial Lamb: He's killed off to show that yes, the Foundation's IT division are NOT playing around when they said that attempting to communicate their real name would get the VR team member killed.
Model Ragnarok
The training boss that serves as an ultimate obstacle for the VR team.
- Humongous Mecha: A gigantic mecha with equally gigantic arsenal capable of ending the world.
- Real After All: Ragnarok is an actual machine, not just a VR simulation boss. It's dormant, and worse, it's the son of the IT division's leader
- Walking Arsenal: Literally loaded to the teeth with weapons.
Nanobytes
IT division Mooks that are made of nanotechnology and can easily shift and disguise themselves.
- Big Brother Is Watching: They're used to track the main trio, usually by hiding as inconspicuous objects.
- Mooks: Of the IT division.
- Mecha-Mooks: As they're made of nanobots, they serve as mechanical mooks befitting the IT division.
Head of IT
A charismatic man who is the head of the Foundation's IT division.
- Arch-Enemy: Of Thanatos.
- Affably Evil: Appears as a charismatic guy who can win the attention of crowds. Even as he encounters the heroes, he's still very well mannered.
- Big Brother Is Watching: Those Nanobytes? They're part of him.
- Grey Goo: A controlled version- He's made of neurally controlled nanomachines, but yes, they can eat everything to reproduce more nanobots if he wanted to
- Nanomachines: He uses them very often, including his own mooks. He himself is a nanoswarm.
- Trick Boss: When the heroes fight him... he launches a few moderately powerful attacks, but goes down very quickly against the combined power of Zircon, Iris, Thanatos, and their allies. Then his nanomachine remains sink into the floor, and a lot of nanomachine goop fills the room... cue One-Winged Angel form
- The Worm That Walks: A Nanomachine swarm.
- Would Hurt a Child: He's not above extracting the brain of a 10 year old child.
