Madin

PHASE 2

Madin
Portrayed by Bex Taylor-Klaus
Codename:	Madin
Affiliations:	Generation X
Birthdate:	26 January 1999
Journal:	xp_madin
Player:	Al

I joined because I didn't know what else to do. They said I could help. It was. What was I supposed to do?

Madin is a mess, on the run and maybe considering violence as a solution.

Details

Character Journal: xp_madin

Real Name: Madin

Codename: N/A

Aliases: (formerly) Maddison Murphy. They consider this a human name that they no longer use or admit to.

First Appearance: February 21, 2023

Date of Birth: 26 January 1999

Place of Birth: Broadmeadows, Australia

Citizenship: Australian

Relatives: Ash (Brother, estranged). Madin is also estranged from their parents.

Education: Rising anti-mutant prejudice led Madin to drop out in the middle of year 8 after their powers manifested. There were attempts to get them back into school through the local TAFE and the Home Detention for Dangerous Mutants program but none of it really stuck and it really wasn’t actually school or even really education. Madin spent a while bouncing in and out of jail as a teenager and that was the closest they got to education for most of that period. There wasn’t a lot of will to include mutants likely to be dangerous in the state school system and by the time they were at the Port Hedland Detention Centre, they’d pretty much given up on education which was probably a good thing because the system wasn’t really designed for that kind of thing.

Madin has completed year 7 and half of year 8. Secretly, they’d like to finish high school and study music but doesn’t see that as realistic, since they’re a year 8 drop out.

Relationship Status: Single

Occupation: Ex-mercenary, odd-jobber, sex worker (occasionally). Unemployed if we're being technical here.

Team Affiliation: (if applicable)

Biography

Childhood

Madin was born on January 26, 1999 to working class but decent parents. When they were 5, their younger brother Ash was born.

A January baby, Madin was 6 when they started school in 2005. They’ve grown up under the shadow of the mutant problem and Australia’s increasingly repressive laws about mutant registration and training.

Their powers manifested in year 8, in 2013, and Madin was forced into the Mutant Registration and Training Program. Around the same time, bullying and social pressure led to Madin stopping attending school. Madin’s parents were wildly ill equipped for this. They wouldn’t have known what to do with a regular kid who refused school due to anxiety and bullying. A kid who was involved in the Registration program, who was under intense scrutiny in case they had a powers accident and killed everyone around them was outside their parents ability to handle and everyone else, from the principal on down was kind of relieved when Madin stopped attending school.

Not long after that, targeted for being purple and fourteen and stupid, Madin started hanging out with the local toughs who offered a shy 14 year old a place as an enforcer. They were jailed for the first time shortly before turning 15. There were attempts at school when Madin was in Parkville Youth Detention Centre and their remand conditions always included school attendance but Madin wouldn’t go, would go get in trouble with the police again and wind up back in jail for a period. When not in jail, Madin would fight, use drugs, hang with the local gangs who offered acceptance for work as muscle.

Post M-Day Australia

In 2015, the Australian government brought in the home detention for dangerous mutants program in response to M Day. Madin was involved. They broke their detention conditions early and wound up back in jail. They were 16. Madin’s parents cut ties with Madin not long after that and, with the safety of 11 year old Ash high on their list, they refused to let them back home.

At 16, homeless, Madin found themself having to turn to petty theft and dealing to survive. They wound up back in jail after a brief stint of homelessness for breach of detention conditions. Their mental health was pretty poor at this stage and after yet another stint in Parkville, Madin was sent to Port Headland in April 2015 as there was no way for them to comply with release conditions that insisted on having access to a home, curfew and movement restrictions.

Port Hedland Mutant Detention Centre was formerly an immigration detention centre. It sucked.

Eventually, in 2018, Madin was sent to Woomera Detention Centre. Less isolated than Port Headland, the Brotherhood staged a breakout from there.

Brotherhood affiliated mercenary and on to America

Madin spent a winter in hiding in Adelaide before being sent overseas to work as a mercenary for the Brotherhood’s operations in August 2018 aged 19. It was sort of voluntary. The alternative was basically staying in hiding and inevitably ending back up in a detention centre. The Brotherhood promised them a chance to fight for mutant liberation. The reality of the situation - some mutant related work interspersed with long periods supporting various mercenary operations in central Africa that the Brotherhood undertook to fund their work did not match what was promised.

After about three and a half years of this, Madin, not generally given to introspection, came to the conclusion that being a living weapon in a variety of conflicts they didn’t really understand and criminal security kind of sucked.

They cut and ran, paying a people smuggler in Kinshasa and wound up in America early 2022, spending a few months in Los Angeles. Madin has no legal ID, no bank accounts and no legal standing.

Early in 2022, Madin got in touch with Ash for the first time in years. The internet is a joy. Ash, newly 18, newly manifested themselves, indicated they would soon be sent to community detention as part of the mutant safety programs in Australia. Madin’s contacts in the Brotherhood got him out as well, via Indonesia where they lost contact again.

Madin left Los Angeles after contacting the Brotherhood, drifting across country before ending up in Chicago in September 2022.

They volunteer with the Underground - the parts not associated with the Brotherhood - in Chicago. They’re homeless and squat in a series of abandoned houses in the city and do odd jobs and sex work for cash. Madin is currently on the run from the Brotherhood who are, thankfully, not currently looking for Madin.

Madin worked with the Chicago Underground for a few months, afraid to ask for assistance and instead just moving into an abandoned house. They completed the odd hired muscle and sex work job for cash, as the prevalence of visible mutants in Chicago’s highly visible homeless population confirmed Madin’s belief that there was probably no help to be had, anyway.

Vaguely aware of Quentin Quire through the Underground, Madin assisted him and a small team of X-Factor's members to assist in finding missing teen Match. The fallout of that led to a showdown with police in Chicago is Burning.

Coming to the Mansion

Following that, with discretion the better part of valour, Madin accompanied them back to the mansion. They had several months of extreme anxiety, terrified that their past with the Brotherhood would come out, leading to a fairly reclusive life.

Their background didn't entirely line up with what they'd said. Garrison Kane and Kevin Sydney both began to ask around about them. Late September, Madin learned that they'd been asking about their background.

Prepared to cut and run, Madin reached out to their one friend at the mansion, Alani Ryan for assistance. Garrison intercepted them and Madin spent a difficult night in detention in the Danger Room before Kevin determined that they might have had Brotherhood ties but were no longer a threat to the mansion.

They were allowed to stay on the condition that they told the truth about their background.

Madin left despite that, taking up Quentin's offer to go to a mutant commune he knew of in Portland. When Quentin and David Haller confronted Radha and the commune fell apart, Madin was again left homeless. Out of options, they again returned to the mansion.

Coming to the Mansion (Again)

This time around, Madin was determined to do it right. No more secrets. A job, working as the mansion groundskeeper/handyman. A chance to finish their education. And with that came the chance to actually make friendships again.

Physical Characteristics

Height: 5'7"

General Build: Lean and athletic. There's no visible six pack but the muscle is there and there's visible definition to Madin's arms and legs.

Eyes: Black

Hair: Black

Other Features: Purple skin. What looks like long, jagged scars up the outside of both arms. These (and to an extent Madin’s arms) glow when their powers are in use. The pattern of the scars varies and is a physical representation of their powers

Powers

Madin’s powers are “light blades” - plasma electricity that is shaped through the scars on their arms into crackling blades that arc out from their hands either as knives they “hold” or short range projectiles. The size and intensity of the blade can be varied depending on the situation.

They’re skilled in the use of them and in fighting with them. They can cut through almost anything when they’re dialed up but dialed down, can deal just concussive force.

Madin uses their own energy to fuel the powers, so they need to eat more than the average person would, especially if they've been using their powers recently. Even when they're not using their powers, a metabolism primed to produce bio plasma runs hotter than human normal.

The blades vary in intensity, from concussive from concussive force with enough heat to burn through to something about as sharp as a scalpel and about 1000 degrees. The blades can be thrown about as far as you'd throw a baseball or just be more or less attached to Madin's hand like a ... plasma glove that's pointy and generally range from about 15 to 45cm, while the thrown ones are at most 20-30cm

Over time, they'd be able to make them smaller and more refined, down to even a few mm in length and 3000 to 5000 degrees if they chose to put that time and effort in - I guess they could use it for welding - or longer and less lethal so more like escrima sticks or a bo staff. Madin is working on the latter and has no idea or desire to go more lethal or knowledge that their powers could have civilian uses like welding.

They can use their powers for 20-30 minutes at low intensity without too much draining of their reserves and just feel like they've had a tough exercise class. High heat or cutting force no more than 5-10 minutes before they need to rest and eat.

Trivia

Madin has learned a reasonable amount of French, however, having primarily learned it in Mali and Democratic Republic of Congo, it is accented and peppered with slang picked up in during their years as a mercenary and Kinshasa and snippets of a few other languages - enough to insult you or ask for a coffee.

External Links

xp_communication posts

xp_journal posts

xp_logs posts

xp_generation-x posts

Plots

2023

Chicago is Burning

Clean Slate

A Haven to Call Home

2024

Behold A Pale Horse

Meta

Player: Al

Player Icon Base: Bex Taylor-Klaus

Meta Trivia

Any curious little things about why the character, if the character had a prior player before you (and who they were), etc.