Microstory 171: Leary Novak

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Leary Novak and his sister, Mindy grew up on a farm in Nebraska, not all that far from Bellevue. Their parents had Leary when they were rather old, and adopted Mindy when they were even older, so they passed on when the children were relatively young. The two of them continued to keep the farm in working order, and felt no need to do anything else with their lives. Leary was on The Keystone’s anomaly shortlist, and was contacted during Stage Two of recruitment. His skin is extremely elastic, and allows him to temporary store and release large amounts of energy. Any strike against him is either deflected by a sort of force field, or absorbed and converted into energy that he can use at his discretion. A bullet will not be able to get within a centimeter or so of his body. If he falls from a great height, he will bounce back up and land safely on the ground. Any punch will be absorbed and stored, and will serve only to make him stronger, but this boost will eventually dissipate. Because of this, he has superhuman strength, and only only ever needed to sleep about a half hour to function throughout the day. The force fields he creates allow him to basically turn any surface into a trampoline. When they were young, he and his sister would jump in the pastures for fun, with the force fields sending them high into the air. They referred to this as the “hopping ground”. After Reactivation, and some training from Bellevue, Leary discovers that he can convert other forms of energy. His skin develops the ability to absorb solar power, wind energy, and even electrical shocks, decreasing his sleep threshold to only about thirty minutes, or even lower. Although he learned what he could about his own abilities, and trained to know how to use them properly and effectively, Leary chose to pursue a simple life. He and Mindy sold the family farmland and moved down to Bellevue where they handled the organization’s agricultural needs, with the help of Hester Khan and Flora Canto, when she wasn’t busy with administration. They never made waves, and stayed out of most of the drama.