Agent Winters
I came up with Agent Winters and Sierra-Kilo with a few friends. The idea of Sierra-Kilo was to be some fun, pulpy, action-filled adventure where everyone worked as a team. It ended up being one of the best roleplaying experiences I ever had. The character, Winters, was always the Leader of a team. He was a character where everyone could collaborate stories with. As such, every time I bring him back, he was almost always seen with a squad of UNTIL agents. As the character grew on me, and as I started to play various distant versions of him in different games, there was always one theme that stuck to him. Agent Winters is an underdog story. He must never become too powerful to fully stand on his own, but he mustn't be too clumsy either. It was a blast to try to balance it in roleplay. And as time went on, Agent Winters became my own little tribute to Nick Fury, my favorite comic book character ever.
Contents
Psychological Profile
Personality
Brandon Winters is a devout and loyal agent of UNTIL, firmly able to stand for the organization's cause and morals. Disciplined through the Australian Army and through UNTIL, Winters tries his best not to sound too robotic in social situations. He loves bad jokes more than anybody should. In the professional setting, he likes it straight-forward and direct. Heroes who do nothing more but talk cryptically are a personal pet-peeve of his. His hobbies include exercising and shooting for sport.
Abilities
Skills
Brandon Winters is highly trained in multiple martial-arts and hand-to-hand combat. When he was in the Australian Army, he had learned Military Self Defense, Freestyle Karate and Hapkido. He knows UNTIL Commando Training and is trained in edge weapons. He is skilled in all basic assault weapons. Winters is athletic and has excellent stamina. The agent is able to keep a cool-head in combat and assess a situation tactically. Studying at an officer academy, he can move personnel into the field when needed. With UNTIL training, he has experience in law enforcement, intelligence, and espionage. The languages he knows are English, American Sign Language, Russian, and French. With his perks of being an UNTIL Agent, he has an International Driver's License, Passport, and an International Weapon Permit.
Equipment
As an UNTIL Agent, he uses the standard UNTIL equipment. Brandon Winters preferred weapon of choice is the U-KTF "Katie" Blaster Assault Rifle. The Assault Rifle is a variant on the U-CCC Blaster Rifle, but the U-KTF has automatic fire. The blasts are powerful enough to knock over a brick wall. Like other agents, he uses the standard sidearm, the U-SHL "Shellie" Blaster Pistol. The pistol fires a Pulson bolt that is able to make an average person fall to the ground. For tougher individuals, the Shellie needs a few more hits to get the job done. Tucked in his harness, he carries a UB-1 Battle Knife. In a combat situation the combat knife is Winters' last resort, no matter how big the opponent is. The agent can almost always be seen in his U-AS Basic Combat Uniform.
Experimental Devices
Winters' main objective is to field-test experimental weaponry for UNTIL's R&D branch. The equipment he must test are supposed to replace the current line of standard issue technology. Whether the new devices are good enough to be mass-produced remains to be seen. The prototypes Agent Winters has to test all come with their special perks but also have their flaws.
For superhuman crowd-control, UNTIL scientists have made the ECW-4 "ElectroWeb" Grenade. Packed inside a small canister, the ElectroWeb is made up of sticky, tightly weaved, metallic fibers. Underneath the twisted fibers are copper wiring that carries an electric current. Tiny black generators run along the fibers and create a shock powerful enough to severely injure a normal human being. When the canister is thrown, the web entangles anyone within a 5 feet radius. The electric current almost immediately kicks in. There are two main drawbacks with this device. One, the shock only lasts for about 3 seconds. Two, it is noted that that the current can weaken the metallic fibers.
The X-UAS 2 "Sky Hammer" Unmanned Air Support Drone is a very expensive piece of technology, so it may never see actual combat use. Only two prototypes have been made. This version that Winters has, comes with a technologically advanced stealth-cloaking system. The Sky Hammer can reach speeds of 581 mph. It is operated by two people on the ground. It is mainly to be used as a recon drone, but the Sky Hammer has a heavy Pulson cannon attached to it and will provide aerial support when needed. UNTIL has been given special permission from PRIMUS to fly this drone in isolated areas inside the United States of America, and it is never to be used near cities.
Service Record
Sierra-Kilo
In August 2010, a top-secret Soviet Union factory became active after nineteen years of abandonment in Siberia. The factory had been spawning powerful mechanized robots that had been capable of defeating superheroes. When Russia realized the threat was too great, they had allowed UNTIL to step in. Sierra-Kilo, among other squads of Sierra Company, was dropped down into the frigid tundra. With UNTIL helping with suppression fire, the superheroes stood a better chance against the robots. Sergeant-Major Lee Rogers and his squad fought through the machines and eventually made their way into the revived facility, alone. When they arrived at the control room, they found an old supercomputer that had been infected by Mechanon. Lee Rogers charged forward into the room, yelling his name like a madman, and promptly died from a laser turret mounted on the ceiling. The whole team was in shock, but Hound quickly took position and led on the fight against the computer. Scorcher planted explosives throughout the factory and Sierra-Kilo started their career with a bang.
After the Siberia incident, Sierra-Kilo was sent to UNTIL's main headquarters in New York to be reassigned a new squad leader. Brandon Winters had just been promoted to sergeant before gaining leadership over Sierra-Kilo. Nobody in the team liked him at first, especially Hound and Scorcher. They saw Winters as too green apposed to their former experienced leader, Rogers. Winters would be their leader from then on.
The squad was never alone in their missions. They had two unprofessional operators, Matthews and Smith, who chatted the team up on their radios. Matthews and Smith watched their movements via satellite and mapped out the battleground. Matthews' personality was more care-free and loose. Smith had a more serious attitude, but was very lazy.
The team had been all over the world doing a variety of different operations. One such operation, codenamed White Mongoose, had Winters and Hound attack a VIPER research base in Northern Canada. They infiltrated the labs, stole the information, and got caught. With alarms blaring, Hound and Winters decided to escape in a VIPER Hovertank. Vehicles were hot on their tail, until the chase ended with the last of the VIPER armor destroyed.
After six months, Sierra-Kilo was decommissioned, and everybody in the team went back to their own respected duties. Agent Winters was stuck at a desk, monitoring the Respond and Protect channels.
UNITED
In February of 2011, The idealistic Colonel Nathan Hayes was given permission by High Command to create a branch of experienced UNTIL Agents from different fields. It was UNITED (The United Nations' Infiltration, Tactics, and Enforcement Detachment). From early on, it was joked that UNITED was to be the UNITY for the Average Joe. Colonel Hayes had contacted a few of his most-wanted agents to meet him at UNTIL's Millennium City Headquarters to register their transfers into the database. Among those agents were Brandon Winters and Hound from Sierra-Kilo. The other three agents were nicknamed Laughter, Dead Eye, and Ranger Prime. An agent in UNITED was to be better than the average soldier. They were outfitted with various gadgets; their physical performance was rigorously tested. Elite men and women were not the only ones recruited. Superheroes, too, such as Gravitas and Ramiel Alexander were added onto the roster. In Colonel Hayes' eyes, UNITED had to be the best-of-the-best in order to match against more than just one Super-powered villain. The new division was to be perfect, able to deal with every international threat more efficiently than any other team UNTIL had seen before.
Colonel Hayes oversaw the entire division. He promoted Brandon Winters from Sergeant to Lieutenant and put him in charge of the field team. Hound continued to be Winters' right-hand man.
The division's very first combat experience had been declared a disaster. It was only a week after UNITED officially began when the heart of Millennium City had been attacked by paramilitary terrorists called the Red Legion. UNITED was the first to detect them, and once they quickly discovered just how dangerous the threat was, they called the local Superheroes for help. The Red Legion troops were heavily armed to take down Super-powered individuals. Winters led his team throughout the Downtown area. Him and his team, along with many superheroes, fought the insurgents from rooftop-to-rooftop and from street-to-street. The heroes were able to fend off the Red Legion but at a heavy price. The damage toll in downtown was high. Everyone wanted to know where this new villain group came from and how they were able to bypass security. Most importantly to UNTIL, it was a mark of a failure for UNITED: The branch of UNTIL that was carefully designed to keep threats contained with low death counts.
Because of the result of the Red Legion attack, the leaders of UNTIL had wanted to drop the project. Colonel Hayes fought hard to keep his division going, promising that UNITED would do better next Operation. Colonel Hayes bumped up the recruitment effort and stressed Winters to get the recruits ready for anything. The next big thing that Millennium City had to face was not the Red Legion, but the Bloodmoon of February 25th, 2011. Unfortunately, UNITED was only able to stay on the grid for two more months. Due to budget constraints from UNTIL, the branch was disbanded. This left all the men and women of UNITED to go their separate ways.
Romeo Platoon
Associates
Scorcher: Leading the team of five agents was his first big assignment after a year of service in UNTIL. Winters' Sierra-Kilo was seen as reckless in the eyes of High Command. They were an odd bunch of men that swore unwavering loyalty to their mission and to each other. Scorcher was the oddest. He was the heart and personality of Fireteam Sierra-Kilo. His strange fixation to blow things up led to an interesting philosophy that, to this day, Winters' still does not understand. Weird or not, Winters liked Scorcher, but they only rarely see each other now-a-days.
Agent Hound: He was the right-hand man of Winters during Sierra-Kilo and again in UNITED. Hound was trained as a Specialist and was the best unarmed-combat fighter Winters ever had to work with. After UNITED was decommissioned, the two agents were assigned to different objectives on different sides of the globe. Winters still keeps tabs with Hound every once in a while.
James Perkins: He was just a client to Winters. UNTIL wanted Winters to trade James Perkins ammunition for his technology. In turn, James became Winters' bodyguard, because James needed that ammo. It was not before long until they found out how much they had in common. Which is guns, guns, and more guns.
Thundrax: What's to say here? Winters looks up to the respected Canadian Superhero.
Rumors
((Feel free post any quotes in this section))
Tropes
Badass Beard - His goatee.
Ensign Newbie - After being promoted to sergeant, he was assigned with the weirdest group of underdogs to take their previous squad leader's place. This trope was played straight up until the resurrection of Sierra-Kilo, when Winters became more of a Sergeant Rock instead.
Insert Grenade Here - This has happened to him far too many times in Sierra-Kilo.
The Squad - Sierra-Kilo. Brandon Winters was The Leader, Hound was The Big Guy, Scorcher was the Demolitions Expert, Jericho, the Cold Sniper, and lastly, Private Gage played the New Meat.
