Characteristic

Cost

END

Cost

9

6

5

3

3

3

3

3

3

3

3

4

3

3

3

2

20

3

3

3

9

5

15

15

15

15

10

10

20

20

1

1

1

1

1

15

5

It was in the summer of 1924 when Samantha Hendricks received a response from Ebenezer Cunningham, writer of The Principle of Relativity, which was the first English book on the topic. The elation of receive a response from such a distinguished person activated Samantha’s mutant powers. At that moment, the location and state of every atom of her body became permanently fixed. They could still move as easily as they ever could, but they would go back to their ‘remembered’ positions. So her muscles and nerves still worked, and her blood went round and round, but effectively her metabolism had stopped.

It took some time for her to notice,, and even longer before she worked out what had happened. The first symptoms where a loss of appetite and difficulty sleeping, which she attributed to the elation she felt at getting a response from a famous scientist. But the way this elation didn’t fade was itself an early symptom. It soon became evident that she wasn’t digesting what food she was eating, though it took her years to discover the full extent of what was happening. The first superhumans were appearing about this time, but Samantha didn’t yet have any powers besides a perpetual good mood.

By the time she entered collage, Samantha had become aware that she had stopped aging. While in collage, she studied science, along with herself. She also joined an acting club, where she learned how to use makeup to look her chronological age. It was while she was in collage that she determined that somehow her atomic structure was being held in some kind of dynamic stasis, that whenever her atoms moved, something was putting them back as they had been. This was why she hadn’t changed a bit since 1924, why her hair quickly grew back when cut, but only to what it had been the night she had received the letter from Ebenezer Cunningham. What’s more, the effect was getting stronger, the atoms of her body resisting change not just moving back. This had the effect of making her skin more resistant to damage.

Samantha graduated from collage and became a public school science teacher in Birmingham, a job she held several decades. During this time the stasis effect continued to grow stronger, to the point it affected her life. Her flesh slowly became firmer and firmer, less and less willing to yield even for a moment to outside pressure. This led her to shun all physical contact,, so as not to be discovered as some kind of freak. At the same time, Samantha slowly lost her sense of touch, though slowly enough that she learned to adapt.

In 1971 her life changed again. Jim Banks, a fellow teacher, had been working on his car in the school parking lot when the jack failed. When the car fell, it managed to catch one of Jim's legs, leaving him pinned under the car. Samantha easily lifted the car, allowing Jim to free his leg. Even in the stress of the moment, she remembered to make it as if it took a great deal of effort to lift the car, claiming later that it was a burst of hysterical strength that allowed the small,, 63 year old woman to perform such a feat of strength.

Later that day, she was approached by one of her students, Stephanie Oswald, who had seen the incident and suspected that there was more to Samantha than met the eye. Stephanie went on to explain that she might be gaining super powers. Samantha had Stephanie meet with her after-school, where testing revealed that Stephanie was indeed becoming a super speedster.

Samantha was able to coach Stephanie on how to become a superhero, though Samantha had to teach herself as she went. In the process, Samantha on discovered that decades of avoiding bumping into things had improved her agility, although she was still clumsy compared to most super heroes.

Stephanie and Samantha became Speedy and her sidekick Samsonite, the youngest heroes in Birmingham, searching for crime after classes and on weekends. Speedy got most of the credit, but then she was doing most of the work. Samsonite was carried around town at speeds approaching that of sound, coaching Speedy and helping out when she could.

Mostly they patrolled the streets of Birmingham, stopping crimes by normals when they found them in progress. They stopped quite a few muggings and no small number of holdups. Mostly because they were only going after normal criminals, they caused very little property damage, and became quite popular heroes. They did tackle the occasional supervillain, where they used team tactics. Speedy would throw the villain to the ground in front of Samsonite, who would punch the villain before he could get up and out of the way. This tended to knock out the villain in a hurry, although it was hard on the pavement underneath.

But after a nearly two years of superheroing, Stephanie graduated and was accepted for further education at Oxford. Life went back to normal for Samantha, who was far too slow to go patrolling on her own. But life as a superhero is addicting, and at 65, Samantha was old enough to retire. So she retired from teaching, and joined the Birmingham superhero team as a full time superhero.

This brought a new level of challenges to Samantha, as now she faced supervillain after supervillain. But with the help of her new teammates, Samantha as Samsonite was up to these challenges. Her apparent youth was an advantage, as she was often underestimated. During this time her strength and durability continued to grow. Although there were bad times, overall, this was the happiest time of Samantha’s life. Among other things, she no longer had to be ‘untouchable’. She was still harder than diamond, but it no longer mattered.

In 1985 Samantha came to the attention of MI5, though she never did find out how. She was invited to try out for Majestic. With her teammates encouragement, she went to London for further testing. The tests were grueling, but Samantha passed, and was admitted into the prestigious hero team.

Having been on the Majestic team for over two decades, Samantha has continued to enjoy the life of a hero. In addition to using her strength and durability, Samantha also now gets to use her skills of acting and disguise, polished by a lifetime of use, to help her country. Now 97, Samantha shows no signs of slowing down.

Over the years, Samantha as Samsonite has made some personal enemies, Velocity of the Prime Movers and Hardbody of the Furies.

Big Ben of Empire thought that Samsonite should be helping Empire, not oposing them. He's now after her to "beat some sense into her." On the other hand his teammate Wildfire is a bit afraid of Samsonite, a seemingly unstoppable object not affected at all by her dreaded Internal Spontaneous Combustion power.

The Hunter is after Samsonite, not because he has a grudge against her, but because as the leader of Majestic, she's the ultimate target for his hunting skills.

Samanta stays in her heroic persona most of the time now days, only rarely apearing anywhere as Samantha. It's only a matter of time before she goes public.

Like the City of Diaspar, Samsonite is held in a dynamic stasis. Unchanging and unchangeable, this makes her the unmovable object and the irresistible force all in one. Her nerves still carry impulses, her muscles contract, and her blood goes round and round. But otherwise the atoms of her body don't move, and when moved will go back to their original locations. This gives Samsonite near invulnerability.

In addition, it makes her hard to move, and very resistant to any attempts to change her. Since her metabolism is stopped, she is immune to any diseases or poisons, and is not affected by any environmental conditions. Her unchanging body doesn’t age, and she no longer needs to sleep or eat. She can still sleep, with difficulty. Also she can eat, but doesn’t digest anything she consumes. Finally, when she is changed, her powers restore her, even to the point of creating new atoms to replace those missing. The prevents her from having any implanted devices, her regeneration would crush them as it moved the flesh back to it’s usual position.

Finally, that stasis effect that holds her body in such rigid status doesn't let her movements be affected by external resistance, this gives her the effect of super strength although she has normal human muscles. Her body hardly notices the difference if she raises an empty hand, or one holding a car.

But while Samsonite is nearly invulnerable, she does have some weaknesses. Her biggest weakness is her mind; she has no mental defense at all. While tough, she isn't hardened, so Armor piercing or penetrating attacks work normally. Likewise she has weak spots, so Find Weakness also works normally. And any attack that does get through her defenses has a significant effect, since she is still just a young girl. Also, any attack that is itself based on immobilizing atoms is especially effective against her.

In addition to her powers, Samantha keeps current with most branches of science, although she is a master of none of them. As a generalist, she has great breadth of sicentific knowledge, but not much depth. She is also a master of disguise, a good actor, and highly skilled at crime fighting.

Because she is being held in stasis, Samsonite never sweats, and her eyes never tear up (this allows her disguises to last longer). Her body is too tightly held at an atomic level for anything to leave, even scents. However, she consistently wears the same perfume (Nokomis), which allows her to be identified and/or tracked by those with enhanced smelling abilities.

Samantha is short and cute but not beautiful. She appears to be a young girl in her mid-teens, although she is skilled at using makeup to appear older. She wears her short black hair in a style that was conservative the early 1900’s. Her clothing choices are more modern, but conservative. As Samsonite she wears a waist length blond wig, pale green gloves and boots, and a red body suit with a golden belt. Her arms and legs are bare, and her body suit has a neckline that goes down almost to her waist. She doesn't wear makeup in hero ID, letting her youthful appearance lead villains to underestimate her. In either identity, her flesh is hard and unyielding.

She rarely uses her Samantha ID anymore, when she does she uses makeup and different wigs to look older. Depending on the occasion this could a mature brunette to a little old lady. She generally uses the younger appearace when attending science conferences or sociallizing, but looks her age when going anywhere where her ID (and age) might be checked.