Smotele
Basic Characteristics
Classification: Young Adult
Feeding Type: Mixed
Name Origin: Smokey Tea and Lemon
Notable Traits
- Electrical Attacks
- Water Jet Attacks
- Second largest gooroo in history
The Tragedy of Smotele
The Best Intentions
Smotele serves as a warning to society and to all gooroos of what can happen when a gooroo denies its nature. As a young gooroo, Smotele hated the idea of preying upon her own friends to survive, and so she resolved to never attack a sentient being again. She survived almost seven years in this state while her predatory instincts grew in strength until she finally suffered a psychotic break. The kind, well meaning woman that others knew was lost as a ravenous beast was set loose on the world. All gooroo need PKE to survive and to sustain their mental stability and growth until they reach elder status, and to deny this results in a feral like state that is far worse than anything they could have done in a lucid state.
The Great Sea Beast
Smotele spends nearly all of her time in or near waterways. She will come up rivers and even creep into the great lakes, but she will never stray far from water. She has grown to tremendous size, rivaling the scale of a blue whale, and she appears as a manta-like figure that lives in deep water. The assumption that this was a simple beast's actions was corrected by Apnuci when she as asked to consult on the topic of this young menace. Smotele still retains her intelligence, but she is driven by primitive instinct meaning she is a very intelligent killing machine, and her reliance on water has kept her safe from her natural weakness: fire.
Smotele possesses an uncanny ability to control electricity, and she uses this both for attacks and for propulsion. Seawater conducts electricity well, and electrified water jets are often used by her to slay victims and damage equipment. She also can cycle power through her body to drive water over her shape by taking advantage of water's dipole moment. This makes it possible to track her, but not any easier to dissuade or defend against.
Unique Abilities
===Aquatic Shape=== Smotele takes the shape of a manta-like creature with membranes joining arms, flanks, and legs while her tail has elongated to something like that of a thresher sharp with membranes to the legs making a single large 'flight' surface for aquatic movement. Her wingspan is over 80 feet while her length from nose to tail tip is roughly 60 feet. She can attain speeds of up to 80 knots, and she suffers no penalties for deep dives or sudden climbs because she contains no gaseous components.
Electrical Disharge
Smotele can generate incredible blasts of electrical energy, and it has been suggested that her core is the cause of this. In addition, she can cycle enough power through her skin to cause water to move past her based only on its dipole moment, something shown in film as part of the movie The Hunt for Red October. Smotele's electrical blasts have been likened to intense lightning bolts, and damage to persons and property confirms this. However, in attacks, she usually combines her blasts with water jets for greater conductivity combined with searing steam bursts.
Water Jets
These are no squirt gun but rather the force of water under tons of force in tight streams, and Smotele has been known to cut people in half with them. She has also added grit and debris to them to damage walls and tear her way deeper into ships she attacks. On at least one occasion, she struck an assault copter from the sky before fleeing a feeding site.
Diet
Smotele's diet is split between PKE sources and mass sources. PKE sources include manned vessels while mass sources include small whales, sharks, fish, and nealry anything she can find. Thankfully, despite her catastrophic feeding habits, the number of attacks per year has diminished, suggesting that her energy stores are reaching a plateau. Apnuci has warned that she may be simply bordering on another mutation or an escalation that needs planning.
Binge Feeder
Smotele is an mixed feeder. She has been so starved for PKE at one point that passive feeding was added to active feeding. She will target individual swimmers and surfers, but most often, he attacks cruise ships and military vessels. In the case of either vessel, she slays masses with her raw strength and electrical capabilities while devouring anything she can grab. Because of her success with such tactics, she has grown to the power of an Elder in only 15 years. Her hit and run style assaults combined with the shelter the sea afford her has made her one of the greater dangers of the sea.
Sadly, there are numerous times when survivors of these attacks are found and will recount an eight foot tall kangaroo like creature sobbing and apologizing followed by begging them to get to safety while they can. It appears that Smotele's civlized self still exists inside the monster, and kinder hearts like that of Hazmokaff still feel there may be a way to save her and save the world from her.
Tracking and Treatment
At present, monitoring for Smotele's magnetic signature and care trip planning is all that keeps casualties down. While Apnuci was consulted, she has made it clear that she will not use her abilities or lend them to someone to attack Smotele citing that she is terrified of ending up underwater with Smotele.
The only other voice has come from a reclusive gooroo named Hazmokaff that has been in contact with Apnuci for some time, and he has offered his skill in trying to subdue Smotele provided someone could get them both in the same place.
- Update
- Because Smotele is carefully monitored, her location and movement patterns were predicted with sufficient accuracy to put Hazmokaff in her path aboard a ship. Unfortunately, luring Smotele requires live prey, but Hazmokaff's presence became a wild card. The moment that Smotele broke the water surface, Hazmokaff ensnared her in his flight tendrils. The large flying gooroo survived the initial electrical counterattack long enough to latch on before he was pull over the side and below the waves. When he emerged twenty minutes later, he was carrying a much smaller lucid form of Smotele who was passed out in his arms. His status appeared to be one of extreme distress both physically and mentally, but he held onto Smotele.
- What Hazmokaff relayed to the ship's crew was not what was expected. Because he was holding her, her pain and trauma was now his, and only his lifelong training in enduring such effects allowed him to hang on. Smotele was expected to be a killing machine without morals or mercy. What he instead reported was that Smotele had suffered a psychotic break from starvation which confirms some of the Elders' suspicions. She was barely old enough to be an adult, and her current world was pain, fear, and regret. He requested of Apnuci that she make something like a sedative or a numbing agent to dull Smotele's senses of hunger and life-force location ability to aid in her treatment as someone with an addiction rather that being a merciless killer. As part of his efforts, Hazmokaff moved her to one of his high mountain hideaways which limits exposure to her by anyone but him and some small number of support staff and keeps her far from population centers. With Hazmokaff taking responsibility, Apnuci complied with a limited amount of therapeutic compound with a composition only she knows.
- Smotele has now been able to sustain herself in her smaller form, and after two years of treatment does not appear to risk going berserk again but has retained all of her other abilities. She is more concerned now with making amends, and she remains terrified of the public and how they must see her. While her remorse is considered a good sign, the public remains split on what to do with her. She has offered herself and her abilities towards humanitarian aid as well as defensive actions when called upon by the Department of Defense Super-Human division. Hazmokaff is always sent alongside her on tasks, and so far there have not been any issues of Smotele's instigation. Some consider it fitting that her greatest roles in dealing with normal lives is in rescuing them from maritime issues, but she takes her role seriously. Her ability to do this is also aided by her status as a false-elder as she needs no new PKE input fur survival for of a trickle when she deal with other monsters.