Abyss (James Vandaleur)

With his brother Patrick one of the two leaders of the Order of the Silver Twilight before its dissolution, James was born in 1850. From an early age his uncle Paul spent much time with the two brothers, involving them in a number of strange, secret activities. When the two brothers had both passed puberty Paul revealed that all the things he had done with the brothers in the past had been a kind of worthiness test - they were both evil through and through, and therefore worthy to become black magicians. Neither brother was too surprised by this, and eagerly began their training. From the first James was more interested in force and brutality, while his brother preferred subtlety and manipulation from behind the scenes. With time they were both granted magical powers and took over the Order. In 1881 James felt he could no longer carry on as he was, and after faking his own death in a boating accident, had himself transformed into an insectoid horror, which although having little actual magical power was physically very powerful indeed. He was involved, with his brother Patrick, in transforming Charity Ravenwood into the cat-woman Greymalkin, and in 1883 was part of a plot against the British Royal Family in which Patrick died. James managed to escape and lived to plan anew.

Little was heard of James for years, apart from rumours and occasional sightings. In 1905 he spearheaded an army of monsters which attempted to take over London, but once again was foiled by the Royal Elite Guard. At the end of the battle, horribly injured, James teleported away and has not been seen since.

After his transformation James was a 6'6" tall steel-blue armoured insectoid horror with large iridescent compound eyes, a tooth-tipped tongue and a second pair of arms below his normal arms which were tipped with huge curved claws. He was hugely strong and very tough. He was well enough coordinated to be able to use both his claw-arms at once, and also to use them to strike through weak points in an opponents defences. He was also apparently very strong-willed, could see in the dark, and was little affected by mental powers.

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