Played by Tony Jones in the early 1990s in a game run by Peter Moore
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Silhouette was born Margaret O'Halloran on 22nd July 1974, to Richard and Mary O'Halloran, an Irish-American couple living in the Somerville area of Boston. Her parents (both of whom are lapsed Catholics) met at college where Richard (a fairly good-looking man with blue eyes and red hair) was studying for a biophysics degree, although he was also a member of the college basketball team and had Irish Republican sympathies (he supported and continues to support NORAID for example), which have rubbed off on Margaret. Mary (a very attractive brunette with brown eyes) was training to be a teacher and doing amateur dramatics in her spare time, although while at college she also turned down several offers of modelling work. They fell in love and after graduating in 1971 they married, with Mary becoming a housewife and never taking up teaching.
After graduation Richard obtained a job with a Boston-based research company, Boston Research Systems (BRS). In 1981 BRS needed a child for use in some experiments on infusing people with energy to give them superhuman powers, and Margaret was volunteered for them by her father. From then on Margaret went to school and lived normally during the week, but at weekends she went to BRS for the infusion experiments, which consisted mainly of bombardment with various types of bizarre energy and tests on the results, with little or no discomfort.
By the beginning of 1983 Mary O'Halloran had decided that enough was enough, and demanded that the experiments on her daughter be stopped at once, threatening to divorce Richard and take Margaret if this was not done. Richard ignored her demands, and so Mary sued for divorce. Unfortunately Richard was given a lot of legal help by BRS in order to protect their investment, so he gained custody without any access or alimony for Mary. Margaret hasn't seen or heard from her mother since then and remembers little about her, although she knows she was a caring loving mother and a good housewife, although slightly naive about the real world, who used to cry a lot when hurt. After Mary's departure Richard became more moody, with occasional bouts of drinking and violent anger. Margaret stood all of it as he was her father and she did love him.
By late 1983 the infusion treatments started to have an effect as her body became converted into solid energy - she lost the need to eat, breathe or sleep as she absorbed energy from the environment for sustenance (she can eat but gets no nourishment from food, and only does so for social reasons). Further tests revealed her strength, ability to desolidify and resistance to most forms of environmental harm. She was told of her powers and limitations as she was trained in their use by BRS (who also know, though she doesn't, that she has the potential to manipulate the energy of her body for many different effects). Since she gained her powers she has grown normally, though BRS scientists know there is no real reason for her to do so - it is mainly because she subconsciously wishes to grow. With the encouragement of BRS Margaret was able to keep her powers secret from the people at school, but after she gained them she never had any trouble with bullies or school sports again.
By the time she was thirteen Margaret had started to object to the continual testing of her powers and how it didnt allow her any social life. Her father was reprimanded for this and took it out on her with ineffective violence. However, she did continue the tests, and also began to be trained in stealth in preparation (over her fathers objections) for her use by BRS in industrial espionage. At school she was also learning a lot very quickly, due to both her high intelligence and lack of a need for sleep, and her liking of learning. Because of this she graduated from High School very early, at age fourteen. She likes to read a lot, fairly indiscriminately.
Meanwhile BRS had been attempting to refine the process by which she was given powers so that adults could be given them without years of treatments. Progress in this area has been fairly slow however.
At about this time BRS went through a bad patch, and a takeover bid was made by a large industrial conglomerate. The company decided that now was time to recoup some of their investment and send Margaret in to sabotage the conglomerate enough to force them to stop the takeover. They gave her the unstable molecule costume she now wears, but when the mission was explained all her misgivings about what had been done to her came to a head and she refused point-blank. BRS management ordered her father to take her home and convince to cooperate, otherwise they would have to assume that his loyalty did not lie with the company, and fire him. Margaret was taken home, and raged at, but she didn't budge, using her desolidification power when he resorted to blows. Slowly she became angry as well and a huge shouting match ensued which ended with her storming to her room then storming out after packing a few things (a few sets of clothes, some of her favourite books, a few personal items like her favourite soft toy and her bank book with all her savings - about $300 - in it, all in a rucksack). She was on a bus to New York before her anger cooled and then her stubborn pride wouldn't let her go back - she could manage on her own.
She arrived in New York at the Port Authority Bus Terminal and walked off into the city, ignoring the Chickenhawks who tried to entice her off, to their annoyance. She wandered the streets for a couple of days, wondering what to do. A few times people tried to mug her, due to her youth and harmless appearance, to their regret, and she was hassled by pimps and drug dealers. As she was sitting in Central Park thinking over her options she was approached by another girl who recognised her as a runaway and invited her back to their place to stay. She quickly became friends with the girl, Sue Guthrie (age 16) on the way to their squat at 9th Avenue and 48th Street on the border of the Theatre District and Hell's Kitchen. She met the other six people living there (all runaways and all girls) and soon became friends with another two of them, Debbie Lee (a black girl, age 16) and Mona Cooper (age 15) - Debbie and Mona are two of her DNPC's. This was about three and a half months ago.
Back in Boston, the morning after Margaret left her father was fired for permitting her to leave, showing his disloyalty to the company. He went a little mad at this and started to hunt her down in order to prove his loyalty and get his old position back. BRS also started a hunt for her in order to recoup their large investment in her and continue their research.
About six weeks after arriving in New York, Margaret was forced to reveal her powers to the other girls, although they had started to suspect something weird about her before that due to her strange physiology. One of the other girls in the squat (not a DNPC) was attacked and raped. They couldn't go to the police as they were all runaways. Margaret decided she couldn't hide her powers any longer as she had been trying to do - people needed her. For the first time she put on her costume with the intention of using it, to the shock of her friends, and set out to bring the rapist to justice - this was when she came up with the name Silhouette. Using her streetwise skills and intelligence she was able to track the rapist down as he was about to attack another woman, and captured him, giving him a good beating before handing him over to the police of the 21st Precinct (in Hell's Kitchen). She was interviewed by the police but refused to give her age or any other personal details despite their suspicions that she was underage. Despite this she has cooperated with the police several times since and is on fairly good terms with them.
During the night Silhouette patrols the streets around Times Square and the Port Authority Bus Terminal. She tries to protect runaways from Chickenhawks and stop drug dealers, both of which activities have not endeared her to the local criminal fraternity, including the Mafia. The reason she does this is that she realises how superior she is to normal people, but rather than making her contemptuous of them this has made her realise that she should use her powers to help and protect them. This also means that she tends to behave according to her own personal code of honour as, although this can put her at a disadvantage when fighting less scrupulous foes, she feels that if she cant be better than the people she fights then what is the point of fighting them? Although this code means that she has extreme moral scruples about killing anyone (although she realises that it may on very rare occasions be necessary), she does believe that criminals shouldnt be allowed to get away with what they do and will persistently hunt them down if possible. She usually tries to take runaways whom she finds to the Under 21 residence for runaways on Times Square (if they let her), and gives the cash she takes from drug dealers to charities which aid runaways and drug addicts, apart from a little which she keeps to buy food (for the other people in the house) and things with. During the day she reads in libraries and goes around with the girls from the squat, who she tries to keep out of trouble, especially her three closest friends. Some of the other girls resent her because she is a superhuman, but they know she is a useful person to have around. She keeps most of her possessions in a locker she rents on Grand Central Station (Locker 217, rented for a year from 17/9/90).
Upon her return from ancient Greece Silhouette discovered that her house had been taken over by a streetgang, the Renegades, who Mona now runs with. She has also been experimenting with drugs. Sue is still living in the house much as she did before, but Debbie had moved out and gone to Katherine Jamesons Shelter for the Homeless Child. After the murder of Katherine Jameson by the Slasher, Debbie was moved to the 23rd Street Orphanage and is now in the process of being adopted. Silhouette has also fallen in love with the handsome and charismatic leader of the Renegades, Steve Meacher, and he with her. They are now an item. She has also joined the Greenpeace organisation, in part because of her realisation that she is likely to live long enough to see and survive through any long-term destruction of the Earths environment, and doesnt really want to have to. Steve has since turned out to be the Greek god Hermes, who travelled forward in time at least partly to be with Margeret. As a side-effect of this he got Margaret pregnant. After a very short pregnancy she gave birth to a daughter, Rachel Athena OHalloran, who is currently a few weeks old.
Silhouette is 5'0"' tall, with dark red hair and green eyes. Out of costume she appears a very attractive but otherwise fairly average sixteen year old girl; even in costume she doesnt appear at all as strong as she actually is. Her costume was originally darkish grey with black gloves and a red gem (which could be mistaken for a Focus) in the centre of her chest. It has now been replaced by a gold, green and grey costume, though the new costume also has the red gem in the centre of the chest. The grey costume has been lost.
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| Original Costume | New Costume |
Silhouettes body is solid energy. She doesn't breathe, has no pulse or heartbeat and nothing remotely resembling normal brainwave patterns. Her body temperature is always the same as the ambient temperature and she never sweats. She doesn't bleed when cut - tiny lightnings flicker around the wound until the bleeding stops. Due to the nature of her powers she cannot carry anything not made of unstable molecules while she is desolid. For this reason she usually wears her costume (with the mask down) under her street clothes as it allows her make a quick change into costume simply by going desolid. Because she tends to lose her clothes when this happens she tends to wear mainly cheap second hand clothes from places like the Salvation Army.
The Original Silhouette, Silhouette with Experience and an 'Ultimate' Silhouette in Champions terms.