text: The [[http://whateleyacademy.net/ Whateley Universe]] is a WebOriginal prose SharedUniverse in a SuperheroSchool scenario with elements of the Franchise/CthulhuMythos comprising the main MythArc. It was inspired by an ''{{ComicBook/X-Men}}'' fanfic written by one of Whateley's many authors, and retains many similarities to the Franchise/MarvelUniverse, but a reasonably well-developed [[TheVerse ficton]] was created before the first stories were released.People in their early teens are manifesting mutant powers. They are widely hated and feared, but there is a place that will take them in, shelter them, and teach them how to control their powers: [[SuperheroSchool Whateley Academy]] in Dunwich, New Hampshire. Whateley is large (nearly 600 middle school through high school students in six grades); has support from superheroes, supervillains, and super-neutrals (so it is not being constantly attacked); does ''not'' have a high school aged superhero team flying around and fighting crime despite what Team Kimba seems to think; and puts heroes and villains together in everyday situations (just like a real high school). It also hosts demons, magical creatures, monsters, demigods, gods, [[ArsonMurderAndJaywalking and]] [[ImpossiblyTackyClothes Jericho]].In one of many twists, between a sixth to a third of the students have a subconscious image of the form that their body ought to take, known as their Body Image Template (BIT). Mutants with a BIT generally gain either a physical or mental package of powers, frequently both. The physical package includes both beauty and brawn, the mental package includes major intelligence boosts as well as memory, etc. A BIT may change ''any'' aspect of a person's body, including their sex. In some cases the transformation may turn them into inhuman ''whatevers'' [[BlessedWithSuck right out of a horror movie]].Most of the main characters are [[GenderBender transgender]] in some way, shape, or form, so the school placed them all in Poe Cottage, an [=LGBTI=] dorm. All the main characters have their own origin story, in which their powers began to manifest, and there is a great deal of grief within their families about their gender change. Of course, there is almost always grief associated with simply being a mutant, but for those involuntarily transformed, the problems are all the greater. Not all transgender characters were involuntarily forced into their present form by their mutation. Some of them changed their own sex using their powers, and some were changed by outside forces.Whateley Universe is not a pastiche or a direct parody, although it is often written in a tongue in cheek manner, putting superhero themes on common things. For example, Whateley Academy has the high school cliques any normal high school would have, the elitist Alphas, the Fashion Police, and the grungy losers (the Rat Patrol). However, they also have other cliques that only a SuperheroSchool would have, such as the Masterminds, the Ninjas, the Robo-Jox, and of course, the [[TheCape Cape Squad]] (the 'Future Superheroes of America', who are very enthusiastic about being future superheroes). Ironically, school administration is quite insistent that Whateley is ''not'' a SuperheroSchool, though they don't deny being an AcademyOfAdventure.[[http://whateleyacademy.net/index.php/stories Here is a link]] to the stories. Until February 2012, when Diane took over updating the main site, the authors made their new stories available at the Authors Corner section of the [[http://whateleyacademy.net/index.php/kunenaforums forums]]. The front page also contains links to the forums and a fan-maintained Wiki. Be forewarned: the Whateley Universe now encompasses something like 14 Canon authors, 20 fanfic authors also hosted on the site, and something close to 150 novels, novelettes, and short stories (NOT counting all the fanfic). It is also somewhat [[NotSafeForWork NSFW]], with rather frank discussions of sexuality in several of the stories.Around 2014, the Canon Cabal ([[RunningGag who don't exist]]) started developing plans for a second generation of Whateley stories, and recruited several fanfic authors for new Cabal. The first of these stories were released in late 2015. While they take place at Whateley, they occur several years after the main cast would have graduated, with an all-new team and new plotlines. As of April 2016, the first story arc has ended, though the students have yet to reach Whateley, and two of the SuperheroOrigin stories have gotten underway. '''The original six characters, Team Kimba, are:'''* Chaka (Toni Chandler), GenkiGirl martial artist who controls [[KiAttacks Ki]].* Fey (Nikki Reilly), [[OurElvesAreBetter elven]] Wizard of unusual power, possessed by an ancient elvish queen. [[LoveIsInTheAir Subconsciously makes people attracted to her.]]* Tennyo (Billie Wilson), flying blasting slicing [[HealingFactor regenerating]] Warper extraordinaire; [[{{Expy}} looks rather like]] Ryoko from ''Anime/TenchiMuyo'' (intentionally, as a result of how she gained her superpowers)* Generator (Jade Sinclair), who 'generates' Jinn, psychokinetic copies of herself by animating inanimate objects for a limited time. When the effect wears off, Jinn's memories merge with Jade's. Note: The singular/plural confusion is canon.** Shroud (Jinn Sinclair), Jade's invented persona when Jinn takes human shape. Using props, she can appear as everything from an ordinary teenage girl, to a spooky eeriness and chains undead, to an empty black cloak. She pretends to be Jade's elder sister.* Phase (Ayla Goodkind), a density-changer who can become [[IntangibleMan intangible]] or [[NighInvulnerable super-dense]]. [[ShelteredAristocrat Comes from a very rich family]], but unfortunately that family is the Whateley Universe version of Fred Phelps's clan, and reacted [[MadScientist very]] [[MoralEventHorizon poorly]] to his mutation. * Lancer (Hank Declan), a twist on the classic super-strong invulnerable FlyingBrick hero type, in that he actually uses a form of personal-ranged psychokinesis to enhance his physical abilities. MilitaryBrat. The only Team Kimba character that's gender bending the ''other'' way, and also was the only Team Kimba character without his own series of stories. Now, he has Phoenix Spiritus as a writer.'''Other main characters with canon authors include:'''* Carmilla (Sara Waite), your average everyday [[HalfHumanHybrid mostly-demon]] [[CombatTentacles tentacle-wielding]] [[VoluntaryShapeshifting shape-changing]] [[PsychicPowers Psi]] who eats by absorbing the [[LifeEnergy lifeforce]] from living things. Named after Le Fanu's [[Literature/{{Carmilla}} famous lesbian vampire]]. For a time after first arriving a member of Team Kimba, now has her own team, Sara's Pack. * Bladedancer (Chou Lee), Handmaid of the Tao, superb martial artist, and wielder of the legendary sword [[EmpathicWeapon Destiny's Wave]]. Not an original character, but still a member of Team Kimba, although currently in the process of drawing together an additional combat team.* Wallflower (Lily Turner), think Violet of WesternAnimation/{{The Incredibles}}, right down to the super hero parents.* Circuit Breaker (Chad/Chaddy/Merry/Mai... [[RunningGag it's complicated]]), a [[{{Technopath}} cyberpath]] and [[ShockAndAwe electricity-wielding Energizer]]. Currently cloned into two people (Petra and Paige Donner), the latter of whom is a werepanther in Sara's Pack, while the other is a holy knight having her own adventures in Italy.* Heyoka (Jamie Carson), a [[MagicalNativeAmerican Lakota Indian with the ability to contact spirits]] and use their powers. [[spoiler: Was murdered in ''The Riddle of Sappho''.]]* Hive (Samantha Everheart), Whateley Security officer, who happens to be merged with a hive-like system of [[{{Nanomachines}} nanites]].* Jobe Wilkins, a MadScientist who ran afoul of one of his own creations, and is shown to be, alternately, a villain and a well meaning yet arrogant bastard with LiteralGenie tendencies who simply can't understand why everyone hates him after he tries to help them. A member of the Bad Seeds, a clique of students who are the children of supervillains.* She-Beast (Jadis Diabolik), de facto leader of the Bad Seeds, who occasionally takes it upon herself to wrangle the others. Something of a neutral force, despite what some people on campus would have you believe.* Outcast Corner, which includes four characters:** Razorback (Jack Carlyle, [[spoiler: born Erin Carlyle]]), a dinosaur-like raptor.** Diamondback (Sandra Carter, [[spoiler: born Ryan Carter]], a Lamia (snake-woman).** Jericho (Joseph 'Joe' Turner), an inventor who is deliberately the world's worst fashion disaster.** Eldritch (Caitlin Bardue, [[spoiler: born Erik Mahren]]), a meld of a human and an ancient [[UltimateBlacksmith super mage-smith]].* The Lit Chix, a group of [[AuthorAvatar girls who write (bad) science fiction]] and get involved in their own detective messes.** Loophole (Elaine 'Doc' Nalley), a GadgeteerGenius with a 100% success rate and the school's foremost RulesLawyer.** Murphy (Joanne Gunnarson), a [[MurphysLaw probability warper (who mainly draws bad luck)]] and teleporter who is most likely insane.** Foxfire (Rebecca 'Bekky' Corbin), a mage and manifestor who is intensely curious about everything and loves exposition.** Compiler (Barbara 'Babs' Younkle), a deviser with super-speed who tried to make herself look like an Exemplar and succeeded… [[GoneHorriblyRight except that she's now super]] ''[[GoneHorriblyRight dense]]'', [[GoneHorriblyRight and crashes into everything with the power of a truck.]]** Arachne (Simone Bender), an Avatar with a spider spirit.** Fractious (Dee Castle), a reality warper with incredibly severe OCD.** Lifeline (Margaret 'Maggie' Vincent), a healer mage and life-energy absorber.** Selkie (Heather O'Malley), a water manipulator who may or may not be a minor Fae mutant.** Reverb (Renae Greist), a probability warper who can amplify others' powers and mimic their voices.** Lupine (Stella Woolfe), a wolf-were who has connections to spirits, most notably Coyote. * The Three Little Witches, a group of junior high girls who go around trying to steal enough essence to do Cool Stuff.** Clover (Estelle ?), a probability warper who draws good luck to herself.** Palantir (Irene Durcell), a manifestor who can create a ball that allows her to scry, can carry her around and can even translate languages she's never heard of.** Abracadabra (Bethany Tarvetti), a mage who may be the smartest one of the witches. * Greasy (Adam Lambert), a Devisor who constantly excretes a substance similar to motor oil. Formerly one half of the Whateley Peeping Toms Club and punching bag of the one person he may love. * Seraphim (Kerry Ellison aka "The Angel of Hell's Kitchen") who is an empath and mystic focus with access to the highest reaches of mystical power, making her a much sought after "commodity" in the eyes of a great many of the powers both inside of and outside of Whateley.* Aquerna (Anna Parsons), one of the kids who didn't win the SuperpowerLottery. She is a fairly low-powered avatar who gets her powers from the literal spirit of the squirrel[[note]]The similarities to [[ComicBook/SquirrelGirl a certain Marvel character]] have been {{Lampshade}}d in-story, where Creator/MarvelComics actually exist as well and have created and copyrighted many of the same characters as in real life, but she's very much her own person.[[/note]] and started out as something of a campus joke because of it, but is proving actually pretty competent with what powers she does have as she gets more story time.* Envy (Seraphina Sophia "Fina" Valocco, born Serafino Valocco), a [[{{Mana}} Wizard]]/[[PsychicPowers Psi]] combo whose mother is the supervillain Strega. She hasn't yet made it to Whateley.* Vamp (Alex O'Brien) former Boston street hustler and teen supervillainess sent to Whateley when she enters the witness protection program. Deliberately plays up the [[TheVamp bad girl]] image that inspired her code name.* Evan Ramsey (no codename as yet) and his friends, a group of ordinary teenagers who were involuntarily used by their captors as living incubators for dynamorphs but escaped before the dynamorphs could be harvested. They're currently traveling across America in the hope of making it to Whateley.The new characters for the 2nd Gen stories include:* (Okami) Hikaru Myoujin - Member of a cadet branch of Japan's Imperial family who was trained from birth to serve as a Shinto priestess, only to find ''herself'' the object of worship when she becomes the [[PhysicalGod Paladin of Amaterasu]].* Kenshin (Taka Ono) - A young man who manifested the martial arts skills of a shonen fighting anime protagonist (and unfortunately the attitude to match) sent off to America after causing too much trouble at home. * Dragonsfyre (Morgana Jones) - a formerly nerdy kid imbued with magical powers in a horrific experiment by a cult that wanted to create a living magical battery and who still bears the physical and mental scars.* Glyph (Bianca St. Claire) - LegacyCharacter whose Avatar mutation allowed him to inherit an AlwaysFemale role - but with the result that ''she'' became a GenderBender as the power adapts her to the role.* Eisenmadel (Erica von Abendritter) - the Jewish product of NaziSuperScience who was imbued with powers in her grandparents' lifelong battle against Nazi deadenders seeking to establish a Fourth Reich. * Lapin (Lucretia "Tia" del Bosque) - The victim of a mutation ray that his MadScientist former girlfriend used on him in a fit of jealous rage, which gave her the Body Image Template of a well-known retired superheroine...which unfortunately included the appearance and proclivities of a Playboy bunny girl... ears, tail and all. * Invictus (Tanya Wright) another LegacyCharacter who is a bit disturbed to have manifested her deceased mother's exact appearance as well as her powers. * Cerulea (Laura Samuels) - Devisor and Gadgeteer, whose manifestation included bright blue skin and hair and broke up her parent's marriage. * Calliope (Fiorella "Cally" Persico): A receptive and projective empath who projects by singing, giving her a limited subset of siren powers.* Nicholas Brennan, Jr. (no code name chosen yet) - second-generation member of a genetically-engineered race of PettingZooPeople, he is the oldest of the Horse Animen to be born that way, and the first to learn that their creator, Dr. DNA, had left an extra gift in their genome in the form of the Mutant Meta-Gene Complex. * Dragonblade (A.J. Blackstone) - Child of [[DatingCatwoman a superhero and a supervillainess]], AJ was already receiving magical training when his mutation kicked in.----!Tropes include:* AbsurdlySharpBlade: Several. Some magical, others created by Devisors or Gadgeteers. Special mention to Destiny's Wave, Chou's magical talking sword. It's only absurdly sharp when Chou intends it to be; otherwise, it's dull.* AbortedArc: Bound to happen in a shared universe this big, but even then very common. The biggest one is Feral: a story called ''Wild Times'', which would have followed Feral as [[spoiler: he became the avatar of Artemis/Diana, transformed into a girl, went to Whateley and joined up with the New Olympians]], but never got released. There's a small teaser, but that's it- Feral's author dropped off the face of the earth and hasn't been heard from for years.** The entire universe demonstrates a classic problem with TransformationFiction in general and GenderBender fiction in specific: once the characters have finished their transformations the authors lose interest in them, which is probably why the authors have introduced LoadsAndLoadsOfCharacters (each with a highly detailed backstory) while the main story arc has been stalled at the beginning of the second semester for years.* AbusiveParents: Part of the reason Jade was so eager to leave her old identity behind was because her previous life as Jared was little more than a long series of verbal and physical abuses from her father, especially in the three years after her mother died.** What Circuit Breaker's parents did to their children is beyond the pale even for child abusers.* AcademyOfAdventure: Superpowers, Magic, Mad Scientists, Eldritch Abominations, Teenagers. Need I say more? There are multiple student deaths each semester, and that's not counting the odd mutilation, possession, BalefulPolymorph or soul lost to demons. Parents still send their kids to Whateley because students there actually have a ''higher'' survival rate than mutant teenagers in the general population.* ActionGirl: Yeah. There's a lot of these.* ActionMom: Several of the students at Whateley are the children of superheroines/villains. ** Tennyo's mother is a superpowered secret agent. ** Becoming an "Action Mom" is Jade's express goal in life, though she is willing to be an action babysitter or action nanny first.* ACupAngst: Jade; technically, she doesn't even have A-cups, since she is still physically male. She'd give anything to be fully female, and one of the most common ways she expresses that desire is breast envy.* ADayInTheLimelight: Every once in a while, a story is told from a minor character's point of view. One of the earliest examples is "It's Good to be the Don", following Don Sebastiano.* AdultsAreUseless: Both averted and played straight. Many adults in the Whateleyverse are in fact quite competent when shown, at least within their areas of expertise; yet since the focus is generally on the (mis)adventures of mutant ''teenagers'', it's just as common to see some adult or other left holding the {{Idiot Ball}}. (This is occasionally justified; at least one story has a house mother being unable to see the very real problems between two roommates due to magical manipulation and thus refusing to reassign them.) According to older characters, Adults used to not be useless when it came to the bullying situation in previous years. [[spoiler: However Carson has admitted to have committed herself to a {{plan}} involving allowing bullies free rein. What exactly that plan entails, has not yet been revealed.]]** [[spoiler: We know a bit more about the plan. Apparently, it involves making sure the Don stays at the school, as he has a part to play in a coming Apocalypse-level event.]]** Played straight later when the students band together against the ultimate enemy and decide to exclude all adults because they would either take too long to convince or take too much time to act.* AGodAmI - Carmilla is the daughter of a human and a Great Old One, and the focus of a religion (the Cult of Kellith).** the New Olympians are the human (mutant) incarnations of the classic Greek Dodecatheon (the twelve highest gods and godesses of Olympus), though two of them (Neptune and Dionysius) are missing.** [[spoiler: Nacht]] became a demigoddess thanks to the Telchines' Astrolabe. [[spoiler: she deliberately lets go of this power, realizing she isn't ready for godhood]]. * AGodIAmNot: [[spoiler: While trapped on the planet Medhas, Tennyo is forced to undergo a GodTest, and passes it - only to turn around and tell them that 'The Captain' (The Star Stalker) was never a god in the first place and that they should stop worshipping her.]]* AIIsACrapshoot* AintNoRule: As Jobe Wilkins, whose codename is also Jobe Wilkins, demonstrates, there ain't no rule saying you can't register your real name as your codename. It may help that keeping any sort of secret identity would be next to impossible in his case since his dad is the setting's expy of Doctor Doom, a major supervillain and emperor of his own nation.** Well, one of them. There's another one set up in Europe in a nation very similar to the one Doctor Doom actual owns, and with an Eastern European name to boot. Jobe's dad lives in the Carribean.* AlienBlood: Including examples that make the in-story scientists' heads hurt, like blood that has antimatter elements in it...but only ''sometimes''.* AlienCatnip: Some mutant biology quirks can cause this. For example some exemplars, Like Toni, find chocolate intoxicating due to their hyperactive metabolism.* AllCheeringAllTheTime: The Whateley Academy [[MartialArtsAndCrafts Martial Arts Cheerleaders]], always dress in cheer costumes of their own design, despite not having any sports teams to cheer for (though they do manage to show up for the martial-arts duels).* AllMenArePerverts: Crops up now and again, named characters are a lot more likely to be an exception than any given crowd. Lancer and Phase definitely are though.* AllThereInTheManual: Three manuals:** The "Whateley Academy Universe Bible" to which only canon authors have access.** The [[http://www.crystalhall.org/chboards3/ Whateley Forums]], where the canon authors answer backstory questions.** The [[http://crystalhall.wikia.com/wiki/Whateley_Academy_Wiki Whateley Wiki]].* AllWitchesHaveCats: Elyzia Grimes is a powerful witch and a member of Whateley Academy's Magical Arts Department. She even looks like a witch, since she's described as looking uncomfortably like what Morticia Addams would look like in real life. Her familiar is a solid black cat named Merlin.--> "I look like this, I teach magic, and I have a black cat for a familiar. There are times, Miss Goodkind, when you either laugh with the joke, or set yourself up to be laughed at."* AlphaBitch: ''Two'' full cliques of them, actually. The Alphas (gender neutral, [[SoBeautifulItsACurse Exemplar]] focused) and the Martial Arts Cheerleaders. A male version is in the goth squad, who worship Great Old Ones. In particular, Tansy Walcutt, an Alpha, stands out; she tormented Ayla ([[GenderBender then known as Trevor]]) at their old school, and carries on at Whateley after they both mutate. The Alphas have undergone something of a HeelFaceTurn, thanks to the bitchiest of them losing power. Tansy is still a bitch, though.* AlwaysVSexy: Vanessa, codename Vox. Girlfriend of Phase, and regarded as one of the hot freshman girls at Whateley. To top it off, she's a Siren. * AnAssKickingChristmas: Nearly everyone (even Aquerna!) ends up have some sort of fight or incident over their first Winter Break. Don't even ask how it went for Ayla or Billie...** Seraphim's SuperheroOrigin story took place at that time as well.* AncientConspiracy: They're all over the place, tripping over each others' feet and regularly causing a GambitPileup. The most important of them are:** The Grand Hall of Sinister Wisdom, a lodge of infernalists and black magicians, ** The Bloodline, an extended family of vampiric proto-mutants, ** The Tong of the Dark Madonna, who made the mistake of attacking the families of several students and wound up getting wiped out,** The Thule Gemeinschaft, who used the Nazi Death Camps to [[{{Ghostapo}} experiment with necromancy]],** The Red Brotherhood, who seek to use chaos and violence to 'awaken' humans to the mistakes they are making,** The White Brotherhood, the sworn enemies of the Red Brotherhood. * AndThenWhat: Clover and co get a hold of some essence (magical power). They've been constantly questing for essence so they can do 'cool stuff' (read: they hate being in junior high and want to do everything the older kids do) but never work out a decent plan, so when they finally get the essence, they end up wasting it all accidentally without ever deciding what to do with it. ** On the flip side of this, Mimeo asked this to himself early in his career - and answered it. Brilliantly.* AndThisIsFor...: Done by Lady Astarte when she finally had the chance to pay back Freya for her crimes against the other students.* AngelDevilShipping: [[invoked]] Canon example with [[spoiler: Fey and Carmilla. The fact that they became "sisters" through a BloodOath makes for IncestSubtext as well.]]* AngryBlackMan:** Chaka's brother Vince tries to pull this off. The rest of the family doesn't like this, and Chaka calls him out regularly as a phoney.** N'Dizi, who founded an Afro-centric martial-arts clique, the Tigers, because of perceived racism from the existing martial arts group, the Dragons. He and many of the other Tigers tend to get in the face of any African or African-American students whom they see as insufficiently militant. Chaka calls him out as a hypocrite due to his possessive misogyny.* AnimalisticAbomination: The voodoo-wolves. Most people can't even stand to be in their presence because their eldritch nature wreaks havoc on the mind.* AnimalStereotypes: Characters who have either changed into animal-like forms or are avatars of certain animals usually adopt traits and habits of said animal. [[MagicalNativeAmerican Heyoka]] has to deal with several different avatars, causing [[PronounTrouble her]] to seem nearly neurotic when [[GenderBender he]] adopts their powers.* AnnoyingYoungerSibling: Some are a ''lot'' worse than merely annoying.** Chaka's little brother Matt, in particular, although Cindy and Vince see ''her'' as the annoying one.** Billie's little brother Thad dosed her with a chemical that triggered a deadly (possibly even fatal, from a certain point of view) burnout over a minor slight. ** Completely averted by Paige's sister, Jo. She decides not to room with Paige, not because she was afraid of being turned into a were, but because she didn't want her sister to blame herself for it.** Loophole is mad because her younger brother Stronghold just won't ''stop embarrassing her''.* AnonymousRinger: Averted: Real life people are always brought up, including UsefulNotes/GeorgeWBush, who is President at the point in time that the stories take place.* AntiVillain: Not surprisingly, there are several, including one who is a POV character:** Dr. Diabolik is a WellIntentionedExtremist and AffablyEvil, with an agenda that aims to make humanity a spacefaring race. However, his methods do tend to leave a lot of CollateralDamage, and have led to over 17,000 deaths to date.** The Brigand is a classic ByronicHero, fighting to root out political and corporate corruption. However, given the setting, and his methods, this means that he's considered a supervillain. ** The Imp is an artist and art collector. The fact that she has GSD and was driven out of her home as a teen left her with a lot of anger towards the world and a {{Trickster}}'s view of the people she steals from. * AppliedPhlebotinum, HandWave, AWizardDidIt: Hat trick!* ApronMatron: Each of the dorm cottages at Whateley has an adult supervisor, usually a matronly woman who is [[NeverMessWithGranny more than she seems]].* ArbitrarySkepticism: ** Unsurprisingly scientists have started to study mutants, and now have working hypotheses for many different powers. For some reason we're yet to see any scientific view on magic, and several top scientists (including the Mr Fantastic {{expy}}) insist that magic is just a mixture of psychic powers and self delusion, something even a simple experiment should prove otherwise. No explanation is given for why scientists are letting prejudice overcome scientific integrity.\\\\On the other hand, some of the ancient mystical beings have implied that psychic powers are just same thing as magic, but used by somebody who doesn't truly understand what they're doing. There are exactly two people who hold this view. One is in a flashback to the 60s, when nobody knew how anything related to mutants works. The other has been operating since childhood on the assumption that everything has a rational explanation (which magic most certainly does not), and spent most of that time fighting Mephisto, a supervillain who has based their entire career on using mundane processes and high intelligence to imitate magic, mutant powers, aliens, etc.** There's also a member of staff, Hakim Al-Feyez, who maintains a belief that Devisors are just alchemists who have yet to admit the mystical basis of their work.* ArcWords: As of ''The Real MCO'' and ''Silent Nacht'', 'Zulu' appears to be this.* ArmoredClosetGay: [[spoiler: Solange]] is terrified that she'll lose status if outed; outwardly, she hates and fears lesbians with a passion, and is determined to sleep with as many men as she can to prove she isn't one, no matter how much she hates it.* ArsonMurderAndLifesaving* ArsonMurderAndJaywalking:-->''Jobe: [...] There's no way genetic engineering can stave off the scourges that are ignorance, poverty, bigotry or line dancing.* ArtificialLimbs: Common in the setting, with all of the devisors and gadgeteers running around. Some are even necessitated by actual disability, illness or injury, others are just mad science run amok.** OmnicidalManiac supervillain Deathlist is a full body replacement cyborg** When Jobe has been beaten and doesn't want to bring the authorities down onto the bully who did it, he claims that it's nothing and that he'd been more injured in a thumbwar, neglecting to mention that it was a thumbwar with his father, whose arm is cybernetic. Jobe, missing [[ICallHimMisterHappy Mister Happy]], creates an organic prosthetic. Jobe's father, missing his ''own'' Mister Happy, built a smart, detachable prosthetic that doubles as a dildo. This reportedly saved the world once. "Do you know how hard it is to declare nuclear war when your wife is doing that to you?"* ArtisticLicenseBiology: Naturally part of the mutant factor, however, the vast majority of people have started puberty by 14 (and in fact many girls are actually done with it by that time), yet all the characters shown have only recently come into their puberty and powers. It's plausible that the mutant gene causes later puberty** It's (jokingly) suggested that there is an increasing number of MTF mutants because the mutant gene is trying to outbreed the baseline genes. Even a cursory knowledge of genetics makes this patently ridiculous as genes aren't intelligent. [[note]]And also begs the question why there would be homosexual mutants at all, given that it defeats said purpose[[/note]].*** It's also been suggested that, while the genes themselves aren't intelligent (duh), there are intelligent forces manipulating the situation both for and against the mutants, which is not entirely implausible in a universe where gods, FairFolk, and CthulhuMythos entities are not only real, but awake, aware, and active. *** The begged question of homosexual mutants may also be addressed by research such as that by Dr. Robin Baker that shows that, statistically, gay and bi people of both genders have a higher reproduction rate than the heterosexual population through chance encounters, exceptions to their preferred gender, and attempts to hide their lifestyle.** A fact occasionally tossed out is that the trans mutants have baseline hormone levels of members of the opposite gender and this somehow explains them developing secondary sex characteristics of that gender incredibly quick. For example Fey goes from male to having to pass as female within the span of a month due to have moderate sized breasts. In real life, secondary sex characteristics take years to develop. Justified to an extent however in that speed of change is apparently incredibly variable depending on the individual, and for some it is agonizingly slow while for others it is almost instantaneous. * ArtisticLicenseReligion: The description Whateley gives for the Tao doesn't match up with the real-life Taoism. At all. To be fair, the Whateley universe also features a large variety of very real-in-setting mystical ''entities'' that real life (as far as we know) doesn't. In a world like that, that such religions as exist even have familiar ''names'' is already a case of LikeRealityUnlessNoted. (For another example, real-life Christians' notion of God isn't exactly "some less-than-all-powerful being once and possibly still named [[http://crystalhall.wikia.com/wiki/Cthulhu_Mythos Nodens]] that's busy staging a carefully stalemated mock-war with 'Satan' so that the {{Eldritch Abomination}}s that really run the show won't come in and wipe them ''both'' out", either.)* ArtisticLicensePhysics** Ayla's stated ability to alter his inertia in flight through density warping (aka "Phase-Leap") is outright ''nonsensical'' in a [[{{UsefulNotes/Relativity}} relativistic universe]]. Even in a classical Newtonian universe there would be problems. The only place "Phase-Leaping" could possibly work as described is on a stationary earth in an Aristotelian universe, which the Whateley universe isn't.* AscendedExtra* TheAtoner: ** Erik Mahren, Elyzia Grimes is said to be this but its not come up much. ** Also: the Green Witch, Mr. Garrity, and Mr. Donner.** Kodiak, mainly for everything he did as a part of Freya's group.* AtrociousAlias: several students (past and present) have chosen codenames which were either poorly thought out or had meanings they weren't aware of:** 'Power Pork' has been trying for years to get his codename changed. Fat chance.** Mega-Death, a (usually) mild-mannered Devisor, chose his name while in the throes of a [[ScienceRelatedMemeticDisorder Diedrick's Syndrome]] episode. He's regretted it ever since. ** N'Dizi thought his codename sounds cool and Afro-centric. It turns out to mean 'cucumber'.** A vicious gossip with translating powers was dubbed 'Traduce' by one of the upperclassmen, and she thought it was a good choice for her codename. She didn't get the joke until it was too late.** Boom Job quickly found herself nicknamed 'Boob Job'. Shortening it to 'BJ' only added to the snickering.** A speedster tried the codename 'Quickie' in her freshman year, but after she figured out what everyone was laughing at, she went with the only slightly less embarrassing 'Go-Go'.* AttractiveBentGender: Standard for the genderbenders, except for those that also get physical mutations thrown in (and it's not unlikely that they won't be attractive in some fashion).* AuthorAppeal: Loads and loads. Aside from the obvious, there's FoodPorn, GunPorn, SupernaturalMartialArts... it is possible to ascribe specific stories and sections of multi-author stories solely by appeal.* AuthorAvatar: Subverted. The ones that most resemble the Canon Cabal are the Lit Chix, who are rather dysfunctional.* AwesomeButImpractical: The one-shot character of OMAG, a duplicator, exemplifies this. While he has a good power, and some creative uses, he never thinks things through. So he's always one step behind.* BackStory: Hive gets a dream-sequence This Is Your Life exploring her past as a Navy SEAL and Mimeo has a full story covering his own life story. Also the core cast have stories - sometimes quite lengthy - of how they came to Whateley and the 'start' of their tales there.* BadassNormal:** Several members of Whateley Security would qualify.** Chief Delarose, definitely. A supervillain that was feared worldwide knew him ''by name''.** As a non-mutant, Chou Lee is listed by Whateley, and registered by the DPA (see below), as a "baseline". The school has deliberately used this to teach at least one of its nastier pupils a painful lesson in WhatMeasureIsANonSuper. However, she is a superbly-skilled martial artist who wields [[AbsurdlySharpBlade a magical sword]] and several other mystical artefacts, that really boost her well beyond normal human abilities.** Sensei Ito, Whateley's Martial Arts instructor, is a little old man with no powers. He routinely kicks his students' asses all over the dojo, many of whom could charitably be described as 'insanely overpowered'. He is a [[OldMaster little]] [[BadassGrandpa old man]] though. One imagines he is typically grinning. Also, he routinely kicks ''one particular kind'' of insanely overpowered student around the dojo..... TK Bricks, who are immensely strong and invulnerable, have well-categorized weaknesses, and have spent most of their time since mutating in a "world of cardboard" scenario and are therefore instinctively holding back for fear of smashing anything they touch. Were Sensei Ito to try this stunt with a blaster, speedster, or any other of the more exotic powersets, he would likely end up wearing his own butt for a hat.** Erik Mahren, before he manifested, deserves special mention.** As well as the rest of the Dragon Slayers, who not only beat up Boston's [[GreenLantern Green Lantern]] expy with either no superpowers or mutations that might as well be useless, but [[spoiler: are seen as the boogeymen of the mutant community]].** Josie Gillman enters Whateley fully expecting to become a badass normal and quickly learns it's just high school, albeit with superpowers* BadBoss: most but not all supervillains, the Grand Hall of Sinister Wisdom takes the cake.* BagOfHolding: these (or technological/magical methods for accomplishing the same effect) are becoming something of a staple of the setting. More than two thirds of Team Kimba have access to something like it: Chou has two, one specifically an invisible scabbard for Destiny's wave, the other a literal BagOfHolding, both given to her by the Taoist Immortals. Ayla has his Mobius-produced utility belt. Fey accomplishes similar effects using magic to store her armour and sword. Shroud has her locker, stored inside her body, where her costumes and things are kept. Jade was given a purse of holding by Thuban for Christmas. The only Kimbas currently lacking are Hank (who manages something similar by using paper swords he can store in his pockets), Tennyo (wo REALLY doesn't need anything) and Chaka. Other notables include Malachai, Loophole, Jericho and the Anti-Paladin, all of whom use gesture- or thought-controlled teleportation devices to pull their gear from nowhere; Thuban himself, who uses his size-warping powers to make bags, pockets, rooms, cars etc into [[Series/DoctorWho TARDIS]]-like structures that are bigger on the inside (this is a big secret power of his); and the [[strike:Spy Kidz]] [[strike:Secret Squirrels]] Espionage Cadet Corps, whose size-warper is able to shrink things down to fit into regular pockets, hence his code-name, Holdout.* BatmanGambit: Ayla successfully pulls one off, putting the Masterminds in his pocket.* BattleInTheCenterOfTheMind: Sara goes through this in "Insanity Prerequisite".* TheBeautifulElite: A lot of mutants, due to the "exemplar" power set. It comes with a price, though: exemplars tend to top out the range of ''everything'', including teenage angst and hormonal tumult, so they have roughly double the mortality, incarceration, pregnancy, and suicide rates of normal teenagers.* BecauseDestinySaysSo: The Tao knows where you live. And what books your daddy has in his library halfway around the world.* BenevolentBoss: Phase/Ayla. Also, Jadis Diabolik gets into a rant about this during her and the Bad Seed's [[ADayInTheLimelight Christmas story]], and how this management style made her father into one of the best supervillains around.* BerserkButton: Go on, hold Strega's kid hostage. [[spoiler: She attacks the entire city of Paris and intended to take over Europe in retaliation, unless they returned her daughter.]]* BewareTheHonestOnes: Jobe Wilkins is fairly honest: he's also a sociopathic genius with LiteralGenie tendencies and a bent for biological tinkering with no scruples about experimenting on himself or others.* BewareTheNiceOnes: All of the main characters really, but:** Jade Sinclair [[spoiler: will nail you to a tree. With railroad spikes. Even if you're twice her size. Then she'll burn a message into your flesh.]]** Nikki Reilly [[spoiler: will melt your face.]]** Billie Wilson [[spoiler: will slice you in two with a lightsaber, blow you up with antimatter, or beat you to death with her bare hands. [[ArsonMurderAndJaywalking Or spit on you.]]]]** Chou Lee [[spoiler: will simply kill you. Sorry, nothing personal, but the balance must be maintained.]]** Ayla Goodkind [[spoiler: ''is'' nice enough...until you threaten someone he cares about. ''Then'' he will financially ruin you, your family, ''and'' your dog. Unless you apologize and agree to play nice.]] Well, he might if it wasn't against school rules, but he'll definitely fantasize about it.** Sara Waite [[spoiler: will eat your soul.]]** Toni Chandler [[spoiler: will throw playing cards into your legs. Ordinary playing cards.]]* BewareTheSillyOnes: Jade. A prank war between Jade and Beltane could conceivably end all life as we know it, but underneath her silliness Jade is a walking MookHorrorShow with a scarily high body count.* BigApplesauce: While most of the series is set in an out of the way corner of New Hampshire, and many of the trips out involve Boston rather than NYC, it is made clear that New York City is ''the'' main place for mutants and other supers on the East Coast in the few stories set there, with at least six major super teams located there and dozens or even hundreds of 'street heroes' and 'street villains' running around. At least four [[BadGuyBar Villain Bars]] are mentioned by name, and one, Superbad, is a regular backdrop for meetings between characters and low-level street supers. Jadis even knows several dance clubs that allow underaged mutants in.* BigEater: many mutants, especially energizers, TK supermen, and some shapeshifters, require massive quantities of food to provide the energy to use their powers.* BiggerIsBetterInBed: The flip side of the MostCommonSuperpower for male Exemplars, often to GagPenis proportions. An in-world sex manual specifically warns male Exemplars not to be too agressive because of the [[ManOfSteelWomanOfKleenex risk of harming their partner due to this]] (the converse warning is made for female Exemplars with baseline male partners, as well, specifically discussing the possibility of of [[VaginaDentata injuring them with their internal musculature]]).* BigNo* BilingualBonus: Especially in 'The Big Idea'. This includes a DISCLAIMER in French!* BiteTheWaxTadpole: In-universe example, Trevor (about a year before becoming Ayla) noticed that the product of an upcoming major HomogenousMultinationalAdCampaign was being titled 'MAIRD' (which would be pronounced the same as the French word 'merde'). He pointed this out and got his father to change the name before it was too late.* BlackCloak* BlackMagic: Kallysta Thessellarean (Hekate) practices the darkest of black arts.* BlackShirt* BlessedWithSuck: inevitable with all of the more powerful/less attractive mutations, but most prominently explored with non-mutant Chou. As the Handmaid of the Tao, she's required to preserve the balance at any cost, even if that requires her to assist evil or murder a saint. Knowing the Tao may require her to murder her own friends causes her much anguish and gives her nightmares.** Tennyo: Potentially the most powerful person in the entire universe, she lives in a world of cardboard and full use of her powers produces hard radiation so she has to limit herself to protect her friends.** Seraphim: Kerry can heal virtually any disease or injury, but each healing takes an enormous physical and emotional toll on her. Just choosing who to heal, knowing that she can't possibly help everyone who deserves it, is a difficult if not intolerable burden.** Screech's voice can rend steel and melt glass. Unfortunately, she can't make it do anything less than rend steel or melt glass, rendering her effectively mute and a constant danger to everyone around her. * BlueAndOrangeMorality: Most [[EldritchAbomination Class X entities]], and anyone who spends any significant amount of time around them (e.g., Ecila Mason), will have a view of existence quite different from anything remotely human.** Jobe's distorted sense of morality makes him completely blind to how other people view his actions.* BloodKnight: Several, but the king of this has to be Counterpoint, aka [[spoiler: Ares]].* BloodyMurder: Some of the characters' blood have unusual qualities, such as Tennyo's, which has {{antimatter}} in it. Sometimes.* BoardingSchool: of the fancy, toney prep school variety, like Phillips Exeter with Mutants.* BodyHorror: In ''A Single Fold'', a number of students are infected with a bio-virus, and Jobe is implicated (though he was innocent). At the same time, the protagonist, Folder, is [[spoiler: involuntarily placed under a spell that changes his gender.]] Jobe, outraged at the perp for doing so while completely disregarding Folder's own opinions on the subject and agreement to be so changed, proceeds to, in no uncertain terms, fuck his body up, like so:--> The right arm was lengthened to where it might drag behind the boy on the ground, if he could walk. The left arm was twisted and bent in so many angles that it seemed to be a knotted mess 'just' hanging from the shoulder. One collarbone jutted upwards while the other stuck out from the front of an oddly reformed chest. The legs and hips seemed to be similarly effected, though the toes on one foot were very nearly a foot long. [[spoiler: Diaz's]] mouth was disturbing in that the lower jaw appeared to have been pulled out half a foot, pinched and pulled downward and then twisted thirty or so degrees to the right.** Nope, it wasn't Jobe who did this, it was Folder. Jobe offered to fix the damage ... subject to some conditions.* BoringInvincibleHero: ** Team Kimba have never lost as a group. Take that as you will. To be fair, they did get ''badly'' beaten up in the climax of ''Ayla and the Birthday Brawl'', wherein [[spoiler: nobody got killed, but none of the bad guys got beaten and the team as a whole were badly hurt.]]** Tennyo can look like this to those who don't know her better, but Chaka may be a better example. Tennyo is a walking PersonOfMassDestruction and MadeOfIron, but has serious psychological issues and has in fact 'lost' or come dangerously close to it a number of times; meanwhile, Chaka's do-anything ki mastery has so far let her merrily skip through life beating any challenges she encounters while making it look ''easy''.** The unique personalities, however, may allow them to move to the level of ShowyInvincibleHero, and they STILL have issues with personality. Individual members can, and will, be defeated big-time. Interestingly enough, they ARE getting this reputation around the school.** And now they've gotten their asses kicked in a simulation [[spoiler: against baselines]], created specifically by their instructors to make sure they aren't getting too confident in their abilities. [[spoiler: 4 died in-sim, not including 2 others who would have bought it without their HealingFactor]]** Ayla's stories tend to focus a lot on aspects outside of combat, such as social networking and building up from scratch the economic empire that Ayla ''would'' have inherited if he had not been a mutant. But when it does come to combat, Ayla is so used to the level of his invincible teammates, and the equally powerful opponents he fights, that he is repeatedly shocked to realise how many people consider ''him'' a BoringInvincibleHero. That is, if they consider him a ''hero''...** In ''Ayla and the Mad Scientist'', the team minus Lancer and Phase are [[spoiler: obliterated by the Grunts, courtesy of Bomber's opening move, in a sim they didn't know they would have. They went in blind and started by getting nuked, only Chaka and Shroud avoiding it.]] They got even in a later sim.** Ultimately most of them except Phase are explicitly excluded from the secret "Atlantean League" the students put together to fight the ultimate enemy because they are either too precious (Fey), too dangerous (Tennyo), too inscrutable (Bladedancer), or both too dangerous and inscrutable (Sara). No one even thinks to consider Jade.* BreakfastClub: Apart from Team Kimba, there's also the [[MonsterMash Outcast Corner]], a group of inhuman looking [[UnstoppableRage ragers]] and a blind guy.* BrickJoke: Quite a few, often occurring in Ayla's stories, along with standard Continuity nods.** Early in Bek D. Corbin's ''The Big Idea'' the Alphas decide to prank the protagonist by painting his room pink and more while he is indisposed elsewhere. Halfway through he's forced to switch rooms with a villain due to roommate problems. Said villain is shown wondering why the room is pink. ** Example of Diane Castle's Brick Jokes? In Maggie Finson/Babs Yernukle's ''Christmas Elves'', Jade receives a purse, [[BagOfHolding big enough to put a floor lamp in]]. A few months later, in ''Ayla And The Great Shoulder Angel'' conspiracy, Jade is asked to empty out her purse. Sure enough, she pulls out a floor lamp (it's not the same one, though.)* BrokenAesop: Sara has a speech on how she doesn't understand why humans are so possessive of the people they love and uses branding as a metaphor, no one points out that she has branded people she loves with a demon mark; demon marks are irreversible marks of ownership, if you have one the demon owns your soul and can control you almost utterly any time they want.* BrotherChuck: Whatever happened to Feral? Also an example of RealLifeWritesThePlot. ** She's still there both as a member of Judicator's faction within the New Olympians and as a member of Sara's Pride. Except now she's almost entirely in the background since the author never had the chance to develop her.** Definitely fits this trope now that the New Olympians, and Judicator, are in major focus. Feral is just not mentioned, even as 'oh, she's over there'. * ButtMonkey: Greasy. In fact, he actually shifts to TheWoobie, at times. ** Josie Gilman. Fate conspires to humiliate her no matter what happens* BunglingInventor: Devisors and Gadgeteers. They're students after all, and sometimes things go "bang".* CallingYourAttacks: The Yama Dojo ninjas. Fey and the Necromancer have also done this when battling each other, and Chaka does this with her [[KiAttacks Chaka Chaka Bang Bang]]. It's noted that in magical duels calling your attacks is standard...so you can psych out your opponent by casting something called Murrigan's Wind or call the WRONG attack and throw off their defenses.* CapeBusters: The Dragonslayers (who are retired) and the Knights of Purity.* CaptainErsatz: Hello, [[strike: Ryoko]] Tennyo. It's very much acknowledged in the stories, and at least one clique considers her to obviously be the real deal, which may cause problems later.** At least one character dismisses her as a CosplayOtakuGirl until she demonstrates her bonafides as a PersonOfMassDestruction.* CaptainSuperhero: Played with: School rules specifically forbid including ranks or titles like "Captain" and "Doctor" in your code name if you have not earned them in real life. There's some juvenile grousing about the unfairness of it all and some unofficial cheating at the margins but you can see why the faculty and staff who have actually earned those ranks, titles and degrees would find the whole idea of HighSchool kids using them unacceptably pretentious. * CardCarryingVillain: [[SuperRegistrationAct Quite literally in some cases]].* TheCasanova: Plenty of mid- and high-level Exemplars are perfectly willing to exploit their superhuman masculinity to get lots of nookie, with [[DepravedBisexual Don Sebastiano]] at the top of the list at Whateley currently. Outside the school, the most notorious of these is Captain Courage, who got dubbed 'Captain Condom' by the tabloids after the news broke that he was the subject of ''hundreds'' of paternity suits; he is rumored to have fled the country to escape from his crushing child-support payments.* CastHerd: Most characters are part of a team, making it somewhat easier to sort out which character is which. The herds do have a habit of intermingling, though.* CatchPhrase: Ayla, and the Goodkind family, have "Goodkinds don't complain. They fix things."* CatGirl: Feral, Miyet, and Paige for starters...* ChainmailBikini: but not as armor; see WardrobeMalfunction, below.** At least one major superheroine, the speedster brick Beach Bunny, ''does'' wear a chainmail bikini in the usual manner, but it's mostly for show; when one of the students tries to emulate her, she discovers that it doesn't work out well for your typical FragileSpeedster, causing her serious chafing in places which don't chafe well. * ChangelingFantasy: Inverted with [[spoiler: Nacht]], who never imagined that the villainess who raised her wasn't her real mother. Given what an amoral monster that villainess was, she was actually ''thrilled'' to learn this.* CharacterDevelopment: With hundreds of stories or chapters written in the series, CharacterDevelopment is a given. While some, such as Chaka, don't deviate very far from their original personalities, other characters can be seen growing and changing in various ways.* CharacterFocus: There's around a [[SharedUniverse dozen canon authors]], all of whom write about different characters. Has generally mellowed out to focus on Ayla and through Ayla, Team Kimba, along with whatever Bek is working on. * ChekhovsGun: In Ayla and the Test, Phase offhandedly considers the problems involved in setting up a mutant-focused webspider. In Ayla and the Networks, two stories later, he's able to use this to entrap Stopwatch after Stopwatch tries to steal data from his laptop.* ChekhovsGunman* TheChewToy: Merry. When she's split into Paige and Petra, Paige (as far as the readers know, because she only appears as a minor character since then) gets a reprieve. Petra, unfortunately, picks up Paige's slack.* ChivalrousPervert: Ayla, definitely.* TheChosenOne:** Chou Lee certainly qualifies, and is ''not'' happy with what the Tao requires.** Nikki Reilly too, but she's OK with her destiny.* ChronicHeroSyndrome: Can result from 'Galahad Syndrome' in Exemplars; cf. WithGreatPowerComesGreatInsanity, below. ** Ayla's determination to solve the problems of everyone around him reaches epic proportions at times.* ChurchMilitant: The Catholic Church, in the Whateley Universe, not only has the Inquisition (who has mellowed out somewhat since the Dark Ages), but another group called the Knights of the Church. The Knights are a bit of an odd duck, though: they, on occasion, include non Catholics and Pagans into their group, and their newest member [[MarkOfTheBeast is very close]] to a [[HornyDevils lust goddess]]. Oh, and she gets the ''[[SarcasmMode fun]]'' position of official [[spoiler:messenger to the Knights from {{Satan}}]].* CleanCut* CodeName: Every mutant (and thus, every pupil) is ''required'' to have one. Jobe Wilkins takes advantage of the fact that no rules say your codename can't simply be your actual name, and Jimmy T only made a token effort. Unfortunately an ill-chosen code name like Megadeath or Power Pork can either follow you for life or leave you open to insults like "Boob Job" for "Boom Job".* CombatCommentator: During the Combat Finals, Peeper and Greasy fulfill this, adding unnecessarily lustful and degrading comments about female participants (almost completely Peeper). At one point, [[BlindBlackGuy Jericho]] and [[TheVoiceless Razorback]] forcefully take over this position after they get a little too sexist about their teammate Diamondback.* CombatPragmatist: Sensei Ito. He encourages this in all of his students.* CombatTentacles: Sara Waite* ComboPlatterPowers: Common, but there's a few characters that stand out, such as Tennyo, Jimmy T, and Merry/Paige/Petra. Power mimics like Counterpoint can create their own combo platters. [[spoiler: [[PowerCopying Power mimic]] Mimeo combines the powers of Phase, Tennyo, Lancer, and Fey during the battle outside the Roxbury C Supermax Prison. After wiping up the floor with all comers and escaping, he then used those powers to hold up a nearly-impregnable diamond exchange.]]* ComedicSociopathy: Much of the humor in Jobe's viewpoint stories comes from his total failure to understand ''why'' most of the people he "helps" hate him so much.* ComesGreatResponsibility: Ayla, despite having just insisted that he has no intention of becoming a superhero, expounds this premise at length. Fubar calls him on the inconsistency, with the exact phrase even.--> "I don't see it as playing superhero. I don't want to be one of the spandex set. I just…" I had to think about it for a second. "...I need to help people. It's my upbringing. Goodkinds are raised to think about how their actions affect others. We're raised to.. well.. if we were royalty, it would be called ''noblesse oblige''. We run a large portion of the planet, and we know that people depend on us. We have an obligation to help those people. Just because it's inconvenient, or difficult, or something we'd rather avoid, doesn't mean we shouldn't do it. I can't look at something like those monsters and just say 'oh let someone else get it'. That's not how I was raised." \\Louis smiled, "With great power comes great responsibility? That sounds like a superhero credo to me, Phase."\\I sighed, "I'm not Peter Parker. Let's re-phrase that as: 'with great economic power comes great social responsibility'. Better?" \\He was still smirking. * CompassionateCritic* CompellingVoice: A StockSuperpower for Sirens, including Vox.* CompulsorySchoolAge: Carmilla and Eldritch. Samantha, despite her [[OlderThanTheyLook apparent age]], doesn't become a student. [[spoiler: Vamp.]]** In Carmilla's defence, she isn't doing any of the normal high school classes. Just the ones that relate to her mutant power. Same applies to Eldritch.** Samantha's new body is 18 so it's not a subversion.** Now Ribbon has gotten into the act, too. Given that she went from fifty to eleven in a few days, and is expected to look like a pre-teen for several years to come, this is at least a plausible answer for her current problems, but is only a short-term solution.* ComicBookTime: Averted, surprisingly. However, it is subtly referenced and mocked with Headmistress Carson, who looked like a teenager well into her thirties, and is currently around eighty and looks to be in her late thirties. Carson has remarked at least once that this was not a pleasent experience for her.* ComicTrio* ConvenientlyCommonKink: Transgenderism, specifically male-to-female transgenderism, with bisexuality a close second.** While gender transformation is the main focus of the series, bisexuality is actually the more common of the two: current students either shown in series or said by WordOfGod to be bisexual include Chaka, Fey, Vox, Carmilla, Bladedancer, Gateway, Jobe (after being transformed, partly due to the Drow serum itself and partly through Carmilla's psychic manipulation), Belphoebe, Loophole, Michelangelo, Gabriel, Flux, Duplex, Macrobiotic (though this may be just a political stance to support Saladin's coming out), Imperious, Counterpoint (in so far as he's willing to rape anyone he beats when he can get away with it), Don Sebastiano (at least if he can cause enough suffering to someone through it), and Vamp.* CoolLoser* CoolOldGuy: Ito-sensei and Gunny Bardue. Headmistress Carson is of the [[CoolOldLady female variety]], despite looking [[OlderThanTheyLook middle aged]].* CoolAndUnusualPunishment: Headmistress Carson is well known for her creative approach to school discipline, with work detentions tailored to the offending student being particularly common.** Phase is simply in love with this trope as a way of getting back for pranks. Often the 'punishment' is an unwanted gift of some kind (e.g., he sent Fey, a vegetarian, a magazine subscription on different ways of preparing meat, in retaliation for [[GroinAttack turning the 'special' shower settings on when he was washing up]]), or one with a boobytrap of some sort (e.g., giving Peeper a devise electronic tablet that isn't affected by his power, thus letting him [[TheInternetIsForPorn browse Internet porn again]] - and then warning him that it would be shut off by remote if he didn't stop harassing the female students). * CoolStarship: Tennyo eventually finds one. It was parked on the moon for millenia, and she finds a memory crystal connected to it in the Whateley Library. It recognizes her as it's rightful captain, and and HilarityEnsues.* CorruptCorporateExecutive: While not very many have been seen in story, it is a part of the background of TheVerse that these types are largely the reason why many gadgeteers and devisors go rogue (though [[ScienceRelatedMemeticDisorder Diedrick's Syndrome]] is a common factor, too).* CosmicHorrorStory: Part of the mishmash setting, complete with {{Eldritch Abomination}}s and [[TomeOfEldritchLore Tomes of Eldritch Lore]]; Carmilla is descended from at least one, if not two of these. Seems to run on Derleth's [[TheyChangedItNowItSucks good vs evil]] interpretation of Lovecraft's material as opposed to Lovecraft's more chaotic and amoral world. But we don't know for sure yet, and WordOfGod hasn't clarified it. The school has a special classification for cosmic horror ''students'', "Class X Entities".* CosmicPlaything: Josie Gilman, due to the attentions of both several [[EldritchAbomination Great Old Ones]] and the now-barely-human Ecila Mason.** Pejuta seems to draw some of this as well, due to the interference of her enemies among the Native American spirits.** Circuit Breaker actually describes her life as a 'cosmic comedy'.* CrimeFightingWithCash: Not uncommon, given the number of superheroes who use PowerArmor and similar things. One of Phase's goals is to ''literally'' apply money to the problem of supervillainy, by [[CutLexLuthorACheck providing lucrative deals]] to Devisors and Gadgeteers for their work, thus making them less likely to turn to crime in the first place. In the shorter term, he has a cadre of inventive students acting as weaponsmiths for him, providing him with everything from a [[BagOfHolding utility belt that is larger on the inside]] to a collapsible tac baton made from Adamantium. He has spent literally ''millions'' on these gadgets and devises, mostly just to give him an edge against the many super-powered bullies at Whateley.* CrossoverCosmology: Side-effect of AllMythsAreTrue (or possibly an alternate interpretation of the world; the pages are vague)* CrouchingMoronHiddenBadass: Jade's solution to the fact that the obviously powerful are the first to get targeted. In addition the entire Team Kimba team has a talisman that makes eavesdroppers think they are acting like 15 year old high school girls when they're talking combat strategy. A LOT of characters work out this way. Take Jobe, for instance. He's not a moron in the intelligence sense of the word, but he's an utterly unsympathetic character from the outside, and not a lot better from the inside. On the face of things, he looks like a typically [[SquishyWizard squishy]], physically clueless nerd. Until he reveals he's been trained in martial arts since his early days, and has damn good strategic intelligence on top of it, enough to thoroughly play a team of trainee covert ops kids in the Bad Seeds christmas story.* CurbStompBattle: Team Kimba hands out one in "The Turks or the Geek". Once the sonic emitters are taken out, the ''entire school'' gets into one of these on Halloween.* CuteBruiser* CuteLittleFangs: Carmilla, Paige, Tennyo* CuteMonsterGirl: Kaiju* CutLexLuthorACheck: Ayla's solution to the problem of gadgeteers and devisors turning to crime after being screwed over by some CorruptCorporateExecutive is to ensure that they get a fair deal - from him - in the first place. * DangerousForbiddenTechnique: Tennyo's [[OneHitKill death blow]], which disintegrates both body ''[[DeaderThanDead and soul]]'' of the victim, to the point that even the particles that constituted their body evaporate into nothingness. She has nightmares about the one time she had to use it deliberately.** Pejuta is once warned by her spirit guides that some of the legendary powers of the Ptesanwi are so dangerous that she should avoid even ''thinking'' about them, lest she invoke them by accident. * DarkIsNotEvil: Carmilla & the Pack. Gothmog. The Dragonslayers. The Bad Seeds (some of the time). El Penitente. Thuban and Faction Three (maybe). See also LightIsNotGood below. * DatingCatwoman: ** Part of why Imp [[spoiler: agrees to go to Whateley as an art teacher]] is to get away from [[spoiler:Superhawk]], whom she had developed a romantic interest in.** Vamp used this as a ploy to get sympathy from Skyhawk, who fell for it hook, line and sinker.** Dragonblade is the result of a liaison between the hero Shadowmage and cult leader The Witch Queen. The custody battle that occurred when Shadowmage found out about A.J. was apparently quite spectacular.** She-Beast suspects that her real mother is the superheroine White Witch, and when she was younger imagined that this was what happened. She's still not sure who her mother really was, but she's no longer quite so sanguine about the relationship.* DayInTheLife* DeadpanSnarker* {{Deconstruction}}: The series liberally mixes deconstructions with [[TakeThat TakeThats]] and [[AffectionateParody AffectionateParodies]], until it is hard to say for sure which is which.** The entire concept of mutant powers, which is central to the series, is deconstructed with most of the Hawthorne Cottage residents.** Some aspects of the Champion serve to deconstruct ComicBook/{{Superman}}, especially Champion's (purely psychological) KryptoniteFactor and his imaginary OriginStory. This is seen most clearly in what Mephisto the Magician says about him.** The Cadet Crusaders deconstruct the concept of a 'teen sidekick team', specifically the ComicBook/TeenTitans. Two members of the CC also serve to deconstruct the 'team of ArtificialPerson superheroes' concept al la ''[=DNAgents=]''.* DependingOnTheWriter: Being a multi-writer verse, it's inevitable.* DepletedPhlebotinumShells* DepravedBisexual: More than a few, with Don Sebastiano (a sadist who gets his kicks humiliating both opponents and lovers alike, and was more than happy to [[spoiler: use both Skybolt and Cavalier as sex slaves]]), Counterpoint (who will gleefully to rape vanquished enemies when he can get away with it, and doesn't much care about what sex they are - he is [[spoiler: the physical incarnation Ares]], after all, and he never showed much distinction in the past either), and Michelangelo (a brutally physical sadist who has managed to drive away almost every possible lover at Poe) standing out. * DeusExitMachina: [[spoiler: Fubar got this treatment at Halloween.]]* DidYouJustPunchOutCthulhu: But the headmistress points out that having been seen to near-single-handedly defeat TheDragon[=/=]BigBad and his Mooks is ''not'' a good thing - because now it means that all the ''other'' villains are going to consider them serious threats.* DidYouJustRomanceCthulhu: Anybody who's received the attentions of Sara Waite.* DifferentForGirls* DirtForcefield: Part of some people's powers. It's why Pristine has her particular codename.* DisabilitySuperpower: Inverted: Hawthorne is full of kids who are effectively disabled by their own powers because a lack adequate control or RequiredSecondaryPowers make them a danger to themselves or others.* DiscardAndDraw: Potentially a result of burnout, as well as increasing or decreasing powers, however it is never considered a good thing as it can cause deformation and death.* DiscriminateAndSwitch: In ''A Fistful of Chaka'', Toni meets Koehnes, an Earth spirit serving Nikki as a maid. Koehnes tries to kick her out, and screams about how horrific it is that the Queen of the West has to share her room with a- and while Toni expects something racial, she instead gets 'With a ''mortal'''. Toni's response, hilariously, is 'Ooh, she said it! She said the M word!'* DisproportionateRetribution: A very common problem, when you have a lot of emotionally-overcharged teens with superpowers in the area of a largish private school. Counterpoint is, not surprisingly, king of this trope.* DoggedNiceGuy: several, as well as some dogged nice girls. Harlan Sawyer is probably the best example.* DoubleReverseQuadrupleAgent: [[spoiler: Aries is now working as a spy on The Don for both Phase and Kodiak while pretending to be a spy on Kodiak for The Don. If that wasn't enough, he has also come clean to Chief Delarose, the results of that are yet to be seen. But seems to be spying for the police, too.]]* DumbBlonde: {{Discussed}}, mentally, by Mrs. Carson in reference to a newsreader in Kayda 9.--> a bleach-blonde newsreader who probably had never heard of South Dakota before it was on the teleprompter. Mrs. Carson caught herself with that thought; it wasn't fair to the woman that she looked like an airhead blonde.* DraggedIntoDrag: The typical fate of anyone who resists the ThirdLawOfGenderBending, though at least one case of it happening to a physically male character occurs in the Halloween arc. ** Phase hates that this keeps happening to him, though given his appearance it is almost unavoidable.** Josie's older sister pulls this on her to keep Josie from moping about her transformation.* DrillSergeantNasty: Gunny Bardue and ''especially'' Erik Mahren, to the point that most students and security personnel knew him as "that asshole".* DrunkOnTheDarkSide: There have been occasional references to 'Quinzel-Osborn Syndrome', a form of bipolar disorder in which the 'manic' periods are characterized by a violent euphoria during which the subject literally appears to be intoxicated by violence and cruelty.* EatTheDog: Sara. Almost always in the main lunch hall at mealtime where it can be seen, as well. * EccentricTownsfolk: The nearby town is named after a [[LovecraftCountry town from a H.P. Lovecraft story]] and has a high school for mutants, heroes, and monsters. One doesn't ask too many questions.* ElaborateUniversityHigh* EldritchAbomination** Jericho's fashion sense.** Sara Waite is growing up into one of these.** Tennyo may be a [[SufficientlyAdvancedTechnology Sufficiently Advanced Biology]] version of this.* ElementalBaggage: Played straight by stronger mutants, but averted by weaker ones. * ElementalPowers* EmbarrassingMiddleName: Chaka* EmotionEater: Sara and El Penitente.* TheEmpath: Seraphim. Jinn, Sara/Carmilla and a few others have a variation, wherein they see people's emotions as colors (purple lust, green jealousy, red rage...) but don't experience the emotions themselves.* EmperorScientist: Joe Wilkins, AKA Gizmatic, who conquered a [[BananaRepublic minor Caribbean island]] and transformed it into the Empire of Karedonia, complete with tax-free offshore banking, robotic police, time-share supervillian lairs, and an [[VolcanoLair artificial volcano]] that quintupled the size of the island and provided it a steady income from mining industries. The [[CollapsingLair instability]] of this setup is itself part of the island's defenses: anyone who manages to beat Gizmatic would have to figure out how to keep the volcano stable, lest it collapse the entire island and swamp the whole region with a mega-tsunami.* EnemyMine: In the last chapter of Birthday Brawl, [[spoiler: Tennyo and a group of supervillains team up to dig out of Rox C after the Necromancer trapped them there.]]* EnergyAbsorption* EntitledBastard: Pretty common when inherited wealth meets with mutant powers. [[RoyalBrat Jobe]], several of the Alphas (naturally), most of the [[PhysicalGod New Olympians]] (no surprise there), some of the Golden Kids (ditto), and at the very least Fantastico and Oiler of the Good Ol' Boyz all fit this trope to varying degrees.. * EntryPimp: Infamously, one fan added hundreds of web links throughout TVTropes to Whateley without creating the actual WhateleyUniverse entry, requiring lots of cleanup and creating a lot of ill will.* EscapedFromHell: [[spoiler: Jade ]]escapes from [[PhysicalGod Sara's]] personal hell dimension in Tennyo Goes To Hell, though an aspect of herself also gets left behind. Fortunately, that part of herself has [[EarnYourHappyEnding achieved everything she ever wanted]] making it a somewhat confusing example.* EvenEvilHasLovedOnes: It's mentioned ''very'' explicitly that one of the few things you can do to get ''everyone'' with powers of some sort trying to kill you is to blackmail, threaten, or attack one of the student's families. Even supervillains have families and kids, after all -- some of which are at Whateley. [[spoiler: Specifically, it's said that the last group who tried to threaten a student's family was made the senior project of that year - and that, of the members of the group ''still living'', every last damn one of them is on life support...and profusely grateful to be in jail.]]** Some of Reverend Goodhope's 'thugs' are dumb enough to do this, and they're dealt with. Very quickly. Very brutally. ** As of the very end of part 4 of 'Five Elements Dancing', an evil cult tries to blackmail a student by threatening the families of her friends at school. Headmistress Carson calls the alumni association, and suddenly all of the superhero alumni are looking the other way while the supervillain alumni take action. * EvenEvilHasStandards: Jobe Wilkins is a sick fuck, but he utterly despises people who disregard the free will of others. Though he's also shown to be a bit of hypocrite about this. He doesn't count things like overriding someones nervous system (you're not controlling their mind, they just can't do anything about it) or making sex with someone addictive (his Drow physiologically imprint on the first person they have sex with). And he's in serious denial about his mother being under mind control from his father.** Mephisto claims that the purpose of his 'Satanikos' scam - a purported 'Satanic Child Abuse Conspiracy' - was intended to undermine a very real plan by the Grand Hall of Sinister Wisdom to arrange fake 'adoptions' of children so they could sacrifice them to demons in exchange for power.--> '''Mephisto''': Now, I'll admit that the Brotherhood doesn't play nice. Hell, by the standards that the vast majority of the populace subscribes to, we're evil as hell. BUT, we have the long-term good of the human race at heart. Selling kids to the Pit does NOT serve the greater good in any way, shape or form. There is shit even WE don't put up with, and the Grand Hall is a textbook example of what we don't put up with.** Gen 2: The cult which kidnapped Dragonsfyre in order to make her a [[PoweredByAForsakenChild living power source]] managed to offend the sensibilities of two ''demons'' enough that they gave her advice on how to escape from them. Considering that they had just jacked up her BIT and made her a GenderBender in the process says that whatever they were planning for her would have been much, much worse.* EvenTheGuysWantHim: Variation; Even the Gays Want Her How bad is this? Even THE FOUR ELEMENTS WANT HER!* EverybodyWasKungFuFighting: It's on the bloody curriculum. True, the introductory combat and survival classes aren't strictly speaking mandatory, but the twice-annual Combat Finals ''are''. Only a handful of confirmed conscientious objectors get out of taking the martial arts courses, and most of those end up wishing they had.** At least one of the survival classes is purely escape and evasion techniques for students who aren't physically or mentally suited for combat. And students who figure out how to solve their combat finals without actual combat usually get better grades.* EveryoneWentToSchoolTogether: Well, not everyone, but (perhaps usurprisingly) a large percentage of the adult characters are Whately graduates, and some of the world's most powerful superheroes and supervillains are still fuming,fussing or feuding over high school slights, grudges or crushes. * ExtranormalInstitute: The Arkham Research Consortium (ARC).* {{Facepalm}}: In [[http://whateleyacademy.net/index.php/content-menu/stories/56-charge-2-le-snob-francais Charge: le Snob Francais]]:--> Adalie face-palmed* FailureIsTheOnlyOption: Do not screw with the BIT. It will not end well-for example, there was a man with a BIT that made him look like a crocodile. He had it changed to make him look like a handsome, completely normal man. Unfortunately, it gave him the mind of a crocodile and he went on a cannibalistic rampage. Which irritates Phase -- physically female except for his genitals -- to no end. It almost makes you wonder if a higher being is screwing with his life [[ForTheLulz because they think it's funny]].* FaintingSeer: Half-demons are not good for the health of precogs.* TheFairFolk: While the Faerie aren't quite so alien as the more extreme examples, they certainly have the arrogance, vengefulness, and caprice down pat. This seems to be somewhat moderated by their being reincarnated in (mutant) human form, making them more like [[OurElvesAreBetter modern ideas of Elves]].* FantasticCatholicism* FantasyKitchenSink: Sidhe, werebeasts, Lovecraftian horrors, they're all there. Along with avatars of ancient gods. Not delusional. Both Circe (THE Circe) and the Tao through Bladedancer acknowledge the fact that they are the ancient Greek gods stuffed into human bodies. Circe even calls one of them by name and says that it's good to see him again.* {{Fartillery}}: Miasma's powers. He did use it [[FartsOnFire to good effect]] against Peeper, though.* FirstLawOfGenderBending: A fundamental law within Whateley. Anyone who changes gender due to being an Exemplar ''cannot'' change back. Some [[VoluntaryShapeshifting shapeshifters]] and Reach (who flips between genders) are the exceptions. The current (possibly wrong) in universe theory as to why there are so many {{Gender Bender}}s is that the spirit of evolution has decided to force mutants to ''out-breed'' humanity, and is helping that along by just making more female mutants -- one way or another. Independent research would be impossible to obtain in order to test this theory...* FirstPersonSmartass: Phase.* FiveManBand: Chaka is TheHero, Fey is TheLancer, Phase is TheSmartGuy, Lancer and Tennyo are [[TheBigGuy The Big Guys]], and Generator is TheChick. Also in Ill Winds, the Grove assembles The Five: Fey as [[TheLeader The Queen]], Razorback as [[TheBigGuy The Champion and Bard]], Jericho as [[TheSmartGuy The Healer]], Chaka as [[TheLancer The Mistress of Chi]] and finally Chou as [[TheChick The Overseer of Balances]].* FlatEarthAtheist: Quite a few of the top scientists believe that magic is just ''psychic'' effects.* FlyingBrick: Hank and many others; the term "brick" is often used in-universe.* FoodPorn: In Ayla's stories. In his first story, "Ayla and the Late Trevor James Goodkind", the contrast between gourmet fare and the stuff he can afford with a normal income is used to illustrate how widespread the major lifestyle changes he goes through are.* ForHalloweenIAmGoingAsMyself: Subverted, Iron Star was actually going as Captain America, but using his powers wrecked the costume. Played straight too, since Tennyo went as Ryoko, and the rest of the team went as other ''Anime/TenchiMuyo'' characters. It's generally considered bad form to go to the Halloween party as "my super future self".* ForScience: A common excuse used by [[MadScientist Mad Scientists]] in-universe, most notably Dr Macabre (who ironically [[MagicPoweredPseudoScience isn't using science at all]]). Ironically, of all Devisors both at school and in the world as a whole, it is Jobe who seems to think of the consequences of his experiments more than anyone, though his [[InsufferableGenius unrestrained ego]] leads him to go ahead and perform them anyway. * FreudianExcuse: ** Tansy Walcutt is an A-grade bitch, but considering what we know of her childhood and family life, one can't help but feel a little sorry for her.** Several of the Bad Seeds also fall into this category, Jobe and Nephandus in particular. In both cases, they were raised by particularly twisted parents who molded them into their own supervillainous mindsets. Nacht's mother seems to have tried to do the same, but somehow this got sidetracked into snarkiness and a chilling ability to frighten even the strongest opponents with just a glare.* TheFriendNobodyLikes: Jobe is this to the rest of the Bad Seeds. Nephandus too.** Dr. Venus explains to Dr. Macabre not only why almost every other supervillain sees him this way, but also why he should care about what the people who have your back think of you.* FunctionalMagic: runs the whole gamut, most prominently Wild Magic (Fey), Rule magic (mages) and Device magic (devisers)* FunetikAksent: [[DependingOnTheWriter Some authors more than others.]]* FutureMeScaresMe: In "It's All In The Timing", Toni and Nikki meet their evil alternate future selves.* GadgeteerGenius: A considerable part of the student body. Come in two main flavours:** Gadgeteers: Their power is a form of ESP that tells them ''exactly'' what tool, material, design etc. to use to build a machine, but their creations obey the normal laws of science. Once created, a gadgeteer's design can be patented, built in a factory by normal workers, and used by anyone.** Devisors: The ''real'' mad scientists. Their power allows them to impose their own personal reality, creating machines, drugs etc. that [[AppliedPhlebotinum defy the laws of science]]. A devisor's creation is known as a "devise" (note the spelling). Devises can ''only'' be built by devisors, and often only work reliably for them, or at least in their presence. ** Some rare individuals manifest ''both'' traits simultaneously, such as secondary character, and love-interest, Bunny "Bugs" Cormick. She cannot be certain whether she's breaking reality or not, until ''somebody else'' tries to build one of her inventions. Also, the closer to consensus reality a Devise is, the more reliable it tends to be, and the more like it is that a Gadgeteer can create a gadget that works similarly to it during a 'Devise test'. * GagBoobs: played seriously following a sabotaged attempt to return Phase to his former male self; Phase is pushed to the edge of a HeroicBSOD as his breasts keep growing almost to the point of immobility. * GenderBender: Everyone in Team Kimba, and others besides. Jericho, Anna, and Jadis are the only major viewpoint characters not in this situation. Most of the support characters aren't either.* GeniusLoci: The Grove, a powerful (and hostile) magical forest on the borders of the Academy, that only allows those it trusts in. It deeply trusts Fey (or more specifically, Aunghadhail), tolerates Totem and possibly Dr. Tanaka, and has a wary respect for Tennyo, but anyone else who enters uninvited is in for a terrifying ordeal - if they get out alive.* {{Ghostapo}}, StupidJetpackHitler and SovietSuperscience: All the major combatants on both sides of WWII experimented heavily with both [[SuperSoldier Super Soldiers]] and powerful magicks. This is speculated to have fueled the rise of the first large wave of mutants a generation later, and specifically is suggested to be why most of them appeared in the US, Europe and the USSR at first.** [[BigBad The Necromancer]] mentions in passing that he still thinks that the Holocaust would have succeeded in creating an unstoppable undead army if his work hadn't been cut short by the Allies. * GirlPosse: What, you were expecting something set in high school without at least one of these?* GogglesDoSomethingUnusual: Phase has a pair of Cool Shades that convert all colors to black, white, and gray so she can talk to Jericho without heaving.** Side character Josie Gilman has to wear special nerd glasses that screen out the Eldritch Abominations clawing around the interstices of our reality thanks to an ancient family curse.* GoldfishPoopGang: The Yama Dojo ninjas definitely count as this. The Vindicators might come close, and a few others follow the general idea. * GoneHorriblyWrong: Non-story example: Doctor Bender created his Lit Chix avatar, Arachne, gave her spider powers as a nod to his own past… and in the process made his avatar unwriteable: he said in an interview that he has absolutely no interest in writing a spider-avatar, and that he isn't too keen on writing a female avatar of himself either. Arachne has appeared only as a minor character and probably won't be getting a story to herself unless she gets retconned.* GoodBadGirl: Several, but Sara stands out.* GoodIsNotNice: Most of the "good" characters are quite prepared to bully, threaten and intimidate anyone they regard (''usually'' with good reason) as their enemy. * GoodThingYouCanHeal** Subversion, in that it's mentioned that [[spoiler: the evidence for Tennyo actually having been in danger during the TrainingFromHell that she got put through by accident, would be more compelling if she ''didn't'' heal so fast.]]** Also subverted in that healing factors come with a host of problems, such as making certain kinds of surgery much more difficult, resistance to medicines (including anasthetics, see surgery), and making cancer more deadly, rather than less.** [[spoiler:Petra]] finds out the hard way what happens when a regenerator does too many full body regenerations in a small time frame: brittle bones and a lot of physical therapy.** Recently played straight, with the fallout from [[spoiler: the Alphas hiring a couple of geeks to take out the safeties in the sims.]]** In the combat final with Lancer and Hippolyta versus Eldritch, Hippolyta makes the mistake of pushing the uncooperative Eldritch too hard. She gets her neck snapped for her trouble.** Counterpoint used to be a regenerator. Then he went up against Jobe and Belphoebe. They both got beaten up pretty badly, but they regenerated. Unfortunately for Counterpoint, he pissed them off enough that Jobe got Belphoebe to inject him with a serum that has removed his power to regenerate- and he can't copy anyone else's regenerating power.** Horrifically subverted when, after Jade actually managed to become female, she reverts to male, now with [[CursedWithAwesome high-level regeneration]]. Her response to this is pure NightmareFuel.* GovernmentConspiracy: The Mutant [[strike: Control]] Commission Office (MCO) is nominally a world-wide private organization with mutant-control powers varying from country to country by treaty. Responsible for defining the international Mutant ID (MID) card standard that many countries have adopted. * GreyAndGreyMorality: Imp's stories cast the villain/hero conflicts into this: on the one hand, supervillains do commit crimes, but on the other hand, some of them often show more regard for people than the so-called 'heroes' do, and a lot of heroes use bad tactics and unreasonable amounts of force when dealing with criminals.* GrievousHarmWithABody: Carson does this with Kodiak in 'The Secret Of Forger's List I'* GroinAttack: [[OurWerewolvesAreDifferent Carl]], Jade, Ayla, and Jobe, as well as others, are subjected to this at one point or another. Carl's is seen as funny, because he can [[GoodThingYouCanHeal regenerate]] anyways, and he [[IdiotBall really]] [[TooDumbToLive deserved]] [[WhatAnIdiot it]], Jade's incident is treated [[SlapStick humorously]] (and was self inflicted during practice), Ayla's ([[DudeNotFunny caused by Jade and Fey as a prank]]) not so much, and Jobe's... [[DeadlyPrank REALLY]] [[DisproportionateRetribution not funny]].** Jade has a ''different'' event which would qualify, even though it is self-inflicted, which is both tragic and [[{{Squick}} extremely disturbing]]: [[spoiler: after having successfully transformed into a female, she gets transformed back to her older form, but now with a high level of regeneration. She takes this so poorly that she repeatedly ''hacked off her male genitals'', until passing out from blood loss. This took ''several hours'', during which she became more and more manic over it.]]* HalfHumanHybrid* HardLight: Part of the [[HandWave Handwaving]] for the combat simulations; also a power available to some mutants.* HaveYouSeenMyGod: The Olympian gods have come to Whateley, but they can't find Poseidon and Dionysus. Phase points out that it's possible that they don't ''want'' to be found, and there's no guarantee that they're even at Whateley.* HaveYouTriedNotBeingAMonster: On so many levels.* HeartIsAnAwesomePower: Jade is a past mistress of this. Aside for the many forms of MundaneUtility she works out, she turns what seems a pretty limited ability - the power to animate objects up to perhaps 180 lbs in weight as an independent aspect of herself - into an ever-growing arsenal of techniques, some of which are ''terrifyingly'' effective. And that's without even considering some of the things Ayla holds back from suggesting to her, such as casting herself into an enemy's clothes and then flying them straight up before dropping them to their deaths, or animating a blob of putty and choking someone with it by having it force itself down their throats.* HeelFaceTurn: [[spoiler: Solange]] has started one, but it's likely going to be a slow process.* HelloNurse: As a result of MostCommonSuperpower -- some of the main characters are considered ''really'' attractive. Fey, in particular, often causes students of both sexes (regardless of sexual orientation) to walk into walls, trip over their own feet, and so on, due to the powerful {{Glamour}} she possesses. ** Cytherea also gets this, being [[spoiler: the physical incarnation of Aphrodite]], but unlike Fey, she's perfectly willing to abuse it for all it's worth.* {{Hermaphrodite}}: ** Several of the transgender characters change more slowly than others, retaining both sexual organs for a while (Lancer and Zenith, for instance). Paige and Petra are both completely and permamently hermaphrodites. Ayla isn't quite one: his body's female in form, including breasts, but his genitalia is male, and so is his mind. This leads to the majority of people thinking that he's female, which tends to annoy him quite a lot.** A more scientifically accurate example: It is revealed that prior to her initial transformation, Tennyo was actually intersexed and had a sealed off uterus and ovaries that, due to insurance issues, had secretly been removed during an appendectomy without her or her family's knowledge. This was what allowed the formerly male Bill to transform into a form with a female template without ever knowing that he was in any way other than male.** Wallflower was born with bot sets of genitals but her female genitals were more complete and her parents decided to have a daughter--causing her to worry she'll follow her mom's footsteps (in the other direction).** Vamp is a true bilateral hermaphrodite though it's not commonly knowlege as she always presents as female.* HeroesUnlimited: Team Kimba is only one team of 6 (give or take a few) students in a school of hundreds of superpowered people, many of which have become reoccurring characters or even had their own [[ADayInTheLimelight day in the limelight]].* HeroicBSOD: Several, usually with good reason.** Tennyo, after being confronted by (literal) ghosts of the Star Stalker's past.** Phase, more than once, most notably when it is revealed that his transformation was a result of his BIT rather than Gross Structural Dystrophy ("I HAD DONE THIS TO MYSELF!!!!!")** Fey, following [[spoiler: the death of Aunghadhail]]).** Pejuta, when she is forced to confront the fact that she had been raped, the memories of which she had been repressing up to that point.* HeroicComedicSociopath: Certainly Jobe Wilkins (when he's not coming across as a LiteralGenie) and arguably quite a few others. Jade, [[TheChick frighteningly enough]], seems to be headed this way, with all of her Hello Kitty fury.* HeroicBuild and LanternJawOfJustice: Common for Exemplars. Bravo, in particular, has both of these taken UpToEleven, making him seem ridiculous rather than heroic.* HeWhoFightsMonsters: Father John gets sucked into the dark side of church politics during Kerry's intro story. If this seems like a weak example, well, [[spoiler: it's not. He ends up becoming an accomplice to keeping her parents from finding her, drugging her into docility, misusing her talents, and causing her grave injury.]] He really was a nice guy just trying to protect her to begin with, too. Aries started out as a bully hunter but got mind raped into being one of Freya's hit men. By the time he realised that he'd been screwed over, he was too deep to get out.* HollywoodEvolution: Frankly, seems to be lifted verbatim from ''ComicBook/{{X-Men}}''. WordOfGod confirms this: the setting initially was based on ''WesternAnimation/XMenEvolution''.* HollywoodHomely: In-universe. Girls like Aquerna, She-Beast and Nacht are actually quite attractive by normal standards, but simply cannot compare to supernatural beauties such as Fey or Poise.* HollywoodNewEngland: Averted. Whateley is located in New Hampshire but it's a boarding school and the kids don't encounter many locals. They do mention the lovely NE fall foliage.* HornyDevils: Sara qualifies, even if she isn't a classic Succubus. She even discusses the subject in her book on mutant sexuality:->Summoning a Succubus, Incubus, or other sexual being for a bit of a tryst sounds like great fun. Until you remember that most Demons of the lower realms want to suck out your soul and leave you as a dry, withered husk. Yes, you can bargain with them, but do you really want to pay the price that they're asking? And once they've got their hooks in you, you can be darn well sure that they aren't letting go. What nobody ever seems to think of is summoning a sex Angel. They're much more reasonable, loving, personable partners as long as you can stand all the sunshine and sweetness and pay their more reasonable prices. Beware tooth decay, confessions of eternal love and REALLY bad poetry.* HornyScientist: Jobe Wilkins is working on a project to create his very own Drow wife. Recent stories reveal that he has succeeded beyond his wildest dreams. However, in a cruel or poetic twist of fate, depending on your opinion of Jobe, [[spoiler: he has ''become'' his Drow wife. And, ''she'' is the semi-official mother of her own clone.]]* HowDidYouKnowIDidnt: In Diamonds Are a Vamp's Best Friend (Part 2), when Bova was shooting a goon with a gun she just picked up:--> "Oh. Capture Gel," I said. "But how did you know that it was that, and not a shotgun or a flame thrower or even a grenade launcher?"--> "I didn't,"* HumiliationConga: Quite a few, with Overclock and Make's comeuppance standing out in particular.* HumanPopsicle: ARC Black Section is a prison full of SealedEvilInACan in the form of a cryogenic storage. Just ''how'' dangerous the inmates really are in order to deserve this is made abundantly clear when a rogue doctor set one of them free.* HyperspaceArsenal: Commercially available from talented Devisors with the usual caveats on purchasing devices that break the laws of physics. Plus several kinds of warpers can do this for themselves and/or others. Like Thuban and Holdout.* IdiotBall: Several, some deliberate and in character. The worst would have to be Amanda Chulkris, supposedly a computent magician and teacher but asks a barely trained clairvoyant to demonstrate by reading Sara's palm. [[CaptainObvious Scrying a great old one isn't a good idea]] and the clairvoyant loses ownership of her soul. So far no one has called Amanda out on this. ** At that point, they didn't really know that Sara herself was a GOO. They knew that her FATHER was, but they didn't know SHE was.** It doesn't matter if they didn't know for sure, her father was a GOO, just having the distinct possibility should have been enough to put a stop to the clairvoyant testing... but it wasn't...** And in 5 Elements Dancing, Chou just handed Clover, an odds mangler with a perchant for trouble, a ball of essence (pure magical power). The authors have shown repeatedly that giving anyone in Clover's group essence generally results in bad things happening, of the unbelievably unlucky kind.** When Jobe realizes that his efforts to [[spoiler: stop his transformation into a female drow]] aren't working, he turns to his archenemy, Carmilla, for help. Now, did he go to his friend Nephandus, an expert on demonic contracts, for help in dealing with the Demon Queen of Lust? No, he just looks the subject up on the Internet, trusting his own superior intelligence to see him through. It doesn't work out so well.* IfItsYouItsOkay: ** Molly. Before meeting Chou, had no interest in other girls and has no interest in other girls apart from Chou.** Fey also has this problem, even from openly gay men who don't even know her. ** Subverted with Sizzle. Poor Darcy, all she wanted was some genetically-engineered BoobsOfSteel, which Jobe had promised her if she helped the Crown Princess overcome some... ah, frustration. She had no idea that sex with Drow was addictive.* IHaveNoSon: Many parents who have mutant children disown them (Aquerna, Aqueous, Phase, Diamondback) but not all parents do so, and GSD cases aren't always disowned (Razorback, Deimos, Phobos, Jericho).** [[SocialDarwinist Gizmatic]] plays this card on Jobe after his/her Drow transformation. Eventually, Joe relents, after a fashion: in return for official status, Jobe will have to ''marry back into the family'', and have children by one Gizmatic's blood relatives. And not through high-tech means, either.* IJustShotMarvinInTheFace: Averted at near AuthorTract levels. Proper gun handling and safety is given instructional levels of detail, and woe betide any student who messes about with ranged weapons, lethal or otherwise. It seems a couple of the authors are firearm enthusiasts and/or soldiers, and hot on safety.* IKnowMaddenKombat: The annoying Whateley Academy Martial Arts Cheerleaders.* ImplausibleFencingPowers: Destiny's Wave can cut anything the ''Tao'' wants to be cut.* ImmodestOrgasm: Any Poe girl who forgets to turn on the sound-dampening system before using the 'special features' of the Hydroflux showers is likely to get teased about it for a week.* InsideAComputerSystem: {{Technopath}}s do this; see Merry.* InstantAIJustAddWater: A common result of Devisors adding computer components to things. Jade's power lets her fake it.* InstantExpert: Loophole has a specific form of psychometry that allows her to know how to use any machine she touches automatically (along with getting a brief flash of how it was used in the past). She demonstrates this repeatedly with both [[ImprobableAimingSkills weapons]] and [[BadassDriver vehicles]].-->What are they reading over there in the Lit Chick meetings? How to be James Bond for Dummies? Where did Loophole learn to ride a bike like Jason Statham on crack? Who IS this chick and what did she do with our Rules Lawyer?* InsufferableGenius: Several, Jobe takes the cake, however.* InterspeciesRomance* IntrepidReporter: What Peeper tries to present himself as. In actuality, he is a at best a [[{{Paparazzi}} paparazzo]], and even that is being generous. He can be better described as a walking sexual harassment suit waiting to happen. Ayla's take on the matter was: --> " If he ever got his teenaged-boy urges under control, he might someday be a valued talent scout for a modelling agency, although I still thought it was more likely he would end up a pervy creep who was a valued scout for a pornographic webzine."** This was shortly before Peeper so lost control of himself at the sight of Ayla's GagBoobs that he tried to grope them in public. It did not end well for Peeper.* InvoluntaryShapeshifting: ** Exemplars dance between InvoluntaryShapeshifting and {{Metamorphosis}} -- Exemplars ''will'' end up looking like their idealized version of themselves, called a BIT. Unfortunately, [=BITs=] can be the wrong gender, the wrong species, etc etc. It's their own powers doing it to themselves, and they have limited if any control over it. (Typically using other powers causes the effect to accelerate.)** Playing the trope more straight are mutants that deal with spirits -- If you're a mutant that deals with the spiritual and not strong enough to completely dominate the spirit, the spirit will make changes to your body to make itself more comfortable. Fey, Miyet, and Heyoka are all examples of this.** Fling transforms into the ideal lover of anyone who lusts after him/her; this affects his/her mind as well, so s/he's not happy when someone wants a bimbo.* JerkassHasAPoint: ** The team keeps getting yelled at for clogging up their comms in the sims with mindless chatter. While Gunny Bardue is right and this could have bad consequences, Phase is also right in that the chatter has helped them keep tabs on each other and quickly realise when someone's gone down- that, and outside of the sims, the comms are just a high-end IM service.** In "Ayla and the Mad Scientist", the Spy Kidz get pissed off at Phase for reducing Kew to tears after Kew stole things from Phase's utility belt. While screaming at Kew probably wasn't the best way to handle the situation, the fact still remains that Kew did steal Phase's weapons, Phase really needed them, and he had every right to be pissed off. Those weapons were ''really freaking expensive''.** From "No Beast So Fierce":--> '''Bravo''': Young lady, is this depraved queen forcing his loathsome attentions on you?--> '''Jobe''': Excuse me? 'Queen'? Let's leave aside the issue of mere slander, and focus on the illogic of your question- if I'm forcing my attentions on her, then I'm not homosexual; if I'm a homosexual, then I'm the last person that she needs to be worried about.* JokerImmunity: In spades, with the most egregious examples coming from Even Murphy's Law Has Loopholes.* KarmaHoudini: There are a few. Luckily, it appears to be averted eventually with most villains, but some [[DesignatedHero Designated Heroes]] may qualify.* KarmicRape: A peculiar case, as Solange had agreed to letting herself be possessed and used sexually by Montana as part of her deal with Thuban; she just never expected to have to go through with the deal, nor did she realize she would actually remember it afterwards. No matter how nasty Tansy was, she really didn't deserve what Thuban put her through.* KavorkaMan: Rack, who despite his diminutive size (he's a dwarf, who used his ability to mimic the gadgeteer trait to build an augmentation exoskeleton), is ''very'' popular with the girls. Apparently, his main ability is telepathy, and after accidentally 'listening in' on other people's thoughts when he first manifested, he realized that most people were too busy with their own problems to have the contempt for him he expected them to have. After he learned to control his powers better, he realized that all most people really want is someone to listen to their problems.* KiAttacks: Chaka, though she can't do the flashier ones from anime. Yet.* KidSidekick: Specifically banned by law, though the school does have a clique of future sidekicks called The Robins. Headmistress Carson, a former kid sidekick herself, was instrumental in getting the anti-sidekick legislation enacted. * KnightTemplar: Unpleasantly common, both for heroes and villains:** Rev. Darryl Englund put the entire student body and security force in jeopardy in an attempt to end the threat he sees in Carmilla. While he is never directly punished for this, he does lose his position as a one of the deans at Whateley for his role in the Halloween disaster. ** SocialDarwinist Crucible attempts to get people to appreciate life by [[DieOrFly causing disasters that kill and cripple thousands]].** Sinsear began as a vigilante who used his flame powers to 'purge evil' (i.e., torture and kill criminals or anyone else who didn't live up to his warped standards) and may even toned things down a bit when he went full-out AxCrazy later, if only because he was too obsessed with Ginormous to bother with criminals any more.** The Lamplighter, who takes this to LawfulStupid proportions.* LamePunReaction: Chaka's puns at the end of "Ayla and the Networks" and "It's All in the Timing" earn her a pillow-pummeling and a faceful of snow, respectively.* LampshadeHanging: Quite a lot of this. People keep mentioning how odd that there are so many genderbent freshman in this particular class. There's even a story written for the purpose. [[spoiler: It's called The Braeburn Report, and in it they explain that this increase in female gender-bending mutants is proof the everyone will be a mutant in about 50 years.]]* LawfulStupidChaoticStupid: Stormwolf could be the poster child for LawfulStupid in the Whateley Universe; his insistence on following the rules at all costs actually hampers Security's efforts to keep the peace at times. The Necromancer, on the other hand, is classic StupidEvil, at least some of the time. Madcap is ChaoticStupid done for laughs.* TheLeader: Toni, Hank, and Ayla have all played leadership roles for Team Kimba at various times. Ayla is a type I/II (mastermind/levelheaded), Hank is a type II/IV (levelheaded/charismatic), and Toni is a type III/IV (headstrong/charismatic). (The first one listed for each is their primary type.)* LesbianVampire: Sara is code named after the first one of these to get famous; not technically a vampire, however. (She's also ''slightly'' bisexual, not a lesbian.)* LegacyCharacter: Champion, whose successors inherit the Champion Force - essentially [[ComicBook/TheFlash the Speed Force]] with {{Superman}}'s powerset. Whateley has a designated Champion-successor and a jet primed and ready at all times, should the current Champion ever fall.* LethalJokeCharacter: Team Wondercute is a whole team of these, founded of course by Jade. It's composed of a few young girls without any traditionally broken powers, was initially mostly intended to bug Jericho, and their mission statement is to be nauseatingly cute. And thanks to a combination of ConfusionFu, Power Synergy, and sheer CrazyAwesome, watching them in action reminds the sim operators of [[TheDreaded The Dragonslayers]].* LeyLine: Nikki can tap them to increase her power. [[spoiler: But there's a catch: after several major battles off-campus lead to a series of minor ecological disasters, Ayla realizes that the common factor is Fey - if she draws too much power from a ley line, the natural energy sources at the other end of the ley line are drained and damaged. They didn't notice it while on campus because the high magical energies there and the nearby [[GeniusLoci Grove]] were enough to sustain her power demands. Fey suddenly finds herself [[{{Nerf}} scrambling to find less energy intensive spells]] to avoid word of this getting around.]]* LightIsNotGood: The Alphas, the New Olympians, occasionally the Capes and the Betas, the Martial Arts Cheerleaders, the Knights of Purity, Lamplighter.* LoadsAndLoadsOfCharacters: That list up there barely scratches the surface. The Whateley Wiki's "Student" category, for example, includes almost 550 articles. The current estimated total is over 1200 named characters and counting.* LockedRoomMystery: ''The Big Idea'', Reach's story.* LogicalWeakness: PK bricks who can hear through their force fields are vulnerable to sonic attacks. Regenerators quickly build up immunities to toxins, but also to painkillers. They also face complications with surgery, painkiller-immunity being just one of them.* LonelyRichKid: Averted by pre-story Ayla, whose family made a solid effort to eat dinner together and do things as a family.* LooksLikeCesare: Sara.* LoveableSexManiac: Lapin suffers from Nymphomania, which is actually a lack of impulse control instead of an addiction to sex itself. So far it's been controlled by medication, but she constantly worries she'll answer "sure, why not" to any irrational or indecent proposal if her meds ever stop working.* LovecraftCountry: Invoked, Whateley's first incarnation became a notorious BoardingSchoolOfHorrors due to the plethora of {{EldritchAbomination}}s in the vicinity. It was reopened as a school for mutants because no one else wanted it and the staff necessary to keep the kids in line also keeps a lid on the unholy things in the neighborhood. * LovecraftianSuperpower: '''Sara'''. Her original self died, and she [[WakingUpAtTheMorgue woke up in the morgue]], vomiting up her internal organs in the process. She eats souls. Her favorite trick (both in and out of battle and bed) is to create random tentacles.* LoveIsInTheAir: A subconscious uncontrollable magical effect from at least one of the characters. And a controllable power for at least three (Aphrodite and two lust demons).* MetaOrigin: All mutants seem to have a common genetic factor. The supernatural beings, however, are all over the map.* MadeOfPlasticine: on the rare occasions when death is allowed, and sometimes with regenerators. The "Voodoo-Wolves" are the most prominent example, apparently so fragile that they can be beheaded with a bare-handed strike from someone equivalent to a very well trained baseline.* MadScientist: The mutant power of Devisors allows them to create machines, drugs, etc. that defy the normal laws of science (cf. GadgeteerGenius above). When combined with the effects of Diedrick's Syndrome (cf. ScienceRelatedMemeticDisorder below), things get dangerous.* MagicAIsMagicA* MagicalNativeAmerican: Heyoka; and, yes, that seems to be the entire basis for the character. Or, more specifically, a deconstruction of this. Spirits can be rather...annoying, and besides that her powers are weak. And her life is screwed up. http://www.crystalhall.org/heyoka.html He has very strong powers, but he has to be in the astral plane to use them.** Pejuta takes this even further: she is bound to two legendary Lakota spirits, and regularly communicates with the Great Spirit itself. Like with Fey, her appearance is supposed to mark a resurgence for her people. This hasn't help prevent her from becoming a total basket case, however, [[RapeLeadsToInsanity though not without reason]].** Bluejay plays at the classic [[TheTrickster Trickster]] archetype, but [[spoiler: secretly he is Totem's apprentice, and is studying to be the next Lore Keeper for the local were-folk tribe]].* MagicDance: Fey, to the Fire Elementals, during her Christmas story.* MakeMeWannaShout: Chaka often uses a superpowered {{Kiai}} in battle, strong enough at least to knock people off balance.** Screech's voice can rend steel and melt glass.* MarsWantsChocolate: While traveling to a distant star system, a fancy restaurant Tennyo eats at offers her Chocoba, purportedly an incredibly delicious and rare delicacy that has been illegally smuggled there at great cost. Despite spending a fortune for it, she isn't very surprised when it turns out to be a Hershey's chocolate bar. * ManIFeelLikeAWoman: Averted, for the most part. Most characters are too distressed by their changes to to fool with themselves.** In the case of Folder, she actively resists the idea, even when Dr. Bellows recommends that she get more familiar with her new body.** Reach, [[IncrediblyLamePun on the other hand]], is surprised but enthusiastic when Zenith makes the same suggestion.** Of them all, it is Whisper who jumps in fastest, which is funny since Bree was almost as bothered with being female as Chou was up until that point. Even though she doesn't go all that far with anything, that long, hot shower really seems to convince Brianna that maybe being a girl isn't so bad after all...* ManipulativeBastard: Don Sebastiano, aided by his telepathic abilities.* AllPeriodsArePMS: Fey's first round of PMS was an event to remember.* {{Metamorphosis}}: The Exemplar superpower, crossed with InvoluntaryShapeshifting (in the sense that it's their own powers doing it to them, and they have no control over the change).* MasterPoisoner: Jobe's best defense is a well-deserved reputation for using poisons and bio-weapons at every opportunity. Even ''mentioning'' Jobe at the medical center is enough to trigger a full-scale lockdown and quarantine.* MegaManning: [[EldritchAbomination Sara's]] hell dimension runs on this via CannibalismSuperpower. Eating something, or exposure to enough of it's genetic material, causes you to [[BodyHorror involuntarily]] [[BlessedWithSuck mutate to assume it's powers.]] It's because Sara's hell is dedicated to evolution, also allowing MixAndMatchCritters and [[AliensMadeThemDoIt forcing everything to breed at least once a day.]]* TheMole: by the dozen. Several (usually nefarious) student cliques have moles in other cliques and many members of the staff have their own agendas. Quite a few of the security force are actually moles for various military and criminal organizations. Chief Delarose tolerates this "payola platoon" because they come well-trained, are extra diligent (to avert suspicion) and can be manipulated as back channels to their secret employers.** Chou's expulsion from Team Kimba is actually a XanatosGambit intended to set her up as a Mole in the KnightTemplar Goobers in order to protect her friend Carmilla.** The Kimbas are not thrilled when teen supervillainess and "Boston Brawl" opponent Vamp shows up at Whateley but she turns out to have been a mole for the Boston Police all along and is now in the witness protection program. * MostCommonSuperPower: Justified as an explicit superpower: mutants with the Exemplar power set have a Body Image Template based on what they would like to look like, and their powers transform them to fit. As a result, the most common superpower really is being very attractive. There are various levels of this, ranging from Exemplar 1, gradual shapeshifting but otherwise merely above the average human, to Exemplar 2s, equivalent to the limit of baseline human potential, all the way up to 7, in which is not only do they get incredible strength, endurance and (in some cases) intelligence, but become supernaturally attractive as well. For female Exemplars, this usually results in BoobsOfSteel (or even GagBoobs). The [[BiggerIsBetterInBed male version of this]] is common among male Exemplars as well, to the point that they are often warned not to be too aggressive with their 'endowment' lest they hurt their partner. [[OurWerewolvesAreDifferent Weres]] also get these despite not having the Exemplar trait, and Paige/Petra are endowed with ''both'' "gifts".* MuggingTheMonster: The Alphas [[spoiler: send some attackers, most notably a power nullifier, after Tennyo. Unfortunately, nullifying her powers ends up waking up the Star Stalker, and things go very badly for them.]] Also shows up in a lot of origin stories.* MundaneUtility: Shows up all over the place. Since most mutants aren't looking to become either heroes or villains, Whateley tries to either teach them or help them find mundane utilities for their powers. Phase earns a lot of good will with the "Workshop" by identifying mundane utilities for gadgets and then acting as an angel investor for their inventors. He even comes up with a list of mundane utilities for Tennyo's vast powers, including emergency repairs on satellites in orbit and nuclear power plants from the inside. Whateley even offers a Winter Term class called "Special Topics - Finding a Job Only YOU Can Do". * MySuitIsAlsoSuper: Many Brick types' NighInvulnerability extends to their clothing and weapons, which is explained by their invulnerability being due to psychokinetic forcefields. Loophole's super-armour, which epitomises super armour in general - almost all the devisors and gadgeteers have some level of this. In fact, a lot of the school uniforms have some level of armour - particularly if Cecilia Rogers made them.** Loophole invents a new fabric called Kevra that combines the characteristics of Kevlar and Lycra and can be used to make virtually any clothing bulletproof. Mega-girl's father is the first NYPD officer saved by a kevra uniform.** Inverted by Tennyo, who often comes out of battles virtually or fully naked because her body is far tougher than any conceivable suit could ever be. Unfortunately, she's also rather shy.* MythologyGag: about as common as the [[BrickJoke BrickJokes]], more so in the vignettes and side stories. For example Vamp's first POV story has her wondering why the Whateley kids are all so intimidated by the librarian (Tennyo).* NarrativeProfanityFilter: 'Hank unleashed several choice phrases that impugned the Monkey King's ancestry, family heritage, sexual proclivities, and recreational interests. Obviously, Hannah Declan had learned more from her time on Army bases than how to shoot firearms.'* {{Nanomachines}}: See Samantha above, and Whisper, Compiler...* {{Nerf}}: In "Ayla and the Mad Scientist", it's discovered that Fey's powers [[spoiler: have been killing entire ecosystems around the country with the energy she's always pulling from ley lines.]] Because of this, she can no longer use power willy-nilly and has to come up with energy-saving alternatives.** In addition, [[spoiler: Aunghadhail dying during ''Whilst Any Speaks'']] has nerfed Fey even more. According to WordOfGod, [[spoiler: Nikki's arsenal has been greatly reduced in size as a result because a lot of her spells were ones that Aunghadhail prepared for her, not spells that Nikki actually knew herself, so with Aunghadhail gone...]]* NewPowersAsThePlotDemands: There's ''a lot'' of flexibility in some characters' power sets. And some are just outright {{AssPull}}s. The character Tennyo (the Ryoko look-alike) is the foremost example of this.* NiceJobBreakingItHero: In-universe example: Doctor Debt, a supervillain, steals millions of dollars and escapes without any weapons, property damage or civilian injuries. The Flying Bulldozer, his superhero nemesis, stops him by [[WhatAnIdiot throwing cars at him]], resulting in millions of dollars in property damage and dozens of civilian injuries.* TheNicknamer: [[EntitledBastard Fantastico]], a [[TakeThat rather pointed]] [[NoCelebritiesWereHarmed stand-in]] for G.W. Bush, simply ''loves'' getting a rise out of people by using demeaning nicknames for them, including - no, ''especially'' - his teammates in the Good Ol' Boys.** [[TheVamp Vamp]] provides some zingers for several of the more absurdly 'heroic' students, especially [[JeanneDArchetype Pucelle]] ("Joan D'ork" and "The Maid of Oy Vey" standing out in particular). She also refers to Phase by such insults as "Goodthang" or "Goodwhine" whenever she can get away with it.** Imp does this to nearly everybody she meets when not in her SecretIdentity. She can really get under people's skin with it, too, as shown by one (previously anonymous) minor supervillain she nicknamed 'Crash Test Dummy'. The name stuck, and he got pissed at her for it.* NinjaSchool: The Yama Dojo.* NoGoodDeedGoesUnpunished: Ayla spends tens of thousands of dollars getting the Poe dorm showers up to scratch. When he tries them out on their first operational morning, [[spoiler: Fey uses them to punch him in the balls with a jet of water, because the girls were pissed off at his staring at them in the shower]].* NonIndicativeName: The Yellow Queen's posse, the Whateley Academy Martial Arts Cheerleaders. They are indeed cheerleaders who know some martial arts, but Whateley Academy doesn't actually have any sports teams, so the 'cheerleaders' have nobody to cheer ''for''.** Also {{Conversed}} in [[http://whateleyacademy.net/index.php/original-timeline/204-ayla-and-the-birthday-brawl-chap-13 Ayla and the Birthday Brawl (Chap 13)]] with regards to Roxbury Prison, which is also an ArtifactTitle:--> "Roxbury Prison hasn't been in Roxbury since 1987, when they built the new prisons."* NonMammalMammaries: [[JustifiedTrope justified]], they're all {{Half Human Hybrid}}s. * NoodleIncident: ** [[InvokedTrope Invoked]] by name - and caused by Jade.** Just as evident is Chaka's combat final, which is never referred to in more than passing - supposedly it can't even be ''described'' in a way that can do it justice.** Parents' Day and Hallowe'en were noodle incidents for a long time. The current NI is the Outcasts' Christmas trip, which seems by the mentions in other stories, to have been suitably disastrous.** Lampshaded in Parent's Day.** Lancer's detention for the Birthday Brawl.** There's also the Isobel Anaelez case, in which a teenage mutant was supposedly disappeard by the MCO. Apparently she's become the poster child for mutant abductions for the purpose of experimentation. We don't know much more than that...** And, there's what happened when [[spoiler: Vamp]] decided to learn what the Lovecraftian sorcerer's turn-ons were. It was bad.** We never learn just what, exactly, is so bad about the Hawthorne Cottage toilets - though apparently there's weapons involved.** Jade's notorious 'Radioactive Condor Girl' combat sim gambit. Just mentioning it causes Gunny Bardue's blood pressure to spike.** The 'poo-tonium' incident Jobe was responsible for as a kid.* NoPeriodsPeriod: ** Played straight in Sara's origin story where it is mentioned she'll never have a period again and is always fertile.** Averted, as many characters who are becoming female at varying rates have to deal with getting a period for the first time.--> Toni: "Oh, so that's where it comes from[[WantonCrueltyToTheCommonComma ---]] Tell me, do you have any little tricks that help tide your wife over on these heavy periods? They might come in handy next time Nikki goes into PMS!"** Both Tennyo and Miyet panic the first time they have their periods; Billie gets a grip quickly enough, but Corey, who had been a macho bully until her transformation, seems to have been unaware of what a menstrual period was.* NotQuiteTheRightThing: Reverend Englund becomes aware that there is a half-demon student at the school who he thinks will take over the world by enslaving people, killing others and using her mind slaves to breed demon spawn. While the Reverend has fought otherworldly invaders and all manner of creatures who did harm, in this case he's actually wrong: Sara/Kellith has actually decided that she's going to do good for the world and promote peace and love. So the Reverend gets the Syndicate (i.e. the organised bad guys) to help him kill her… and what would have been a controlled attempt to kill just one person gets hijacked by the Chessmaster, resulting in a large part of the school getting blown up, a number of security personnel and teachers getting maimed and/or killed and all the students being incredibly traumatised. * OlderThanTheyLook, YoungerThanTheyLook, ReallySevenHundredYearsOld: Hat trick of deceptive age tropes* OmniscientMoralityLicense: Played perhaps uncomfortably straight with the Tao, which ostensibly always knows just what is required to maintain 'the balance'. So far a few people have coughed but only Strawmen have actually debated against it. The omniscient-seeming Mrs. Potter may also count, though she seems to be more unambiguously on the side of the angels than many of the usual trope examples.* OpenMindedParent: Some are, others... not so much. For example, Wallflower's parents Falcon and Tabby Cat have no problems with her dating a transgender boy because Tabby Cat is a GenderBender herself.* OurVampiresAreDifferent: Discussed at length (by Ayla, of course), in order to dissuade Ceecee from staking Vamp. Apparently, there are a lot of different kinds around, and no one knows what all of them are like. ** According to Robur, the Bloodline are often mistaken for vampires, but are actually the earliest family of mutants. The longevity and ability to drain others of their psychic energies shown by many members [[CaptainObvious may have played a role in that confusion]]. * OurWerebeastsAreDifferent: There several types "weres" that draw from numerous different archetypes.* OrphansPlotTrinket - [[spoiler: Nacht's cameo necklace]], which at a critical juncture comes apart, revealing the picture of her ''real'' mother underneath, thus freeing her from [[spoiler: The Bell Witch's]] domination. Presumably there's some mystical reason (magical resonance, perhaps?) why there was a picture of her real mother in there in the first place.* PajamaCladHero: One of the popular nicknames for Team Kimba in-universe is the Negligee Nightingales, referring to their first fight with the Yama Dojo Ninjas.* ParallelPornTitles: Not of itself but other works, 'Grease, the Lolicon Version' and 'Ho School Musical' in regards to a bit character dressing oddly. These are probably just snotty comments by some of the [[DeadpanSnarker snarkers]] rather than real movies.* ParentalAbandonment: Common (Ayla, Jade, Chou etc.) but not universal (Toni, Nikki, Billie, Hank etc.) In some cases it's either half and half (Vamp, whose parents split over her mutation) or complicated (Reach, who is not totally estranged from his parents though his aunt has guardianship.)** In addition, there's the notorious Captain [[strike:Condom]]Courage, a 'superhero' better known for the hundreds of children he fathered than for his mighty deeds.* LeParkour: Parkour Jam Hooligans is the best story for this, but this being a superhero 'verse, there's a reasonable amount of it elsewhere, too.* ParodySue: Joanne Gunnarson, written by [[AuthorAvatar Joe Gunnarson]].** In later stories, there's a girl who goes by the 'Crimson Comet', who seems to be a straight parody of poorly-written fanfic. She transitioned perfectly in three days, is a knockout almost on the level of Fey, is fairly powerful overall, and has all the intelligence and forward planning skills of an ice cream sandwich.* ParttimeHero: And part time villains, too. They hang out in a bar called Superbad.* PersonOfMassDestruction: Tennyo. Even with only a fraction of the Star Stalker's full power, she has been estimated to be able to destroy vast swaths of land ''by accident'' if she were to lose control of her powers. In at least one simulation, killing her led to TheEndOfTheWorldAsWeKnowIt, wiping out the entire eastern half of North America and plunging the world into a three year nuclear winter.* PhysicalGod: there are several, of different types:** Avatars which sufficiently large hallows can become Paladins to gods or other powerful entities; rather than the Avatar serving as the spirit's hallow, the spirit empowers the Paladin with a part of its essence, in exchange for the Paladin serving the god's wishes. Examples: Miyet, Pejuta.** The New Olympians are similar to Avatars, in that they are the original Greek Gods who took over the bodies of newborn human children who had high potential for mutant powers, but they didn't specifically choose mutants with the Avatar ability and thus don't show up through tests meant to detect Avatars. ** Carmilla is part human, part EldritchAbomination, and is worshiped by the Cult of Kellith.** Some of the more human-like [[EldritchAbomination Class X Entities]], such as Nyarlathotep and Gothmog, are willing to take human form when needed, though apparently it requires quite a few [[HumanSacrifice Human Sacrifices]] by their followers to translate them into this plane for even a short time.** Lucifer has managed to appear on Earth as well (in a church, no less), though it may be that he can only materialize in the presence of certain individuals such as the Scarlet Knight.** Some of the more powerful beings from the Fivefold Court era, whose spirits were shattered during the Sundering, have managed to reincarnate different parts of themselves over the ages until one of the reincarnations would happen to arise in someone with a mutant power that allowed them to gather the shards together and wholly re-create themselves. The most powerful of these, Aunghadhail, was indeed worshiped by the Werefolk, whom she created, though Fey prefers not to see herself as actually divine.* PlentyOfBlondes: Justified, since they're mostly exemplars.* PlugNPlayFriends: Team Kimba * PoweredArmour: Rarely seen "onscreen", but present in the setting. Apparently, a lot of Devisors and Gadgeteers like to think 'I can keep up with the Exemplars if I just engineer it right' (as Lady Astarte puts it), and there is even a special course on 'Advanced Defensive Technologies' which teaches the details of building a suit.** Loophole manages to build a suit from drawing board to working prototype in three days, before the class even started.** Jericho, who is also in the ADT course, has been building a suit of PoweredArmor for a different reason: his Rafael armor is designed to allow medics and other emergency workers to enter battlefields and other hostile environments for rescue work. His own version ''is'' armed, but the main intention is life-saving, not combat.* PowerCrystal: Power gems are a common source of superpowers for non-mutants, and can be used by wizards as a power focus. Devisors and wizards are sometimes able to create 'cultured' power gems, a more limited form of the real thing but still very useful.* PoweredByAForsakenChild: The Bell Witch tries to enslave ''her own daughter'' as a living power battery. It doesn't end well for her.* PowerIncontinence: A real problem for many of the students in Hawthorne, and generally throughout the setting. Many cases of power incontinence ultimately prove to be fatal to the mutant or bystanders. It's just one more reason why mutants are so feared and hated--they don't have to ''want'' to hurt you.* ThePowerOfActing: Most early supervillains, especially Mephisto the Mentalist, used a mixture of stage magic, hypnotic suggestion, MadScience, and garish costuming to fake their superpowers, and would stage everything from a ZombieApocalypse to an alien invasion in order to distract the superheroes from the real day-to-day crimes of their Mob associates.* PowerNullifier: A few mutants have this power, but no nullifier device exists. Special mention goes to the STAR League parents, [[spoiler: who threaten their children with being forced into wearing fake "Power Nullifier Bracelets" until they're 18, or going to Whateley. The kids choose Whateley, only to find out that 1. The bracelets were fake and 2. Their parents had enrolled them in Whateley days before they asked them if they wanted to go.]]** Martial arts classes enforce "no powers" sparring using power recorders since nullifiers aren't possible.* PowerPerversionPotential: The biggest example is Sara, but she's by no means the only one. However, some say that being a lust demon it is not perversion, rather that this was intentional. Fittingly, it is Sara who - literally - writes [[http://www.crystalhall.org/SLPB.html the definitive book on this subject]] in-universe, covering both the possibilities and the caveats of super-powered sex (and even quotes the Larry Niven essay ''ManOfSteelWomanOfKleenex'' when discussing Exemplars)** Honestly, the person who uses this the most, outside of Sara, is Harlan/Harley from The Big Idea. Also, surprisingly, Jenny. They take GREAT advantage of this trope. ** Solange (Tansy), who can use her powers to (a) make herself look and feel 'just that special' and (b) implant hypnotic suggestions, especially when her target's defenses are down - like they are during sex.** Chaka! She used her Ki powers to give her girlfriend a Ki-powered massage.** Glamours in general act as a mix of low level mind control / aphrodisiac.** Fling is entirely based on this; when someone lusts after him/her, if s/he's close enough to them, s/he changes into their ideal lover.** When discussing the question of whether men or women experience sex better, Sizzle comes down firmly on the side of women, claiming that - according to several telepaths she knew - male telepaths often get depressed if their female lovers don't let them 'listen in' during sex. * {{Precursors}}: According to one theory put forth by some scientists in the universe, entire species and their evolution may be the playthings of an entity tentatively identified as Gaia. If true, it isn't clear how much this overlaps with 'natural' evolution (since by necessity 'untainted' data would be hard to come by) and what this entity's ultimate goals might be.* PrettyBoy:** Rosethorn (whose given name is, appropriately enough, Romeo) is a high-level Exemplar who is consistently described as 'beautiful' rather than 'handsome'. He tends to pick girlfriends who are winsome, shy, and naive, but have the potential to be real knockouts - who, after he's coaxed them out of their shell, then dump ''him'' because they get tired of him being the prettier one in the relationship.** His fellow Bad Seed, Nephandus, is not quite Romeo's equal in looks, but is ''far'' more vain. He's the evil version of the trope and isn't nearly as smooth with the ladies, either, despite being [[CasanovaWannabe a legend in his own mind]] in this and many other regards.* PrettyInMink: Solange, and Kodiak even imagines her NakedInMink.* PronounTrouble: Phase is intersexed. Heyoka shifts forms and genders. And then there's Generator and the J-Team, who are several entities who all are really the same girl...* PsmithPsyndrome: Fey's name is often misspelled by others as F-A-Y. The reader can tell that a character doesn't know the proper spelling by looking at how it's written in their dialogue. For some reason, though, characters that are aware of the correct spelling seem to know instinctively when it's being misspelled, despite "Fay" and "Fey" sounding exactly the same when spoken. Averted hilariously in this exchange between female-drow Jobe (it's a long story) and Thunderbird:--> '''Jobe:''' You can call me... ''(thinks)'' ...anti-Fey.--> '''Thunderbird:''' Auntie Fay? If you say so.* PsychoElectro: The only group more prone to Deidrick's Syndrome than devisors are electrical Energizers, with Olympia being the current stock example. Of course, the fact that she is also schizophrenic doesn't help much. ** While he doesn't have Deidrick's, Imperious counts. True, he may not be delusional - he ''really is'' the reincarnation of Zeus - but he is still pretty quick to toss those lightning bolts around at anyone who defies him.* PubertySuperpower: Every mutant. Gaining mutant powers after puberty is usually lethal. Non mutant supers are not restricted in this way. Some, such as Tennyo's brother, do develop their abilities during childhood. It seems most common with the MadScientist types but is relatively uncommon.* PunchPunchPunchUhOh: On her first day in Poe, Chaka defends herself by using her Ki powers to sock Hippolyta in the guts. This is about as effective as punching TheHulk. Hank has to rescue her before she gets pummelled.* PurpleProse: Toni's narration slips into this when looking around [[EldritchLocation the cave]] in "It's All in the Timing". [[PaintingTheMedium It's implied that the cave itself is the cause of this.]]-->Feeling boo-koo nervous, I looked around, and my jaw almost hit the floor of the cave. Something was bubbling down from the roof of the cavern. No, now that it was clearer, it wasn't bubbling, it WAS the bubbles. It was only a congeries of iridescent globes, yet stupendous in its malign suggestiveness.-->[[LampshadeHanging Whoa! Where did THAT come from?]]* QuintessentialBritishGentleman: Fey's magic tutor Sir Wallace Westmont, who is a ShoutOut to John Steed of ''The Avengers''.* RapeAsBackstory: [[spoiler: Loophole, by one of Freya's minions.]]** Also appears in Vamp's origin story.* RapeIsASpecialKindOfEvil: Writers REALLY like this trope. Numerous villains are rapists. [[spoiler: Especially Freya and the Don.]] While not overused, it is a pattern. * RashomonStyle: Most of the early stories are set amongst the same group of people, with the same events happening, but with each story taking place from a different character's Point of View.* RealLifeWritesThePlot: Feral disapppeared because her author had to go away, and Ayla underwent retcons and character changes when Diane Castle took over. * ReallyWasBornYesterday: Belphoebe, a cloned drow created by Belphegor using the cloning chamber he'd stolen from Jobe then accidentally imprinted the clone with a copy of his own memories. Hence while Belfy is chronologically 0, she looks 16 and is treated as such by the administration, staff and students.* RedPillBluePill: In Bladedancer's origin story, the Taoist Immortal Lan Caihe Ho offers Alex Farshine the choice: give up the magic sword and return to his mundane life, or keep it and become Handmaid Of The Tao, servant of powers of which she understands nothing. * RequiredSecondaryPowers: Wallflower, because she can become invisible, logically couldn't see while invisible (because the light would pass through all of her without interacting, including her eyes). She never really thought about this before going to Whateley, when one of the scientists noted it. It then turns out that while invisible, she can see in the dark, apparently because she has an extra power that lets her sense her surroundings without light. In fact, almost all mutants require secondary powers. Investigating them, and the exact means by which the laws of physics are being bent, is most of what the Whateley scientists spend their time investigating. According to Sara it all comes down to Pattern Theory.** There are also plenty of examples of kids who are disabled because they lack required secondary powers. Like Frostbite, who freezes water but isn't immune to cold herself.* TheReveal: ''Silent Nacht'' reveals that [[spoiler: the Bell Witch and Nacht aren't related at all. The Bell Witch stole Nacht from her actual mother and dipped her into the Erebos river, thinking that it would kill her, but when Nacht unexpectedly survived, Bell Witch decided to raise her as her own instead.]]* RockPaperSwitch: Chaka and Fey in "It's All in the Timing!"* RotatingArcs: Each canon author has his or her own characters, and writes from their point of view. This does have the downside in that arcs involving all of the characters get told piecemeal and if you're following the order recommended outright spoiled in some instances.* RoyallyScrewedUp: The Wilkins family, naturally. While Joe and Jobe are the only ones who are mutants, they are ''all'' weaselly, self-centered, [[JerkAss Jerk Asses]] with ChronicBackstabbingDisorder. On the other hand, each of them is remarkably talented in their chosen field, which means that when they ''do'' work together, they are almost unstoppable. Fortunately, most of them are so specialized in some professional or aesthetic field (e.g., couture, interior design, automobile detailing and restoration, medical administration) that they have to double in some black market operation to make a living, with Karedonian diplomatic immunity to shield them from prosecution. The main exception, aside from Jobe and Emperor Joseph himself, is their UN Ambassador, who has a thriving butcher's shop next to the embassy, and most of the diplomatic work actually gets done there. * RulesLawyer: Loophole. It's the source of her code name.* RuleOfThree: Part of the laws of magic. Its a recent convention though according to Augenhail, only a few thousand years old.* RunningGag: During the shopping montage in "No Beast So Fierce", someone keeps asking: "Do you have anything that shows off a little more cleavage?"* ScienceRelatedMemeticDisorder: A sort of example: Diedrick's Syndrome causes people to mimic typical mad scientist or supervillain behaviours, such as crazed rages, ranting monologues, revenge obsessions etc. Particularly common among Devisors (cf. GadgeteerGenius, MadScientist above). WordOfGod explains that Diedrick's is a ''mental illness'', not specifically evil, and seen among heroes as well as villains. However the villainous examples (such as Diedrick himself) are much better known. Whateley students refer to an acute attack as "dricking out". Megadeath, for instance, is an incredibly nice guy when on his meds. Another, Olympia, however, is stark raving mad even when NOT having an attack.* ScrewDestiny: Sara is determined to shape her own destiny as the Kellith to become the first ProhumanTranshuman EldritchAbomination * ScryVsScry* SecondLawOfGenderBending: Many of the changelings take to their new genders with aplomb. Others, notably Ayla Goodkind and Chou Lee, have much more of a problem with it. Mostly because the Exemplar, Avatar and Shifter traits ALL switch the gender of the brain to match the body. Chou's a baseline, Phase has a combination of male and female [=BITs=] (female ones being responsible for the whole intersexed thing). Hive... has no excuse.* SecretIdentity: Many practicing superheroes have one. Keeping enemies away from the family is a good thing. Also used to justify the use of in-school "code names," especially during powers testing, since records are stolen, or otherwise "acquired", by corrupt government agencies and others. All Arena matches are inevitably filmed and sold to Mutant Deathmatch tv shows, especially the combat finals.* SelfDuplication: Troika can split into three identical people, while OMAG can split into at least six people but the duplicates don't seem to have the autonomy that Troika's dupes do.* SerialRomeo: Rosethorn; doubly ironic, as not only is his ''name'' Romeo, but he consistently is the one who gets dumped by his girlfriends.* SewerGator: Between the {{Eldritch Abomination}}s lurking in the area and decades' worth of Devisor experiments getting dumped into the sewers, Stan and Morrie would probably find mere alligators a relief.* ShapeshifterModeLock: It is eventually revealed that this is the reason Jade never aged past 11. The exact cause of the lock isn't known, but implied to be an extremely powerful curse. [[spoiler: In Tennyo Goes To Hell, the lock is broken on a copy of her via exposure to [[RapeAsDrama Shoggoth genetic material.]] She becomes an Omnimorph on par with Jimmy T, and the ability to pull MesACrowd. Since she's literally in a hell at the time, she needs it.]]* SharedUniverse* ShipTease: ** Hank and Nikki have a bit in the early stories. They show attraction to each other and hints of jealousy over potential rivals. This is dropped after Lily is introduced and starts dating Hank.** Ayla and Jadis have a bit, the most overt of it being some comments from their friends.* ShootHimHeHasAWallet: {{Averted}} in Diamonds Are a Vamp's Best Friend (Part 2), where the police were about to shoot Bova when she was holding [[spoiler:a hair-dryer]].* ShoutOut:** Tennyo looks just like [[Anime/TenchiMuyo Ryoko]].** Including several direct references to trope names from this very wiki. (One fanfic author on the forums even uses trope names as his fic names.)** Team Kimba is explicitly named after Manga/KimbaTheWhiteLion.** Ayla's original name is a reference to Trevor Goodchild, the CorruptCorporateExecutive AntiVillain in ''WesternAnimation/AeonFlux''. ** Dr. Bellows, named after the shrink from ''Series/IDreamOfJeannie'', is a shrink with a Genie Bottle (from said show) in his office. Jade uses the pink sand inside to animate Jinn.** The paperwork from Whateley goes through a shell company called [[Franchise/FantasticFour Richards and Grimm Consulting]]. This is probably an in-universe shout out, since the comic still exists (and indeed, Ayla catches the reference). And was probably a [[CelebrityParadox blatant expy of The Amazing Three in the first place...]]** A major mutants-only website, geared towards the sale of high-end weaponry and espionage gear, is named the [[WesternAnimation/TheIncredibles Sin d'Rome Mercenarium]].** Two of the administrative assistants on campus are named [[Literature/TheSagaOfTuck Valerie Tucker and Debra Carstairs]].** The name of 'Quinzel-Osborn Syndrome', a psychological condition that makes the sufferer DrunkOnTheDarkSide, combines references to ComicBook/HarleyQuinn and ComicBook/NormanOsborn, both of whom are known for such behavior. ** Razzle Dazzle is possibly the best example. Including a Deconstruction of Franchise/DocSavage. * ShownTheirWork: Anything by Diane Castle, which is parodied in Fractious, her Lit-Chick counterpart. Fractious cannot help doing this, to the point that a 20 page short story becomes a 600 page criminology textbook.* SliceOfLife: Ayla stories have a strong tendency towards this, as do Aquerna's and some of Jade's.* SnarkKnight: Nacht. She has reasons why she acts this way, though.* SoBadItsGood: "Tales of the MCO" is seen as this in-universe.* SpannerInTheWorks: Jade, at least twice. Special mention is that both times this is specifically prophesied by Hekate, who nevertheless fails to take appropriate precautions. More specifically, the first time her prophesy says 'don't bother' and she believes it but Don Sebastiano doesn't listen. The second time she TRIES to take appropriate precautions and does a pretty good job. [[spoiler: But how do you take precautions against someone who is dead using telekinesis to keep her heart pumping, removing a sacrifical dagger, murdering half your base, and telekinetically making them into a zombie army? All the while claiming to be a Vampire Princess?!]]* SpellMyNameWithAnS:** Reverend Englund. It doesn't help that half of the canon authors actually ''do'' spell it "England."** Some authors tend to spell "Hippolyta" as "Hippolyte". (Never mind that it'd be pronounced differently.)* SplitPersonality and TalkingToThemself: Jade. Ayla and the others have made note of the fact that the J-Team needs their own set of pronouns. Jade's the only one shown so far able to have a conference with ''herself''. However at the heart of it Jade and Jinn ''roughly'' are the same, and as time has gone on Jade has been acting more like Jinn. Their talking to each other is just a natural extension of her powers duplicating her mind. Whether using her ability to effectively parallel process with all her duplicates mind linked with her counts is debatable.* SquishyWizard: Magic users, psychics, and gadget-using types generally fall into this category when their bags of tricks run out. Which is an important caveat. Averting this is one of the major tactical decisions TK takes early on- and very effective it is too. When she starts waving Malachim's Feather about, Fey is the equal of most decent close-in fighters.* StockSuperpowers: Damn near all of them. The school has standard testing to evaluate what kind of powers someone has, how strong they are, and which curriculum modules will develop them most effectively. Averted though, with Jade. Who has ever heard of her powers? Lampshaded partially by the police testing her and having difficulty classifying her powers.* StrawmanPolitical: The Goodkinds. FridgeLogic raises the question why they are unassailable as well by the ''superpowered'' community. Brute force isn't going to work well because the Goodkinds are rich and famous. They believe in hiring competent help -- including security, who will be highly trained, motivated, and equipped with the best that money can buy -- and any open attacks on them are apt to result in ''major'' public backlash. Add to that that superpowered individuals in the setting are generally less than 'cosmically' powerful and their community is far from united (to the point where quite a few, upon learning of a pending attack, would do their own best to stop it), and it ''really'' starts to look like the Goodkinds are here to stay.** It was pointed out in a recent story that [[spoiler: based on past family history this makes no sense whatsoever. The Goodkinds have been pro-life, anti-slavery, pro-revolutionary war, pro-civil rights, pro all kinds of things that would suggest they should be some of mutantkind's greatest supporters. Yet, somehow, they have become the opposite. Ayla doesn't even know how to explain it. It's implied the oddness of this had never yet been pointed out anyone in the family, either, though mention is made of secrets only 21 and old working members of the family are privy to.]] The question of why, exactly, the Goodkinds are so anti-mutant has been raised as a plot-point.*** Another story implies that the Goodkinds have been [[VillainWithGoodPublicity Villains With Good Publicity]] all along, with the highly visible good deeds covering an ugly history of exploitation, strikebreaking, double-dealing and other similar skullduggery. * StoryBreakerPower: Averted. the series as a whole contains several good examples of ways to prevent ultra-powerful characters from breaking the story by giving them believable reasons to hold back.* StrongAsTheyNeedToBe: Chou Lee's powers are given to her by the Tao, and it gives her as much power as it sees fit. WordOfGod says ''nothing'' can stand in her way if the Tao deems it necessary. But usually it doesn't.* SubspaceOrHyperspace: Team Kimba has subspace communicators, built by Bunny with mathematical help from Sara.* SuicideByCop: Stygian has tried this more than once, by trying to provoke the most dangerous students on campus (e.g., Razorback, Tennyo) into blowing him away.** Inverted: An FBI agent goes out of sanction to try and kill Strega; when she (literally) stomps him into the ground, the FBI basically write it off as a suicide.* SuperGenderBender: A central premise but uncommon in the greater community.* {{Superhero}}: Duh!, * SuperHeroOrigin: Ditto duh!* SuperheroSchool: While this is what most people (including many of the students) assume Whateley Academy is, the School Administration, and particularly Headmistress Carson, are [[InsistentTerminology quite insistent]] that Whateley Academy is ''not'' a superhero school, though they will admit that it's an AcademyOfAdventure. Due to Whateley being funded by Superheroes, Supervillains, and Superneutrals, it doesn't push the "hero" thing.* SuperpowerfulGenetics* SuperpowerLottery: And guess who pulled the jackpot(s)? [[spoiler: Everyone]]* SuperRegistrationAct: Internationally administered by the MCO, in the US administered by the Department of Paranormal Affairs (DPA). DPA maintains records of all US citizens with abilities beyond the human baseline, and issues their mandatory Mutant ID (MID) cards. For international ease of travel, the DPA uses the MCO model for this card.* SuperSoldier: Experimentation in augmented soldiers during WWII plays an important role in the series backstory.** Several supervillains have various types of genetically or cybernetically augmented foot soldiers, including the Chessmen, the Syndicate's Tiger Guard (especially the elite Sabertooths), Dr. Diabolik's Devil Dogs, and Lord Paramount's Catamount Troopers. The Animen were originally created by Dr. DNA with this in mind as well, being meant as breeding stock for future super-soldiers.* {{Supervillain}}: Lots. Many send their own children to Whateley. Part of why nobody with half a brain messes with a students family, or attacks the school.* TakingYouWithMe: What [[spoiler: the Star Stalker]] was created to do, on a universal scale.* TakeAThirdOption: The whole point of Faction Three. Thuban and co don't want to be forced onto the hero or villain parts, they want to do their own thing without being instantly judged for being GSD sufferers.* TechnicolorEyes: Unusual eye-colour is a normal byproduct of a mutant's emergence, and a classic "give-away" even when their appearance is otherwise that of a baseline human. Known colors are anything under the sun, but purple and normal eye colors with bright tinges seems to be the most common.* {{Technopath}}: Several of these, most notably Merry, Dr. Palm, and Samantha Everheart.* {{Telefrag}}: Ayla is capable of something best described as this; upon going 'light', phasing into something, and then going back to regular density, whatever was in the way stops being in the way. The process is quite painful for Ayla, however, so he tries not to do it. In the earliest stories, it keeps wrecking his clothes when he phases out accidentally.* ThatCameOutWrong: "Nikki keeps fondling my bling-bling!"* ThenLetMeBeEvil: For some this is true, others just an excuse. The Bad Seeds are pretty much a whole clique of "then let me be evil" just waiting to happen. She Beast and Nacht seem to be resisting, but both lament how giving in would be so much easier, and Jobe doesn't really count because of his BlueAndOrangeMorality. Gloriana even warns her fellow Cape Squad members that they're going to trigger this trope if they don't cut the Bad Seeds a little slack. ** This seems to play a role in Imp's backstory, as well, though she isn't evil so much as she is a {{Trickster}} with a love of fine art and a desire to get back at the world.* ThereAreNoTherapists: Averted, so far three characters have been portrayed as competent therapists, two of whom are telepathic. TeenDrama is preserved because [[AwfulTruth for]] [[IdiotBall various]] [[YouWouldntBelieveMeIfIToldYou reasons]] characters often are less than cooperative with their therapist. When they work with their therapist they tend to get good help with even the oddest problems, and considering what the therapists see on a daily basis they probably would be believed, but when has an angsty teenager ''ever'' believed that ''anyone'' could understand their problems... ** Even with a staff of four, and assistance from ARC's therapists and Fubar, the school is all too aware that it often still isn't enough, given the often unique nature of some of the problems, especially for cases where their powers directly cause behavioral changes (as is often the case for Avatars, due to the passenger that shares their head). In addition, you have trauma cases like Pejuta, kids who have been rjected by their friends and families, kids who have been attacked by other mutants or hunted by H1! and/or the MCO, kids who were subject to abuse due their mutation, kids who were victims of more mundane, by no less tragic, forms of mistreatment (such as Jade), and even cases of psychic, astral, or magical assaults (such as what [[spoiler:Skybolt and Cavalier]] experienced). Just keeping them all going is a monumental undertaking. * TheFatalist: A major aspect of the Taoist religion, we've seen them accept murder because it was destined. Not happily mind, but…* ThirdLawOfGenderBending: Played straight, especially with clothing stereotypes:** The girls all end up in lingerie style sleepwear, just in time to get into a very public brawl against a bunch of [[ItMakesSenseInContext student ninjas from a rival school.]]** The only ones who voice any objection to dressing or acting girly are Chou (who favours mandarin tops and yoga pants) and Ayla (who actually owns more silk lingerie than ''any'' of the girls, admitting he likes it too much to stop).** The girls even make use of the stereotype, using masking technology to make eavesdroppers ''think'' they're talking about vapid girly stuff, when in reality they're talking SeriousBusiness.** Jade displays a tendency early on to adopt the stereotypical submissive behavior of her mother as a way of making herself feel more feminine. She also likes it when her boyfriend is macho and dominant - but only when it's about something she wants to do anyway.** During his Christmas story, Phase gets this shoved into his face, ''hard'': fearing that the MCO is after him, his older sister Gracie decides that the best place to hide him is... a beauty pageant. Cue the [[DraggedIntoDrag Makeover Scene from Hell]]. Worst of all, after the wax treatment they gave him, his body hair and eyebrows never grew back, permanently giving him a more feminine appearance than ever.** Ribbon takes this trope and runs with it, on the premise that if she's going to have a chance at a whole new life after living fifty years as a man, then she'd better do it right. Her manifestation powers, which allow her to create a whole suit of clothing instantaneously, may have influenced this. It makes for some jarring interactions when her old habits do show through.* ThirdOptionLoveInterest: Chaka for Thunderbird. An interesting example, considering that he had no clue that the other girls were interested in him in that way.* ThouShaltNotKill: Averted by many of the characters, heroic or villainous. Among Team Kimba, only Chaka and Phase have no confirmed kills (though Ayla ''did'' set one opponent on fire, an act of desperation that left him horrified with himself), and Jade in particular has a body count in the hundreds. Jobe has tested numerous serums on Karadonian prisoners with fatal effects, and thought nothing of infecting the [[AcademyOfEvil DeVille Academy]] attackers with a deadly disease in order to get them to surrender in exchange for the vaccine/antidote. Several supervillains, including WellIntentionedExtremist Dr. Diabolik, have been responsible for tens of thousands of deaths.** Even the BigGood of the series is pushed to this: during her fight with Deathlist, headmistress Lady Astarte finally decides that he's too big a threat to let live, and tries in full earnest to kill him. While he managed to escape, it isn't known if he survived his injuries or not.** Interestingly, it is a super''villain'' who is best known for this trope. Mimeo is known as 'the supervillain who doesn't kill'; personal ethics aside, he wants to keep his most powerful opponents alive and active, so he can ''keep'' copying their powers whenever he needs a power-up. The Necromancer ''almost'' pushed him to the point of killing during the fight at the Roxbury C Supermax Penitentary, but once he was convinced that Necromancer would spare Fey's life, he simply left the scene. * TimTaylorTechnology - Devisor gear frequently works this way, presumably because needing enough energy to work is one of the few laws of physics to which devisors pay attention. Knick-Knack is a big believer in this style of Devising.* TransformationFiction: Standard for mutants whether BIT changes in sex, age, or gender, or GSD changes into monstrous forms.* {{Transgender}}: Everybody in Team Kimba and quite a number of other characters in their own stories. A uncommon (but apparently growing more common, see LampshadeHanging above) side effect of the Exemplar power means you'll be changed whether you like it or not.* {{Transsexual}}: A number of {{Transgender}} characters (Chaka the most prominent example) felt as though they were the other gender to begin with before transforming. Jade is a more traditional example, being the only member of Team Kimba who has not physically transformed in any way and is searching for a way to become a "real" girl. Ayla is an inversion, he wasn't transgender until after his body changed when he manifested, and he firmly retains a male psyche.* {{Troperiffic}}: At some points in the story the characters themselves are referring to tropes.* TroubleMagnetGambit: A man who is known to be rather friendly with the local weres is slipped a fungus that affects them like catnip does cats by a man who wants all the land he owns. [[spoiler: And gets killed, as one might expect.]]* TrueCompanions: Summarized in the last bit of "Away from Home". * UniverseBible: See AllThereInTheManual above.* UnfortunateName: In addition to the many students and other supers who have chosen an AtrociousAlias over the years, there are a few folks saddled with personal names that are less than desirable, though often quite fitting:** [[NamesToRunAwayFromReallyFast Dr. Paine Deth]], who [[WhatDidYouExpectWhenYouNamedIt not surprisingly]] grew up to be a MadScientist. ** Techwolf, who is under a family curse that causes the men of the family to look like werewolves, has the real name of Harry Wolfe. His father, who was the first victim of the curse and has bright red fur, is named Red Wolfe. There's speculation that terribly punny names are part of the curse.** Tansy Walcutt's first name is the source of much humor for the other students. No wonder she prefers her codename.* UnwinnableTrainingSimulation: In some of the school's training sessions, the student squads face off against each other in this sort of scenario. Its generally to stop them from thinking they're invulnerable and undefeatable.** Then Team Kimba beats one on their second try. With a [[NoodleIncident Radioactive Condor Girl]].* UnwittingPawn: Mr. Cool is used by a lot of people during "Have Yourself An EVIL Little Christmas". [[spoiler: He still ends up profitting more than most of them, without even being aware of the whole deal. He even gets a girlfriend who likes the supervillain stuff!]] * UnstoppableRage: Some mutants (called ragers) have this problem, where they can be provoked into a bloodthirsty or destructive state. While some of these ragers are villainous in nature, the ones that are seen and focused on are sympathetic and, unfortunately, ostracized for their condition. Merry and Eldritch are somewhat of a subversion, though: though they would be considered "ragers" in universe, they are much more [[TranquilFury focused and systematic]] in their rage, possibly making them even MORE dangerous than the berserk velociraptor that can move at speeds higher than 100 MPH.* UpgradeArtifact:** The sentient, talking, magic sword Destiny's Wave granted Alex Farshine ''qing gong'' powers, Taoist healing knowledge, peak physical fitness, superb martial-arts skills, ImplausibleFencingPowers, and the ability to speak, read and write Chinese. And turned him into a hot Chinese girl. ** The Pearl of Great Price, which [[spoiler: turned Dr. Braeburn into a mutant psychic. With the body of a Playboy model - s/he even matches the parts that were airbrushed.]] * UselessSuperpowers: Occasional side-effect of the {{Masquerade}}.* TheVamp: Vamp. Invoked.* VillainBar: At least four have been mentioned: three in NYC (Moriarty's, the Black Mask, and Superbad), and one unnamed one in Pittsburgh. Superbad is notable for being mostly a hangout for part-time supervillains with day jobs, basically a workingman's bar with a tolerance for odd costumes. ** Also mentioned is a villain ''hotel'', the Mayfair, a 4-star exclusive hotel whose staff are willing to look the other way at odd costumes and behavior so long at no one causes trouble for the ordinary patrons, or commits any crimes inside the hotel itself. According to She-Beast, this actually makes it one of the safest hotels to stay at in Boston.** It has also been mentioned that henchmen also have their own bars, where they can go to pound down the brew - and each other - between missions.* WakeUpGoToSchoolSaveTheWorld: This describes Team Kimba's life in a nutshell, what with the Boston Brawls, the Voodoo Wolves, etc. Still, the emphasis is a bit more on "Go to School" then with other things.* WantonCrueltyToTheCommonComma: Some authors are more prone to this than others.* WardrobeMalfunction: Tennyo in particular is prone to this to the point that she has ended up completely naked at the end of several battles because her body can withstand far more damage than any conceivable clothing. This is a real problem because she's actually quite shy even though she's too HotBlooded for DefeatByModesty. Eventually, Ayla has Techwolf craft a ChainmailBikini made of adamantium plates for her to wear under her costume to preserve her modesty.* WeaponsKitchenSink: There are martial arts instructors, so they have experts helping them choose, if they don't already have a weapon. Bladedancer has a mystical jade ''jian'', Fey now has a mithril scimitar, and Chaka is learning everything she can (right now she's a chain fighter and wields a meteor hammer). Lancer, because of his power set, has two swords ''made out of paper''. Jinn is made of this.* WebcomicTime: Since the series started in 2004, they have managed to move forward way under a year of Whateley time.* WhamEpisode: In universe, every so often students are shown a video of the Dragonslayers taking down a rager, dozens of people dying brutally in the process. It's designed to show them that not only are they not unkillable, but that mercy will not be forthcoming.** The Halloween attack. Hundreds of powerful people are ambushed and attacked on their own ground, completely unprepared. While the body count is very low, the injury count is huge, and leaves a lot of people ''very'' shaken.** Tennyo's Combat Final. Taking out an arena of attacking robots single-handedly made everyone want to leave her alone.** ''Whilst Any Speaks'', Part Four. [[spoiler: Aunghadhail ''dies''. Kodiak subsumes his spirit, who was controlling Loophole. Freya gets taken out for good, and Skybolt and Cavalier are finally freed from their mental prison.]]** The first part of ''The Riddle Of Sappho'' ends with [[spoiler: Heyoka being found dead.]]* WhatKindOfLamePowerIsHeartAnyway: Minor characters often have this.* WhatMeasureIsANonHuman: Certain humans (The Goodkinds and Humanity First!) have this attitude towards mutants.* WhatMeasureIsANonSuper: Certain mutants (The villainous super-ninja Nex for example) have this attitude towards ordinary humans.* WhereTheHellIsSpringfield: Whateley is located in the fictional town of Dunwich, New Hampshire which is somewhere near the real Presidential range and the real town of Berlin, However, all of the rest of the local geography (like the fictional [[LovecraftCountry Miskatonic river valley]]) is invented, and there's little or no mention of other prominent and unavoidable geographical features like the rest of the White Mountains, implying that the authors chose the location from a map and have no real familiarity with the area.* WindsOfDestinyChange: While probability manipulation is a relatively uncommon power, it causes disproportionate problems for the school administration, as having two or more 'reality manglers' in close proximity to each other can cause ''extremely'' unpredictable results. They run into a serious problem when more probability manipulators show up in one year than there are cottages. ** This plays a major role in the Halloween invasion, as three probability manipulators ended up close to each other during the fight, throwing off Chessmaster's ability to predict events accurately.* WithGreatPowerComesGreatInsanity: In addition to the rather common [[ScienceRelatedMemeticDisorder Deidrick's Syndrome]] and [[DrunkOnTheDarkSide Quinzel-Osborn Syndrome]], it has been stated canonically that ''all'' Exemplars suffer from some degree of both Galahad Syndrome (a tendency to fixate irrationally on finishing the task they have set themselves to at all costs, whether it be [[ChronicHeroSyndrome 'protecting the innocent']] or 'conquering the world') and Hercules Syndrome (an inability to control their emotional extremes, leading them to vacillate between overly dramatic posturing and violent rages). This is, of course, even worse when they are still teenagers, which goes far in explaining why things happen they way they do at Whateley.** Part of Jade's increasing erratic behavior is due to the destabilizing effects of her power on her perspective. The events of 'Bottle a Jinn', 'The Christmas Crisis' and especially 'Christmas Elves' in particular involved uses or side effects of her powers that caused severe emotional disturbances for her.* WizardDuel: Fey and the Necromancer in all three Boston brawls.* WizardingSchool: It may not be Whateley's main purpose, but the Mystic Arts Department stands as one of the world's best [[WizardingSchool Wizarding Schools]] all on its own.* WholesomeCrossdresser: Gotterdamerung. Fortunately for him, his girlfriend, Sunshine, is understanding about it.* WritingLines: In their eponymous story, The Three Little Witches have to copy out the Whateley Code of Mystic Ethics twenty times, and as the Code of Ethics is five pages long, it's a hundred pages.* XanatosGambit: Invoked by name. Also, that story goes through the GambitIndex.* XRayVision: Peeper. And yes, he abuses it. Interestingly enough, he can't turn it OFF, explaining some of his issues. Not all, just some.* YourMimeMakesItReal: Marcel, Robur's right-hand man is an EnemyMime who kidnaps Envy and Daphne. He silences Envy to prevent her from using magic, and traps Daphne with an invisible box. ----