[Supers] GURPS Unofficial Handbook to the Marvel Universe, Reboot Edition

[Phantasm]

RUSSELL, LISSA

Real Name: Alissa "Lissa" Russell (legally changed from her birth name Alissa Russoff).
Occupation: Occult bookstore clerk.
Identity: Lissa Russell does not use a dual identity; her existence as a werewolf is not known to the general public nor to the authorities.
Legal Status: Citizen of the United States with no criminal record.
Other Aliases: Werewolf, "she-wolf", "wolf-girl", "Liss".
Place of Birth: Malibu, California.
Marital Status: Single.
Known Relatives: Jacob "Jack" Russell (alias the Werewolf, brother); Gregor Russoff (father, deceased); Philip Russell (nee Russoff, step-father, uncle); Laura Russoff Russell (mother, deceased); Grigori, Baron Russoff (distant ancestor, deceased).
Group Affiliation: Ally of the Werewolf; occasional ally of Spider-Woman.
Base of Operations: Los Angeles, California.
History: Lissa Russell was the second child born to Gregor and Laura Russoff, born two years after her brother Jack (see Werewolf). However, while their mother was pregnant with Lissa, Gregor was outed as a werewolf and killed by the townsfolk in the Romanian village they lived in. Fearing for her own life and those of her children, Laura fled to her brother-in-law Philip's home in America – specifically Malibu, California – where Lissa was born. Eventually Philip and Laura married, and Philip legally adopted Jack and Lissa. Years before, Philip had legally changed his last name to Russell; when he adopted them, they took on his new last name.

Nearly a hundred years before, Gregor and Philip's ancestor, Baron Grigori Russoff, had come into possession of a tome of black magic, the Darkhold, and in studying it came to be cursed with lycanthropy. This curse was passed to his bloodline, although because his children were already born, the curse remained dormant for almost a century. The Darkhold was stolen from his home and passed through a number of hands before Russoff's descendant, Gregor, discovered it, triggering the curse. (Philip had emigrated to America by that time. He learned about the curse from Gregor, but was never affected by it.)

Lissa at first was unaware of any of this until Jack went through his first transformation on his eighteenth birthday, which coincided with the first night of a full moon; Lissa was sixteen at the time. (Their mother died in a car crash that same night, ironically out searching for Jack who had run off in a panic.) Lissa learned of her brother's condition several months later when, after encountering the Werewolf just before dawn, he transformed back to human and passed out. After learning of the history of the curse from her step-father, Lissa sought out a means of curing or at least controlling the curse and threw herself into studies of both the occult and meditation. Although she has yet to find a means to cure herself or her brother of the curse, her studies in meditation enabled her to maintain control of the wolf from her very first transformation, two weeks after her own eighteenth birthday.

Lissa was first encountered as a clerk at an occult bookstore in downtown Los Angeles during an investigation by private investigator Jessica Drew. Days later, Lissa was forced to reveal her own nature as a werewolf to Drew in the latter's alter ego as Spider-Woman in order to prevent Spider-Woman from harming Jack during one of his moon-fueled rampages (see Spider-Woman).

Since then, Jack and Lissa have found themselves occasionally assisting Drew in her cases, although Lissa insists on staying away from what she calls "field work". With the appearance of the ghost of the ancient sorcerer Magnus and his revelations on the origin of the Darkhold, Lissa has begun to wonder if a true cure – or at the least a measure of control – for Jack is in sight (see Magnus).
Height: 5' 4"; (as werewolf) 5' 9".
Weight: 120 lbs; (as werewolf) 170 lbs.
Eyes: Brown.
Hair: Brown.
Uniform: None; she has been known to wear regular clothes made of dynamic molecules which merge into her when she takes on a more lupine form (see Common Technologies).
Strength Level: In her human form, Lissa Russell possesses the normal human strength of a woman of her age, height, and build who engages in moderate regular exercise. As a werewolf, she possesses superhuman strength enabling her to lift (press) roughly one ton under optimal conditions.
Known Superhuman Powers: Lissa is heir to a supernatural hereditary curse of lycanthropy, forcing her to become a werewolf. Unlike her brother, Lissa has full control over her transformations, able to transform at will rather than being subject to the phase of the moon, and maintaining her full human intelligence in her lupine state, even under the effects of a full moon.

As a werewolf, Lissa possesses superhuman strength, endurance, and durability; only weapons made of silver or the claws or bite of another werewolf will truly harm her, as other wounds close almost immediately. Her agility increases, her eyes become better able to see in the dark, her hands form into sharp claws, her feet become digitigrade claws, and her teeth sharpen. She is able to speak in her werewolf form, although her voice is distorted (and has been described as "eerily raspy"). She still needs to breathe, so strangulation can still kill her. As a werewolf she is immune to the mental control of vampires; furthermore, the herb wolfsbane if ingested will cause her severe problems.

Even in her human state, Lissa maintains the wolf's sense of smell, enabling her to track by following scents up to twenty four hours later even in a busy city street as well as being able to tell when someone is nervous, fearful, or calm when they shouldn't be.

There is evidence that Lissa, as "a child of the Darkhold", has the potential to become a sorceress, but she has never pursued any training.
Other Abilities: Lissa is very knowledgeable about the occult and Buddhist meditation practices. She is fluent in Latin, Sanskrit, Aramaic, Hebrew, Arabic, Tamil, Tibetan Chinese, Han Chinese, and Japanese, and can effortlessly read Ancient Egyptian, Old and Middle Tamil, and Sumerian. She is untrained in hand to hand combat, but has been known to occasionally "let the wolf out", fighting with a savage instinct in her lupine form.

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