Note: All things marked with * refer to items that are strictly MUSH-related, and have no basis in the Marvel Canon.
Alias(es): Red, Ray, Phoenix
Parents: 'Jean Grey' (aka Phoenix), and Scott Summers
Known Relatives: (Tho technically, all of Rachel's relatives are
deceased. This list comprises the list of relatives had Rachel been the
daughter of mainstream timeline's Scott and Jean.)
Note: The following information was taken directly from my application for the character on Xavier's.
Desc: [name(me)] is a fairly tall young woman, approximately 25 to 30 years of age. She has short red hair on the top and sides of her head, with a long braid down her back. Her body is thin, but not skinny, with little traces of flab anywhere. While not prominent, her muscles are visible in a way to show that she leads a fairly active lifestyle. Her green eyes show a depth unusual in most people. They tell a tale of great loss, great suffering, as well as great joy and great happiness. If she is stressed out or powered up as Phoenix, black tattoos radiating out from her nose cover her face.
Clothes: (Civilian-frumpy) She is wearing a fairly plain suit outfit, concealing her feminine features and looking pretty ordinary. The dull brown cotton skirt reaches past her knees, billowing out slightly in a passing breeze. The outfit is topped with a white blouse, pretty standard for any office, and that is covered with a brown suit jacket that matches the skirt. Her shoes are a pair of pretty high heels, and a gold pendant in the shape of a bird of prey dangles around her neck.
(Civilian-racy) She is wearing a tight leather outfit of a metallic red color with matching thigh-high boots. Her midriff is covered with a tight strapless skirt, the cloth reaching barely down past her behind and up past her breasts. Her arms are covered by a jacket with a back that basically only covers her shoulders. A gold pendant dangles around her neck, the stylized bird of prey glinting in the available light.
(Costume) She is wearing skin-tight spandex from neck to toe. It hugs her body's every contour in a very provocative way. Along her arms, wrists and down between her breasts run strips of little spikes, much like an American might wear when in a punk mood. The costume has no visible zippers or closures.
* Character's background and history
Rachel Summers was born in an alternate future to Scott Summers and his wife, Jean Grey. Despite the passing of the Mutant Registration Act after the assassination of Senator Robert Kelly, she spent her formative years happily in the care of her parents and her parents' adopted family, the X-Men.
Rachel, it must be noted, is the daughter of the Phoenix' version of Jean, not the real Jean Grey. Marvel once alluded to Rachel's mother not being Phoenix in that alternate timeline, and with the Excalibur claim of 'no analogue for Phoenix', but all the other canon suggests that Rachel is the daughter of the original Phoenix from that alternate timeline that just wasn't killed on the Moon and managed to stave off the Dark Phoenix.
That said, back to the good stuff. Rachel was born in the house of John and Elaine Grey, Jean's parents, in Annandale-on-Hudson, New York, not too far from Xavier's School for Gifted Youngsters. Despite the assassination of Senator Robert Kelly causing a panic against mutants, Rachel suffered no major catastrophes until her mother was killed when Jason Wyngarde (Mastermind) caused the destruction of Pittsburgh with a nuke (I've heard of conspiracies against the Super Bowl, but this takes the cake ... oh, sorry. ;) It was during this time that Rachel met Franklin Richards, the son of Reed and Sue Richards of the Fantastic Four. The two were the equivalent of childhood sweethearts.
Rachel was taught by Professor Xavier himself (despite the continuity error of him having been killed with Kelly and Moira MacTaggert before she was born) at the School until his death at the hands of the US Government, which was trying to enforce the Mutant Control Act signed into law. After that, Rachel was captured by Ahab, who brainwashed her and programmed her as his prototype hound, a mutant whose job was to hunt down other mutants for the Sentinel-led government to kill. It was at this time that her hound-tattoos were applied permanently. Normally, Rachel psionically masks them from peoples' perception, but when exceedingly stressed, or when powered up as the Phoenix, the mask fails. Rachel was the leader of Ahab's hound pack, his greatest achievement. Still, the knowledge of her past happy life, and the shame brought to her by her slavery caused her to finally rebel and mutilate Ahab. She was then sent to an internment centre in the Bronx, and was rejoined with the remaining X-Men, Magneto, and her childhood sweetheart, Franklin 'Scrapper' Richards.
The X-Men had heard of a plot by the other nations on the planet to tactically nuke New York City and any other Sentinels' bases if they made moves against them. As the Sentinels' plans went forward, Rachel and the others made a counterplan of their own. Rachel used the telepathy she'd inherited with her mother and her own second-generation mutant power of astral time travel to send Kate Pryde-Rasputin's soul back to exchange places with Kitty Pryde some 30 years ago (the present of the books) to warn the X-Men about the attempt to assassinate Kelly in 1980. In the future, Rachel stayed and guarded Kate's body as the rest of the X-Men, Magneto, and Franklin were all killed by the Sentinels in their attempt to avoid the nuclear holocaust that was being threatened from overseas. The attempt to stop the Sentinels failed, so Kate and Rachel went on a suicide mission to try and blow up a particularly sensitive base, where the Nimrod Sentinels were being designed. Instead, Kate programmed Rachel with a post-hypnotic suggestion to send herself back in time to get a second chance at life.
In the past, Rachel immediately started tracking down those people she knew to be family: the X-Men. She knocked on the door of the X-Mansion and freaked out when an Illyana who was a teenager answered the door. Fleeing back to New York City, she wandered around, picking up information on where she was. She was beginning to suspect that she was in the wrong past after seeing Storm on telly all punked out, something that hadn't happened in her time. She didn't have much time to reflect on that as Selene attacked her. Rachel panicked and escaped into the club of Nick Damiano. Selene found her and attacked again after killing Nick. Rachel fought as hard as she could, but her raw power wasn't worth spit against Selene's eons of skill and experience. It took the intervention of the X-Men to save her. Rachel's trauma didn't end there. She had to confront the fact that she'd gone to the wrong past. In her past, the Professor had never walked, and Storm had never gone punk.
Still, the X-Men took Rachel to Westchester with them to ascertain the truth of her claims to be from the future. She was careful not to reveal too much about herself, but claimed to know the X-Men as if she was one of them. Professor Xavier was counselling her when Storm interrupted with a problem with Rogue having disappeared, and Rachel snuck a look at Xavier's phone list while he left the office. She ran up Xavier's phone bill by calling Scott, who was in Alaska with Maddy. As Scott answered the phone, Rachel broke down in tears. Her daddy was still alive.
However, mommy wasn't still alive, and Rachel was /not/ a happy camper about that. She nearly killed Nightcrawler when he said it. It took Xavier to calm her down, but she went on and revealed some of her past/a future to the X-Men, pleading with them not to give up on Xavier's dream. Rachel was desperate that the future of this timeline not go the way of her own. Finally, she convinced them that sticking with Xavier's dream was a good thing.
Rachel continued to hang out at the mansion, networking with the New Mutants in residence, especially Amara Aquilla. In an escapade in New York City, they ran across Selene. Rachel, fueled by revenge for Selene's previous attack on her, strikes out and nearly causes the destruction of the Hellfire Club. She reveals one of her mom's teke tricks by rearranging the X-Men's clothes after the inevitable fight.
Rachel's tenure with the X-Men and New Mutants included meeting Kitty Pryde, who recognized her from the timeswitch Rachel pulled on Kate. Rachel was still tormented by the ghosts of her past/a future, but she stayed with the X-Men, and she even grew back some of her hair!
Shortly thereafter, Rachel met the Beyonder, a being of incredible power. While the X-men were trying to find out which of Professor Xavier's students were trying to kill him, he observed her as they caused her to lose control and revert to a 'life-for-a-life' mentality as she revealed her past as a 'hound', a mutant that hunted other mutants in the future. Ironically enough, it took Magneto, feared and hated over most of the planet for his past crimes, to convince her that his former way of life, and the one she contemplated embarking upon, just gave the anti-mutant humans the final victory. She desisted for the time being. She was then involved in a caper in Canada and nearly killed Shaman of Alpha Flight when she falsely accused him of trying to kill Cyclops. She also freaked out when she found out that Scott's wife Madelyne was going to have a son, instead of a daughter.
Rachel decided to embark on the next stage of her life when she went to visit the grave of this timeline's Jean Grey. She then went on a conjugal visit to the house where she was born, reliving some memories of her real parents worrying about the state of affairs. She felt an overwhelming need to prove that the Phoenix was a force for good as well as take on enough power to help her void the future that she felt was coming: one like her past, if not actually hers. Still, when she revealed herself as Phoenix to the X-Men, Scott wasn't a happy camper. Rachel reminded him so much of Jean, and Jean was dead. Scott had married and had a son with Madelyne Pryor, a son that had never existed in Rachel's past.
Rachel felt that she was the lone guardian of the world against those who would come to oppress and kill mutants in her past and also threats like the Beyonder, those who could kill without a care, so she took it upon herself to take out the Beyonder. Instead, she wound up having to save the X-Men from him, using the power that he himself had given to her to kill him. When he didn't take the power back, she decided to destroy the entire universe to save it from him. However, within the M'Kraan Crystal, she discovered that she couldn't do it. She'd realized the cost of trying to rid the universe of the Beyonder, and the cost was too high. This leads to a measure of maturation of Rachel's psyche, but not enough. She goes on to try and take out Selene /again/, this time being stopped only by Wolverine. She had the power of the Phoenix, and Wolverine knew that if she didn't learn to control herself, she'd be no better than the Dark Phoenix, no matter her noble theories on Phoenix as a force of life. So, Rachel got stuck like a pig, and the X-Men had another fight on their hands. In the scuffle, Rachel was abducted by Spiral and shipped off to the Mojoverse.
After a time, Rachel was rescued from the Mojoverse when Kitty and Kurt aided her in what they thought was a dream. Rachel escaped to London, where the Technet had taken out a contract to capture her. With her new 'hound' costume, she, Kitty, and Nightcrawler of the X-Men joined up with Captain Britain and Meggan to form Excalibur, England's own X-team. Unfortunately, the Warwolves that Mojo sent to capture Rachel were still loose in London. They nearly killed Kitty, but Rachel's link to her helped to preserve her personality long enough for the others to rescue her.
One of the up sides of moving to England has been getting to move into a swank lighthouse that Captain Britain owns. Rachel has also taken the shift away from Xavier and the X-Men scene to start going around acting like an adult. She began sporting a racy style of clothing until the others forced her to start wearing less provocative clothing. However, she managed to attract the attention of Nigel Frobisher, a swine, umm, gentleman who worked for Frasier's Bank, where Captain Britain's ex-girlfriend also worked.
At first, her role on Excalibur was to aid the team in their work catching criminals with the regular police. Then, she was part of the team's effort to recapture Juggernaut, her power being key to stopping him without a massive fight. However, she couldn't protect herself enough to avoid getting her mind screwed with several times whilst on the team. For instance, early on in her career with Excalibur, the team was lured to Murderworld to help save Cap's ex-girlfriend, and Rachel was possessed by the Executioner. It took Kitty's phasing into her to free her from the possession. Another example was the Inferno. Excalibur was in America, and Rachel was captured and turned into a mannequin as a part of the spell that was Inferno. It took Nightcrawler and a gargoyle to free her.
At this point in her life, Rachel was slowly starting to mature. Very slowly, mind you. She happily challenged Lightning Force (aka Nazi Excalibur) to take a potshot at her, so she could beat the baloney out of them. It was a bit of a difference when Shadowcat lost her temper at the fate of her other self, and Rachel pulled her out before she caused an incident. It was also at this time when Excalibur met Professor Alistaire Stuart, another guy who goes infantile around Rachel. Rachel was quite aware of Kitty's jealousy over this, but to her credit, did nothing to encourage the poor chap.
This behavior continued on the jaunt that the team took which Marvel called 'The Cross-Time Caper'. Rachel's power overloaded a thing they found and named Widget, that creates portals to other parallel dimensions. The team spent a lot of time in the other worlds, and Rachel was nearly possessed several times. Once, in their first destination, Rachel was nearly transformed into a demon by an elemental being. She was also nearly captured by a creature that Kitty's other self in that realm had created to attack Kitty. It took the real Kitty's phasing power to pull her cookies outta the over that time. Also at this time, Rachel had yet to learn self-control, as she went off half-cocked when Kitty was transformed into a princess by the Queen Mother and had to be convinced that Kitty was all right. Another example of this is when Rachel ran across that world's Nigel Frobisher (pig!) and gave him the tar and feather treatment.
An interesting parallel appeared on their next stop. Rachel had to use her power to save the team, encasing everyone in cocoons. Rachel's was borne away and wound up in the care of that world's Fantastic Four. Reed Richards' tinkering caused her cocoon to crack open, and it was a neat reference to the FF issue where Jean Grey was revived prior to X-Factor #1.
During her days with Excalibur, Rachel has suffered some 'blurring' with Meggan. Once and awhile, they'd switch half their minds or bodies. Once was because of Meggan's special Britain-related properties when the team was in Westchester following Inferno, and once was for no discernible reason in the middle of the CTC.
It's possible that the stress of the multiple jaunts through crosstime was finally getting to Rachel. After being tossed into a creature to overload it, Rachel decided to take off and do a bit of soul-searching, stranding the team on the world they were currently visiting. Part of the problem with that world caused a dampening of everyone's mutant powers, including Rachel's own telepathy. Rachel managed to run across that world's Jean Grey (by this time, an elderly matron favorably disposed to her).
Unfortunately for Rachel, that Jean was killed by slavers, and Rachel had to save herself from them by kicking the lard out of their leader. She then took on the disguise of 'a hero' and entered the games to pick a new 'Hero' for that world. She nearly won the games, but for an assassin that caused her to reveal her identity. Still, the lives of most of Excalibur were lost in the ensuing struggle. It took Rachel's choice of using her power again to revert the world to bring things to a happy conclusion.
Even though the team was going like a bat out of hell through the multiverse/omniverse/whatever, one thing remained: Rachel was wanted as a threat to reality by Saturnyne, Omniversal Majestrix and other self of Captain Britain's ex-girlfriend, Courtney Ross. Of course, the team (minus Kitty) showed up on Otherworld, home of Saturnyne and Roma, the Omniversal Guardian. The team tried to hide Rachel as Kitty, and a flaw in Rachel's power manifests when it's revealed that everyone uses telepathy instead of spoken speech as the standard form of communication, making it hard for Rachel to keep her thoughts straight.
Saturnyne spares Rachel then, and sends the team back home, where they find Galactus himself parked off their lighthouse. He wants the Phoenix, and doesn't give a damn what it will do to Rachel. It's then that Rachel realizes that in all their cross-time travelling, there was never any other Phoenix to go with the Excaliburs the team had encountered. It was also then that Rachel told Alistaire that she knew how he felt about her, but didn't return the emotion. In the end, it came down to Rachel giving up her life voluntarily to save her friends, or Galactus having a planetary lunch, so Rachel let Galactus try to separate her from the Phoenix Force. However, it was not to be, as Roma, Death, and Uatu convinced him that the two could not be separated, at the cost of his own life in the future.
Despite all of this, Rachel is still vulnerable. Before the CTC, Jason Wyngarde (Mastermind) attempted to take control of the Phoenix Force by acting the part of Franklin Richards. What Mastermind didn't realize was that Rachel isn't Phoenix in just name only. She is the Phoenix in every way, a fact that Jean Grey wasn't too thrilled to know about when Jean from this timeline and Rachel finally met. Jean turned away from Rachel, hurting her immensely, all because Rachel was the Phoenix now. Ironically, it was Rachel's power as Phoenix that saved the day during that escapade, enabling Cyclops and the Invisible Woman to be freed from the hound process that Ahab had put them through. Of course, Rachel had to deal with her past and its effects on her during this adventure. Even at this late date, she wasn't reconciled to what she'd had to do as a hound. Still, Jean finally found out about her, and Scott got to do the big 'duh!' when he found out who she was as well. It was at this time that Rachel began the 'Jean hates me' complex that would stay with her until well after the continuity cut-off.
Rachel continued to have a great many problems during her tenure on the team. She started acting as if she was above the law, as if might made right, and she realized that she was turning into exactly those things about her past that she abhorred. So, toward the present time, she has been maturing, but slowly. She is still prone to fits of anger and rage and lots of random property damage :), but she is starting to grow up emotionally and take control of her life.
* Personality
Rachel's personality in pre-cutoff books tends to be rather impulsive and selfish. She wanted her parents back, so she jumped back in time to head off the mutant exterminations. She wants to get revenge for her father's seeming death, so she attacks Shaman of Alpha Flight. She has made a habit of doing things without really thinking them through. She wants to do so many things that might have good ends (saving parents, saving the world, etc.) but her choice of means always seem to be less than ideal. She tries to kill the Beyonder, she nearly destroys the universe to protect it from him, she invades Amara Aquilla's mind. After getting the Phoenix Force, she continues the pattern of being impulsive and liable to freak out. She was skittish around Scott for the longest time, and acts like a child a lot of the time. However, she is fiercely protective of her teammates, especially Kitty. She isn't afraid to stand up to anyone, and is willing to take on anyone for her friends and beliefs. However, her control of herself is rather less than absolute. She has strong emotions, and a lot of the time, lets these emotions rule her, not her head. It's why she gets in trouble a lot of the time.
Another major facet of her personality stems from her having been a hound in her past. The degradation and pain and torture she suffered there are a strong part of her. It is the reason she is so selfish when she comes to the past. She wants so desperately to undo the past, to save her parents, whatever. However, some part of her still regards her time as a hound as something she wants back. Whenever offered that or a similar enslavement, she usually wavers and sometimes gives in before her indomitable spirit kicks in and she rejects it. However, the dark spots in her psyche due to those horrible times are still there.
* Non-power skills and resources
Rachel, as a two-time Xavier student, has perhaps a high school diploma level of knowledge, if not a college student. I wouldn't go so far as to claim full college graduate knowledge. Unfortunately, Rachel is hardly ever shown outside of her role as an X-Man and member of Excalibur. She might go shopping once or twice, but has no job, no non-team-related friends, nothing. She presumably has some espionage skills, because she /was/ a Xavier's student, and perhaps knows how to fight hand-to-hand (self-defense stuff).
Due to Rachel's time as a hound, she also has a number of paramilitary skills and the ability to put up with very disgusting/degrading situations. She doesn't revel in these skills, but they could come in handy somewhere.
Finally, Rachel's personality is defined by a lack of full memory of her past. This facet of the character isn't fully fleshed out until post-cutoff, but there's enough canon beforehand to make a case for it. Basically, the Phoenix Force has been keeping Rachel's memory from healing. This factors in to some of her power usages, which I'll note below.
* Description of power and applications
W/O PHOENIX FORCE:
TELEKINESIS: Rachel inherited her mother's telekinesis and can use it to spring locks, lift objects, change her clothes and otherwise manipulate physical objects. Rachel's raw power is greater than Jean Grey's, but her skill is far less than Jean's.
TELEPATHY: Rachel also inherited her mother's telepathic talents, able to read minds, control minds, psi-blast minds, send and receive telepathic messages, form psi-links between herself and her teammates. Her power is greater than Jean Grey's, but her skill is much less. She is more of a telepath than telekinetic, so this power is the one she has more control/power with.
ASTRAL TIME TRAVEL: Rachel's own mutant power is that of astral time travel. She can project her or someone else's astral self through time and crosstime.
PSYCHIC BOND: Rachel has a bond with Kitty Pryde that goes beyond telepathy. This includes a special link with the Kate Pryde from her past. Thus, if her usual telepathy is blocked, she is most likely able to reach Kitty/Kate.
POWER STUNTS: Flight, Mindlinks, Shields (both tepe and teke), Astral Plane Travel/Fighting, Psionic Masking
WITH PHOENIX FORCE:
TELEKINESIS: Rachel's tk powers are greatly strengthened. Her levels are on a par with Stryfe or a pure telekinetic. Her teke blasts are so strong, they register as a straight energy attack.
TELEPATHY: Rachel's tp powers are also greatly strengthened. However, since the Dark Phoenix was bested by Xavier, one can presume that Rachel with the PF is not stronger or more skilled than him. She should be able to beat anyone under Xavier, however, since Xavier nearly lost to the Dark Phoenix.
TIME TRAVEL: With the Phoenix Force, Rachel is able to physically move through time, as well as crosstime travel. However, her control is nowhere near perfect.
WIDGET FOOD: As an adjunct to her powers to cause time travel, Rachel could also power up Widget to cause crosstime travel for herself and anything Widget hauls along with them. (This doesn't change until Saturnyne has Widget fixed in #42.)
MATTER MANIPULATION: With the Phoenix Force, Rachel can manipulate both living and non-living matter either via genetic manipulation, or alchemy. In the X-Men RPG, it says Phoenix can also manipulate the weather at a higher level than Ororo can, but I've found no canon to support /any/ weather manipulating, and even canon to suggest that Phoenix /can't/ change the weather.
STARGATES: Rachel can instantaneously transport herself and anyone she wishes with her across the universe via stargates. This usage of power leaves her weakened and open to attack.
POWER STUNTS: Genetic healing, minor alchemy, stargates, energy bolts, massive destruction, stronger mindlinks.
* Limitations and flaws (both power and non-power)
Rachel's biggest flaw is her wonderful ability to go off half-cocked and wind up destroying something or beating up on someone or try to kill someone. She thinks with her emotions, not with her head and this leads to her causing a lot of trouble. She tends to overdo things sometimes, emotionally.
Rachel is the only known survivor of an alternate future wherein all of the X-Men were killed. The memories of that time plague her and make her desperate to do /anything/ to avoid a future like that happening to this timeline, no matter how unethical it might be to the other upstanding citizens in the X-Men and Excalibur. Also, she is vulnerable to mental attack via these memories.
Because the Phoenix Force is keeping Rachel from remembering more than bits and pieces (very general things) about her past, Rachel has forgotten how to use her own mutant power of astral (much less bodily) time travel. As far as she or any of the others know, she is only the batteries for Widget, nothing else.
Finally, Rachel's control over her own powers (and those boosts provided by the Phoenix Force) is not great. Due to her impetuosity, she has been known to overdo things and lose control. In a society where telepathy is the standard mode of conversation, she has a harder time keeping her psi-screens up, such as the society of Otherworld. Also, she hasn't been trained by Xavier as long as Jean Grey, so it's assured that Rachel's skill and control is less than Xavier's or Jean's.
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