Heretical Edge Other Crossroads Heretics / Characters

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Heretics

Tribald Kine

A Bow Street Runner, a member of a police force that was originally recruited by the Heretics in the mid-eighteen hundreds. Nowadays they essentially function as detectives for Crossroads.

Could Say It, But...: He directs Flick to a picture proving her mother graduated from Crossroads by telling her that she might find something interesting if she looked in a particular place.
Everyone Went to School Together: He went to school with Klassin Roe and Liam Mason. And Deveron and Joselyn. He was actually Deveron's first roommate.
Geek Physiques: He's really thin. Almost skeletal.
Internal Reformist: He's one of Gaia's people.
Long-Lost Relative: Kenneth Fellows, Koren's father and Abigail's husband, is his cousin's grandson.
Stealth Mentor: To Wyatt. He did his best to shield the boy from Ruthers while he was at school, which included ensuring that various books on the security magic he would eventually specialize in ended up in his hands. Later, Kine always made sure that Wyatt would have a job to fall back on.
- Kine has also impacted Wyatt's sisters' lives. Abigail met her husband Kenneth Fellows because of him. And as noted, he directed Flick towards the picture proving Joselyn graduated from Crossroads Academy.
Teleportation
The Mole: For Joselyn during the Revolution. He joined the Runners to be her eyes inside the organization.
You Remind Me of X: He's struck momentarily speechless by Flick's resemblance to her mother when he first meets her.

Jackson

A hardliner Heretic. He encountered Nevada once when she was a Djinni, nearly killing her before Deveron stepped in.

But for Me, It Was Tuesday: It's suggested that he probably didn't even bother to remember Nevada's face from their encounter spoiler: when she was a Djinn.
Implacable Man: Seeing Jackson in action in his first appearance is the first time we really see what it feels like to be chased by a hostile Heretic.
Irrational Hatred: There is nothing rational about his behavior when he's hunting a djinni.
Karmic Death: Killed by Nevada during the jailbreak operation.
Knight Templar

Sebastian Gerardo

Sean's uncle. He's a retired Heretic living in Bogotá, the capital city of Colombia with his boyfriend who is a werewolf named Mateo.

Cool Uncle: Sean clearly adores his uncle. He spent most of his summers over in Colombia with him and Mateo.
Papa Wolf: He helped Mateo mop up a few gang members who almost hurt Sean as a kid.

Larissa Mason

The daughter of a lawyer, Larissa was born in 1975 and recruited by Crossroads in the nineties. She went on to marry Liam Mason and have twin daughters, Sandoval and Sarah. She was abducted by a Stranger when her daughters were ten years old and she was on a boating trip with Sarah, who has gone by Scout ever since.

Even before her disappearance, Larissa had a secret. That boat trip she was on with Scout? It was to introduce her to a friend of hers that was an Alter. That Alter is eventually revealed to be the renegade Seosten Sariel Moon when Larissa turns up looking for her in Seosten space with Haiden Moon a decade later.

Action Mom: Oh yes. Having twins did absolutely nothing to slow her down.
Demonic Possession: Gained the Seosten's possession ability when stranded in space.
Elemental Shapeshifter: Larissa shift into a water form. She can form water whips and turn parts of herself into ice in this state.
Good Parents: Her daughters are the most important thing in the world to her. And unlike her husband, they can actually trust her with really big things.
Made a Slave: Spent time in Seostenic slave pits after escaping the creature that attacked her.
Meat Puppet: The Seosten intended to use Larissa to spy on first her father and then Gaia. She ultimately avoided spending her life as a puppet because Sariel, the Seosten assigned to possess her, had long since tired of her duties at that point and took steps to protect her freedom.
Missing Mom: She hasn't seen her daughters in seven years.
- Finally reunited with Sands in Uprising 29-09.
Mysterious Protector: Larissa, following Sariel's directions, is the one who made Flick immune to Seosten possession.
Tomboy: Larissa preferred reading comics and playing baseball with the neighborhood boys in 1986.
Tragic Keepsake: She recorded a number of Minnesota Twins games for Sarah to listen to. Scout still has and regularly listens to the recordings years later.
Theme Twin Naming: Her twin daughters Sarah and Sandoval. She subconsciously named them after Sariel.

Donald Therasis

A doctor at Eduard Jenner Center For Strange Maladies, a Heretical hospital for Heretics that suffer Healing Factor resistance injuries and sicknesses.

Nice Guy: To a pack of visiting students, at least.

October Atrean

A representative of the Committee who typically reports to Edward Teach, his ancestor. He and Patrick are sent to Crossroads soon after Lincoln Chambers disappears.

Nice Guy: A friendly and personable man... although he may simply be really good at playing Good Cop.
Famous Ancestor: Blackbeard is his.

Patrick Dinast

Another Committee representative sent with October to keep an eye on Crossroads when too many suspicious events pile up. He usually reports to Litonya.

Didn't See That Coming: He's incredibly surprised when Flick voluntarily brings up her mother as as suspect in the killing of eleven Heretics.
Good Cop/Bad Cop: Definitely used to playing Bad Cop. He treats Flick with barely disguised hostility when questioning her.
Tracking Device: May or may not have tried to slip one (or a listening device) to Flick, who throws it away as soon as she leaves his sight.

Josiah Carfried

Benji Carfried's ancestor. Josiah works as a professor of cultural anthropology at a prestigious university in the Bystander world.

Nice Guy: He's very friendly, and likes to help out Crossroads students when he has the chance.
Sacrificial Lion: Shows up just often enough to make an impression before Charmeine murders him.

Sulan

Douglas Frey's great-great-great-grandfather, a Heretic disgraced for his role in the destruction of the colony world Vanaheimr, which he used to live on with his family.

Old Friend: To Percival.
The Scapegoat: Played with, in that unleashing the Whispers upon genuinely was his fault but he basically took all the blame to protect Doug from blowback by other Heretics and the rest of their family from retaliation or possession from the Seosten.

Nobles

Baron Jeremiah Dallant

The current Baron of Wyoming, a position he inherited after his predecessor (and father) disappeared in 1964.

Abusive Parents: He's horrified by the thought of allowing other children to grow up in a home like his.
The Mole: Apparently Gaia's mole with Ruther's people, although Flick can't bring herself to fully trust him.
Self-Made Orphan: Claims to have killed his father to prevent him from gaining custody of Joselyn's infant children in 1964.
Wild Card: Trusted by both Gaia Sinclaire and Gabriel Ruthers. Word of God says that he's one of the few people Gaia would be willing to trust Flick's safety to if she had to send her away, but also that Ruthers trusts him just as much.

The Committee

In General

The Committee is the governing body of Crossroads Heretics, a group of the most experienced and most powerful Heretics in the organization. Each individual member is given jurisdiction over a part of overall operations.

There are currently twelve members, and they do not agree on everything.

All Your Powers Combined: The members of the Committee are magically linked through a ritual spell involving the Heretical Edge, giving each of them access to all the powers possessed by the others. These powers include:
- Self-Duplication, freezing things (with or without Super-Breath), turning opponents into stone at a touch, Super-Strength, Super-Speed, Super-Toughness, Telekinesis, the ability to magically create matter, Energy Absorption, conjure and manipulate Ghost-fire (fire that can harm intangible beings such as ghosts), Intangibility, Flight, summon lightning and wear it like armor, Teleportation, Animate Inanimate Objects, create portals, stop time, summon tornadoes (of fire), and erupt Lava from the ground and control it.
The Blind Leading the Blind: The Committee as a whole is breathtakingly and largely willfully ignorant of their world in general and the origins of their organization in particular.
Classified Information: Most of the members are really big on keeping their subordinates in the dark on certain subjects, like how often they disagree with each other.
Hoist By Their Own Petard: The Committee is ignorant about a lot of things regarding their society, partiuclarly in regards to the Heretical Edge. This ignorance has bit them in the ass. For starters, they don't know the Edge is still alive, or that it secretly added Joselyn Atherby to their power link when Ruthers joined their ranks.
Just the First Citizen: The official title for a member of the Committee is Counselor.
Ruthers: After all, what is the purpose of the leaders of Crossroads if not to counsel?
Omniscient Morality License: They collectively believe they have one of these, and they could not possibly be more wrong.
Person of Mass Destruction: Just look at that list of powers! A fight between two Committee-level combatants can destroy cities!
Self-Fulfilling Prophecy: Flick eventually does start sneaking around and engaging in subversive behavior, just as some Counselors assumed she would. Not because Joselyn conditioned her to do it, but because their insistence on keeping her in the dark leads her to distrust Crossroads as a whole after she encounters Fossor and realize how much danger her family had been in all her life. They could have saved themselves a lot of trouble if they had been upfront with Flick about her mother's banishment from the beginning.
Slavery Is a Special Kind of Evil: This is the body that was almost convinced to cast a blood plague on all the Heretics in Joselyn's Revolution after "capturing" her did not stop them. Notably, they repeatedly voted against this course of action, but the suggestion kept coming up and the votes were distressingly close calls by the time another option was presented.
Teeth-Clenched Teamwork: The Counselors don't always get along, and they've come close to outright violence against each other numerous times at meetings.
This Cannot Be!: A number of them have taken Joselyn's ability to fight evenly with them very badly. As far as they're concerned, it should not have been possible for anyone to gain enough power to face the Committee so quickly. Ironically, they're completely right. Joselyn became that powerful because she was secretly added to their power link.
Unwitting Pawn: The society they lead was set up to serve as pawns of the Seosten, and the majority of Counselors continue to play right into their hands to this day.
Well-Intentioned Extremist: Every one one of them that genuinely believes Crossroads' extreme methods are necessary.
Wrong Genre Savvy: The Committee as a whole would be right at home in the Imperium of Man, where all the monsters really are out to wipe out or manipulate humanity. Unfortunately for most people, they live in a world where many (though certainly not all) nonhumans are perfectly capable of peaceful coexistence.

Gabriel Ruthers

A former Headmaster of Crossroads Academy, Ruthers is a hardliner convinced of the supposed Always Chaotic Evil nature of Strangers. As a counselor, he has jurisdiction over the education and training of recruits.

A Father to His Men: One of his more redeeming characteristics is the way he cares for his subordinates, both those report to him and Crossroads Heretics in general. A few of them, such as Davis and Peterson Neal, actually see him as a father figure.
A Nazi by Any Other Name
Arbitrary Skepticism: He thinks it's impossible for Strangers and humans to interbreed despite being a leader in a society of people that can magically alter their DNA.
The Atoner: In a twisted way, his extreme hatred of "Strangers" counts as this. His willingness to trust Fossor in the fourteenth century directly led to The Black Death.
Big Bad Ensemble: Ruthers is an adamant opponent to any attempts at reformation within Crossroads. His history with Joselyn also makes him a personal enemy of Flick's.
Boomerang Bigot: He thinks Strangers are inferior to humans even though Heretics gain their powers by overwriting their genetics, making themselves less human every time they kill a Stranger.
Evil Cannot Comprehend Good: His Fantastic Racism is extreme enough that this trope applies. He can't understand that Alters who fought with the revolution against Crossroads were not slaves and servants, but friends and allies of the rebel Heretics.
Fallen Hero: In his younger days, Ruthers just wanted to help as many people as possible. His experiences with Fossor and the subsequent efforts of the Seosten turned him into the fanatic he is today.
Fantastic Racism: Will not even begin to consider the notion that sapient Strangers are anything other than subhuman beasts. He doesn't even think they're capable of being as intelligent as humans.
Freudian Excuse: He was actually willing to trust Alters centuries ago. Unfortunately, the one Alter he convinced other Heretics to trust quickly betrayed them. Then he caused The Black Death.
Guilt Complex: His history with Fossor has left Ruthers with a massive one that drives him to this day.
- He also thinks its his fault that Joselyn was "corrupted" into thinking Strangers can be good, and feels guilty for not "saving" Flick from her mother between Joselyn's disappearance and Flick's recruitment into Crossroads.
He Who Fights Monsters: Ruthers' intention is to protect humanity, that much is undeniable. But his methods make him just as bad or even worse than he thinks all Strangers are.
Horrible Judge of Character: The one Alter he extended his trust towards was Fossor. Although Fossor can be pretty convincing when he wants to be, so you can't entirely blame Ruthers for that.
- He has a very distorted view of the methods and motivations of reformer Heretics like Joselyn, often attributing murderous actions to them with no evidence.
I Hate Past Me: Word of God confirms that he hates reformers so much because he's projecting his own guilt and self-loathing onto them.
I Have Your Children: Had Joselyn's infant twins kidnapped in order to force her surrender.
I Need a Freaking Drink: Ruthers immediately starts conjuring shots for himself when reminded of his role in The Black Death.
I Reject Your Reality: It takes some pretty impressive, Cartman-esque mental gymnastics for Ruthers to maintain his delusional mindset.
- Believes that Joselyn Atherby abandoned her family to keep them safe after regaining her memory even though he knows full well that she was only "captured" in the first place because he kidnapped and threatened to murder her infant children. Leaving Lincoln and Felicity unprotected in a place where he could reach them whenever he wants would be the last thing Joselyn would do to protect them. And that's before you get into his belief that Joselyn trained Flick to infiltrate the Academy, which directly contradicts his claim that she was trying to protect her family by leaving.
  - In addition, his plan to accomplish this "capture" hinged on supposedly monstrous Strangers being compassionate enough to risk their lives to save innocent Alter and human children when his followers set fire to their nurseries.
- Will not listen to any evidence that Strangers can interbreed with humans. Mostly just because he doesn't want it to be true.
- His hatred of Strangers, while understandable when you learn the reason for it, is still irrational. Assuming that all Strangers are as bad as Fossor is ludicrous when you consider that he isn't even a representative sample of his own race, what with having enslaved everyone on his homeworld and all.
Irony: His joining the Committee inadvertently gave Joselyn enough power to fight counselors evenly.
Irrational Hatred: He is completely incapable of thinking rationally when Joselyn Atherby is involved.
Jerkass: Ruthers would be a lot more bearable if he wasn't such an asshat.
- Jerk with a Heart of Gold: To humans that aren't his enemies.
Knight Templar: As far as he's concerned, anyone who won't "do what needs to be done" (read: automatically assume that all nonhumans are purely evil monsters that need to be exterminated at any cost) is a soft-hearted idiot.
Moral Myopia: In his mind, Ruthers is a hero doing what is necessary, no matter how utterly atrocious his actions are and people who resort to comparatively tame tactics are scum. He actually has the gall to call executing Joselyn "justice" after he murdered innocent children to "capture" her.
Oblivious to His Own Description: Anytime he uses the word "ignorant" to describe someone else. Especially when it comes to Joselyn, as he is far more ignorant than she is.
Obstructive Bureaucrat: To Gaia Sinclaire, because he's ideologically opposed to her on every level, and to Flick Chambers because he believes she's a spy.
One-Steve Limit: Averted. Gabriel Ruthers shares his first name with Gabriel Prosser, the naturally occurring Living Legend Reaper Heretic.
Papa Wolf: His feud with Joselyn began when she laid out his son Jonathon in their school days.
- Parental Obliviousness: But most, including Jonathon himself later in his life, agree that he deserved it at the time.
  - Ruthers was also completely oblivious to his son's Heel–Face Turn and subsequent work as a spy for the revolutionaries until Jonathon tried to convince him not to Banish Joselyn.
Right for the Wrong Reasons: The few times his suspicions are correct tend to fall under this trope.
- Gaia really did conspire with Joselyn at times and later does the same with Flick, but nowhere near to the extent he suspects.
- Joselyn actually does have allies capable of undoing the memory wipe Crossroads preformed on her, but they never got the chance to do so because Fossor found her first.
- And Flick eventually does start convincing students that Strangers are not all evil, but on her own, not because Joselyn trained her to do it.
Self-Fulfilling Prophecy: His assumption that Wyatt, Flick, and Koren are his enemies from the get-go plays a vital role in actually making them his enemies. It would have been easy for him to get them on his side if he wasn't so caught up in his paranoia.
Self-Serving Memory: Remembers Joselyn Atherby's revolution as a defeated nuisance brought up by "malcontents." He's apparently forgotten that it lasted over seventy years and only ended when his side needed to resort to teaming up with Eden's Garden to cast a worldwide memory spell because they couldn't actually win through conventional means.
Shoot the Dog: Most of the bad things he does count as this from his perspective. As dangerous and destructive as he is, Ruthers isn't cruel. He genuinely sees every one of his actions as necessary.
- Kick the Dog: Except where Joselyn is concerned, of course. Threatening her children's lives to make her surrender? Horrible, but you can see how he justifies it to himself as necessary. Not even bothering to learn those children's names before leaving one of them out in the open and the other with Abusive Parents? That's just petty.
Sins of the Father: Ruthers tells himself (and others) that he doesn't bear Joselyn's children any ill will. But it's very obvious that he's kidding himself. Only Fossor and the Hiding Man can be said to have hurt them more than Ruthers, and that's pretty debatable.
- To his credit, he does try to treat them fairly, as seen when he starts telling Flick that she won't be in trouble if she "confesses" before she interrupts him. But he can't overcome his paranoia enough to actually treat them fairly.
Sword of Damocles: Continued to threaten Wyatt's life after Joselyn surrendered to keep her from telling anyone what actually happened.
Theory Tunnelvision: Ruthers can and will twist any piece of information to fit his own assumptions, no matter how much he has to ignore reality to do so.
The Unfettered: Will do anything to do what he believes needs to be done. Up to and including enslaving or murdering innocent children.
Tragic Villain: At his core, Ruthers is a well-meaning man who wants to protect people. But the manipulations of Fossor and the Seosten have turned him into little more than a monster.
Unwitting Pawn: Apparently zigzagged. According to Sariel Moon, Ruthers' particular brand of stubborn fanaticism actually makes him harder to manipulate than their superiors would prefer. That said, he acts exactly as they want Heretics to, right down to refusing to accept that humans can have offspring with Strangers, and their infiltrators still convinced him to attack Joselyn through her children.
Windmill Crusader: Is utterly convinced that Joselyn Atherby restarted their revolution years ago, is responsible for helping every Stranger that's escaped from Heretic pursuit since then, and has inserted their child into Crossroads Academy as a spy. He dismisses all evidence to the contrary (which correctly suggests that Joselyn was abducted by Fossor and that Flick knew absolutely nothing of her mother's history when she started school) as "conspiracy theories." Needless to say, he's wrong on every single count.
- No Mere Windmill: It does bear mentioning that his suspicions aren't unfounded, as the individual in question not only did what he thinks they're still doing, but would most likely continue if they had the chance. The problem is that he's ignoring all the evidence of what's actually going on because he wants to be right, and there is absolutely no evidence to support his belief that Joselyn has been training Flick to spy on Crossroads since her disappearance.
Villain Has a Point: He tried to convince his colleagues to take Flick from her father's care after Joselyn's disappearance by pointing out how much potential danger she was in. The truth is, he was actually right. She really was (and still is, though he no longer believes it) in a lot of danger.
With Us or Against Us: His worldview in a nutshell.
Would Hurt a Child: It's not surprising that Ruthers' hatred of Alters extends to Alter children. But it's somewhat surprising that he's willing to burn human children alive as well.

Sophronia Leven

The second member of the Committee to be named, Sophronia is in charge of the "tourist-busters," Heretics who target Strangers that pass through/lurk in travel stations like airports, train and bus stations, etc. Zeke Leven is her son. She's nearly a thousand years old, and was present for the First Crusade.

Death Trap: She's pioneered a simple and effective one for her tourist-busters. They set up a proximity activated spell that causes Alters to have a bowel movement, then set up killzones in restrooms.
Heel–Face Turn: She was convinced of Joselyn's claims over the course of the revolution, before Zeke's birth but after the birth of her second youngest child.
Good Parents: She cares deeply for her son, who practically hero-worships her in turn. Beyond that, she's not blind to his abrasive personality. Part of the reason she voted to let Flick into Crossroads was because she thought being around someone like Flick would be good for that.
- She's had a lot of practice. Word of God says that she's had around twenty kids over the course of her life.
Like Mother, Unlike Son: She's not at all what you would expect from Zeke's parent. For starters, she's a lot more personable.
Mama Bear
Only Sane Woman: One of the three members of the Committee that believes Strangers aren't automatically evil.
Reasonable Authority Figure
Shout-Out: Out of universe, her name is taken from a section of Jerusalem Delivered. In-universe, that character was based on her.

Edward Teach

The Edward Teach. Blackbeard. Long before that, he was one of the Argonauts. Nowadays he's one of the Committee's friendliest members. His areas of authority cover Crossroads' financial issues and technological development.

Cool Old Guy: He goes out of his way to offer well-meaning advice to Flick about her slaying of Doxer and her mother's situation, and he does so in a way that warns her the other counselors can be in two places at once.
Deadpan Snarker
Historical Domain Character
Historical Hero Upgrade: In Heretical Edge, Blackbeard's acts of piracy were actually his efforts to curb the attempts of Nocen such as Fossor to bring supernatural plagues to either side of the Atlantic.
I Need a Freaking Drink: He keeps a bottle of rum with him at Committee meetings.
Only Sane Man: One of the few counselors that understands that "Strangers" are not universally evil. He's quick to point out that it's hard to judge nonhumans when all the others counselors do is slaughter them.
Pragmatic Hero: His darker actions, such as massacring the entire crew of some ships, were Shoot the Dog moments.
Public Domain Character: He's the last surviving Argonaut.
Really 700 Years Old: Blackbeard is thought to have been born around 1680. Hearing that is enough to make the man himself start laughing, because he's roughly 3000 years older than that.
Reasonable Authority Figure
Shrouded in Myth: Twice over, both as the last living member of the legendary Argo, and as Blackbeard. He intentionally cultivated his reputation as Blackbeard to combat Fossor in the Age of Sail.
That Man Is Dead: No longer identifies himself by his original name. As far as he's concerned, he is simply "the last of the Argonauts."

Litonya

An older looking Native American woman. Currently the counselor in charge of judicial matters within Crossroads. She holds a great deal of personal dislike for Gaia Sinclaire.

Bad Boss: Accused of this by Namid, a young relative of hers who is quick to point out how angry she was over a theft of magical artifacts she owns while showing no concern for the four Heretics who were killed in the theft. That's not entirely unreasonable, as the artifacts in question could potentially kill a lot more than four Heretics in the wrong hands, but Namid is under the impression that "Great-Aunt Litty" didn't care about the deaths at all.
Condescending Compassion: Even when she's trying to "help" people, Litonya seems to go out of her way to be as patronizing as possible about it, as seen when she rebukes Avalon for speaking out against her theory that Flick is responsible for the attempts on her life.
Elderly Immortal: Actually appears to be old.
Embarrassing Nickname: She hates it when Namid calls her "Great-Aunt Litty."
Head-in-the-Sand Management: Immediately dismisses the idea that there are traitors within Crossroads because she would rather believe Joselyn is responsible.
- Honestly, this verges on I Reject Your Reality, because even if her theory about who else is trying to kill Avalon was right (it's not), it really does nothing to disprove the notion that there are traitors to Crossroads. After all, one of Joselyn's big things was recruiting Heretics from Crossroads and Eden's Garden, many of whom are still alive and could have their memories restored.
Horrible Judge of Character: Considers Gaia Sinclaire, a woman who blew up an American state to end an invasion, soft.
- She also very clearly doesn't understand Joselyn Atherby at all. Like Ruthers, Litonya quick to believe the worse of her without any evidence, even when it contradicts her actual behavior and MO. This obviously extends to Flick as well.
Hypocrite: Two major examples.
- First, she dismisses Blackbeard's concern that there are traitors within Crossroads as a conspiracy theory while treating her own explanation for the same events (she blames Flick) as valid despite it making less sense and having more evidence against it.
- Later, she speaks disdainfully of Seller for being willing to "side against those he should care for in the past if it saved his own hide," which seems fair at first, but ultimately rings very hollow when one remembers that this is the woman who murdered her own brother because she wasn't willing to listen to him.
Jerkass: Litonya is a thoroughly unpleasant woman, and not just to her enemies. Even some of her own relatives can't stand her.
Knight Templar: She would rather commit fratricide than even listen to the suggestion that Strangers can be good.
Know-Nothing Know-It-All: Her condescending attitude would be a lot easier to take if she wasn't so incredibly wrong so often.
Right for the Wrong Reasons: Assumes Joselyn Atherby is willingly working with Fossor to get revenge on Crossroads. Joselyn is working for Fossor, but she is only doing so because swearing an Oath Spell to serve him was the only way she could convince him not to enslave her daughter instead.
Unwitting Pawn: To the Seosten.

Geta

Publius Septimius Geta was a son of Septimus Severus, the man who came out on top as ruler of the Roman Empire in the Year of Five Emperors following the murder of Commodus. He and his brother Caracalla were named as Co-Emperors by Septimus until Caracalla murdered him. In Heretical Edge, Geta claims that his brother was being controlled by a Stranger, and became a Natural Lavinsi the night he was supposedly assassinated in real life.

He's in charge of the initial exploration and colonization of new worlds.

Berserk Button: Speaking ill of his brother, a big inversion of real life, where Caracalla was his Berserk Button.
By-the-Book Cop: Refuses to break pre-established rules even when he knows things will not go his way.
Denying the Dead Brother's Sins: Possibly. In real life, Caracalla and Geta's mutual hatred of each other was well known long before they became co-emperors, and they were both pretty big bastards. This version of Geta believes his brother's insanity was the result of being manipulated by a Stranger. He could be telling the truth, in denial, or lying. It's impossible to know for sure without someone else to corroborate or refute his claims.
- It's eventually revealed that while Geta is right about Alters trying to control his brother, they were actually a moderating influence on Caracalla. They worked to curb his madness and prevent him from murdering Geta.
Even Evil Has Standards: Voted against the use of the Blood Plague.
Historical Domain Character
Knight Templar
No Mere Windmill: Geta doesn't believe Flick was in any danger in Wyoming. He's wrong, and there's a very real chance that her abduction could lead to the end of Crossroads and Eden's Garden.
Reasonable Authority Figure: Despite remaining a Knight Templar and being one of the only counselors to believe that "blood is blood," Geta sometimes comes across as an antagonistic version of this. Unlike the counselors who vote against letting Flick into the Academy based on unfounded assumptions that Joselyn has been conditioning her, most of the reasons Geta gives for wanting to keep her out (the Committee's inability to agree on how to deal with her, the lack of obvious benefits to her inclusion compared to the potential risks) are much more valid arguments.
- Hell, even the one thing he's wrong about (Flick being "perfectly safe" in Wyoming) is a logical conclusion to reach from the information available to him.
- But he still buys into the idea that Strangers can't possibly be good, and he's among the counselors who believes Flick and Joselyn are behind the attempts to assassinate Avalon, so he's not a true example.
Settling the Frontier: His main job, basically. The frontier in this case being new planets in other dimensions.
Sins of the Father: Believes that "blood is blood," and people will always side with their relatives. Which is the primary reason he voted to deny Flick admittance into Crossroads Academy.
Unwitting Pawn: Both in the present time as a Heretic who believes everything the Seosten want him to, and all the way back to 211 AD when Radueriel tricked him into believing his brother Caracalla was the helpless victim of Strangers.

Elisabet

A Spanish looking Counselor. She's one of the hardliners, though a bit quieter about it than the others. She's in charge of the security and defense of Crossroads' earth-based holdings. She's secretly playing host to Jophiel, although their relationship isn't as simple as Seosten possession usually is.

Black-and-White Insanity: Elisabet is the type that won't even begin to consider the idea that Strangers can be good anything but a lie. Subverted. She's only pretending to think all Alters are evil because she's in league with Jophiel, and she actually does feels guilty about all the innocent non-humans she's complicit in killing. Not enough to stop though, as she truly believes working with the Seosten is necessary.
By-the-Book Cop: Much like Geta, Elisabet isn't willing to break the rules of their society even when she knows a vote won't go her way.
Deadpan Snarker: She's quick to take a shot at Ruthers when it's made clear that Gaia will be breaking the tie on whether or not to let Flick into the Academy.
'And we all know who to thank for Sinclaire ending up where she is.
Les Collaborateurs: Unlike other Seosten hosts, Elisabet is fully on board with what Jophiel is doing. The two of them are Sharing a Body while operating as The Mole.

Well-Intentioned Extremist: Of a slightly different flavor that most of her peers. Okay, a vastly different flavor. Elisabet is fully complicit in what the Seosten are doing. But thanks to her relationship with Jophiel, she also believes it's all necessary to protect humanity from the Fomorians.

Percival

Sir Percival, formerly a Knight of the Round Table. He's currently responsible for keeping up to date with developments in the Bystander world.

Cool Old Guy: He doesn't look his age, but Word of God says that he spends more time in the modern world than his colleagues, partially because it's his main responsibility, but The Ramones and Nirvana T-shirts he wears indicate that he genuinely enjoys it.
Fun T-Shirt: Has a habit of wearing them (usually for his favorite bands) at meetings with his fellow incredibly powerful immortals.
Irony: The man known for being the youngest of the Knights of the Round Table ended up living far longer than the rest of his comrades.
Only Sane Man: Another of the few Counselors that understands Strangers aren't automatically evil.
Papa Wolf: He keeps a close eye on his descendants down to the twenty-fourth generation.
Public Domain Character
Reasonable Authority Figure: Percival was one of the members that pushed to let Flick to be allowed to enter the Academy. He's also eager for chances to change his colleagues' minds about Strangers.
Undying Loyalty: To Arthur Pendragon. The entire reason Percival joined Crossroads was because the last thing Arthur ever told him was to stay with "the light" when he found it. He believes that light is the Heretical Edge.

Oliver Brockett

A rotund member of the Committee. He's in charge of supplying and defending established off-world colonies.

Eye Glasses: He's got a habit of wiping them clean in the middle of conversations.
Fantastic Racism: He frames the question of whether or not Strangers can be good as whether or not they can be taught morality, as if it can only come from humans.
Knight Templar: Quick to imply threats against Teach.
The Rival: Oliver's dislike for Davis is clear to see.

Jue

An young-looking Asian member of the Committee. She's a hardliner that tends to think along the same lines as Ruthers, but from a much more rational viewpoint. Her area of responsibility covers magical research.

Even Well-Intentioned Extremists Have Standards: Voted against casting the blood plague.
Immortality Begins at Twenty: Jue appears significantly younger than the other counselors.
Knight Templar: She's quick to remind Teach that he and his allies are outnumbered and outgunned by the rest of the Committee for trying to continue discussing the possibility that Strangers aren't automatically evil.
The Spock: In sharp contrast to other hardliner counselors like Ruthers and Litonya, Jue doesn't let her emotions get in the way of her judgement. For example: she does not believe the theory that Flick is trying to murder Avalon on Joselyn's behalf because she recognizes how out of character that would be for Joselyn.

Davis Neal

A counselor that comes to meetings dressed like a lumberjack. He's in charge of appointing teams of Hunters to deal with "outstanding" Strangers that have gone on too long without being found. He was born in nineteenth century America, and became a Heretic after his parents were killed.

Big Brother Instinct: For his younger brother, Peterson.
Hunter of Monsters: Obviously not the only counselor to fall under this, but unlike the rest this is Davis' main job. It's what got him on the Committee in the first place. Before he joined, he had an 89% success rate for hunting down Strangers.
Improbable Age: Davis was 96 years old when he was invited to join the Committee in 1918. That makes him considerably younger than most of his colleagues, who tend to have at least a few centuries under their belts before joining.
Mighty Lumberjack
Reasonable Authority Figure: He's quick to play peacemaker among his colleagues, always mindful of the need for the Committee to remain civil.
- He's also one of the counselors to recognize that there is no evidence Joselyn has had any contact with Flick since her disappearance, and votes to let Flick in as a result.
The Rival: He and Oliver don't get along.

Sigmund

An ancient Norseman who appears in The Saga Of The Volsungs. He deals with Stranger "hot-spots," ordering larger and specialized groups of Heretics to target areas with high-Stranger populations or with particularly powerful creatures.

Black-and-White Insanity: Among those that consider it insane to think that it's even possible for Strangers to be good.
Knight Templar: Sigmund was one of the counselors who voted for the blood plague.
Pet the Dog: Despite being among the more fanatical counselors, he still voted to let Flick into the Academy.
Public Domain Character

Calafia

An former warrior queen who now sits on the Committee. She heads the Investigative branch of Crossroads operations.

Amazonian Beauty: She was once a warrior queen, and upon meeting for the first time Flick wonders how many succubi she's killed to become so beautiful.
Anonymous Benefactor: To Lincoln Chambers. Calafia is the one who dug up old footage of Joselyn from 1963 and got it to him using Gabriel Prosser as an intermediary. She also gave Lincoln the chance to figure out what's going on by weakening the Bystander Effect around him.
Batman Gambit: Correctly guessed that Lincoln Chambers would be able to break through the Bystander Effect if she weakened it. He succeeded much more quickly than she was expecting him to.
Da Chief: Essentially this to the Bow Street Runners, although she doesn't seem to be as abrasive as most chiefs.
Heel–Face Turn: Realized the truth about Strangers after her son was made into a weretiger.
I Owe You My Life: Calafia considers herself to owe Joselyn Atherby "more than she can ever repay," after she saved her weretiger son's life and sent him into hiding.
The Mole: She's the counselor who gave Joselyn's location to Gabriel Prosser.
Public Domain Character
Reasonable Authority Figure: She doesn't actively believe that Strangers can be good, but appears to be more open to the possibility than the hardliners. She also voted to let Flick into the Academy and is quick to diffuse arguments among her colleagues.
- Later events show that she is fully aware that Alters are people too, she's just hiding her change of heart from the other hardliners.

Historical Heretics

Hieronymus Bosch

A Dutch Renaissance painter born in 1450, Hieronymus Bosch became a Heretic when he managed to kill a Hangman Demon in (apparent) self defense. He then drained the demon's body of its remaining blood and mixed into the paints he made his art with. Later, he went on to create the Heretical Edge and found Crossroads as an organization.

Awful Truth: Everything Crossroads and Eden's Garden know about him is a lie. He was nothing more than a Seostenic slave.
Fake Ultimate Hero: Heretics at Crossroads and Eden's Garden believe that Bosch was just about the greatest hero ever. Not only a genius inventor, but one of the most gifted and powerful magic users to ever live. He's not as great as they think.
Famous Ancestor: To Avalon Sinclaire.
Historical Domain Character: Hieronymus Bosch really was a painter during the Renaissance who created creepy works filled with grotesque imagery of monsters and Hell. Not much is known about his actual life, making him perfect to use as a mysterious monster hunter heavily involved in the supernatural.
Historical Hero Upgrade: The real Bosch most likely was not a monster hunter. In-universe, it's pretty obvious that Crossroads and Eden's Garden are playing up his heroic tendencies, though to what extent is unknown. At the very least, he probably wasn't as altruistic as Professor Ross claims. The truth is that the poor sap wasn't much of a hero or a villain. He was a slave possessed by a Seosten to create the Heretical Edge and Crossroads.
Hunter of Monsters: Most pre-Bosch Heretics just made their own way and tried to survive. Bosch straight up hunted down Strangers to make himself stronger and smarter.
Our Founder: Founded Crossroads by creating the Heretical Edge, which allows Heretics to be made by design rather than by accident. It works by plugging the remains of the demon that tried to kill him into a device that broadcasts its memories as a light that grants its Assimilator abilities to any potential caught in it.
- He's also the founder of Eden's Garden in a spiritual sense. He was gone by the time it was formed, but the Garden Heretics consider themselves to be following his example more accurately than Crossroads does. One tribe even calls itself the Children of Bosch.
Renaissance Man: A skilled painter, monster hunter, and inventor who was actually alive during the Renaissance.
Super Prototype: Going by the life of Gabriel Prosser, becoming a Heretic directly from a Hangman makes the Heretic a lot more powerful than the more diluted upgrade granted by the Heretical Edge. This means that Bosch, like Gabriel, was a lot stronger than those made into Heretics by his invention. IF the part of the story where he killed the Hangman and gained its abilities is true.

Liesje Aken

Bosch's daughter. She refused to use his name, presumably in order to maintain some degree of privacy among the society her father created. She's Avalon's ancestor.

Inheritance Murder: A distant relative of hers has been murdering her descendants in order to gain access to the family blood vault.
Shed the Family Name: She chose not to identify herself as a Bosch.

Dries Aken

Liesje's husband. He disappeared centuries ago, after apparently murdering his father-in-law.

Doesn't Trust Those Guys: He hates Seosten. A lot. Doesn't matter if they've been rebelling against the Empire for longer than he's been alive, he can't bring himself to trust them.
Go Mad from the Isolation: He's not quite mad, but he's been alone for long enough to have gone more than a little stir-crazy. And that's without the mind-screwing the Seosten did.
Hated by All: Among Heretics, he's basically the worst criminal in history for his murder of the revered creator the Heretical Edge.
Nervous Wreck
Papa Wolf: To Avalon, the descendant he's never met. He's very interested in getting to know her and violently protective of her girlfriend.

Characters / Heretical Edge Other Crossroads Heretics

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