[This character is where I REALLY started getting better with my poses]
Lydia Chastain/Black Maratia: It’s no secret that superheroes battles tend to destroy their surroundings, and a harsher reality? They can’t save everyone. Sometimes they end up worsening the issues that were already there, and socialite Lydia Chastain is a victim of all three circumstances; the end result is a sadistic control freak who truly believes there aren’t any good people left.
Between growing up surrounded by horrible people, having to rebuild her family’s influence from scratch, and her deep-seated fear of feeling helpless, the only comforts she had was her family and fiancé; losing them and everything she had rebuilt in the Nightlighters’ first battle was just the final straw, and Lydia dedicated her life to getting her revenge; her chance finally came in the form of Project: G.E.M, and they turned her into what she hated, granting her immense power but sterilizing her. Now with her sadistic misanthropy out in full force, Lydia uses charisma, sex, and her beauty to seduce, charm, and bring her victims under her thrall. As more lovestruck men flock to her, she keeps finding new ways to guarantee herself victory; she has used her newfound mind control abilities to force a vampire to bite her, transforming her into a vampire herself; in weaponizing the violent rampages brought on by overdosing on bloodsucking, Lydia Chastain just might end up being one of the most dangerous threats Atlas has ever seen.
Lydia Chastain/Black Maratia is partially inspired by the Jorōgumo, and her original Toolkit abilities give her the physiology of a black widow spider; her senses and strength have been greatly enhanced, she can crawl across walls and ceilings, produce and manipulate copious amounts of silk, and is armed with retractable claws filled with venom. However, her greatest power is her mind control; by maintaining eye contact with a victim for 7 seconds, Maratia will be able to control them with both verbal and nonverbal commands; the power only works on men. She can also telepathically communicate with spiders, using them both as servants and as attack dogs.
Black Maratia later gains vampiric abilities by brainwashing a vampire into biting her; she is thus also incredibly durable and capable of extraordinary feats of strength, agility, speed, and stamina far exceeding what a human is capable of. As a Turned Vampire, Maratia can turn her body into mist and reform at will. As with all vampires, Maratia’s bloodsucking ability is a multi-tool based on her own emotions; she can use it for nourishment, to heal any wounds she sustains, and to sexually gratify herself. The fangs themselves also serve as an effective weapon, as she possesses a bite force equivalent to that of a saltwater crocodile. However, sucking too much blood will reduce her mind to a feral animal state and send her into a mindless berserker rage… something she deliberately weaponizes as a last resort.
Black Maratia’s price for her powers was her fertility; the Teardrop compound rendered her permanently unable to have kids.
