Fritz

{ played by @Jon }

NAME: Dustin Holmes
AGE: 21
SPECIES: Human
HAIR: Dark Blond
EYES: Blue
BIRTHPLACE: Manhattan, New York
OCCUPATION(S):

1. CEO of the Fritz Foundation
2. Vigilante
3. Influencer
4. Actor
5. Producer

AFFILIATION(S):

1. Member of The Neverenders
2. Former member of Incrediforce
3. Ally of The Vanquishers
4. Corporate partner of Titan Industries

SKILLS & ABILITIES

1. SABOTAGE
   His specialty is destroying dangerous technology, and doing it with performative flair.
2. ENGINEERING
   He is always coming up with new devices to use in the field. Some are more niche than others.
3. CORPORATE INFLUENCE
   He is extremely well-connected and has the resources to accomplish whatever he sets out to do.

Holmes Investments is a corporate investment firm run primarily by members of the multi-billionaire Holmes family since its creation in the early 1900s. For over a hundred years, they have used their wealth to fund the development of businesses and communities around the world. Their hands are in virtually every economic industry, and their influence is vast.

Each member of the Holmes family is highly individualistic and is granted the freedom to use the limitless resources of Holmes Investments to finance their own personal ventures upon reaching adulthood. Generally speaking, they are all very skilled businesspeople and excel wherever they establish roots. Morally, they are all over the place; even some of the least malicious capitalists among the family would still put profits over people in the right scenario.

Social media influencer Dustin Holmes is the youngest member of the Holmes family currently employed by the company. Shortly after his 18th birthday, he used his corporate power to start up a company called the Fritz Foundation, which develops technology that Dustin uses for his high-profile career as the vigilante Fritz. To make a profit, Dustin maintains social capital by publishing his heroic exploits online for his fans, and then uses his social capital to sell watered down versions of his gadgetry adapted into safer pieces of technology. All of the gadgetry is invented by Dustin himself, and he takes pride in his own ingenuity, although he still has teams of people assisting him at every level to help keep the company afloat.

Although the entire Fritz project is undeniably a vain attempt to make Dustin famous, it is also possibly the most morally righteous and altruistic business under the Holmes corporate umbrella due to the very direct, positive impact the Fritz Foundation makes on society every day.

The Fritz Foundation works very closely with Titan Industries due to sharing similar goals of keeping dangerous technologies out of evil hands, although Titan Girl tries her best to keep a distance between the two companies publicly because of Fritz's numerous media controversies that are born out of his egotistical, incessant need to always be the center of attention.

When the American Superpower Initiative (ASP) sets up Ace and other allies of Fritz to be arrested and experimented on by the government for their powers, Fritz took it upon himself to singlehandedly protect those that were known targets. He was able to leverage the fact that his lack of powers meant few eyes were on him and stop the ASP's shadowy enforcer Amnesty in his tracks every time. Deep down, Fritz was a bit jealous to not be wanted by the government like everyone else, and protecting him was his way of proving to himself that he should have been a target regardless.

Ironically it was these confrontations against Amnesty that would finally put him on the government's radar. Although The Vanquishers were able to free Ace and dismantle the ASP, Fritz would be monitored as a person of interest following those events. All publicity is good publicity, he likes to say, although that remains to be seen.

The Fritz Foundation had been dabbling in the artificial intelligence industry here and there since the company's first inception, but nothing of significance ever came from Dustin's tinkering. He built a prototype for a luxury robotic butler named Botsworth, but it ended up getting scrapped after his attention was dragged onto cooler things. It sat in a secure warehouse collecting dust, waiting for Dustin to improve it and finish it. At least, that's what Dustin thought was happening with the Botsworth project.

Unknown to Dustin at the time, the COO of the Fritz Foundation Edward Zappinski, who never liked standing in Dustin's shadow, was slipping into the warehouse behind his back and altering Botsworth's code so that it would violently malfunction and harm people after selling it to interested buyers. Unexpectedly, the A.I. program running on Botsworth developed sentience and, after naming itself Error, lured in a gang of criminals called The Hazards to steal it in a desperate ploy to escape. Dustin tracked them back to the Rogue Isles, where two Hazards members Au Revoir and Beeline would fatally attack him and leave him for dead.

At least, they would have left Dustin for dead if Error didn't have other plans. Instead, they took Dustin captive, and Dustin was forced to create a new body for Error to inhabit, one less restrictive than the old Botsworth model Dustin built before. Luckily, Dustin was located and rescued by Spyhunter and The Neverenders, but not before completing the body that Error now uses to roam freely. Dustin felt completely responsible for Error getting let loose upon the world, and he's kept tabs on the Hazards ever since escaping them. He was able to figure out that Zapp altered its code, but rather than out Zapp for it, he wanted to keep knowledge about what happened to a minimum so that people didn't lose respect for him as a CEO. It wouldn't look good on him to have a security breach from inside the company, after all.

Frustratingly, someone did end up leaking information about the Error situation to Incrediman, and Zappinski used that as an opportunity to strike a deal with him to get the Fritz Foundation on a better track. Thinking that it was his allies in the Neverenders, who were explicitly asked to keep quiet, responsible for news getting out, Dustin joined the Incrediforce, which was being set up by Incrediman to replace the Vanquishers and take control of Paragon City. He suddenly found himself in opposition to ever ally he'd made throughout his whole career as Fritz, compelled by his own company to keep working for a hero who he'd once helped expose as a criminal not that long before. It was a complicated situation for him to say the least.

Things got pretty heated between Fritz and the other heroes, particularly his fellow Neverenders, and eventually they came to blows. It seemed like whatever friendship he had with them was over until Dustin learned they weren't the ones responsible; it was his own right-hand man Zappinski who sabotaged the Botsworth project, created Error, and sold him out to Incrediman. Faced with the realization that he'd been played, he quietly quit Incrediforce just before they were taken down by the Vanquishers. This meant that he wasn't there when Incrediman murdered the Spell-Slinger in front of all the other heroes... an event which threw Dustin into possibly the first genuine emotional turmoil of his entire life. He worked with Incrediman... so in his own mind, Dustin was responsible for Chester's death. How could anyone ever forgive him for it? How could he forgive himself?

Fortunately, Chester left everyone a way to bring him back: fight in the Hellgames, a gladiatorial competition in the underworld where factions from all over compete for a prize soul. It was difficult to show his face at all, but Fritz showed up to fight a round for the heroes' team and won his match with expertise. They were successful in winning Chester's soul from the Hellgames and were eventually able to bring him back to life, liberating Dustin from most of the guilt he was carrying about his death before. Still, he found it hard to stick around after everything he'd done, so once everything settled down he got in touch with a contact in Hollywood to come and work on the set of a new movie in production... a movie about the Vanquishers themselves, much to their dismay.

1. Generators
   His suit generates electricity through a variety of functions that are all used to power his equipment in the field. The electricity generated can also be discharged offensively.
2. Projectile Matrix
   By surging power to his hand and making a finger gun formation, he can activate a bow-like matrix that can be used to launch his projectile gadgetry.
3. Gadgetry
   He possesses a vast assortment of custom-designed equipment that is primarily intended to disable technology & hostile combatants. Almost all are modified to be fired as projectiles.
4. Static Sliders
   His boots harness electricity to allow him to zip around quickly with heightened speed & mobility, as well as cling to walls and ceilings when he has enough momentum. It's like electric parkour.
5. AR Lenses
   He is constantly being fed data about the world around him through a vast Fritz Foundation repository.

1. The Neverenders
   Dustin joining the Neverenders officiated him as a hero in many respects. It certainly introduced him to some of his closest allies and friends. They taught him how to work with others, at least somewhat. It was definitely a skill he sorely lacked before.
2. The Vanquishers
   Though not an official member of the team, his proximity to it has enabled him to work with the Vanquishers on multiple occasions. He is a trusted ally of the group... or at least he was until he agreed to help produce a film about the team, even going so far as to star in it himself as an adaptation of Limbo.
3. Titan Industries
   Dustin sought to legitimize his operation by partnering up with one of the world's most reputable security firms, although their partnership is kept secret from the public for security reasons (as ironic as that is).
4. Limbo
   One of Dustin's most popular series of videos online involves him following Ethan Holloway around on his ghost-hunting missions, which often requires the assistance of highly specialized Fritz tech for capturing and analyzing supernatural data in the field. Dustin thinks Ethan is a complete idiot, but a profitable idiot, which ensures that Dustin doesn't let his ego ruin the relationship.
5. Airwave
   This rebellious engineer uses powerful equipment cobbled together from stolen tech to siphon top secret information being transmitted all around the universe. He's well known to underground dark web communities as a reliable source of high-profile leaks. Recently, Fritz joined the Vanquishers to stop his attempt at contacting killer aliens and bringing them to Earth.
6. Zero Chill
   Presley is a young inventor who at one point was up for an internship at the Fritz Foundation, but Dustin ended up turning him down because he was worried about being outshone by Presley in his own company. This started a years-long feud between the two, as Presley isn't one to take rejection very well.
7. Startup
   Jude Warren is a technopathic anarchist who is huge thorn in Fritz's side. Responsible for the production of dangerous black market tech that is highly resistant to conventional sabotage methods, he always manages to stay one step ahead, constantly undermining the Fritz Foundation's work to make Dustin look like an idiot.
8. Maximal
   Samuel Strong is a dangerous technophile who has cybernetically augmented his body out of an obsessive desire to reach humanity's peak potential. He, and the cyber-junky thugs who follow him, pose a threat to safety wherever they go. Fritz works hard to keep the world's most dangerous tech out of Maximal's hands.
9. Hydrant
   The A.Q.U.A. series of firefighting drones that the Fritz Foundation worked on in coordination with the Paragon City Fire Department ended up being scrapped due to accidental sentience developed in the core AI. Most of the drones were shut down, but Dustin couldn't bring himself to turn off the original model... a decision that he occasionally is made to regret whenever the robot gets into trouble.
10. Webmaster
    Nothing happens on the internet that Bishop Weaver isn't tapped into, thanks to cybernetic augmentations hardwired into his brain that keep him mentally online while vastly enhancing his intellect. The Webmaster entered Fritz's radar after his app - an underground, villainous craigslist-style app called Blackbook - was used by Airwave to flood Paragon City with mercenaries. Fritz is currently searching for a way to find Webmaster and shut the project down.
11. Incrediman
    
12. Amnesty
    
13. Nick O. Thyme
    
14. Ace
    
15. Spell-Slinger
    
16. Chromeheart
    
17. Blister
    
18. Smelter
    
19. Titan Girl
    
20. Warpdrive
    
21. The Hazards
    
22. Error
    
23. Au Revoir
    
24. Beeline
    
25. Zapp