The Hellqueen

Gwen Nugent just wanted to be loved. She wanted to feel important rather than ignored. She wanted to be more like her friend and co-worker Nancy Dumont. Nancy was attractive, funny, personable, and well liked. Eventually, Gwen fell in with people who did make her feel important, but for all the wrong reasons. They were members of a cult who told Gwen she was their “chosen one.” They wanted her to take part in a rite of black magic, and told her she was the only one who could do it.
By the dark of the moon, Gwen lay on the altar slab as the members of the cult chanted and worked their ritual to summon a demon from the netherworld. They succeeded, but things didn’t go quite as they expected. The powerful demoness they summoned needed a human host to work through, and Gwen was perfect. Her fell energies merged with Gwen’s body, and the unholy being that rose from the altar unleashed blasts of hellfire to kill the foolish mortals who thought to bind her to their will. Then she seized control of the remainder of the cult.
Driven at least partly by Gwen’s subconscious feelings, the Hellqueen kidnapped Nancy Dumont as a sacrifice to raise more of her kind. The intervention of Captain Thunder saved Ms. Dumont and broke the Hellqueen’s cult, but she escaped and plotted revenge. Over time, the Hellqueen became fascinated with Captain Thunder. On several occasions, she tried to seduce him into becoming her consort, but each time he spurned her advances. It was Nancy Dumont who finally defeated the Hellqueen by appealing to her former friend Gwen, buried deep within the demonic personality. Gwen was able to reassert her sense of self and exorcise the demon from her soul, and was placed in psychiatric care.
The threat of the Hellqueen was believed over, but when Captain Thunder’s true identity was exposed, Gwen Nugent saw the broadcast, and it all came together for her. They had tricked her! Nancy, and her husband Ray, who was really Captain Thunder, played this joke on her the whole time. They were probably laughing about what a trusting fool she was behind her back after they left her to rot in “recovery.” In her jealous rage, Gwen gave in to the demon trapped within her and the Hellqueen lived again. She decided to maintain quiet, mousey “Gwen” to hide her activities and quietly began gathering her cult again. Now she works her way into the lives of her enemies and destroys them slowly from within.
The Hellqueen made other attempts against Captain Thunder and his wife, as well as their son—once an innocent bystander but, eventually, an adult hardened by experience and disappointments of his own. There was a soul to tempt a corruptor like the Hellqueen. She has taken an interest in both Thunderbolt and the “simpering goodness” of Centuria, as well as holding onto larger ambitions for earthly power. The Hellqueen’s followers grow in strength as she seeks new ways to corrupt goodness, gather power, and plot for when she can unleash Hell on Earth.

Physical Description

Special abilities

The Hellqueen has a number of magic-spawned powers at her command. Her demonic might enhances her borrowed flesh, making her superhumanly strong and tough. She does not age, nor is she subject to mortal needs for food, air, or sleep.
She commands a mystic “hellfire” she can project as fiery bolts from her hands or eyes or shape into flaming weapons like tridents, swords, or whips that she wields. She can also project hellfire aimed at her target’s soul rather than his body, inflicting searing psychic and emotional damage instead of the usual physical harm.
The Hellqueen was originally a succubus, or demon temptress, and she retains those powers as well in her current form. She can alter her appearance at will, looking like any humanoid, and her touch or kiss can cloud the mind, making victims distracted and less aware of their surroundings, less likely to notice any danger or deception.
Finally, the Hellqueen can travel at will to the infernal realms, various hellish dimensions like the one she hails from. This also allows her to vanish in a burst of hellfire and black smoke, slip through the infernal realms, and reemerge onto Earth some distance away. By projecting her perceptions through the infernal realms, she can scry through flames, seeing and hearing all that happens some distance away.

Mental characteristics

Intellectual Characteristics

Gwen Nugent was originally a shy woman looking for approval and acceptance. The Hellqueen is jealousy and hate personified, her actions always viciously cruel and wicked. She delights in causing pain and suffering, particularly in bringing about the downfall of others through their own mortal weaknesses. She loves to surround herself with willing worshipers who fulfill her slightest whim. Her greatest pleasure is to break a strong-willed enemy and have him or her bow down before her.
She has learned patience and greater guile in her many years on Earth and interactions with mortals. Where she originally tended to lash out or go for showy rituals of blood sacrifice, now the Hellqueen prefers to bid her time, use her shapeshifting and phantasm powers to get close to her foes, and exercise her power to cloud their minds to her schemes. She may insinuate herself into their lives as a friend or ally, learning their weaknesses and hopes to eventually use against them.