Team Leader

Team Leader is a villain introduced in the serial "Legion of Lawndale Heroes". She makes her first appearance in Volume 5, Part 1 ("Keeping Things Hidden").

First appearance

Team Leader is the leader of a group of mercenaries including "Black" and "Red". Her team is hired by John Dynell in an effort to kidnap Legionnaires Jane Lane, Daria Morgendorffer, and Quinn Morgendorffer.

The group manages to break into the lightly guarded Legion compound. Team Leader uses her physical transformation powers to pass herself off as Jane and manages to subdue Daria while the other mercenaries subdue the others. The three Legionnaires are restrained and the mercenaries attempt an escape from Lawndale by armored car.

However, the remaining Legionnaires -- Sandi Griffin, Tiffany Blum-Deckler and Charles "Upchuck" Ruttheimer -- manage to catch up with the armored car. One of Sandi Griffin's self-clones crashes her yellow corvette into the armored car, forcing the vehicle onto its side. Black and Red fall onto Team Leader; none of the mercenaries was wearing seat belts. Team Leader is knocked into unconsciousness after the collision, suffering broken teeth, a broken jaw and neck injuries.

Team Leader was taken to a special secret Elite hospital where she was last seen recovering. Dynell refused to pay the team and passed on word of the mercenaries' failure to other superpowered mercenaries, effectively punishing Team Leader and her companions by embarrassing them.

Powers/abilities

Despite the failure of Team Leader's group, Team Leader is a talented mercenary-for-hire with some sort of special forces training, although it is unknown to which military branch Team Leader belonged. It was remarked that Team Leader had "a great kill list" and that the group was highly talented. Furthermore, Team Leader was a member of the secret society of superpowered beings known as The Elite. It is unknown if Team Leader's mercenary team has Elite sanction, or if they operate independently.

Team Leader has the ability to change her physical form to impersonate anyone. Her power does not seem to work the same way that Charles Ruttheimer's power works -- Ruttheimer can change his form into an exact genetic duplicate even without direct observation whereas Team Leader's power seems to require some sort of observation or detailed photographic evidence. For example, her impersonation of Daria was perfect, save for the fact that Daria bites her nails, a fact which was not reflected in the final transformation. However, Team Leader's impersonation of Jane Lane was good enough at first observation to fool even Jane Lane's best friend, Daria Morgendorffer.

However, Team Leader has the handicap of being unable to maintain a baseline physical form. Every so often, unbidden, Team Leader will change form to a random, physically fit female. Team Leader is unable to maintain any particular form for more than a few hours -- if a form exceeds a certain timeframe, she will randomly change appearance and it might be several days before she can change to that form again. As a result, Team Leader has to pay attention to how long she takes a transformation before being forced to rest, lest she exceed the threshold time. As a result, Team Leader has no "true" appearance; when relaxed, her physical appearance automatically changes every few hours. This has proven to be a social handicap, but also makes Team Leader very hard to locate.

Mercenary team

Team Leader is obviously the leader of the three-person mercenary team including Black and Red. After completed missions, she receives payment on behalf of the group and splits the money with her comrades. She has been known to punish Red or Black for disobeying orders by withholding money.

She neither likes nor fully trusts her comrades in arms; her relationship with Red is particularly poor. However, despite their mutual dislike, she is able to make Black and Red follow orders and maintain field discipline.

Weapons

It is assumed that Team Leader is familiar with weaponry of all types due to her special forces training. However, the only weapon she used in apprehending Daria was a hand-held canister with a breathing mask attachment. When forced over someone's nose and mouth, the canister can force its contents into the victim's respiratory system almost immediately. Unconsciousness results in moments.