Pamela Isley/Poison Ivy (WIP)

Subject Facts

Full Name: Pamela Lillian Isley
Codename: Poison Ivy
Age: 38
Gender: Female
Archetype: Meta Villain
Aliases: Paula Irving
Marital Status: Single
Affiliation: N/A; Harley Quinn

Subject Attributes

Meta-Human Abilities: Chlorokinesis - Pamela has an innate connection to the Green, the force that bridges all plant-life. Through this connection she boasts a great many abilities. Pamela has an empathic awareness of surrounding flora, able to feel and experience what they do, especially pain. She can communicate to plant life, and it does her bidding, sometimes seemingly of its own accord. Using the Green as a source of energy and vitality, Pamela can inspire rapid, instantaneous, organic growth in flora, supplementing the need for water and sunlight and even call life into processed plant matter such as wooden furnishings, etc.

Toxikinesis - With Pamela's new, hybrid physiology, her body is a cocktail of toxins and poisons. Most remarkably of all is that she can consciously manipulate, control and orchestrate this production to suit her needs. Pamela can alter the amount of poison her body is secreting, dimming it down to completely nonlethal measures, or concentrating it in her hands or lips to make a handshake or kiss lethal. She can also manipulate the construct of the toxins she's producing for varying results - causing paralysis, blindness, etc, selectively. Ivy can also reduce the emerald pigmentation of her skin with concentration, appearing Caucasian if she wishes.

Pheromone Emissions - Along with toxins, Pamela's body naturally produces plant-based pheromones. Like with the poisons she generates, Pamela has control over their levels of intensity and is famous for concentrating them in her lips to ensnare a person's mind with a kiss. Those subject to Pamela's pheromones find themselves entranced, chemically bent around her finger and will do anything within their power to please her.

Toxin Immunity - Pamela is immune to almost any toxin or poison imaginable, including signature products of other Gotham villains such as Joker Gas or Scarecrow's Fear Toxin.

Augmented Physiology - Among all the other abilities that her altered physiology have granted her, Pamela's speed, agility and strength are at meta-human levels. She is especially talented at climbing and swimming.

Standard Abilities: Genius-Level Intellect - Poison Ivy's level of intelligence is soundly on a genius level when it comes to botanical fields.

Botanist - Pamela is the most genius botanist on the face of the earth. Her understanding of flora was tempered over a lifetime of passionate fascination, study, application and schooling. Originally, before her transformation, Pamela was brilliant in the field of botany. After it, with her new connection to plant life and control over it, Pamela's knowledge is at an inhuman level. She is known to engineer plants for her own ends, famously splicing fauna DNA into flora for desired ends.

Toxicologist - She is incomparably gifted in scientifically engineering or manipulating toxins and antidotes. Yet again, this knowledge has been pushed to new, humanly unattainable heights with her powers.

Seductress - Pamela has learned the nuances of the art of seduction and how useful a careful smile or plunging neckline can be. Though her pheromones help her in these departments, she has a natural talent in her own right to wrap people around her finger.

Paraphernalia: Pamela's arsenal adapts to her situation and needs. Often she carries on her person various seedlings that she can use her powers to inspire to rapid growth. Otherwise she will employ plant hybrids, toxins and flora-based chemicals of her own creation at need. Pamela's costume as Poison Ivy is typically fashioned out of living plants and hidden seeds that allow her to alter it according to her wishes - gauntlets sending out thorny vines to grab onto others; loosing poison spines as projectiles; etc.

Subject Weaknesses: Physiological Dependencies - Pamela requires much more water than a normal human to remain healthy, along with copious amounts of sunlight. Without a proper amount of either Pamela will become fatigued, lethargic and weakened.

Mental Instability - Pamela places more respect toward plant- ife, treating them as her children, than human life and will harm the latter without hesitation if the former is threatened.

Hyper-sexuality - Pamela's pheromone emissions and physical attractiveness have lent to the habit of automatically seducing many that she encounters, particularly men.

Ultra-feminist - Most men automatically earn Pamela's ire for their gender alone. She is harsher against the male sex, more prone to lethal acts and less likely to trust than with females.

Prepared Opponents - Pamela's powers are formidable, but those who approach her appropriately prepared can render most of her choice weapons less effective, or entirely useless. Wax lips can fend off many of her kisses, breath masks can filter her pheromones or airborne poisons and there are antidotes that exist or can be fashioned to make someone resistant to some of her go-to concoctions.

A Mother's Weakness - She views all plant-life as her children, and will be more compliant or surrendering if they are thoroughly threatened and she sees no alternative.

Floronic Empathy - Pamela experiences what nearby flora does secondhand as a general rule. Though she can dampen this connection consciously, if severe damage is done to her children, Pamela will feel that pain as her own, possibly distracting her or even rendering her unconscious.

Subject History

Pamela Lillian Isley was born and raised in Seattle, Washington with wealthy but emotionally distant parents. Deeply introverted, but brilliantly studious, she nurtured a love for all growing things from her childhood studying advanced botanical biochemistry at a university alongside Alec Holland under Dr Jason Woodrue, earning a PhD in botany. Pamela was seduced by Woodrue, who used her as a human test subject, injecting her with various toxins that nearly killed her twice and fractured her sanity. Woodrue fled from authorities soon after, leaving Pamela hospitalized for six months and psychologically addled due to the betrayal and experimentation.

When her boyfriend died mysteriously from a fungal overgrowth, Pamela dropped out of university and moved to Gotham City. There she created a costumed persona for herself called Poison Ivy, though she was foiled by the Batman and committed to Arkham Asylum. Over the following years, the true extent of Woodrue's experiments revealed themselves; Pamela's physiology had been altered, making her a plant/human hybrid with a connection to the Green and, thereby, all plant life on the planet as well as a toxic touch and pheromone emissions.

After several years operating in Gotham, Ivy tried to leave it forever, finding a remote and uninhabited Caribbean island to make her new Eden. This was short-lived when an American-owned, Gotham-based corporation used it to test their weapons, razing it entirely. Pamela was driven back to Gotham for revenge and, after willingly being apprehended by Batman, realized that she could never leave Gotham until it was "purified." Next, while in Arkham Poison Ivy was freed by Eva Green and Holly, who brought her to a miraculously alive Woodrue, now more plant than human going by the moniker "Floronic Man," and making an empire from genetically-altered marijuana in Gotham. Ultimately Ivy played Batman and Woodrue against one another to her advantage, escaping with his fortune.

Gotham City was later devastated by an earthquake that rendered it a No Man's Land. During this period Poison Ivy settled in and operated out of Robinson Park, taking in sixteen orphans from the quake as if they were her own children. Clayface approached her to bargain, but when Ivy refused he trapped her and the orphans underground beneath the park for six months before Batman rescued her. Following this, Ivy struck a deal with Batman: he would leave her and the orphans be, but she would grow and supply the starving populace of Gotham with produce. It was during her fulfillment of this pact that Ivy happened upon Harley Quinn for the first time, nursing her back to health and giving her an elixir that made her immune to Pamela's toxins as well as heightened her physical attributes.

Once Gotham was restored and recovering from the earthquake, the GCPD demanded that Poison Ivy and the orphans, who they believed she was holding hostage, abandon Robinson Park. Though she was originally bent on martyrdom, Ivy ended up turning herself in to protect the children and was incarcerated. Later, Pamela was manipulated by the Riddler and Hush, using her pheromones to enthrall Catwoman and Superman. After she realized she'd been used as a pawn, when the Riddler approached her for safe haven from Hush, she brutally humiliated him physically and psychologically, breaking his spirit in recompense.

When Ivy began to suspect that her orphans from Robinson Park were dying because of their past exposure to her, she sought out Bruce Wayne to help her reverse what had transformed her into Poison Ivy. Though it was successful, Pamela found the reason for the orphans's deaths and was convinced only by becoming Ivy again could she save them. With Hush's help, she tried to reverse the process again but allegedly died in the attempt. In reality, after she was buried her body completed the physiological metamorphosis and she escaped.

One year later, Poison Ivy was attacked in Arkham Asylum by a creature called Harvest, which was the fused consciousnesses of all the victims that she had fed to the plant. With Batman's help, Ivy was saved, but left in critical condition. After her recovery and next escape, Ivy encountered the Trickster and the Pied Piper and was intent on killing them, but Deathstroke intervened. She was a member of the short-lived Secret Society of Super Villains. Poison Ivy was freed by Black Mask afterward and briefly helped him in his hostile takeover of the city, aiding Killer Croc attacking Robin, but quickly turned her back on the scheme.

Ivy assisted Catwoman in her revenge on Hush after he surgically removed her heart to get at Batman and made off with a large portion of the Elliot fortune as a reward. With Gotham City getting ever more dangerous, after saving Selina from an up-and-coming, mediocre super villain, she, Selina and Harley formed their own alliance. The three lived together and fought various threats. After many exploits, Harley betrayed Ivy and Catwoman when she broke into Arkham to kill the Joker only to release him from his cell instead and stage a hostile takeover of the asylum with him. Though Ivy tried to break through to Harley, she was unsuccessful, and following the heroic intervention of Batman and Catwoman, Selina disbanded their group formally and Ivy was incarcerated.

Soon thereafter Ivy escaped along with Harley and the two made amends. Together they sought out Selina and attacked her for her betrayal. They fought, and when Batman arrived Catwoman battled him to give Ivy and Harley a chance to escape, saying she'd always seen a little bit of good in them.

Subject Interview

The orange-tinged night sky of Gotham glowed dully through her windows. Plants with phosphorescent capabilities glowed like natural night lights here and there. One in particular, whose shining bulb acted like a living lamp, was at Pamela's elbow, turning its head down on her work so she could see. She should really be getting to bed. The absence of the sun made her more lethargic as the hours prior to dusk wore on. After this, the botanist told herself. For the tenth time that night, in fact.

"You're doing well, my dear," she whispered to the cactus-like plant in the small pot that her fingers were probing. "Two weeks after planting, and you're almost full-grown." The rapid growth was a genetic trait borrowed from her namesake and engineered into the mosaic of spliced genes that created the thing before her. "Tomorrow I'll put you in the sill, so you can get the most sun. Then we'll see if you're a little more livel-"

Pamela stopped talking. There was the faintest vibration that rippled through her bent legs and the earth under her fingers. Elusive enough, in fact, that a moment after Ivy registered it, she pondered if it had been genuine, or a trick of the late hour. Then, just as she decided to discard the commotion and return to her task, there was a clatter at her door. Pamela straightened and looked over her shoulder just as the cell door hissed open and the disused lighting above flickered to life. Only as it would if emergency unlock-codes had been put into effect.

Confusion turned into unimpressed brittleness when Pamela put two and two together. "I wonder who started this?" she mused, turning back to her work. "One of the Joker's annoying schemes, no doubt." Poison Ivy heard a scuffling in the corridor beyond her cell. She wasn't certain if she was prepared to leave. Not in this manner, at least. Mass breakouts such as these were notoriously bloody affairs, and the subsequent surge of do-gooders who flocked to the asylum almost immediately after it began caught most who tried to properly break out.

The scuffle in the corridor turned into a scuttling noise that quickly gained in volume. Finally, Poison Ivy turned to look at the door again, squinting against the obnoxious lights, to see a warped figure leaning in the doorway. He was wrapped mostly in a straitjacket, but had managed to free one of his hands. He also dragged one foot behind him like dead weight, hence the scuffle/scuttle. Drool hung in ropes from his open mouth. His eyes bugged nearly out of his skull. "I'm offended I was put in a room with such brutish neighbors."

The man gave a deranged cackle and lunged forward. Pamela paid him no heed. After giving him a once-over she'd turned back to her work. He made it two feet into the room when a closed flower on one of the plants opened and loosed a cloud of rich pink spores. They spilled up into the air and clung to his straitjacket, his mangy hair. He coughed, wheezed, and fell over backwards, skin shriveling and blackening at a rapid rate. Poison Ivy had lost interest in the whole thing when a nasally, girlish voice with a New York accent echoed over the comm. system following the annoying jingle that sounded before every such announcement.

Pamela tilted her head. "Harleen?" She turned more fully toward the speaker on the ceiling. Poison Ivy rolled her eyes initially, but by the time Harley had listed her demands, the botanist was smiling wryly. "Impressive. I didn't think you had it in you to engineer something this complex," she thought aloud, "though it does hold to your... brazen motif." Pamela stood now, and brushed dirt from her front as she did so. Her orange jumpsuit was unzipped with the upper half tied around her waist, showing her gray tank-top beneath.

Ivy's hair was even tied in a doable bun at the back of her head to keep from falling over her eyes. Maybe she would venture out of her cell after all? Another disturbance echoed through the hallway again. Within a few moments, a security guard came panting into view, gun held at the ready, trained on Pamela. "Isley! Good, you haven't done anything stupid... yet. Now, let's keep you that way. Stay in your cell!" Ivy smiled. The guard moved cautiously forward, edging toward her cell door to close it.

"Mr Wilkens. Ever the gentleman. I'm afraid that I can't afford to be amiable tonight," she said, lamenting. "I have a girlfriend to inevitably save." The guard jerked his gun viciously. "I mean it, Isley! I'll shoot!" Pam gave him both auburn brows raised. "Very well in theory, Mr Wilkens, but how do you hope to do that without a gun?" The guard wasn't offered a chance to comprehend this comment, because a vine had loosed itself from the plants at Pamela's back and lashed Wilkens' knuckles.

He dropped the gun on instinct, cursing under his breath. Wilkens looked down at his fallen weapon, back at Ivy, and made a desperate grab for it. The selfsame vine that had launched an offensive on the unsuspecting man was too quick. Emerald tendrils thrashed once more, sending the firearm skittering further down the hall and out of reach. The security guard had just levered himself back onto his feet to give chase when five emerald fingers curled around his shoulder and turned him.

Turned him into a kiss against sizzling lips.

The guard gave a grunt in his throat that turned into a moan. When Pamela peeled her lips away from his, he was no longer of a mind to assault her. His eyes had already begun to take on a luminous quality, and every exhalation through his nose brought with it a yellowish vapor of spores that began to drift in a cloud around his head. "Decent kisser," Ivy smiled. "Now, get your little toy so you can be of some use to me. You're going to be my escort for the evening."

While the brainwashed man rushed to do as he was bidden, Poison Ivy turned back toward the intercom speaker as Harley's voice - much less cheerful this time - echoed through it again. Pamela sighed, crossing her arms over chest. Typical. The vigilantes were already here. Harley would definitely be needing her help, then. Just as well. She needed a good workout after so long stuck in a vase. "And it seems that we'll be having company."

Author's Notes

Player Alias: Di

Other Characters: Diana Prince/Wonder Woman

How did you find ARFD?: Creator/founder