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Medusa
Real Name: Medusalith Amaquelin Occupation: Royal interpreter Identity: Medusa does not use a dual identity. She is
unknown by the general public of Earth to be an Inhuman. Legal Status: Citizen of Attilan Other Aliases: Madame Medusa Place of Birth: Island of Attilan, Atlantic Ocean Marital Status: Married Known Relatives: Quelin (father), Ambur (mother), Crystal
(sister), Karnak, Gorgon, Triton (second cousins), Black Bolt
(husband), Luna (niece), Pietro Maximoff (brother-in-law) Group Affiliation: Royal Family of the Inhumans, former
member of the Frightful Four and Fantastic Four Base of Operations: Attilan, Blue Area, Earth's Moon First Appearance: FANTASTIC FOUR #36
History: Medusa was the first of two children born to
the Inhuman nutritionists Quelin and Ambur. Her father
Quelin was the brother of Rynda, wife of Agon, king of
the Inhumans, and as such she has been considered part
of the Royal Family. Medusa's parents elected to expose
her to the mutagenic Terrigen Mist when she was an infant,
and the process endowed her with hair that she could animate
like added appendages. While still in adolescence she
began to make frequent visits to the isolation cell of
her second cousin, Black
Bolt, and learned to communicate with him in a special
sign language. Medusa and Black Bolt developed a special
bond between them that blossomed into love when Black
Bolt was first allowed out of his cell at the age of eighteen.
In the aftermath of the first coming of the Trikon, Medusa
left the Inhumans' Great Refuge. Afflicted with amnesia
sustained in an aircrash, the Inhuman wandered Europe, committing
petty thefts to get food to survive. Her animated hair soon
brought her unwanted attention, and eventually the American
criminal called the Wizard heard rumors of her. Locating
Medusa in Paris, the Wizard brought her to America and enlisted
her in the Frightful Four, a band of criminals he had organized.
Medusa went along with the criminal activities of the Frightful
Four since she felt grateful to the Wizard for her rescue
and had nothing better to do. The Frightful Four battled
the Fantastic Four,
and all but Medusa were captured. Medusa's public exploits
enabled Black Bolt and the other members of the Royal Family,
who had been exiled from the Great Refuge by Black Bolt's
mad brother Maximus, to locate
her. Seeing them again restored her memory, and they were
all taken back to the Great Refuge by the Seeker, an agent
of Maximus.
When Black Bolt regained the throne, Medusa renewed her betrothal
to him and served as his royal interpreter. She has remained
at his side as his constant companion for most of the
time since, seeing the Inhumans through one of their most
tumultuous periods in history. Although Medusa has taken
various short journeys from the Inhumans' base Attilan
without Black Bolt (once where she engaged Spider-Man
in battle, another time to thwart the reunion of the Frightful
Four), she has only left his side for a period of months
twice. The first time she joined the Fantastic Four to
take the Invisible Girl's
place on the team during her estrangement from her husband.
The second time, she was taken captive by the criminal
Enclave, who sought
to conquer Attilan.
Medusa has recently wed Black Bolt, thus becoming the queen
of the Inhumans, after the customary several year royal
engagement period was over. She and Black Bolt are expecting
a child.
Height: 5 ft. 11 in. Weight: 130 lbs Eyes: Green Hair: Red
Strength Level: Medusa possesses the normal strength
of a female Inhuman of her age, height, and weight who
engages in moderate regular exercise, Due to generations
of eugenics, Inhumans are superior to humans in strength,
reaction time, stamina, resistance to injury, and speed.
Known Superhuman Powers: Medusa possesses a long, thick
head of hair, every strand of which has greater tensile
strength, modulus of elasticity, and shear resistance
than an iron wire of the same thickness (average hair
diameter: .045 inches), as well as the psychokinetic ability
to animate her hair for a number of feats. Her hair, approximately
6 feet in length while relaxed, can elongate to almost
twice its normal length with only about a 25% loss of
overall tensile strength. One strand of hair, 2-feet long,
can support 6.4 pounds, a list-sized lock of hair can
support about 750 pounds and her whole head of hair can
lift about 3,200 pounds (1.6 tons). A portion of her hair
must be used to anchor the rest at these greater weights,
so that more than her scalp/skull is used as a brace.
Medusa can control the movement of her hair as if it were countless
thin appendages growing from her head. A psionic field
permeates her mutagenically altered hair-cells, causing
mutual attraction across the gaps between strands. These
relatively small forces operate in conjunction to develop
larger forces. Through concentration, she can psionically
move her hair in any manner imaginable. She can snap the
length of it through the air like a whip (the tip of which
moves faster than the speed of sound), or rotate it in
a fan-like manner. She can bind persons or objects with
it as if it were rope or use it to lift objects which
weigh more than she could lift with her arms. (Her scalp,
skull, and neck do not support the weight of an object
that she lifts: it is held aloft by the psionic force
coursing through the hair.) Medusa can also perform delicate
manipulations with her hair such as lock picking or threading
a needle, and such complex acts of coordination as typing
or shuffling a deck of cards. Although she has no nerve
endings in her hair, she can "feel" sensations
on all parts of her hair by a form of mental feedback
from her psionic field.
As yet Medusa has not manifested her psychokinetic powers in
any way except the animation of her own hair. Whether
she has the potential to control other fibrous substances
other than her own hair (as can the mutant Gypsy Moth)
has not yet been determined.