Anti-Matter

"The Emperor has been a fool to ignore my brilliance, and SHE... she... has been swayed by his opinion of me. But now, I will show her... I will show HIM... I WILL SHOW YOU... what I can do!"

- Anti-Matter

Reymond Keyes A.K.A. Anti-Matter, and formerly known as Praetor Keyes, is one of the main antagonists of the Praetoria in the super-hero/villain M.M.O. City of Heroes. Praetoria is the signature alternate reality to the game's main reality, the Praetorians have nick-named Primal Earth. Anti-Matter is this alternate reality's version of Positron - signature science hero of the main game. Anti-Matter is a scientist living as a pariah among his own people yet still dedicated to keeping his world running but becoming more and more desperate to earn back his respect and thus willing to do nearly anything for Emperor Cole to regain his clout as Praetoria's leading scientific mind.

Anti-Matter negates a Positron
Reymond Keyes was a scientist working for the Crey Industries in Paragon City. Crey was a pharmaceutical giant but after the owner and C.E.O. Alphonse "Count" Crey married his lovely wife Clarissa Van Dorn (becoming "Countess Crey" after marriage), Countess Crey started taking the company in new directions to a variety of new fields outside of pharmaceuticals, one being technology. Dr. Raymond Keyes put together a project having to do with a set of power-armor, while military applications had been suggested by the Countess, Keyes was more concerned with using the armor to operate in hazardous environments and intended to use it a flying nuclear suit to handle radiated areas. Dr. Keyes' research took a sharp turn after his friend Steven Berry was abducted and turned out was being held captive in Crey labs as a test-subject for a set of gene-spicing experiments, when Keyes found his friend half-alive and just barely escaped from the lab, Keyes saw the company he was working for was corrupt if not wholly evil, he destroyed his notes then took his power armor and flew Steven out to safety never to return to the company. The scientist responsible for the experiments on Steven was never found, his very record expunged from the company even though both men had seen him on site; Both Steven and Raymond took this as proof it was more than one bad apple and Countess Crey herself had sanctioned the project to have the sort of pul required make all evidence disappear. Steven took up the name Synapse and Raymond the name "Positron" and both started plying their powers to prevent science and technology from ever being used for such nefarious deeds again. Unfortunately due to a blast during the war with the extra-terrestrial invaders the Rikti, Positron's suit was damaged and he was irradiated by the power core, making him radioactive and the suit a requirement to keep others from being harmed by his very presence. This would eventually be cured but for several years Keyes could not remove his suit for fear of destroying everything around him.

In Praetoria Keyes' life took a different turn. The details are fuzzy on how Anti-Matter gained his powers but presumably he had a similar experiment with his suit, though not working for Crey, and thus with his friend Steven Berry never being experimented on and causing him to run off with his own suit. In Praetoria however, Steven Berry was envious of his friend and wanted to be a great scientist like him. Though Berry had a keen mind he had no degrees, he however was able to sift through Keyes notes as well as the notes of other scientists Keyes worked with and put them all together to create a harness that would accelerate his brain-synapses so he could think at super-speeds - the device worked better than expected and in addition to granting his thought process massive speeds, he was granted super-physical-speed as well - soon earning the nick-name "Neuron" for the light-fast speeds he seemed to work at. From that moment on, Berry was a constant thorn in Keyes' side - his enthusiasm to be a great scientist turning into a desire to out-do his former idol. In his fervor to out do Berry, Dr. Keyes rushed his open projects before his super-fast rival could get wind of their base outlines and thus complete in minutes what might take Keyes months. As a result of this rush to complete his coveted "Anti-Matter" armor, Keyes accidentally irradiated himself due to an over-active core and similar to his Primal Earth counter-part, Keyes needed to start wearing the armor constantly to prevent himself from nuking everyone around him, though unlike the Primal-Earth Raymond Keyes, Anti-Matter would never run into the same set of circumstances to cure his radioactive condition.

Hamidon Invasion
Anti-Matter and Neuron's rivalry came to something of a pause during the Hamidon Wars. A scientist called Hamidon was doing genetic research experiments in favor of saving he environment - in process mutating himself to a giant amoeba with ecological influence Hamidon expelled spores that infected others, transforming them into elemental based monsters, who, once mutated were neurologically controlled by the spores and part of a hive-mind of Hamidon's consciousness. Society collapsed in the war. Though Hamidon exists in both Primal Earth and Praetorian Earth the Rikti that invaded Primal Earth did so from their own reality, as a result there is no Praetorian version of them and without the Rikiti invasion to keep Hamidon waiting out the invaders to strike and eventually being discovered while he was still in hiding, Praetoria's Hamidon simply attacked en-mass with no reason to hold-back. Governments fell, leaders were infected or killed by the infected and entire chains-of-command ceased to function. Marcus Cole (Praetorian version of the Primal Earth Marcus Cole who would become "Statesman" and lead Positron and others against the Rikiti) lead Anti-Matter and the others against Hamidon. Hamidon use a mind-meld to try to destroy Cole but was repulsed after touching Cole's mind and turned away with it's infected. Cole quickly drove back Hamidon, but he could only go so far, with nearly every thing outside major cites a massive hositle forest grown by Hamidon's spores.

Cole had a fondness for the Roman-Empire and culture and thought to make a new "Praetorian" government, after the Praetorian Guard - military units who would seize control of the city during times of emergency. The time of emergency was obviously on-going and thus Cole became "Emperor Cole" of the new Praetorian society - the only society left after Hamidon's raid. Cole flew around the world rescuing as many people as he could find to populate his last few massive cities as hold-outs for humanity, while search middle America he found a large convey of survivors lead by a hero of the wastes, Michael White or as his massive convey called him by then "Marauder", though Marrauder had not helped Cole fight Hamidon as Keyes, Berry, Shalice Tilman, Justin Sinclair and his grand-daughter Alexia did, he had saved a high-number of Americans. Cole offered Shalice, Alexia, Sinclair, White, Berry and Keyes places by his side as "Praetors" meta-humans/those on the level of meta-humans who would use their gifts and skills to keep humanity safe from the things that now went "bump" outside the city walls.

Fall From Favor
With Hamidon at arm's length and Cole the new Emperor of society, Raymond Keyes got to know his new partners. He was all too familiar with Berry and their rivalry would increase experimentally while working for society's new emperor. Sinclair was a wet-works specialist who went by the code-name "Chimera" prior to meeting Cole in the war. White genuinely cared about two things, the common-man and finding new challenges and as a result was constantly looking for a fight with those who disturbed the peace. Tilman fancied herself "Mother" to the people of Praetoria, she was a psychic whose empathetic link had created a disillusion of mother-hood for all the people of Praetoria. Lastly there was Alexia, Cole's grand-daughter, who in an act of rebellion to her grand-father's puritanical image fancied herself "Dominatrix" - a whip-wielding warrior with a magical girdle passed down from a gift her grandfather had given to his wife, then daughter and finally Alexia herself. Berry gravitated towards getting along with Sinclair while Keyes got on better with Mother and White, but the one he had high-hopes for was Alexia. Alexia had spotted Keyes' affections for seemed to reciprocate. Before long the two were romantically involved, though Alexia insisted they meet in secret as her grandfather was so old-fashioned he would never approve of his little girl dating.

Keyes met in secret to flirt with Alexia but eventually Emperor Cole got wind of the romance and confronted Alexia and Keyes. Keyes, put-on-the-spot proudly proclaimed his desires for Alexia, however Alexia denied it - thus appearing the relationship was one-way and Keyes had been stalked the Emperor's grand-daughter. Keyes had also been trying to exposes Berry's attempts to steal his work and the seeming attempt to sexually harass his grand-daughter was the last straw for Emperor Cole, Keyes was robbed of his title as "Praetor", statues and plaques to him were taken down, and the Emperor banished him to Praetoria's central power-station, a set of nuclear-reactors on their own island just outside the city. Officially this was because "the only man the emperor trusted to look after Praetoria's power-source was the great scientist Raymond Keyes whose constant attention was needed to keep the plants safe, and of-course since his attention there would be constant he could no-longer provide his services as a Praetor, and had selflessly given up the position for the good of the Praetorian people" - in reality of-course it was an exile. Cole has sanctioned many oppressive actions and Keyes, ever in an attempt to earn back both his clout and Alexia's affections, is keen to jump through whatever hoops the Emperor needs him to, or, as Anti-Matter believes even many endeavors Emperor Cole does not know he needs him for yet.

Powers and Abilities
Anti-Matter is a walking nuclear isotope without his suit, as such the suit less fires radiation than unleashes Keyes's now involuntary radiation in targeted bursts. Keyes can give of radiation waves that boost metabolisms, immune-systems and generally mutated the molecular structures of those he considers allies for temporary boosts in strength, stamina, speed and endurance. The Anti-Matter suit itself flies, provides remote communication, computer-access to Keyes' many other inventions, including full operating systems for the plants themselves and most importantly keeps Keyes from accidentally nuking Praetoria. After Cole gives Keyes access to his power source, the multiversal/divine nexus point The Well of the Furies, Keyes is boosted to the level of the emperor Incarnate - basically a demi-god. In his Incarnate state, Keyes can actually handle being made a channeling point for all his reactors at once, and Keyes goes from being a walking nuclear-isotope to a walking set of nuclear power-plants!

Personality
Keyes was always and outcast due to his intellect but began to be pillared after Berry became a peer in intellect. His need for validation drives him to validate any action he has to take to win himself the recognition he so desperately craves. Players starting off as Praetorians have access to two main factions, each faction with branching paths. While one can join The Resistance, that opposes Emperor Cole's rule it has two sides to it, one is for those seeking freedom while the other is for those seeking anarchy, neither able to exist without the other and violence and liberty are linked for the Resistance, though players can try to focus on one or the other. Praetorian Loyalists, work for Emperor Cole's government and will follow inverse paths of either Responsibility or Power while being passed along from contact to contact. Keyes is the final contact for the Responsibility path, introduced by Mother. Fittingly Berry is part of the Power path as even on a meta-level the two compete with each-other. Keyes can, will and has done morally reprehensible things but validates every last one of them as being necessary for the good of Praetoria. His strong sense of justice in-combination with his misfortunes has given him a massive martyr-complex, allowing him to justify anything he needs to do. After sipping from the Well, Anti-Matter can't think clearly anymore and forgets to account for the lives of those just beyond his power-plant if he makes it go nuclear to destroy the invading Primals. Though he does recover his baring somewhat in beta-releases for a future arch of the game (which thanks to NC Soft will now never be released), while high on The Well of the Furies, he turns into a neurotic obsessive mess.