Hydrant



A gruff and grumbly robot designed to look like a fire hydrant.

Origin
The original idea for The Hydrant was from boy inventor Richard "Dickie" Dean who had the idea of a robot hero that could easily hide in an urban or suburban setting. Dickie became distracted with other things and ended up putting the project on indefinite hiatus. However someone, no one knows who, finished the construction of the robot. The Hydrant doesn't know how he ended up in Philadelphia in 1949, or why he feels driven to help people or even why he knows his "real" name is Fred J. Plugraff. He assumes that is just how he was programmed and isn't about to let anyone tinker with his inner workings to find out. It could be one of the reasons for the robot's generally grouchy disposition. His heroics got him a semiofficial job as a Philly superhero as part of a super task force. For three years he was the only super being on the task force and the humans tended to change out regularly, due partially to Fred's grating persona. In retrospect he would later quip that it was the greatest time of his existance.

Things changed in 1952 when a canine headed alien ambassador from the Sirrus system landed near Philly. The alien quickly became enamoured with Earth's superhero subculture and wanted to be a part of it. Despite having seniority The Hydrant was essentially relegated to be the alien's sidekick, mostly due to likability. They gave the new arrival the monicker of The Great Dane and he took an human sounding alias of Talbot Molossus. It could have been an ignorance of human culture, but Talbot couldn't grasp why The Hydrant would find a canine looking partner embarrassing... or why the humans kept on asking what it was like to always have a bathroom nearby. It could be that the alien was remarkably oblivious. Despite being somewhat dense The Great Dane was every bit a hero: brave, kind, outgoing, and loved by all... except The Hydrant. Despite being an odd duo the two have stayed partners and still fight crime together to this day.

Powers

 * Water Generation (can shoot water from his base, top, hands, and mouth)
 * Flight, from firing a spout of water from his base.
 * His robotic qualities make it so he doesn't need sleep, air, etc. Unlike most robots he doesn't need to recharge. What powers him and how he is able to generate massive amounts of water is a mystery.