The Teraverse

""How do I become a hero?" More than one person has asked me this, and I think this is a really great question. You do not need superpowers to be a hero. There are everyday heroes all around us... All you need is the morals and the strength to ask the question you already posed."

- Terawatt, in Chapter 73 of The Secret Return of Alex Mack

The Teraverse (also called the "Alexverse") is a Shared Universe Fanfic setting created essentially by accident by author Diane Castle with the publication between 2012 and 2014 of her Alex Mack fanfic The Secret Return of Alex Mack. The story of how Alex Mack transformed herself from "a kid with powers" to her Earth's counterpart to Superman inspired a whole raft of other fan writers, who began creating their own stories set in the same world (with Castle's permission).

At its core, the Teraverse started out as a blend of The Secret World of Alex Mack and a highly variant version of The DCU in which counterparts to the characters of the latter are starting to appear (not necessarily in familiar forms) at the turn of the 21st century. As writers joined the project and added their own ideas to the 'Verse, it quickly evolved into a world that only superficially resembled our own before the advent of Terawatt, and which had a secret history of metahumans and weird science dating back centuries or even millennia. Along the way a world that started out with a mostly Black and White Morality became somewhat more nuanced, but never to the point of excusing its villains and their depravity.

The Teraverse does not yet have a dedicated home page, but a listing of its fics is included on the home page for Castle's intersecting series A Brane of Extraordinary Women, and all of the fics in it can be found on the fanfic site Twisting The Hellmouth. Also, Spacebattles.com hosts a discussion area for the Teraverse. With the number of contributors it possesses and the rate at which stories in its 'Verse are being written, it may come to rival Undocumented Features in size and scope in only a few more years. The authors (especially Diane) also all tend to Show Their Work and/or Write What They Know in a multitude of obscure fields.


 * The Secret Return of Alex Mack, which unintentionally launched the 'Verse.
 * Hermione Granger and the Boy Who Lived by Diane Castle
 * The Lion, the Walsh, and the Laboratory by Speakertocustomers
 * As the general saw it... by fpb
 * Refusing the Call by Zeviz
 * It is to Laugh by batzulger
 * I Thought I Was Crazy by batzulger
 * Nevada by batzulger
 * A Matter of Family by AntonioCC
 * Thank Yuh Very Much by batzulger
 * Rough Day at the Office by batzulger
 * Flyover Country by batzulger
 * MINUSCULE by batzulger
 * The First Cut is the Deepest by Speakertocustomers
 * Hunter's Moon by batzulger
 * Band in Boston by hysteriumredux
 * Bee Alone by Traszgo
 * Ye Shall Not Die Alone by BobSchroeck
 * Legacies by hysteriumredux
 * The Crime Dog by hysteriumredux
 * AGENTS by batzulger
 * The Dog Pack by hysteriumredux
 * Announcements by MarcusRowland
 * Release the Hounds by hysteriumredux
 * Apprenticeship by batzulger
 * Source by batzulger
 * Dog Fight by hysteriumredux
 * One Riot by batzulger
 * Shadowbox by batzulger
 * Snapshots by Letomo
 * BeeDazzled by batzulger
 * Leverage Inc. by Letomo
 * Leaping to Conclusions by batzulger
 * Inside Job by hysteriumredux
 * Bad Medicine by MarcusRowland
 * Cave Canem by hysteriumredux
 * Messing With The Mouse by MarcusRowland
 * Boston Accent by hysteriumredux
 * Stone City Blues by batzulger
 * The Gonged by Manchester
 * Promethean by batzulger
 * La Ville des Lumières (et du Sang) by batzulger
 * The Champions by batzulger
 * It's Just A Habit by CaptainBoulanger
 * AXAA AAXC GYAG CYGG... by batzulger
 * Standard Practice by hysteriumredux
 * Empires by batzulger
 * Life's a Beach by CaptainBoulanger
 * Cut Bait and Fish by hysteriumredux
 * Dirty Science by batzulger
 * X Insert by AceDreamer
 * Detective... by batzulger
 * Terawatt: Seven days in Italy by fpb
 * Five Golden Rings by CaptainBoulanger
 * Dog Days of Summer by hysteriumredux
 * Six by batzulger
 * Living Under Iraq by CaptainBoulanger
 * Been a Long Time by batzulger
 * Five Photographers Alex Met and One She Didn't by MarcusRowland
 * Shellfish and Sea Dogs by hysteriumredux
 * Operation Eternal Flame by CaptainBoulanger
 * The Secret Collocation of Alex Mack by Diane Castle
 * Buckeroo Bonsai by hysteriumredux
 * [Fiddler by batzulger

The Teraverse overlaps with Diane Castle's series A Brane of Extraordinary Women, which chronicles in its various parts events which take place in several different universes, of which the Teraverse is only one.

There also exists a Who's Who in the Tera-Verse guide, listing characters, organizations and locations in a format similar to that seen in "official" guides to The DCU and the Marvel Universe. It can be found here. (Warning! Spoilers abound!)

Finally, artwork for the Teraverse can be found on the home page of A Brane of Extraordinary Women.

In addition to the sources already incorporated into The Secret Return of Alex Mack, the Teraverse also includes elements and/or characters from the following works:


 * Angel


 * Archie Comics


 * The Assassination Bureau


 * Banacek


 * Big Trouble in Little China


 * Black Mask


 * Black Scorpion


 * Boondock Saints


 * Boston Legal


 * The Bourne Legacy


 * Breaking Bad


 * Bubba Ho-Tep


 * Burt & I


 * The Cellar Series by Bob Mayer


 * The Champions


 * Charlie Chan


 * Charmed


 * Christopher Cool: TEEN Agent


 * Colossus: The Forbin Project


 * Condor


 * Danger Man


 * Demon Seed


 * The Departed


 * Department S


 * The Destroyer


 * Dexter


 * The "Medfield College" movies from Disney: Flubber, The Computer Wore Tennis Shoes, Now You See Him, Now You Don't, and The Strongest Man in the World


 * Drop the Dead Donkey


 * Dumbo


 * The Eiger Sanction and The Loo Sanction


 * Eisenhower and Lutz


 * The Embassy


 * Emergency


 * The Equalizer


 * Evolution


 * An Eye for an Eye


 * Eyes of Laura Mars


 * The FBI


 * Flowers for Algernon


 * Frankenstein


 * Fu Manchu


 * Gladiator


 * Goldeneye


 * Good Will Hunting


 * The Great Pursuit by Tom Sharpe


 * Green Lama


 * Gunsmith Cats


 * Harvey


 * Herbie, the Fat Fury


 * Hitman: Codename 47


 * Hooper


 * House


 * Hunter


 * In the Heat of the Night


 * Innocent Blood


 * Inspector Gadget


 * Ironside


 * It Takes a Thief


 * Jason King


 * Jekyll


 * Jerry Maguire


 * The Karate Kid. Both Daniel LaRusso and Julie Pierce are mentioned as the current grandmasters of the Miyagi-Ryu.  Daniel wrote a book that went on to inspire the in-universe version of the Karate Kid movie series.


 * Kim Possible. Although KP is an In-Universe work, there is a dimensional counterpart to Shego in Siobhan Bri, and one to Kim in Trish Chabot.


 * Kolchak the Night Stalker


 * Legally Blonde


 * Leverage


 * A Lobster's Tale


 * The Long Kiss Goodnight


 * Lou Grant


 * Man from Atlantis


 * The Mechanic


 * Men in Black. Agent K has a counterpart in the Teraverse, but there are no aliens, so he was never an MIB.  Oddly enough, there was still a Men in Black movie.


 * NCIS


 * Neverwhere


 * Norse Mythology


 * Northern Exposure


 * Numb3rs


 * The OC


 * Paparazzi


 * Patlabor


 * Payday: The Heist and Payday 2


 * Petticoat Junction


 * Preacher


 * The Prisoner


 * The Prize


 * Professor Challenger


 * Queen and Country


 * Rear Window


 * The Relic


 * Remington Steele


 * Revenge of the Ninja


 * The Ring of Fire books by Eric Flint


 * Rizzoli and Isles


 * Sabotage


 * The Shadow


 * Shannon's Mob


 * Short Circuit


 * Sumuru


 * Stephanie Plum


 * The Strange Case of Doctor Jekyll and Mr. Hyde


 * The Stunt Man


 * The Thomas Crown Affair (1999 remake)


 * The Toby Peters mysteries by Stuart M. Kaminsky


 * Tootsie


 * The Transporter


 * True Lies


 * Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea


 * Universal Studios' classic monster movies: Frankenstein, Creature from the Black Lagoon, The Mummy, Dracula, The Wolf Man


 * Vega$


 * The View Askewniverse, particularly Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back


 * The Wasp Woman


 * ''Watch Dogs Video game


 * Watchers by Dean Koontz


 * West Side Story


 * The West Wing


 * Finally, in an unusual case, characters from Ah! My Goddess, Neon Genesis Evangelion, Bubblegum Crisis and Sailor Moon (among others) briefly appear in a metaphysical realm attached to the Teraverse to.

Some of these may be thoroughly transformed and not obvious. For instance, the Universal monsters are more homages than direct imports.

In-Universe works which have some influence on the events of one or more stories include:


 * The Chronicles of Narnia


 * The Flying Nun


 * The Karate Kid. A movie series based on Miyagi and Me, a non-fiction book written by Daniel Larusso.


 * Kim Possible. Despite this being an In-Universe work, the Teraverse has a dimensional counterpart to Shego in Siobhan Bri, and one to Kim in Trish Chabot.


 * Marvel Comics in general


 * Men in Black. Despite the existence of a dimensional counterpart to Agent K in the Teraverse, there was still a Men in Black movie, whose iconography and code-naming conventions the ISERB have appropriated.


 * Mission: Impossible


 * Monty Python's Flying Circus


 * Newhart


 * Orca: The Killer Whale


 * The Pink Panther


 * The Princess Bride


 * Star Trek

In addition to those tropes present in The Secret Return of Alex Mack, the stories in the Teraverse make use of the following:


 * All Myths Are True:
 * Centuries of weird biosciences are responsible for at least some creatures of myth being real, or at least made real after the fact.


 * Alternate Universe: Very much one of The DCU.
 * Also, Alex Mack is summoned to one by Hermione Granger in The League of Extraordinary Women.


 * Anachronism Stew/Schizo-Tech: Deliberately done by the authors to reflect the more advanced tech level of the Teraverse.  (And according to one of the authors, to annoy readers who get too obsessive about that kind of thing.)


 * Ancient Conspiracy: Not just one but two battling over the control of the world in secret.


 * Anime Catholicism: Very much averted by It's Just A Habit, which depicts a very real Catholicism.


 * Another Dimension: Bendix Space, which is essentially a universe filled with nothing but roiling energy that some devices and metas can tap.


 * Artificial Intelligence: Only one so far, but they are one of the scariest hackers and crackers in the 'verse.


 * Atomic Hate: Nuclear events have occurred multiple times on US, Lebanese, and Chinese soil in the past decade or so. These include everything from meta and Godzilla Option situations, to something of the scale of an Atomic Hand Grenade.


 * Back from the Dead: Lord Deathstrike from Hermione Granger and the Boy Who Lived didn't actually die, although many in the intelligence community thought he had for about a decade.  Regardless, even if he had, he could have come back with a combination of the weird-science cloning and memory upload technologies he came up with.


 * Bad Habits: Averted by Sister Marie of the Order of Sainte Jeanne, who is a genuine nun who happens to have super powers.


 * Badass Normal: The Breslynn Orphans and many other "metas" are really just humans engineered to be at the top end of the bell curve and aren't, strictly speaking, "super" at all, any more than Captain America is.
 * There are also the various academy-trained intelligence specialists, many of which are qualified for this trope.


 * Based on a True Story: The in-universe Karate Kid movies, with a little Adaptation Decay thrown in.


 * The Cameo: Alex/Terawatt herself makes surprisingly few appearances in these stories, and when she does it's almost always as a supporting character, and often in disguise or her civilian identity. Most of the authors keep a hands-off approach because they don't want to screw up in writing her.


 * Canine Companion: Umysl, Penny Wynalazek's service dog and unofficial mascot of the Chicago Crew hero team.


 * The Caper: Any time Allison Mundy shows up, there is a high likelihood that a caper of some kind is occurring.


 * The Chessmaster: Dumont Appledore and Sefot Na-Gavolot.


 * Christianity Is Catholic: Well, for Sister Marie it is.


 * Cloak and Dagger: Most of the agencies involved in the Shadow War fall under this trope.


 * Cloning Blues: Lord Deathstrike's seemingly endless collection of secret bases with their cloning tubes.
 * The Nazi experiments to clone Hitler which led to the Breslynn Orphans and other enhanced humans.


 * Collective Identity: Spring-Heel'd Jackie is the poster child for this one.


 * Cyborg: Cybernetic replacements/enhancements are definitely a maturing technology in the Teraverse, with cyborged animals and humans appearing, including Konneycha and Cerberus of the Chicago Seven, and Cesca Santana's associate Romeo. On the villainous side, several opponents including Ort-Myer, Onatopp, and 47 have been upgraded.


 * Death Ray: Created by Lord Deathstrike using a transuranic element found in a meteor.


 * Everything Is Online: Shown by the CtOS and Ted Kord's, Malcolm's, and Willow Rosenberg's ability to infiltrate almost any form of telecommunications or computer records.


 * Fake Nationality: Spring-Heel'd Jackie, twice over:  once for being a Fake Brit (and a pseudo-Victorian as well!), but even more for being a Fake Extradimensional Alien.
 * Rinkin Mueller (a Japanese/German) almost never operates under her own nationality having impersonated an Aussie (her most common), a Texas ex-Beauty Queen-looking woman, a South African, a Chinese, and a Russian.
 * Stewart Scott has made a career of impersonating Russian and Serbian mobsters.


 * Fantastic Catholicism: We see the very beginning of it in It's Just a Habit when Sister Marie and two other nuns found the Order of Sainte Jeanne.  Officially an order of nuns dedicated to first responders and emergency preparedness, it is also explicitly intended as an order for nuns with super-powers -- like Sister Marie -- and their support structure.


 * Fast Roping: Many of the trope's fallacies are averted when it is performed by Mike Long, Alf Bellows, and Dexter Reilly as a variant on the Super Window Jump escape plan in Dallas.


 * Flying Saucer: The ISERB (aka The Men in Black) have several of these built from Nazi designs. These Haunebu units are also capable of going invisible.


 * Gadgeteer Genius: Scattered all throughout the Teraverse, including such notables as Ted Kord, Dr. Gretchen Thomke, Fred Burkle, and Penny Wynalazek.


 * Giant Enemy Lobsters: Larry, Darryl and Darryl, the bus-sized lobsters that appear in Boston, led by the Merman.
 * And let us not forget their smaller cousin, Burt.


 * Goggles Do Something Unusual: Hermione Granger's sunglasses in much of Hermione Granger and the Boy Who Lived -- they're the display screen for her forearm-mounted computer.
 * Also Cate Baltimore and Dana Tasker's sunglasses, which function as a display for some of their gear.


 * Half-Human Hybrid: In addition to the products of Nazi weird science, there are also Lord Deathstrike's lizard-men and wolf-men.
 * The Merman.


 * He's Just Hiding: Lord Deathstrike, for ten years or so, in-universe.


 * Heterosexual Life Partners: Dr. Gretchen Thomke and Detective Lien Kane, the two women who take turns being "Spring-Heel'd Jackie", are shaping up into this (though not entirely by Gretchen's choice).


 * Mercenaries: There is a remarkable assortment of them in the Teraverse. People that are willing to fight and kill for money range from elite Assassins and former assassins like guns for hire Siobhan Bri and and Ethan Rayne; to the Consummate Professionals that are contracted to Department Six such as Wanderer, Wipe-Out, Socrates, and the Kid; and on to Private Military Contractors as in Nick Tollander and his Oneida Assets firm.


 * Hollywood Nuns: Averted with The Order of Sainte Jeanne.


 * Humanoid Alien: What Spring-Heel'd Jackie claims to be.


 * Impersonation Gambit: Performed by both Dana Tasker and Cate Baltimore.
 * Also a semi-reverse performed by.
 * Stewart Scott is frequently undercover as a gangster (usually Russian or Serbian), though he has gone undercover as himself once.


 * Intoxication Ensues: A mild case of this affects both women who portray Spring-Heel'd Jackie when they wear the suit; the technology behind the suit has a mild side effect on their brains that reduces their inhibitions and enhances their libidos.  It's nowhere near severe enough to be a problem, and it helps make Jackie's personality quite different from either of their own.


 * Last Rites: Averted and discussed in It's Just A Habit.  At the start of the story POV character Marie O'Neill is a Catholic Eucharistic minister -- a variety of Catholic lay-clergy with a very limited remit -- and in one chapter she remarks on the difference between the movies and reality when it comes to the Sacrament of the Anointing of the Sick.


 * Lizard Folk: The Lizard King of the Chicago Seven along with his 'relatives', the Kothaga.
 * Lord Deathstrike's lizard men Mooks.


 * Lower Deck Episode: Several stories shift the focus to the less-prominent members of the SRI, and let us see just how badass they can be on their own.


 * Loyal Phlebotinum: Inverted.  Anyone can use the Death Rays created by Lord Deathstrike on any target they like -- but they are keyed to his DNA and will blow up if they are turned on him.  (Harry Potter had a sample of Deathstrike's DNA injected into him as an infant, which was unfortunate for Deathstrike...)


 * Magic: One of the most FORBIDDEN elements of the Teraverse. No spells or spellcasters are permitted.


 * Master of Disguise Rinkin Mueller, the Wanderer.


 * The Men in Black: Field agents of the ISERB have sort of fallen into using the MIB look and feel, lifted from an in-universe Men in Black movie which appears to have been similar to the one in our time line.


 * Meta Fic: A couple of the stories include or are actually glimpses at In-Universe fan works, including content posted on "Twisting the X-Men", the counterpart to the series' host site Twisting The Hellmouth in a world where Buffy Summers is a real person but not a Slayer.


 * Mind Control: Lord Deathstrike has a mind control system composed of two parts -- a bulky "chair" in which the actual mind control is accomplished, and a coin-sized disk which is implanted behind the ear of the controlled victim and is basically a radio receiver for verbal commands from a handler.  The "chair" is large enough that it requires a good-sized van or truck to transport it, and it takes several hours to subdue a victim.


 * No Conservation of Energy: A consequence of anyone or anything that taps Bendix Space for power, because doing so is essentially stealing energy from one universe for use in another.
 * Averted, at least partially, for those characters like Terawatt and Sister Marie whose powers impose a sometimes drastically increased caloric intake on them. (The "partially" comes from it being unclear whether they are actually taking in as many calories as their powers expend; in many cases there appears to be a rather large shortfall which has to be made up from somewhere.)


 * Non-Human Sidekick: Romeo, the heavily cyborged Leopard that is the inseparable companion of Cesca Santana.


 * Nuns Are Spooky: Although she actively works to avoid this trope, Sister Marie of the Order of Sainte Jeanne does sometimes give off this vibe -- particularly in a moment in It's Just A Habit where she castigated the mayor of San Diego for trying to politicize her, then flew into a church whose doors opened for her apparently on their own.


 * Obfuscating Stupidity: One of BeeDazzle's tactics for keeping her various personae separate -- her hero ID deliberately comes across as a bit of a Valley Girl Ditz.


 * One Riot, One Ranger: Actually recognized in story by anybody that's met Cesca Santana.


 * Our Vampires Are Different: Marie and Joe are created by a modified fungus administered to Marie as part of a Nazi experiment.


 * Our Werewolves Are Different: Lord Deathstrike's "wolf-men".  They don't actually transform, physically, but are in all other regards basically Hollywood-style wolfmen.


 * Our Zombies Are Different:
 * Aidos and Bill Glenmorgan are Type Cs created by Dr. Tucker Wells's research.
 * Awqasisa is a Type-PS from a symbiotic relationship with a lichen, and unlike most Type-PS she is fully intelligent and is non-infectious and non-murderous.


 * Posse: "Jackie's Boyz", AKA San Francisco's "Bay Area Meta Operations Task Force", who have fallen into a comfortable partnership with Spring-Heel'd Jackie, and hover somewhere between the classic use and the modern use of the term.


 * Powered Armor: Numerous examples, ranging from the powered diving hardsuits used by Schubert's goons to the Black Scorpion's mix of armor and magnetic fields to Spring-Heel'd Jackie's convincing but bogus alien guise.  After biochemical manipulation, this is the number two way of becoming "super" in the Teraverse.


 * Psychopomp: The girls  in Ye Shall Not Die Alone.


 * Reformed Criminal: Various. Kaji, Azure Crush, Aidos, Wanderer, Orhidei, and the entire Mundy Family for example.


 * Rogue Agent: Dumont Appledore ran an entire rogue intelligence network inside the British intelligence community in the Backstory (and main story) of Hermione Granger and the Boy Who Lived.  Later, Hermione, Ron and Harry themselves are essentially rogue agents (although with the tacit approval of some factions of British Intelligence), and end up running their own network.
 * There is also an entirely impromptu team of intelligence, military, and 'independent' specialists that has taken it upon themselves to deal with some of the greater secret threats.
 * Ethan Rayne is an example of a rogue turned mercenary.


 * Secret War: A subsection of the stories deals with the organizations and people that allowed something like Harworts and the other intelligence academies to be created, and in fact necessary.


 * Shared Universe


 * Significant Anagram: "I am Lord Deathstrike" from "Thomas Arkheit Riddle", in an analogue to Tom Riddle/Voldemort.


 * Sinister Surveillance: Malcolm used this and Everything Is Online to assist in an attempted takeover of the entire city of Chicago.


 * Spy School: The UK's Harworts, The US's Culpepper Academy, The PRC's Temple, and the Russian Institute and Finishing School are just some of the elite training sites. The various ninja clans have their own schools and the League and the Order also have their own facilities.


 * Stock Ninja Weaponry: Subverted by the Wanderer; as she has said, "It's the 21st century, why should I be stuck with gear from the 15th century if there's better stuff around?" She will use swords and other traditional weapons, but only if they are the best tools for the job at hand.


 * Super Serum: GC-161 and its various knock-offs and offshoots: Tar, Rush, Asp and more.
 * Then there's the work of the Nazis, Deathstrike, and other "weird scientists".
 * And finally, the various natural enhancement compounds found in distant, isolated spots, like the Lazarus Pits and the Waters of Teraka.


 * Super Soldier: Technically Hannah, the 701 soldiers, and Mr. 47; as they all were engineered or augmented to their current level of ability. The point could be made that Marie and Joe and the Champions also qualify.


 * Sweet Polly Oliver: Performed by Wanderer in her "Strannik" ID and BeeDazzle as her "Mr. Unknown" persona. Wanderer is good enough and has practiced this identity so thoroughly that she has currently been able to fool ...so far.


 * Talk Show: Stay Up Late! with Buffy Summers.


 * Teen Superspy: Harworts (or any of the other academy's), grads all qualify as they will be still in their teens at the time of the graduation ceremony. Others that qualify are 'Homeschooled' or 'Independent' such as Dana Tasker, Marcie Ross to some extent, Alexi Mundy or any of the Mundy children, and of course Cate Baltimore. The Kid from Department Six is also one of these at the start of his career.


 * They Walk Among Us: Invoked in-universe by Spring-Heel'd Jackie, who claims to be an extradimensional exile. (But really isn't.)


 * Time Travel: One of the most FORBIDDEN elements of the Teraverse. Any sort of temporal fiddling is not allowed.


 * Uplifted Animal: Dr. Suzanne MacGregor, an enhanced orangutan.
 * To a much lesser degree, Cesca Santana's associate Romeo.


 * The Verse


 * Weird Science: Much of it dating back to Those Wacky Nazis.  The summer 2016 story Dirty Science is about a US military team set up to recover and protect artifacts of weird science, some of which was created "off the books" as part of Operation Paperclip immediately after World War II.
 * Some of it is even older. There's the work of Hugo Danner's father in the very early years of the 20th century, and Salazar's alchemical experiments with the radioactive meteorite he found some centuries earlier.