NUAGE

Real Name: Silvie Rouge 

Identity/Class: Human, source of superhuman abilities unrevealed (see comments);
   citizen of France 

Occupation: Adventurer;
   former S.H.I.E.L.D. agent, EuroLab science officer 

Group Membership: Euroforce (Argento/Michele Argento, Danger/Dolph Dongen, Deep Sight/Jane Melville, Key/Geyr Kluge, Picaro/Antonio Rey, Tiger/Hughes Aït-Kaci);
   formerly EuroLab (Danger, Deep Sight, Key, Picaro), EuroMind, S.H.I.E.L.D.   

Affiliations: Director François Borillon, Moloid Subterraneans, Task Force (Argento, Blue Condor/Emilie Scholz, Dragonfly/Cornelia van der Valk, Iceboy/Hamish Carlyle, Tiger)

Enemies: A.I.M., Lords of War (Kaneda, Oda, Sakuragi, others), S.H.A.P.E. (Supreme Headquarters Allied Powers Europe) Commission, "Skrullified" subterranean Inhumans

Known Relatives: None 

Aliases: Cloud (English translation of Nuage)

Base of Operations: Mobile throughout Europe;
    formerly EuroMind base, Spain;
    formerly Avignon, France

First Appearance: Europa#0 (April 1996) 

Powers/Abilities: Nuage is a telepath, extremely adept at using her abilities but limited in terms of power. She can sense other minds, allowing her to identify where and how many people are in a given vicinity, and communicate telepathically, thus overcoming any language barriers. By preventing someone from looking in a specific direction or stopping the information provided by their senses from being properly processed by the mind, she can effectively cloak people, but her range is limited to small areas, so that others farther away can still see the cloaked individuals, and she can't maintain this cloaking for very long.

    She can blast people telepathically, knocking them out in an instant. She is also telekinetic and able to fly short distances. She is always accompanied by a flying sphere of unidentified material or energy, which changes color, perhaps reflecting her mood or level of power being called on (see comments). She can send it flying into people to knock them out. Overusing her powers swiftly exhausts Nuage and gives her pounding headaches. A scientist, Nuage is trained in ethology, the study of animal behavior including how biology shapes human behavior and social organization, with an emphasis on interspecies communication.

Height: 6' (by approximation)
Weight: 160 lbs. (by approximation)
Eyes: Green (see comments)
Hair: Blonde

History: (Europa#1 back cover text) - Silvie Rouge was born in Avignon, France.

(Europa#0/text (fb) - BTS) - She spent her infancy having to overcome her fears, and came to possess telepathic and telekinetic powers via unspecified means. In connection to this, she came to possess a floating sphere that accompanied her most of the time (see comments).

(Europa#1 back cover text) - Silvie studied ethology and did advanced research on communications between differing species.

(Europa#0/text (fb) - BTS) -  She joined EuroLab, a scientific research division for EuroMind, a European section of S.H.I.E.L.D. that answered to S.H.A.P.E. (Supreme Headquarters Allied Powers Europe). They were first responders dedicated to the survey and study of all paranormal phenomena encountered within Europe (and sometimes beyond), and were based out of EuroMind's complex in a secret location near Spain's Mediterranean coast. She took the codename Nuage (French for Cloud).

(Europa#2 (fb) - BTS) - EuroLab's leader, Key, formerly of S.H.I.E.L.D.'s Science Division, was assured that EuroMind (and by extension EuroLab) was intended to be a scientific research organization, not a front for a disguised military unit.

(Europa#0/text (fb) - BTS) - Though many of EuroLab possessed talents that could be used for fighting, they were not considered a combat unit, and so the rapid-response S.H.I.E.L.D. combat unit Task Force was sometimes sent along on their missions to lend assistance if required.  

(Europa#0/2) - EuroLab were sent to an archeological site in Spain to investigate alleged monster sightings, with Task Force present to monitor their mission. Via a natural gorge, EuroLab descended into the cavern system below, where Nuage sensed something awakening, and her teammate Picaro noticed a grotesque insectoid creature watching them. Initially it seemed non-hostile, but then the creature began transforming into something even more monstrous, and EuroLab's Danger spotted more approaching, seemingly drawn by EuroLab's lights. After the first creature attacked, Key instructed the team to withdraw into an adjacent cavern where they found humanoid skeletons, long picked clean of flesh. Noticing the frontal lobes and parietals, Nuage deduced the bones belonged to Inhumans, but her musings were interrupted as she sensed another ground of underground dwellers approaching, this time Moloid Subterraneans. The Moiloids mobbed Picaro while Danger fought a rearguard action against the hostile insectoids. Nuage shouted that according to Reed Richards' notes, Moloids were normally peaceable and sociable, and that she would try to communicate with them, but the numbers were clearly against them, and the insectoids gradually began to get the upper hand. Hearing this over EuroLab's radios, EuroMind's Director François Borillon deployed Task Force, who dropped down into the caverns and into the fray. Task Force ignored the protestations of Danger about their use of lethal force, gunning down the monsters, but Nuage shouted to them that the Subterraneans were not hostile, merely frightened and disoriented. Accepting this, and with more monsters than they could handle anyway, Task Force began defending the Subterraneans too, gunning down the monsters attacking them. Reaching out telepathically, Nuage convinced the Subterraneans that the monsters were a common enemy. More and more insectoids attacked until Dragonfly switched her gun to explosive rounds, and brought down a stone arch on the insectoids' heads, killing them all.

   Afterwards, Eurolab and Task Force discovered inscriptions explaining that the "monsters" were descendants of Inhumans who had been captured by the Spanish Inquisition, and thrown into the gorge to die. A few survived the fall, and, unable to escape the caves, scraped a living, eating whatever they could find. Then the Inquisition dropped another group of "demons" into the precipice; the remains of a crashed Skrull ship and its crew. Eating the dead Skrulls caused a mutagenic change in the remaining Inhumans, driving them insane, and they had degenerated into a colony of predators.

(Europa#1) - In the skies over Chioggia, Italy, a passenger on a civilian flight unexpectedly transformed into a monstrous creature with claws and fangs. His violent rampage into the cockpit caused a forced splashdown. EuroLab was sent to investigate and to recover any survivors, finding the plane barely afloat, taking on water and with the rear already submerged. While Picaro, Deep Sight and Nuage finished evacuating passengers into a life raft, Danger and Key descended further into the sinking plane seeking the mutate. Key soon returned alone, evacuating a young girl he had found, and near the front exit Key handed the child over to Nuage, but was prevented from returning to Danger by Picaro because the plane was about to submerge. On the raft, Nuage tried to comfort the girl, promising her that the monster couldn't hurt anymore, only for the child to dismiss her attempt at reassurance for being obvious; after all, the monster was good, having taken care of her until it heard Danger and Key approaching, prompting it to flee. Seconds later Key and Picaro jumped from the plane's forward hatch just before the craft finally sank beneath the waves. The mutate chose to die rather than continue living as a monster or risk recapture by those who had mutated him, but Danger made it out of the rapidly sinking wreck, barely making it back to the surface. His teammates fished him from the waters to find he was not breathing, and with Nuage sensing no brain activity, they hurriedly attempted to revive him.

(Europa#2/2 (fb) - BTS) - The members of EuroLab successfully revived Danger.

(Europa#2/2 (fb) - BTS) - After Task Force was attacked by armored mercenaries, the Lords of War, while on a mission to Malaysia investigating reports of similar mutates, Tiger and Argento returned to base to report two team members, Dragonfly and Blue Condor, had been slain, Argento had suddenly displayed unpredictable and previously unrevealed superpowers, and that Iceboy was missing. EuroLab also arrived back from their mission, but like Tiger and Argento were ordered to stand down from further investigations.

(Europa#2/2) - Back in EuroMind's Research Center near Spain's Mediterranean coast, Key and Tiger told the rest of EuroLab of and told them of Borillon's orders, that S.H.A.P.E.'s executive commission had closed the case. All of EuroLab responded with incredulity at the instruction, and Tiger pointed out that it didn't take a genius to figure out Nadir, Inc. were behind the Lords of War and Iceboy's abduction. Picaro and Deep Sight suggested they could carry out an unofficial internet investigation of Nadir, but Key replied that he was not planning to sit idly by with Iceboy held prisoner. Despite knowing they would be acting without official permission, the entire team concurred, unaware their discussion was being observed over hidden cameras. Their unseen watcher deployed a hit team hidden within EuroMind's own agents, Blue 1 (Azzurro 1), to eliminate the rogue agents, and the assassins caught up with EuroLab and Tiger after they entered the base's hanger. They opened fire, but between Danger's energy powers and the surprise arrival and intervention of Argento, who had slain his own would-be assassins, the group managed to make their escape in a stolen nuclear plane.

(Europa#3/2 (fb) - BTS) - En route to Western Malaya, EuroLab and the two survivors of Task Force decided to unite as a new team, choosing the name Euroforce. Meanwhile, back at EuroMind, faked video footage was used to frame the group for murdering fellow agents, making them fugitives. However, EuroMind operative Salomé secretly analyzed the footage for Director François Borillon, confirming his suspicion that it had been altered to discredit his operatives. 

(Europa#3/2) - Aware from their investigations that Nadir had an expensive lab on an isolated private island in Western Malaya, the team snuck in. When a guard nearly stumbled across them, Nuage telepathically prevented him from looking at them, effectively cloaking them, then stunned him into unconsciousness when she realized she could not maintain the cloak. Deep Sight accessed the base's map, and the group split into two teams. Argento, Danger, Deep Sight, Nuage and Picaro formed the larger group, designated Euroforce Red, who headed for the lab's main computer to get into the archives, while Tiger and Key (Euroforce Blue) set out to retrieve Iceboy. Unfortunately, the guard was soon discovered, and seconds before the Red squad reached their target the alert was sounded.  

   As Red squad entered the room, Nuage informed Danger that she sensed eight more people inside, while Deep Sight told Picaro she had detected a terminal compatible with her internal biochip A-14. After subduing the guards, Argento and Danger then stood guard while Picaro and Deep Sight worked to access the database, copy it and then destroy it. However, they were interrupted by the Lords of War, who announced their arrival by blasting Danger from behind. Caught on the edge of the blast, Nuage was knocked off her feet and her bolero jacket was shredded.

(Europa#4/2) - The Lords of War learned they had underestimated their new adversaries. Though most of Euroforce's members were not combat specialists like Task Force, this time the Lords of War did not have the advantage of ambushing and downing half their opponents before the battle began. Additionally, the former EuroLab members possessed a wider range of powers than Task Force, who had mostly been armed with military weapons outmatched by the Lords' superior technology. An energy blast from Picaro sent Oda flying backwards, and a telepathic assault by Nuage instantly knocked out Sakuragi. Complaining that these tactics were dishonorable, Kaneda and Oda switched their armors up to higher power levels and charged back into the fray, but were taken by surprise by Argento and Danger, who had been hidden by Nuage's psychic camouflage. As Danger and Argento continued to brawl with their opponents, Nuage asked Picaro if he could assist with another of his charges, explaining that she was too dazed to mentally incapacitate another of the mercenaries; Picaro apologized, noting that activating his mutant powers always left him breathless, hence why he rarely used them. Announcing that she had finished downloading the files and had destroyed the database, Deep Sight added that she didn't foresee any great difficulty taking down the Lords. Nuage drew the Lords attention towards her, distracting them while Deep Sight stepped up behind them and electrocuted them into unconsciousness, a feat she noted was only possible because the battle had ruptured their armors' internal insulators. Noting that his nausea was abating, Picaro enquired how Nuage was doing, and the telepath responded that she was fine apart from a record-breaking headache.

    Heading out, Red squad radioed the others to let them know they had achieved their objective, and Key responded that they should return to their jet, stating that he and Tiger needed no support. Unwilling to leave their friends behind, Red squad ignored this order, reaching Key's location just in time for Nuage to knock out a guard who was about to shoot a distracted Key in the back, sending her sphere flying into the man to knock him out. Then they saw why Tiger and Key's attentions had been elsewhere; Ice Boy's horribly mutated corpse lay on the floor nearby. The group reluctantly accepted it was time to depart before A.I.M. reinforcements or the revived Lords caught up with them. Reaching the exterior of the base, Nuage facilitated sneaking past some guards by telepathically suggesting those sentries look in the other direction as they passed, but other guards she had not noticed spotted them and opened fire; tackling Nuage, Picaro saved her from being shot. Making a dash for it, Euroforce reached their stolen jet, but as they flew away, a trio of armored figures breached the vehicle. The team prepared to fight, but moments later the jet exploded (see comments).




   Director Borillon subsequently informed S.H.A.P.E.'s commission that Euroforce had been slain, then contacted the team, alive and well and staying in a large villa, informing them that he had provided them with fake identities. Until they could prove their innocence and help him uncover just how deep the corruption in EuroMind went, they had to stay officially dead.









Comments: Created by Xavier Marturet and Paco Diaz for Marvel Italia.

   The back cover mini-bios for the team in Europa#1 state that Silvie was born in 1967; this date would count as a topical reference and her year of birth will now be more recent, but they do confirm she was 29 at the time of her debut story.

   There's no information about how she came by her powers, though a mention about having spent her infancy learning to overcome her fears suggests she's had those powers since early childhood. She's nearly always accompanied by a floating sphere (even when out of costume), but this provides little by way of clues, and she's still seen to have use of at least some of her powers the one time the sphere isn't visibly present. That one time was during the rescue mission to the sinking plane; if the sphere is technological, perhaps it's not entirely waterproof and Nuage couldn't risk it being soaked by the sea? It's able to knock someone out when it flies into them; energy might still knock out the target, but the accompanying sound effect and appearance of high speed (it leaves a trail of light behind) suggests a high speed impact by something solid. Her powers could be technological, provided or boosted by the (mechanical?) sphere; though the infancy statement would seem to make this less likely, perhaps her parents felt she was in some kind of danger and the sphere was a guardian of sorts, or perhaps her childhood fears were not caused by powers and she developed technology that granted telepathy to somehow help her overcome those fears? Perhaps more likely is that she might be a mutant or mutate, and the sphere is some sort of manifestation of her psychic powers, like Psylocke's blades; if a mutant, then her absence in EuroLab and Euroforce's post-Europa appearances might be because she was depowered on M-Day. It's even feasible that she's not human; just because she was born in France doesn't mean her family couldn't be extraterrestrials, Inhumans, or something else; maybe the sphere's real purpose is to maintain a human disguise for her (though I think this last is probably pushing the speculation a tad too far). In fact, if her parents were aliens who had come to Earth to study humanity, that might even explain her interest in xenobiology and interspecies communication.

   The aforementioned sphere changes color. It was blue when she was in the Spanish caves, but orange to red for most of the infiltration of Nadir, which might either indicate her state of mind (angrier when dealing with the people who had murdered half of Task Force?) or be an indication of higher power usage on that mission. However, the colorists changed between issues, so it might also just be down to that. For what it's worth, the cover of Europa#4 depicts her during the events of that issue (her bolero jacket is shredded, which happened at the end of Europa#3) with a blue sphere.

   Talking of changing color, a close-up of her eyes in Europa#0 confirms them to be green (as do a couple of other more "long range" panels), but in Europa#2 her eyes are blue. In a universe full of superpowers, it's certainly possible that Nuage could have eyes that change color, but it's more likely to be a coloring error. Her bolero jacket also changes color between issues; on its own, I'd have put that down to a simple costume change, but in conjunction with the eyes and sphere color changes...  

   It's not overtly stated who attacked the jet after Euroforce fled Malaya. The attackers are drawn wearing armor similar to the known Lords of War, but the man behind them, one of S.H.A.P.E.'s commission, was informed the Lords were unconscious at the time the jet blew up, so it seems the whole attack, not just Euroforce's "demise," was a fake. Euroforce were surprised by the armored trio who breached the jet, clearly thinking they were the Lords, but given the subsequent revelation that Borillon was assisting the team, it seems likely he was behind the "attackers." However, who they were remains unrevealed.  

   It is unclear from Euroforce's more recent appearance in Avengers World whether the old team members have left or not. Given that Key was present to recruit Black Knight for the mission, and mentioned EuroLab, it appears the more scientific team has been re-established, which could explain the absence of all the old EuroLab members from said mission. Meanwhile Euroforce seems to have taken up what were effectively the duties of the old Task Force, investigating more perilous, likely to end in combat, missions. As such, it would make sense why Tiger was the only old Euroforce member to go on the City of the Dead mission; he's one of Task Force's two surviving members, so he wouldn't have transferred to EuroLab. The other Task Force survivor, Argento, might have been depowered on M-Day, or, given they only had four hours to deploy to Velletri, might simply have been elsewhere when the team got scrambled.

Profile by Wolfhead and Loki, with invaluable aid from comic translator Angelo Mammone.












CLARIFICATIONS:
Nuage has no known connections to

images: (without ads)
All images from Europa issues, 2nd (Euroforce) stories:
#4, p13, pan 1 (main)
#3, p15, pan 1 (head and shoulder shot)
#0, p13, pan 4 (with yellow jacket and blue sphere)
#3, p2, pan 4 (telepathic knockout, with green jacket and red sphere)
#4, p2, pan 1 (knocking out Sakuragi telepathically)
#4, p21, pan 2 (in civilian gear without eyepatch makeup)
#4, p12, pan 4 and p13, pan 1 (using [red] sphere as flying bludgeon, with shredded jacket)
#4, cover (shredded jacket but blue sphere)

Appearances:
Europa#0-5 (April-October, 1996) - Xavier Marturet (writer), Paco Diaz (art), Enrico Fornaroli; Marco M. Lupoi; Miguel Carrasco (editors)

First posted: 01/13/2019
Last updated: 01/13/2019

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