Martian

Martians are creatures native to the planet Mars, a neighbor of Earth in the Sol system.

Martians are incredibly resilient and unique creatures. An individual Martian possesses exceptional psychic talents, able to communicate wordlessly over a significant distance. Any given Martian is capable of shapeshifting to a remarkable degree, with perfect control over their bodies to the molecular level. Martians can become as hard as steel or phase through solid matter. They can fly at subsonic speeds unaided and are incredibly dense and tough, allowing them to lift substantial weight. Martians breath C02 and prefer an atmospheric temperature of around 45F. At 140F or higher, Martians actually pass out in a few minutes and may even die. Martians have a profound psychological aversion to flames and can catch fire at approximately 300F of temperature.

Green Martians share in a 'race memory'. Any experience of any member of the race can be recalled by all others. This has turned them into pacifists as a matter of social courtesy; no Martian wants to add to the suffering of their people. White Martians do not have this racial trait. There is a disease among Martians that dates back to their primordial roots: too much exposure and close psychic contact can trigger a burning conflagration. Intense emotions can rapidly spread from carrier to carrier, and closely interlinked Martians can die in short order. For this reason, Martian psychic contacts are infrequent and highly regimented affairs.

History

16,000 BCE, the Martians were a singular race called the Burning. Malevolent and hostile, their relative lack of technical capability kept them from being a threat in the millennia previous. They thrived on fire and violence, with intense psychic battles producing burning conflagrations form which new progeny would emergy.

Eventually the Martians developed the means for interstellar flight, and attacked Earth. Atlantean magic handily repelled them, and Asgard set satellite guardians in place to monitor the planet.

A mystical plague-curse was released on Mars sometime before 16,000 BCE. It sterilized many Martians and slowed their birth rate. It also instilled a weakness to intense heat and a fear of fire in general, forcing Martians to reproduce through pair bonding.

Martians no longer existed as burning pyres of psychic rage. Instead, they developed an insectlike appearance with green skin and deep red eyes, though they retained their psychic talents. However, a unique mutation would strike just under 1% of the Martian population due to latent Celestial DNA patterns. This infant would have all the powers of the Martians, but be much stronger physically as well as more resistant to psychic influence. However, increased tendencies towards violence made them a lower social class-- White Martians were generally confined to their own regions, and ostracized from regular Martian society.

In 14,000 BCE, the White Martians attempted an invasion of Earth, in retribution for Atlantis' harsh manipulation of their species. Simultaneously, civil war broke out in Mars as White Martians sought to wrest control from the ruling caste of Greens.

The Martian invasion force encountered the Inhumans and ousted them from the Kree science colony vessel. With Kree science in hand, the White Martians recognized the much-craved Celestial DNA strains that were also present in their people before Atlantean sterilization. In retribution, they modified the Terrigen Mists to delete the coding for the Celestial genetic code, and released it into the upper atmosphere. 99.9% of the human species lost their metahuman genetic potential.

The invading White Martians then attempted to build permanent portals to their homeworld, but the damage to the Demiurge destabilized their efforts. The portal remains intermittently active in Central America to this day.

Five years later, the Green Martians gained enough of a foothold on Mars to pursue their enemies to Earth. They assisted the Inhumans with retaking their home on the Kree vessel, and many White Martians were lost to space in time when their transit portal was destroyed with an invading force en route.

The Greens prepared to withdraw with their cousins, but humanity had other ideas. The Inhumans burned down 100,000 acres of rain forest and killed the thousand remaining White Martians in the conflagration. This action so horrified the Green Martians that they abandoned their colony plans and returned to Mars. With dwindling birth rates and the loss of tens of thousands of Martians, the outlook for the species over the next millennia was lonely and bleak.

J'onn J'onnz came to Earth following the crash of a Kryptonian hyperspace pod in 1986. The first Martian to visit the planet in centuries, he concealed his identity using shapeshifting. Taking the name John Jones, he accepted a position as a private detective, similar to his duties as a Manhunter in the Martian police force.