(Warning: this is very superhero-ish again, and this uses Mindscapes and Psionics, with some nods towards Cityworks haha.)
111, A small-town country bard who travels to the big city as he hears so much of its glorious delights and famed sophisication. He is quickly disillusioned and finds himself out of work as his rural, rustic songs aren't appreciated by the city-dwellers (with the exception of the rural-urban migrants, but they aren't nearly rich enough to pay for his living) and is roped into a gang. With little power or protection, he thus becomes a reluctant criminal to survive. He works by being a listener and informant for the gangs on the street- all that memorizing and musical training helps to keep him alert and attentive.
Gang war and mob conflicts ensue, and his gang loses - he is "punished" for being a snitch and stool pigeon by the foes of the gangs he ran with. His ears are stabbed, and his tongue is cut out so that he can never hear or speak again, and he is left gagging, bleeding slowly to death, and thrown into the sewers of the city to rot. There, he is healed by the personification of the Spirit of the City, the nature-spirit of sorts that is the City's spiritual manifestation, who wishes to shirk and cleanse itself of its taint and blight. He is reborn, of sorts, and something changes inside him - he discovers a new sensitivity for sound and manipulating that sound. he adopts the path of a psychic warrior and eventually becomes a Voce Warrior, and uses his knowledge of the streets (bardic knowledge and skills etc) to protect the people from the gangs and mobs as a masked vigilante. His voice itself is the weapon that shatters the blades of the injust and the wills of the craven. The city itself speaks to him through his telepathic powers, a memory, or a dream-hope, of the people's wishes for a better and safer life, and thus he serves that cause that has returned him to life.
i played this PC for a while, but the game didn't really last long. unfortunately, i lost my secret identity in the end of the very first session - all in all, i wasn't too good a masked mystery man
yours,
shao