Svetlana X

Origin

In the world of Tom Strong, Svetlana X is the protector and highly popular heroine of the Soviet Union, which apparently fared much better for itself in this world. She has been called “Tom Strong’s opposite number in Russia.” Svetlana X has been active since at least the 1940s, as Tom Strong said he met her at Stalingrad - presumably the WWII Battle of Stalingrad - where she helped turn the tide. It's possible she and Tom Strong where enemies during the Cold War, but they have long since been allies, calling on each other for aid on numerous occasions.

Svetlana X is often helped by her husband Dimitri; she has mentioned that she owed him many favors, with their marriage possibly being the result of one such favor. Dimitri is reported to have many specialized skills that have proven useful to Svetlana, but he’s probably not a specialist in the hard sciences though, as Svetlana calls on Tom Strong when it comes to those and she's even joked about Dimitri not being a technical expert.

Although she speaks fluent English, Svetlana tends to get American colloquialisms wrong, typically by using a synonym instead of the usual term in the phrase. She rarely seems to care about getting her expressions right though.

• “I knew that. I’m just giving you feces.”
• “Oh, great. Now we’re really copulated.”
• “I hope Dalhua is not urinated with me.”

Creation

Svetlana X was created by Alan Moore as a supporting character in his Tom Strong series

In the real world, Josef Stalin’s only daughter was named Svetlana, making it possible that Svetlana X might be an alternate version of Svetlana Iosifovna Alliluyeva, whom Stalin had with his second wife Nadezhda Alliluyeva in 1926. This would explain why she is known as just “Svetlana X,” and matches with her being active by the Battle of Stalingrad.

Major Story Arcs

Live Culture

In 2001, Svetlana X requested Tom Strong’s help in investigating LEM15, an orbiting particles lab which had gone offline. The pair discovered that the inside of an exotic particle had warped reality inside the LEM and corrupted everything, including the crew. After a hard fought retreat, Svetlana made the decision to destroy the station with a nuclear charge to prevent the reality warp from spreading. Svetlana and Dimitri then took Tom out to have coffee.

Ant Fugue!

The following year, Svetlana X was one of the adventurers Tom Strong summoned to help against an invasion of giant slaver ants from outer space. She accompanied Tom into the field when invading the space anthill and fearlessly took on the ants with her bare hands.

Moonday

Svetlana later called on Tom to help her find her husband, Dimitri, who had gone missing during an expedition on the Moon.

Cold Calling

Some months later, Svetlana and her husband again helped Tom by providing orbital thermal imaging from a Soviet satellite that allowed him to locate a cold-wielding villain in the US.

Svetlana also attended some social events organized by the Strongs.

Powers & Abilities

Svetlana X is superhumanly fast, strong and tough, and a master hand-to-hand combatant - on the level of Tom Strong himself, if not greater. She greatly enjoys danger, exploration and fighting, and seems devoid of fear. She hits with literally bone-crushing strength, with her fighting skill and superhuman strength shown to be sufficient for her to take on hordes of giant ants and the like.

Svetlana X has a very broad skills base and has decades of experience in adventuring. She can confidently do all sorts of specialized things such as piloting Soviet space vehicles or setting up nuclear bombs. She’s clearly not a scientist or technologist though; she has been called a “science heroine," but this appears to be more a reference to whatever the source of her superhuman strength is.

She doesn’t generally use weapons, and rarely seems to need them.