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Celsius is the superhero alias of Arani Desai, a fictional character in the DC Comics series, Doom Patrol. She first appeared in Showcase #94 (September 1977), and was created by Paul Kupperberg and Jim Aparo.
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Fictional character biography
Arani Desai was born in India into a life of wealth and privilege. Due to the death of her mother while giving birth to Arani, her father Ashok rejected her even though she possessed an excellent intellect and athleticism. Arani ran away from home after her father went insane. Life on the streets in Calcutta made her deathly ill until she was rescued by young American Dr. Niles Caulder. He gifted her with immortality on their wedding and left her in the Himalayas while he tried to evade General Immortus. She is among the very few superheros of Desi heritage, and may be the first ever such hero created by DC Comics.
Doom Patrol
Arani waited and realized that the serum augmented her powerfully, so that she could control her core temperature and project quantities of heat and cold. This ability coupled with the mysticism and monastery training made her a formidable martial artist. Discovering the death of the Doom Patrol, she created her own team to initially protect herself from General Immortus, who had momentarily restored his youth by experimenting on Arani and torturing her. Arani then used the team to seek out her husband whom she believed was alive.
Kalki
During her leadership of the Doom Patrol, they discovered Negative Man was a hostage of her now demonically controlled father Ashok Desai, now renamed Kalki. Like the terrorist known as Kobra, Ashok believed it was his destiny to bring about the Kali Yuga. Ashok Desai had originally worked with Niles Caulder to develop the immortality serum that Caulder would later perfect and use on Arani. Ashok tested an early version of the mutagenic serum on himself. The formula triggered his metagene, and mutated his body, driving him insane. He was transformed into a living portal to a nether dimension that he believed was "hell". He and Caulder devised a suit of armor to contain his deteriorating body and to control the dimensional portal. Kalki had setup a hidden base on the island of Jamaica from which he intended to launch a satellite designed to eliminate all life on earth. Kalki died when Celsius damaged his armor, causing the "demons" on the other side of its portal to turn on him, they were then able to drag his body through to the other side. Celsius was the only member left fighting against an evil Lord of Chaos, hand in hand with Power Girl. Her Arctic cold blast exploded the superheated Metallo after he managed to control Robotman's actions to battle Superman. Arani later discovered that Niles Caulder was still alive and that Valentina Vostok was a covert operative for the United States government.
Invasion
When Niles came out of hiding, he declared they were never married, although he would later retract that statement. He admitted to experimenting on her with his immortality serum. Arani was seemingly killed in a suicidal attempt to freeze a Gil Dispan battle Cruiser from escaping the Arctic Circle during the Invasion! crossover. Celsius remained behind when she realized that the aliens were seeking to escape the surprise attack, When other Doom Patrol members begged her to get away she flatly refused, stating that "Niles knows the truth" while engulfing the rear of the ship in tonnes of ice, it was spectacular BUT as the fusion engines erupted with power the force blew back at her point blank. Aquaman realized that the backlash created by Celsius coupled with the bombs did indeed cripple the interstellar ship. Tragically, Celsius became the first heroic casualty in the invasion. However, because Celsius was both immortal and able to control fire (the cause of her supposed death), whether her death was undone by the events of Infinite Crisis like the deaths of other Doom Patrol members is unknown. Niles Caulder later revealed that he and Arani had indeed been married when Grant Morrison took over the Doom Patrol, but like the other members, he manipulated her for his own needs.
Powers and abilities
- Superior martial artist due to her monastery training
- Minor levels of mysticism taught to her due to her monastery training
- Celsius is able to control and manipulate her core temperature, projecting heat or intense cold from her hands after Niles Caulder's immortality serum triggered her metagene. Celsius was even seen to hold a Government helicopter aloft due to a power blast of superheated steam.
- Due to the serum given to her by Niles Caulder she was supposedly immortal.
The combination of her natural athletic prowess, intelligence, martial arts and thermal duality made Celsius one of the most formidable and dynamic martial artists in the DCU.
