WILD WEST
The period of American western expansion in the 1800s, especially the lawless post-Civil War period
is commonly referred to as the "Wild West". While not as colorful as their counterparts of the 20th and
21st centuries, the West also had its heroes and villains. Most of these were concentrated in the American
southwest where lawmen, bounty hunters and vigilantes like Jonah Hex, Nighthawk, Johnny Thunder, Madame .44,
the Scalphunter, and Bat Lash operated. In the Pacific Northwest there were also those who battled to establish
and defend law and order, as well as those that resisted them.
RENEGADE
PERSONAL DATA
- Alter Ego: Garrett Land
- Known Aliases: Billy Sullivan
HISTORY
Billy Sullivan was from Central City, Missouri. He lost his father in the Civil War and was raised by his mother. He was
always getting into trouble, which troubled his poor mother. By 14 he had left home and was travelling the American West,
doing odd jobs and generally getting into more trouble. In 1875, at age 16, he made the mistake of crossing a powerful land
baron in Oklahoma, who faked some charges against Billy. The young teenager fled to Texas but was eventually apprehended by
a Ranger who was looking to claim the reward on the young boy. Billy's return trip to Oklahoma was interrupted by temporal
disruptions around Dodge City, Kansas, caused by a creature called a Chronovore. The Ranger who had captured Billy was
killed by a time-displaced Tyrannosaurus Rex and Billy fell in with the time-travelling
Enforcers of Justice (who were investigating the time disturbances
while on a mission to another time period).
Billy tried to get away from the group at one point, only to find himself confronted by a masked stranger. The stranger
revealed himself to be Billy's future self, a Robin Hood-esque bandit who had deliberately stowed away aboard a train he knew
would be caught in the time displacement. The older Billy remembered the encounter with the stranger and made a point to come
back. It was enough to frighten the younger Billy to rejoin the travelling group. Along the way he learned a lot from the two
educated men travelling with them, Peter Law and Ian MacBride, and from a man from the future named Albert Einstein.
After time was restored Billy went off on his own determined to learn to read and write, and to learn everything he could.
He bought books, or stole (borrowed) when he couldn't afford them. He still got into trouble and eventually became one of the
most skilled bandits of the early 1880s. A near fatal brush with the law, which also nearly killed his mother (of a broken
heart), led Billy to reform slightly or at least change his targets. This was when he took the opportunity to sneak aboard a
westbound train and meet his younger self. Afterward he followed Peter Law and Ian MacBride west to Fort Superior. Having only
met Billy as a younger man, the two did not recognize him and he set up a new identity in Superior. Billy, now calling himself
Garrett Land, took a job as a typesetter at the local newspaper and began his new life.
At the time Fort Superior was the center for illegal activity in the Pacific Northwest. As the west had become settled, many
of the outlaws made their way north to Superior and the city had become a haven for gamblers, smugglers, and other unsavory
types. The criminal operation was controlled by the man called the Black Baron, and
Garrett soon found himself drawn into conflict the Baron. Drawing on the skills he had honed over the years, and inspired by one
of the time travelling heroes he had encountered in his youth, Garret became the masked vigilante called The Renegade, and the
Black Baron became his chief opponent. The Baron backed the city's corrupt government and made Renegade the only source for
justice in Superior during the late 1880s and early 90s. Renegade battled many other foes, both on his own and occasionally with
the aid of the equally mysterious Nightengale. Renegade even had an opportunity to team up with the time-traveling Enforcers on
a few more occasions.
Renegade's appearances dwindled as order slowly came to what was now called Superior
City. Garrett settled down with a woman named Jennifer Kirk, but his quiet life would not last. Renegade's last recorded
appearance was in 1899, when he came out of semi-retirement to fight the Black Baron one last time. Their final battle at the Baron's
base of operations on Gray Island sparked an explosion and fire, which destroyed most of the community on the island. After the battle
neither Renegade nor Garett Land were heard from again. Prior to his death, Garrett had fathered a son with Jennifer Kirk and the son
took the combined family name of Kirkland. His descendant would eventually adopt the Renegade identity himself in the early 21st
century.
POWERS & WEAPONS
Renegade was well schooled, mostly self-taught, and had even acquired some knowledge of future technology thanks to his great
curiosity combined with his encounters with Albert Einstein and the time traveling Enforcers of Justice. He was an accomplished
rider and a skilled marksman with his pistols, and retained the skills he had picked up as a successful bandit in his early years.
He was also a reasonably skilled actor, able to keep others from making the connection between timid newspaperman Garrett Land and
the mysterious Renegade.
NIGHTENGALE
PERSONAL DATA
HISTORY
The first traditional costumed "hero" of the Paradise settlement across from Fort Superior was the enigmatic
Nightengale, a contemporary of the first Renegade. By all accounts a raven-haired beauty, little else is known about her.
Nightengale was more or less a phantom, appearing seemingly from nowhere to deal with threats to the area around the new
Paradise settlement. Reports of Nightengale dwindled as the Paradise settlement grew and the last confirmed sighting of her
was in 1895.
In reality Nightengale's father was a warrior from a hidden Native tribe known as the Children of Thunder and her mother
the sole survivor of a secret European settlement that had been wiped out by the forces of the
Illuminati. The secret settlement had been a sanctuary to hide and protect
members of a special bloodline, a bloodline that the leader of the Illuminati, the immortal Vandal Savage, had a special
interest in. Nightengale herself was an incarnation of the Heart of Reason and
the sword she carried was allegedly the Sword of Heaven, the weapon forged by Charles Martel from a meteor and later
wielded by Saint Joan of Arc. When Vandal Savage learned who and what Nightengale was he returned to the Paradise area
and trapped and killed her, taking the Sword of Heaven for himself.
The urban center that evolved from the Paradise settlement had a string of winged/bird-themed female protectors since
the days Nightengale. There was Ladyhawk in the 1940s,
Sparrowhawk in the 1960s, and most recently
ArcAngel.
POWERS & WEAPONS
According to the little reliable information available, The Nightengale was a formidable fighter skilled in both armed
and unarmed combat. She seemed to wield an endless variety of weapons including sixguns and rifles, knives, swords,
bow and arrow, and throwing axes. Nightengale appeared to be an accomplished scout, able to track an opponent across
any terrain. She also had uncanny, perhaps even supernatural, stealth and seemed to be able to vanish and appear at will.
As an incarnation of the Heart of Reason, Nightengale would have had access to some mystical abilities but it is unknown
if she was aware of them or ever used any of them.
JAKE LAWLESS, THE SPIDER-RANCHER
PERSONAL DATA
HISTORY
Thousands of years ago a meteor fell to Earth, landing in what is now northern Oregon. The meteor, of unknown origin, possessed
strange radioactive properties that began to cause unusual mutations in the nearby animal life. In time the area's tectonic activity
buried the meteor but it's power continued to affect the animal life in the area. By the time Native American tribes arrived in the
area several significant mutations had already occurred. The main mutation in the area that would become Superior City was a race of
giant poisonous spiders. The spiders lived underground and were worshipped by one of the Native tribes. That tribe would perform
human sacrifices to the spiders, often sacrificing prisoners taken by raiding other nearby tribes. Eventually the other tribes banded
together to wipe out the spider-worshippers, and drove the spiders further underground.
The spiders were relegated to Native legend until discovered in the 1880s by the villain Jason Law, who called himself Jake Lawless
the Spider-Rancher. Teaming with the evil Black Baron, Jake Lawless commanded the spiders to capture and kill ranchers and farmers near
Fort Superior to allow the Baron to seize the land. The first Renegade, assisted by the time-travelling Enforcers of Justice, thwarted
this plan and the spiders' underground warren was flooded. All that was found of Jake Lawless after the battle was his blood-stained
mask. There are no further recorded encounters with the Spider-Rancher so he was assumed to have been killed.
POWERS & WEAPONS
Jason Law was an accomplished chemist and developed an artificial pheremone that he was able to use to control the giant
mutant spiders.
