Thomas and Martha Wayne’s second son, Bruce was born with a silver spoon in his mouth, privy to the perks afforded by his father’s corporate giant, Wayne Enterprises. Living on the outskirts of Gotham City in his family’s manor, he was often left alone with his older brother, Thomas Jr., and butler, Alfred Pennyworth, as his parents attended to such things that the lives of wealthy philanthropic socialites demanded of them. While one would think that being raised under such privileged conditions would guarantee that a child grew into little more than a spoilt brat, this was not the case for either of the Wayne brothers. Thomas Sr. and Martha were not your typical members of high society, planting their roots deep within Gotham’s foundations; Thomas, a renowned physician and surgeon, ran a large number of free clinics throughout the city’s most impoverished neighbourhoods, and Martha, having developed a strong social conscience in her youth, fought hard for Gotham’s children through her many charity events, giving the proceeds to any orphanages in need, all while campaigning for the gentrification of neighbourhoods such as the Narrows and East End. With such devotion to their fellow man, Thomas and Martha hoped to instil into their children values that would see them use their affluence to help those who were less fortunate.

Unfortunately, a life in which the two brothers could be raised by their parents was snatched away from them, be it by the cruel hands of fate or simply harsh circumstance, one cold night out at the theatre. Cornered in the place that would become known as Crime Alley, Bruce, age eight, and Tommy, age thirteen, watched as a common criminal shot their parents dead.

Custody of the brothers fell to Alfred, as per Thomas Sr.’s will, the older man struggling to coax the young Waynes of their mournful states; neither their therapist, Leslie Thompkins, or Bruce’s best friend, Thomas Elliot, could get more than a few words out of them. Worried about their increasingly antisocial behaviour, Alfred nonetheless relented, hoping that when Thomas and Martha’s killer was arrested, Bruce and Tommy might find some semblance of closure. And so he waited for the day that he would turn on the television and see the headline, “WAYNE KILLER BROUGHT TO JUSTICE,” but when the months continued to pass without any such news, Alfred all but gave up, fearing that he might lose the boys forever – but then they came to him. Bruce and Thomas knew of Alfred’s past – tales of his achievements while serving in Her Majesty’s Royal Marines and the MI6 were among their favourites – and they wanted him to train them, under the pretence of wanting a productive way to channel their anger, and while this wasn’t entirely untrue, it became clear that, as Alfred began to run out of things to teach them, that they had a larger plan in the works.

As their tutelage moved from Alfred to others, such as the world-famous boxer, Ted Grant, the boys started to drop their guardian hints as to what they were plotting, before telling him outright: they had vowed to avenge their parents’ deaths, and to see that Gotham’s criminal element, who struck so much fear into the hearts of the public, would have something to fear of their own. And so it was that Bruce and Tommy, fourteen and nineteen, left Gotham, marking the beginning of their worldwide trek as they trained under the world’s greatest martial artists, scholars, escape artists and strategists, the public believing that they were taking nothing more than an extensive trip around the world.

It was during the final years of Bruce and Tommy’s training that they found themselves in Nanda Parbat, stepping into the secretive world of the League of Shadows. Eight years had passed since they left Gotham, and they had learned a lot; gone were the helpless boys that watched their parents die in front of them – they were different now. They were capable.

They were greeted by the end of a sword as they entered the ancient halls of the League’s temple. To say that it was an organisation shrouded in mystery was an understatement, as its agents proceeded with the utmost caution, unable to believe that Westerners, Americans at that, knew of the League, and not only that, but its whereabouts, too. But after a test of their skills, Ra’s al Ghul, the Demon’s Head himself, deemed the brothers worthy, marking the beginning of their first years of League training – especially impressed when they name dropped one Henri Ducard. During their stay, Bruce and Tommy underwent a rigorous four years of training in the way of the assassin, preparing for their final test before their official induction: their first kill. It was around this time that Bruce developed a friendship with Ra’s’ daughter, Talia, soon spiralling into a fledgling romance that provided him with an anchor for much of his time there.

Four years later, Bruce returned to Gotham, alone.

Alfred welcomed him with open arms, doing the best he could to keep vultures – the most persistent among them, Victoria Vale of Gotham City News – from prying too deep into Bruce’s time away. He was surprised to see the youngest Wayne deflect their questions with expert charm and off-handedness, fitting into the role of the irresponsible playboy as easily as if he’d been raised by the Queens.

While Alfred was glad to see Bruce back home in good health, there was always one question on the tip of his tongue, one he was desperate to find an answer for: where’s Thomas? But no matter how much he wanted to know, Bruce had made it clear that he didn’t want to talk about it. The matter was dropped, and that was that – but Alfred wasn’t stupid. Something had happened between the brothers.

Gotham was not in a good state. Ever since Thomas Sr. and Martha’s deaths, the city had spiralled into chaos. Its officials reeked of corruption, and criminals, emboldened by the Waynes’ passing, expanded their operations well beyond their original scope – Gotham was now in their control. On the throne sat Carmine “the Roman” Falcone, uniting Gotham’s crime families under one banner: that of the Roman Empire. Falcone himself controlled half of the Upper East Side and the Bowery; the Maronis the other half, along with the rest of the Narrows; the Bertinellis seized the Upper West Side and Tricorner, while the Cobblepots had control of the Diamond and City Hall Districts, as well as Old Gotham.

Incensed, Bruce immediately began preparing for his mission, largely leaving his newfound responsibilities in Wayne Enterprises to its deputy CEO, William Earle. Donning a balaclava and tactical gear, he began striking the Empire where it hurt – barely escaping with his life each time. Recalling something Ra’s had taught him and Tommy early on, Bruce went to Lucius Fox, head of WayneTech, a different plan forming in his head. “Theatricality and deception are powerful agents.”

On the 27th of May, 2010, rumours of a bat-like terror shook Gotham’s underworld as the Roman Empire began sustaining crippling blows.

The Batman was born.

Bruce’s mission was underway, but it was far from easy. Falcone had many assets, one of them, Commissioner Loeb; as head of the GCPD, it was guaranteed that a SWAT team would be on Bruce’s trail, trying their hardest not to bring him in, but to shoot him dead. However, not all in Gotham’s law enforcement saw him in a hostile light, one being Lieutenant James Gordon, a veteran on the force for more than a decade. Jim viewed Batman as his only ally against the mob, and in turn, Bruce saw him as a valuable asset; using a modified Klieg searchlight dubbed as the Batsignal, Gordon summoned Batman whenever he had new intel to share, an arrangement that suited them both just fine.

While the GCPD knew of Batman, the rest of Gotham’s citizenry did not. To the public, he was nothing but a myth, an urban legend, fabricated by the police to scare any who might think to break the law. To any criminal who was not Carmine Falcone, Sal Maroni, Franco Bertinelli or Oswald Cobblepot, he wasn’t a man, but rather, a creature – a beast of terrible vengeance raining hell upon Gotham’s underworld. As far as anyone was concerned, Batman didn’t exist… and Bruce planned to keep it that way.

Within the span of months, he had sent shockwaves throughout the Roman Empire. The Bertinellis had retreated to Italy, Cobblepot had all but disappeared, the Maronis were relying on their only drug operation still underway, and Falcone was scrambling to hold it all together.

With his empire collapsing all around him, Falcone looked for someone to blame. Batman was untouchable; a ghost; making him pay was nothing more than a fantasy. Instead, Falcone turned to the one problematic cop not yet on his payroll: Jim Gordon. Hiring an old associate by the name of Ray Salinger, he rested a little easier knowing that Gordon’s family would soon suffer blows as crippling as his own. Not a night after he gave the order, Barbara Gordon, age thirteen, was kidnapped by the serial killer, Birthday Boy – Salinger’s alter ego.

Jim, in a state of panic he’d never been before, knew that he couldn’t help Barbara, not all by himself. Calling for Batman’s help, Bruce hurried to find his ally’s daughter before it was too late, searching for clues in the Gordons’ apartment and delving into Birthday Boy’s old case files. It wasn’t long before he found what he was looking for. Obsessed with his first victim, Amanda Grant, Salinger would take his victims – all young girls – to her former home, an abandoned mansion in the neighbourhood of Coventry. With a place to look, Bruce and Gordon rushed to save Barbara, bursting into the mansion as Salinger held a knife to her throat. After a brief scuffle, Bruce took the serial killer down – and in his anger, went after Falcone one last time.

The Roman Empire fell in the October of that year. To Alfred, it meant hope that Bruce might abandon his crusade – but Bruce had made it clear. He was just getting started.

As the year drew to a close, Bruce faced an even greater challenge than the Roman Empire: the enigma of the Riddler. Holding the Narrows at ransom, he demanded that Batman undertake a series of trials, or otherwise let the downtrodden neighbourhood suffer an explosive death. Playing to the Riddler’s whims, Bruce participated in potentially lethal “games”, all while trying to deduce Riddler’s location and identity, eventually succeeding. Tracking Riddler down to Gotham’s sewers, Bruce found his identity to being one Edward Nashton, former strategist of Wayne Enterprise’s CEO, William Earle. Bringing him in to the GCPD, Jim took credit for Nashton’s apprehension, further cementing Batman’s status as an urban legend.

By the beginning of Batman’s second year, Bruce had garnered three more allies: Detective Harvey Bullock of the GCPD’s Major Crimes Unit, and sibling lawyers, Harvey Dent and his sister, Jessica – an old flame of Bruce’s teens. Of the three, Harvey and Jessica were the most useful; their positions as assistant district attorneys meant that more of the scum Bruce brought in remained locked up. Bullock, on the other hand, though helpful with cases not super in nature, frequently questioned Batman’s methods, challenging him on more than one occasion. Their clashing ideologies saw Bruce avoid Bullock more often than not, only going to him if it was absolutely necessary.

Following the fall of Falcone’s empire and the ordeal with the Riddler, Jim had been promoted to captain of the Central Precinct, granting him access to far more information – and power – than before. Even though Commissioner Loeb was still the ever present anchor of corruption within the GCPD, Jim didn’t let that stop him from helping Batman in any way he could; whereas before it had been an uneasy alliance, after Bruce saved Barbara, Jim not only felt indebted to the vigilante, but a great deal of respect.

New Year’s opened with a spectacular display of flames as the mercenary known as Firefly set fire to a number of locations in Gotham’s Narrows, resulting in over a dozen deaths in total. Equipped with a high-tech suit, he was a dangerous new enemy – but in the end, it wasn’t enough to beat the Batman. Analysing the scorched remains of Firefly’s victims, Bruce was able to identify most of them as former employees of Carmine Falcone, tracking down a survivor, who revealed Firefly to be one Garfield Lynns, former enforcer for Sal Maroni. Batman confronted Lynns in City Hall, besting him just as he was about to kill Commissioner Loeb. Agreeing to testify against Loeb with evidence on his corruption and position in the Roman Empire, Lynns was able to get a shortened sentence at Blackgate Penitentiary with thanks to the Dents, much to Bruce’s chagrin.

With Loeb exposed, the GCPD was in need of a new commissioner, finding one in former Chief of Police Michael Akins. Akins’ administration saw the department’s relations with Batman grow a little easier; no longer was there a vigilante task force out to get him, but rather an uneasiness in knowing that he was a necessity, but hating that fact regardless.

Batman found his next challenge in Killer Croc. Investigating a series of disappearances throughout Gotham’s Upper West Side, all of the evidence pointed Bruce towards the sewers. After a brief time spent searching, he found the remains of the missing persons, gathered in a bloody heap in a makeshift settlement amongst Gotham’s urine and excrement. Too far below ground to contact Alfred, Bruce could do nothing but fight when he was attacked by a hulking mass of green scales and sharpened teeth. The man that he would come to know as Waylon Jones, aka Killer Croc, tore through Bruce’s armour with quick and terrible ferocity, his seemingly impossible strength tearing through the Wayne heir’s flesh like scissors through paper. Weakened and bleeding out, Bruce managed to escape with a well-placed smoke pellet, dragging himself to what Alfred had sardonically dubbed the Batmobile, its autopilot driving him back to his headquarters below Wayne Manor. His injuries far beyond what Alfred could repair, Bruce’s loyal guardian came close to revealing the vigilante’s identity so that he might receive care in hospital – but Bruce had another idea in mind. Communicating through Morse code, he requested that Alfred call in a face from the past: Thomas Elliot, Bruce’s former best friend. Following in his father and Thomas Wayne Sr.’s footsteps, Tom had become a renowned surgeon throughout the East Coast, running Elliot Memorial Hospital in memory of his parents in the Bowery. Arriving at Wayne Manor, Tom was confronted by Bruce’s bloody form. Tending to his former best friend, no lie Alfred told could dissuade him. He remembered what the older man had told him all those years ago when he was fourteen, hoping that he could dissuade Bruce and Tommy Jr. from their mission. Thomas knew. Bruce was the Batman.

Despite Tom’s instructions, Bruce was back in action far sooner than he should have been. Donning an upgraded suit courtesy of Lucius Fox, Batman tracked Killer Croc down, besting him in the ensuing fight. The reptilian man was taken to GCPD lockup, before being committed to Arkham Asylum after pleading insanity in court. Seeing the extents to which Bruce was willing to push himself, Tom made it abundantly clear to his estranged friend that he would no longer be relying on Alfred’s medical expertise – but rather, his own. With Tom enlisted as Batman’s personal medic, Bruce continued his crusade. However, the next time he got injured, in what may be perceived as irony, it wasn’t Tom who gave him aid – it was an elusive woman by the name of Selina Kyle.

Someone was killing the heads of Wayne Enterprises’ competition. The ballistics eluded police – there was no way someone could pull off such accurate shots from such a large distance. The evidence didn’t lie, however, and soon William Earle, CEO of Wayne Enterprises, was under investigation for the murder of four high-profile businessmen.

Upon his return to Gotham, Bruce had done his research on Earle. He knew that the man wasn’t an honest businessman, but he’d kept Wayne Enterprises afloat for all these years, and with Bruce’s focus on Batman, that had to be enough. But this investigation opened Bruce’s eyes, and he started to monitor Earle’s activities, soon finding details of a wire transfer to one Floyd Lawton’s bank account – whose M.O. matched that of the GCPD’s mystery sniper, codename, Deadshot. With Bruce’s knowledge of Lawton’s previous four victims, he concluded that the next was Simon Stagg, head of Stagg Industries. He knew that Stagg was currently residing in a penthouse in the Fashion District, and so Batman scouted out the area, searching for Deadshot’s most probable position. It wasn’t long before he found it. Confronting the sharpshooter before he could pull the trigger, Batman and Lawton engaged in a firefight that spanned entire city blocks, making their way to the Fashion District’s less prestigious, yet still lavish, apartment buildings. Deadshot proved to be an extremely skilled marksman, more than living up to his apparent notoriety – a well placed shot wedged itself between the Batsuit’s chestplates, sending Bruce plummeting to a balcony below. Not waiting to see if his adversary was dead, Lawton fled the scene in fear of being found by the GCPD. When Bruce woke up, he was in a beautiful woman’s bed.

But this wasn’t like other times. Ever since his return to Gotham he had carefully put on a show, maintaining the image of an irresponsible billionaire playboy, like so much of the media seemed to want him to. This would understandably lead him to waking up in women’s beds, or them in his, after a night of agonising social activity. But no. This time, the night had consisted of chasing after a hitman – a hitman that managed to shoot Bruce through his armour, that sent him plummeting onto a balcony, knocking him out cold. A hitman that had inadvertently pushed Bruce Wayne and Selina Kyle into each other’s lives.

Selina had patched Bruce up. It was temporary at best, and Bruce had to replace the stitches soon after, but she hadn’t done badly – and with her cat curled in a ball by his side, Bruce awoke early the next day, long before the sun would come up. It didn’t take long for him to notice that his cowl was no longer atop his head, and anger soon boiled out – anger that the headstrong Ms. Kyle shut down with seductive ease. Before she could ask what Bruce Wayne was doing running around in a bat costume, he left, intent on finding Deadshot before he could carry out his contract. He’d deal with Selina later.

When Batman found Deadshot next, he once again stopped him short of pulling the trigger. This time, Bruce made sure to keep the fight up close and personal, unwilling to risk another bullet. As the battle reached its peak, they were joined by a third party – a woman dressed in a cat-like costume, calling herself Catwoman – who Bruce quickly identified as Selina. He was surprised to see her prowess in combat, and with their combined skill, it didn’t take long for them to take Lawton down.

With adrenaline rushing through their system, Bruce and Selina shared a night of passion in her apartment. Though Bruce was not willing to admit it, it was the first time he had truly enjoyed such things since his time with Talia in the League of Shadows. So began Batman and Catwoman’s… complicated relationship.

The next day, Bruce made to deal with Earle, intending to leak evidence of his hiring of Deadshot after confronting the CEO as Batman. However, in accessing Earle’s computer, he saw no trace of the documents that had led him to finding out about Earle and Lawton’s business deal; in questioning the businessman, Earle acted dumb, unwilling to divulge any information. Enraged, Batman vowed that he would bring Earle to justice. It was only a matter of time.

The next Bruce saw of Earle, he wasn’t going after him. He was protecting him. A man going by the moniker of Mr. Freeze had taken those in Wayne Tower hostage, literally covering it in ice with technology that Bruce had never seen before. Batman confronted him, and in doing so learned that his real name was Victor Fries, an expert on cryogenics formerly under employment at WayneTech. He had been fired for using company funds for his own private research; research on how to save the life of Nora, his wife, who was dying from a rare heart condition. Searching for a cure, he had placed her in cryostasis using company equipment to prevent her health from deteriorating. Earle found out about this, and in an act of cruelty that Bruce was beginning to know him for, had ordered the funding for Fries’ projects cut and for Nora to be brought out of stasis. Unwilling to see his work undone and his wife dead, Victor struggled against Earle’s security, resulting in his exposure to his own cryogenic coolants. His body chemistry was significantly altered, leaving him only able to survive at sub-zero temperatures. He escaped unseen, taking Nora with him. Now, Fries had returned to take his vengeance on Earle. It took Batman all he had not to let him.

Earle was an evil man. Bruce knew this. He’d hired a contract killer, and a very expensive one, at that, to get rid of competition, and got rid of all evidence the moment he thought that he could get caught. He’d taken an innocent man – yes, he’d been misusing company funds, but for an innocent cause – and all the research, and the hope, that he had gathered, and ruined them without a second thought. Earle was scum, the very definition of the people Bruce had vowed protect Gotham from. But Victor was also in the wrong; he sought vengeance, not justice, and in doing so was putting innocent people in harm’s way. Bruce had no choice. He confronted Fries with words, trying to avoid a physical conflict. He had no wish to fight him. However, Fries’ hatred for Earle proved too strong to reason against, and the situation devolved into a fight, Bruce only narrowly escaping injury. That night, Victor Fries, alias Mr. Freeze, was taken to Arkham Asylum and punished for his crimes. And with no evidence to incriminate Earle with, there was nothing Bruce could do but watch as the current CEO of his father’s company got off scot-free once again.

The first item on Bruce’s agenda as 2012 came about was the removal of William Earle from his seat as CEO of Wayne Enterprises. The majority of WE’s board was more than cooperative (Earle had rubbed them the wrong way more than once), so Bruce soon informed Earle of his removal from office personally and with great satisfaction, gladly handing the reins over to Lucius Fox, who had by that time been promoted from Batman’s tech guy to a trustworthy member of Bruce’s inner circle, so far consisting of just himself, Alfred, Lucius and Thomas Elliot. Little did he know that this was the year it would grow by two more members.

In February, Jim Gordon was kidnapped. As the GCPD scrambled to find him, Bruce busied himself with finding any clues to his whereabouts, a search that was cut short by the activation of the Batsignal. Its light summoning him to the Central Precinct, Batman was met by a fifteen year-old Barbara Gordon, her kidnapping – and rescue – still fresh on her mind. Armed with footage of the Dark Knight (no doubt from one of her father’s case files) she demanded that Bruce help her get Jim back, lest she release it to the media and thus expose him to the public. Disapproving of her blackmail, but admiring her tenacity, Bruce agreed to let her tag along, provided that she did everything he told her to. Following a trail of familiar clues and cryptic riddles, they soon realised that the man behind Jim’s kidnapping was none other than Edward Nashton, the Riddler. Tracking him down to the expansive carpark of an apartment complex in Old Gotham, Batman navigated a variety of death traps even more complicated than those of his first tangle with Riddler. After a brief face-to-face confrontation with Nashton, and with Barbara’s help, the Riddler was apprehended. Jim and Barbara Gordon returned home safely that night. Edward Nashton was taken to Arkham.

A few nights after the incident, Batman offered to train Barbara. Her tenacity and fierce determination were to be commended, as was her level head under intense conditions – and this was the second time she’d been caught in the crossfire of Batman and Jim’s war against crime. She was happy to accept, and so every night, when her father was at work, he would train her on the roof of her apartment building. When she advanced to the point that it was no longer a suitable place to train, they would risk going to the Batcave, where training continued until September. Batgirl debuted not long afterwards, helping Batman take down Clayface, formerly the actor known as Basil Karlo before he was transformed into what could only be described as living clay, his change pushing him towards insanity and a life of crime.

Later that month, tragedy struck Haly’s Circus. A travelling act, the circus’ arrival in Gotham was highly anticipated, as it always was in the past. Bruce had taken Vicki Vale, recently made the host of her very own titular television show, on a date there. As far as he could tell, it was going well – a trio of teenage acrobats were wowing the crowd, and Bruce had to admit, their form was admirable – but then a man clad in red with a golden mask appeared, and chaos erupted. People died. Vicki and Bruce were threatened, the man claiming that they were the very thing that was wrong with Gotham; rich people trampling over the disenfranchised. Bruce managed to fend him off – Anarky, he called himself – chalking it off to self defence training when Vicki later asked. In truth, Bruce didn’t need to use even a fraction of his training; “Anarky” was weak and inexperienced, just a kid by the looks of it. By the time the police arrived, it was over. And one of the teenage acrobats, Richard Grayson, was left alone. Orphaned.

Barely a week after what would become known as the Haly’s Circus Massacre, Bruce took Richard in. Feeling guilty that he couldn’t do more when Anarky attacked, and sympathising with Dick’s situation – in doing his research, he discovered that this was the second time the boy’s family had been taken from him – it felt like the only right thing to do. Dick’s transition into Wayne Manor was awkward, the boy still in mourning for his lost loved ones. Bruce’s busy schedule in both Gotham’s streets and Wayne Enterprises’ boardroom (after what transpired with Earle, he was insistent on being more involved with his company) meant that Dick had to spend the majority of his time alone within the manor’s halls, exploring. One night when browsing through one of its expansive, dust-covered libraries, he stumbled upon something a little out of place – a hidden doorway concealed by a bookshelf, controlled by a singular mechanism: the Mark of Zorro, the original 1924 novelisation of the magazine serial. Walking through the dark corridor it revealed, he descended a seemingly endless set of stairs, walking out into the gigantic expanse of the Batcave, bearing witness to one of Bruce and Barbara’s more intense training sessions. With the two’s suits on display for all to see, everything suddenly made so much more sense to Dick. It wasn’t long before Bruce noticed his presence.

It was only after weeks of persistent badgering that Bruce agreed to train Dick, but even then, he only agreed to the basics, making it clear that he would never allow him to don a mask like himself or Barbara. However, as Dick progressed in his training – his hand-to-hand combat a particular highlight; his skill in acrobatics contributed to a unique, dynamic style all of his own – both his ability and conviction were made abundantly clear, and Bruce finally relented, providing him with the training he truly sought.

In October, Bruce came into contact with the being known as Superman. Ever since the Man of Steel’s debut earlier that summer, along with the likes of the second Flash, Coast City’s Green Lantern and the vigilante dubbed as Spider-Man, Bruce had eyed these superpowered beings with great caution, compiling files within which he analysed their every power, action and aspect of personality, in the case that he ever needed to use such information against them. When he first found himself face-to-face with Metropolis’ resident hero, the man in blue was snooping around Wayne Enterprises, claiming that it was funding the criminal organisation known as Intergang; an accusation so bold and so infuriatingly untrue that the Batman denied it outright. It was impossible, he maintained – the fact that it was his company, and that as such, he should have known, he left out – and demanded that Superman leave. The tension between the two came to a boiling point when the Dark Knight attacked, thinking that he knew everything there was to know about Superman’s powers. However, he had underestimated him, and soon found himself held by the throat, his cowl ripped from his face like it was nothing but paper. And so that night, Superman discovered that not only did the Batman exist, but that his name was Bruce Wayne. After listening to the boy scout’s reasoning, Bruce grudgingly agreed to help him investigate – if what he was saying was true, then it was Bruce’s problem to fix. Following a carefully covered trail, the caped crusaders soon discovered evidence pointing at William Earle, implicating him in involvement with not only Intergang, but many other criminal enterprises as well. Giving Captain Gordon the information he needed to arrest the former CEO of Wayne Enterprises, Batman and Superman’s first team-up came to a close. By that time, Bruce had deduced Superman’s identity, and he watched Clark Kent leave as an ally – and not only that, a friend.

As the year came to a close, Gotham became subject to the biggest computer hack ever performed. Utilising a virus not unlike Stuxnet, the man known as the Calculator used a malicious software of his own design, utilising worms and remote access tools to take control of Gotham’s power grid. With the city at his mercy, he demanded that he be paid hundreds of millions of dollars, or otherwise render the power grid out of order. With a virus of such complexity, Bruce couldn’t hope to write a program to counter it in time; to do so would take weeks, if not months – time he did not have. He sent Barbara out into the streets to mediate the impending riots, focussing on tracking the Calculator down from the Batcave, something that would backfire on him as the criminal traced the hack back to his computer, compromising the lair. Unplugging every device with a possible connection to the internet, he destroyed their circuitry for good measure, before donning the Batsuit to track Calculator down remotely. Writing code from his suit, he located the hacker miles away from the city, confronting him in a small motel. Identifying him as Noah Kuttler, Batman forced him to deactivate the virus and wipe any and all data from his devices, effectively removing any information he might have on the Batcave’s location, and getting rid of any copies of the virus he had used to hack Gotham’s power grid. With Kuttler taken care of, Bruce refitted the Batcave with new computers, reinforcing its cybersecurity measures – all while getting to work on a program that could counter viruses with ten times the scope of the Calculator’s. All the while, Dick and Barbara continued their training.

Oswald Cobblepot resurfaced as the world transitioned into the new year. After nearly three years in witness protection (agreeing to expose the Falcones and Maronis had seen him demand that he be guarded from what would no doubt have been a vengeful retaliation), he sprung back into the public eye with all charges against him dropped, and a lavish new nightclub to his name. The Iceberg Lounge opened to an enthusiastic crowd, boasting the most profitable opening night of any establishment in the Upper East Side. While people were flocking to the supposedly reformed Cobblepot and his new, “legitimate” business, Bruce was less than convinced that the mob boss had turned over a new leaf. With Barbara in tow, they broke into the Lounge, discovering that Bruce was, in fact, correct. Cobblepot, called “Penguin” behind his back by his underlings due to his... unfortunate appearance, was using his club as a front, still operating in Gotham’s underworld through the bartering of information and the sales of firearms, drugs and stolen goods. This lead to one of their many ensuing clashes over the years, with Cobblepot somehow always evading capture.

Dick Grayson completed basic training in the April of that year. After undergoing what Bruce called “the Gauntlet”, in which he had to evade Batman for an entire night all while fighting whatever crime he saw (much like Barbara had to before she became Batgirl), he donned a suit made to his own specifications and debuted as the “Boy Wonder” – a nickname courtesy of Barbara – codename, Robin.

Robin’s first run-in with Gotham’s brand of costumed crime would be with a man called Jervis Tetch. A schizophrenic man, Tetch had an unhealthy obsession with the works of Lewis Carroll, coming to believe that he was, in fact, a character from Alice in Wonderland: the Mad Hatter. Formerly under the employment of Horizon Labs, Tetch was a gifted inventor before the deterioration of his mental state, leading to his release from the company. As he slipped further into his delusions, he became obsessed with hats and finding “Alice”, believing her to be “in trouble” and that she “needed his help”. Using mind control technology he had invented after being let go from Horizon Labs, he began luring young, blonde girls to his lair in the Bowery, molesting and then murdering them in a psychotic episode. There had been three missing girls of such description by the time Batman, Batgirl and Robin picked up Tetch’s trail. Confronting him just as he was about to “free Alice” (his latest would-be victim), it was ultimately Robin that subdued Tetch as Batgirl and Bruce freed the captured girl. Jervis was later taken to Arkham Asylum.

Bruce’s paranoia reached an all time high when he heard of CADMUS’s most recent development: synthetic kryptonite. He’d acquired that information through less than legal means, but it was for the greater good. He’d seen what the mineral could do to Superman – such an asset could be the difference between winning and losing if Clark were to ever go rogue. Bruce wasn’t kidding himself; Clark was the most optimistic, inherently good person he knew, perhaps to the point of stupidity. The chances of him ever switching sides were minimal at best. But even so, he had to be prepared for any outcome, any possibility. Who knew where the rest of Clark’s species were? What if they came to Earth, hostile, an unknown number of near-gods trying to retrieve one of their kind? What if it wasn’t Clark that would interest them, but Earth? He had to be prepared. And so, Robin in tow, Batman took a trip to Metropolis. Moving past the CADMUS facility’s security with practiced ease, they stole the amount of synthetic kryptonite Bruce required, escaping into the night. Arriving back at the Batcave, Bruce immediately got to work on his anti-Kryptonian armoury.

In mid-January, 2014, the University of Gotham was held at ransom by a former professor, Dr. Jonathan Crane. Specialising in psychology, Crane had always been fascinated by fear, coming to be fired from his job after performing several experiments on students with what would become known as his trademark fear toxin. Overwhelmed with rage, he returned to the university with murder in his eyes, calling himself the Scarecrow; he was dressed in a fearful costume to accompany his moniker. Flooding the school with his toxin, he caused everyone without a gas mask or the antidote to see, hear and feel their greatest fear, triggering an eruption of chaos unlike any seen before. Under the distraction such a disruption provided, Crane attempted to murder the regents responsible for his termination. Unfortunately for him, Batman, Batgirl and Robin were on the scene. While they managed to subdue Scarecrow without any deaths, it wasn’t before Bruce received a concentrated dose of the fear toxin. As Batgirl and Robin rushed to get him back to the Batcave, Crane was being escorted by GCPD officers to a police cruiser. The last words news teams managed to pick up from him were, “You think this is it? I’m just getting started. Gotham will know me. It will be afraid of me. I’ll make it a city of fear!”

It took two days for Bruce to recover from the effects of the fear toxin. Upon his recuperation, using a sample of the toxin extracted from his blood, he immediately got to work on an antidote – much to Alfred and Tom Elliot’s dismay.

Barbara hung up the cape and cowl in mid-2014, believing Bruce to have a very skilled and capable partner in Dick. Moving on with her life, she was already looking ahead to the future, excited for what it might hold. After a few nights of silence, Bruce returned to his regular schedule – taking out his frustrations on Gotham’s criminals. He began dating Selina Kyle again a few months later.

2015 opened with the kidnapping of three infants. Over the next few months, dozens more were taken from their homes. All evidence the GCPD uncovered pointed towards a human trafficking ring, with Harvey Bullock theorising that the babies were being sold to parents who thought they were simply adopting. However, when investigating, Bruce uncovered evidence that didn’t match Bullock’s hypothesis, and decided to follow the lead himself, keeping the police out of the loop. His search for clues took him all over Gotham, and all the while, more infants were being kidnapped; determined to find them before any harm could come to them, Bruce pushed himself harder than he ever had before, nights blending into days before he lost track of time completely. Eventually he found the location of where the infants were being held, where he believed that they weren’t being sold off to families in the United States, but rather, overseas. What he believed to be good, legitimate detective work led him to an abandoned warehouse in Gotham’s neighbouring city of Blüdhaven. Tipping Jim Gordon off to be ready at the scene, Batman went inside. What he saw would traumatise him for months – years – to come. A large pit, dug into the centre of the warehouse. Inside it, the dismembered bodies of all the kidnapped infants, of every baby taken over the last few months. And at the edge of the pit, the monster behind it all – a man dressed in purple, his skin bleached as white as a ghost, with a shock of green hair… and that smile. The grotesque, red-streaked smile as he laughed, cackling at Bruce’s horror. The Joker, he called himself. He’d been manipulating Batman the entire time, he said – he always had a feeling that he was real, he was simply too crazy a thing not to be – leaving clues and evidence that would point him here, to the warehouse in Blüdhaven, where the punchline awaited him, and oh, was it a good one. Bruce didn’t know how to take it. Rage, pure, unbridled rage, flowed through him, the sudden hatred he felt for the Joker unmatched by any other, not even by the hatred he had for his parents’ killer, whoever he may be. But there was also something else, something he had never felt before during his time as Batman, never induced by his own, natural reactions: fear. Bruce was afraid. And he took that fear, and that hatred, and that rage, the anger he felt for all those innocent lives lost, those lives barely lived, and he let it all out, hitting the Joker harder than he’d ever let himself hit anyone, over and over, until Jim burst into the warehouse and pulled him away. All the while, the sadistic, twisted clown cheered him on. The Joker's face would haunt Bruce's dreams ever since.

Following the Joker’s horrible debut, Bruce became more reclusive than ever. Not Alfred, Tom, Selina, Barbara or Dick could get him to open up. He spent weeks in isolation, never leaving the shadows of the Batcave. Eventually, Dick had enough. With his bags packed, he informed Bruce that he would be leaving Gotham for his hometown, Blüdhaven. He wanted to ensure that nothing like what the Joker did would ever happen there again. Bruce didn’t try to convince him to stay.

Just before the new year dawned, Alfred and Selina were able to convince Bruce to seek therapy. Seeking out Leslie Thompkins, his and Tommy Jr.’s psychiatrist since Thomas Sr. and Martha’s murder, he did as they wished, if only because he wanted someone to talk to. It was around this time that he was contacted by a mysterious figure going by “the Message Man”, offering to tip him off on crimes in progress and keep him informed on any developments, be it supercrime or not. After the Joker, although he would never admit it, Bruce had lost confidence in himself. Against his better judgement, he accepted Message Man’s offer, and further still, came to trust him.

On April 1st, Bruce’s worst-case scenario of the Kryptonian race became a reality when Commander Dru-Zod and his army invaded the Earth, intending to shape it into “New Krypton.” It wasn’t long before Kryptonian soldiers, powered by the Sol System’s yellow sun, arrived in Gotham, and Bruce was forced to don the suit he’d had prepared three years prior. With the synthetic substance weakening the Kryptonians, and their cells not fully charged by the sun’s radiation, he was able to hold them off as Gotham slowly shook around him, courtesy of Zod’s World Engines. However, one man was not enough to stop the aliens, and people died as a result. The Kryptonians only fled when their leader was flung into the Phantom Zone by Clark Kent, known to them as Kal-El – the traitor.

Following the invasion, Bruce continued on with life as it had been after Blüdhaven. He was not prepared for what’s to come.

Wallace Rudolph West was born to Rudy and Mary West in the town of Blue Valley, Nebraska. An avid daydreamer, he would spend his days dreaming about the long-disbanded Justice Society of America, namely the Flash – a speedster who could, according to recounts of countless stories, run as fast as sound. Idolising the hero did well for Wally’s personal development; since the beginning of his infatuation with the Flash, he’d adopted the speedster’s strong moral principles as his own, seeing the world in black and white – good and evil – wherever he looked. However, his reputation as a dreamer and his admiration of the Flash didn’t do as well for his schooling. His parents would often be called up to the principal’s office, be it because the young West’s grades were at an all time low, or because he’d gotten in yet another fight with a bully picking on kids below his weight. But while most parents would scold their child, let them know how disappointed they were and then punish them accordingly, Wally’s parents were not so invested in their duties. Being what some would consider emotionally distant, Rudy and Mary were too busy trying to get rich quick and worrying about what others thought of them to truly concern themselves with their son’s upbringing, and as such did what they always did in such circumstances: they sent him to stay with his Aunt Iris.

This was not the punishment they thought it to be. Wally was as close to Iris as he was distant from his parents – as a little boy, he would often refer to her as his best friend. Living in Central City, Missouri – “the city always on the run” – Iris lived a life more exciting than that of anyone else he knew. Working as a journalist for Central City Picture News, she delivered news on both paper and television screens; if the story was big, you could bet that her name was on the byline. More than her job, though, Wally felt like she truly got him – like she truly understood who he was, and not only that, accepted it. During his “punishments”, so cheekily named by his aunt, one of his favourite pastimes was their visits to Keystone, Central’s sister city on the other side of the Missouri River, across the Kansas-Missouri border. The Flash’s home city before his retirement in the eighties, Keystone was also home to the Flash Museum, a proud building full of memorabilia from the Justice Society and the Flash’s heyday. It was here that Wally and Iris would spend the majority of their weekends together, dividing their time between the museum and sites where the Flash had fought what were considered some of his toughest battles, namely those between himself and the aptly named Rival, a man considered his reverse – a perversion of the speedster’s every principle, of everything he had ever stood for. Although Wally was born in Blue Valley, it was in Central-Keystone, the Gem Cities, that he was raised. In Nebraska, he was ridiculed because of his idol; an outsider. With his Aunt Iris, he was home.

It wasn’t until the middle of 2011 that he met Barry Allen. A forensic scientist for the Central City Police Department, Barry initially struck Wally as a boring man; Iris’ new boyfriend, he was around more often than not, and from what Wally saw of him, he did not impress. Always the last to arrive, Barry seemed so uninteresting, so dull, that he often found himself wondering what his aunt saw in the man; the only interesting thing he could find out about him was the coma he’d been in after getting struck by lighting – that was until they had their first real conversation. Once Wally actually paid Barry the attention Iris wanted him to, he was surprised – and happy – to find a kindred soul that shared his opinions on the world, on good and bad, on heroism and villainy, but not only that – on the Flash. When Barry spoke of the Flash, it was as if he was speaking from experience; an impossibility, Wally knew, as Barry was born in the decade that the Flash retired, but still – the teenager couldn’t help but wonder at how Barry could describe running at high speeds so vividly, how his imagination could take him to such places with so much detail and emotion.

And then the Flash released his autobiography. Titled Things You Can’t Outrun, the book revealed the Flash’s identity as that of one Jason “Jay” Garrick, a former scientist turned superhero caught in a one-in-a-million lab accident that transformed him into the speedster of fame. Upon its release, Wally immediately purchased a copy, and it was everything he expected it to be – a near one thousand page shrine of information on his childhood hero. The quotes collected over his years of activity didn’t portray half the man Jay was. In his autobiography, his words radiated the values he upheld, giving depth and detail to the tall tales Wally knew of – and to those he didn’t – that he could only dream of. But there was one thing in particular that caught his eye that both puzzled him and filled him with excitement – a single paragraph in one of the final chapters of the book.


The thought of a second Flash debuting in a time when Wally was alive seemed absolutely mind-blowing – and to think that he, whoever he was, had the blessing of Jay Garrick, was even more so. It seemed impossible to Wally. Another Flash, in this modern era. No way that could happen.

And then it did.

Within days of Superman’s debut in Metropolis, the second Flash sped his way through the Gem Cities in a sleek red suit, apprehending a grand total of two hundred criminals between the two cities before a minute passed noon. Wally was staying with Iris when it happened, and even saw the new speedster rush past her apartment building. Barry arrived shortly after, too late to catch a glimpse.

Over the next year Wally would continue to spot the Flash during his visits, quickly growing to admire the new hero just as much as he did Jay Garrick. The former superhero was right; whoever this new Flash was, he was the best candidate for the job. He wouldn’t dish out anything a criminal didn’t deserve. To those who could still walk away, he gave a chance. Even when the supercriminals began to surface – Captain Cold and his Rogues, Turtle Man, Double Down and Peek-a-Boo, to name a few – he didn’t serve them any unneeded punishment, never allowing his anger to get the better of him. But there was more to it than that. It was the little stories, too; the fluff pieces in the news about how he took the time (a few seconds) to paint an elderly couple’s fence, about how he renovated an apartment block that had been damaged in one of his run-ins with the Rogues, about how he’d brought pizza to a group of kids he’d saved from plummeting off the Central-Keystone Bridge in their school bus. He wasn’t like that supposed urban legend in Gotham, the Batman, a silent protector that hid in the dark – he was that guy all the locals knew, who always lent a hand because he wanted to, not because he was obliged to.

One hot summer’s day in the August of 2013, everything changed. Wally, now fifteen, was once again in Central City. This time was worse than the others. He and his parents had argued before, but it had never escalated to the point that it had now. Rudy had hit him. Before either of his parents could tell him to, Wally had already packed his bags. Barry and Iris could tell that something was wrong; yes, Wally was usually in a bad mood upon his arrival, but it was usually gone by the time he set foot in Iris’ apartment. But now, his mood only ranged from sullen to joyless – not even a sighting of the Flash near Iris’ work was enough to lift his spirits. A few days into his stay, Iris and Barry made an executive decision. They needed help from a friend.

The Flash met a starstruck Wally that evening, angry storm clouds overhead, touring him around the Gem Cities at speeds high enough to exhilarate, but not enough to cause injury by the laws of physics. They talked for a while, Wally asking all of the questions he had wanted to since the Flash first debuted a year earlier: what’s it like to be a superhero? How didn’t he get sick of criminals like the Rogues, always seeming to break out just to hurt people again? How did he get his powers? And so it was that Wally found himself in a familiar forensics lab in which he’d met with Barry countless times before. The Flash rearranged the room, placing vials of chemicals in a specific order, explaining that those were the substances that spilled onto him when he was struck by lightning – it was then that everything clicked, and Wally realised who it was that he was really talking to. And then the lighting struck.

Months after Wally woke from his coma, he and Barry theorised that Barry had subconsciously drawn the Speed Force to Wally, thus replicating the accident that gave him his powers – and making a sad kid’s dreams come true.

When Wally awoke from his coma, six months had passed. He wasn’t in the hospital, though – he was in STAR Labs’ Central City facility, under the care of Dr. Harrison Wells and Darwin Elias, who Barry told him were his go-to experts on their power source, barring Jay Garrick. At first, Wally thought he’d misheard Barry; surely he hadn’t said that the Speed Force was their power source. But then time slowed down, and Wally zipped from one end of STAR Labs to another, and he knew that he hadn’t misheard Barry. He had the Flash’s powers.

But while Wally was ecstatic, and Barry had agreed to help him learn how to control his speed, not all was well – his parents, more angry at Barry and Iris than they were happy to see him up and about, had banned Wally from visiting them until he was able to live on his own, and for a few moments, he was devastated. And then it hit him. He had the Flash’s powers. He didn’t need their permission to visit Barry and Iris; he could run from Blue Valley to Central City before either of them even noticed. So began a new chapter in Wally’s life, running to the Gem Cities to catch up with Barry and Iris, training with the former in the use of his powers. Eventually, Barry made him a costume with a reversed colour scheme to his own, and Wally happily debuted as Kid Flash. For a while, all was well.

And then his mother died.

Mary West was on a cruise. She needed a break from everything; Rudy was starting to drink again, and ever since Wally awoke from his coma, it seemed as if he wanted to do anything but spend time with his immediate family. No, he’d much rather have spent time with his aunt and her boyfriend in Central City, the very people that were to blame for his ending up in a coma. The only person that seemed to want to be with Mary was herself, and so she came to the conclusion that she shouldn’t wait for Rudy to snap out of his drunken, violent stupor, and nor should she expect Wally to suddenly prefer her company over that horrible woman’s – so the first chance she got, she bought a ticket for a relaxing cruise through the Caribbean. She did not make it back home.

A freak storm, seemingly out of nowhere. No one was prepared. The majority of the cruise ship’s occupants managed to get to the safety of a life raft. Mary was not one of them.

Wally blamed himself. He knew he shouldn’t, that it wasn’t his fault, but he couldn’t help but feel that with his powers – his speed – maybe, just maybe, he could have saved her. Maybe, just maybe, she would still be alive… if he’d just been fast enough.

Rudy blamed Wally, too. Slipping further into his drinks, he insisted that it was Wally’s insistence on keeping away from Mary, from him, that drove her to go on that cruise. Not long after her funeral, Rudy packed his bags and left, leaving Wally without his parents. Without a home.

Barry and Iris took Wally in without hesitation. They shared in his grief, but they were happy to be able to provide him with some semblance of normality, providing him with a family he could come home to. Joe West, Wally’s great uncle, became a more prominent figure in the young speedster’s life. Whereas before he’d served as an ally for the Flashes, after Mary’s death he became something more – what he was always meant to be. Family.

Wally began attending school at Central City High, held back a year due to his time spent in a coma. He was quick to find friends in Jared Morillo, Lilith Clay and Linda Park, three people with very clear aspirations – a future cop, psychologist and journalist – their sureness in where they wanted to go in life drawing him to them like some sort of lightning rod. Wally didn’t want to admit it then, but he, along with everyone else in the school, knew that he was drawn to Linda most of all. It wasn’t until mid-2015 that he found the nerve to ask her out. No one was surprised when she said yes.

As Kid Flash, Wally was increasingly in his element, taking to the role of a superhero as easily as he did talking. He even got to meet his childhood hero, the one and only Jay Garrick, and his wife, Joan; a meal with the Garricks became a near weekly event, something that Wally got excited for no matter how often they visited. Jay was everything the media and his book said, and more. Wally knew of the saying, “Never meet your heroes,” but people would eat those words if their hero was the original Flash. All in all, despite his mother’s death, things were going well for Wally. He wasn’t expecting the Kryptonians to attack.

But even before General Zod came with his army and the World Engines, an invisible enemy was making himself known to Barry. The Flash would find notes at work and in his home, letters from his “biggest fan” informing him of “something big” in the works, disturbed fan mail from an untraceable stalker. When the Kryptonians invaded… he struck.

Eobard Thawne. Professor Zoom. A man wearing a perverted, reversed version of Barry’s costume, he was faster than anyone Wally had ever seen before – initiating a chase through the Gem Cities as they were torn apart by Zod’s army, taunting them the entire way… to STAR Labs. It was no secret that the Central City division of the think tank were constructing a particle accelerator; the media frequently cited it as a controversy, with renowned scientists such as Dr. Reed Richards and Anthony Stark stating that there was no telling what the activation of such an apparatus within a populated urban environment such as Central City would mean, or what kind of damage it would cause. Professor Zoom’s plan soon became clear, as he sought to activate the accelerator – unfinished in its current state – under the blanket of distraction the Kryptonians provided. In desperate need of help, Barry and Wally called for help, signifying Jay Garrick’s return to action. As he and Wally did what they could to protect civilians from Zod’s army, Barry confronted Zoom, but was ultimately unable to defeat him – he was too fast. With the particle accelerator primed to explode, Barry began to run around STAR Labs, pushing himself to run as fast as he could without breaking the time barrier. If he was fast enough, then he might have been able to contain the explosion. But the strain was beginning to be too much for him, and with the onslaught of antimatter and other “theoretical” energies, released as the accelerator ripped open the fabric of reality, causing him more damage than anything ever had, Barry was beginning to become one with the Speed Force. Unwilling to let his mentor and uncle (Barry and Iris had married a few short months ago) die, Wally helped him, running faster than he ever had before. With their combined speed, the explosion was contained to a two-block radius, dimensional energies flooding what was a relatively minimal area, as opposed to what could have been. Barry, Wally and Jay did their best to get everyone out of the blast radius, and as far as they knew, they did. Soon after, Superman and his allies defeated Zod and his army. The Kryptonians left in the Gem Cities fled at their leader’s defeat.

One month later, the Gem Cities were still recovering. Barry, Wally and Jay (who “temporarily ran out of retirement”) did their best to assist with the clean up, speeding up the process significantly. All the while, Barry and Wally reeled from the beat-down they received from Professor Zoom, his whereabouts thus far unknown.

Arthur Curry is the product of a chance encounter between two people from entirely different worlds. Philip Curry, a world famous marine biologist and Atlanna Queen of Atlantis. Atlanna had fled from the grasp of her husband King Trevis, the current ruler of Atlantis. Philip found Atlanna walking up on a beach in the middle of the harsh Maine winter. So he brought her back to his home to help her get warm and as days became weeks the pair ended up falling in love. The product of their love was Arthur, a child of land and sea. Half Atlantean and Half Human. Soon after though when the boy was still young, King Trevis sent out forces to the surface world to 'rescue' his wife and bring her back to him. Atlanna urged her husband to take their young son flee for if they found Arthur they surely would of killed him.

So Philip bundled up his young son and together they fled as Atlanna was dragged back to her king. When Arthur was older his father would tell him that his mother died when he was young of illness, in an effort to protect his son from the same monsters that had taken his mother. Thanks to Philip's work, as a young boy Arthur never stayed in one place for too long, he spent most of his youth at sea on his father's research vessel named the Atlanna in memory of the Queen he once loved. Together the two sailed across the world. When he was not working Philip home schooled his son in many subjects: math, the sciences, English, et cetra. In short it was a good life if not a conventional one and by the time the boy was ten he had already seen more of the world than most see in a lifetime.

Of course even as the boy was young his abilities began to show through, his Atlantean blood giving him strength, speed and endurance far beyond levels of Olympic athletes let alone other boys of his age. His father only began to realize the true extent of the boy's abilities when he slipped off of their boat in shark infested waters off the coast of Papua New Guinea; rather then kill the boy, the sharks actually helped push the boy back up to the surface and to his father's boat. Finally coming to understand that he couldn't go around pretending that his son was just a normal boy like everyone else, he made it his life goal to help train his son and help him come into mastery of his powers.

Fate would have different plans of course.

They got caught in a terrible storm. The waves streching taller than buildings came crashing down upon their little research vessels and the very water gnashed and whipped around them. The Atlanna would end up in pieces by the end of it. As he tried to reach his father struggling to stay afloat in the rough water, floating debris carried by a wave hit young Arthur. Knocked out by the force of the blow, his lifeless body drifted slowly down into the ocean depths. Philip Curry would die during that storm and when the coastguard found the wreckage they assumed his young son had perished as well.

Arthur evidently would end up being saved by a pod of dolphins and there they would give him his second name Swimmer. Arthur would spend his pre-teen years with the dolphins and in return the dolphins taught him the ways of the world below the surface. At first the Dolphins rightfully thought him as a lost Atlantean but when Arthur proved to have no knowledge of Atlantis or the people that dwelt their, they realized they had stumbled upon something much different.

The world first found out about Arthur after one of the dolphins was killed by illegal fisherman off the coast of Japan. In rage and anger, Arthur hunted after the ship and when he found it assaulted the fisherman aboard easily beating them back and destroying their equipment, threatening to take their lives if they harmed the creatures of the sea again. After several other events such as that, the press caught on and soon headlines were appearing talking of the mysterious Aquaman fighting back against illegal fisherman. And just like that Arthur gained his third name.

He could feel the disturbances in the ocean and from what he could gather form the other creatures was that something was happening out in the sea. The waters had become dark and lifeless for miles, and no matter where Arthur went he found dead creatures. Eventually he would find the culprit of these crimes, a man who would become know as Black Manta. Manta was Arthur's first real taste of a so called supervillan, a man who grew to come to hate the sea after events he could not control in his childhood. So in return he wanted to make all the creatures within suffer.The two would engage in combat and Arthur nearly perished but the young man was able to outwit Black Manta and in the process make a life long foe.

Soon afterward Arthur began having dreams of a beautiful women telling him to go and save Atlantis...

Upon arriving at the city, he discovered that King Trevis had gone mad and put all of Atlantis underneath his totalitarian regime. He kept his Queen tucked inside the palace and the people were kept in check only by fear of death. Arthur sneaked his way into the palace where he discovered that the woman haunting his dreams was none other than his own mother Atlanna.

Atlanna would tell him the true story of his heritage, and give him a new task to free Atlantis from the grasp of King Trevis. And so that was how Arthur ended up leading a rebellion against the king. It was during this period that Arthur met Orm Marius. Orm was the son of Atlanna and King Trevis borne after the Queen was dragged back to Atlantis after her small getaway with Philip Curry. Hated by his father for being weak and hated by his mother for being a child that she was forced to bear, Orm had always felt like an outsider and an outcast. Seeing his chance to change his position in life he allied with his new half-brother to fight against his own father.
deep into parts of the ocean long since abandoned to find the tomb of Atlan, ruler of Atlantis once lo
Together the pair traveledng ago and the one who eventually brought it sinking beneath the sea. It was in this ruin that they found the lost Trident of Neptune, once the symbol of the royalty of Atlantis and an object of great power. With the power of the Trident at his hand Arthur was able to rally an army to his cause from those oppressed by King Trevis. While the war was costly for both sides, in the end due to Arthur's might and Orm's tactical brilliance they were able to dethrone King Trevis. The king dying by the hands of his own son. who

Among the casualties of the war were Atlanna. The good queen was killed in the final siege of the royal palace, sacrificing herself to save her sons. Atlantis finally free from the rule of Trevis made the one that had freed them their king and Arthur Curry received his fourth and final name that day, Orin King of Atlantis taking the name of one of the first great kings of Atlantis. This fact angered Orm greatly as the young man believed that he as the 'rightful heir' should of taken the throne, but he kept his anger to himself and in return from his service his half-brother even made him the High General of Atlantis.

Atlantis was not the only kingdom to survive the wrath of Atlan, two others did and in time Orin would come to know the first of those Xebel. The Xeblians much like those of Atlantis and assumed they were the only ones to survive the great sinking by Atlan. They were a peaceful and prosperous people compared to the more warlike and aggressive Atlanteans. In a bid to secure his own power, a lesser noble known as Leron lead a revolt and forced the then Queen Mera into exile. Mera traveled the oceans alone until she heard talk of the city of Atlantis. Desperate the young queen made her way to Atlantis chased all the way by Leron's forces. Eventually she would be saved from the clutches of death by none other than Orin himself.

Orin defeated Leron's thugs and took the injured Mera back to Atlantis. Swayed by her tale Orin along with Orm and several Atlantean soldiers made the dangerous journey back to Xebel. Using some clever tactics and great courage, Orin and company were able to displace Leron and restore Mera's place as Queen. After the fact, Atlantis and Xebel came closer together as the two monarchs believed that their peoples would do better as allies than enemies establishing both political and trade relations. Though eventually the two cities would become unified even further than just by politics.

A man by the name of Professor Hadley became fascinated by the old Aquaman tales on the surface. A talented biological engineer, he created a serum which allowed him to gain the powers of the mythical man beneath the waves, essentially becoming Aquaman's doppelganger. Hadley in his extensive research had discovered that Atlantis did exist and soon wanted it for his own. So the Professor ambushed Orin and Mera when they were out on an excursion together and trapped them in his own secrete underwater base, while he went on to pretend to be Orin and take the throne of Atlantis for his own. Together though the King and Queen were able to break free from Hadley's base and stop Hadley before his was able to do any harm. Hadley himself perished when he tried to hold Mera hostage only to have the sharks he tried to call down upon Orin attack him instead.

The incident brought Aquaman and Mera closer together and planted the sparks that would eventually flame into romance. A year after the incident the two were married and the cities of Xebel and Atlantis were untied as and the kingdom that was shattered long ago seemed to slowly come back together.

A third city survived the sinking one forgotten by time, a kingdom which would become known as Trench. Cast into the darkest depths of the Mariana Trench by the rage of Atlan, they were once people but overtime evolved into something much more monstrous to survive the dark depths. For generations upon end they remained in the darkness following the will of their King and Queen. But then Black Manta found the Scepter of Atlan, the very same scepter that had brought ruin to all of his kingdoms. Upon being touched, the Scepter was activated and the Trench were drawn to it like a magnet. Black Manta controlled an army and with it he set his sights on Orin his old foe.

Orin would come to learn of the threat from a youth by the name of Garth. Garth was born in a forgotten colony known as Idyllists. The colony of pacifists and builders was entirely wiped out by the Trench lead by Black Manta. Garth was away when the attack happened and manged to avoid the Trench and find his way to Atlantis. Taking Garth underneath his wing to help avenge his people and protect his own, Orin began a great quest to defeat the Trench and save those that he cared about. The Trench devoured all that stood in their wake and in the darkest hours it seemed as if Black Manta would destroy them all.

It was not Orin would saved the day, but young Garth who was pushed aside by the Manta as nothing but a mere boy. Garth saved Orin from being devoured by the Trench by sneaking up upon Black Manta and knocking the Scepter out of his hand. With the Trench now in state of confusion, Orin was able to break free and help Garth take down Black Manta before taking the scepter and leading the Trench back into the depths. Unable to destroy the scepter because of its magic, Orin threw it down into the depths with the people that it controlled hopefully to never be found again.

Time passed and life return much to normal with Orin and Mera ruling over a time of peace and prosperity. When trouble approached the city it was fought back by Orin and Garth who had become his prodigy. Yet all the while Orm was at work spinning his plot to take the throne that he deserved. His chance would come with the arrival of a new face in Atlantis. Namor. Namor was a young upstart, much like Orin himself had been sharing the blood of both Atlantis and the surface. Namor's mother an Atlatiean princess and younger sister of Atlanna haaving escaped the grasp of King Trevis much like her older sister and having escaped to the surface where she fell in love with a human man known as Leonard McKenzie. The two were killed though some time later by sleeper agents left on the surface by Trevis to deal with such issues.

Namor would spend his time alone growing up and get in his own host of adventures and problems and on an occasion was even confused himself for the Aquaman that had been sighted time and time again. Eventually following the rumors and stories of mysterious happenings in the ocean, Namor went out in search of the lost city of Atlantis to find those that had killed his parents and to take revenge. It was here that he met Orm. After telling him of his tale, Orm saw an opportunity. He whispered falsehoods and lies in Namor's ears telling him it was Orin that had sent out the order to kill his parents like he did with his own father, the last good king of Atlantis. And that he ruled the people through brainwashing and fear. He told him of an old prophecy of a true son of Atlantis would come and save them from the yellow king.

And so Orm secretly began shaping Namor into the tool he would use to usurp his half brother. He presented Namor as his own son and brought him into the royal court. Orin was cautious but accepted the boy into the palace. Namor earned the respect and love of the people of Atlantis for his skills and abilities, becoming a hero of the people. At the height of his popularity with the help of Orm he raised a rebellion against Orin calling himself to be the true King of Atlantis. That Orin himself was weak willed and corrupt, that he shared too much love for the surface world and that he would only lead them to ruin. Many flocked to the young mutant's cause.

And for what seemed like the fiftieth time, Orin had to defend his throne once again. Namor proved himself to be a tremendous foe though with not just great skill but inherit tactical supremacy. His forces first seized Xebel making it into their own base of operations and conscripting the citizens superior building abilities to create great weapons of war. Orin with his allies including Orm (still pretending to be on his side) brought together their own army and fought against Namor time and time again. While Orin's force was bigger, Namor used guerilla tactics to strike out against his supply lines and severally damage his morale. Deserters became a common occurrence with many of them switching over to Namor's side.

Eventually Orin's forces were pushed back to the walls of Atlantis were a great siege began listing months. While Namor's forces continued to assault the city the defenders held on with all their might and kept them back. Many lives were lost in the process and the great city was nearly destroyed in the process. Seeing his people suffer and the city he had come to love turned to ruins, Orin knew that he had the war and end it soon. So he did it in a way which he saw could end the bloodshed once and for all So he challenge Namor to single combat to the death, whoever one would be the rightful king. Mera tried to stop him and so did Garth but Orin had already made up his mind and knew what he had to do.

Before he left he gave The Trident of Neptune to Orm to watch over and protect as up to this point his half-brother had seen him through thick and thin. And Orin left the city to meet Namor on the field of battle. The battle was long and bloody with the two would be kings fighting with everything they had. It continued for hours, and the hours turned into days and yet they continued to fight. The survivors on both sides could only watch the horizon in baited breath feeling the earth shake as they saw columns of dust rise in the distance. The two beat each other to near death in the process and in the last moments of the fight Orin had gained the upper hand. He saw victory, he saw peace finally.

It was then when they were both weakened the Orm struck. Using the power of Neptune's Trident he thought that he had destroyed both of them bringing an entire section of the seafloor down with them. Orm then returned to Atlantis and with his own forces hiding among both Orin and Namor's armies rose up and took control of the defeated city, crowing himself as Ocean Master. He imprisoned Mera and Arthur Curry, Jr, the couples young child in the royal place dungeons. And with the ocean under his control he soon began to set his sights on the surface world above.

Though little did Orm now that the pair had survived his treachery. The pair would wash up ashore on the coast of California, weary and beaten. Namor realized he had been tricked by Orm into believing was filled with rage and anger. Orin was once again a king without his kingdom, separated from his family and those he cared about. Unable to do anything about his half-brother's treachery. Now stuck with Namor wither he liked it or not he had to gather up allies once more, warriors to help him fight Orm who held the power of Neptune in his hand and had an army to do his beck and call.

Anthony Edward “Tony” Stark // Iron Man

Chaotic Neutral

Tony Stark was born to Howard and Maria Stark in New York City in the year of 1986. His father was a genius in his own right, the fourth generation of Starks to run the family business, Stark Industries, founded in the mid-nineteenth century by Isaac Stark Sr. as Stark Enterprises. It came as no surprise when Tony demonstrated his own genius, having inherited Howard’s a hundredfold, graduating from high school before he entered his teens. However, he and Howard had a strained relationship, Howard often berating him for the tiniest of mistakes; this was made worse by the drinks, and so Tony endured much verbal abuse from his father since an early age. He instead found a father figure in Edwin Jarvis, his family’s butler, and for much of his life before the Iron Man, his best friend.

At the age of fifteen, Tony was already acquiring his tertiary education, having graduated from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology with Master’s degrees in physics and electrical engineering. It was during this time that he first met Obadiah Stane, the CEO of Stane Industries, Stark’s biggest competitor in the corporate world. Intrigued by the man, a master of chess, Tony allowed himself to speak with him, leaving the conversation with a sour taste in his mouth. He didn’t need his father to berate him for talking with Stane, and although Howard did, a part of Tony was glad. Something seemed off about the man, something that not even his genius mind could pinpoint, and he remained cautious of him ever since.

Later in that year of 2001, Tony met people who would remain his rivals for years to come at Oxford University, attending Dr. Harrison Wells’ “Forward Thought Conference”. It was there that he was introduced to the likes of Bruce Banner and the jet-setting brothers, Thomas Jr. and Bruce Wayne. Priding himself as a futurist, Tony saw through the latter two’s facades; while they behaved like anyone would expect the young inheritors of a gigantic fortune to, Tony noticed a conviction within them that ran deeper than a taste for young models and the thrill of high adventure, like so many tabloids liked to report – an observation that would later lead to his deduction of the younger Wayne’s identity as the mythical Batman.

Howard and Maria Stark were killed in an apparent car accident when Tony was twenty-one years old. Edwin Jarvis, their driver, died along with them. Moving past his grief with concerning speed, Tony took over as CEO of Stark Industries, transforming it into Stark International – and through the manufacturing of weapons he’d designed in his bedroom and many military and government contracts, he transitioned it from a multi-million dollar company to that of a multi-billion dollar conglomerate, bringing to the forefront of the American corporate world alongside the likes of OsCorp, Wayne Enterprises and LexCorp. Stane Industries was left behind in the dust, and unbeknownst to Tony, Obadiah was slowly but surely developing a dangerous vendetta against him.

Tony later got involved in what would have to be his most serious romantic relationship yet, with a woman called Whitney Frost. It was progressing far further and faster than any other relationship he’d had before – Whitney was, as far as he could tell, the woman of his dreams. If that was so, however, then the woman of his dreams would have had to have ties to a gigantic criminal empire – that of the Maggia, an international syndicate led by her father, Count Luchino Nefaria. Whitney was a mole, placed within Tony’s life in order to get Stark International’s tech within the Maggia’s grasp. Upon his discovery of Whitney’s agenda, he broke things off with her, telling her that if he ever saw her again, he would call the authorities. She disappeared not long after, going completely off the grid – but not before she got caught in accident that left her face permanently disfigured.

After promoting the woman that had notified him of Whitney’s activities, Virginia “Pepper” Potts, to the position of his personal assistant, Tony soon returned to his ways of drinking, partying and womanizing as if nothing had ever happened.

A weapons demonstration in Afghanistan would change Tony’s life forever. He’d flown over there to introduce a new multi-warhead missile of his own design to the U.S. Air Force, but before he could do anything of the sort, his convoy was attacked by a militant terrorist cabal called the Ten Rings. In the ensuing firefight, shrapnel was embedded deep within his chest, just inches from his heart. He was taken captive by the terrorists, placed in a makeshift lab within their encampment in the Afghani desert, serving as his prison. He awoke to find another man with him: Dr. Ho Yinsen, a renowned physicist and Nobel prize winner whose work Tony had admired from an early age. Yinsen had built a makeshift electromagnetic device that was inserted into Tony’s chest, keeping the shrapnel from piercing his heart, effectively saving his life. He explained that they were being held captive by the Ten Rings, who answered to a mysterious figure called the Mandarin, and that they wanted Tony to build them his weapons, or else face death. This was soon confirmed by the encampment’s leader, Raza, who made it very clear that should Tony not comply, his death would be very slow, and even more painful. Agreeing to help, Tony pretended to give the Ten Rings what they wanted – but with Yinsen acting as his assistant, he began working on something else entirely.

The Iron Man Mark 1 debuted as it burst through the sandstone walls of the terrorist encampment, protecting Tony from machinegun fire as he fought to escape with Yinsen. Unfortunately, Yinsen was killed by a stray bullet, and Tony was forced to leave by himself. As he traversed the desert with the armour’s rudimentary propulsion system, he stumbled upon an Air Force pilot who had been shot out of the sky and was under fire. Tony helped him repel his attackers, and soon he and James Rhodes had radioed for immediate extraction via Rhodes’ downed plane.

Tony returned home with a new lease on life. Pepper had insisted on hiring a bodyguard upon his return, expecting him to be fully opposed to the idea, and although he initially was, he was too preoccupied with other thoughts to do anything other than tolerate Harold Hogan. Having seen what his technology was capable of, he announced that Stark International would no longer be involved in the development of weapons, cancelling any military contracts his company might have had; shocking many and angering even more. He instead spent his time developing what would become the revolutionary repulsor technology (R.T.), replacing the electromagnet in his chest with a never ending source of R.T. energy after the shrapnel was removed from his heart. It was this R.T. battery that would come to power the new and improved Iron Man armours, and it wasn’t long until the Iron Man Mk 3 took flight, destroying any Stark weapons caches left in the hands of terrorists and criminals – bringing Tony face to face with organisations such as the Ten Rings, al Qaeda and the Taliban. By this time Rhodey had declined Tony’s offer to come work at Stark International, opting instead to leave the Air Force for work as a test pilot at Ferris Aircraft; a job that lasted all of three months before he came to work at Stark.

Tony’s identity as Iron Man was revealed to the public in a press conference after he prevented a missile launched by the Ten Rings from hitting its target: Times Square, New York City. Holding a press conference the morning after, Tony announced to the journalists and news crews gathered there that he was the armoured hero that had prevented the terrorist act, and that the Iron Man armour will never be anything more than a tool for peace, squashing any hopes the military might have had for getting the tech themselves.

The publicity stunt – because that’s what it was, a stunt – left Obadiah Stane seething with rage. He would not be outshined by another Stark, let alone the entitled brat that was Tony. He was no stranger to corporate espionage, and through it he was able to acquire the blueprints to the Mark 1 armour, beginning to add his own touches to it. Then the Iron Monger attacked, and Tony faced his first real battle as a superhero.

Only because of Stane’s inferior technology was Tony able to beat him. The older man fought viciously, and could have beaten him if not for the absence of R.T. in his armour. Incarcerated in Ryker’s Island, the reigns of Stane Industries’ CEO were handed to Obadiah’s then eighteen year-old son, Ezekiel.

Tony went on to encounter many more supercriminals as Iron Man, chief among them siblings Anton and Ivan Vanko (Crimson Dynamo and Whiplash) and Boris Bullski (the creatively named Titanium Man). All the while he continued to upgrade and create his Iron Man armours, and expanding Stark International beyond the weapons sector, moving into nearly field imaginable.

April 1st, 2016 would see him receiving his biggest reality check yet.

Not even Tony was prepared for Zod’s invasion. A self-proclaimed futurist, he didn’t see it coming – and when it did, Iron Man struggled to protect New York. People died, and if it wasn’t for himself and New York’s other heroes, the city may have well been nothing but rubble by the invasion’s end. His armour barely holding up against the Kryptonians, Tony could at least save one life – that of Spider-Man, a vigilante recently returned from a two year hiatus, who upon their meeting, Tony realised was just a kid. Soon, though, the invasion was over… and Tony was left feeling like he should have done more.

He soon heard of the Avengers Initiative – a S.H.I.E.L.D. response unit tasked with dealing with and preventing superhuman and extranormal threats to the world at large. Approached by S.H.I.E.L.D. director Slade Wilson, Tony was offered a position on the team, the director saying that his intellect would be a valued asset to the team. Seeing this as his chance to make things right, Tony agreed – even though the conditions of his enlistment meant a lucrative deal between Stark International and the government.

And so, the Avengers assembled.

A S.H.I.E.L.D. unit tasked with responding to and preventing superhuman and extranormal threats, the Avengers are made up of a variety of government agents, those from the armed forces... and Tony Stark.


Tony's position in the Avengers Initiative also sees him working with those not a part of the team, but still affiliated with S.H.I.E.L.D. and its three branches.

Dr. Harrison Wells | The reclusive head of Keystone City's S.T.A.R. Labs, Wells was one of Tony's biggest influences as a teenager.

??? // Spider-Man | A young kid with spider powers who's in way over his head, but Tony thinks that he has great potential regardless.

Bruce Wayne // Batman | First meeting at Oxford University when they were teenagers, Bruce always struck Tony as... off. This hunch has led to Tony deducing his identity as the mythical Batman, something he is yet to make Bruce aware of.

Oliver Queen // Green Arrow | The CEO of Queen Industries, moonlighting as the bow-wielding vigilante, Green Arrow.

Henry Fyff | Formerly working for Queen Industries' tech division, Henry was fired for allegedly stalking a colleague of his. He now works at Stark, mostly because Tony heard of his talents when it came to technology – something that he'd hate to see go to waste.

James "Jim" "Rhodey" Rhodes | Having met Tony as he escaped from the Ten Rings, Rhodey has since left the Air Force to work for Ferris Aircraft before coming to work at Stark International as Tony's personal pilot and chief aviation engineer. He's since become a close friend of Tony's.

Virginia "Pepper" Potts | Tony's personal assistant at Stark International, and one of his best -- and only -- friends. Although there is an attraction between the two, both would rather not act upon it, Tony instead choosing to maintain his playboy lifestyle.

Harold "Happy" Hogan | Tony's bodyguard, hired by Pepper following his return from Afghanistan, Tony gave Harold the nickname, "Happy", due to his seemingly permanent frown. Initially opposed to the idea of a bodyguard, Tony eventually came to befriend Happy.

J.A.R.V.I.S. | Tony's A.I., J.A.R.V.I.S. is based on his deceased butler, Edwin Jarvis.

Obadiah Stane // Iron Monger | Howard Stark's fiercest competitor in the corporate world, Obadiah Stane was the head of Stane Industries, and largely considered by contractors as the poor man's Stark. Following many failed hostile takeovers of Stark International, Obadiah did the only thing he saw fit to do: he had Howard and Maria Stark killed. Following Tony's debut as Iron Man, he donned the Iron Monger armour, unable to take being outshined by a Stark once more. He currently spends his time in a holding cell within the Triskelion.

Ezekiel Stane // Iron Monger II | Obadiah Stane's son, and the current CEO of Stane Industries, Zeke is a genius rivalling and perhaps even surpassing Tony, developing advanced tech since the age of nine. Indoctrinated by his father to hate the Stark name, Zeke harbours a deep enmity towards Tony.

Anton Vanko // Crimson Dynamo | Brother to Ivan Vanko, Anton is a Russian inventor who built the Crimson Dynamo power armour, enabling its user to manipulate electrical fields. He is currently incarcerated in a Russian prison with his brother.

Ivan Vanko // Whiplash | Brother to Anton Vanko, Ivan followed in his older brother's footsteps as an inventor, creating an armour of his own design that closely resembled that of Tony's Mk IV, complete with two electrically charged whips. He is currently behind bars in a Russian prison with Anton.

Whitney Frost | One of Tony's many exes, Whitney was what Tony would call one of his most serious relationships. Breaking up with her after discovering that she was a corporate mole for the Maggia, Whitney was caught in an accident that left her face permanently disfigured. She's been off the grid ever since.

The Mandarin | The mysterious leader of the Ten Rings terrorist cabal.

Following the Kryptonian Invasion, he’s become focussed on designing and implementing security measures and new technologies in order to protect himself, those close to him, his new teammates, and ultimately, the world.