The Dark Harrier
Real Name: Eric Drighten
Age: 38
Occupation: News van technician
Legal Status: Born Citizen of the USA
Identity: Secret
Other Aliases: former NYC gang member known as 'the Harrasser'
Place of Birth: New York City, NY
Marital Status: Single
Known Relatives: mother, identity secret
Group Affiliation: Malador
Base Of Operations: currently Independance Port and nearby zones
First Appearance: summer of 1987, New York City [as seen in Heroes of the Empire State issue 87]
History: Born in a poor neighborhood in Queens, NY, Eric Drighten did not exhibit any of his latent mutant abilities until puberty began. Always a loner in school, his single mother sent him to the best schools available to her limited income. Although she supplied him with great moral support, his emerging mutations, though easily concealable, made him an outsider in his own mind.
He eventually fell in with a group of leather-clad gang members calling themselves the Jackyls, and despite a slim frame, found use and status as the group's enforcer.
Keeping his gang activities secret from his mother, Eric soon found things spiraling out of his control. Until this time, the gang's activities in drug traffic and protection had netted them only small money, and their leader, Black Jack O'Keefe, wanted more. He soon 'contracted' his group's services out to more violent underworld figures, and wound up getting his peers in way over their heads.
Eventually called to the office of the minor mob figure who oversaw the Jackyls, ostensibly for a scolding, Drighten found himself and his gang in a proper mob rubout. His gang friends were gunned down in the dank warehouse office, and Eric took 5 slugs to the body. However, he stood back up, and using his hands and feet alone, beat the 5 mafia goons to death.
Realizing he had placed himself in danger of a more serious reckoning than he'd ever imagined, he ransacked the offices, left all the drugs and other illicit goods he found in plain sight and phoned police, then absconded with a bag full of cash.
Tearfully relating the entire tale to his mother, Eric faced yet another shock: his mother felt serious shame that he had been involved in such dangerous illegal activities for so long, after all she had tried to teach him about right and wrong. Mortally shamed, Eric nonetheless escaped the Big Apple with her to flee the inevidable mob retaliation, completely altered his costume, and adopted a new secret- and hero-identity as they settled in a quiet Rhode Island suburb, and went back to school for a degree.
Determined to right all the wrongs he may have commited as a youth, and to make sure he never fails his mother's teachings again, he used his burgeoning flight powers to soar back and forth between his birthplace of New York City, and his quiet home outside Paragon, combating evil in both places. With local crime on the upswing, he now battles evil in Paragon City almost exclusively. He uses his former contacts and civilian job in TV news as a location van video techician to be where the trouble is thickest.
Height: 5' 10''
Weight: 200lbs
Eyes: Green
Hair: Light Blond, possibly dyed from darker color
Strength Level: The Dark Harrier exhibit strength slightly above human norms. Under stress he has been able to lift [press] 500 pounds with relative ease and propel such weight medium distances. His reflexes are typical for an average martial arts practitioner, which is to say, trained to be slightly faster than the average human.
Known SuperHuman Powers: Dark Harrier displays intense skill in Eastern martial arts, and couples it with his mutated strength, stamina, and physical fortitude to attack his foes by main force. He is completely immune to small weapons fire, and once took the impact of a shoulder-fired rocket to his body with no lasting effects. He can fly at medium speeds, and possesses some skill at aerial combat. His invulnerabilities extend to impact, energy, fire and intense cold.
Abilities: Aside from a smattering of knowledge in a wide variety of the world's martial arts, Eric Drighten also uses his contacts in the seamy underworld to know where to be when trouble is brewing. He is otherwise an average joe.
Weapons: His hands and feet are registered as lethal weapons with the New York and Rhode Island state authorities. He is not known to use any other devices as weapons.
