Harrier (Hero/Villain)
Code-name: Harrier
Full Name: Harriet Henderson
Allegiance: Unknown
Harriet Henderson never understood all of that “power comes with price” thing. Great family, great schools, great job and a great mutant power to boot. And that’s all for free! What else could you want? Unlike most teenage mutants she never gave her special powers a lot of thought, she just embraced the fact that she had them.
At twenty-one, Harrier took a sabbatical from the School of High Arts in Pulp City (where being a mutant was hip) and set out to travel the world. Something that became truly affordable when you could fly!
Her travels took her to Europe and her dream came true – being able to see all of the art galleries she had read about. While spending a lovely week in Paris, Harriet received an unexpected letter from her mother, demanding her to meet a man described as a family friend.
The charming stranger cut to the chase so fast, Harriet almost choked on her croissant. The man claimed that her parents had a debt to a French businessman and she had to pay it off.
Repayment was simple, a task to be completed by Harriet. In the gardens of Versailles, an open air exhibit of modern art would be held on Sunday. She, gifted with flight, was the only one that could get close enough to the pieces by Maxdrian and still get away.
“Think about it, one dive and your family will never have to worry about those cars parked on the other side of the street next to their place.”
A chill ran down Harriet’s spine as she heard the subtle threat that answered all of her questions about her parents irrational anxieties. “No”, came out of her mouth faster then she could evaluate her situation.
The man replied, “As expected”, and left in a hurry.
Harriet rose and tried to follow but her legs felt so weak and her head so heavy. The last thing she saw were two men grabbing her arms and dragging her into a black limo.
Upon awakening, Harriet found herself aboard a luxurious plane, velvet seats embroidered with a highly ornate crowned “R”. The man starring with cold eyes at her waking body spoke with a deep voice, asking her if she had changed her mind, backing up his words with a flick of his hand that pointed to a table. There lay two round objects that looked at first like cheap Halloween masks, rubbery and pale, but when Harriet focused, she realized in horror that those were flayed faces of her parents.
Using her last reserves of energy, Harriet flung herself at the emergency hatch, knocking the door open. Her body fell like a stone into the dark well of night. Her mutant powers could not kick in, partly because of the drugs clouding her mind, and partly to the numbing cold and air pressure she felt as she noticed the metallic taste of blood enter her mouth. Seconds before her inevitable crash, she mustered all her concentration and her frail teenage body skimmed over the ground and ploughed into a line of trees and hedges.
Knowing that something has gone awfully wrong, and without a chance to properly recover, Harriet, bruised and still drugged, tried to get on the first flight to Pulp City. Her world came crashing down as her passport got confiscated and she barely escaped airport security.
Harriet Henderson now never existed. Her name, her childhood, was all gone and irrelevant. It seemed like somebody had erased her life in the act of the cruelest vengeance. Her credit cards were blank, her home phone never answered. Some things could be settled only with a man behind all of this – Mr. Sanguine.
On that fatal night, high on the rooftop of the Royal Investments Tower in Paris, she confronted Guillame Sanguine who did not spare her the painful truth. Harriet had learned that her parents were Sanguine’s employees given a mission to raise a ’product’ of genetic manipulation. A project codenamed Harceleur was planned to produce an army of airborne soldiers able to deliver the decisive blow against the nations of the developing world unable to afford them. Their first meeting was just a test since most of the soldiers from Harriet’s generation (or as he called it ‘the batch’) were flawed and did not obey their intended masters.
Sanguine had all the power, but Harriet had her fury that fired her. Only one of them would survive to see the dawn, or so thought Harriet then.
Her wounds ran deep, in fact, some people claim she even lost her eye that night to the claws of Sanguine.
With the fall of Sanguine, her life as Harriet Henderson was over. When she saw Sanguine come back from the dead next week in the television news, Harrier was born.
Back in Pulp City, hot on the heels of Sanguine and his schemes, Harrier felt alive. An angry woman is dangerous. An angry mutant woman is lethal.
Some may call her a coward, but Harrier is just like a bird of prey: striking from above and retreating fast to the safety high above. She can cripple a man twice her size thanks to the well placed hits of her talon gloves.
With no other identity whatsoever, Harrier, the woman with no past, goes to any lengths to stay free like a bird.