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Background / History
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Justice Incorporated
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In the early 90's a group of supers from across the American south started working
together from time to time, and in 1993 a formal team was founded drawn from a network
of allies and friends. Taking the name Justice Incorporated, with the logo
"When you want Justice not Law, call 1-888-JUSTICE", the original line up included:
- Discus: a short but fiesty woman wearing a powered armor suit of unknown
manufacture, which utilized force field technology both offensively and defensively,
and allowed its wearer to run superfast.
- Dural: a genetically engineered product of a secret NASA project with comprehensive
physical adaptations and a plethora of space-faring and science skills; he also
had moderate superstrength and remarkable toughness.
- Lady Drake: a mystic metamorph able to assume various draconic forms, breathe
fire, and possessed of moderate but flexible magical powers.
- Solare: a solar-powered dynamo able to absorb solar energy and use it for
a variety of effects including energy projection and super strength (though he was
not particularly durable). Though flexible, he could quickly run himself out of
power and was unable to recover without exposure to sunlight.
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The new team quickly established itself as not messing around, fighting several
engagements with supervillains and criminal syndicates, most notably including encounters
with Agents of Deathstroke (an organization of primarily high-tech mercenaries led
by a ring of five supers level badguys, Broken Arrow, Swan Song, Old Sparky, Killshot,
and Hypothermic) which would prove to be a reoccurring nemesis for the group.
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The line up fluctuated in late 94, with two new supers joining, and Lady Drake and
Solare departing soon thereafter.
- Fade: a superfast mutant teleporter with an established record fighting against
drug syndicates in Georgia, Florida, and Louisiana.
- Vesper: a mutant telepath and telekinetic, who over time developed from an
emotional and troubled young lady with poor control over her powers into a very
dangerous and effective combatant.
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After Fade and Vesper joined and Solare had departed, the team prevented Deathstroke
from using the mayor of Atlanta as ransom leverage to rob the First National Bank
of Georgia in the employ of an unknown mastermind, and in the process "liberated"
a Deathstroke hoverjet which the team dubbed "Winged Justice". Dural undertook care
and maintenance of the jet and piloted it for the team thereafter.
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The grateful city made an abandoned public works facility on the outskirts of town
available to the group in appreciation, and the team slowly converted it into a
modest base, with basic facilities and a place for Dural to store and service the
Winged Justice. Lady Drake, who had served as transport for the group when necessary
thus far, felt that the team had finally matured sufficiently and no longer needed
her aid, and departed to deal with a personal matter in another dimension; she has
yet to return to the best of anyone's knowledge.
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The team continued on in this basic configuration, though Fade often departed to
pursue his own war on drugs, and Solare occasionally popped back in for short stints.
The group had many successes and a few less than successes. They fought the likes
of Meteora, Powercrusher, the Vereux Vaudau, the Leper King, Revelations Awakening,
and the Elementals as well as other lesser dogs and cats. However, the teams ongoing
war against Deathstroke continued to take form and more than anything characterized
the group's focus.
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In 1999 the team managed to uncover a major base for Deathstroke hidden in the Everglades
and assaulted it in full force. They delivered a hard blow to Deathstroke, but Discus
was slain in the encounter after charging after a fleeing Hypothermic, directly
into the mouth of a death trap set up by Killshot. Dural, who was in a long term
relationship with Discus, was devastated and left the group to deal with his grief.
Though he would occasionally come out of retirement to help out when needed in later
years, he was effectively done with active heroing.
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With the departure or inactivity of the founding members, Vesper was left as the
unwilling lynchpin of the group. She gamely attempted to keep things going by recruiting
in two heroes the group had worked with in the past as allies:
- Techrage: a brilliant inventor worth millions in his civilian identity. His
primary abilities revolved around technology, gadgeteering, a power suit, and vehicles
but he also suffered from a family curse of lycanthropy and would occasionally "wolf
out" into a furred clawed slashy bundle of fury.
- Visor: a mutant with the ability to absorb and project energy from his eyes.
Extremely accurate and capable of truly world-class blasts when fully charged.
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However at three active members, two of them new, the group just didn't quite gel
properly. Techrage stepped to the fore, and effectively took over. He orchestrated
the merger of Justice Inc with another less established group of supers called Southern
Shield active in the south, particularly around Atlanta, who was also sitting at
three members and struggling.
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Southern Shield
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Southern Shield was founded in 1997 by four young supers working in the Atlanta
area:
- Brain Drain: a mutant with heightened intelligence and the ability to absorb
the knowledge of others, gaining new abilities and depriving those targeted of them
for a time, draining their psyches even to the point of leaving them temporarily
insensate. He constructed an armored van and built various gadgets and weapons using
stolen knowledge. As time went on he became increasingly more knowledgeable and
capable thanks to residual effects of his powers.
- Bruiser: a mutant with broadly superhuman physical and mental capabilities,
and very useful in a knock down drag out fight.
- Terrar: a mutant with comprehensive earth and stone manipulation powers and
related stunts.
- Dr. Robomodo: a colorful roboticist with a quirky sense of humor. He used
a bewildering collection of odd-ball robots, of varying effectiveness. His mechanical
skills also served to seed Brain Drain's.
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The team mostly focused on street crime and miscellaneous lesser villains, the Road
Crewe, and also had encounters with Deathstroke on several occasions. In fact, the
robotics based gadgeteer Doctor Robomodo, was slain by Agents of Deathstroke. He
was replaced by a new member met in the same encounter:
- Tar: a mutant with strange powers related to a dimension of dark energy that
he can travel to and from and channel for unusual effects.
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The team became even more dedicated after Dr. Robomodo's death, but eventually Terrar
left the group in 1999 to pursue a love interest and a chance at a normal life leaving
the group at three and ultimately leading to them merging with Justice Inc.
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NewGen
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The six remaining supers from Justice Inc and Southern Shield reformed under Techrage's
leadership and took the name NewGen, short for New Generation. Techrage had a lot
of big ideas, and the money to back them up. He paid to build out the modest Justice
Inc base into a much more impressive facility, and hired a staff of support personnel
including a small PR team. He hired an image consultant on retainer and with their
advice commissioned high quality professionally made team-themed costumes. He equipped
the team with communicators and location beacons. He also rebuilt the Winged Justice,
which had been effectively mothballed with Dural's departure, from the inside out
and equipped it with a sophisticated AutoPilot computer of his own design named
Victrix. The newly refurbished and greatly superior aircraft was re-christened the "Winged Victory".
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Under Techrage's leadership, NewGen was an extremely successful enterprise, though
there was a good deal of internal strife, particularly between Brain Drain and Vesper
who were both used to having a stronger voice in previous incarnations of the team.
Techrage was very good at diplomatically managing personalities and egos, but Brain
Drain had a lot of pent up frustration and a constant feeling of being marginalized
and fixated on Vesper as the cause.
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The membership of the group was pretty stable, with the original six members being
reliable, with occasional visits by Solare, Fade, and Dural from the old Justice
Inc roster (typically when Deathstroke was involved). In 2005 the group plus Fade,
Solare, and Dural, tracked down Deathstroke's new base in the Texas deadlands and
launched an all out assault.
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Unlike Justice Inc's earlier willy nilly attack against the Everglades facility,
this one was carefully planned down to the last detail, orchestrated and managed
by Techrage with invaluable intelligence gathering by Fade and using an intricate
and elegant strategy developed using the unique talents of Brain Drain. The plan
called for a careful layered attack utilizing the talents of the offensive team
members as well as robotic drones, the Winged Victory piloted by Victrix, and deep
insertion of assets and demolitions by Fade and Tar. Escape routes were posited
and cut off. Contingencies were predicted and defeated.
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It was a masterpiece of sorts, and it worked very well when the time came to execute
it. At the end of an intense and brutal prolonged battle, four of the five ringleaders
of Deathstroke were captured and incarcerated, along with bushels of defeated agents.
Deathstroke had effectively been delivered a coup de grace. However, the nuclear
powered ringleader Broken Arrow managed to escape, killing Brain Drain in the process.
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With Deathstroke finally defeated, Dural retired for good, and both Solare and Fade
departed again. Visor had tried to save Brain Drain by absorbing Broken Arrow's
energies but failed, and racked by guilt and self doubt he departed the team to
get his head right. NewGen soldiered on, and soon added two new members over the
course of several months:
- Hype: a mutant with a superhuman physique and vast speed.
- Gravitate: a mutant with powerful but narrow gravity control abilities.
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With the new line up in place the team continued to make splashy headlines taking
on both new foes such as the Demolitionists and old foes such as a seemingly returned
from the dead and even nastier Papa Zombie. But without the threat of a common enemy
of Deathstroke's caliber to bind them all together the group started to drift apart
a bit to pursue individual goals.
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After a couple of years of this Techrage finally succeeded in his lifelong goal
and managed to cure his lycanthropy, after which he chose to retire to pursue his
business interests in the civilian sector. Though he continued to finance the team,
he no longer led it and without his steady hand on the wheel the group proceeded
to run aground before half a year had passed. Formally disbanding in 2004 the heroes
went their separate ways. The Winged Victory was given to Dural, who turned it into
a fancy chartered plane and makes a living piloting it out of Orlando. The base
was dismantled and turned back over to the city. NewGen was no more.
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Southern Justice
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A few years passed. Most of the former NewGen members continued to fight crime in
some way on their own or in small ersatz team ups. Several came to find the experience
less than satisfying. In 2007 Vesper, who was the only one of the allums who was
any good at keeping in touch with people, started putting out feelers to see if
any of her old allies wanted to try teaming up again and maybe recapture some of
the glory of the good old days.
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This team would go back to basics and be more akin to the Justice Inc focus on results,
eshewing the high profile media oriented style of NewGen. Fighting real crime, all
the time, and no pandering to the press or public opinion polls, she vowed. Bruiser
and Tar, who both sorely missed the team environment, signed up immediately. Surprisingly
Fade, who had never been the best at being teamed up, agreed on the provision that
fighting drug related crime would be included in the groups active operations.
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Considering the new team had two members each from Justice Inc and Southern Shield,
they collectively settled on Southern Justice as their new name in homage to times
past. The four have proven out their focus on whatever works, low profile heroism
and have been very active in cracking down on street level crime, syndicates, and
supervillains alike across the southern states since then. The groups absolute refusal
to sanction or cooperate with PRIMUS causes them issues from time to time, but the
memebers all agree to varying levels that PRIMUS interference and red tape is not
worth the benefits of registering. And thus they carry on the torch of superheroism
on their own.
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