The Visitor

A hero whose powers hide the truth of his identity behind the veil of super heroics, the Visitor is the adult Pete Stanchek, who came from the dark times of the Harbinger Wars on a mission to save the world from Toyo Harada and his dream.
Victorious in freeing his past self from Harada's control at the cost of his own life, this visitor from another era sets his younger self on a path to find a better tomorrow for man and Harbinger alike in an attempt to steer humanity away from the dark future he hails from.
=A Stranger In A Strange Land=
==A Stranger In A Strange Land – Part I==
At approximately 1:30 pm Pacific Standard Time, an earthquake measuring 6.6 on the Richter scale rocked Los Angeles and the surrounding area, and as the structural supports of many buildings in the downtown area crumbled, falling rubble threatened to bury a group of commuters. Suddenly, the Visitor, a flying creature who UFOlogist C. Biggers would later state to the news fit the description of aliens described by people who had experienced close encounters, swooped down and stopped the failing debris. Like a strange visitor from another world, the Visitor rescued several people from the chaos following the tremor, a heroic act captured by the news that reached the home of Charlene Dupré, the Harbinger formerly known as Flamingo, in Mobile. Listening to statements that called the Visitor an angel and said that a pulsating beam of light accompanied him at various times, Charlene turned the TV off and, citing her Sunday School teacher’s tale of an archangel that would appear from the sky when it was time to battle the demon rising from the east, she left for L.A.
Meanwhile, at the new Harbinger Foundation facility in Los Angeles, Toyo Harada, in a bid to test the Visitor’s mettle, met with a media mogul and used his powers of the mind to convince him to see to it that the Visitor was shown for the menace that he was and blamed for the tremor.
Two days later, after three Orange County men stole nearly $300,000 from a Bank of America in Downtown Los Angeles, LAPD officers joined with the security guards in exchanging gunfire with the suspects, who managed to flee the scene. As the Visitor arrived on the scene, the men lost control of their vehicle, crashing into oncoming traffic. As reported by the news, the lack of the Visitor’s direct intervention left the media and authorities wondering if it was possible that he was somehow in league with the thieves. To Toyo’s delight, the news reported that the Visitor made no attempt to assist the police and fled the scene, which, along with the question of whether he was responsible for the tremors that shook Southern California earlier that week, made it seem like the Visitor was a very powerful and potentially dangerous question mark.
In the following days, while Chan, a monk from the Temple of Lamayuru in Ladakh who accompanied the Visitor to Los Angeles, futility told people to look to themselves to decide what the Visitor was and said that he had witnessed him to be a Harbinger of good, the heroes of the world fell for Harada’s smear campaign.
At Orb Industries’ headquarters in Boston, Aric Dacia, convinced by the reporters on television that said that the Visitor might be an alien, and assuming that the Spider Aliens sent him, decided to seek him out and kill him as per his blood oath to destroy the aliens. Donning his Manowar Class Armor, Aric took to the skies and left.
At Camp Pendleton in Southern California, the Armorines suit up to seek out the Visitor, who the President had deemed a potential threat. Having spotted the Visitor within a specific 150–mile radius, the Armorines departed in a helicopter equipped with detection gear designed for very low flying objects.
In London, Jillian Alcott arrived at the British museum, the scene of a terrorist attack that nearly caused the destruction of some of Great Britain’s most treasured artifacts foiled by Bloodshot and the Secret Weapons, and told the team that her father received a call from the US requesting their assistance against the Visitor.
Ten hours later in Los Angeles, X–O Manowar tackled the Visitor while he was in mid-flight over the city and they crashed into a building. Hovering over the Visitor, X–O told him that if the Spider Aliens sent him to prey on the humans of Earth he would die where he stood and demanded that he explain himself. Taking the Visitor’s silence as a scream of his guilt, Aric opened fire on him with his ion cannon, a blast that the Visitor deflected with his left hand much to the Visigoth’s surprise. As the Visitor took off, X–O went after him but lost his trail, then, as the Visitor struck Aric from behind, they both vanished in a burst of multi colored lights.
Hundreds of miles away, X–O and the Visitor materialized in the Mojave desert, to where Solar had brought them in the hopes that they could talk and ensure that no innocents suffered from a battle in case they could not. Telling the Visitor that if his intentions were good, and if he wished to be a hero for the Earth, he could not be a public figure, he warned him that the government would send its forces after him, when just then the Armorines arrived. As the Visitor flew away, X–O Manowar, enraged, gave chase despite Solar’s assertion that the Visitor had not even struck back. Turning back, the Visitor lashed out against Aric with an invisible concussion blast that pushed him against the ground.
As X–O Manowar stood up, Solar hovered beside him and said that the Visitor’s energy traces did not match to anything he had seen from the Spider Aliens, and that he did not think he was one of them, while standing beside him, Gunny told him that the Armorines had orders to disable the Visitor and retrieve him. Facing the Visitor, Aric told him that if Solar was right he had nothing to fear from him, then he demanded that he reveal who he was.
==A Stranger In A Strange Land – Part II==
Early dusk, in the California–Nevada desert, a momentous battle took place between the Visitor and the bulk of Earth’s heroes. Throwing X–O Manowar against the side of a boulder and holding him against its face with his power, the Visitor then sparred with Solar, who warned him that the Armorines and X–O Manowar would not stop until they knew what he was and why he was there. As the Visitor tossed Solar aside, severely injuring him, the Armorines opened fire with their ion cannons, a blast that much to Solar’s amazement the Visitor deflected with a force field. Just then, Gunny rushed against the Visitor and dared him to face him. Breaking free of the Visitor’s hold, X–O Manowar leapt in between Gunny and the Visitor to protect the Armorine from an energy blast.
Meanwhile, Bloodshot and the Secret Weapons arrived on an aircraft carrier in San Diego harbor and boarded a Chinook transport that took them to the desert. An hour later, as the chopper flew over the desert, Bloodshot noticed a large burnt area with his enhanced vision and leapt down to investigate. Picking up liquefied sand and rock in his hand, Bloodshot sensed low–grade radiation and determined that Solar had been there. Elsewhere, in the Chaplin Hotel in Hollywood, Charlene became angry while reading a newspaper that accused the Visitor of destroying a neighborhood, when then she unconsciously set the paper ablaze. Feeling like she had sinned, Charlene fell to her knees and prayed for God to forgive her.
Reaching the site of the battle between the heroes and the Visitor, Bloodshot and the Secret Weapons leapt out of the chopper and joined the fray. While X–O Manowar fired on the Visitor, certain that the Good Skin’s power would crush his force field, Para–Man flew toward them and shot the Visitor with a blast of stun ram that sent him reeling against the boulder. Taking advantage of the Visitor’s daze, Bloodshot punched him in the face, but then the Visitor shot Tank. Warning the others that the Visitor was too strong for them to fight individually, X–O Manowar rallied them to strike at him together.
Meanwhile, at an abandoned mission in Southern California, Chan wrote in his journal of his concern that the Visitor had not returned. Musing in his writing that if he were not thousands of miles from his home in Tibet accompanying a creature more powerful than any man on Earth who he could not hope to understand he would think it all a strange dream, Chan wondered aloud why he was so worried about him.
Back in the desert, Bloodshot stroke the Visitor with a haymaker that sent him reeling several yards across the ground. Rushing toward the Visitor, Bloodshot told Sonar to hit him with concentrated sound to knock him out, but the Visitor sealed them inside a force field that trapped her blast with them. While Bloodshot and Sonar fell to his feet, the Visitor flew like a blur against X–O Manowar and Gunny and tackled them to the ground. Though weakened and barely able to contain himself after his defeat at the Visitor’s hands, Solar stood up and, refusing to let the battle continue, hit the Visitor with a concentrated energy blast to destroy him.
As Solar fell to his knees, hoping that he had done the right thing, the Visitor hovered above him and said that he had far from destroyed him. Reaching into the heroes’ minds, the Visitor told them that what he saw there, the loves and lives lost due to their actions and their acceptance of the grim responsibility, intrigued him. Seeking to help, despite the lies spread about him, the Visitor said that he lived among humans now, and could not stand by and witness any atrocities. Bearing no grudges, The Visitor took his leave, but not before he warned the heroes that if any of them attacked him against without motive he would show them no mercy.
That night at the mission, as the Visitor entered his sleeping chamber and told Chan that he would emerge three days later, he assured the young monk that the worst was over, yet, as he watched the Visitor vanish into the shadows, Chan wondered why he felt that it was all just beginning.
=Layers Upon Layers=
==Layers Upon Layers==
Near Lake Arrowhead in California, the Visitor rescued two firefighters trapped in the middle of a forest fire, then he made a firebreak to stop the blaze and saved about a hundred acres from going up. A short time later, Sam McGee, a reporter for WARJ News, referred to the Visitor as a menace that had been terrorizing Los Angeles and accused him of setting fire to dozens of acres of forest with his other–worldly powers.
Far below the ruins of a Franciscan mission in Southern California, the Visitor took Chan down the tunnels that the monks fashioned to hold their food and drink to a cavern filled with alien–looking machinery to show him where his time had gone. While the Visitor said that he devised most of what he needed despite their limited resources, he suddenly sensed the approach of a human that he told Chan did not respect life like they did and took off to confront him. Meanwhile, in Hollywood, the Harbinger checked into the Roosevelt Hotel.
Two hours later over the freeway, the Harbinger attacked a KTLN news chopper, but the Visitor stopped it from crashing on the street. A half a mile away, thirty seconds later, the Visitor caught up to the Harbinger over the Hollywood sign and demanded to know why he attempted to destroy the helicopter. Releasing an electrical charge, the Harbinger said that he did it to lure the Visitor to him. Expecting to defeat the Visitor, the Harbinger told him that he would mount his head on his father’s wall as a trophy of their battle, but then the Visitor suggested that his father was psychologically disturbed and said that they should go to him and discuss their conflict rationally.
Behaving erratically, the Harbinger lashed out at the Visitor with a blast of fire that the Visitor reflected back at him. Screaming in pain, the Harbinger flew away as he had never felt anything like that intense pain before, but the Visitor, refusing to allow him to murder any more innocents, chased him over the Capitol Records building and attacked him.
Meanwhile, in the Sunnyside Golf Course in Riverside, California, Major Paul Benson, an Air force major, confronted Colonel Bradley with his belief that the Visitor was the same alien “Moth Man” that he had seen over Area 51 in Nevada. Refusing to listen to Benson, or look at his evidence, which he had already reviewed in the major’s five appeal hearings took off in his golf cart and warned Benson that if he bothered him again he would slap him with a restraining order.
While the battle between the Harbinger and the Visitor continued, in New York Toyo Harada used his power to peak into Walter Sakai’s mind and learn of the Harbinger’s progress. An hour later, in Harada’s private sanctum, Harada jumped into a pool while wondering where the Visitor came from and whether his motives were as altruistic as they seemed now that he had turned the media against him.
3,000 miles away, the Visitor tossed the Harbinger into the ocean, but then the Harbinger leapt out and knocked the Visitor over to the beach with one punch. Landing beside the Visitor, the Harbinger grabbed his head and prepared to unmask him.
==Masks==
As the Harbinger pulled on the Visitor’s mask in a barren stretch of beach, the Visitor used his cape to toss the Harbinger off him. Standing up, the Visitor told the Harbinger to turn his eyes inward and ask what his mask concealed before he worried about what he was hiding. Keeping the Harbinger off balance, the Visitor told him that he would not allow him to harm another innocent and asked him who his father, a man that hated him and the Harbinger would kill to draw him out, really was. Taking off, the Harbinger told the Visitor that he would cry for those that were about to die. Chasing the Harbinger back to the city, the Visitor pushed him through the roof of a television studio just as a reporter was showing footage of their battle.
Several miles north, on the corner of Hollywood Boulevard and Highland, while Charlene Dupré listened to the witnesses’ accounts of the Harbinger and Visitor’s battle at the museum, Major Benson walked into a pawn shop and sold his guitar for two hundred dollars. When the store keeper offered him two bills more for his air force ring, however, he adamantly refused to part with it and left. Twenty minutes later, Benson returned home, where he met with two other individuals that like him had had close encounters of the third kind. Going inside, Benson reiterated to the men his encounter over Area 51 in Nevada and showed them a picture of the Visitor, who he was certain was the creature he saw.
While the battle between the Harbinger and the Visitor raged on in Los Angeles and left the television studio, back in the mission, Chan meditated over his decision to follow the Visitor. Seeing himself standing on burning coals while talking with an old master, Chan came to the conclusion that he followed the Visitor because he believed that there was as much for him to learn from him as there was for him to teach him.
At the world–famous Rodeo Drive, the Harbinger took a cop hostage and took him to the California Federal Savings Bank, which was close for renovations. Following the Harbinger, the Visitor shot him through a wall with an energy blast that caused his helmet to fall off, revealing the face of the cop behind it. Refusing to accept that he was looking at the Harbinger’s real face, the Visitor punched him, while in an effort to confuse him further, the Harbinger changed his face again and again, until he took on the looks of Harada, which the Visitor again refused to accept it as the truth. Finally, the Harbinger revealed his truth visage and asked the Visitor how he knew that he was not showing him his true self. Before the Visitor could reply, however, he heard gun shots and a cry for help and left, but not before he electrocuted the Harbinger with arc charge.
=Illusions=
==Illusions==
One mid–afternoon in Beverly Hills, the Visitor broke into a jewelry store and stopped a foursome of men garbed in black from stealing the jewels. Just then, the police arrived and threatened to arrest the Visitor, but the store’s owner assured them that he stopped the real burglars. Unexpectedly, the burglar’s phone rang with a call for the Visitor from a man who told him that he had planted three bombs at three schools, and that if he tried to evacuate them would blow sky–high. In a bid to keep the Visitor busy, the man told him which schools to go to and gave him two hours to save the children. Seconds later, the Visitor took off.
Across town in one of the schools, a kid called Maurice found one of the bombs inside a trash can, and thinking that it was a toy, put it in his backpack. Shortly, the Visitor arrived at another school, and using his powers he detected an electrical disturbance of the proper output that he followed into the kitchen, where he confronted a man holding what he believed to be a bomb that turned out to be a tracking computer. Elsewhere, Maurice innocently played with in the courtyard with his friends and the bomb.
After tracking one of the bombs to a school auditorium and detonating it within a force field, the Visitor arrived at Maurice’s school during a fire drill and did the same with the bomb that he found.
Back in Beverly Hills, Charlene overheard the cops talking about the call that the Visitor received, then she approached the owner of the store and told him that she was writing a book about the Visitor and that if he was interested in telling her his story she was sure she could tell the truth about his heroism. Meanwhile, at a McDonald’s in Hollywood BLVD, McCoy, Dave, and Jimmy, three special effect technicians who lost their job after their movie’s backing was pulled, decided to create their practical–effects Mech suit in a bid to show everyone how hot their stuff really was.
Minutes before the deadline, the Visitor arrived at the third school too late to stop the detonation, but, luckily, the school was evacuated hours earlier because of a gas leak and no one died. Later that night, in the Los Angeles county jail, the Visitor phased through the walls of cell 315 to question the leader of the jewelry store burglars.
Learning the identity of the man on the other side of the line, the Visitor traveled to the home of Shawn Naughton, a wealthy industrialist turned politician in Thousand Oaks, California. Threatening to detonate one of the bombs, the Visitor forced Naughton to call the police and confess that he stole the diamonds to support he laws he proposed to keep immigrants out of the country due to his hatred. Faced with choosing between going to jail and dying, Naughton did as the Visitor told him and called the bomb squad to confess. Two hours later, the police took Naughton away in front of the TV cameras.
Sometime later near the Visitor’s lair, Charlene watched from a cliff as the Visitor flew toward the mission. Though this was the first time she had laid eyes on him, Charlene felt as she had known the Visitor for years.
==Facades==
While Chan viewed a holographic reproduction of the Visitor’s battle with the Earth’s heroes on a device in their lair, the Visitor warned him not to touch it as it was very delicate. Floating toward him, the Visitor told Chan that watching him write on his journal inspired him to record his experiences since his arrival. As Chan expressed amazement at how real the images of the chaos in Tibet after the Visitor arrived, his encounter with the heroes who thought he was a menace, and even the Harbinger looked, the Visitor said that thought was energy, and that as such it could be recorded. Reiterating his request that Chan not touch the instruments, the Visitor told him not to tamper with things he could not understand.
That night in Los Angeles, California, Bio-Mech killed a man who was going to jump from the Westin Bonaventure Hotel and warned the crowd gathered below that things would be different from then on.
Not far away, in the basement of former Air Force Major Paul Benson, Paul urged Matt to share his story of extraterrestrial contact with him and Rodriguez. Matt started by saying that he and his friends were on their way back to get payback on the Blades for shooting one of their brothers when the cops showed up and they had to escape. Matt continued to say that, just as he figured they were in the clear, he lights in his mirror that came from up in the sky, and that after his friends bailed on him he opened fire on them with his AK, but the lights got too bright and he lost consciousness. Awaking in his car the next morning like nothing happened, Matt said that he was covered in blood from the fight when he saw the lights, but when he woke up there was not a drop on him, like somebody came after it.
The next day, while the Visitor inspected the room in the Westin Bonaventure Hotel, he saw Bio–Mech standing on the Hollywood sign and flew at him to confront him. Warning the Visitor that LA did not need another hero, Bio–Mech detonated a massive bomb that destroyed the entire hill.
Several miles away, in the Mission that concealed the Visitor’s lair, Chan wrote on his journal that he was attempting to keep his Zen lessons fresh in his mind, which had been difficult since he left Tibet and arrived in LA, where things were much different. Just as Chan wrote down that the Visitor left him alone much of the time, Charlene arrived in the mission and asked him for some water for her car’s radiator.
Introducing herself, Charlene told Chan that she was doing a book on the area and asked him if she could take some pictures of him. Focusing her camera’s lens on the mission instead, Charlene asked Chan if she could take some pictures inside, but he refused, citing that the building was too old and dangerous. As Charlene asked Chan if she could come back to visit him sometime, Chan told her that he would really like that.
Back in Hollywood, the Visitor awoke and saw a message in the sky from Bio–Mech that said that next time he would die. Finding the bomb that destroyed the sign, the Visitor wondered why someone as powerful as Bio–Mech would need such a device. Elsewhere, in a warehouse in Burbank, Bio–Mech met with the disgruntled Special Effect team, including the man that he supposedly killed at the hotel, and proclaimed that the world had not seen anything yet.
Later, at Laser–Battles, a playground for ground–ups in Glendale, Bio–Mech electrocuted and killed Mark, the executive who canceled the project his suit was designed for. Several hours later in Burbank, the Visitor grabbed Bio–Mech and flew him to the roof of the warehouse, where he confronted him for killing Mark. Telling the Visitor that he was not scared of him Bio–Mech shot him with a gauntlet cannon but he Visitor dispersed the energy blast and warned him that he should be afraid of him. Breaking Bio–Mech’s gauntlet, the Visitor said that his illusions were convincing for a time, but that he made mistakes, like leaving evidence of the device he used to appear to fly, the bomb in Hollywood, and not making sure that he killed Mark, who was not dead when the Visitor arrived and told him enough before he stopped breathing.
As the Visitor confronted Bio–Mech with his discovery of his identity, the Harbinger suddenly killed Bio–Mech with a blast from his hands.
==Make Believe==
Lunging at the Visitor, the Harbinger grabbed his neck to try to choke him, but the Visitor punched him off him and told him that he was simply more skilled than him. As the Visitor and Harbinger fought, the FX guys dragged Bio–Mech off the field.
At the Los Angeles Public Library, former Air Force Major Benson found an article about himself after three hours of research, when, suddenly, Rodriguez startled him and told him that, though he did not mean to tell him his business, when a man had only two friends in the world, he could not afford to alienate either of them.
Inside a van in Burbank, Bio–Mech’s friends reminded him that his suit could not hold up against super guys, but since he liked being Bio–Mech he warned them that he would decide when things would be over.
Elsewhere, the Harbinger attacked a bus full of tourist during a tour of Universal Studios, but acting swiftly the Visitor saved them before anyone got seriously hurt. Flying the Harbinger away from the park by force, the Visitor told him that he believed he put innocent lives in danger because he did not wish to fight him. Enraged, the Visitor shot the Harbinger with an energy blast and told him that he could not stop what was already in motion, and that they would fight that day.
Breaking into another attraction, the Harbinger set up a blaze, but the Visitor quickly put it out. Leading the Visitor on a chase across the park, the Harbinger told him that his father wanted him dead or alive, but that he would just as soon he were dead. As the Visitor avoided a blast that he fired at him, the Harbinger expressed great dismay and erected a force field to protect a helpless bystander from it. Reading the Harbinger’s mind, the Visitor discovered that he killed Sam back in Washington as well as what his identity really was.
Rendering the Harbinger unconscious, the Visitor took him to the Harbinger Foundation’s building in Los Angeles, where he met Toyo Harada, the man that the Harbinger called father. Expressing contentment that the Harbinger still lived, Harada asked the Visitor what he was, and told him that in time he would know everything he wished to. As the Visitor asked Harada why he did not go after him himself since he possessed the same abilities as the Harbinger, Harada told him that he had his reason and that he was justified in his actions. Flying away, the Visitor told Harada that he had made the Harbinger a murderer and asked him how he would justify that.
Back at the warehouse, Bio–Mech’s friends left him after they discovered that he killed Mark. Once alone, Bio–Mech went to work on his suit, proclaiming that he would show everyone what he could do.
=Obsession=
==Obsession==
At 1 a.m., a massive UFO suddenly appeared near the lair of the Visitor in Southern California. Flying to investigate, the Visitor confessed that the vessel was like nothing he had ever seen, then, as he went after it, the ship shot him with a single blast and he fell down on the desert.
An hour later, near the mysterious Area 51 in Nevada, former Air Force Major Paul Benson awoke from a nightmare in which he saw himself aboard his old Tomcat fighter plane pursuing the Moth–Man, which vanished and transformed into the Visitor when he reappeared. A few minutes later, Paul assured Rodriguez that he was certain that what he saw was the Visitor.
At a dinner an hour’s drive south of Area 51, two Men in Black who used the wrong end of their spoons to stir their coffee startled the cook and waitress. Later, as the waitress drove home, the Men in Black ran her off the road and, using their strange powers, levitated her from inside her car and took her hostage. As a bright light that reached down to the earth and seemed to go on forever fell on to the woman and the Men in Black, the Visitor swooped in and ordered them to let her go, but one of the strangers swatted him out of his sight. Refusing to let them take the woman, the Visitor shot the Man in Black with an energy blast, but the stranger stood his ground unfazed and told him that he had no power over them. Enraged, the Visitor punched the Man in Black, who electrocuted him with an energy blast and told him that there was nothing he could do to stop them from taking the woman. As the Man in Black told the Visitor that he did not know who he was but knew that he was not what he was pretending to be, he and the woman vanished in the light.
Standing on a ridge elsewhere, Paul, Matt, and Rodriguez saw a space ship in the desert and Paul drove toward it, leaving the others behind. Enthralled by the smell of honeysuckle and the size of the vessel, Paul walked closer to it, when, suddenly, the Visitor swooped down and warned him not to get any closer. Amazed at the sight of the Visitor, Paul said that he knew he would come back to where he saw him, but the Visitor told him that he had not seen him before, and that he did not know what he did see or what the ship was, but it was not him. Upset, Paul accused the Visitor of lying and told him that with him he could recover what he had lost, but the Visitor told him to look inward and said that his life was a series of events, and that he used the sighting he obsessed with as an excuse. Telling Paul that he could not change the past, only embrace it, the Visitor told him that he had to move forward.
As the door to the space ship opened up, the Moth–Man walked down toward the Visitor and Paul, who certain that the creature had come for him, walked toward him. When the Visitor tried to stop Paul, he found himself held within a force field, from where he witnessed as the Moth–Man transformed into one of the Men in Black, who thanked him for his help in helping them secure two specimens.
As the ship took off, Matt and Rodriguez came running toward the Visitor and asked him what he did to Paul.
==Blood On Your Hands==
Somewhere in the Nevada desert, Matt pointed an accusing finger at the Visitor and accused him of killing Paul Benson. Assuring Matt and Rodriguez that he did nothing to their friend but who the ones who did, the Visitor promised that he would find them and took off.
Wondering where the Men in Black could have taken Major Benson, the Visitor arrived at the Air Force base he saw in Paul’s mind, the place where Benson saw the Moth–Man for the first time. Turning himself invisible to avoid two fighter jets, the Visitor flew back into the desert, where a bright light coming from a cave caught his attention.
Flying inside the cave, the Visitor saw a shadowy figure making his way through an underground facility. Following the man, the Visitor came across Ninjak, who with blood–red eyes held his sword against his throat and demanded his blood so he would not die. Refusing to relinquish his blood or let Ninjak die, the Visitor used his abilities to clear Colin’s mind. Clear–headed, Ninjak told the Visitor that he was infected with a virus that created an insatiable craving for blood, and that the place they were in was a private research facility where scientists experimented in various things, including virus–fighting antibody agents, until they acquired a blood and tissue sample from something of possibly extraterrestrial origin. Telling the Visitor that the virus was the result of the scientists’ synthesizing of the blood, Ninjak said that he got involved after a test subject fled the area. Assuring the Visitor that he had an operative who was trying to eliminate the possibility of further infection, Ninjak said that he unfortunately got infected when he came to investigate and that he was now trying to find their labs and learn what he needed to do to reverse it. Feeling the hunger pangs again, Ninjak was unsure of how long he could fight it, so the Visitor agreed to help him, but just then they became trapped in a laser field triggered by a motion detector in the security systems.
Somewhere in Southern California, at the old Mission that housed the Visitor’s secret lair, Chan and Charlene had a picnic by the lake. While walking off their lunch, Charlene pointed at an entrance to the Visitor’s lair and wondered where it led to, so Chan told her that it was a root cellar and it was a too dangerous to go inside. Hours later, while writing in his journal, Chan wrote that he sounded like a fool in front of Charlene and wondered what the harm would be in showing her the caverns. Thinking that Charlene was beautiful and kind, Chan was certain that the Visitor would like her.
Back at the research facility, Ninjak discovered that the virus had made him stronger than he used to be, then, as the Visitor used his powers to stop the lasers, he told him that murder was a high price to pay for that added strength. Finding a laboratory, the Visitor used his powers to power a computer that told Ninjak were to find a sealed sterilized needled with a small sample of an enzyme that broke down the infection. In need of more enzymes to affect a cure, Ninjak asked the Visitor to find a laboratory where the scientist grew their cultures. Flying through the facility, the Visitor found the enzyme that Ninjak needed and gave it to him, but just as Ninjak created a cure, the sound of a self–destruct alarm filled the facility and they had to escape.
As the Visitor used his powers to erect a force field to protect them from the falling debris, Ninjak told him that the cure worked and thanked him. Saying that the fire would destroy the facility, the Visitor asked what kind of vile creature could have started the research, and Ninjak confessed that he began the initial studied to look for an antibody to fight off infection and enhance strength, then he passed on hi research to the people who perverted it into what they found.
Telling Ninjak that perhaps his methods were at fault and not his intentions, the Visitor offered to take him wherever he wanted, but Ninjak told him that he had a vehicle nearby and that he could use the time to think.
=Revelation=
==Revelation==
Somewhere in Southern California, the Visitor returned to his underground cavern, where he came across the Harbinger, who followed him and camouflaged so that he could not detect him. As the two men prepared to engage in combat, Chan walked in and the Harbinger took him hostage.
Meanwhile, at a park in Hollywood, California, Charlene Dupré came upon a priest giving a lecture while on her morning jog. Striking a conversation with the blind preacher, Charlene learned that he used to preach at a mission on Highland until he got tired of bribing people with food to listen. As the preacher explained that he helped a few of them get jobs and apartments, and Charlene said that they looked tragic and desperate, he told her that everyone wears marks of some sort from time to time, and some of them have truly beautiful people behind them.
Back at the mission, the Visitor tackled the Harbinger into a room specially prepared to handle him in the event that he ever found the lair. Aware that he could defeat the Harbinger with physical force, the Visitor activated a device that contained him within a force field. Standing behind a control panel that monitored the field that held the Harbinger captive, the Visitor warned Chan to leave as he could not contain the Harbinger for long. Suddenly, the Harbinger broke free of his energy cell and the device exploded. As the dust settled, the Harbinger rose from the debris looking for the Visitor.
Outside the mission, Charlene knocked on the door looking for Chan, who was always there, but when he did not answer she walked inside and found the Visitor’s lair. As Charlene stumbled onto Chan’s unconscious body, the Harbinger and the Visitor came up from behind her. Using her Harbinger ability, Charlene set the Harbinger’s head ablaze, but he punched her aside and pushed her on the ground.
As the Visitor and Harbinger fought, Charlene shot the Harbinger in the back and then punched him in the face, which caused his helmet to fall off. Looming over the Harbinger, Charlene was startled to discover that he was really Peter Stanchek, her old friend.
==Pete Stanchek Is The Harbinger?!==
Standing over the Harbinger, Charlene Dupré, the Harbinger formerly known as Flamingo, reached out to Peter and asked him what happened to him, but he lashed out at her and told her not to touch him. Hearing Chan yell out Charlene’s name, the Harbinger recognized her name, but could not remember why. Enraged, the Harbinger flew away even though the Visitor offered to help him.
Wrapping Charlene with his cape, the Visitor asked Chan to fetch his cloak for her and told him that she had to leave, as it was dangerous in the caverns and the Harbinger might return. Moments after Chan, who was amazed that Flamingo set herself ablaze, left with Charlene, the Visitor collapsed. Staggering into his room, the Visitor removed his glove to inspect a severe burn in his hand that he suffered during his battle with the Harbinger. Feeling groggy, the Visitor felt that he had done too much too quickly, and wondered if he was helping at all. Removing his mask and pouring water into a saucer, the Visitor mused that Charlene was a wild card he had not planned on, then, all of a suddenly, he tossed the saucer at a wall and proclaimed that he should not have gone there at all.
Meanwhile, at the Harbinger Foundation facility in Los Angeles, Peter broke into Toyo Harada’s office demanding to know who he was. Hovering over Harada, Peter accused Harada of lying and asked him if his name was really Peter. Accusing the Visitor of playing mind tricks on Peter, Harada tried to scan his mind, but Peter blocked his thoughts from him and said that he had messed with his mind enough. Enraged, Peter tossed Harada about his office and said that he could not believe anything he said, but lashing out with a mental blast, Harada took hold of his mind and said that he would believe and do what he told him to. Breaking Harada’s hold on him the Harbinger refused to fight him there on his terms and escaped.
Outside the Mission that housed the hidden lair of the Visitor, Chan asked Charlene why she did not tell him about her gifts. Ashamed, she told him that she dreaded that moment, but that she planned to tell him everything eventually. Pleading with Chan, Charlene told him that she needed to talk to the Visitor so they could find Peter and help him, but turning back into the Mission, Chan told her that the Visitor was resting and that when he awoke he would tell him about her and he could decide what to do.
Several hours later, inside the caverns, the Visitor used his powers to repair the damage that the Harbinger caused during their battle. Taking flight, the Visitor was certain that the Harbinger was out there, hurt and angry but not broken, so he decided that he had to show him how to use the pain.
Immersing himself in a deep meditative state Chan found himself in Ladakh during a snowstorm with his old master, who asked him if the Harbinger’s face reminded him of anyone. As Chan replied that it did not, his master asked him if the Visitor recognized the stranger and he said he believed that he did. Emerging from his meditation, Chan wrote in his journal that he now believed that the master in his meditations was a part of himself asking questions that asked him to think about his new life with the Visitor.
At the Harbinger facility in Los Angeles, Toyo Harada went inside the private quarters of the Visitor and saw a painting that the Harbinger painted of himself with Faith Herbert, Kris Hathaway, and Charlene Dupré, his friends, that made him realize that the Harbinger had started to remember his past all on his own.
=Final Act=
==A Killing Frost==
On June 1995, at a park near Tujunga, California, the Visitor saved a family from a freak downpour that turned into snow. Several miles away, in Burbank, Monsieur Lafitte, a Harbinger with the ability to control the weather, dispelled the maelstrom once he had impressed a group of investors looking to hire him to destroy their competitors’ grape crops and orange groves. When asked what he would do about the Visitor, Lafitte said that he had very special plans for him.
Elsewhere, shortly after the end of the 6 O’clock News, Christine Rhettsgal, an anchorwoman for KTLA, exited the new station and found herself surrounded by reporters who asked her if she believed that the Visitor was involved with the freak weather and if she would date him. Walking into her car, Christine said that she did not believe that the Visitor was involved and that she was not the Lois Lane–type.
The next day, while people in the city were amazed to see that there were no clouds in the sky, miles away, outside the abandoned Mission that served as the Visitor’s home, Chan wrote in his journal that the Visitor, who did not believe that the storms were born in nature, intended to find whoever created them.
Meanwhile, in Anaheim, California, Lafitte hovered high above an orange grove while his powers created a snowstorm to destroy the fruits. Elated by his actions, Lafitte flew away to find more vineyards to destroy. Elsewhere, in Pico Boulevard near Beverly Hills, the members of a coven met to being a secret ceremony.
Flying toward Lafitte, the Visitor shot him with an energy blast and ordered him to stop, but Lafitte attacked him with a whirlwind that tossed him like a piece of paper. Certain that the Visitor was finished, Lafitte left to continue wreaking his chaos.
Returning to his room in the Burbank Hotel, Lafitte asked the investors for proof of a wire transfer to his Zurich account before he committed to performing more jobs for them, but one of them did not have it. Enraged, Lafitte wanted to take his payment some other way, but just then the Visitor arrived and pulled him out of the room through the window. Ensuring that Lafitte could not harm him without hurting himself, the Visitor flew him inside the eye of the gale of his storm, where he used his abilities to remove Lafitte’s power. Dropping Lafitte in the street, the Visitor flew away and left him feeling empty inside.
Outside the cult’s meeting hall, Charlene watched as the coven’s leader left in his car and, certain that she had found the cult, swore that she would use the fires of heaven to send it back to hell.
==Blind Abduction==
In an alley in North Hollywood, near Highland Avenue, a figure whose features were hidden in shadow abducted Daniel, a homeless man searching for food. Three days later, the blind priest that Charlene met earlier went to the alley looking for Daniel, when then he smelled Charlene coming up from behind.
Inside the caverns of the Visitor’s lair beneath an abandoned mission, the Visitor brewed an elixir that he drank shortly before Chan called him and told him that he could not stop thinking about Charlene and the Harbinger. As Chan wondered why Charlene hid her powers from him, the Visitor told him that he could not answer his questions and that he could only tell him to seek the truth the way his masters showed him.
Returning to his room, Chan assumed a meditative position and found himself inside a taxi driven by his master, who he asked if he was who he believed him to be. Uncertain, the master said that every now and then Chan got in tune enough to reach through to him, and that when he remembered it seemed like a dream. Reaching for a calendar to ascertain how old they were, the master said that he had no idea what day it was and that Chan had to go get her some help because he could be there to save her.
Rushing into the Visitor’s lair while the Visitor reviewed his encounter with the Harbinger, Chan told him that the old man in his meditation told him that Charlene was in trouble and that he could save her. As the Visitor wondered why he should trust in Chan’s vision, Chan told him that the old man told him that he would know he was right, and that it was a chance for him to undo something terribly wrong
At the alleyway in North Hollywood, two men attacked the father and Charlene, who refused to use her powers against them. Forty five minutes later, inside a shadowy meeting hall, the coven gathered around the unconscious bodies of Charlene and the father, who their leader planned to sacrifice to their dark lord.
Flying toward LA, the Visitor mused that Chan would not have made a story like the one he told him and say the things he told him. Inside the church, Charlene awoke and, sheeting herself ablaze, ordered the members of the coven to stay away from the father. Though the father pleaded with Charlene not to hurt anyone, she believed that they deserved to die, and that she was given those powers for a reason. Just then, the Visitor phased through the walls of the church and stopped Charlene from killing the cult’s leader and said that he could not let her take a life because she would never forgive him.
Relenting, Charlene abated her fire and grabbed a cultist’s robe to cover herself. As the Visitor told Charlene that he found her because Chan had a vision in which he was told of the danger she was in and where to find her, the cult’s leader suddenly stabbed her in the back in the name of his master. Enraged, the Visitor lashed out at the man, but did not kill him. Picking Charlene up in his arms, the Visitor promised her and the father that the cult would pay for what they had done somehow.
That night, at the Harbinger foundation’s facility, in Los Angeles, Toyo Harada met with the Men in Black, who agreed to bring the Harbinger back to him.
==Questions==
Flying high above the Mission clutching his chest and screaming of pain in his heart, the Visitor came crashing down into the ground moments before Charlene arrived to see him. Phasing into the building, the Visitor acted like nothing happened and welcomed Charlene into his abode.
At Major Benson’s former apartment, Rodriguez and Matt broke into the room looking for clues to what happened to their friend. As the two men went over Benson’s papers and debated whether or not the Visitor was involved in his disappearance, a strange energy field filled the room and a Man in Black appeared.
Inside the Visitor’s lair, Charlene told the Visitor that Peter and her had known each other for a few years, and that she believed that with his help they could help him beat Harada’s brainwashing. Though Charlene believed that if she triggered any of his old memories Peter would go back to New York where he fought Harada last time, the Visitor told her that he had not left the Los Angeles area.
Several hours later, inside the Visitor’s private sanctorum, the Visitor mused that Chan had always told him that the mixture for good for his condition, but that he was still not sure if he was pulling a joke on him and laughing that he would actually drink it. Nevertheless, the Visitor drank the elixir and then donned his uniform to go find the Harbinger, who was not close by but he could still feel. Watching the Visitor fly out of the mission like a bat out of hell, Charlene and Chan followed him in her car.
Seeing a light like the one from the Men in Black’s ship around the Harbinger foundation facility, the Visitor teamed up with the Harbinger against a Man in Black, who after knocking both men around grabbed the Visitor by the throat and revealed that he was Paul Benson. Downstairs, Charlene and Chan watched as a helicopter that bore the emblem of the foundation landed on the roof.
Emerging from the helicopter, Harada chastised the Man in Black for destroying his property, which was never part of their plan. Arriving on the roof while Peter and Harada and the Man in Black and the Visitor were engaged in battle, Charlene shot a burst of flames at the Man in Black, but Harada blocked it with a force field. Sealing Charlene and Chan within the field, Harada defeated Peter while the Man in Black defeated the Visitor and proceeded to unmask him.
Looming over the Visitor as his mask fell to the ground, Harada refused to believe that the man behind it was the Visitor.
==The Final Chapter==
In 2042 AD, Peter Stanchek escaped from a Harbinger Detention Center in Los Angeles after spending what must have been years held in a cell with a dampening field that inhibited his psionic and telekinetic powers that he eventually grew immune to. Marked by Harada with the emblem of the Harbinger Foundation so that anyone would recognize him, Peter knew that any man who found him would kill him.
When Peter saw what had happened to Los Angeles, it nearly broke his heart. Los Angeles was a city he visited when he was younger, and for a time he thought he would eventually live there, but that was not to be. Finding hidden weapons in the rubble of the city, Peter swore that he would seek out the one man responsible for the destruction around him and end it forever.
Lured by a flash of lights in the sky, Peter opened fire on Ivar the Timewalker as he emerged from a time arc because he believed him to be Harada. Confused, Peter did not initially recognize Ivar and confused him with his brother Gilad too before he passed out from exhaustion.
In 1995, at the Harbinger Foundation facility in Los Angeles, Charlene Dupré, Chan, Toyo Harada, Paul Benson, and Peter Stanchek surrounded the unmasked Visitor, who they were shocked to learn was an older Peter Stanchek with the emblem of the Harbinger Foundation tattooed on his face.
Saying that in the future he came from there was no one to stop Harada from ruining his life and making him the Harbinger, the Visitor lashed out telepathically and showed everyone what Harada had done.
Sometime in the mid–21st Century in Ladakh, Tibet, an older Chan stood out in the snow and recalled a series of recent dreams he had of a time when he was at the Visitor’s side in America. Returning to his room in the temple, Chan retrieved a framed photograph of himself and Charlene, who he mused he would always love, and said that he missed his friend., who his grandchildren asked him to tell them stories about all the time.
Back in 1995, the Man in Black told Harada to make sure to hold up his end of their deal before he vanished into his ship in a burst of light. Looking up at the massive alien vessel, Peter flew after the Man in Black despite Charlene telling him not to go.
Thousands of miles above the Earth, Matt and Rodriguez awoke in a room filled with shackled restrains designed to hold a myriad of prisoners. Appearing out of nowhere, the Man in Black formerly known as Paul Benson, told his friends that they had seen enough and vanished with them in a flash of light. Appearing in his old apartment, Paul said that the Men in Black took human beings to mutate them into them to populate their race, which could no longer procreate, but that because of something the Visitor did when he reached into his mind, his transformation was not complete. Warning Matt and Rodriguez about the Men in Black’s deal with Harada in exchange for inclusion in their plans when they made their conquest, Paul told them that he intended to blow the Men in Black out of the galaxy.
On the roof of the Harbinger Foundation facility in Los Angeles, Harada demanded that the Visitor tell him about the future and how he ruled, but Peter said that the sequence of events that constituted his past had been prevented and it would no longer happen. Just then, the Harbinger returned from the Men in Black’s ship, where he witnessed as the aliens mutated a human into one of them, and shared what he saw with everyone.
Transporting themselves to the roof of the facility, the Men in Black demanded to know who spied on their ship and where their missing prisoners were taken. Standing beside the Harbinger, Charlene, and even Toyo, the Visitor defiantly refused to let the aliens harm anyone else and ordered them to leave. Together, the four Harbingers engaged the Men in Black in a battle that was shortly joined by Major Benson, who told them that the only way to defeat the aliens was to use their sensitivity to ultra–low frequency sounds against them. In unison, Toyo Harada and both Peter Stanchek, three Omega Harbingers, defeated the Men in Black.
Certain that as long as the aliens’ ship remained in orbit they would send others, Major Benson offered to open a portal that would allow the Harbingers to blast the vessel away at the cost of his own life. Minutes later, the Harbingers fired a combined mental blast through a portal generated by Benson’s body that destroyed the aliens’ vessel and killed Paul.
Picking Charlene in his arms, Peter said that the psychic energy he picked up from the Men in Black had faded. Just then, the Visitor fell to his knees and told Chan that he was lucky enough to grow old in their friendship and had known him in his youth. Telling Peter that he was proud of him, the Visitor said that they succeeded and countless lives would be spared, and that he now had a freedom he never did.
Picking up the Visitor in his arms, Peter assured Harada that the Visitor was not dead, and warned him to leave Charlene and Chan alone or else he would return and destroy him. Leaving with the Visitor in his arms, Peter left his mask in the battle field that used to be the Harbinger facility.
Sometime in the mid–21st Century, in Ladakh, Tibet, an older Chan wrote in his journal that he heard the Visitor’s laughter carried in the winds of time, and lamented that he would never know the difference he made in his and every body else’s lives.
Category:The Visitor
Category:Valiant Universe