Skywatch

## Origins

Ever since he was a kid, all **Jeremiah Mercury** wanted to do was fly. He spent the long, warm summer days of his childhood laying on his back, staring into the sky and watching as planes buzzed overhead. He daydreamed about planes and piloting when he should have been concentrating on schoolwork, and was frequently caught hanging around the local airfield, covetously looking on as pilots came in to land.

In his early teens, his father forced him to take a more active role in helping out on the farm, and he discovered that he had a knack for fixing engines, frequently tinkering with his dad’s run-down car and the family’s beaten-up old tractor. He even took on a secret evening job at the local garage, saving his earnings so he could eventually move to Texas and join the US Army Air Corps Training Center and train to become a pilot.

When he turned eighteen, he followed through on his dream, leaving his mother heartbroken and his father disappointed, and enrolled in the USAACTC a few days after his birthday. He worked his way in as an engineer, performing maintenance on the planes and ultimately started gradually building up his flying hours.

### World War II

Jeremiah was chosen to undertake combat missions during **World War II**, and was shot down over **Belgium** during a particularly harrowing dogfight. Armed with only a pistol, a meagre stock of supplies in a backpack and his own wits, he managed to survive in hostile enemy territory for three days before he encountered any allies.

Fortunately for Jeremiah, the ally that he stumbled across was the legendary enhanced combatant known as **Agent Apex** who, with his small squad of elite soldiers, was in the process of exfiltrating the country after an important strategic mission. He invited Jeremiah to join them, and eager for an opportunity to prove himself, the young pilot agreed and began to move out with the squad.

Jeremiah handled himself admirably in their movements back to an Allied base on the border of the country, even saving the life of **Rusty Collier**, Agent Apex's second-in-command during an ambush. Once they arrived at the base and Jeremiah was able to radio back to his commanding officer, Agent Apex gave an official recommendation that he receive a commendation for his actions in the field.

Not one to be put off by a bad experience, Jeremiah concluded the war flying a number of further successful combat operations, and took on a commanding role within the US Air Force, in part due to the recommendation from the country’s greatest hero.

### After the War

A year after the war ended, Agent Apex contacted Jeremiah with a proposal to join a specialist squad of soldiers dedicated to global peacekeeping operations. Jeremiah took him up on the offer, and moved to **Washington, D.C.** to be a part of the squad. There, he was reunited with Agent Apex and equipped with an experimental jetpack to complement his flying skills. It took him a few weeks to get the hang of it, but before long he was flying around the basecamp elegantly and even acrobatically, and he was given the codename **Skywatch**.

He flew a number of missions for Agent Apex, acting as aerial reconnaissance and combat and providing valuable backup for his friend and commanding officer. One such mission took him back to his home state as a heavily-armed terrorist group calling themselves **The Merciful Hand** had launched an attack on the city hall in **Atlanta, Georgia**, and Agent Apex was called in to assist local police forces.

After dispatching the terrorists, Jeremiah was able to introduce his family to the great American hero he was now close friends with, and he finally gained the approval of his father.

### The Founder Invasion

As an invaluable part of the unit, Skywatch was one of the first people Agent Apex called on when the **Founder Invasion** was launched in July of 1947. In his role as aerial reconnaissance, he was one of the first heroes to come into direct contact with one of the **Founder** spacecraft in the skies above **Roswell, New Mexico**, and was able to return to Earth with valuable insight into the weaknesses of the craft.

He even joined the final raiding party as Agent Apex and a handful of other enhanced combatants boarded the Founder mothership to confront the **Founder Overlord**. Although his weapons made little impact on the powerful alien, he rescued fellow combatant **Doctor Photon** when she was blasted out of the ship, flying out to catch her before she fell too far.

Soon afterwards the team watch, victorious, as the invading forces retreated into the depths of the cosmos, and the work of rebuilding commenced. Skywatch took on an important role in supervising the cleanup operation, albeit with a promise to join Agent Apex for a special project once the work was done.

### The Superior Squad

Soon after the Founder Invasion, Skywatch was invited to join Agent Apex's brand new enhanced response team named **The Superior Squad**. He quickly became the heart and soul of the team with his combat skills and his down-to-earth wisecracking sensibilities, and played a key role in many missions as both a combatant and reconnaissance expert.

However, unlike his superpowered teammates, Jeremiah was only human and after a few years he began to feel the stresses and strains of the job on his physical body. He planned to retire after a final mission into the hostile foreign nation of **Kymeria**, and accompanied Agent Apex on a covert infiltration of the country.

### The Siege of Kymeria

The nation of Kymeria had been under surveillance for some time, as they had refused to join the **Unified Nations** and made several openly hostile gestures to the rest of the world. When the despotic ruler of the country, a woman calling herself **Countess Chaos** launched attacks on a number of Unified Nations facilities, it was decided that further investigation needed to be carried out.

However, it was soon discovered that the Kymerians had erected vast, impenetrable force shields around the borders of their country, sealing themselves off from the outside world. Nobody knew what was going on behind the barriers, and rumours of everything from advanced weapons development to dark occult rituals swirled around the mysterious country. The Superior Squad were called on to infiltrate the country and find out more, and responsibility fell on Agent Apex and Skywatch as the two members of the team with the most military and combat training.

In disguise, they were able to pass over the borders of the country and began to see that things were very wrong in the country. Countess Chaos had utilised a combination of magic and advanced technology to brainwash the denizens of Kymeria into becoming her own private army, and she planned to wage war on the outside world. As the pair uncovered this information, however, they fell into a trap.

Surrounded by enemy soldiers but unable to fight back for fear of injuring innocents, Agent Apex and Skywatch were forced to surrender to the Countess. Merciless and wanting to punish the outside world for interfering in her affairs, she impaled Skywatch on her sword and watched as he bled out in front of everyone.

With Agent Apex's death and **Cinder**'s subsequent annihilation of the entire country a few days later, the Superior Squad was broken and would never fully recover. The remaining team members disbanded and the team was no more.

### Legacy

Although his body was never recovered from the scorched remains of Kymeria, a well-attended public memorial service was held for Skywatch and a scholarship fund was set up at the **UNION** Air Academy to allow people from low-income backgrounds to train to become pilots and follow in the hero's footsteps.

In the mid-1980s the Skywatch persona was adopted by **Annie Mercury**, Jeremiah's younger sister, who operated as an agent of UNION in her brother's honour until her retirement at the close of the **Eternity Pursuit** in the year 2000.

## Personality

A farmboy with a head full of dreams, Jeremiah has always had a positive outlook on life, often to the annoyance of others. An energetic child, he was frequently exhausting to be around, but the rewards of his friendship were enough to balance this out. Loyal and supportive, he was always the friend you would turn to around big life decisions.

This continued into his adult life, although he became more serious about his career as a pilot as the years moved on. His upbeat attitude helped many of his fellow cadets manage through basic training, and he became beloved by his comrades if not necessarily by his commanding officers.

The harrowing effects of being involved in the Second World War did dampen his spirits somewhat, having witnessed many of his friends and peers killed in the line of duty. But he used this horror as a motivation to push forward and uplift others around him with his quirky sense of humour and genuine love of flying.

He became the warm and friendly heart and soul of the Superior Squad in his later years, always welcoming to the younger, more nervous members of the team. He struck up a close friendship with the young **Doctor Photon**, frequently exclaiming that even though he didn't know what she was talking about half the time, he loved her passion when she was talking about it. They also bonded over the fact that they were the only two non-enhanced individuals on the team, reassuring each other that even though they didn't have powers, they were still valuable.

His death in 1964 hit the rest of the team hard, and the memory of it still traumatises the now mature Doctor Photon to this day.

## Superhuman Abilities

Skywatch is one of only two members of the Superior Squad to possess no superhuman abilities. He is an expert pilot, one of the only people in the world to competently pilot a jetpack, a skilled hand-to-hand combatant and a highly proficient marksman, but as far as superhuman powers go, he leaves that sort of thing to his teammates.

## Weapons and Equipment

With no superhuman abilities, Skywatch is reliant on his arsenal of equipment and gadgets when he is in the field.

* **ThrustPack** - Originally an experimental prototype, the ThrustPack was developed by UNION engineers to allow single combatants to mount aerial assaults on small targets. It consists of a large engine mounted on the pilot's back and held on with leather straps, and the thrust is controlled by pads which are inserted into the pilot's boots. Applying pressure to these pads increases the thrust, while direction is controlled by the pilot's body. The original ThrustPack had capacity for approximately 60 minutes uninterrupted flight, but it has since been upgraded to manage up to six hours.
* **ThrustHelm** - Although the initial purpose of the ThrustHelm was simply to protect the pilot's head during flight, it has been upgraded to include a built-in HUD displaying altitude, speed and a variety of other metrics to assist the pilot when in the air.
* **Pistols** - Although a skilled unarmed combatant, Skywatch also chooses to use a pair of semi-automatic handguns for ranged combat. These are mounted on spring-loaded arms hidden within the sleeves of his flying jacket, and can be deployed at a moment's notice when he needs to enter a combat situation.
* **Stun Baton** - Skywatch also chooses to carry a collapsible telescopic baton with him for close-quarters combat. This weapon also has the capacity to deliver a low-voltage electric shock capable of stunning a large male human with a single pulse, although he tends to find it has problems dealing with enhanced humans.