Jack Hawksmoor's History
John Cooper "Jack" Hawksmoor is the King of Cities. He gains his powers from a symbiotic link with the city he's in; the bigger it is, the bigger his powers. He has been a member of the Authority and Stormwatch.
As a boy, Jack Hawksmoor was frequently abducted by what he thought were aliens. In reality, they were beings from the future and they were abducting him in order to prepare him to save the world. During each abduction, Jack's organs were removed and he was painfully implanted with strange technologies that enabled him to interact with cities in bizarre ways. The reason for his enhancements became obvious when a gestalt being that was the entire city of Kansas City from the 70th Century came back in time to destroy the world. Jack was older now and had some experience with his powers. He turned the city of Tokyo into a giant robot, merged with it, and fought Kansas City, successfully destroying it.[1] After the battle, Jack slipped away and went to live in New York until, years later, he was approached by Stormwatch.
Stormwatch
Jack Hawksmoor began quietly fighting crime in the city, later moving to strike higher, at politicians and corporations. He caught the attention of Stormwatch's Henry Bendix, who offered him a place in Stormwatch Black, the covert operations team of Stormwatch, alongside Jenny Sparks and Swift. Hawksmoor helped remove power-mad, super-powered cops, stopped biological warfare in a small American city, solve the murder of ex-Stormwatch member Undertow and he personally fought and killed the insane, murderous, illegitimate son of a revered American President.
Jack had a tough time with Stormwatch, as the organization's flying fortress was simply not large enough in order to support his unique biological systems. Medical assistance was not very helpful.
Hawksmoor was part of the mission against the Changers, a super-powered group out to change the world. During this mission, he was forced to kill fellow teammate Rose Tattoo in order to stop her from murdering. The peace failed, as all the Changers ended up murdered or dead.
The Authority
After Stormwatch was destroyed by alien life-forms, Hawksmoor went into hiding with Jenny Sparks and Swift. There they recruited Apollo, Midnighter, The Engineer and The Doctor. The latter two became spiritual successors of two of the members of the Changers.
This team later became The Authority, who formed after a devastating supervillain attack on Moscow. This was where Jack learned his powers had increased, bonding him to cities much faster than usual. For example, Moscow let him know she was hurting through a painful nosebleed.
The Authority operated on a ship called The Carrier, which was large enough to qualify as a city, thus keeping Jack healthy.
After helping against various invasions, such as from Sliding Albion and "God's" own parasitic worms, Jack was there when Jenny's unique life came to an end. He inherited leadership of the team, leading it through many more dimension-crossing misadventures. He helped the team's independence along, even once threatening Bill Clinton. For a while, when the team was replaced by evil forces of the G-7 Authority, he lived as a brain-damaged homeless bum, unable to convince anyone who he was. He was rescued by his teammates and restored to his normal self.
Coup D'Etat
Some time after The Authority defeated Godhead, a bigger threat appeared. Tao, an old member (and then enemy) of the Wildcats and one of the most powerful men in the world, had somehow found himself with a phase engine, an alien device powered by a black hole. Tao's purposes and goals had always been sinister, but what he did with the engine was something not even his own people could have predicted. He staged an elaborate attack on a secret American base all as a cover to get the engine into government hands without them knowing it. Once they did, they realized that the engine could be used to travel into The Bleed, something that until then, only The Authority could do with any measure of success. As soon as they realized this they put together a probe driven by the engine and launched it into the Bleed. Somehow Tao had known what was coming next.
When the engine made it into the Bleed, it exploded, but the destruction was more than any normal thing. The black hole in the engine had ripped a hole in the Bleed and also destroyed an enormous alien ship (5 or 6 times the size of the Carrier) that had been nearby. The effects were disastrous and in moments burning pieces of the ship and it's passengers (members of a race of giant beings called the Vigil) fell on the state of Florida. The Authority arrived to help but there was basically nothing they could do but teleport away the people who were still alive. The ship fell and much of Florida was destroyed.
After the dust had settled, Jack tried to learn all he could about the Vigil and what had happened. The Vigil were the first beings to ever use The Bleed and they had given themselves the task of recording everything that happened in the multiverse. The destruction of their ship was especially bad because it had been on a return trip to their home planet, bringing with it a millennium of information to be added to their main database. After finding this out, and the fact that this loss of information might drive the Vigil to a full scale war against Earth, Jack discovered whose fault it was. He learned that Tao had provided the engine, but that the US government had gone ahead and used it without assessing the situation in a way that would have shown that Tao was behind it. Jack felt that this was the last straw. After a discussion with the rest of the team, Jack Hawksmoor took over America.
Jack's announcement that The Authority now ran America was not accepted willingly. The President stated he'd send other SPBs (Super Powered Beings) to stop them if he had to, but the government wasn't the only group that opposed the idea of The Authority being in charge. Stormwatch Team Achilles leader Ben Santini had always had a problem with post-humans who thought their power entitled them to everything they wanted, and to him, that's what the Authority perceived. He was determined to stop them from taking over. The Authority realized this immediately and went to deal with them. Their first attempt almost got Apollo and Midnighter killed so on their second try the whole team went. They were too slow though and Team Achilles escaped, leaving an injured man (who was actually a super villain, Baron Chaos, though the Authority didn't know it) behind. When Jack found the man's body he declared war on Stormwatch.
More problems came from the Wildcats. Grifter procured a bomb capable of destroying the Authority and their carrier and wanted Spartan to teleport it there. Spartan wouldn't, but went to talk with Jack on his own. Since they both wanted to change the world from how it was, their disagreement was mostly about method. Jack preferred taking the straight forward approach and just taking charge whereas Spartan wanted to do it in a different, less obvious way. He couldn't change Jack's mind though and he just left him to do what he was doing.
By this point, the American government had actually started to fight back, however feebly. The Authority easily shut down their communications, destroyed their satellites, stopped their tanks, ships, planes and armies, and destroyed all their super human soldiers. America could do nothing to stop them and no one else in the world would try. Trouble only really started once the Vigil came. Negotiations that Swift had been carrying on failed and the Vigil declared war. Hawksmoor was able to call them off though when trapped some of them in the ground. With the Vigil no longer attacking and the American military machine crushed (almost bloodlessly, The Authority made it a point not to kill human soldiers), The Authority had successfully taken over and other nations even recognized and endorsed their position. Though the Vigil had stopped attacking, they were still around. To get rid of them Hawksmoor offered up the former President and killed him in front of the Vigil. They claimed that he had been the one behind the phase engine and all the following destruction so that the Vigil would feel like justice was served and wouldn't decide to attack again. With the aliens gone and the country theirs, Jack appointed himself President of the United States.
Revolution
Despite the Authority's rule over America, they were risen against a rejuvenated group of old superhumans called the Sons of Liberty backed by Henry Bendix who planned his own machinations to remove the Authority. In their battle against their new foes, Jack and his team suffered internal disagreement, particularly the Doctor who is greatly upset over the death of his Shamanism followers, and Jack himself getting into a grudging fight with Midnighter who heavily criticized him the way he handled his outright dictatorial rule.
Ultimately, after Washington D.C. was destroyed in 2005 the Authority disbanded in shame thus relinquishing their control over America, leaving Hawksmoor with the Engineer to take the Carrier for themselves and travel through the multiverse for pleasure.
By 2008, Hawksmoor rejoined the restored team by Jenny Quantum and defeated Henry Bendix. Jack still completely subscribed to the team ideology to fight for a finer world, no matter what it took.
Worldstorm
Main article: Captain Atom: Armageddon
When Captain Atom was displaced into the Wildstorm Universe and posed a destructive threat to it due to possessing a fragment of the Void entity, Hawksmoor and the Engineer had helped him find his universe. When Jack brought the three to a Nazi ruled reality in order to access their door technology to explore further uncharted realities, Atom was shocked in seeing Hawksmoor and the Engineer's brutality. Furthermore, Jack even brought an alternate Adolf Hitler for Captain Atom to kill to "make things up", in which Atom morally refused (allowing Hawksmoor to kill the dictator instead). When visited by Mister Majestic, who was concerned about Captain Atom's imminent destiny, Jack explained to him that he and the Engineer had a second solution for Atom: allowing the Engineer to use her nanotechnology to probe and neutralize the Void fragment within Captain Atom, and thus preventing the destruction of their universe.
However, this technique had failed when Captain Atom came into contact with Nikola Hanssen, the next successor of the Void, causing a violent reaction between the two. Seeing that to prevent the destruction of the universe by any means necessary, Jack then ordered Apollo and Midnighter to kill Captain Atom. Majestic, who came a second time to the Carrier, was against Hawksmoor's callous tactic as given from his discovery that killing Captain Atom would only instigate the cataclysm. However, Hawksmoor disagreed with Majestic's insistence and had the Doctor freeze Majestic in time. Hawksmoor then contacted Apollo and Midnighter to bring Atom back on to the Carrier to avoid any potential damages on Earth.
Once on the Carrier, Captain Atom tried to reason Hawksmoor, but he again disregarded Atom's words and had Apollo kill Atom. However, once Apollo blasted Captain Atom with his eyebeams, he inadvertently caused Atom to suddenly transform into a glowing and menacing looking form. Surprised at what happened, Hawksmoor yet again ordered Apollo to kill Captain Atom, but the solar powered human was then instantly killed upon touching him. After Midnighter was also killed in touching Atom, Hawksmoor desperately ordered the Doctor to unfreeze Majestic for 'backup'. When Majestic was unfrozen and realizing of what had happened, he grabbed Hawksmoor and angrily reprimanded him for what he did, in which Hawksmoor admitted that he was wrong. Before Majestic could do anything to Hawksmoor, Jenny Quantum entered and chastised Hawksmoor for his mistakes, and then tried to solve the problem. But unfortunately, Jenny Quantum was accidentally killed by Captain Atom causing Hawksmoor to break down and criticize Atom for the deaths and the Doctor for making "tasteless jokes" about Jenny Quantum's death. However, the Doctor reasoned to him that he wasn't making a joke, and that the death of Jenny Quantum signified the actual end of their universe, and that it was inevitable for anyone to do anything. Hawksmoor was then asked by him if he was going to have his last moments in the end of the universe "whining and fighting", in which Hawksmoor softly replied "no".
However, Nikola Hanssen, having accepted herself as the Void, arrived and easily managed to remove her other fragment from Atom and causing him to turn back into his normal appearance, and thus prevented the cataclysm. After the Void successfully sent Atom back to his universe, she surprisingly revealed to everyone that she intended to end the universe. She further explained that the universe isn't "sane" and that it is "twisted" by its own heroes. Jack tried to desperately reason with her that she is "one of us", but Void reasoned back that she was "one of (normal humans)" and that Hawksmoor (and his team) fail to save their universe out of shear violent hubris. Void ultimately ended the universe in a flash of light, but she also reassured that she intended to restart the universe without people feeling "weak and afraid".
In this event, Hawksmoor and everything in the universe relived anew and without any knowledge of the said events.
World's End
With the end of the world and due to the devastation done to the cities worldwide, Jack became an invalid on life support in a wheelchair, deformed, and reliant on a depowered Engineer, Angie Spica.
Jack was also damaged emotionally and had given up on trying to save the world. He believed that they had failed and that there was nothing left to do but try and stay alive. He was still seen as the leader, but the other members of the team like Angela Spica and Midnighter began to assert themselves more and stood apart from him.
When Stormwatch came down and suggested they put aside their old differences and work together with the Authority taking in more refugees and Stormwatch giving the dead Carrier power, Jack agreed when Jackson King told him that bringing the Carrier to life could help Jack's situation. The two teams faced off against Eidolon and his Army of The Mad and were able to defeat him and get the Carrier charged; however, no change in Jack was seen. After the fight all the members of the Authority left to investigate a problem elsewhere and Jack was left alone where he was attacked by an Incubite that was roaming the halls of the Carrier. Jack somehow beat the creature and when the rest of the team returned his body seemed greatly healed, though still not perfect and had to use crutch. Which in turn can be used as a weapon.
When Kaizen Gamorra threatened the Authority, Jack was held prisoner and tortured on Gamorra Island by the dictator after being defeated by Cybernary. However, Gamorra had made the mistake in setting Hawksmoor inside a city and allowing him to regain his power. He caused chaos on the island and reunited with the Authority before letting loose a Incubite-infected Apollo. Afterward Jack contained the infection in Gamorra Tower and dumped it into the Norwegian Trench, where the virus would become dormant from the cold. Prior to the end of Gamorra, Jack learned of a weapon developed by Kaizen Gamorra that could destroy the Carrier. Also, he further discovered that a lab assistant named Mayumi Kana whose mind and consciousness was grafted to the weapon in order to control it. Hawksmoor took the weapon in finding a way to humanely free Kana's mind and prevent it falling into the wrong hands. Jack and the Authority later came to Midnighter's aid against an insane Habib Hassan and ultimately killed him.
Following Apollo's cure from the Warhol Virus, the Carrier was struck from an unknown source of energy coming from outer space and caused the shift-ship to be fully repaired and operational. Learning that the Carrier was about to automatically leave Earth to the source of the light, Jack was intent to board the Carrier and see where it's going. In so he offered the other heroes of Earth the choice to either stay on Earth or go with the Carrier. Ultimately, the news of the Carrier's departure caused a divided panic among human refugees. After Earth's heroes tried to bring order, Jack, the Authority (consisting of only the Engineer and Swift) and a few handful of heroes (Christine Trelane, Grifter, Flint, Deathblow, The High, and Gen 13's Sarah Rainmaker and Freefall) left Earth on the Carrier. Throughout the long voyage, Hawksmoor was cautious of the Carrier's independence since its reactivation and intended on using Gamorra's weapon, dubbed Mayumi after the imprisoned Mayumi Kana, in case he needed it to stop the shift-ship.
Ultimately, the Authority arrived at their destination at a massive space station neighboring a Chthonian plane. It turned out that the Carrier was actually lured there by a malevolent alien race known as the Karibna, who preyed on other lifeforms to sustain themselves. Hawksmoor, Grifter, and Flint along with the Carrier's passengers were captured by the Karibna. Fortunately, The Authority were able to free the Karibna's prisoners and Hawksmoor then used Mayumi, and as well her living head, to destroy the heart of the station, causing it to plummet toward it's planet. Hawksmoor was discouraged that their journey to supposedly find a way to help Earth came out for nothing, but was comforted by the Engineer that their odyssey had eliminated the Karibna from threatening the universe. The High also reminded Jack that heroes never truly die. It was his experience that they always come back and that is why he's convinced the Earth will be repaired as well.
