They nearly succeeded and in the effort to fight against them a new experimental weapon was developed, the Gamma Sequencer Bomb. The device, through mishandling, was accidently detonated in the Nevada desert creating a radioactive dead zone and relasing some unknown radiation across the planetary surface.
It was this, perhaps combined with mutnagenics released by the Tyranthrax themselves that began the current paranormal age.
The first team I want to present is Brigade, a fairly new corporate backed team of paranormals operating out of Maimi Florida.
Background: The core members of Brigade met under very odd circumstances. Alien fugitive Ning Ta, fleeing with a group of slaves he had freed from the Galactic Concordium (an interplanetary conglomerate) arrived on Earth a few months ago. The Concordium issued a bounty for his capture, making him out to be a thief and murderer.
The Elim bounty hunter, Kell, came to Terra to collect him and the slaves. Once he arrived, he discovered that Ning Ta was not the evil being he had been told. In fact, the slave he had freed looked upon him a their saviour and were willing to sacrifice themselves for him. He rejected the Concordium contract but he had lead them to Ning ta.
Jahari (the warrior race of the Concordium) were dispatched to deal with them both.
Meanwhile, Scarlet Krynn, millionaire industrialist, and her bodyguard, Guardian, an four armed humanoid of unknown origin, were yachting near the site of the attack.
Also on board was a well reputed thief named Full House, mutant with the ability to charge objects with concussive energy. He was planning to secretly loot the boat.
When the Jahari attacked, Scarlet and Guardian were caught in the cross fire. Full House was forced to fight. They all functioned surprisingly well as a team and the idea of forming an operative team began to in Scarlet's mind.
Later, at a meeting where she intended to make the proposal, a race of beings called the Aquarians attacked. They were seeking a jewel called the Eye of Krym. Using surprise they managed to escape with the jewel, taking Kell hostage in the process.
Ning ta used his mental powers to search for Kell and the chase lead to an underground base of the organization Demon. Fighting their way through the facility, the future team members lost track of Kell again, as he was taken out to sea. Using some evidence recovered from the base, they discover he was taken to an underwater base off the coast of Florida.
At the underwater base, they found and rescued Kell only seconds before the entire place exploded. The Jewel had been taken earlier and Kell had overheard some mentioned coordinates, several sets, while being held prisoner. The team began to check out the locations, finding various isolated islands, dotted with ruins through out the Atlantic.
On one such island, they found something more. A nest if the insectoid Tyranthrax had survived on the island. They attacked the heros as they explored the island. Barely managing to escape the alien, they characters all returned to Florida as ISIS forces moved in clear the hive.
Once back in Miami, Scarlet began to pour over her mystic texts, looking for a clue as to why the gem was taken and where is could be. Meanwhile Guardian and Kell stumbled across a plot to unite the various Miami street gangs into one demon worshipping sect.
The center of the plot was a subterranean temple located under a slum neighborhood. While investigating the plot, Guardian and Kell were warned that Scarlet was in danger from vastly powerful forces bytwo vampiric beings.
The rest of the team joined them later to confront the instigator of the plot, a businessman named Keller. They fought his summoned servants in the temple and drove them off. Keller himself escaped by magically teleporting. Without his magic and creatures, the cult was easily shut down by the police.
After such a stunning success, the Brigade idea was easily to get accepted with city government. The entire group was to be awarded at a public ceremony that would also serve to announce the group's formation.
The award's dinner was attacked by undead creatures attempting to kill Scarlet. After defeating the zombies with the help of a mysterious mage named Damion Keller (he claimed not to be related to Robert Keller) the team followed him a abandoned mansion that Keller claimed was being used as a base by the sorcerous Demon organization.
Inside however, they found that the building had been taken over by a group of vampires. The apparent leader of the group severely injured Kell and bit Full House, seemingly infecting him with vampirism before fleeing. Taking their wounded teammates, the group returned to Scarlet's offices after being unable to find Damion Keller.
Full House, caught fully in the grip of the vampires bite had to be isolated at Ning Ta's island facility while Scarlet searched for a cure. While he was there, a sorceress and member of the Circle arrived on the island. She was planning to use the power of the island natural magical node to search for a mystic disturbance in the area.
She examined Full House and found that he was not infected with vampirism but had been the victim of a spell cast on him. He was possessed by a Bloodkin spirit, a non corporeal creature that fed on human blood. If the possession was not reversed in day or so it would be permanent.
The Eye of Krym jewel was a key component in the rite. Scarlet had tracked down a possible location for the gem. A small South American island, Saint Martinique. It was a resort island privately owned by an American company.
Setting out for the island the team was welcomed at first. There was a series of temple ruin the hills near the center of St Martinque, under the protection of the governmentof Brazil. While waiting for permission to enter the grounds, the team was caught in a trap.
The whole island was controlled by cultist worshipping the elder god Kyrm. The ceremony to return him to this plane was being held in the temple ruins. Five women of high magical potential were selected to be the brides of Kyrm and power his return to this world. Among the was Scarlet's sister Violet and the wife of Aegis, whom had been vacationing on the island.
Dodging various attempts on their life, they made their way to the temple, joined along the way be members of the Defenders, who had come searching for their lost members. The group split up both due to chance and the advice of demoness, Truul Ker who had turned against the Kyrm cultists.
One group moved to destroy the Orb of Souls, the artifact that was in part powering the ritual and its defenses, while the other group moved to take out the ceremony itself. With help from the Defenders and the weakening of Keller (who had been behind the whole thing) that came from the destruction of the Orb, Brigade won.
During the conflict though, Scarlet had been replaced by another. A duplicate from another dimension. This Scarlet was evil and pulled the group back into her other, keeping them unaware of her true nature. Brigade found itself in a world where the ISIS was a secret police force for a corrupt American "empire". Their versions here were twisted evil parodies of the "real" characters. The false Scarlet had brought them here to steal back a certain magical tome that was in the hands of the Defenders (formerly known as the Defilers before their "rehabilitation"). With the real Scarlet, Aegis' wife and two innocent pilots held hostage the team had no choice but to comply.
They were captured by the Defenders shortly after entering their West Coast base. The villainous group gave them a book to return to Scarlet which turned out to be a trap. The magical "bomb" hurled the team back to their own universe and they returned home.
A few days after the teams return, Ran joined them. She faced a trial by fire, arrving just in time for the Interstellar Concordium to show up to collect their due from Kel and Ning ta. Despite a valiant battle several of the heros were captured and the team split for now.
Team Name: The Defenders
Status: Independent paranormal action team with ISIS backing
Location: Brenwood Hills, Los Angeles California
Members:
The Defenders were originally composed of Protector, Null, Shade, Wendigo and Dark Stalker. All but Dark Stalker were heroes who had been operating on the West Coast and where contacted by ISIS or Protector. Dark Stalker was actually a reformed Viper agents serving a "community service" sentence by acting with the Defenders.
The fledgling teams first actual mission ended in tragedy. Word of a Viper weapons shipment had been leaked to ISIS and the Defenders were sent in to investigate.
The shipment had come in at an isolated waterfront in San Francisco. It was not the weapons that were the actual threat, but a team of mercenary super hired by Viper to form a enforcement team called the Deathwing. In the ensuing battle, Wendigo was killed by Deathstalker, leader of the Deathwing and Dark Stalker's brother.
The battle itself was, at best, a draw with Viper loses most if its weapons but a fatality on the side of the Defenders.
Needing a replacement for Wendigo, Protector went to ISIS for assistance,.. In a controversial decision on the Boards parts (with staunch objections from Valerie Markham, the West Coast director), an alien being, Vanguard was assigned to the team. The alien was uncommunicative and had been held at a METE facility put was proving difficult to hold.
It was felt that he could be watched more thoroughly by the paranormal team and lighten the burden of ISIS security teams. Sera, another alien, but far more sociable, was also placed on the team staff. Vanguard's first test came a few days after his arrival. Viper troops had entered an LA mall, for unknown purposes and were systematically destroying it.
The team was dispatched to aid the police in the situation. By the time they had arrived Viper had disposed of the conventional authorities. The Defenders battled the Troops in the parking lot while Null and Shade separately entered the building looking for innocents and more Viper operatives.
Inside Shade found the mutant bounty hunters Hound and Asp. Injured by Asp , Shade was forced to conceal himself long enough for his regenerative abilities to close the wounds. While hiding he came across the bounty hunter's hunters and apparently Viper's quarry, a teenaged girl. The girl called herself Jane (the name was sewn into the ill-fitting jacket that she wore).
Jane healed Shade's wounds just as the rest of the Defenders entered the mall. Dark Stalker shot and severely injured Hound with his laser weapon, forcing Asp to help her injured partner from the scene. Null dealt with Viper cyborg Omega while the rest of the team mopped up the remaining agents.
Jane was taken a local hospital, escorted by the team, who tried to find out more about the girl. She was only able to tell them that she was running from Viper, who had "made her do bad things" before fatigue made her black out.
At the hospital, another attempt was made to get Jane, this time by the Deathwing in full force. The battle nearly destroyed a floor of the building and ISIS had to send in a Silver Avenger and troops to drive off the Viper Supers. The Defenders decided that Jane would be safer at their base and fewer lives would be endangered.
After a few days of relative peace, while trying to coax memories out of Jane, the Defenders base was attacked. It occurred during a practice excersise on the base grounds. Several ninja, armed with primitive looking weapons, invaded the facility and engaged the Defenders in battle.
They were easily defeated but Jane, who had been watching the exercise came under attack as well. Once attacked she entered a berserker frenzy, literally dismembering her attackers. Once the frenzy left her, she was over come at the sight of her actions and tried desperately to use her healing powers on the corpses to no avail.
The attack did, however, overcome the mental block on her memories. She now remembered being a project of Viper's, a first generation Super soldier clone. She remembered her escape and the location of the laboratory where she had been constructed.
Following Jane back to the hidden Viper lab, the team found it mysteriously abandoned or so they thought. They found an arena like area and where suddenly sealed in. Deathstalker appeared hovering above the arena, taunting them with the knowledge that they had been tracked all long by a subdermal implant that had been installed in Jane during the hospital attack. They were to be the test subjects of viper's new soldiers.
At that 10 of the clones were released and attacked the group. Protector realized that the clones were being motivated by a collar similar to the one Jane wore. Removing the collars freed the clone's from Viper's control.
The Deathwing attacked when they saw that the Defenders had realized this. Deathstalker and Dark Stalker squared off to settle a personal feud and Dark Stalker was killed by his brother. Deathstalker then ordered the Deathwing to leave, realizing the battle was futile.
The Defenders calmed the frightened, child like clones and gave them over to PSI (Paranormal Studies Institute) for safe keeping. Jane remained with them as she had attached to the group as has family and didn't want to leave them.
The next crisis occurred during an attempt to transfer Vanguard's vessel to the Defender's base. The convoy was ambushed by the Redirection Cartel, a group of paranormal thieves. The Cartel stole Vanguard's space craft. The team lost track on the group in the ensuing brief chase.
After a few days, ISIS intelligence located the stolen spacecraft. It was being sold at an auction being held by a villainous group calling itself Shadow Axis. Among the bidders were Viper and the master villain Nemesis. An attempted infiltration of the site went awry leading to the temporary capture of Shade and Flux (a new temporary member of the team). They were later freed and the space craft recovered after Shadow Axis fled the facility rather than face a combined assault by ISIS and the remaining Defenders.
Shadow Axis had tampered with the ship while it was in their hands and reactivated the damaged communications systems. They were picking up a signal originated from another vessel from Vanguard's home world. Tracking down the alien craft, Vanguard was reunited with what was perhaps the only other member of his race. She told him that she had found evidence of what had happened to their people and they left together shortly thereafter.
Vanguard was shortly replaced by Nightwind, a flamboyant mutant hero from Europe. When riots broke out in the Los Angeles Zone over a demonstration by The Society for Genetic Purity the Defenders moved in to quell the violence. After a brief battle with Mutant Force Alpha (Alpha Force), Protector and Shade convinced the team leader to abandon the attack, by questioning his justification and pointing out the evil of harming innocents.
Nightwind could not morally bring himself to fight against his fellow mutants who were fighting an bigoted organization which caused some friction among the Defenders.
On the same evening the team fought a looting street gang lead by the mutant gang leader Roughhouse and engaged the Conquers in battle. The Conquers were taking advantage of the blackouts caused by the riots to loot a scientific research facility. The Defenders utterly smashed the villains driving them off. During the retreat, the Conquers leader swore to avenge the defeat.
The attempt at vengeance came a few days later. The Conquers attacked the Defender's base in force. The action proved quite futile as the team once again soundly defeated them, capturing all except Neutron, the team leader.
During the battle Flux nearly killed Wyvern of the Conquers with a flame blast. Jane used her bio empathic power to bring him back from the brink of death, but sent herself into a coma in the process. She was sent to PSI for treatment.
Flux left the group shortly afterward, unable to reconcile himself to constantly fighting his own kind (mutants).
A day later the Defenders recived word of a hostage situation occuring in a orphanage in a small suburb of LA. Arriving on the scence they were warned of by local authorities who wanted maintain sole jurisdiction in the matter. Seeing that the local police were no match for the paramormal backed terrorists, the Defenders went into the building in a multifront attack intended to tale the criminals off guard.
After a brief but intense battle the group was defeated but one of the paranormals criminals, Frenzy escaped with stolen gold bars that had been hidden under the orphanage. Another villain, Radical sacrificed her life for his escape. It was later revealed that she was the identical twin of Murphy Carter.
Flux was replaced by Thunder, a being claiming to be the incarnation of a ancient storm god. He said he was related to Deathstalker and Dark Stalker and had come to avenge the death of his "good" sibling. The exact connection between the three is very vague. Thunder's acute magical sense lead him and the rest of the team to abandoned mansion and cemetery where a perverse magical ritual was taking place.
Bel 'reth Tal and Karna, a ancient death goddess were attempting to sap the magical energy remaining in the long dead corpse of a potent necromancer buried in the graveyard in a rite combing necromancy and sex magic. Another lone hero arrived on the scene, a mage calling himself Black Magic.
The Defender's interrupted the ceremony and Bel 'reth and Karna left once their prize was destroyed, after summoning hordes of animated bodies to slow pursuit. After dealing with the Zombies, the Defenders searched the nearby mansion and found a set of magical books. They took the tomes back to base, meaning to study them later. Black Magic came as well and later joined officially.
Thunder, Void and Null' s street contacts lead the group into another encounter. This time with drug dealers selling a deadly new narcotic, Velvet Dawn. The team moved to shut down the production plant on the waterfront, battling street scum and a cyborg mercenary group, the Iron Hawks.
Nightwind was severely injured in the course of the battle and had to be hospitalized. The operation was revealed to be run by Null's stepfather, a brutal man responsible for torturing Null and murdering his mother.
Null took his vengeance, shattering his father's hands before he could be stopped. Null was placed on probation as a member for his actions.
During his hospitalization, Nightwind was visited by his sister, Bora. Thunder encountered her in the hospital but avoided fighting her to spare the innocents in the place. He did learn that Eurostar had gained new members since Nightwind had left, Mentalla and the Whip.
Shortly after his release from the hospital, the Defender were called in to help Project: Prometheus in testing an experimental combat AI: Unus. The call was a ruse, however. The AI had taken over the facility and was "testing" the organic life forms in the area. It wanted to test the Defender's combat ability against its drones.
It lead them into a trap, separated them and began a series of attacks. They escaped but were trapped in the facility until Black Magic summoned a demonic entity from the Abyss. The creature, lovely but inhuman called it self Alexis, queen of the succubi. She tricked the naive mage into freeing her permanently from her extra dimenonal prison but did destroy the computer controlled building.
She also revealed that Black Magic was her son, half human and half demon. His father was none other than Bel 'reth Tal. Unus escaped by transmitting copies of itself into the computer networks. Its current location and activities are unknown. Black Magic left the group to track down his origins shortly afterward.
Thunder left, too, ironically, shortly before his younger "sister" arrived for a visit. Like him she claimed to be ancient "god" that controlled ice and snow.
The base was later attacked by a coordinated group or mercenary paranormals, including , among others, Thunder (a villain with the same name) and a "Star beast" an engineered killer that grew from a crystal given to Protector from an "fan" The attack was a diversion to keep the team away from the kidnapping of Murphy and Jane by forces from outside this dimension.
Using some evidence found at the scene of the kidnapping and computer records that Sera managed to regain (Crystal had been damaged in the attack) they tracked the kidnappers to an alternate universe governed by a corrupt version of ISIS called the PSI police.
Linking up with the resistance in that world , they learned that a Jane was due to be executed by the PSI police. They staged a dramatic rescue and revealed that PSI police were actually using captured Psi's as enforcers and operatives rather than confining them. The Jane of this world turned out not to be the one they were looking for. In fact, there was no record with the PSI police of the operation to kidnap anyone.
The whole thing had been a set up to waste time.
While still in the alternate universe they were contacted by the mage Ariel. She told them of the true fate of their friends and brought them to her magical world. Jane and Murphy had been captured by Mordikei, an evil necromancer who planned to use them as part of a dark summoning ritual.
They found Murphy, who had managed to escape from Mordikei and had become a wizard in her own right
After rejoining with Murphy and her new companions, the warrior elf Nightwing and Allron, the team set off for the palace of the Mage Ariel. Along the way, the Snow Queen discovered she was somehow the incarnation of the Goddess Wintermute and was to wield a mystic artifact called the Ice Brand against the Dead King Mordeki.
She claimed the Ice Brand, a simple crown composed of ice crystals from its guardians, a tribe of shamanistic winged humanoids, and was transformed.
Her powers grew almost the level they were on Earth, Her demeanor changed as well. She truly became a winter elemental, cold and aloof from the mortals around her.
The journey to Ariel's fortress took 5 days over land and there were a few encounters with Mordeki's forces, monstrous humanoids and undead warriors called the Black Guard. With the help of the Snow Queen's new powers they were defeated.
Arriving at Ariel's home they were greeted and told the full story of what had happened. The Necromancer Mordeki had been a long standing threat in this world, called Heridan, for ages. Long ago he was killed, but only returned in an undead form to plague this world once more.
He serves a demonic lord called Krym and using its power s hopes to regain a living form. Krym granted him the ability to look across dimensions to find the nessecary catalyst, Jane. Her life force manipulating powers will help him craft a new immortal body for himself.
To stop him the team had to recover the weapon that defeated him the last time. A sword called Quicksilver. The blade was being guarded by a sect of warrior priestesses.
Setting off for the temple, the group found it ransacked by Mordeki Black Guard. The sole survivor told them that the army was taking the blade back to the island fortress Mordeki called home. It was to be a gift to his demonic master.
Ariel used a Moon Gate to send the party to the island where they managed to infiltrate the castle from the catacombs beneath it, battling undead and the twisted mutations lairing there. Coming upon the final stage in the rite, they found Jane sealed, magically asleep, in a sarcophagus crafted of mystic fire.
The necromancer attacked with his undead and human servants, distracting the group long enough for him to continue the spell. Jane revived in her prison, entranced and began to channel the energy of the Eye of Kyrm jewel into the lich.
Murphy's used her own magical knowledge and power to try to stop the rite but despite her strength was quickly bested by the much more skilled Mordeki.
Nightwing snatched the sword Quicksilver up during the melee and tried to attack to Mordeki but was flung away, injured, by his magical shields. Only a quick wind gust, summoned by Nightwind saved her from falling to her death. Protector took up the blade and , protected by his magical shield, forced his way to the lich.
Mordeki, intoxicated by the power flowing through him accepted the knight's challenge to combat. Thoroughly out classed in skill but backed by the demon's power, Mordeki proved a difficult opponent, even with the magical sword.
Then the Snow Queen struck , shattering the magical prison holding Jane and dispelling the trance. Krym choose that moment to abandon the lich, removing the fearsome power he had granted him. Protector, using sheer will to overcome the injuries inflicted on him, attacked again, impaling the Lich King.
As Mordeki died, the spell he was weaving fell apart. The magical energies began to tear a hole in the fabric of reality. Murphy saw that it was a gate way back to Earth. Mordeki had simply been a pawn for his master to siphon off the jewels energy, when he was done, he simply abandoned him. That also meant the creature was somewhere on the Earth. Ariel appeared and used her magical power with Murphy's help to stabilize the portal to send the heros (The Defenders) to the site of Krym.
Nightwing and Allron wanted to go but the elf was too badly injured and there was no guarantee they could return. Murphy would come as swiftly as she could but had to get her child (brought by Ariel ) and Jane to safety on Earth first. The team leapt through the portal.
Meanwhile on the Defender' s home Earth, the est of the team was frantically searching for their missing members. Null and Void tracked down the ones responsible for the computer sabotage and damaging the portal. A criminal mercenary called Circuit Breaker was the culprit and once cornered she revealed her employers, a sect of demon worshippers called the Children of Krym.
After finding the cult's headquarter's in Nevada, the Defenders went there to hunt out any clues to their companions whereabouts. After defeated the few remaining guards they found a map leading to the island in the pacific, Saint Martinque. Since it seemed the only place to go they headed out to the island.
After leaping into the dimensional gateway crafted by Murphy and Ariel from the released energy of Mordekei's destruction, the team was swept across time and space to the site of Kyrm's rebirth.
Expecting a weakened being they instead foundthat the entity was at nearly full strength. The lose of the sixth Eye of Kyrm jewel had been compensated for by feeding from the life energy of 5 young women, each gifted with extreme magical potential. The grotesque entity had sealed them in a complex magical construct that was steadily draining the power from their bodies to feed the complex ritual that was merging Krym's sundered soul and body.
To make matters worse, Bora had been somehow recruited into service and her powers increased several times, making her nearly a match for the entire group of superheros.
Sanctu (Princess of the Succubi), Paladin (A member of a magical order called the Circle), Scarlet and Kel joined in the battle. Together with the Snow Queen's new power they were able to battle Bora to a stand still.
Nightwind then managed to calm his raging sibling long enough to convince her of the foolishness of dealing with a treacherous creature like Krym. Angered, she attempted to attack the demon and was thoroughly beaten back by his magical defenses and fled.
More supernatural creatures were called to guard Kyrm, undead and beast summoned from an unknown source in a seemingly endless wave. Sanctu and other mystical beings could see that the Circle (a group of powerful mages) had entered the battle on the astral plane, engaging Krym's soul form in an attempt to destroy him .
The magical creatures kept coming, slowly but steadily wearing down all the characters and Krym's defense seemed impenetrable. Just the battle seemed lost, the tide turned.
Thanks to the actions of the rest of Brigade, Null and Colt, the Soul Orb was destroyed, eliminating the power it was supplying to Kyrm or , more correctly, to his aid Richard Keller (a powerful mage that Brigade had encountered was before during his scheme to unite several Miami street gangs into one demon serving cult).
Keller had been hidden with several illusion spell and protective wards while he summoned creatures to defend Krym. Now, without the aid of the Soul Orb, he could not maintain his summoned army which vanished instantly.
Keller put up a brief fight, but weakened by the massive conjuring he was much less effective. Keller abandoned his demonic master when Murphy arrived to add her abilities to the fight.
Sanctu taunted the demon lord, insulting his abilities and challenging him to fight his own battle now that his mortal puppets had fled. Enraged by the succubi's insults, Kyrm made the mistake of leaving his shielded position and engaging the assembled heros. despite his power he took a massive amount of punishment from their combined strength His distraction drew his attention away from the attack on the stronger, the rite to restore his strength having reached a point were it was self sustaining.
Scarlet and the Circle mages (speaking through a mind link with Sanctu) knew that the rite could only be halted by destroying the construct that held the women. So far it had been invulnerable to all attempts to harm it, repelling even Paladin's blade and Sanctu's demonfire.
Scarlet came up with a solution that could work. She could try and focus energy through her link with her sister (one of the captives) bypassing the defense around the construct. Sanctu and Paladin would add their power to hers while the Circle attacked in full force at the same instant.
The other characters drew Krym's attention from Scarlet's spell casting, taking the brunt of Krym's new assault. Linking with Violet, Scarlet successfully channeled the power into the girl. The raw energy poured in to the delicate magical matrix of the construct, shattering it instantly. Krym was sent reeling by the backlash and left open to the astral attack by the Circle.
The ensuing explosion destroyed most of the mountain top temple and dropped the island back out of the limbo it had fallen into. Some hastily summoned shields from Murphy protected the characters from injury. But after the blast there was no sign of Scarlet or the Brigade team members.
A through search of the island, assisted by the Champions of Justice and ISIS forces revealed nothing. Their fate remains a mystery.
Reunited with FairyFire, Void and Null, the Defenders set off to return to their base on the West Coast. On the way, however, they receive an urgent call from ISIS. A massive breakout has occurred at Fortress Alpha, a paranormal prison and help is urgently needed from any available paranormal action teams in the area.
The team joined in the effort, assisted by an ISIS paranormal named Titan, and encountered several escaping prisoner, among them Star Well and Betelgeuse, minor mutant criminals. Star Well and her companion surrendered after talking to Protector, but their fellow escapee Ripper had to be convinced.
Just as he was defeated, another group attacked severely injuring Star Well and Betelguese, and incapacitating most of the team in seconds. It turned out to be Genocide agents using new and deadly equipment and tactics. The terrorist fled before a ISIS attack squad could arrive.