Membership:
Apocryphus, Deathunt
9000, Raa, Sir Raston, Ssith, Tyndar, WildrunANACHRONAUTS
Membership:
Apocryphus, Deathunt
9000, Raa, Sir Raston, Ssith, Tyndar, Wildrun
Purpose: Minions of Kang
Affiliations: Kang, Terminatrix, Iron Man, Professor Gamble
Enemies: Avengers, Fantastic Four, Force Works, Immortus, War Machine, Incinerators
Base of Operations: Chronopolis
First Appearance: Fantastic Four Annual#25 (1992)
History: Kang’s hand-picked commandos, the greatest warriors of all the ages, Kang was the only man to have defeated them in battle, and thus they swore loyalty to him, as the Anachronauts.
(Fantastic Four Annual#25) - As the Fantastic Four and Avengers battled each other within Kang’s city of Chronopolis, the Anachronauts (individually un-named) were deployed to deal with the intruders.
(Avengers Annual#21) - The Anachronauts demanded that the FF and Avengers surrender, only to be challenged by Hercules. The Anachronauts attack, and fought until the FF and Avengers surrender, not knowing that Sersi had disguised herself as Raa, and that the heroes had surrendered in order to be taken to Kang, which is where the Anachronauts took their prisoners, and trapped them in a slowly-shrinking energy cube, while Kang explained his plans and confronted Terminatrix. Sersi freed the FF and Avengers, who quickly subdued the Anachronauts.
(Avengers: The Terminatrix Objective#1) - Deathunt 9000 announced the Anachronauts’ resignation to Terminatrix, the team having sworn allegiance to Kang only, and claming Kang would know how to summon them when he returned. Terminatrix threatened to have the team and all their divergent selves killed if they revealed her impersonation of the real Kang. Deathunt swore to have the same done to her if she didn’t look after Kang’s empire well.
(Avengers Annual#22/2) - The Anachronauts were training by fighting each other in Chronopolis, when Sir Raston’s Ebony Blade began to glow and become unsolid. Terminatrix determined that this was tied into a temporal anomaly that threatened Chronopolis itself, forcing them to go back to Camelot, to ensure the creation of the Ebony Blade. Raa claimed that if Chronopolis fell, the Anachronauts would be thrown back into their own eras. They arrived in time to witness the landing of the Starstone from which the Blade was created, only for an army of the robot Incinerators to arrive in a time-vessel disguised as a cottage, and steal the Starstone. Entering the vessel, they found and rescued ex-TVA employee Professor Gamble, an old enemy of the Incinerators, who explained how they had stolen his vessel and were using a replicator device to create an army of Incinerators, planning to use the Starstone to power a ‘Time Incinerator’ weapon. Gamble claimed to have met Terminatrix and the Anachronauts before, in their future and his past.
The Anachronauts attacked the Incinerators, only to be slowly overwhelmed by the sheer number of the robots, and were saved by Gamble’s use of a bypass module to regain control of his ship, and forcibly eject the Incinerators. The Anachronauts and Terminatrix then returned to Chronopolis as Gamble ensured that Merlin received the Starstone, to create the Ebony Blade.
(OHotMU 2006 A-Z#1) - Immortus, disguised as Kang, tricked several of the Anachronauts into assisting him.
(Force Works#17) - As the Chronographic Weapon was used to ‘erase’ Vietnam, from the time-stream, Apocryphus and some ‘greenshirt’ Anachronauts (identities of all hidden in shadow) located a survivor, a boy who was being ‘hyper-evolved’ into a superhuman by the weapon’s effect, who they intended to recruit.
(Force Works#18) - Apocryphus observed the crash of Force Works’ Hex Ship, and, with his ‘greenshirts’, investigated, thinking he had found more survivors to recruit. Mistaking Force Works for the Avengers, he attacked. They defeated Force Works, only for Moonraker to recover from his breakdown and single-handedly defeat them.
(War Machine#21) - Deathunt 9000 led a squad of cyborg soldiers, "Strike Fireteam Decimal Four" in an attack on the fugitives War Machine, Hawkeye, US Agent and Black Widow, (having been called in to deal with them by the then-evil Iron Man, who had framed Hawkeye for his murders, and now needing him silenced). Deathunt 9000 defeated Hawkeye and US Agent, but was defeated by War Machine, and used an emergency temportal to escape before they could interrogate him.
(Force Works#19) - To escape from Vietnam, Force Works stole ‘temporal activators’ from Apocryphus and the ‘greenshirts’, who the Scarlet Witch claimed to all be dead. Although given that Apocryphus is an Eternal, this was unlikely.
(OHotMU 2006 A-Z#1) - Kang reasserted his control over the Anachronauts.
(Avengers Forever#3) - The Anachronauts defended Chronopolis from Immortus’ invading armies, only for most of the group to be killed (off panel, to add insult to injury) by a ‘time-twisting explosion’, leaving slowly fading ‘temporal shadows’ of the dead. Wildrun survived, albeit injured, and was taken away by Kang’s medics, only to be presumably caught in the destruction of Chronopolis by Immortus (or potentially thrown back to his own era). Deathunt 9000 was never depicted amongst the fallen Anachronauts, so may still survive.
Comments: Anachronauts created by Mark
Gruenwald and Dan Panosian.
Strike Fireteam Decimal Four created by Dan Abnett and Fred
Hayes.
Mighty convenient how Immortus’ army ran out of those time-twisting weapons when the Avengers showed up, isn’t it?
The ‘greenshirt’ Anachronauts of the Crossing are essentially a whole other group, and aren’t included alongside the originals.
Further, the events of the Crossing were pretty much revealed
to all be smoke and mirrors used by Immortus to distract the Avengers and keep
them on Earth until the coming of Onslaught. I don't think the appearances of
the Anachronauts in those issues were actually Kang's warriors, but rather Space
Phantoms under the control of Immortus.
In OHotMU 2006 A-Z#1 this was cleared up. The
Anachronauts seen in the Crossing really were the originals, who were
tricked into working for Immortus.
A few things:
CLARIFICATIONS:
Wildrun, the first Red Wolf, should not be confused with:
Sir Raston should not be confused with:
Raa should not be confused with:
The Hellgate, from which Deathunt fought monsters, has no known connection to:
Deathunt 9000
A cyborg from the next century*, Deathunt usually acted as the team’s leader, and also led Strike Fireteam Decimal Four. His use of the expletive "shock" may tie him into the 2099 future of Earth-928. As one of the more technologically advanced Anachronauts, it usually fell on him to explain things to the more superstitious Anachronauts from the past. Deathunt respected the Avengers' tenacity and unwillingness to give up, but believed they lacked the guts to win a fight to the death, which cost him when he mistook War Machine for an Avenger. Deathunt has experience fighting Thing-esque monsters from Hellgate.
Deathunt’s cyborg body was armoured, could fly by means of boot-jets and he possessed enhanced strength, on a level to grapple with War Machine. He could fire plasma and electro-magnetic blasts from his hands or wrist-bands, and also had wrist-mounted energy-guns and a retractable blade. He could also fire an energy-blast from his cybernetic left eye. He also sometimes carries a futuristic gun.
--Fantastic Four Annual#25 (Fantastic Four Annual#25, Avengers Annual#21, 22/2, Avengers: The Terminatrix Objective#1, War Machine#21
*At the time of ‘Citizen Kang’, Deathunt was intended to be from the 21st century, but as Marvel-time works, he’ll always be from "the next century".
Last "and mightiest" of the Earth-Eternals, from the alternate future of Earth-1952, was the son of Sersi and yet did not recognise her when he met her. He boasted of wanting to kill a legend, namely the legendarily clumsy Hercules.
Apocryphus presumably had all the usual powers of an Eternal, but only ever displayed the ability to fly, and project energy blasts from his eyes.
--Fantastic Four Annual#25 (Fantastic Four Annual#25, Avengers Annual#21, 22/2, Force Works#17-19, Avengers Forever#3
Wildrun (AKA Red Wolf)
He was the first of the Red Wolves, @ 1760. He drove the Sioux away from the planes so that the Cheyenne would have a place to live. Wildrun was the lone survivor of the Anachronaut’s battle with Immortus’ forces. His origins in the past showed in his belief that Reed Richards was a shaman. Wildrun somehow knows Libra, although how and when they previously met remains unrevealed. Wildrun claimed to be the human son of the Wolf God Owayodata, but may not have meant this literally.
Wildrun displayed no superhuman abilities, but presumably had the same enhanced senses and tracking skills as his successors. He carried a bow, dagger and spear, and sometimes used explosive arrows.
--Avengers I#80 (Avengers I#80, Fantastic Four Annual#25, Avengers Annual#21, 22/2, Avengers Forever#3
Note: Like the other Red Wolfs of his line, Wildrun would in some fashion correspond to the Elder God Chthon;
see also the Catalogue of Correspondences for Chthon from Ian McNee's reading of the First Tarot
Sir
Raston (AKA Black Knight)
He was the second Black Knight, born into the Dark Ages of the 6th-7th Century, Raston had to fend for himself until the ghost of his predecessor and nephew, Sir Percy, led him to the Ebony Blade. Raston feared that Merlin would see him as an unworthy successor to the role of Black Knight, and would take the Ebony Blade from him, yet when he met the present day Black Knight, he dismissed Sir Percy as "a fop and a fool."
At some point Raston fought the Visigoths.
Sir Raston carried the Ebony Blade and wore medieval armor. Raston believed Kang, and himself, to be ambitious rather than evil. Like Wildrun, Sir Raston’s origins in the past left him still unfamiliar with aspects of the world he had found himself in.
A portrait of Sir Raston was hung in the museum at Garret Castle.
--Fantastic Four Annual#25 (Fantastic Four Annual#25, Avengers Annual#21, 22/2, [New Excalibur#10 (fb)], Avengers Forever#3, [New Excalibur#10]
He’s been said to be from both the 6th and 7th centuries. Presumably he lived through the end of the 6th and the start of the 7th.
Ssith,
last of the Serpent Men
Ssith was one of the more bloodthirsty Anachronauts, and despised being mistaken for a lizard. Despite being from much further in the past than other Anachronauts (12,000 years ago), he showed no signs of having trouble adapting to life in the future.
As a Serpent-Man, Ssith had fangs, enhanced strength, size and endurance, and a scaly armored body. He carried a sword. As a reptile, he presumably also had a weakness to temperature extremes.
--Fantastic Four Annual#25 (Fantastic Four Annual#25, Avengers Annual#21, 22/2, Avengers Forever#3
He was a caveman from a tribe known as the Hill-Dwellers, a skilled hunter, who sought to find foes worthy of him, having long since tired of battling sabretooths.
Raa had what appeared to be a fragment of the Bloodgem embedded in his chest (in Avengers Annual#22/2, the Bloodgem fragment was incorrectly depicted as hanging from his bone necklace), which would presumably grant him the same enhanced strength and toughness, healing powers and immortality as it did Ulysses Bloodstone himself. Raa carried a spear, and whilst training, once carried an advanced laser pistol of some kind.
--Fantastic Four Annual#25 (Fantastic Four Annual#25, Avengers Annual#21, 22/2, Avengers Forever#3
Like the legendary Achilles, the last warrior of Troy had been immersed in the River Styx, rendering him invulnerable. Neither Hercules nor Sersi appeared to know him, despite being amongst those from a similar era to him.
Tyndar was invulnerable to all physical harm (although he could still be restrained or knocked unconscious), and, unlike Achilles, had no known weak spot. He wore Trojan armor, and carried a sword and shield.
--Fantastic Four Annual#25 (Fantastic Four Annual#25, Avengers Annual#21, 22/2, Avengers Forever#3
Strike Fireteam Decimal Four
They were a squad of six cyborg soldiers that accompanied Deathunt in his attack on Hawkeye, War Machine, US Agent and Black Widow. They were armed with various advanced guns, and most had wrist-blades as well. The entire team, programmed to fight to the death, were apparently killed by War Machine.
--War Machine#21
Appearances:
Fantastic Four Annual#25 (1992) - Mark Gruenwald (writer), Herb Trimpe (pencils), Brad Vancata (inks), Ralph Macchio (editor)
Avengers Annual#21 (1992) - Mark Gruenwald (writer), Herb Trimpe
(pencils), Charles Barnett & Brad Vancata (inks), Ralph Macchio
(editor)
Avengers Annual#22 (1993) - Roy Thomas & Jean-Marc Lofficier
(writer), Al Milgrom (pencils), Mark Steckbauer (inks), Ralph Macchio
(editor)
Avengers: Terminatrix Objective#1 (September, 1993) - Mark Gruenwald
(writer), Mike Gustovich (pencils), Bud LaRosa (inks), Ralph Macchio
(editor)
Force Works#17-18 (November-December, 1995) - Dan Abnett & Andy
Lanning (writer), Jim Cheung (#17) & Yancey Labat (#18) (pencils),
Rey Garcia (inks), Nel Yomtov (editor)
War Machine#21 (December, 1995) - Dan Abnett (writer), Fred Haynes
& Sandu Florea (pencils), Johnny Greene, Jim Palmiotti & Sandu
Florea (inks), Nel Yomtov (editor)
Force Works#19 (January, 1996) - Dan Abnett & Andy Lanning
(writer), Hector Oliveira (pencils), Glass House Graphics & Rey
Garcia (inks), Nel Yomtov (editor)
Avengers Forever#3 (February, 1999) - Kurt Busiek & Roger Stern
(writer), Carlos Pacheco (pencils), Jesus Merino (inks), Tom Brevoort
(editor)
New Excalibur#10 (October, 2006) - Frank Tieri (writer), Michael Ryan (pencils), Rick Ketcham (inks), Mike Marts (editor)
First Posted: 08/31/2002
Last updated: 02/17/2019
Any Additions/Corrections? please let me know.
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