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This article, Aldrich Killian (Earth-61615), is property of MarvelousMarty. |
Iron Man Vol 1 12
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History
Once misfits, cripples... Rejects... We are now the next, supreme iteration of human evolution.
- — Aldrich Killian
- — Aldrich Killian
Early Years
Aldrich Killian (born 1977, died 2013) had a sorrowful and tragic childhood. Having been born with a number of physical disabilities, even his own single father — a washed-up poet — felt hopeless for him, and he eventually died from alcohol poisoning after years of untreated depression and continuous self-harm. However, the unfortunate innate circumstances of his reality didn't prevent Aldrich's brilliant mind and determined spirit from developing, with the potential for him to become a brilliant scientist and innovator, particularly one who is aimed at overcoming conditions like his which were considered to be terminal or untreatable by modern medicine at the time. With his excellence in academics, Aldrich went to a prestigious college, where he befriended mathematics major George Tarleton. Throughout his years of study in biotechnology, Aldrich came across and became obsessed over DNA coding after finding the exceptional research of Dr. Maya Hansen and her revolutionary Extremis project.
Establishing A.I.M.
Of course, he had to start somewhere in order to accomplish a similar feat, so he began working at the conservative and uninventive corporation, FuturePharm, as a stepping stone to his theoretical think tank project, Advanced Idea Mechanics or A.I.M. for short. When Aldrich found out that FuturePharm was attending Bern 2000 on New Years' Eve of 1999, among other sci-tech affiliations and occupations, Killian knew he couldn't let this opportunity slide, so he persistently petitioned to come as one of the company's representatives, much to his employers' irritation, and they let him tag along. He met Tony Stark and Maya Hansen there, two of the prominent figures which motivated him to pursue his scientific career. Unfortunately, Stark turned him down by lying that he was willing to meet with him to talk about his think tank, only for Stark to not reappear for the rest of the night.
Contemplating suicide at first, that very humiliating night gave Aldrich a moment of realization that someone like him had to work on his own, otherwise he would end up like his father, no matter how the rest of the world would ridicule or berate him for trying. Although Stark never contacted Aldrich again, Dr. Hansen did call him and joined his work using her designs for her Extremis formula, desperate to solve its flaws. In a few years, the two officially founded A.I.M. with government funding (though even the likes of Hydra had been secretly supporting its projects). He got a team to further research and develop Extremis, which imparted unusual levels of strength and resiliency to human subjects, volunteers and recruits, mostly composed of soldier amputees who were discharged from the military. Unfortunately, there were downsides to the experiment, as his subjects would often experience overheating, and in the worse case scenario, they would explode in certain cases of overuse. However, they could be trained to use the heat under levels of regulation.
Besides working on Extremis with Dr. Hansen, Aldrich decided to progressively expand the fields and branches of his organization, living up to the name "Advanced Idea Mechanics". He went down memory lane to recruit his college associate George Tarleton, who gladly accepted his offer and left his old occupation as a technician since he'd gained an affinity with the field of physics. Aldrich also become lucky enough to have his company pique the interest of one Dr. Monica Rappaccini, a master biochemist and innovator. However, some of his crew (including Dr. Hansen) had questioned Rappaccini's sanity due to her breakthroughs being considered extremely dangerous.
Looking on the bright side, Aldrich and Tarleton didn't see much difference with Aldrich's own progress with Extremis, firmly believing that Rappaccini would be a pivotal asset to A.I.M. since she could improve and master her works as one of them. However, the once solid partnership of Aldrich and Tarleton would arrive at a disparity regarding how Aldrich was running the organization. Tarleton was noticing how his partner had been spiraling due to his obsession with amplifying the capabilities of Extremis, but his concern only encouraged Aldrich to experiment on himself with the formula just to prove Tarleton wrong. The Extremis serum within Aldrich's system proved to be regulatable with training, but Tarleton was still skeptical since it could still prove unstable over time. In a fit of rage over Tarleton's consistent doubts, Aldrich almost killed him with his enhanced strength, not realizing that his partner had only proven him right. Tarleton left A.I.M. in dismay, not knowing it would be the last time he would interact with his old friend.
Killian's War on Terror
When certain global peace-keeping espionage organizations such as S.H.I.E.L.D. and the E.D.I. becoming more secure and protective on the heels of the Chitauri Invasion in 2010, Aldrich and A.I.M. were facing a great obstacle in continuing their progress. A.I.M. had to mask their illegal activities as terrorist attacks, for which Aldrich had adopted the idealized terrorist persona known as the Mandarin. The role was based on an Eastern legend, and Aldrich had dopehead and struggling English actor Trevor Slattery portray the Mandarin and serve as his proxy, unaware that a real Mandarin actually existed.
Around 2012, Killian also conspired with a few politicians through a group of benefactors in an attempt to take economic and political control of the United States of America for his own uses, monopolizing the War on Terror as he has been doing in the past four to five years. From that moment forward, he embraced his reputation as a warmongering terrorist in order to get back at Tony Stark, now reformed as the superhero Iron Man. It had been a decade since they last met and he showed him his success by having his soldiers, the Extremis enhanciles, take him on as well as everything that he had built. He had kidnapped both Pepper Potts, the current head of Stark Industries, and then-President Matthew Ellis, with the intention of publicly executing him and broadcasting it across the country. With his descent into madness, even Hansen was remorseful since her pure idea and greatest work originally meant for medicine had devolved into a deadly and volatile biological weapon. Hansen betrayed him and sought Tony Stark's help to fix it, but Aldrich didn't hesitate to put a bullet in her chest.
When he was at the climax of his success, Aldrich was confronted by his former idol, who managed to defeat his plans with the assistance of the Iron Legion, War Machine and Potts during the Battle on the Norco in Pensacola, Florida. After dealing with several explosions from a few self-destructing Iron Man armors, a regenerating Aldrich was bested by Pepper Potts, whom he had also previously augmented with Extremis. Aldrich was supposed to be dead, but miraculously enough, his vengeful spirit kept him going long enough that his healing factor kept him (barely) alive for hours. He almost alerted his subordinates at A.I.M. about his real status and whereabouts, but his survival had gotten someone else's attention first. In the aftermath of the battle, a group of men posing as agents of Damage Control had swept the site in search of the weakened Aldrich, subduing him before they took him to the designated headquarters of their organization.
A Duel to the Death
Aldrich faces the real Mandarin in the last moments of his life
After he was handed over to the leaders of the Ten Rings somewhere in a province in China, Aldrich — already barely alive — was brutally tortured for ten straight months all because he stole their master's sacred name, and by the end of the tenth month, the Mandarin himself came to visit his impostor face-to-face, only to remind him not to mess with his title and diabolical reputation. He told him that Killian's imitation of him through Slattery was nothing more than a pale and humiliating attempt of his character. Even Killian trying to compare his power and authority as A.I.M's Scientist Supreme to the Ten Rings was something the warrior had deemed an insult. However, the Mandarin didn't want his own impression to Aldrich to be a disappointment, the same way he saw Slattery's theatrics had portrayed him as a character.
Wenwu never wanted to portray himself as a stereotypical domineering and all-talk superior who just orders people around and made no fruitful contribution to his own society of the Ten Rings, something he deemed as his "obra maestra". Taking off his Ten Rings for a moment to prove his raw power, Wenwu channeled his inner chi to transfer some of his life-force to a weakened Killian, enough that the Extremis within his system would be amplified, powering him up into his best, healthy state; as if he had never been tortured. With a hospitable yet patronizing demeanor, the Mandarin told Killian that he would give him the merciful choice to get out of his headquarters and start a second chance at life, or let his fuming rage consume him and kill his captor right in front of him. With his enhancement, an enraged Killian took this change to fight back with the intention of killing the Mandarin, which the latter had expected since it was his intention to challenge him in a duel to begin with.
The two dueled using their hands and the energy within themselves: Killian's spontaneous Extremis against the Mandarin's concentrated chi. After the Mandarin told Killian everything about his history and hardships to spite the imposter as they fought, the true Mandarin nevertheless bested his imposter in hand-to-hand combat, effortlessly proving he was the superior fighter. An observant yet desperate Killian wore the Ten Rings, hoping it would turn the tides in his favor. The only problem was, he had no experience with them nor comprehension on how to use them, and it was too late for him to realize that the rings could be still controlled by their owner from a distance despite not wearing them. The rings melted in Killian's fingers, scorching through his hands as he wailed in agony. In Killian's excruciating defeat, the Mandarin killed him painfully and mercilessly using his ten powerful rings, though he only needed to use five in one hand to kill Killian slowly, dissolving him headfirst as he melted to death.
Legacy Exceeded
With his flesh mostly melted into a puddle, the Mandarin had Killian's remains fed to the wild animals near his headquarters, but kept his skull and impaled it on a spike as a warning to those who may still dare to mock or challenge his power. At some point after Killian's War had officially ended with his death, Aldrich's former partner, George Tarleton, was able to somehow finally claim his desired position as the deputy head of Advanced Idea Mechanics assigned to him by A.I.M.'s new leader, the more respectable and competent Scientist Supreme Monica Rappaccini, and was free to fully pursue his goals without anyone standing on his way or his higher ups interfering with his work too often. Unfortunately, despite his being the founding father of A.I.M. from the ground, it was A.I.M.'s legacy that lasted longer than Aldrich's memory as its first Scientist Supreme. The leadership of Advanced Idea Mechanics persisted through the following decade, with Rappaccini, Tarleton, and Franklin Hall being the last Scientist Supreme Triumvirate before its defeat during the Battle of America in the late 2020s.
Powers and Abilities
Powers
Artificially Enhanced Physiology Thanks to the genetic enhancement of the techno-organic virus Extremis, Killian displays various superhuman abilities, such as being able to regrow entire body parts and heal injuries very quickly, enhanced strength, a touch able to melt Iron Man's armor, and at one point channels the heat produced by Extremis to spit fire at the War Machine and the real Mandarin.
- Superhuman Strength
- Enhanced Agility
- Regenerative Healing Factor
- Exothermic Manipulation
- Firebreathing
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| Intelligence |
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| Strength* |
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| Speed* |
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| Durability* |
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| Energy Projection* |
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| * Enhancements by Extremis | |||||
Abilities
- Genius Level Intellect
- Master Scientist
- Expert Businessman
- Expert Martial Artist
Strength level
Class 15+
Weaknesses
- Mental Instability
- Insanity
- Power Instability (often regulated)
- Potential Spontaneous Combustion
- Potential Spontaneous Combustion
Paraphernalia
Equipment:
- Extremis Supply (formerly)
Transportation:
- Black SUV
Weapons:
- Handgun (formerly)
Notes
- No special notes.
- ↑ Modern Comics: Iron Man Vol 1 13
Trivia
- No trivia.
See Also
- Appearances of Aldrich Killian (Earth-61615)
- Character Gallery: Aldrich Killian (Earth-61615)
- Quotations by Aldrich Killian (Earth-61615)
Discover and Discuss
- Search News for: Aldrich Killian · Aldrich Killian (Earth-61615)
Links and References
- None.