|
This article, Jacques Duquesne (Earth-61615), is property of MarvelousMarty. |
Domhnall Duquesne (father; deceased),
Aveline Duquesne (mother; deceased);
Xavier Duquesne (brother)
Armand Duquesne III (uncle; deceased),
Armand Duquesne VII (nephew)
Wolfgang von Strucker (maternal cousin; estranged);
Werner von Strucker (first cousin once-removed, nephew);
Arabella Brandt (wife),
Adelynn Duquesne (daughter)
Hawkeye Vol 1 4
Hawkeye Vol 4 11
History
Wait and see... 'Til the Swordsman surprises them all!
- — Swordsman
- — Swordsman
Early Years
Jacques "Jack" Duquesne (born 1962) once belonged to the wealthy and snobbish French Duquesne family, but had grown as more of an outcast by most of his relatives, despite having it all living in luxurious aristocracy. Such feeling of exclusion in the family eventually led him to partner up with a determined yet somewhat deluded and resentful man named Buck Chisholm, who claimed to be liberating different impoverished sectors of the community from the unfair treatment of elitist families and oligarchs like the Duquesne. Seeing this as a way to self-justify the grudges he had been holding against his own family, Jack utilized his skills in swordsmanship as the two went on to terrorize various wealthy institutions, including the ones funded by Jack's family, which they blindly perceived most of them to be corrupt. In their final vendetta against the Duquesne, Jack was shrouded with rage ransacking his former home, which ended it with a bombing and burning that led to the deaths of some of his relatives, most notably his own father and uncle. While their original goal was to give the money of the elite to the poor, they nevertheless took most of the wealth when they were forced to hide and go on the run from the national authorities.
Running away from his home country after embracing their statuses as fugitives and terrorists, the pair traveled overseas for a few years until they moved and settled on the United States of America as in their late adulthood to live off from their skills as an independent and self-made men. Fabricating the new identity of Antonio "Tony" Dixon, he acted as a performer at various circuses and carnivals mostly by day as the appropriate moniker of the Swordsman. His special act demonstrated his mastery of knives, swords, and other bladed weapons, which he learned and perfected since his youth. Having their circus business become a mere front for all their criminal operations as thieves and illicit arms dealers, eventually becoming an associate of the Kingpin's Empire during its earliest years as they also mutually helped their business flourish with money and access to weaponry due to their discreet illegal transactions. Eventually, Jack met a young Clint Barton, as well as his older brother, Barney. Seeing great potential in him to be their protégés, the Swordsman and Trickshot trained the boys in blades and archery respectively, with Clint often being a secondary performer in the Swordsman's act.
When Clint found out one day that the Swordsman and Trickshot's circus was nothing more than a façade to keep the duo's criminal activities from getting exposed, it led to the Barton brothers going their separate ways after leaving the circus of crime, out of each other's safety. While Barney fled to safety, Jack and Buck were able to track down Clint when he tried to join and compete for the Olympics in hopes of putting his skills in a better light. When Clint was able to defeat Trickshot in long-range combat, Clint spared and injured Trickshot and left him for the authorities, before disarming and warning Jack to leave him and his brother alone, who unfortunately parted ways with Clint since they planned to leave the circus of crime. The Swordsman committed various crimes around the world as a terrorist, which led him to be barred from several nations, unless he entered and operate within those regions under different aliases and identities to remain undetected during his stay.
However, when agents of the European Defense Initiative were able to track down Jack during the events of Ultimate War, when the Swordsman worked alongside the villainous Movement Alliance as a lone and independent assassin and mercenary who helped European branches of Hydra and A.I.M. in bombing various institutions and monuments as well as taking out targeted figures which posed a threat to their vision of a better society. In the final hours of battle against the soldiers of the E.D.I. who were slowly turning the tides in their favor, Jack's angst to surrender combined with his thought to turn the situation of the Movement's defeat as an opportunity to make himself look like a hero had subsequently led him to make the bold decision to rig the remaining explosives he had planted, which resulted in detonating right at his situational allies, killing most of them the second they made contact with the Swordsman's explosives. Jack's actions immediately gave off an impression of someone willing to switch sides and heroically redeemed themselves to some agents when he surrendered to the E.D.I. afterward, although the likes of Lionheart knew better, having an intuition that his act was merely out of survival.
Finding his act to be impressive enough, the momentarily Jack was recruited into a black ops team, although he was sent and stationed to the United States as a special agent, due to the executive council of the E.D.I.'s realization that he couldn't be truly trusted as a fully dedicated agent in Europe, which Lionheart had brought up earlier. The day before he was stationed back to the United States, Jack Duquesne was given a new makeover for his appearance to make him look younger, and had to forge him a new set of records with a deceased agent's identity and a new moniker. Before leaving through a plane, The E.D.I.'s high-ranking agent Monarch had warned Jack that his service to the E.D.I. would be the only shot at his redemption of him seeing and living a life outside prison, and he could only fulfill it if he accomplished every mission assigned to him. Starting off his mission, Jack was revealed to have been registered as a mercenary under the guise of Phillip Javert, the name of an agent bearing the codename of Chevalier who had been killed by Jack himself before changing sides during Ultimate War, although his public records state he's alive due to the fortunate convenience that Javert had no other surviving family, with Jack now wearing his face as a spy for the E.D.I.
Final Years of Redemption
Serving in a Civil War
Using the identity of Phillip Javert during his secret mission on the United States, Jacques Duquesne enlisted in the Superhuman Registration Act under the moniker of Chevalier
In the month that would lead up to the Civil War among the superhuman communities, wherein he registered for the Superhuman Registration Act in the United States under the mercenary faction due to Jack's first significant mission being able to secretly evaluate the efficacy of the United Nations' newly greenlighted Superhuman Registration Act. In the span of a few months, the conflict had helped Jack to adjust significantly as a mercenary and assassin in the United States, although he would find himself having a serious workplace conflict with a mercenary who used to be his partner in the past: Buck Chisholm, the Bowman. In the final days of the war, the Chevalier had saved civilians and a few unregistered superheroes from his own former partner, whom he had to kill with his sword, for the first time in a while, as he would have killed them in a fit of rage and disillusionment from the Registration Act.
Although Jack's new records as the Chevalier had stated he has killed Jacques Duquesne during Ultimate War, only Bowman at first was able to confirm that Javert was none other than his old partner, Jacques Duquesne, and in his final moments, the dying archer mocked Jack as a traitor who abandoned everything they stood for since the beginning. While Jack rebutted that he has changed, Chisolm's' final words made him question himself if he really did change. In spite of his efforts to cover up, Swordsman's reputation as the Chevalier would eventually be taken an interest by various individuals and agencies, both in the criminal underworld and in the sides of the authority, due to his recent activities as an newly recruited agent of H.A.M.M.E.R. since it transitioned from S.H.I.E.L.D. after Civil War under Norman Osborn's directorship. Jack's true ulterior motive was to expose its true grim nature in his secret mission for both the E.D.I. and eventually, Kingpin's criminal empire, whom he had to get closer with.
Around mid-2017, Chevalier had mostly gained the trust of Wilson Fisk, revealing his true identity as Jacques Duquesne, the Swordsman — one of Fisk's former and earliest associates — in order to keep a low profile in the and an assurance to keep any other criminal group from disrupting his mission to infiltrate H.A.M.M.E.R. as early as its first year. However, Fisk and Jack had to struck an agreement before he could officially join in their ranks, which required the Swordsman to get his hand bloody by eliminating various criminal leaders and members as scapegoats when Fisk has become a civil servant for the public of New York City, making it seem like crime has lowered due to extrajudicial killings executed by the Swordsman, who masqueraded himself as various vigilantes as a means of framing them for the murders, which also pursued Fisk's dilemma to the public about the growing problem with street-level superheroes. Jack was more than willing to comply with Fisk's tasks for him in order to have a form of security, access to better arsenal & equipment without being tracked on by the E.D.I., and finally, prove his allegiance during the Dark Reign wherein most organized crime secretly rose to power thanks to Osborn as the director of H.A.M.M.E.R. and his Dark Avengers, who still hypocritically served to various criminals and organized crime to convince the public of their assured safety amidst the terror lurking behind them.
Infiltrating the Dark Reign
In the last days of his final mission, Duquesne was confronted and reunited by his former protégé, Hawkeye, as well as the latter's protégé
Around 2018, Jack was able to infiltrate H.A.M.M.E.R. by acting as one of its enforcers and field agents for several months, secretly working with other secret crime lords affiliated with the Kingpin across the neighboring states of New York. This covert investigation and subsequent infiltration on H.A.M.M.E.R. eventually got him to cross paths with the Young Avenger Kate Bishop, the younger Hawkeye, which inevitably grabbed the attention of the older Clint Barton, who also confronted his former mentor and first archenemy after receiving a cryptic message from the E.D.I. about Duquesne getting rid and turning off his tracker, unaware that he had done it to prove his allegiance to Fisk's Criminal Empire to cover up his true intentions. The mission of the two Hawkeyes against Swordsman has also led them the ambush of young and vengeful vigilante known as Echo, who was once the protégé of the Kingpin only to leave his tutelage after she had found out that Fisk was responsible for ordering the Swordsman to assassinated her father William Lopez, the former leader of the Tracksuit Mafia. The four parties fought, which ended with Echo having upper hand with her superior skills of combat mimicry as she was willing to drive Jack's own retractable sword into his chest and through his heart.
However, Echo chose to spare to her father's killer due to Hawkeye's last minute advice not to give in to revenge and the reminder that she would only end up like the Swordsman, leading a guilt-ridden Jack to hand over the files he had retrieved to the Hawkeyes in order to finally help E.D.I. and the agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (who were in hiding at the time) expose H.A.M.M.E.R. for turning most of the country in a kingdom of crime for almost two years, as well as records of how the heroes he had masqueraded weren't at all guilty of killing thousands of criminals, thus finally completing his mission. However, his redemption didn't last longer nor his final retaliation against Fisk by bombing his current headquarters than anyone has anticipated as Jack would meet his unfortunate end by the orders of Fisk himself, after the former faced and was fatally wounded by the equally agile and formidable crime lord Madame Masque, who had secretly formed a brief alliance with the Kingpin to gain a fraction of power during Osborn's Dark Reign over the United States which lasted for months.
In his dying breath, Jack Duquesne didn't die with regrets, dying in the arms of the man who he could only see as the closest thing he'll ever get as a son. Echo knew of Swordsman's plans to detonate the explosives which he was supposed to implant on his current headquarters, but even she couldn't bring herself to pull the trigger as she realized would only make Fisk the moment an assassination attempt on him would spark sympathy and outrage to the public, potentially further pushing Fisk to gain sympathy and support from the people of their views on him. In the end of the Dark Reign, it was Duquesne's success to hand over his files to the Avengers and the E.D.I. that helped H.A.M.M.E.R. topple down by exposing their diabolical activities to the public and other authorities. Nevertheless, Due to Fisk having already cleared out any of his record of involvement with Osborn, H.A.M.M.E.R. or any other crime-related encounters, the Kingpin would still continue his rise to power in New York's municipal government in the near future, but Echo and her heroic allies never stopped working from the shadows to stop him.
Powers and Abilities
Powers
| Power Grid [1] | |||||
| Intelligence |
|
||||
| Strength |
|
||||
| Speed |
|
||||
| Durability |
|
||||
| Energy Projection* |
|
||||
| Fighting Skills |
|
||||
| * Powerful energy projected from his retractable sword | |||||
Abilities
- Superb Athlete
- Expert Unarmed Combatant
- Master of Bladed Weaponry
- Unequaled Swordsmanship
Strength level
Class 8+
Weaknesses
None known.
Paraphernalia
Equipment: None known.
Transportation: None known.
Weapons:
- Swordsman's Retractable Sword
- Swordsman's Energy Sword
- Throwing Knives
Notes
- No special notes.
- ↑ Modern Comics: Avengers Vol 1 1
Trivia
- No trivia.
See Also
- Appearances of Jacques Duquesne (Earth-61615)
- Character Gallery: Jacques Duquesne (Earth-61615)
- Quotations by Jacques Duquesne (Earth-61615)
Discover and Discuss
- Search News for: Swordsman · Jacques Duquesne · Jacques Duquesne (Earth-61615)
Links and References
- None.