The original Gen13 International Operations started "government internship" for gifted youths, taking place in an isolated training facility. Following the manifestation of Caitlin Fairchild's powers, she fled the complex with Roxy Spaulding, Grunge, Burnout and Threshold in disguise. They were later joined by Sarah Rainmaker. The project was revealed to be a gathering of the gen-active
progeny of
Team 7. Threshold tricked the group, sans Fairchild, to return to base to help free the other kids, but upon their return they were apprehended for further testing. With the help of
Pitt and John Lynch, the kids finally escaped. The group retreated to
La Jolla, California, and officially formed as the group Gen13. They opposed I.O. and their violent counterpart,
DV8. ("Gen13" loosely refers to the 13th generation of Americans. Team 7 had been part of a project called
Gen12.) The team spent a lot of time delving into the past of Team 7 to learn more about themselves. Fairchild and Freefall learned they were half-sisters and Lynch was revealed to be Burnout's father. Also during this time, Freefall and Grunge began to date, while Rainmaker revealed herself to be
bisexual. The team was caught in an explosion of a six-
megaton bomb and believed to be dead. Fairchild was the only survivor and mentored a new Gen13 team, effectively taking Lynch's role. However, this team existed in what is later revealed to be an alternate reality which was similar to the mainstream Wildstorm universe except for its point of divergence, the last issue of
Gen13 volume 2. At the end of volume 3, the rest of the original Gen13 team was revealed to be alive and, after time-traveling to avoid the detonation that "killed" them, the reunited group returned to the mainstream Wildstorm universe.
Wildstorm In early 2006, Wildstorm brought all its in-continuity comics since
WildC.A.T.s #1 to an end. The universe's finale came in the form of the
crossover miniseries
Captain Atom: Armageddon. Following the conclusion of this limited series, the entire Wildstorm line was relaunched with "Worldstorm." A new
Gen13 series began. The entire world had a "soft reset"; the surroundings were mostly familiar, but there were changes throughout. In the first arc, the future Gen13 are taken away from their home lives. It is revealed that their parents have been assigned to raise the children to encourage the emergence of specific personality traits. In different areas of the country, Caitlin Fairchild, Roxy Spaulding, Eddie Chang, Bobby Lane and Sarah Rainmaker wake up, each wearing a uniform recognized by their parents. Strike teams immediately attempt to capture the kids; many of their foster parents are terminated. In the course of the series, it is eventually revealed that (in contrast to the previous iterations) these Gen13s were manipulated and formulated from birth by an unscrupulous biogenetics firm from I.O., called Tabula Rasa. Furthermore, the "souls" of the previous iterations of the Gen13s, previously collected by the Authority's Doctor, have settled into these bodies, and when the five of them are together, they cause people to forget their previous history, even those who knew them. As a result of these new origins, the personalities, histories and abilities of each character have displayed mild-to-massive differences from the previous canon. For instance, Burnout is now a former juvenile hall-resident-turned-reggae-loving pacifist, and John Lynch is a young grunt in I.O.'s employ. Rainmaker is retconned into being a lesbian rather than bisexual, Fairchild is suspicious and unhappy about her excessive beauty, and Grunge is portrayed as being secretly more intelligent than even Caitlin. Outside of her newfound origins, the character of Freefall remains mostly consistent to previous iterations, save for a slightly greater level of confidence and self-reliance.
World's End The series resumes following
Number of the Beast as part of the "
World's End" storyline, with the group coming out of a teleportation system in which they had been held (due to power loss) into a devastated New York approximately six months following the events of
Number of the Beast. Once they reach the surface from the underground lair, the group is shocked to see what has happened in New York (aside from Burnout, who is blind at this point). While Grunge is quick to claim that an asteroid, global warming, and other natural disasters were responsible for the destruction, Rainmaker blames terrorists. After a confrontation with several crazed
metahuman-hunters, the group finally manages to escape New York. Once outside of New York, the group finds themselves trapped in a mall with several mutated monsters, one of which seemingly infects Fairchild. While the group is holding together, tensions have begun to rise between Fairchild and Rainmaker, with the latter being attracted to the first. Burnout, while still blind, gains some semblance of vision with the ability to sense heat patterns. During their stay at a skater park run by teens, Grunge is crowned king. He is originally thrilled about it but later finds out that his predecessor is to be eaten in a soup. Rainmaker, having witnessed Caitlin and Bobby kiss in a tent, grabs her gear and leaves the group without saying goodbye to anyone. The other teens are confronted by the cloned scientist Dr. Cross, who created them after their original deaths; however, he and his assistant Megan are both stuck at ages five and nine, respectively, due to the loss of electricity caused by the cataclysm, while retaining their memories and intellects. They manage to save Grunge and to overpower the heavily armed children-scientists due to the intervention of Goo, a Gen14. As they flee, it is revealed that Caitlin's power has failed, most probably due to the infection, and she suffers a serious knife injury. Having nowhere else to go, they join the children-scientists, who promise to heal Caitlin. They arrive in a small town that is under the "protection" of a World War II supervillain team, the Fearsmiths (the imprisoned villains from
Number of the Beast). The two groups clash, with Gen13 being easily beaten. Following another defeat, they are separated from Fairchild and the scientists as they are abducted by the Paladins, who offer to train them. Unknown to any them, Goo was sent by the remnants of the U.S. military—specifically a branch who specialized in fighting metahumans. The squad was designed to apprehend Gen13 and have accordingly been practicing on a small group of Gen14s, of which Goo is a member. Naturally, their practice sessions ended with the Gen14s being killed, cloned, and their minds transferred and later modified so that they do not remember their ordeal. Oddly enough, Goo seems to be regaining some of her memories. Currently on orders from the general in charge of the military squad, Gen14 has invaded the Paladins' headquarters and are ready to confront Gen13, which currently consists only of Burnout, Grunge and Freefall. The fight between the gen-actives and the military branch is over quickly with the Gen14 and military winning. Once they have been captured, Gen13 are offered an ultimatum: either join the military and serve them or be executed. In order to prove his point, the general shoots and kills Gen14's Windsprint. His plans, however, are crossed by Roxy, who levitates the Paladin base into space, knocking them all out due to oxygen deprivation. In the meantime, Caitlin has fully mutated due to the Warhol virus to which she was exposed and is rampaging across town in a
Hulk-like fashion. Her rampage is cut short as the Paladin base crash-lands next to her. The gen-actives band together and take on Caitlin, hoping to calm her down, but they do not succeed. Seeing no alternative, Goo sacrifices herself in order to short-circuit the virus, thus reverting Caitlin to her former self. Three weeks later, Bobby, Roxy, Grunge, Caitlin and the surviving Gen14s Runt and Ditto arrive at
Tranquility (a town of retired super-heroes), only to find a crater where the town had been. The group decides not to despair and to go on even if it means that are heading into trouble.
The New 52 Following the
New 52 continuity
reboot, Gen13 briefly debuts in the epilogue of
Supergirl issue #33; membership consists of the original lineup. ==Characters== The original lineup of Gen13 was: •
Caitlin Fairchild: Once an ordinary girl, Caitlin's muscles spontaneously increased in density, granting her superhuman strength, agility, speed and endurance. She is later revealed to be Freefall's half-sister. Caitlin is often portrayed as being either naively unaware of or mildly uncomfortable with her larger body. •
Bobby "Burnout" Lane: Son of John Lynch (Gen13's mentor), Bobby manifested the ability to generate and manipulate high-energy coherent plasma, which ignites on exposure to oxygen. He later developed the ability to fly as well as certain
psionic abilities. •
Roxanne "Freefall" Spaulding: "Roxy" is the youngest gen-active teen, with the ability to control the effects of gravity on herself and on others. She can nullify gravity (and float) or multiply it (making objects heavy). It is also suggested by some other characters that if she thought about it and used her powers to their fullest advantage, she could manipulate
spacetime as this is related to gravity. She has a crush on Grunge and is jealous of Fairchild's physique. Keeps Queelocke as a "pet." It was later revealed that Spaulding and Fairchild were half-sisters, both the daughters of Alex Fairchild from
Team 7. •
Sarah Rainmaker: Rainmaker can influence local weather systems, manipulating air currents to grant herself flight and direct water with a gesture. Amplifier bands on her wrists augment her ability to project lightning. Rainmaker is
Apache and is Stephen Callahan's daughter and Threshold and Bliss' half-sister. Among the main characters, she is the most concerned with social and political issues. The rest of the team is still adjusting to her sexual orientation (she is attracted to women). •
Percival Edmund "Grunge" Chang: Able to mimic the molecular structure of any material he touches (and partially bestow this effect on others), Grunge is a surf rat who enjoys sleeping late. He possesses brown belts in five martial arts styles and has few if any redeeming characteristics—though he does possess a photographic memory that allowed him to take the same classes as Fairchild does (much to her surprise) during the period that the team went to college. His father is Team 7 member Phillip Chang. •
John Lynch: The team's mentor and father of Robert "Burnout" Lane. Lynch was the leader of Team 7 and close friend of the children's parents. His eye has been replaced after he gouged it out as a result of a mental attack. Like all surviving members of Team 7, Lynch was granted powerful telepathic and telekinetic abilities that are highly unstable and dangerous. Because of this, he avoids using his powers if at all possible. •
Anna: A heavily armed covert-assassination
gynoid programmed to serve Gen13 as a
maid and to love them as her own children. The team recently added newcomers: •
Holly "Breakdown" Denton: Occasionally known as
Goo, Holly has the ability to disassemble molecules, seemingly causing objects to melt into goo. She was formerly a member of Gen14. Holly sacrifices herself to save Caitlin, but is shown to have been cloned. •
Amber "Ditto" LeRoux: Not much is known about Amber, only that Holly refers to her as a typical airhead. A former Gen14. Her power is infinite multiplicity which allows her to make an unlimited number of copies of herself. •
Guillermo "Runt" Sandoval: Not much is known about Guillermo. A former Gen14. His powers allow him to grow and shrink. •
Lance "Hardbody" Wieder: The second-in-command of the former Gen14. Not much is known about him at this point; during a fight between him and Gen13, his face was scarred by Holly, who was defending herself. He and Windsprint were left behind in order to recover. His powers include augmented strength/stamina and increased dermal density which makes him super-strong and near-invulnerable. Doctor Cross (the maker of the current Gen program) expressed interest in potential offspring between him and Caitlin Fairchild. •
Shaqira "Windsprint" Johnson: The
speedster of Gen14. She was shot in the head by a crazed general and believed to be dead. However, it is revealed that her enhanced physiology also included a heightened metabolism allowing her to survive the gunshot. She and Hardbody had been originally left behind in order to recuperate. ==Collected editions==