Icon (Character)

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Publisher: Milestone Comics

Created by Dwayne McDuffie and Denys Cowan.

1st appearance: Icon #1, May 1993

Nationality: Terminan mutate (disguised as human)

Alias: Augustus Freeman, Augustus Freeman, Jr., Augustus Freeman III, Augustus Freeman IV, Hero of Dakota, Arnus Prime, Black Superman

Team Affiliations: Shadow Cabinet

Legal Status: No criminal record

Weight: 290 lbs    Height: 6’3

Eyes: Black             Hair: Black

Known Relatives: Estelle Freeman (wife, deceased), unborn child (deceased), Miriam Freeman (adoptive mother, deceased), adoptive brother (name unrevealed, deceased), adoptive sisters (names unrevealed, both deceased), Arnus II (clone), Amistad Augustus Ervin (godson)

Skills and abilities: Skilled in armed and unarmed combat having fought in the every American war from the civil war-WW2. He is also a skilled mediator and lawyer thanks to a century’s worth of experience in American law.

Powers: Icon is a member of the Terminian alien race. When his ship crash landed and reassembled his DNA into that  of a human being it had the side effect of “mutating” him, literally maximizing all his natural abilities making him very similar in power to a Kryptonian under a yellow sun. His powers grant him the following abilities

Flight: through the manipulation of gravitons and magnetic fields;

Invulnerability: allowing him to withstand unharmed high caliber bullets, energy blasts and temperature extremes;

Superhuman-strength: Due to his alien heritage and the maximization of his potential as a human being he has near limitless strength shown to at least be equal to Superman;

Super-speed: Although his top speed is unknown Icon has been shown to have comparable speed to Flash and Superman;

Super-reflexes; Icon can think, react and move at superhuman speed;

Super-stamina: Icon does not tire as his body never gets fatigued;

Enhance-mental perception: Icon is highly resistant to all forms of mind control and probing;

Enhance-senses: Sight, smell, taste, touch and hearing are all far beyond that of a normal human;

Regenerative-healing factor; When one actually manages to injure Icon his body is able to replace lost organs, limbs and damaged tissue very quickly;

longevity: Though centuries old Icon appears to be a man possessing peak health in the prime of his life;

Ability to generate and project positron energy: Perhaps his most powerful ability, a low level flicker of this energy can turn on a light switch or shatter a bottle while a more powerful blast has staggered Superman, he can also channel this energy into his fists to enhance his strength even further, as a pulse to identify Bang Babies and create limited constructs. It is unknown just how powerful his positron energy is as it has never been used to its maximum potential.

Biography

Before Earth

Born Arnus on Terminia. He eventually joined the galactic council known as the “Cooperative” where he was essentially a lawyer. After Adjudicating  a very disagreeable situation, involving the criminal Oblivion he took a vacation. On the interstellar pleasure cruise line however the ship came under attack and he was forced to crash land his already damaged pod on the nearest planet, Earth.

Slavery

He crash landed on earth in 1839 on a cotton plantation. His life pod recreated his body by duplicating the dna of the nearest life form, a slave woman.  As a human infant he learned the local language and the caste system of slavery based on skin tone. He grew to love his earth mother Miriam. Arnus later discovered he had superhuman powers and immortality.He used his powers secretly to lighten the load of his fellow slaves and aiding a resistance movement dedicated to freeing slaves known as the “underground railroad”. Here he bid his time in hopes that Earth’s technology would catch up to his own allowing his ship to be repaired. By the time he was fifteen slavery was abolished and he took the last name “Freeman”, he also fought in the Civil war against Slavery.

Due to his mutated Terminan body he has virtual immorality which he has manged to keep from the public by assuming the identity of his “son” throughout the years. Following the War he attended “Fist University” where he studied law and “passed the bar’ in several states, thus able to support himself. This allowed him to retrieve his pod. (Icon #25)

While building his law practice he found his adopted mother and siblings right before she died (Icon #25). Distraught he became distant from human society and interaction. He met a young woman who he was fond of but knowing he would outlive her he left so that she could have a normal life (Icon #32).

Harlem renaissance

During a time of great artistic renewal known as the Harlem renaissance he met and fell in love with Estelle Jackson, they later married. After the disappointment by the era’s unfulfilled promise they left the country, living as expatriates in France. During World War two he fought with the allies against Nazi Germany in hopes that the united front against racial segregation would lead to more racial unity in the Americas. After the War they returned to America. Racism reappeared even more fervently than before, though in 1964 under Martin Luther King blacks gained “legal parity’ with their white brethren.

With his wife’s encouragement he increased his heroics though he never went public. This lead to rumors of a “mystery man”. This is when they also realized their genetic incompatibility prevented them from having children. In 1977 his wife died of Cancer. This left him even more emotionally distant than before as he now lived only to return home. He blamed himself fro her death since he knew his pod could have saved her if he had known how to fix it in time. He moved to Dakota, away from Harlem to escape the memories and pain of his wife’s passing.

Modern Times

He threw himself into his work and kept eyes on Alva Technologies’ which was very close to being able to repair his ship. His law firm grew to one of the most successful in the country. He became the personal lawyer to Corporate leaders, senators and the upper crust of American society. Under the guise of Augustus Freeman IV he met Raquel Irvin who was one of a group of teens who were trying to rob him. In her he saw the same impartiality of his dead wife Estelle. This same girl would later convince him to don a costume and become “Icon”. He then became the dakotavers’ premier superhero, essentially their “superman”.

In recent years he battled the Justice league along with a newly reformed Shadow Cabinet. He is friends with superman, immune to green lantern prosecution thanks to his status as a Terminan mutate.