WILD CHILD
Real Name: Kyle Gibney
Former Aliases: Weapon Omega, Wildheart
Group Affiliation: Weapon X. Former member of X-Factor, former member of Alpha
Flight, former member of Omega Flight, former member of the first two
incarnations of Gamma Flight
First Appearance: Alpha Flight #11
Creator: John Byrne
Kyle Gibney is a mutant whose
parents kicked him out of their lives when he developed obvious mutations
at puberty. Living on the streets, he was abducted by the
subversive organization called the Secret Empire. There the Empire used DNA
from the man called Wyre, along with drugs and other
methods, to turn the young man into a perfect killing machine. While a captive of the
Empire Kyle met Valerie Cooper, an up-and-coming bureaucrat who mistakenly
believed she was working for a UN-sponsored organization.
Unfortunately for the Empire,
Wyre developed something of a conscience. Deciding that these "offspring"
created from his DNA were too monstrous to live, Wyre stormed the Empire's
Canadian complex and killed almost all he found there. Kyle managed to survive
and was found by a Ministry of Defence investigative team.
General Jeremy Clarke
approached Department H with two options: either take
Kyle into the super-powers program or the Military would "liquidate" him. At the
time, James Hudson was away, and
Walter Langkowski had to make the command decision.
Langkowski opted to take the boy, thinking H could help him. Walt also fudged
psychiatric test results in order to make it possible. Kyle was inducted into
Gamma Flight as Wild Child.
Wild Child remained a member of
Gamma Flight until Department H's original disbanding by the Canadian
government. Subsequently, he was recruited by the criminal organization called
Omega Flight, and he participated in both of
that group's altercations with Alpha Flight.
Sometime after his second
capture with Omega, Wild Child escaped from custody
and he was living in his old apartment. He was also responsible for
a string of murders. Heather Hudson
investigated, and was nearly killed
herself. Kyle was eventually stopped by Wolverine. His
responsibility for the killings was never proven in a court of law.
Later Kyle, (like his team-mate
Diamond Lil,) was pardoned by the gov't
for his Omega activities and he then joined the new Gamma
Flight. He served with the team until it was disbanded, when he proceeded
to go berserk and severely injure Alpha associate Laura Dean, aka
Pathway.
Gamma Flight leader
Nemesis teleported away with Wild Child after
an altercation with Guardian II and Wolverine.
When Wild Child next appeared he had been cerified as being completely
under control by doctors in the new Department H. He joined the team as
Weapon Omega to act as a covert operative. Eventually he took the code-name
Wildheart. He served with the team until Alpha was suspended following the
Joshua Lord incident.
During Alpha Flight's i
suspension Kyle reverted to his
former ugly duckling appearance. [Kyle's appearance had steadily improved
over the years until the point that he was a fairly attractive individual. -C]
Feeling ashamed over this, he began to feel
unworthy of a relationship he had started with his team-mate
Aurora. In order
to get away, he accepted a request by his old friend Val Cooper to assist the U.S. Government
mutant team called X-Factor. Aurora followed him to the U.S., where the two
had a violent confrontation. At that point Kyle decided to remain with
X-Factor.
Kyle left X-Factor after his
body began mutating uncontrollably. After leaving the group he was forcibly
recruited by the new Weapon X project. The project's experiments have left
him with a distinctly vampiric appearance (very like the movie Nosferatu
) and an encounter with his team-mate Sabretooth has rendered him mute.
Kyle Gibney is a mutant with
enhanced speed, agility, senses and he also has razor-sharp claws.
Kyle possesses a feral,
beastial nature courtesy of the Secret Empire's experiments
on him. He currently struggles to keep that nature under control. For a time,
Kyle was able to firmly control that part of him and use it to add ferocity
to his fights. At that time Kyle would still maintain complete control over
all of his actions.
Before joining Alpha Flight as
Weapon Omega Kyle received extensive
hand-to-hand combat training. That, combined with his powers and ferocity,
made him one of Alpha's most dangerous combatants in a close-up fight.
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