Jared Banks
NPCs
Misery Love
Stephanie Fields
Cliff Rohm
Warren Tether
Tabitha Harkin
Stingray
c r e a t e d b y M i c h a e l O ' C o n n e l l
Real Name: Jared Banks
First Appearance: Forte 2000 #1
Base of Operations: Seattle, WA
Occupation: Head of Corporate Security, The Tether Corporation
Marital Status: Divorced
Known Relatives: Stephanie Fields (ex-wife), Gabriel Banks (son), Patrick Banks (father), Sophia Maggiore-Banks (mother), Anthony Banks (grandfather (paternal)), Giovanni Maggiore (grandfather (maternal), deceased)
Hair: Brown
Eyes: Green
Height: 6’3
History: A police officer from a long family line of police officers, Jared Banks was a promising detective with the Seattle Police Department. He carried with him his father’s sense of duty and honor, but also his grandfather Banks' belief in a higher law. His grandfather often told him stories of how they handed justice down in the old days, before all the lawyers and bureaucrats came in and made the system work for the criminals. Jared’s father, on the other hand, was a strict believer in the law, and he and Jared often clashed in discussions over this during Jared’s teen years (and at family dinners ever since). Jared made detective early, and carried on the family tradition of exceptional police work.
But Jared’s time in vice, and his undercover work, showed him the world the public never saw, the one where the criminals flaunted the justice system and paid off those who might otherwise bring their deeds to light. Time and again, he saw his efforts to put these men away wasted. When a fellow officer and close friend was murdered getting close to the Ribisi family, Jared became obsessed with taking them down. This obsession caused problems in his already rocky marriage. He went deeper and deeper undercover, to the point where he began to hate himself as much as them. One night, it all became too much. A large drug deal was happening with him there (though one not quite big enough, his superiors had decided, as their case wasn’t ready yet), and he thought of how he was a police officer, standing there among criminals, watching them break the law and letting them. He might have made it through, but for a young girl that one of the Ribisis had there. The thug had picked her up somewhere on the streets, and someone suggested they test the merchandise on her. Jared saw the fear in her eyes and could take it no more. He pulled badge and gun. A standoff turned into a shootout. Jared’s backup showed up, and the arrests were made. Jared suffered a shoulder wound. The girl was all right. Jared saw to it that she got back home to Michigan, with a second chance.
Everything about the case went wrong. The Ribisi lawyers took it apart. Jared was reprimanded for ignoring procedure and blowing a months-long investigation. Jared’s arguments that he’d been doing his job held no water. His medical leave turned into a suspension. The case never went anywhere, and the Ribisis walked. Disgusted with the whole system, Jared resigned. He left broken, bitter and angry. His marriage finally came apart, and his wife divorced him and took their young son. Jared knew how disappointed his father was with what his son had done with his career, and his life.
One day, a man arrived at the boat that Jared now lived on (his prized possession). The man introduced himself, and Jared quickly recognized him. How could he not? He was one of the richest men in the world—Warren Tether. Tether told him he’d followed the news story closely, and felt he understood Jared fairly well. They had, he said, similar views on justice. Not liking what the police had done to Jared, Tether offered him a job as head of security at his Seattle corporate office, saying Jared was just the kind of man he wanted for the position. Without other options at the moment, and feeling an affinity for the blunt-speaking billionaire, Jared accepted. It was a good job—much more than just being a glorified security guard—and it paid the bills (and child support). But it wasn’t a calling like police work had been. It was still just a job. And Jared was left restless and empty.
Soon enough, Tether had a bombshell to drop in him. Jared’s employer said he’d wanted him around to observe him for a while, make sure he was, in fact, the kind of man Tether expected. Tether revealed that aside from his public business ventures, he had other…private concerns. Jared was shocked to learn that Tether had made justice something of a personal obsession of his own. An immigrant orphan who lost his parents to war criminals, Tether used his vast resources to see that those who deserved to pay for their crimes did, and those who cried out for justice received it. He had practically his own private intelligence agency, and operatives around the world who helped him when he found out about someone who had nowhere else to turn for vindication. And he managed to do it all in secret. The recipients of his gift never knew who had finally righted their wrong.
And now he wanted Banks to be a part of it. But not in the way Jared might have expected. He led Jared to a secret lab within his vast headquarters. There, he introduced him to the experimental exoskeletal suit that carried the code name of Seahawk. It had started as a design for a light undersea exploration suit, but had become much more. Tether was very fond of superheroes and the things they did, the way they worked above the law and did what was right. For a long time, he’d had the idea to add a super-powered operative to his stable of resources. Now he’d set out to create his own. And he wanted Jared Banks to be that superhero. Before Jared could resist, Tether told him of all the things he could accomplish, the people he could help, the wrongs he could right…but now, without the constraints of a badge holding him back. Tether would have special missions in mind for him, whenever word of a needy person or persons came to him, but beyond that, his choices would be his own. And as icing to the proposal, Tether had already chosen Jared’s first assignment—taking down the Ribisis once and for all. Tether had a huge file on them, and wanted them out of his city…and for them to pay for all the pains they had caused so many, and gotten away with. And he felt he owed Jared this chance for the wrong they’d done to him as well.
Seeing the possibilities—and another chance to get at the Ribisis—Jared thought over the offer, got back to his employer, and took the job. A period of training in the high-tech suit followed—hard and rigorous training. The suit linked right into his own nervous system, and made him stronger, tougher and faster than he’d ever imagined. Coupling this with his own extensive training in Kung Fu since childhood (something his father had insisted upon, always wanting his son to be able to handle himself in a scrap), he became a formidable force. And with the suit, he could fly. Learning that took quite a while, and only the suit’s defenses kept him from killing himself during that process. As the suit was also designed for underwater use and high-speed aquatic travel, training in that followed as well. With training came skill, and confidence, and a new feeling of purpose.
When the time came, he did take on the Ribisis, breaking up operations by night, sinking off-shore drug shipments, whatever he could do to disrupt them. But he had a grander plan than just this. It all led toward a final incarceration of Peter Ribisi, the old man himself. Using his knowledge of the family, his police background and knowledge of how superheroes and the law mixed, and all of Tether’s resources to collect information, he brought their empire down around them, piece by piece, and then handed the police Peter Ribisi and all the evidence they needed on him after one last, grand showdown with the mobster and his army. He and Tether worked it perfectly. Ribisi went down for a fifty-year stretch, and the henchman who’d killed Jared’s fellow officer got the death penalty. Jared felt vindicated, and, finally, like he was really doing what he was meant to do. During this war on the mob, the name and fame of Seahawk began to spread throughout the city, and people (and the authorities) were divided on how to feel about him. Hero or vigilante? The jury would remain out on that one, but all of Seattle’s criminals knew they had a new adversary, and all of Seattle’s innocents knew they had a new defender called Seahawk.
Now Jared Banks is Tether Corporation head of security by day, Seahawk by night. He patrols the alleyways and waterfronts of the city for crime--with help from his crew of contacts, including private investigator Misery Love (of the Misery Love Company), FBI Agent (and his former partner in Seattle Vice) Cliff Rohm, and his police contact Detective Tabitha Harkin (who knows him as Seahawk, but has no idea he used to be a cop in her same department)--and takes on missions hand-picked by the ever-vigilant Tether, missions to bring justice for someone the law has failed. He lives on his boat, still, and Tether has upgraded the boat with a special exit on the bottom of it to allow Jared safe exit and entry in the Seahawk suit. Though he mostly fought normal criminals in his hero career's infant stages, he did come up against a handful of super-villains, including a sea-faring murderer/pirate calling himself Stingray, who has taken his defeats at Seahawk’s hands very personally. He also met and worked with a couple of super-heroes early on—Captain Compass and Armor Security’s Riptide. But heroes and villains would become a much bigger part of his life when Seahawk found himself joining with fellow Seattle heroes Tinker, Max and Rainier and forming a brand new incarnation of Forte...
Power and Abilities: The Seahawk suit is directly linked to Jared’s nervous system, and makes him very strong and fast. The unique connection, however, also makes him more susceptible to attacks of an electrical nature, as he had to discover the hard way. The suit provides a great deal of protection against most other attacks. The helmet is equipped with an audio/video transmitter that lets him keep in touch with Tether (or whoever else he may need to communicate with, like calling in police on the police band to mop up his work), an active sonar array, ultraviolet eye-screens that let him see in darkness, and a state-of-the-art re-breather that lets him breathe while underwater. The suits propulsion system works two-fold, giving him incredible speed under the ocean depths, and jets that propel him through the air, used in conjunction with retractable wings that deploy and lock magnetically to his wrist gauntlets.
Jared is an expert in hand-to-hand fighting, and has many skills from years of police training that aid him in crime-fighting.
Personality: Jared is a caring, honorable man who believes at his very core in defending those who can’t help themselves, a belief instilled in him by both his father and grandfather. He believes in justice above all else, that there is an absolute right and wrong, and those who choose the wrong deserve to be punished. He tangles, on occasion, with lingering issues of rage, but has that much more under control these days than he did when his life was turning upside down and he was driving his wife away. He’s a loving father who cherishes his time with his young son, Gabriel, and centers his efforts of making the world a better place on doing so for his boy’s future. In his leisure time (of which there is very little these days), Jared enjoys boating and fishing (often with his grandfather), sports (name the sport, and he enjoys it, but baseball is his true love). His boat has its own satellite dish for catching whatever game he’s looking for), and cooking.
Jared Banks