Left to Right: Pounder, Ace, Recon, Gunner Air Raid is an aerial based team of "Technological heroes" who use jetpacks as means to fight crime. Based in Australia they are known worldwide and are regarded as a special asset by CLEA and the Australian Government who have both called upon the team to deal with “problems”. CLEA DATA FILE Team Identities: Braydon MacMahon - Pounder (Leader) Adrian Torres - Gunner Nikita Dhawan - Ace Teri Carmichael - Recon (Founder) CLEA Classification: Tech Augmented Humans (all group members) Special Skills and/or Abilities: Each member of the team possess an advance suit and jet pack. The suit acts as light body-armour but its lined with flexible nanofibres that can lock the material in specific shapes. This allows the wearer to hold their body in specific positions during flying relieving muscle strain. The same fibres have the effect of increasing muscle strength so can be used during hand to hand combat situations. The jet pack is capable of flying the wearer at Mach 0.75 and its flight systems are controlled via the helmet. It can follow voice commands or track eye movements so the wearer flies where they are looking. For manual operations the wearer can use the touch pads built in on the back of their gloves. Recognised as CLEA Special Assets Limitation(s)/Weakness(s): Carmichael has not received military training so in combat situations might be considered a weak link. The suits can only protect against small calibre weapons fire. Maximum flight time of the jet pack is around 90 mins before refuelling is needed. Rap Sheet/Criminal Traits: N/A Notes/History Air Raid started out as a dream of a young woman Teri Carmichael. Born in Australia, she was orphaned at an early age after her parents met with a tragic accident and was taken care of by her aunt and uncle. As her parents had been extremely successful business people, Teri inherited much of their fortune which was kept in trust until she was eighteen. Despite this she was given a massive regular allowance so whilst growing up she never had to want for anything. Money though did not make up for her loss so she threw herself into studying and the education led her to become fascinated by engineering, particularly aerospace related. At weekends instead of going out with friends she would lock herself up in her small home workshop and dabble in all sorts of projects. Such was her means to absorb the information that very quickly she surpassed all the other students and by the time she left school her IQ was reaching genius levels. Many around thought she would continue with studying at a higher level so those people were surprised when she opted not to, none more so than her aunt and uncle. Instead Teri decided to continue on with her personal projects. When one of those projects was picked up by an aerospace manufacturer she was set for life, albeit she did not need the money. Other projects and designs followed and those that she completely were eagerly snapped up by a growing market. Unfortunately for Teri she started far more projects that she finished. Her aunt and uncle’s farm was littered with still born and partially created projects because she would often get bored and start something else. Many times her uncle had suggested she start her own company and manufacture her own designs but the very thought of spending every day managing people and paperwork was enough to make her blood run cold. About the only thing that did hold her attention throughout her life was the stories of Alpha Heroes. In between studies when growing up she would take timeout to read the historical stories of these fascinating people who she viewed as living comic book legends. History books of course recorded the fact that the Alpha heroes vanished without a trace and Teri never believed she would ever see their kind until Team Zodiac appeared on the scene and the next generation of heroes started to surface. By this time she was a successful inventor and as soon as the first “technological” heroes appeared in the media it triggered her childhood fantasy. Not being an Alpha had meant she considered she could never be an actual “hero” but seeing ordinary people fighting crime by using tech to give them an edge changed that opinion. Then she was stuck in thinking about what sort of crime fighter could she become. She’d seen armoured heroes and she’d seen heroes in advanced vehicles but the one image that impaled itself on her was the shaky footage of ex-Raider, “Hawk” in action. Using his jet pack to fly around really appealed to her and since she was well versed in aerospace engineering that was what she wanted to do. Having succeeded at everything without a single failure made Teri complacent so she thought that just by studying the footage she would easily be able to work out how Hawk’s jet pack worked and then it was a simply a matter to create her own version. What she did not realise was that Hawk’s semi armoured body was chock full of micro servos that controlled every limb which enabled him to balance perfectly. That problem only became apparent when six months later she was ready to test her flight suit. As the well-known saying goes "pride comes before a fall", Teri's remarkable run of luck lasted until her forth test flight and it was on this flight she decided to push how fast her jet pack could go. In the all out speed test an unexpected problem arose resulting in massive instability. She crash landed in the outback miles from anywhere and was lucky to get away with minor cuts and bruises. Her flight suit though was faired far worse and whilst it could be repaired she needed to get it back to her works shop. Effectively she was stranded and so had no option but to put a call to the authorities and request a rescue. A retired AAF officer turned bush flyer heard the transmission and volunteered to pick her up and that was how an hour after crashing she was came to be picked up by Adrian Torres. Though looking back the chance meeting would become a pivotal moment in the formation of Air Raid at the time the only thing Teri was grateful of was being saved from the desert heat. With nothing much to do on the flight back Adrian showed an interest in her unusual flying apparatus. Happy to talk about herself and her work she explained what it was and that she intended to use it to become a sort of flying hero, like Hawk. She thought in telling him that he would find her quite nuts but oddly his reaction was the opposite. He showed genuine interest. He even made an off the cuff comment that if she ever got it working he might like to try it, although she thought he was just being friendly. The two parted and thought nothing more about it until three months later. By this time despite numerous tests she had been unable to cure the problem with her design and was considering abandoning it like so many of her other projects when she got a call from Adrian. The pair had remained in semi-regular contact since the rescue "incident" and he mentioned he’d got drunk one night and mentioned her crash to some of his buddies still in the AAF. They then got talking to other people after they realised that Teri was the recluse design genius behind several important aviation innovations. Sooner or later other people picked up on the rumours and Adrian had received a visit from some strangers very interested in her work. They wanted to learn of her whereabouts but since he was suspicious he gave them false information. Adrian figured it would not take them long to work out he’d lied so he decided to warn Teri. Acting on the information she packed up a car and prepared to leave the farm but before the car even got off the premises a strange looking car showed up and blocked her path. The man got out and pointed a gun at her and forced her to leave her car and get into his at which point he injected her with something that knocked her out. When she came to she found herself restrained to a chair in strange room with wire covering her entire body and opposite her was her je tpack prototype. The man then appeared and began asking her a series of questions. He revealed the equipment attached to her would reveal if she was lying and the consequences of doing so would be dire to her. Though tired and angry she was also terrified of what might happen to her so she answered all his questions about herself, the jet pack and the purpose she had built it for. She considered the man might be working for a company that wished to steal her design but was so scared she told him everything. After he had finished she was left alone and that got her really panicky. On his return he told her he was called Griffin and apologised for her treatment. He explained he worked for a private research and development company that supplied CLEA and “technological” heroes. He then explained that sometimes they did this work by taking dangerous tech out of the hands of “bad guys” and reverse engineering it, improving it and giving it back to the “good guys”. Though he had heard of the genius Teri Carmichael he did not know who her tech was destined for because in his opinion often the most respected people sometimes wore a front to hide illicit activities. Leading her out of the room he took her into a large lab and announced she was now in the Knight’s Forge and in return for letting the scientists study her jet pack they would get it to achieve her goal. She was unsure how they could accomplish this until Griffin explained that the forge often received visitors who allowed their tech to be studied and after finding Teri’s jet pack and realising it did not work the Forge had called in two “experts”, Hawk and Blue Flame. She was astonished to see Hawk but he explained he had come to the Forge in the past after some of his Raider tech began failing. Since he was not going to go back to Lozen to get it fixed he had been put in touch with the Knights Forge. Blue Flame, Teri had never heard which amused him as he had been working on an idea similar to hers but where she had failed he had succeeded although he was not well known in Europa. A few weeks after staying at the Forge, Teri finally got her design to work and was then permitted to leave, albeit Griffin explained she could tell nobody about the Forge, and then promptly knocked her out with another injection When she opened her eyes next she was in her bed at the farm. Her aunt and uncle had been given a cover story by Griffin about her “disappearance” and she decided not to tell them anything different. One thing she did do was contact Adrian to let him know she was alright. He was very worried and though she gave him the same cover story Griffin had given her aunt and uncle he seemed unsure as to whether or not to believe her so she distracted him and told him that she fixed the jet pack and she would fulfil her promise to let him try it out. Adrian was impressed after his flight. As a bush pilot he’d flown all sorts but never anything as unusual as the jet pack and no aircraft ever gave him the sheer exhilaration and freedom as Teri’s apparatus. She realised that an offered to build him a unit of his own providing he kept it a secret. When the day came to present him with a jet pack of his own she found two other people with him, namely Brayden MacMahon and Nikita Dhawan. He had told them about the suit and they wanted to test it out for themselves. Though Teri was upset about the betrayal of trust, Adrian convinced her they could be trusted. Seeing as the newcomers knew of the jet pack, Teri thought it pointless to deny Nikita and Brayden a test flight. Brayden took Adrian’s unit and seeing as Nikita had a similar body shape to her own Teri leant Nikita her jet pack and outfit. To say Brayden and Nikita were impressed would have been an understatement and it was after this “trial” that Brayden queried whether she could build a third unit for him. Along with Adrian the three had considered using Teri’s idea to become an active group of crime fighters, the only snag being they did not think Teri should be one. Without any form of military training they felt she would be likely to get herself hurt. Teri would not accept the suggestion, after all it was her idea and her “dream” to become a costumed adventurer. With all the money and time she poured into the project she imply was not going to hand it over to Brayden, someone she hardly knew. Adrian tried to convince Teri of the logic but she was angry and countered with an ultimatum, she would create a jetpack for Brayden and even one specifically for Nikita but only if she was on the “team”, and if not she would destroy her design altogether. Though she had no military training she had the resources to fund a crime fighting enterprise so without her she reasoned, the other three were dead in the water anyway. No agreement was reached that day due to the heated exchanges but a week later Teri agreed to meet with Brayden in a bar and this time he had another proposal. He explained that if their enterprise went ahead then both he and Nikita were taking a risk in giving up successful AAF careers. Furthermore he told Teri that as a squadron leader he was used to leading people and accepting responsibility for everyone’s actions. That was why he did not want her with them because he trusted Adrian and Nikita and had no idea how she would react in a pressure situation whilst under fire. However he also accepted Teri’s demands to become involved so had devised a compromise where both of them could “win”. The proposal was therefore that he led the “unit” and she would follow his orders and if she did not agree then they would both walk away there and then. At first she was not sure if she should be insulted but figured since Brayden was perhaps right, after all she had no experience and had never been in a combat situation in her entire life. With the decision reached Brayden and Nikita quit the AAF a few months apart in order not to arouse suspicion. Then once Teri had built the remaining suits and jet packs, Brayden had them all training throughout the summer. That work was hard on Teri as she was used to working out with her mind and not her body. However by autumn the “Air Raid” team as they called themselves was ready for action. At first they performed night raids on small time criminals in New Tokyo. Dropping down on thugs and surprising them allowed the team to iron out any kinks in either themselves of the suits, so by the time they came up against a “real challenge” they had gelled as a unit. This challenge came in the form of The Forgotten who were wrecking a small area of down town Sydney. The battle was swift and fierce and though they did not beat their robotic opponents Air Raid did send them packing and did so without too many civilian casualties. In time group gained enough of a reputation to be asked to perform missions for the Australian Government and they also have become accepted as special assets for CLEA.