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The winged Shen Li-Men is Swift, a member of StormWatch and the Authority.

Origin

When a comet passed by Earth, it activated a genetic quirk in some people that would manifest into superpowers either naturally or through special Seedlings called Activators. Swift was one such Seedling. Swift was brought into Stormwatch as a rookie, with her powers only partially activated. Weatherman Henry Bendix later reconfigured the Stormwatch teams, assigning her to Stormwatch Black, Stormwatch's black-ops team, alongside Jenny Sparks (with whom she had a brief romance) and Jack Hawksmoor. It was then that Christine Trelane offered to fully activate Swift's powers, bringing out their full potential, and she accepted.

The Authority

After Stormwatch disbanded, Swift joined former teammates in The Authority. Formerly a pacifist, she has put aside those beliefs to fight for a better world regardless of the cost. She has fought all over the world, from Moscow to Mexico to Gamorra Island. Following the Authority's replacement by the G-7 Authority, Swift was replaced by Rush from Canada after being taken out of a fight by radioactive feces. Swift was brainwashed into becoming the obedient trophy wife of a television mogul who had been part of the conspiracy to replace her and her team. She was insulted at every opportunity, from having her cooking ignored to the implications she could not remember large words. Eventually she overheard the "off-button" code of the monster Three-Willied Seth and proceeded to free herself. She literally took the heads of the television mogul and his software billionaire co-conspirator. She also saved her friend Angela Spica, the Engineer, and killed the man who had been abusing Angela by drowning him.

World's End

After the events of the Number of the Beast, Swift acts as a transmitter for the Authority in post-Apocalyptic London, called 'UnLondon', as she is the only way people can communicate across vast areas, seeing as all communications are obsolete. For some unknown reason birds follow her wherever she goes. Swift assumes its because of their social structures, breeding patterns and migratory instincts broke down and that they must feel she knows where she's going.

Swift was one of the few heroes, along with the Authority, to leave Earth on the Carrier after its sudden departure for an unknown destination in the universe. Eventually, their destination was a lure for the shift-ship to have it's passengers being taken as biological resources by the malevolent alien race known as the Karibna. Prior to the Carrier's capture, Swift was knocked into a coma after combating a mind-controlled Aegean and was kept at the medical ward. Unlike the other human passengers who were captured by the Karibna, Swift's comatose body remained hidden due from an unknown power that was keeping her invisible.

When the Authority defeated the Karibna and returned to Earth, which was at the time about to destroy itself through the insane Century Baby Gaia Rothstein, it was revealed that Swift was chosen as Earth's new Doctor as she possessed a connection to the planet's ecosystem. Her timely return to Earth allowed her to enter Gaia's mind and tell her that she was forgiven for all that she did and that she needed time to heal. Jeroen Thornedike then took Gaia to the newly restored Garden of Ancestral Memory.[1] Once Earth's structure was restored, Swift worked alongside with Tumbleweed of the Paladins in healing Earth's ecosystem.[2]

Powers

  • Avian Enhanced Genetics: When her powers were only partially activated, Swift had a line of feathers that ran along the underside of her arms. This allowed for only limited flight. She can also retract her claws and talons and shed her wings, which eventually decompose into liquid, although she no longer does this since joining the Authority. After being fully activated by Christine Trelane, she has more completed abilities:
    • Enhanced Durability
    • Enhanced Senses: She has some birdlike enhanced senses; apart from superior hearing and eyesight, she is able to feel or "read" the air to locate moving things and mentally listen to the bio-rhythms of the planet.
    • Enhanced Strength
    • Animal Empathy: Shen has a seemingly sixth sense when it comes to tithing with the avian creatures of the world. Often using them to get a feel for the land beneath the skies.
    • Flight: Swift can fly through the powerful wings she can grow from her back. Given a straight flight race she is one of the fastest members of the Authority.
      • Superhuman Speed: Consequently, she is called the "fastest winged mammal on the planet." She has flown fast enough to catch super speedsters.
    • Talons
  • Magic: Each doctor is as powerful as the sum of all preceding Doctors, each of whom was also as wise and powerful as the sum of all preceding Doctors, hence, each new Doctor is more powerful than his/her immediate predecessor. The Doctor's vast magical abilities can do almost anything, as long as they can conceive and believe in their abilities in poetic terms, although more powerful feats can take their toll both on the Doctor and the planet's ecosystem. The Doctor can alter reality through magic.
    • Enlightened Senses: The Doctor through natural evolution of his position has developed fifteen new senses, making him completely enlightened. He cant help but be naturally empathize with every living creature in existence.
    • Reincarnation: As the Shaman of Earth is literally unending, it is almost impossible to kill him and even if one is to succeed, upon his death, the singularity opens up around the next in line and he will know everything that all the doctors through time has, therefore experience is not required.
      • Garden of Ancestral Memory: When a Doctor dies, their spirit goes to the Garden of Ancestral Memory, where they can be visited by the current Doctor, and advise him. It is his connection to this realm that allows the doctor instant understanding of anything that happens on earth. Its a tether to the Earths consciousness on a spiritual level. Thus this knowledge comes as more of a intuitive feeling as well as actual given knowledge. The Garden is in the dimension known as the Dreamtime, (a metaphysical place of ancestral memory on a alternate plane.) It is made up of everything good and bad about the human race. It contains every birth, every death, every idea, every triumph, every failure, every murder, every mutilation, every kiss, every caress, all the love, all the hate.

Abilities

  • Tracking
  • Aviation: She is also a natural pilot who has Stormwatch level combat training. Swift is the navigator for The Carrier, the mobile sentient spaceship that is headquarters for the Authority.
  • Hand-to-Hand Combat (Basic)
  • Cooking: She has also demonstrated excellent cooking skills.
  • Singing: She has also demonstrated excellent singing skills.


  • Swift is a bisexual.[3]
  • Swift is a Buddhist. However, she admitted she gave up being Buddhist after the World's End event.[4]
  • Swift is often called the Winged Huntress.

Related

Footnotes


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