Neptune Perkins

• Also known as

In 1827, Arthur Gordon Pym found himself stranded in the Antarctic, where he was rescued by a white-skinned humanoid and brought to the city of the Dzyan. There he learned the secret of the vril, which unlocks the full physical and mental potential of a species. A number of years later, he became the mate of Kalla, one of the city's residents. Pym eventually forced the Dzyan to build him an undersea vessel which he called the Nautilus, and beginning in 1866, using the alias Captain Nemo, he wreaked havoc on the open seas. In time, the Nautilus was caught in a maelstrom and destroyed. Pym survived and made his way back to America, where he adopted the alias Perkins. He eventually married and fathered a son, Ross Perkins, however his wife died in childbirth. Pym brought his son to live with the Dzyan, however he was miserable there, and at an early age he was sent back to America. Ross never saw his father again. In 1912, using a new vessel that he had built named Leviathan, Pym sank the Titanic, so that he could acquire the gold it carried. Some time later, Ross Perkins, recognizing his father's secret handiwork in the Titanic tragedy and other such events, decided to dedicate his life to stopping his father. He traveled to a secret island possessed by Pym, and there he discovered a physical form of the vril that his father had stored there. Ross later met and married a woman named Miriam, a survivor of the Titanic. They wished to conceive a child of justice and revenge. To this end, they spent their nights in a special chamber, bathed in the radiant light of the vril. They produced a son, whom they named Neptune Perkins, who was born with webbed hands and feet, and a need to remain immersed in sea water in order to satisfy a severe salt deficiency. In June 1941, Neptune found his parents murdered in their houseboat. In May 1942, he learned that his parents had been killed by agents of The Black Order, a secret branch of Nazi Germany's military that dealt in matters of the occult. They killed his parents in a futile attempt to force them to reveal the whereabouts of Arthur Gordon Pym. Upon discovering that the Black Order had just found and captured Pym, Neptune attempted to free him before they could wield the vril power, but he was also captured. After being freed by a dying Kalla and the Young All-Stars, Pym sacrificed his life to defeat their Nazis captors. Neptune Perkins teamed up with Hawkman on at least two occasions, once in 1945 and again in 1947.