KLARION II (Klarion Bleak)	BIOGRAPHY
Created by Grant Morrison and Frazer Irving

PERSONAL DATA

Real Name: Klarion Bleak
Identity: Secret
Occupation: Witch-boy, Submissionary pro-tempor of Limbo Town, possibly King of the Sheeda
Place of Birth: Limbo Town, Croatoan
Citizenship: Croatoan
Marital Status: Single
Known Relatives: Mordechai Bleak (father, possibly deceased); Ezekial (last name unknown, stepfather, deceased); Charity Bleak (mother); Beulah Bleak (sister); Teekl (draaga/familiar), Melmoth (distant ancestor)
Base of Operation: Currently mobile
Group Affiliation(s): Seven Soldiers
Gender: Male
Height: 5' 1"
Weight: 113 lbs.
Eyes: Black
Hair: Black
Distinguishing Features: Blue skin, pointed ears
First Appearance: Seven Soldiers: Klarion #1 (June 2005)
Creators: Grant Morrison and Frazer Irving

OVERVIEW

A young rebel from Limbo Town, deep beneath Manhattan, Klarion has been thrust into the joys and the dangers of modern America. A reluctant champion, he may be all that stands between his race and the evil Sheeda.

[Note: It is currently unknown whether there is any connection between this Klarion and the first character of that name. Indeed, the first may no longer exist.]

HISTORY

Klarion Bleak is a member of the race of Croatoan, human/Sheeda hybrids whose origins date back to the first American colonies. The Croatoans live in a town deep underground, in a Puritan society that has remained unchanged since the 15th century. The Croatoans are witch-people, and each Croatoan has his or her own familiar, with whom they share a psychic bond. They spend their lives either working or studying the Book of Shadows, a pagan offshoot of the Bible. When they die, they are laid to rest for several decades and then resurrected as Grundies to do hard labor for the town. The government consists of three Submissionaries who enforce a strict code designed to prevent change, however, recently some of the witch-men have been trying to institute a parliament in order to keep the Submissionaries in check.

Among the other denizens of Limbo Town, Klarion was a troublemaker who disdained authority figures. His progressive stepfather Ezekial encouraged this rebellious streak, telling the boy about his father, who had left Limbo Town and never returned, apparently fed up with the Submissionaries and their rules. For the most part, Klarion's life was a dull one, his attempts to escape continually thwarted by his bossy older sister, and his boredom occasionally alleviated by sending his cat Teekl out to cause trouble.

However, this all changed one day when the Submissionaries ordered the Witchmen to close the Wicket Gate, which led to the outer world, claiming that the town was at risk for invasion. Angered that they were effectively preventing him from escaping, Klarion sent Teekl to make mischief for the Submissionaries, and in the process discovered a sinister plan. The order to close the gate was really a ruse to ambush and weed out subversives, like Ezekial, who had been trying to convince the other Croatoans to create a parliament that would keep the Submissionaries' power in check. The Submissionaries took the form of the Horigal, an eight-legged monster that they used to crush opposition.

Horrified, Klarion ran to the Wicket Gate to warn his stepfather, only to find him and the other witch-men dead. The Horigal appeared and chased Klarion all the way through the Wicket Gate and into Cenozoic Station, a secret subway system deep below Manhattan. Only the intervention of Ebeneezer Badde, a scavenger, and the fortunate passing of a train prevented the Horigal from killing Klarion, and in the process of escaping, he was separated from Teekl.

Ebeneezer Badde, himself a runaway from Limbo Town, took Klarion to Vanity Fair, the junction between Croatoan and Earth. There, Badde went to arrange for someone to guide Klarion to the surface world. Left on his own for a few minutes, Klarion telepathically called out to Teekl, and found that his cat was nearby and surrounded by a tribe of lost children, called the Leviathan. The Leviathan was after Badde who had been kidnapping them and trying to sell them to Mr. Melmoth, a sinister businessman. Realizing that he'd been betrayed, Klarion directed Teekl to bring the Leviathan to Vanity Fair. The Leviathan attacked Badde and tore him limb from limb. In thanks, one of them led Klarion and Teekl to where the underground met the Manhattan subway.

Upon reaching the surface, Klarion was bewildered by the modern world. He was approached by a businessman, Mr. Melmoth, who offered him and Teekl food and a place to stay, and Klarion naively accepted.

Klarion was sent to a youth hostel, where he fell in with a gang of kids called the Deviants. The leader, Billy Beezer, tricked him into helping the other Deviants break into a museum devoted to Golden Age superhero paraphernalia and steal a large mobile drill, and then bullied him into navigating the underground in order to bring the drill to Melmoth.

Upon their return, Klarion became well-liked among the Deviants, and Melmoth deliberately dropped hints to Billy that he was on his way out, soon to be moved to an upper-level gang, and that Klarion would take over. Enraged at the prospect of being replaced by a new recruit, Billy attacked Teekl, only to have his own teammates turn against him. A fight ensued between him and Klarion, who won by using mind tricks. Humiliated, Billy stalked off.

Later that night, Teekl was awakened by clock chimes and saw Billy wandering into the hall. The cat followed him and watched as Billy was pulled through a red gate that led to a hard labor camp on Mars. It also learned that Melmoth intended to use the stolen drill to travel to Limbo Town. It alerted Klarion, who warned the other Deviants about Melmoth's treachery. Panicked, they turned to Klarion for leadership, but he walked away, determined to avoid involvement in the invasion of Limbo Town and the efforts to prevent it. However, Teekl was not willing to leave Limbo Town to its own devices, and stubbornly refused to follow Klarion unless they returned to Limbo Town.

After a short contest of wills, Klarion grudgingly agreed, and so they returned. However, Klarion's attempts to warn his mother and sister backfired and they, along with the other Croatoans, attempted to burn him for heresy, refusing to believe that there truly was a world beyond Limbo Town. The burning was distrupted, however, with the arrival of the stolen drill. Melmoth emerged from the cockpit of the drill with a small army of men, and announced to the Croatoans his intent to turn Limbo Town into a Sheeda rape camp. In the ensuing chaos, Klarion's sister Beulah came to her senses and freed him, instructing him to ring the town bells to summon the town's few remaining Grundies.

At the bell tower, Klarion was confronted by Submissionary Judah, who had survived their last encounter, but had been horribly disfigured. Judah had realized that he and the other submissionaries had left the town vulnerable to attack when they tried to stop Klarion from going on to the surface world, and thus he taught him the incantations required to turn himself and Teekl into a Horigal.

Klarion performed the incantations and became a cat-like beast. In this form, he attacked and killed the invading forces, and then chased Melmoth into a fire, ripping off one of the villain's arms in the process. However, his prey escaped, albeit charred and missing a limb. Klarion himself was left injured by both the fire and the strain of the Horigal spell, and was saved only by a counter-spell from his mother.

In the aftermath of the battle, Klarion found himself once more thrust into a leadership role as the new Submissionary of Limbo Town, but he deferred, deciding instead to go back to the surface world to fight the Sheeda.

Once back on the surface world, which was now embroiled in the Harrowing, Klarion encountered Misty Kilgore, princess of the Sheeda and keeper of the die which, combined with the die he had picked up at the Foundation Stone, formed the Fatherbox, a powerful artifact. Misty attempted to convince him to give up his half of the Fatherbox to help her stop the Sheeda from destroying New York, threatening to kill him if he refused. Klarion, however, pointed out that as his people were descended from Sheeda (who were, in turn, descended from his people), killing him might cause her people to cease to exist. This paradox distracted her, and Klarion had Teekl pounce on her, causing her to drop her die, which Teekl snatched up. Klarion and Teekl then made their getaway, commandeering a Sheeda riding fly.

They ended up aboard the Sheeda time-dreadnaught Castle Revolving, which had been captured by the undead Frankenstein. Klarion, using a cruciform (which can control the undead), took control of Frankenstein and ordered him to pilot the ship back to the future inhabited by the Sheeda, where he became king thanks to his Fatherbox.

Shortly afterwards, Klarion and Teekl returned to the present, where he apparently freed Frankenstein from bondage and aided other superheroes in the Infinite Crisis. His activities after that are for the most part unknown, though he was seen at the memorial service for Earth-2's Superman and Superboy, and was at one point begged for a bargain by Felix Faust, who was seeking to sell his soul.

More recently, he teamed up with Robin when Teekl and several other draagas from Limbo Town went missing. The cat was being chased by a judgment beat, a creature made up of one of each type of draaga, summoned by another young Croatoan named Uriah, who intended to take over the surface world. Together, Robin and Klarion found the ingredient needed to stop Uriah, and Klarion broke up the judgment beast by merging with Teekl to become a Horigal once more. As with before, his horigal form proved difficult to control, but Robin managed to dispel him through sheer beginner's luck.

Afterwards, Teekl took Uriah and the missing Draagas back to Limbo Town, though he didn't stay there for long. On her quest for power, he was encountered by Mary Marvel. He offered to help her, intending to trick her, but was soundly defeated, taken unaware by the depth of power within her.

POWERS AND WEAPONS

As a Croatoan, Klarion has a natural command of magic - as Melmoth puts it, "Curses come as naturally to this one as breathing does to you or me." His most-used power is his telepathic connection to his cat Teekl. When necessary, Klarion can see through Teekl's eyes, hear through Teekl's ears, and smell with Teekl's nose, allowing him to use Teekl to spy on people or to detect possible traps, but this power is reduced in the presence of black magick. More recently, he has gained the submissionary's rod and learned the incantation to merge himself and Teekl into a Horigal, cementing his place among the most powerful of the Croatoan witch-folk (however, he does not yet know the counter-spell required to return him and his cat to their respective forms.)

When bearing a cruciform (a cross-shaped bundle of sticks) he can control the undead and perform certain other magic spells.

Later, when he obtained the Fatherbox, Klarion gained immeasurable power; however, whether or not he still has the Fatherbox is unknown.

He is also fairly sharp and resourceful, and has a way of getting others to follow him, though he refuses to be a leader.

CHRONOLOGY

For a definitive list of appearances of Klarion in chronological order click here