Villains Rising: New Recruits

One day Bernardo Nunez and his gang, the Sharks were sauntering down the streets of new york looking for people to impress and intimidate with their strength and power, when they ran into their rival gang, the Jets. This of course provoked a fight between the two gangs until finally the police broke it up. Both gangs reluctantly stalked off and the Sharks went to a nearby café that had a computer bank in it that offered free internet access. Bernardo went to check his e-mail and was surprised to find an e-mail from an unknown sender. The message invited them to join a website called Villain.net and offered them the power to dominate everyone around them. The invitation was too good to resist and with the consent of his fellow Sharks, clicked on the link, which took them directly to the main page.

They clicked on an icon he'd never seen before. It took him to a screen with more strange icons, most of which were strange to him. They showed stick figures doing various things, some had lines coming from their eyes, some were covered in flames, some icons were merely symbols. One was merely a bio-hazard sign. This last one piqued Bernardo's interest and he clicked on it. The screen warped and a finger-like projectile tapped Bernardo on the forehead. The others decided to click on something as well and they each clicked on different icons. The finger tapped each of them and after that, nothing happened. the Sharks felt gypped. Was this some sort of stupid joke? The thought of someone pulling something over on him made Bernardo furious and the next thing he knew they all smelled something burning. Just then Chino noticed a green glow around Bernardo as well as the fact that the armrest on the chair was charred and melting! Chino's panicked look and gasps of horror alerted Bernardo that something was wrong and he glanced down to see what it was. He jumped up in a panic and tried to fix the damage, but only succeeded in making it worse. Soon enough, the other Sharks discovered they had powers as well, some of them as dangerous as those Bernardo had acquired. Just then they received a strange message from an anonymous source asking them to meet them in an old warehouse by the docks. Bernardo didn't want to at first, but then another message popped in, saying that the mysterious contact had a business proposition for them. This got Bernardo's attention and they agreed to meet the mysterious person.

When they got to the warehouse, they found a strange woman waiting for them. She called herself Chromosome and offered them a partnership with her. Bernardo laughed at first, but once Chromosome demonstrated her power, he stopped laughing. This was one seriously evil lady! Chromosome wanted to overturn something called the Council of Evil, but Bernardo and the Sharks had no idea what that was. Chromosome refused to explain anything about the Council no matter how much they pestered her about it. Finally Bernardo and the Sharks resigned themselves to taking orders from this scary woman, even though they REALLY didn't like it. The first thing she had them do involved kidnapping the Queen of England, so the Sharks teleported to England using Chino's power and began to blend in with the crowd. As it got close to time for the changing of the guard, they began to move closer to Buckingham Palace and pretended they were there to watch. In all the chaos, they managed to find an isolated spot and teleported into the palace, knocked out the Queen's guards, and teleported back to Chromosome's headquarters with Her Majesty in tow.

Chromosome was pleased and finally asked them to come with her to Council headquarters, where they would stage a coup and remove the current Council head where they would install Chromosome in his place. First, however, they needed money for some equipment needed for the coup. So they were assigned to rob the US Mint and take as much money as they could get their hands on. When they attempted to rob the Mint, however, they ran into recruits for the other side, the Hero Foundation, including Tony and Tanya Wyzek, and the Jets. Boy were the Jets and Tony surprised to see the newly turned supervillain Sharks! Bernardo at first hesitated because he knew Tony and the Jets, but when he realized that they would have to get past them to get into the Mint, so they attacked with their powers. Tony and Tanya had no choice but to turn their own powers on them in return. The battle ended in failure for the villains in regards to money, so they had to turn to robbing a bank instead. They managed to get away with some money that time, but when they finally got to Council headquarters, they found the Council was expecting them. They had heard of Chromosome's plot and had prepared a punishment for her. They sentenced her to be unraveled, as in being pulled apart on a molecular level! Chromosome's screams were terrible to hear as her sentence was carried out. Her seat on the Council was offered to a young up-and-coming teen villain named Jake Hunter, codenamed Dark Hunter. Jake eventually accepted the position and became the newest Council member. Bernardo and the other Sharks knew they could never go back to their families now that they were wanted felons, so they went on the run, moving from place to place and pursuing villainous missions for the Council of Evil.