Bloodshot is a super-soldier project created by the secret government organization Project Rising Spirit. Special nanites in his bloodstream give him a variety of powers, including the ability to recover from almost any trauma by consuming protein. The modern incarnation of Bloodshot is Ray Garrison, though to improve his efficiency, he was brainwashed with a number of implanted identities, allowing PRS to give him personal motivations for every mission. His original purpose was to hunt down and capture or assassinate psiots. Eventually he would escape his programming and go on a search for his true identity.
History[]
Origins[]
The man known today as Bloodshot is not the first of his kind. For decades, countless men were roped into a mysterious government program run by Project Rising Spirit, in an attempt to make the ultimate super soldier. Most of the subjects failed, but in the 21st century the Project tried again, using their recent studies in artificial intelligence and nanites to make a brand new, perfect soldier. In an attempt to avoid the emotional and mental problems previous subjects had faced, the Project used Nanites to manipulate the new Bloodshot's memories. Sometimes he was a prisoner on death row given a new lease on life, and other times he was a washed up former athlete. However, none of these memory files would "stick". This led to rampages, and the Project having to try over and over again. This means no one, even Bloodshot, knows who he truly is, after so many fake, broken lives. The first memory to really stick was that of Raymond "Ray" Garrison, a trained soldier fighting to protect his family, and that became his "real" life. "Ray's" physiology was enhanced further, granting him a healing factor, super strength, and powerful technopathy.
Escaping the Project[]
For years, "Ray Garrison" was used in simple operations in the Middle East and wherever he was needed. Soon, however, Project Rising Spirit was made aware of the growing presence of Psiots, a subspecies of humanity who all possess powerful psychic abilities. As the Bloodshot Program's resources were diverted to the growing crisis, a scientist named Kuretich fled the Project, and joined the Psiot-run Harbinger Foundation. While Bloodshot was running an assassination attempt on a young psiot in Afghanistan, Bloodshot was captured, and the rogue scientist reprogrammed Bloodshot's nanites to reveal the fakeness of his memories. Bloodshot agreed to work with Kuretich under the agreement that the scientist would help him find his true identity.
Harbinger Wars[]
Kuretich, and his new boss Toyo Harada, sent Bloodshot after his old masters. Aided by a young psiot named Pulse, Bloodshot attacked a PRS facility in Nevada, where a number of young psiots were imprisoned under a sadistic jailer named Gamma. While battling Gamma and the cyborg hit squad called Chainsaw, Pulse lost her life, forcing Bloodshot to free the children on his own. This, however, turned out to be a mistake, as some of the younger psiots, using the name Generation Zero, ended up causing a massive conflict in Las Vegas between PRS, the Harbinger Foundation, the psiot Renegades, and Bloodshot himself. Bloodshot attempted to aid the Generation, but despite his efforts, he ended up kidnapped and imprisoned by Toyo Harada.
Back With the Project[]
When PRS discovered their most powerful weapon was in the hands of their most powerful rival, they organized a raid on Foundation headquarters. The recently-reinstated H.A.R.D. Corps, a team of artificial psiots who had previously been used to stop Bloodshot's rampages in the early days of the experiments, were successful in infiltrating the Foundation and extracting Bloodshot. The cyborg agreed to work for the Project once more, now as a field leader for the Corps, in exchange for his original personnel files. Despite these files not providing any solid answers on his identity, only raising more questions, Bloodshot allowed himself to be roped into multiple H.A.R.D. Corps missions. This all turned out to be a ploy, however, with Bloodshot using the trust he'd gained by the Corps as a tool in order to facilitate his escape. For the first time he could ever remember, Bloodshot was free--not controlled by the Project, not manipulated by Kuretich, not a member of the H.A.R.D. Corps. His own man.
Invasion and War[]
For a living weapon such as Bloodshot, however, freedom does not bring peace. He attempted to isolate himself in the Amazon Jungle, but he was soon roped into the outside world once more when MI-6 and M.E.R.O. kidnapped him and recruited him into the war effort against an invading force of aliens known as the Armor Hunters. He worked alongside superhero team Unity in driving them off. After the invasion was over, Bloodshot continued to work with MI-6, and was eventually sent on a seemingly routine mission to recover a strange box from the Pacific Rim. It was soon discovered that whatever the box contained was the only thing in the world that stood a chance at stopping an immortal weapon of destruction called the Immortal Enemy.
As the Enemy's rival, Gilad the Eternal Warrior, led the heroes of Earth against him, Bloodshot was sent to guard the embodiment of Earth, Kay McHenry. As they ran from the Enemy, the young woman and Bloodshot grew closer. She helped remind him that he can be more than a mindless murder machine. However, the front line of heroes eventually fell, and the Enemy reached Kay and Bloodshot. The cyborg fault valiantly, but the Enemy was simply out of his league, and it managed to kill Kay. With her dying breath, she used her healing powers to flush the nanites from Bloodshot's system, restoring his lost humanity.
Reborn[]
Now a normal man for the first time in years, Bloodshot--adopting the name "Ray Garrison", despite knowing it may not be who he really is--tried to live a normal life in Colorado. He found himself haunted by Kay's death, as well as everything he had done in his time as a killer. These regrets manifested themselves as a hallucination of a cartoon version of himself, called Bloodsquirt, as well as hallucinations of Kay herself. His tortured peace does not last long, however, as he discovered that PRS was seemingly transforming ordinary people into killers. He reclaimed his nanites, and hunted down the killers, becoming attached to someone once again when he saved a young woman named Magic from the killers.
Bloodshot Island[]
After stopping the outbreak of the Bloodshot-lookalikes, Bloodshot found himself kidnapped and stranded on a mysterious island. Antagonized by an incredibly powerful cyborg named Deathmate, he discovered a group of men with powers just like him. Named the Bloodshot Squad, the group was made of former subjects of PRS's Bloodshot Program, making them Ray's predecessors. The Squad revealed to Ray that this was all a ploy by the Project. They were there to test the prowess of Deathmate, who was in reality the resurrected Kay McHenry. While the Squad managed to escape with their lives, PRS simply moved on to the next phase of their plan: The Bloodshot Virus.
Bloodshot U.S.A.[]
Studying the process that transformed normal people into Bloodshot-lookalikes, PRS developed a "Bloodshot Virus" in New York--a nanite-based virus that transforms it's victims into creatures comparable to, although weaker than, Bloodshot. Bloodshot and the Squad were brought into NYC by Unity as the city became a warzone. The Bloodshots aided the team in controlling the chaos, even as some of the heroes fell to the Virus. Bloodshot, however, discovered that he could absorb the nanites of the virus just as easily as the other, so they had a plan. As the Squad and their new Unity allies held off the infected, Bloodshot battled Deathmate and eventually freed her of PRS' control, returning her to normal. Ray embraced Kay, only for Magic to find them in each others arms. Ray had to leave Magic again, to stop the chaos, but they were losing. The Virus was spreading to fast for the Squad to stop or for Unity to contain, until Kay used her abilities to absorb the entire Virus into her body, seemingly sacrificing herself in the process. After the chaos had ended, Ray tracked down Magic, and explained that she was the only woman he wanted to be with, even if Kay had lived. Together, alongside the nanite-enhanced Bloodhound, Ray and Magic decided to settle down.
Salvation[]
Not long after they settled down, Magic gave birth to a girl named Jessie. The couple tried to live a normal life, and were successful for several months, but when Ray learned that Magic's abusive father was still alive, and looking to bring his daughter back into a cult, he went on a rampage to kill the man. While Bloodshot successfully killed the cult leader, his nanites were mysteriously deactivated (at the hands of the mysterious Project Omen) in the middle of the cult's camp, leading him to be captured. With help from the superhero Ninjak, he escaped the cult, but before he could relax, Ninjak gave the soldier a dark message--his infant daughter Jessie had become infected with his nanites, and her condition was terminal.
With science failing to remove the nanites from her system, Bloodshot took his sick daughter into the mysterious land of the dead known as the Deadside. Battling through hordes of demons, the hero known as Magpie led him to the house of the Dealmaker, Baron Samedi. The powerful sorcerer agreed to heal Jessie, in the process causing her to grow to the age of a young girl, but Bloodshot was forced to make a deal with him--Bloodshot was cast into the far future of the 41st Century, sent to kill a mysterious man.
The Book of Revelations[]
Finding his faithful companion Bloodhound possessed by one of Samedi's minions, Bloodshot wandered the wastleland of the future towards a shining city. When he arrived their, the lackey informed him that he was sent to kill a man who would some day, further in the future, gain the power to fight Samedi. Bloodshot didn't want to kill a man who had yet to actually do anything, but the minion reminded him his daughter's life was on the line. His attempt to kill the man was interrupted, however, by a strange sight--himself! Bloodshot stood face-to-face with the Bloodshot of 4002, a being made of nanites, and possessing Ray's memories. As the nanite man tried to convince Ray there had to be another way to save his daughter, Bloodhound came under the possession of another magical being: 21st century sorcerer, Punk Mambo, who had established a mental connection between the dog and Magic. Magic, who had believed Ray to be dead, was ecstatic to hear he was alive, but the conversation was cut short when Magic and Mambo were attacked.
Scared for his family's safety, Ray stopped listening to the nanite man, and shot the innocent man in the face. Samedi's lackey opened a portal to the present, and Bloodshot stepped through, warning his future self that he can't escape his fate as a killer. Returning to the present, Ray led an assault on Project Omen's base, where his kidnapped daughter was being kept. Ripping through the base with the Bloodshot Squad behind him, Ray saved his daughter, and reunited with his family.
Harbinger Wars 2[]
While Bloodshot's adventures in the Deadside and the future might suggest otherwise, the supersoldier was created as a solution to the "psiot problem". This part of his life resurfaced when the technopathic psiot Livewire came to him. She had caused a nation-wide blackout in an attempt to stop a government-sanctioned psiot massacre, and she needed his help. Fearing he wouldn't come quietly, she used her abilities to control the cyborg, she sent him to infiltrate the Love Boat, a floating military vessel that somehow still had power, and was being used as a base of operations by the military. The telepathicly-controlled Bloodshot infiltrated the ship, finding that the Geomancer Tama was using her powers like a living battery. Bloodshot was forced to confront the child, as well as his old ally X-O Manowar, with Livewire causing his nanites to corrupt his body into a monstrous, demon-like form. He tried to resist Livewire's attempts to force him to sink the ship, but he failed, and the resulting crash should have killed him if it weren't for his healing factor. With the second Harbinger War calming down, Bloodshot fled the chaos, hoping to find peace again.
The Long Shot[]
Bloodshot fled to Russia, abandoning his life in pursuit of peace. Calling himself "Mr. Janus", he lived as a humble drunk, hiding from the public eye, until a G.A.T.E agent found him. The agent had discovered a crime ring kidnapping women in the area, and sought Bloodshot's help in stopping them. Ray refused initially, but when he discovered the agent went to do it anyway, getting himself killed in the process, he was panged with guilt. After stopping the crime ring, he embraced his Bloodshot persona once more, and began traveling the globe helping people.
Bloodshot found himself in Yemen, where he helped feed starving families. His heroism was cut short, however, when a mysterious group called the Black Bar attacked him. The Bar existed to hunt down and apprehend superhumans and cyborgs, with Bloodshot having long been their leader General Grayle's "white whale". While Bloodshot was able to hold off much of the Bar's assault, they had a secret weapon: a powerful psiot "DNA Whisperer" named Eidolon, who Bloodshot soon discovered had been captured by PRS in order to be weaponized by him, back when he was still their agent. With Eidolon's help, the Bar managed to capture Ray, but this also didn't last. The Black Bar's plane was attacked by a group of mysterious spies called The Burned, who freed Bloodshot from his captivity and stole him away to their hidden base called The Desolate House.
Personality[]
There is no information about this character's personality recorded yet.
Powers and Abilities[]
- Nanite Enhanced Physiology: Bloodshot is enhanced with an army of self-replicating nanites that fill his bloodstream and augment his muscles, giving him incredible superhuman abilities. These machines are only limited by needing energy, primarily in the form of protein. Being machines, these nanites have been shown to be capable of further enhancement to increase his power levels even greater, such as Livewire's technopathy increasing his strength and shape-changing abilities,[1] or Eidolon's DNA manipulation allowing him to transfer his consciousness and duplicate himself.[2]
- Regenerative Healing Factor: Provided his nanites have enough energy, generally in the form of protein, Bloodshot can heal from incredibly grievous wounds. He has survived a broken neck,[3] being ripped in half,[4] his body's connective tissues being melted by Eidolon,[5]and even being almost fully disintegrated by the crash of the Love Boat.[6]
- Camouflage
- Malleable Anatomy
- Superhuman Strength
- Superhuman Endurance
- Superhuman Speed
- Superhuman Reflexes
- Superhuman Agility
- Superhuman Stamina
- Superhuman Senses
- Sonic Scream
- Low-Frequency ultrasound Emission: Bloodshot is able to induce a form of mesmerization by feeding his acoustics directly into the inner ear to stimulate the pleasure centers of a persons neurons, effectively putting them on a psychedelic high that lasts a few hours.
- Adaptability
- Technopathy
- Living Database
- Nanite Dispersal (Latent)
- Conversion
- Mind Control
- Physical Augmentation
- Self Spawn: With help from Eidolon, Ray can use his nanites to remold an infected host into a convincing simulacrum of himself.
- Master Hand-to-Hand Combatant
- Weapons Expert
Equipment[]
- Nanites
- H.A.R.D. Corps Neural Implants (Formerly)
- Super Speed
- Radiation Projection
- Psionic Drain
- Burned Ghost Mode (Formerly)
- Sense Dilution: Ghost mode also has an olfactory disruption effect upon those whom use the technology. Bending light waves from visible to radio spectrums distorts visual acuity while emitting a buckling effect accompanying low frequency hypnosis coupled with beguiling pheromone tech potent enough to mask even Ray's nanites.
- Invisibility
- Dimensional Phasing: The ghosting technology employed by the Burned uses trans-spatial shifting mechanics in order to move out of synch with reality and into a pocket dimension where their headquarters in located. Bloodshot could use these facilities to shift in and out of reality at will.
Notes[]
- For his future reincarnation, see Bloodshot 4001.
Appearances[]
Gallery[]
Cover Appearances[]
Panels[]
Quotes[]
- I used to have a lot of names. Angelo, Ray -- turns out none of them were real. Until I find the truth... call me Bloodshot.
- -- Bloodshot[src]
- I'm not hungry for a snack. I'm hungry for revenge.
- -- Bloodshot[src]
- Are you seriously trying to get nostalgic with a man who can't remember his past?
- -- Bloodshot[src]
- Listen to our peace plan. Or I'll kill everyone in this room.
- -- Bloodshot[src]
References[]
This section is for footnotes and citations.