Arnus (Earth-9107)

In 1839, an alien starliner malfunctioned and exploded, and a jettisoned lifepod crashed in the middle of a cotton field in the American South. The pod automatically altered the appearance of its passenger named Arnus to mimic the first sentient life-form who discovered him. That life-form was a slave woman named Miriam, who saw the pod crash land. And so it happened that Miriam found inside a baby boy with her mother's eyes.

In the present, Arnus is still with us. He did not age visibly beyond adulthood; to disguise this fact, he periodically assumed the identity of his own son. By the early 21st century, he was posing as Augustus Freeman IV, the great-grandson of his original human identity. Still marooned, Augustus waits for Earth's technology to catch up to his lifepod's. Secretly possessing superpowers that belie his human appearance, he has always performed quiet acts of charity. But one night, Augustus' house is broken into, and he uses his powers for the first time in decades, an action witnessed by Raquel Ervin.

Raquel is an idealistic teenage girl who was born in Paris Island, the poorest, most gang-ridden neighborhood in Dakota. Her prospects seemed fairly bleak until a chance encounter with Augustus Freeman IV. After seeing him use his powers, Raquel persuaded Augustus to become a superhero named Icon, with herself as his sidekick, Rocket.