TENSEN 2099: What Has Gone Before...

Part I

This text is a chronicle of the events which occurred in 2099 to bring John Tensen, the Net Prophet, to the point where we have joined him in Episode One of "TENSEN 2099UG: NO JUSTICE!". It includes, in chronological order, the occurrences which led to the arrival of both John Tensen and his "arch-enemy," the evil Thanatos.

The story of Thanatos and the Net Prophet begins with Alchemax employee and head of Research & Development Aaron Delgato, who disagreed with Tyler Stone's decision for Miguel O'Hara, a "young upstart," to go ahead with a plan designed to genetically engineer a corporate raider for Alchemax, a la Spider-Man from the Twentieth Century. Disagreement led to overwhelming jealousy, and so, late at night, when O'Hara decided to use the genetic recombinator to reconfigure his own DNA to what it was before Tyler Stone slipped him hyperaddictive drug Rapture, Delgato decided to sabotage this venture in a way so that Miguel might die, or worse, meaning that once again Tyler Stone would look favorably upon him and never again trust O'Hara. The resulting sabotage led to the mingling of human and arachnid genetic patterns in Miguel's genetic structure, which would eventually lead to his acceptance of the role of the hero, Spider-Man.

Delgato was surprised that Miguel survived the botched DNA recombination sequence and went to observe his failure and blame him. When he saw Miguel's newly-formed talons and fangs, he immediately took out a blaster and began shooting at him, damaging a great deal of equipment and causing a tremendous explosion which made Delgato fall out the breach in Alchemax Tower. When O'Hara tried to rescue him from certain death, he refused his aid and instead plunged tens of stories to his apparent death.

Falling!

Omega! But death would not come so easy for Aaron Delgato. About a month later, during Spider-Man's battle with an officer of the Public Eye who had been outfitted by the Situation Emergency Gear (SIEGE for short), a shotgun blast disrupted the fight and killed the officer immediately. When Spider-Man looked to see where the blast had come from using his accelerated sight, he only saw a craft, the underside of which possessed the Greek letter Omega.

In his civilian identity as Miguel O'Hara, Spider-Man was then introduced to Virtual Unreality and genetic specialist Jordan Boone, who had been transferred from Alchemax's European division at a time shortly after Delgato had died. The relationship between Boone and O'Hara would not be a strong one.

Thanatos! A few days afterward, Alchemax suffered an attack by a man who identified himself as Thanatos -- whom Spider-Man immediately recognized as the same man who had killed the Public Eye officer earlier. He apparently had intentions to destroy Alchemax and kill its CEO, Tyler Stone. Spider-Man raced to save Stone, who was with Dana D'Angelo, Spider-Man/Miguel's fiancee at the time, from the villain. When Dana prayed to her Lord, Thanatos' only reply was that "Calling your God won't help you, woman. He's dead! I was one of his pallbearers." Soon after Spider-Man arrived to save Dana, he, Thanatos, and Stone all escaped via Thanatos' skycraft to discuss matters further. Here it was revealed that Thanatos was interested in the work done by Alchemax to crack interdimensional barriers, in part duplicating the work of Reed Richards; that work being the Virtual Unreality project headed by Jordan Boone. When they arrived at Boone's lab on the upper floors of Alchemax Tower, they were in time to see Boone open the portal and obtain a living alien sample from within the Virtual Unreality portal. Thanatos threw Boone into the portal, and Spider-Man attempted to save him using a webline. However, in the portal, Boone made contact with a humanoid being trapped inside, someone who, once Boone found safety, escaped himself. This man was an amnesiac John Tensen.

SPIDER-MAN 2099 #1-2, 11-12