Swift (comics)
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Swift, real name Shen Li-Min, is a comic book superheroine from the Wildstorm universe. Swift first appeared in the pages of Stormwatch and later became member of The Authority. She is very similar in appearance to Hawkgirl of DC Comics.
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[edit] Biography
Swift is a bisexual Buddhist Tibetan Chinese woman. She began life as a fetus inside a large egg, guarded by Tibetan monks for generations, prophesied to hatch in the end of the millennium and usher a golden age of love and peace, for generations. The egg's incubation was not uneventful - it had to be rescued from Nazi agents by Jenny Sparks in 1943. Eventually it hatched into Swift, a physically ordinary human female.
When a comet passed by Earth, it activated a genetic quirk in some people that would alter manifest into superpowers either naturally or through special Seedlings called Activators. Swift was one such Seedling. Swift was brought into Stormwatch as a rookie, with her powers only partially activated. Weatherman Henry Bendix later reconfigured the Stormwatch teams, assigning her to Stormwatch Black, Stormwatch's black-ops team, alongside Jenny Sparks (with whom she had a brief relationship) and Jack Hawksmoor. It was then that Christine Trelane asked her if she wanted to be fully activated, and she agreed, bringing her powers to full.
After Stormwatch disbanded, Swift joined her former teammates in The Authority. Formerly a pacifist, she has put aside those beliefs to fight for a finer world, no matter what it takes.
During the Transfer of Power storyline, Swift was replaced by Rush representing Canada, while Shen was brainwashed into becoming the abused trophy wife of a television mogul. Eventually, in a G7 reunion, she found out the "off-button" code of the monster Seth, and proceeded to free herself and The Engineer, killing the television mogul and his like-minded software mogul friend in the process.
[edit] Powers
At first, when her powers were only partially activated, she had a line of feathers than ran along the underside of her arms, allowing her to fly. After being fully activated by Christine Trelane, she has the ability to grow wings at will out her back as well as claws and talons, consequently be the "fastest winged mammal on the planet". She has flown fast enough to catch superspeedsters and her talons can easily rip through human flesh. Her attacks indicate some enhanced strength and durability as well. It has been implied that she has some vaguely-defined enhanced senses; apart from superior hearing and eyesight, she is able to feel or "read" the air to locate moving things. She can also shed wings, which eventually rot down into liquid, though she no longer does this since joining the Authority.
[edit] Other Notes
In East Asia the surname precedes the given name. Shen is a common East Asian surname, and Li-Men is a given name. However, many of the comic book creators do not seem to realize this. Swift's teammates refer to her familiarly as "Shen," and Shen has been addressed in Vol. 2 as "Ms. Li-Men."
