Spawn (Al Simmons)

History
Spawn was once a Black Ops Operative Merc named Albert Francis Simmons, who worked for the United States Marine Corps, Secret Service, and even the C.I.A. In the CIA, Simmons was recruited by Director Jason Wynn into a special top-secret covert ops division known as the U.S. Security Group, an elite task force with jurisdiction in all domestic and foreign situations. Simmons was murdered during a mission in Botswana for the USSG's Operation Knightstrike by fellow mercenary Bruce Stinson (also known as Chapel), at the order of Director Wynn, and was sent to hell because of his life as an assassin. After arranging a deal with the being known as Malebolgia Simmons agrees to become a Hellspawn in exchange for being allowed to see his wife, Wanda Blake, one last time.

Malebolgia returns Simmons to the world, but with little memory, a badly burned and disfigured body, and his newly acquired hellspawn powers. Monitored by a demon known as the Violator to monitor his progress Simmons slowly realizes that five years have passed since his death. After deciding to seek out Wanda for his one final visit, he shape-shifts his body but discovers his powers cannot yet indefinitely maintain his former appearance. After locating her Simmons discovers that his wife has since married his best friend, Terry Fitzgerald, and the two have a daughter, Cyan. Emotionally shattered at his discovery, Simmons is left with the choice of whether or not to fulfill his agreement with Malebolgia.

Now embracing his identity as Spawn his initial adventures are antihero in nature. While battling street gangs and organized crime syndicates, he comes across depraved individuals such as the child molester and murderer Billy Kincaid. It was this act that brought the detective duo of Sam Burke and Twitch Williams into Spawn's life. Spawn also encounters foes from the controlled by the realm of Heaven including an "Anti-Spawn" and an individual known as the Redeemer. He survives an assault by Angela, an angel whose mission is to hunt Hellspawn for sport. Over time, he takes over the alleys that comprise "Rat City" and befriends the homeless within it, becoming their champion. In particular, he befriends an old bum named Cogliostro (Cog), a homeless old man who knows more about Spawn than even he himself. Cogliostro and the Clown act as polar opposite guides for Al as they attempt to convince him of role he should play in the Earth's fate. At one point Spawn encounters Harry Houdini, who teaches Spawn some new tricks and saves Terry from being murdered by the mob. Spawn's face is injured during his time with Houdini prompting him to turn to a loyal bum named Bobby to sew the wound up with a shoelace rather than have Spawn waste precious energy healing it. This shoelace would eventually be removed by Terry Fitzgerald, and later worn as a necklace by Terry's daughter, Cyan Fitzgerald. "Shoestring face" Spawn would remain one of the iconic visuals of the character.

After an almost dangerous confrontation with a Redeemer, Spawns suit mutated and became more advanced. The unusual cape became slightly ripped, and the red glow that had come from the costume was gone, and had evolved to what is now black and white. Spawn used to have boots and gloves but he found out that those had also changed, becoming replaced with spikes. Spawn's suit was more powerful than the original and had also found out that he had a new cape and chains, which were able to shape shift into different things to confuse his opponents. After finding this out, Spawn used his blades to slash off a redeemer's hand. After defeating the redeemer Spawn thought that the battle was over until he meets someone more powerful than the redeemer known as the Freak. Spawn fought with The Freak but was unaware of The Freak's power, the ability to create nightmares which he did to torture Spawn with his past. During the battle a creature appearing to have the original appearance of Spawn, fights other beings and creatures, and knocks out Spawn. When Spawn woke up the creature tells Spawn that ever since the metamorphosis the suit will feed off souls. After being informed this Spawn later finds himself in New York City.

After this Tony Twist sends a reprogrammed Overtkill after Terry, blaming him for the recent attacks on the mob and Spawn was forced to reveal his identity while saving his friend. However it was a well-placed shot from Twitch Williams that brought Overtkill down this time. He would later bring back his friend Bobby after he was killed in another fight with Chapel. Spawn would be a part of Angela’s trial and later traveled to the South and had an encounter with the KKK and an abusive father of two boys. When he returned to New York he was attacked by a new Redeemer. This caused his costume to evolve and defeated the Redeemer with it’s new found power. After another encounter with the Curse the suit began to go wild and after saving Terry from his cancer sent him to Hell, but Malebolgia sent him back with full control of the suit.