History:(Dark Avengers II#177 (fb) - BTS/181 (fb) - BTS) - Erik Wender and his twin brother Lars were American citizens born superhuman with the ability to transfer energy between themselves like living conduits.
PIPELINE
1
Real Name: Erik Wender
Identity/Class: Human mutant
Occupation: Government asset/agent
Group Membership: Infidel Ops (Jakitz, Korso, Lifeboat, Lighthouse, two unidentified others)
Affiliations: F.A.C.T. (Doyle, Kell, Marin, others), Infidel Ops, the US Defense Department, Lars Wender
Enemies: The Dark Avengers (Dark
Spider-Man/Ai Apaec, Ragnarok, Toxie Doxie/June Covington, Trick
Shot/Barney Barton), Sultan Magus (Dagan Shah)
Known Relatives: Lars Wender (brother)
Aliases: "Boy"
Base of Operations: An unidentified location in the USA
First Appearance: Dark Avengers II#175 (August, 2012)
Powers/Abilities: Pipeline 1 had a special
connection to his twin brother, granting them both the ability to absorb
and transfer megatorrents of energy across global distance to one
another. Whichever brother received the transfer was capable of
projecting outward in large bursts. Once the energy transfer began, only
the brothers could stop the transfer using energy signals transferred to
one another.
Height: Unrevealed (approximately 5'9")
Weight: Unrevealed (approximately 155 lbs.)
Eyes: Brown
Hair: Shaved bald
History:
(Dark Avengers II#177 (fb) - BTS/181 (fb) - BTS) - Erik
Wender and his twin brother Lars were American citizens born superhuman
with the ability to transfer energy between themselves like living
conduits.
(Dark Avengers II#181 (fb) - BTS) - The US Defense
Department gained control of the Wenders and worked to build up the
limits of their abilities.
(Dark Avengers II#180 (fb) - BTS) - Erik and Lars Wender were genetically altered to harness and transfer more and more energy.
(Dark Avengers II#181 (fb)) - The Defense Department
began using the Wenders alongside their special ops teams, with either
Erik or Lars going into a target city while the other was station near
an enemy. The missions usually involved one of the Wenders being placed
in a city's power plant, where he would black out the entire area by
absorbing the energy and transferring it to the other brother, who would
unleash the absorbed energy against enemy agents. Learning of the new
country of Sharzhad and its energy-powered ruler, Sultan Magus, F.A.C.T.
sought to utilize the Sultan's unlimited power source for their own ends
and worked out a plan to secretly reconstruct the damaged Raft prison
into a containment facility for the Sultan's energy, which they intended
to have Erik Wender transfer back to his brother at the Raft. Before the
construction was completed, however, the US military, not wishing to
lose their access to Erik Wender's abilities, attempted to infiltrate
Sharzhad on their own.
(Dark Avengers II#175) - Codenamed Pipeline 1, Erik Wender
was brought into the North African Desert in Sharzhad alongside the US
military ops unit codenamed Infidel Ops. As they neared the Sharzhad
capital city, ops agent Lighthouse radioed to check on the status of
Pipeline 1 and his fellow agent Lifeboat responded that Wender was
proceeding normally. Lighthouse remarked favorably on the situation,
commenting that Pipeline 1 needed to be functioning at full capacity.
When the unit was attacked by a large monster, Wender was knocked over a
small cliff and he ran for his life.
(Dark Avengers II#181 (fb)) - With the military having
failed in their mission, F.A.C.T. viewed footage of the escaping Erik
Wender and opted to take advantage of the situation by getting Wender
into a position where he could transfer Sultan Magus' unlimited energy
to his brother Lars at the Raft.
(Dark Avengers II#175 - BTS) - Having recently taken the Dark Avengers into Raft custody, F.A.C.T. freed them to act as a new team of Thunderbolts to retrieve Wender from Sharzhad, albeit with a secret secondary mission.
(Dark Avengers II#179 (fb) - BTS) - F.A.C.T. revealed to
the Dark Avengers that their true goal in retrieving Erik Wender was to
get him into Sultan Magus' palace to absorb the Sultan's energy source.
(Dark Avengers II#177 (fb) - BTS) - To help the Dark Avengers track down Erik Wender, F.A.C.T. provided the Dark Avenger Toxie Doxie with some of Wender's belongings.
(Dark Avengers II#178 (fb) - BTS) - F.A.C.T. also provided
Toxie Doxie with a vial of Wender's blood.
(Dark Avengers II#177 - BTS) - After Luke Cage, suspicious
but unaware of F.A.C.T.'s true motives, inserted himself into the Dark
Avengers' mission as appointed head of the Thunderbolts, F.A.C.T. was
forced to partially reveal the Dark Avengers' mission to retrieve Wender
from Sharzhad. Briefed only on Wender's powers and Sultan Magus, Cage
mistakenly concluded that Sultan Magus planned to use Wender's abilities
to funnel his energy source anywhere in the world. Soon after, Cage, his
ally Skaar and the Dark Avengers were teleported to Sharzhad, where the
Dark Avengers' Toxie Doxie cast a spell using some of Wender's
belongings to track Wender's essence. The spell was successfull and
Toxie Doxie sensed Wender in a northeastern direction.
(Dark Avengers II#178 - BTS) - Following an attack for
trespassing by monsters generated by Sultan Magus, Cage and the Dark
Avengers realized that the Sultan was attempting to tire them out and
Toxie Doxie refocused her attention towards locating Wender. Pulling out
a vial of Wender's blood, Toxie Doxie used the genetic sample to better
pinpoint Wender's location and the Dark Avengers rushed off on their
own, leaving Cage and Skaar behind to suspect the Dark Avengers were
enacting some sort of secret plan.
(Dark Avengers II#179) - As F.A.C.T. observed the Dark Avengers' mission from afar, remarking on how the team needed to get Wender into Sultan Magus' palace to accomplish the goal he "made for," the Dark Avengers found Wender cowering amidst a large group of rocks. When the Dark Avengers blasted the rocks away, Erik Wender tried to flee but the Dark Avenger Trick Shot tangled Wender's legs with a bola arrow. Trick Shot then gave Wender some water and Toxie Doxie questioned whether Wender could accomplish his original mission there in his current condition.
(Dark Avengers II#180) - Tired of Luke Cage and Skaar
interfering in his country, Sultan Magus attacked them, unaware that the
Dark Avengers had taken advantage of the Sultan's distraction to break
into his palace with Erik Wender. Once inside, Wender immediately sensed
the massive underground energy source empowering the Sultan and the Dark
Avengers brought tunneled their way to the energy source, unaware that the
Thunderbolts' Mach-IV had uncovered part of F.A.C.T.'s true mission at the
Raft. Finding the energy source in a Rigellian subspace pocket, the Dark
Avengers brought Wender into the pocket and goaded him into giving in to
his genetic disposition to absorb and transfer the energy. Touching the
energy source to absorb a small amount of it, Erik Wender ultimately
leaped fully into the energy itself.
(Dark Avengers II#181) - As Erik Wender was inside the Rigellian energy source, Sultan Magus arrived to stop Wender but the Dark Avengers engaged the Sultan to buy Wender more time. While Wender was transferring some of the energy his brother Lars, Thunderbolts Mach-IV and Songbird, along with the Avenger Hank Pym, defeated and apprehended the three senior F.A.C.T. agents Doyle, Kell and Marin. The trio were forced to reveal their true plans to harness Sultan Magus' energies using Wender and the heroes departed for Sharzhad to stop the energy transfer.
(Dark Avengers II#182) - Several of Earth's mightiest heroes converged on
the Sharzhad palace and Songbird and Mach-IV regrouped with Luke Cage and
Skaar, informing them of F.A.C.T.'s plot to transfer Sultan Magus' energy
using the Wender twins. Erik Wender continued the energy transfer to Lars
with no sign of stopping, prompting the Dark Avengers to grow concerned.
When Cage busted into the subspace pocket with warnings that the Wenders'
energy transfer would destroy the entire planet, the Dark Avengers
attempted to stop him but they were defeated with the help of the
Thunderbolts. The heroes then focused on how to stop Erik Wender from
transferring energy but their attempts to stop the transfer failed,
prompting the Thunderbolt Centurius to grab one of Skaar's swords and
impale Erik Wender. Erik's death stopped the energy transfer mere minutes
before a cataclysmic event occurred.
Comments: Created by Jeff Parker and Declan
Shalvey.
With Erik Wender codenamed Pipeline 1, it seems likely but not confirmed that his brother Lars was Pipeline 2.
I'm aware that the main image in this profile is actually an image of Erik Wender's psychic essence rather than the actual Erik Wender but it was the best full body image of Wender available. Most of the time he was only seen sitting down or from the waist up. On a similar note, he seemed to appear very different between issues as he was drawn by different artists. Declan Shalvey alone drew him as an adult while Kev Walker and Declan Shalvey together drew him to appear much younger, probably in his late teens or early twenties. Finally, Neil Edwards' art made him appear to be older, resembling more a man in his early 40s. Given that Wender was referred to as "boy" at one point, I'd lean more towards him being in his late teens-early twenties...
Speaking of artistic differences, Wender's costume seemed to change issue by issue. In Dark Avengers II#175 & #179, Wender wore dual-shaded red costume, as seen in the above images, but in #180, he appeared to be naked as a jaybird (see above image of him listening to the ground). In issue#181-182, he appeared to be wearing a two-toned gray costume despite appearing to be naked prior to jumping into the Rigellian energy source. So either he stripped down between the Dark Avengers finding them and the group arriving at Sultan Magus' palace then somehow spontaneously generated a gray costume after being stabbed by Centurius, or the artist and/or colorist made a mistake...
This profile was completed on 10/26/2023, but its publication was delayed as it was intended for the Appendix 25th anniversary's celebratory event
Profile by Proto-Man.
CLARIFICATIONS:
Pipeline 1 should be distinguished from:
Appearances:
Dark Avengers II#175 (August, 2012) - Jeff Parker (writer), Declan
Shalvey (art), Tom Brennan (editor)
Dark Avengers II#177 (September, 2012) - Jeff Parker (writer), Kev
Walker, Declan Shalvey (art), Tom Brennan (editor)
Dark Avengers II#178 (September, 2012) - Jeff Parker (writer), Kev
Walker, Declan Shalvey (art), Tom Brennan (editor)
Dark Avengers II#179 (October, 2012) - Jeff Parker (writer), Gabriel
Hernandez Walta, Kev Walker (art), Tom Brennan (editor)
Dark Avengers II#180 (November, 2012) - Jeff Parker (writer), Neil
Edwards (pencils), Terry Pallot (inks), Tom Brennan (editor)
Dark Avengers II#181 (November, 2012) - Jeff Parker (writer), Neil
Edwards (pencils), Terry Pallot (inks), Tom Brennan (editor)
Dark Avengers II#182 (December, 2012) - Jeff Parker (writer), Neil
Edwards (pencils), Terry Pallot (inks), Tom Brennan (editor)
First posted: 09/15/2026
Last updated: 10/26/2023
Any Additions/Corrections? please let me know.
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