The Brat Pack (Throughout the 1980s and Beyond)
Inception - This League set itself apart from many of its predecessors in several aspects. First, unlike other Leagues throughout history, it served no government, nor did it have a powerful patron that sponsored it. In fact, due to the anarchist leanings of its leader, and her history with dealing with less than helpful institutions, the League was in many ways explicitly anti-authoritarian, much preferring to deal with crises their own way without outside interference that they deemed untrustworthy. This tendency towards rebelliousness would become more prominent as the League would go on and clash with forces aligned with the conservative governments of the 1980s.
Second, while the League was primarily fixed in the 1980s, it did not go through the decade linearly. Instead, due to the League's access to a time machine (and lack of government restrictions on how they could use it, unlike the 1988 American League led by Dr. Emmett Brown), the group frequently leaped from one year in the decade to another during their adventures. As a result, trying to determine how long the League lasted chronologically is something of a pointless exercise, which this chronicle will not entertain.
Finally, the very reason for the team's existence was extraordinary even by League standards. Brought together by Dorothy McShane, or Ace, as she preferred to be called, it was formed as a consequence of a cosmic-level conflict known only as the Last Great Time War. Ace saw how the intergalactic conflict was putting the Earth in jeopardy through temporal ripple effects, a sort of cosmic fallout that was primarily affecting her 'home' decade of the 1980s. These ripples distorted humanity's collective timeline, creating dangerous branching points in time that if not dealt with would create countless nightmarish and dystopian futures for the entire human race.
Ace begged the Time Lords, all-powerful alien stewards of time, to shield her home from these aftershocks, but her pleas were ignored as unimportant to the larger war. With the Time Lords unwilling to help, and her mentor "The Professor" long-missing, Ace was forced to seek allies of her own. Thus, the Brat Pack was formed, a group of mostly young adults whom Ace met mostly at random, trying to fix a problem that no one else seemed willing to confront or believe in.
Members
Dorothy "Ace" McShane - Time's Vigilante, the Seventh's Ward, and Ace, are just some of the monikers that this brash young time traveler had been known to use over the years. Originally just a teenage girl from London, England, Ace became a companion of the infamous Doctor during one of the alien's many time-travelling adventures. She spent years traveling with him but eventually grew disillusioned with the man after his constant lies and manipulations led to the death of someone she cared for. Afterwards, she traveled alone across the universe until her wandering led her to the Time Lord homeworld of Gallifrey, where she became the first human to enroll in their legendary Time Academy. Joining the Gallifreyan temporal policing service known as the Celestial Intelligence Agency after graduating, Ace tried to adhere to the rules of the CIA but found them just as stifling and controlling as her old mentor. This tension eventually came to a head when the Time Lords refusal to listen to her fears about the Earth's safety forced her to abandon the agency. Stealing a TARDIS, a highly advanced and spatially impossible time machine far beyond what human chrononauts like Dr. Emmett Brown or Jacob von Hogflume could imagine, Ace returned to Earth and formed the Brat Pack. Even after all her experiences and adventures through time, Ace was still at heart a rebellious and opinionated young woman, whose tough, streetwise exterior, and love for making explosives, hid a great compassion for the downtrodden.
Leroy Green - A martial artist from New York City, Leroy had achieved the final level of martial arts mastery after confronting and defeating the once infamous Kung-Fu master and gang leader Sho'Nuff, the Shogun of Harlem. This allowed him to tap into "The Glow," a physically empowering mystical chi energy not too dissimilar to the supernatural abilities used by other famous martial artists, such as Danny Rand and Shang-Chi. Leroy himself was a kind and thoughtful young man with a sincere respect for Chinese culture and a personal admiration of Bruce Lee, who he considered his role model. Leroy joined the Brat Pack after Ace helped him permanently disband the Gramercy Riffs, which had been taken over by his old nemesis Sho'Nuff, who had planned on using the gang, and its many criminal allies, in a plot to first take his revenge against Leroy and then move on to take over the entire city as the Duke of New York.
Alex Rogan - One of last of the once great Starfighters, this ace GunStar pilot, had once just been an average teenager living a mostly dead-end existence. That was until his high score in a video game got him noticed by the Star League, a united federation of planets dedicated to mutual defense from intergalactic threats, who had used the game as a secret scouting tool. While at first hesitant about getting involved in an intergalactic war that he knew little about, Alex took to being a Starfighter naturally, saving the Star League from the invading Ko-Dan Armada and even deciding to stay in space and rebuild the Starfighters. Alex first met Ace when she was still traveling with the Doctor, the two having helped save the entire Star League from a plot concocted by the despot Ming the Merciless. When she asked Alex to join her own budding League he was initially torn between his duties to the Star League and his desire to protect his former home, but eventually chose to aid Ace in her mission, believing correctly that it wouldn't be long until the worlds of the Star League were affected by the consequences of the Time War.
Charlene "Charlie" McGee - The child of two former university students who had gained meta-human abilities after unknowingly volunteering in a secret government experiment, Charlie had inherited both of her parent's powers and much more, being capable of mind control, telepathy, telekinesis, precognition, and most strikingly pyrokinesis. Unfortunately, despite the best efforts of her parents to live a normal life, her abilities caught the attention of "The Shop," the very government organization that had given her parents their powers in the first place. Determined to use Charlie for military purposes, the Shop's agents tracked her family down, murdering her mother and capturing her and her father. She eventually managed to escape the Shop's facility, but not without her father sacrificing himself to ensure her escape. Afterwards, Charlie tried to expose the Shop's and the government's wrongdoings but found major publications were either unwilling to believe her or were too afraid of backlash to run her story. Defeated, alone, and believing she was the only one willing to stop the Shop, Charlie went on her own private crusade against them, tracking down their remaining facilities and destroying them one by one. It was ultimately an encounter with Ace in 1984, where she talked Charlie out of destroying the once Shop-affiliated Hawkins Institute, that she realized that she'd be able to do more good as part of a team than alone. While the youngest member of the Brat Pack, Charlie was without a doubt the most powerful, her growing psychic powers making her nigh-invincible. In terms of personality, she was more intelligent, determined and serious-minded than most kids her age.
Thomas "Tommy" Jarvis - This young man was possibly the closest thing the infamous Slasher of Crystal Lake had to a persistent adversary. Having not only survived an encounter with the legendary serial killer back when he was a child, Tommy would be one of the few people to survive not one but three bouts with the camp-stalking slasher. Regrettably, a cavalier attempt to ensure the slasher was dead for good would ironically lead to his resurrection and metamorphose into the more familiar undead menace that would plague Crystal Lake for decades to come. Guilt-ridden by his mistake, Tommy dedicated his life to containing Jason whenever the undead threat reappeared to stake Crystal Lake, becoming an incredibly capable and crafty fighter as he repeatedly faced off against the monster. Knowing that such a fearless and knowledgeable hunter of the supernatural would be ideal for her League given the varied threats she believed it would encounter, Ace sought out Tommy for recruitment. While at first apprehensive about leaving his station at Crystal Lake, Ace's reassurances that the TARDIS would allow him to return right back to the time he left eventually won him over. As a part of the League, Tommy was a determined and fearless compatriot despite lacking the supernatural abilities or alien gadgetry of his friends.
Johnny Five - A robot created for military purposes that had become self-aware after being struck by lightning, Johnny 5 was, in the philosophical sense anyway, alive. Created by NOVA Labs, a prominent military tech company that in the 80s managed to rival both the veteran Stark Industries and fellow newcomer Cyberdyne Systems for a time due to its profitable contract with the US military, Johnny had escaped from their research lab shortly after becoming self-aware. Meeting friendly humans who not only accepted him as a sentient being, but even helped him fight off NOVA Labs when they wanted to capture and reprogram him, the A.I. had been laying low at a one of his new friends secluded cabins for some time when Ace showed up at his door with an offer to join her League, stating that she needed someone with advanced technical know-how and that he'd get to experience the world like never before. Unbeknownst to Johnny at the time Ace had ulterior motives for recruiting him, which this chronicle will explain in detail later on. Johnny was decidedly the most carefree and jovial member of the Brat Pack, his comedic nature and childlike wonder at anything new making him the group's collective sidekick.
Team Dynamics - True Companions. Despite their disparate origins, experiences, and talents, the Brat Pack worked well together throughout the entirety of its existence and is likely one of the most cohesive Leagues ever formed. Much of this camaraderie can be chalked up to the fact that unlike many of the Leagues that came before them or after, Brat Pack were friends first and colleagues in a League second. In fact, when not on strange adventures they would socialize amongst each other like normal teenagers and young adults, using Ace's TARDIS as not only their mobile headquarters, but also as a shared home where they'd engage in a variety of activities like partying, having movie nights, and even playing early tabletop RPGs together. This laidback atmosphere was directly encouraged by Ace, who despite technically being the leader of the League refused the title and preferred that major decisions be made together as a group.
Adventures
- Going to Tromaville, New Jersey, and teaming up with the town's local superhero, the misshapen but benign Toxic Avenger, to defeat a horde of man-eating mutants. Originally from the radioactive sewers of New York City, these mutants migrated to Tromaville in a plot to recoup their numbers by sabotaging the town's nuclear plant and causing a meltdown that would mutate the community's already mutation-prone residents. If successfully, it would have been the first in a series of events that would have led to World War III. Fortunately, thanks to Johnny and the Toxic Avenger delivering one of Ace's explosives to the mutant's heavily contaminated underground den, such a nightmarish future was avoided. (1984)
- Crashing a Battle of the Bands on Halloween night in the formerly puritanical small town of Bomont. The town's wild youth had invited several relative unknowns, like the always ahead of their time Pinheads, Taekwondo practicing members of Dragon Sound, and the stoner duo Wyld Stallyns, to their high school to perform only for them, and the musicians, to become possessed by the demonic spirits of the heavy metal rock star, Sammi Curr, and his literal bride from Hell, Mary Lou. After an attempt at physically attacking, and then blowing up, the two spirits failed due to their incorporeal nature, the Brat Pack regrouped and used the TARDIS to quickly travel to New York City to get the aid of a quartet of parapsychologists. Even with their help the fight was hard fought and only ended when Tommy used his resourcefulness to come up with a plan. Using the high school's sprinkler system, the Brat Pack were able to spray the possessed teens and musicians with holy water all at once, putting an end to the mass possession and allowing the parapsychologists to freely capture Sammi and Mary Lou. Notably, it was this early adventure where the Brat Pack got their name, having been called such sarcastically by the leader of the parapsychologists. Ace and the rest of the group took the insult in stride and appropriated it for lack of a better name. (1989)
- While the Brat Pack rarely used the TARDIS to time travel outside the 1980s due to Ace's fear of accidentally messing up the past or being trapped in a possible future, they did make a few noteworthy exceptions and traveled into several of the very dystopian futures they wished to prevent: Travelling to the ruins of Neo-Tokyo in 2019, they helped a young psychic girl by the name of Kei escape from her country's fascist government. This act of kindness ultimately backfired though when Kei powers overwhelmed her just like it did all the other psychics of her timeline. In another possible 2019, they tried to discover a way to extend the lifespans of a genetic slave caste but found that even with the advanced medical science of Gallifrey and the Star League there was nothing to be done. Surprisingly, their most successful mission in the future was an excursion to a post-apocalyptic wasteland in Australia. There they meet a small tribe of semi-feral children who had taken up residence in the ruins of Sydney. While the children were at first apprehensive about receiving the Brat Pack's help, they eventually accepted them and let the group educate them about the "Old World" and how to make their small community thrive.
- Using Leroy's knowledge of the world of martial arts and Chinese culture, the Brat Pack foiled the nefarious plans of Lo Pan, a twice-dead sorcerer from ancient China. Seeking to regain a physical form, Lo Pan sought to possess the body of a great warrior and thus sponsored an underground martial arts tournament in San Francisco's Chinatown, wherein the final victor would end being his host. Knowing the only way to make Lo Pan reveal himself in the open, and thus leave him susceptible to "borrowed" spirit-trapping tech, was by participating in the tournament, Leroy entered it himself. While he was successful in defeating former U.S. Army Captain Frank Dux, and the wannabe ninja Joe Armstrong, Leroy unexpectedly lost to Daniel LaRusso's signature crane kick. Realizing that the young martial artist was doomed without his help, Leroy tried to convince Daniel that Lo Pan's prize was nothing of the sort but found that he was unwilling to listen until his former mentor, Keisuke Miyagi, was convinced himself. Together, the trio of martial artists, along with the rest of the Brat Pack and the other contestants of the tournament, were able to banish Lo Pan's legions of demonic servants and permanently seal away the sorcerer's evil spirit once and for all. (1986)
- Receiving a telepathetic cry for help from Derry, Maine thanks to Charlie's abilities, the Brat Pack ended up joining forces with another group investigating the mysterious call. Informally calling themselves the Party, this group was led by another young psychic girl by the name of Elle who's life very much mirrored Charlie's. While both girls were overjoyed to meet someone with similar powers, they both quickly realized that neither of them had sent the call for help. Sensing the psychic transmission was somewhere underneath the town, Charlie was convinced that there was a hidden Shop facility down in the town's sewers, though Elle felt more wary about going down there for reasons she could not explain. These worries turned out to be correct as there was no secret Shop facility and no psychic child in need of help. The telepathic cry that Charlie and Elle had felt was a deception orchestrated by a shapeshifting creature that Ace would later surmise to have been a creature from "Todash Space," a nightmarish realm of infinite nothingness that existed between universes and was inhabited by abominations so monstrous and powerful that even the Time Lords feared to tread there. The creature sought to consume a "shining child" in a bid to quickly regenerate from the wounds it suffered in a recent battle with another group of children that managed to harm it. Fortunately, the monster did not anticipate its intended victims to bring friends. Thus, when it tried its typical predatory tactics it found itself unable to sufficiently terrify its resilient quarry. The creature was desperate though, and might have succeed in devouring Charlie, who was temporarily mesmerized when it took the form of her deceased father, if not for arrival of Carrie White, who was in the area and had also sensed the psychic cry but knew it to be a trap due to her experience with the supernatural forces that stalked Maine. Since she was momentarily delayed dealing with zombies in the nearby town of Ludlow, she could only send a psychic transmission of own, warning the other psychics of the danger, a warning that only Elle picked up. Together, the three psychics were able to concentrate their powers and immolate the shapeshifter, seemingly destroying it for good. Afterwards, all parties involved had a celebration for the victory. Alex took a few of Elle's friends on a ride on the GunStar, while Ace offered them the chance to play a game of DnD using an edition from the future. Charlie, Elle, and Carrie discussed the differing tactics they used to control their powers and how their powers might be all connected to experiments done by the Shop. Carrie also told Ace of the existence of another League of youths led by her former League of Extraordinary Investigators teammate, Velma Dinkley. Ultimately, all three parties departed, but not before promising to keep contact with one another and swearing to come to the other's defense whenever they were in need. (1989)
- Encountering and allying with the Mystery League, a group of young paranormal investigators, to track down a group of vampires exsanguinating people all across New Mexico. At first the two teams got along quite well, with Charlie bonding with the Mystery League's own psychic, Tina Shepard, and informing her of the existence of others like them and Ace getting advice on leadership from Velma Dinkley. This comradery momentarily ceased when the two teams found their quarry and discovered that the bloodthirsty vampires they were hunting were children. For the Mystery League this wasn't the first time they had encountered child-monsters and though they explained to the Brat Pack that they would take no joy from it that they had to destroy the creatures. The Brat Pack were unconvinced and called out the other League for having a werewolf on their team and yet not considering him worthy of destruction. Ace argued that the children might be cured using Time Lord technology created during a Gallifreyan conflict with "Great Vampires," though even she admitted it was a long shot. Dinkley was sympathetic to Ace's convictions but informed her that a cure for the children was impossible given that they had already killed and as consequence were damned. Ace refused to accept this explanation and warned the Mystery League of what would happen if they tried to kill the children. While accounts vary on who made the first move (this chronicle estimates that Edgar Frog of the Mystery League was the most likely culprit given his extreme hatred of vampires) the two Leagues clashed, both with the intent of simply disabling on the other. Unfortunately, the two League were equally matched, with Charlie and Tina both straining themselves using their psychic powers on one another, Leroy and Scott Howard dueling to a stalemate with their supernatural powers, and Alex and Edgar getting into an old-fashioned brawl. Ultimately, the question of which League would come out on top would be moot as the two vampire children used the fight as an opportunity to attack a distracted Dinkley. Ironically enough, it was Ace who saved the aging investigator, using one of Edgar's dropped stakes to quickly impale both vampires. In the aftermath, both Leagues made their apologies and promised to maintain contact with each other in case another threat warranting both their attentions cropped up, though their relationship was never as warm as it was when they first met. (1986)
- Freeing kidnapped Colorado teenagers from Project: Red Dawn, a virtual reality scenario meant to brainwash American youths into accepting Red Scare paranoia. Created by the Reagan administration as a "necessary evil," the simulation used the sensory transfer technology of Project: Brainstorm, an early form of benign virtual reality technology that was re-purposed for military use, and the appropriated mind control techniques of G.I. Joe nemesis, Dr. Brian Binder, to force its teenage victims to live out a horrific, if highly improbable, scenario, where the United States is invaded by an alliance of Soviet and Cuban paratroopers and they must take up arms against as child guerrilla soldiers. The Brat Pack's destruction of Project: Red Dawn's central indoctrination facility in Calumet, Colorado, and leaking of the facility's activities to a young Edison Carter, is what ultimately started their less than cordially, and often violent, relationship with the Reagan government, and other right-wing Western governments in the 80s. (1984)
- Avoiding several attempts at capture, or outright execution, at the hand's various conservative government agencies and operatives, who either wanted to stop their "terrorist" actions or sought to seize or study the powerful technologies and individuals (Leroy, Charlie, and Johnny especially) the League possessed. The most effective mixed task force of the United States at the time, the G.I. Joe Team was frequently sent to apprehend the Brat Pack. Led by their field commander, Conrad S. Hauser, a squad of Joes almost succeed in capturing them outside Hawkins, Indiana, when they were just leaving the town in the GunStar after visiting friends there. Shooting down the GunStar using a VAMP Mark II and leaving the Brat Pack stranded and barely alive in a remote country pumpkin patch, the Joes would have likely succeeded in their mission if not for Charlie using the full extent of her powers and freezing the minds of the Joes just long enough for the Brat Pack to escape. The effort almost killed her though, and the League was forced to seek the help of Carrie White to treat her psychic exertion. While this was the closest the Joe Team ever came to capturing the group, there were several other violent encounters. The most notable being Alex's dogfight with G.I. Joe ace pilot Brad J. Armbruster and Leroy's near-fatal single combat with the Joe Team's mysterious ninja operative, Snake Eyes. The Brat Pack also ran afoul of the United Kingdom's two major alien-hunting agencies, the mostly benign U.N.I.T and the morally compromised and xenophobic Torchwood Institute, the latter of the pair frequently attempted to capture Ace's TARDIS for study, and Ace herself due to her connection to the Doctor and half-Time Lord nature. Lastly, the 1988 American League of Extraordinary Gentlemen was once ordered by Reagan to neutralize the Brat Pack but given that the youths had secretly saved the American League when they were trapped in the cyber-realm of Tron, they deliberately failed to catch them. Eventually, the frustrated president decided the whole pursuit was a waste of taxpayer money and not worth the effort for catching "Just a bunch of anarchist punks," and stopped sending teams after them. (1981-1989)
- Travelling to the Land of Fiction and being tasked by Dream of the Endless, the Childlike Empress, and the Dungeon Master, with protecting the lands of imagination from the predations of the Nothing, a cosmic embodiment of despair and disbelief that sought to consume it all. Dubbed the Dream Warriors by the trinity, the Brat Pack went on an epic quest that saw them clash with the Nothing's greatest minions. They traversed the Labyrinth and overcame the trials of the Goblin King Jareth, prevented the dream demon Freddy Krueger from murdering Bastian Bux in his dreams, and even managed to defeat the self-proclaimed Lord of Darkness before he could kill the Last Unicorn. These successes would force the Nothing and its remaining to make one last bid to destroy the Land of Fiction by trying to slay its greatest deity, the depressed Master of the Land, in his citadel. Shockingly, it would be Johnny 5 telling the Master of the Land a good-natured joke while the rest of the Brat Pack held back the legions of the Nothing that would rouse the entity back to action and banish the Nothing and his armies from the Land of Fiction once and for all.
- Going to New York City to visit Leroy's friends and family only to get sucked into a conflict with two competing ninja clans and the hyperviolent Vigilante League. The successor to the 70s group of antiheroes, this League was no less violent than its predecessor. Led by the 70s iteration's surviving member Paul Kersey and supported by the mysterious Star Chamber organization, the second League of NYC-based crime fighters was comprised of a flamethrower-wielding Vietnam vet, an increasing deranged former New York attorney turned violent superhero known as the Vigilante, a so-called "Equaliser" who was once an elite agent of a clandestine US intelligence organization, and a young sports enthusiast by the name of Casey Jones who's use of sports gear for weaponry and relative inexperience made him a "rookie" among the vigilantes. The group had already made a name for themselves on the street having been the ones who brought the deranged yuppie serial killer Patrick Bateman to justice, brought down several Maggia drug operations, and forced the underground CHUD mutants to flee to Tromaville but it would be their mission to destroy the notorious Foot Clan and the Hand that would see them run into trouble with the Brat Pack. Using Leroy's local connections, the Brat Pack learned of a rumble between the two rival ninja clans, one meant to test the worthiness of street youths who wished to join their ranks, and attempted to intervene for the sake of the misguided teens there. The Vigilante League on the other hand were determined to wipe out all the "punks" with extreme prejudice, the only exception being Jones who saw the mission as a bridge too far. When the Leagues unexpectedly found each other facing off as the rumble started, it was Casey Jones of all people who tried to end hostilities before they could start, having recognized Leroy as a local hero. While the Brat Pack was willing to listen and avoid violence, especially after their run-in with the Mystery League, the rest of the Vigilantes could not be gainsaid and opened fire on the rumble. Fortunately, thanks to Charlie's telekinetic abilities, a slaughter was avoided, forcing the Vigilantes sans Jones to flee into the night. With them gone, the Brat Pack and Jones were able to talk down the frightened youths and get them to expose their ninja masters. The Vigilante League on the other hand would seemingly disappear with their NYC headquarters abandoned and their shadowy Star Chamber handlers also having fled to parts unknown. (1988)
- One daunting adventure had the Brat Pack frantically search for Johnny 5 after he suddenly disappeared from the TARDIS. As it turned out, Ace was already prepared for such a disappearance having known all along that Johnny was fated to be one day taken by one of the many robotics corporations of the era and used as the basis for a genocidal A.I.'s neural matrix. As a result, Ace installed Johnny with a tracker knowing that it would lead her to the lab where the A.I. would be conceived. While Charlie, Leroy, and Alex were less than thrilled by this deception they nevertheless still used the tracker to find their friend in Cyberdyne Systems branch office in Detroit. Their plan to rescue him didn't go as planned, however, as it turned out Johnny was not the only robot captured by Cyberdyne Systems. An android named V.I.C.I was also kidnapped by the tech company causing her creator Ted Lawson, a lesser known robotics engineer working for Cyberdyne's rival United Robotronics, to seek the aid of the infamous hyper-violent cyborg vigilante Robo-Cop to find her. Regrettably for the Brat Pack he found her at just the same time they did Johnny. Using his datalink to clandestine FBI, CIA, and G.I. Joe watchlists, he identified the Brat Pack as terrorists and opened fire on the group. If not for Charlie's telekinetic powers and Leroy's legendary bullet-catching skills, Ace, Alex, and Ash would have died almost instantaneously in a hail of gunfire. Fortunately, they were saved from this battle by another one suddenly getting in the way. Corporate espionage had tipped off both Omni Consumer Products and NOVA Labs to Cyberdyne having managed to capture not one, but two sentient robots, one which was the latter's former asset. Both corporations had sent agents to infiltrate Cyberdyne's Detroit office and take the robots for themselves. With these agents suddenly engaging with each other and both would-be rescuers, it became clear to both Robo-Cop and the Brat Pack that this new element demanded a temporary alliance until both squads of corporate operatives were dealt with. After eliminating the agents, destroying the lab, and escaping with Johnny and V.I.C.I, Robo-Cop thanked the reunited Brat Pack for assisting him in his mission but pressed that if they returned to Detroit "There will be trouble," a threat that the youths took seriously. Johnny for his part was, perhaps unsurprisingly, largely unaffected by the revelation of Ace's secret motives for getting him to join the League, stating that he understood her reasons. That said, he was noted to have reiterated a phrase he had picked up during the League's adventures, "Friends don't lie," something that Ace dedicated herself to standing by after the mission. (1987)
- Given the more laidback nature of the Brat Pack, the group routinely traveled for recreational purposes, using the TARDIS or the GunStar to go to fantastical places to meet interesting individuals and groups. For instance, they went to sunny Beach City to visit the beautiful Crystal Temple there and attempt to catch a glimpse of the strange aliens that inhabited it. Similarly, they braved the stinking sewers of New York City to try and find a quartet of reptilian mutants that were apparently behind the defeat of infamous ninja crime Lord Shredder but found nothing but rotten pizza slices and mutated homeless people for their efforts. The Brat Pack tended to be more successful in their explorations whenever they joined forces with other extraordinary groups. Together with Buckaroo Banzai's Hong Kong Cavaliers, a band that the Brat Pack became familiar with after helping them take down the supervillains of the World Crime League, they managed to temporarily open a gateway to the Upside Down and for a time to explore the strange parallel dimension. Fortunately, it did not take long for both groups to regret the experiment and cease further explorations. In another joint case with Velma Dinkley's Mystery League, they were able to explore the mysteries of the Afterlife and even meet the famous dead. Lastly, the League frequently traveled to the seemingly mundane towns like Hawkins, Indiana, and Derry, Maine, along with more fantastic worlds such as Eternia, Third Earth, and Fantasia in the Land of Fiction, to visit the many friends and allies they had made during their various adventures through time and space. (1980-1989)
- Possibly the single most important adventure the Brat Pack was ever involved with was saving the entire Earth, and who knows how many other planets, from the world-eater Unicron. As the Time War between the Time Lords and Daleks began to escalate, both factions started to recruit other alien species to serve as proxies and fodder for their conflict. One of these auxiliaries ended up being Unicron, the monstrous Cybertronian god of entropy, who was forcefully made a giant Dalek-slave unit by the Daleks creator and master Davros. Using the god-machine as a living weapon of planetary destruction, Davros planned on testing Unicron's destructive capabilities by destroying the homeworld of his archenemy's favorite species before using it to annihilate Gallifrey. Finding out about Earth's pending extermination through her former colleagues in the C.I.A., Ace tried to contact the Doctor, but as always, she was unable to reach him. Realizing that the Time Lords wouldn't bother to help save the Earth either, Ace and the Brat Pack put out a rallying cry across known space and beyond asking for allies to come to the Earth's defense. They called in old debts and sought the help of old friends, traveling to numerous worlds in the short time they had. All in all, the Brat Pack gathered one of the largest, and most diverse, fleets of spacecraft ever brought together in one place. While listing absolutely all the individuals, groups and planetary governments that heeded the Brat Pack's call for help would be impossible for this chronicle, it will still list the most remarkable ones that made their appearance; The Star League government, of course, was more than willing to help defend the homeworld of their greatest pilot and was the first of the Brat Pack's stellar allies to lend support in the form it's still small force of Starfighters. Along with the Starfighters, the last remaining space-worthy ship of the once great Thunderean ThunderFleet, the Starship Eternia, the Silverhawks attack craft Miraj, John Blackstar's experimental proton-powered spaceship, the repaired Autobot flagship "The Ark," and the fleets of the Asogians, Black Lectroids, Melmacians, and even the incorporeal "Starmen" were all present to come to the Earth's defense. The Brat's Pack's plan was for Alex to lead the alliance and have it serve as a distraction for the enslaved Unicron and the fleet of Dalek escort ships that surrounded him while the rest of the Brat Pack used the TARDIS to teleport into the heart of god-machine, their goal being to find and destroy the shield generators that made Unicron almost invincible. With them gone Alex and the alliance would be able to destroy the Dalek command node that enslaved the planet-eater to Davros's will. Avoiding roving Daleks, the Brat Pack reached the shield generator's chamber only to be taken unawares by Davros and his Dalek guards. Davros knew about the Brat Pack's presence in Unicron from the very beginning but allowed them to believe they had outwitted him so he could relish seeing their hopes of success turned into the ultimate failure as he prepared Unicron to destroy their fleet and then the Earth. Fortunately, for the Brat Pack, the alliance, and all of humanity, Tommy was able to save the day by reciting a memorized passage from the Necronomicon, having secretly been studying the tome in an attempt to see if it could be used to finally destroy Jason Voorhees. Miraculously, the gambit worked with many of the Daleks being immediately possessed by demonic spirits. With Davros and his minions panicking and fighting their possessed counterparts, the Brat Pack used the opening to destroy the shield generators with one of Ace's Nitro-bombs and escape on the TARDIS. With the shields down, Alex and the fleet was finally able to attack the exposed Dalek command node, though it took Alex making a nigh-impossible shot to do so. When Unicron once again in control of his body he began to use his internal and external defenses to destroy the genocidal aliens that thought they could use him. Once he destroyed the Dalek escort ships, Unicron, to everyone's collective relief, did not continue towards the Earth but instead made for a new destination: Skaro. (1989)
Dissolution – Shortly after defeating the Daleks, Ace came to the realization that while humanity's proper future was finally secured, the dystopic divergent timelines largely no longer springing up, the Time War was only getting more intense and destructive for other parts of the universe. Believing the Time Lords couldn't be trusted to do their duty and protect the entire universe, but also unwilling to continue to endanger the lives of her friends in a war that she didn't know she, or anyone else for that matter, could really win, Ace tearfully decided to disband the League and fight the war by herself as Time Vigilante's.
Final Fates
As already mentioned, Ace went on to fight the Time War alone. Some say she once again traveled with the Doctor at some point in the conflict, but this chronicle has no hard evidence about what she did during the War, whether she did meet the Doctor again, or even if she's still alive.
Leroy returned to New York City, and after marrying his long-time girlfriend Laura, opened up his own dojo for poor families unable to afford typical dojo fees. Leroy quickly became a prominent community leader and was a significant influence in lowering local gang activity. He still lives in New York City to this day and has become something of an unmasked local hero in the same vein as Luke Cage or Shaft.
Alex went back to service the Star League and used his reputation as the Hero of the Battle of Sol to become a respected ambassador to the various different species that wished to join the rising Star League. As the Daleks and Time Lords rampaged across the universe, Alex and his Starfighters became an almost universal symbol of hope and resistance for the hundreds of alien species caught in the middle. Like Leroy, Alex eventually married his girlfriend Maggie. The two would go down in the annals of Star League history as two of the best pilots the Starfighters ever produced.
Charlie wasn't on her own for long after the Brat Pack disbanded. Making her way to Maine, she ended up being officially adopted by Carrie White and given a new identity. Together, the two explored the full capabilities of their psychic powers and many years later were able to finally expose the criminal activities of the Shop to the American public.
Tommy would return to his duties in Crystal Lake. While he would devote much of his time to watching for the return of Jason Voorhees, the capable survivor would still manage to become an ambulance driver and even marry his girlfriend Megan. While Tommy would never quite destroy the Slasher of Crystal Lake, though he would nearly do so during a grand teamup with Ash Williams and several other slasher survivors in the late 2000s, his wardenship would ensure that the monster would rarely stay active for long to rack up his massive body counts of old.
Johnny 5 would eventually succeed in proving his right to life as a sentient being in open court, a legal victory that would have several unexpected repercussions for other robots and androids, and for companies like Cyberdene and Nova Labs, for years to come. Regardless of those pitfalls, Johnny went on to become a major advocate for A.I. rights and a successful comedian as well.
Though they never did see Ace again, the remaining members of the Brat Pack did keep in contact with each as best they could and remained close friends even years after the disbandment of their League. If reports can be believed they even make the yearly effort of all meeting together and reminiscing about their adventures in the 80s and beyond.
Author's Note - Hey. I'm back. Sort of. Been working been on this off and on for a while now. Never was completely satisfied with the old version of the 80s League so decided to make a couple alternations here and there and add a few more adventures and swap out a League member. Not sure if this is actually better but it was fun tinkering with it. Hope it comes across as a fun read as well instead of just a retread.