Captain Frederick Skylar, or Sky Captain as many people jokingly refer to him (much to his confusion and annoyance) is a true old-timey gentleman who seems like he was plucked right out of the 1940’s despite only being in his sixties.
This retired RAF veteran was chosen to be the test pilot for a new type of wing-frame developed by the Ministry of Defence. At least they said they developed it. It was really an almost complete rip-off of the wing-frame developed by the original Freedom Eagle, the current Freedom Eagle’s grandfather. Michael O’Connor’s lawyers were on the MOD’s case as soon as the first prototype wings were built and given to the Captain to test. The whole project was tied up in red tape while the legal fiasco was sorted out. O’Connor, while he didn’t want his invention to be used by the military for use in their wars, did have quite a soft spot for Fred and knew that he would only use the prototype wing-frame for good so he allowed him to keep using it as long as he promised to only use it to protect others. Which he did for several years.
The legal case between O’Connor and the MOD became so much of a headache and ultimately a waste of time that they decided to scrap the project rather than waste more money on fighting a legal battle.
After defending his home country for several years with the wing-frame, Captain Skylar decided it was time to retire. He attempted to return the wing-frame to Michael O’Connor (It was the honourable thing to do after all) but O’Connor had sadly passed away by that point so Fred attempted instead to give the wings to his son, Michael Jr. Unfortunately, the younger O’Connor wanted nothing to do with his fathers superhero life, wings included, and told Fred to keep them.
Fred was both honoured and slightly annoyed by this.
He put the wings in private storage, only occasionally pulling them out when he had need of them to protect the UK or its people.
Over the years, Fred met and became good friends with the original Paladin, Invictus’ father, and the two shared many an adventure both before and after retirement. That blasted retirement never sat well with the Captain so when Paladin offered him a part time job at the Horizon Academy to help train the new generation of British Superheroes, Fred practically jumped at the opportunity.
Unfortunately, only two years later, Paladin was killed.
The whole world grieved the loss of a legend, the captain included. He had to maintain a stiff upper lip though as Horizon fell into chaos with the loss of their founder and headmaster. Fred was largely responsible for keeping things together for the next year. When things finally began to return to normal, many of the students and faculty suggested that Fred take over as official headmaster. Fred was initially hesitant to take on the role of his old friend but Invictus convinced him that it’s what Paladin would have wanted. So the Captain accepted.
Captain Skylar is still headmaster of Horizon Academy today. While he occasionally has a tendency to run the school like an army and its students his soldiers, he more often than not catches himself doing this and stops.
The captain is largely responsible for training many of Britain’s best and brightest young heroes and he looks at them all as the children that he and his wife never had. The feeling is often mutual and Invictus, Whisper, Pulse and many more would be at his side in an instant if he ever needed their help.
Fred enjoys his life as headmaster of Horizon Academy and feels this is where he belongs but he has to admit that every now and then he feels the urge to put those wings back on and go punch some bad guys himself…..He’s not ruling it out entirely yet.
