Brigand

Origin

Brigand is a professional thief/assassin who has completed various thefts from superhuman individuals across the years, including breaking into the Fantastic Four's Baxter Building, stealing the handgun that Adolf Hitler used to commit suicide from a warlock, as well as stealing many security robots from possibly the Avengers Mansion or Stark Industries.

Creation

Brigand was created by writer Brian K. Vaughan and artist Marcos Martin. He first appeared in 2006's Doctor Strange: The Oath #1.

Major Story Arcs

The Oath

Nicodemus West hired Brigand to steal a mystical elixir from Doctor Strange that could potentially cure any known disease. As a precaution, West magically prevented Brigand from being able to reveal his employer to anyone, and implanted false memories in his mind of past foes of Strange.

Breaking into the Sanctum Sanctorum, Brigand introduced himself to Strange and demanded he hand over the elixir. Strange started throwing blasts of magic, but Brigand acrobatically evaded them with ease. He then pulled out Hitler's Walther P-38, the handgun he had committed suicide with. This act imbued it with powerful negative energy and allowed Brigand to pierce Strange's magic defenses by channeling its dark power through a silver bullet. Shooting Strange with the gun, Brigand stole the elixir and left the sorcerer for dead.

Brigand presented Nicodemus West with the elixir, but his employer didn't believe that Strange could be killed so easily. Brigand then tracked down a sample of the elixir that Strange had sent for further study to an old friend, killing the man, and getting rid of the sample.

His life saved by Night Nurse, Strange, Wong, and Night Nurse herself followed Brigand to a safe house hidden in a fold of reality and protected by a mystic security sigil. Night Nurse picked the lock, at which point several deadly security robots appeared. Strange and Wong made short work of the robots, but then Brigand appeared, holding Night Nurse hostage with Hitler's gun.

At a seeming stalemate with Strange unable to act against the enchanted weapon, Night Nurse recognized that Brigand's nose had been broken before and headbutted him there while Wong disarmed the thief. Strange then magically shackled Brigand, put him to sleep and mystically entered the thief's mind to identify who had hired him. Inside his mind, Brigand leaped about while Strange was slowed down by several mental roadblocks, including memory constructs of Nightmare and Dormammu. Strange however quickly saw that these entities were simply a ruse made by Brigand. Brigand then unleashed more mental constructs of numerous past enemies of Strange, but he easily blasted them away and then threatened to wipe away Brigand's real memories of things like how to walk, talk, or clean himself. This caused Brigand to quickly back down, and he revealed a mental image of Nicodemus West. Strange then exited Brigand's mind and locked the thief inside his own mind to serve as an eternal prison.

Having taken it from Brigand, Strange later used Hitler's gun to kill a powerful demon that West had summoned to kill him, after which he turned it into fireflies to dispose of it.

Powers & Abilities

Brigand is an accomplished thief-for-hire who has managed to retain a low profile despite his robberies from high profile marks. He has been shown to be highly athletic and agile, and has mental blocks in his mind to thwart most psychic attacks. His crimes are carefully planned and researched to prepare him for the his marks might do to stop him.

Brigand has numerous items of power and gadgets at his disposal for thefts, such as the enchanted handgun of Hitler, Stark security robots, and even a safe house hidden in a fold of reality. These were either stolen by Brigand on earlier jobs, or provided by those who employed him for the jobs.