KING COBRA

First Appearance: Journey Into Mystery #98
Origin Issue: Journey Into Mystery #98

Height: 5' 10"
Weight: 160 lbs
Eyes: Blue
Hair: Bald
Distinguishing Features: Swayback posture makes him appear shorter

Occupation: Professional Criminal, leader of the Serpent Society crime cartel: (former) laboratory assistant
Citizenship: Naturalized citizen of the United States of America
Place of Creation/Birth: Rotterdam, Holland

Known Relatives: none
Known Allies: (former) Mister Hyde, Jester, Viper, Viper 2, Krang, Princess Python, Eel, Gladiator, Purple Man, Diamondback 2, Sidewinder, Asp, Black Mamba; (current) Serpent Society
Known Enemies: Thor, Daredevil, Captain America, Mister Hyde, Viper 2, Sidewinder, Copperhead

Intelligence: Normal (4/10)
Strength: Athlete
Speed: Peak human
Stamina: Athlete
Durability: Athlete
Agility: Superhuman
Reflexes: Superhuman
Fighting Skills: Moderate knowledge of streetfighting techniques
Special Skills/Abilities: King Cobra’s bones and muscle tissue are extremely malleable; they are virtually impossible to break or tear and can be contorted to allow him to fit through a hole four inches in diameter. This flexibility allows him to wrap around a victim in an exceedingly strong “cobra grip,” and also allows him to slither over surfaces in bursts of speed up to 50 miles per hour for just a few seconds. He molts his skin on occasion; this leaves him with a serpentine appearance (scales, yellowed eyes), but his appearance gradually returns to normal.
Superhuman physical powers: King Cobra's bones are flexible and nearly impossible to break
Superhuman Mental Powers: none
Special Limitations: none
Source of Superhuman Powers: Mutagenic effects of venom of a radioactive cobra plus experimental antidote

Personal Weaponry: King Cobra’s tools include venomed cobra darts (with lethal or tranquilizing venoms) and blinding darts (fired from wrist blasters), nerve gas missiles, and a constricting “cobra cable” which can be fired from his costume’s chest. Via muscle control, the tail of his suit can be separately manipulated as a bludgeon. His suit is coated with a slippery silicon/graphic compound, and chemical suction devices his its extremities allow him to cling to walls. Though he claims to have built these items himself, most have been purchased from AIM or the Tinkerer. Klaus controls the Serpent Society’s resources, including multiple secret headquarters, Brand Corporation technology capable of creating superhumans, and their flying “Serpent Saucers.”

History: Klaus Voorhees was an ex-convict whom humanitarian medical professor Ezekiel Shecktor attempted to rehabilitate. The pair worked in a remote Indian village, attempting to develop universal snake anti-venom, but Klaus grew envious of Shecktor’s fame and decided to kill him. Klaus injected himself with the anti-venom and then forced a laboratory king cobra to bite both Shecktor and himself, to make It look like an accident; however, Shecktor had irradiated the Cobra during an experiment, and though the bite killed the doctor, Klaus survived, his body having gained the snake’s attributes and abilities. Calling himself the Cobra, Voorhees donned a cobra costume equipped with envenomed darts, venom-gas missiles and a projectile entangling cable. He returned to New York City, intent on using the empowering serum to create an army of serpent-powered followers, but Thor drove him off before he could collect the supplies needed to recreate the serum.

Realizing that he couldn’t control others even if he transformed them, Cobra turned to simple crime to survive. Early in this career he robbed the office of Calvin Zabo, who quickly revealed himself to be the villainous Mr Hyde. Their shared enmity against Thor led to a partnership, and they even briefly defeated the thunder god when Klaus deduced that he could use machinery to lift Thor’s hammer and keep it away from him. Thor eventually recovered the hammer and both Cobra and Hyde were imprisoned, but not before Hyde set the tone for future problems when he abandoned his partner in an escape attempt. They were soon freed by Thor’s brother Loki (who briefly increased their powers), but Thor quickly recaptured them. Similarly, they were later twice captured by Daredevil, once alongside criminal ally the Jester (Jonathan Powers), and Hyde abandoned Cobra completely during one of these defeats.

Tiring of his untrustworthy partner, the Cobra arranged a new partner, the Eel (Leopold Stryke). The Eel wanted his brother (Jordon Dixon, the Viper) involved, so the Cobra smuggled new costumes into both their cells, allowing them to escape, and named their new trio the Serpent Squad. Unfortunately, the Viper insisted on a mission of vengeance against Captain America, resulting in the team’s defeat. Killing Jordan Dixon and usurping his Viper alias, Madame Hydra took over the Serpent Squad, recruited Princess Python to free the Eel and the Cobra, and then defeated the Cobra in a fight for team leadership. Allied with the Atlantean Warlord Krang, the quartet kidnapped Hugh Jones, then-president of the Roxxon Corporation, and placed him under the control of the mystical Serpent Crown. The Cobra, who just wanted wealth and security, quickly disagreed with the Viper’s nihilistic goals. The Cobra attempted to abandon Viper when Nomad (secretly Captain America) confronted her; in retribution, she shot him in the back.

Cobra recovered and resumed his partnership with Hyde, but they were again twice defeated by Daredevil and imprisoned. Escaping yet again, the Cobra left Hyde behind, telling him he was dissolving their partnership. The Cobra tried to live a quiet life in the Bojess Building’s penthouse on Park Avenue, but his occasional jewelry store burglaries led to his short-lived capture by Spider-Man. Spider-Man sought the Cobra again thereafter, but the angry Hyde escaped prison himself and sought vengeance on the Cobra for abandoning him. When Spider-Man defeated Hyde, Cobra wearily surrendered rather than live as a fugitive. Both Hyde and Cobra were returned to Ryker’s Island, where a rampaging Hyde tried to get at his former partner. Cobra escaped to save himself, and Hyde pursued him; when Cobra was forced to face his super-strong ex-partner in single combat, he held his own until the Black Cat collapsed a wall on the duo, defeating them both.

Fellow snake-themed criminal Sidewinder (Seth Voelker) soon teleported the Cobra out of prison. Voelker had decided to take his own Serpent Squad to a new level and create the Serpent Society, an alliance of snake-themed criminals which would operate on a business model: sharing profits, offering medical benefits, and using Sidewinder’s teleportation to avoid long-term imprisonment. The Cobra joined as a founding member, and with Anaconda and the Rattler stole from the former Brand Corporation the equipment that had been used to empower Sidewinder and some of his fellow serpents; despite the interference of Captain America, the Cobra saw the mission successfully completed. The Cobra’s experience gained him his teammates’ respect, and over the next few days he accompanied Anaconda in gaining vengeance on the traitorous Constrictor, hunted MODOK with the team, investigated AIM with Bushmaster, and rescued Diamondback from a hospital (getting shot at by a Scourge in the process).

When the Viper infiltrated the team with her own serpent-themed villains and took control from within, the Cobra unhappily went along with her. Witnessing her underlings dumping chemicals in the DC water supply, he again realized that her terrorism was at odds with his own goals. He attempted to kill the Viper to end her threat, but ultimately left her unconscious and turned her over to Captain America, then known simply as “the Captain.” Sidewinder left the team following the Viper-led mutiny, and Cobra, due to his extensive experience, assumed leadership almost by default; however, he found himself insecurely unhappy. When Ghaur and Llyra hired the Society to acquire some mystical artifacts for them, the X-Men defeated the Society; the fact that Sidewinder completed the mission and ceded the Society a ten percent fee as “thanks” only reinforced Voorhees’ insecurity. In an attempt to restore his own self-confidence, Cobra hunted down and defeated his old partner Mr Hyde. He renamed himself King Cobra, vowing to lead the Society as it deserved thereafter.

King Cobra had a brief relationship with Serpent Society teammate Coachwhip during this time; however, another Society member, Diamondback, had begun a serious romance with Captain America. King Cobra feared Diamondback might reveal Society secrets, and he also disliked her continued friendship with Sidewinder. He had her captured, and after a brief trial the Society found her guilty and ordered her death. Asp and Black Mamba objected and arranged Diamondback’s escape, but King Cobra had them captured in turn. Diamondback teamed with super-mercenary Paladin and Captain America to rescue the pair, and King Cobra was jailed and sent to the Vault alongside much of the Society. Sidewinder soon freed King Cobra in an attempt to square accounts, but Klaus returned to prison rather than allow his teammates to think he was abandoning them as Hyde had so often done to him.

Eventually, the Society was again freed. King Cobra arranged only small, safe work for the team and moved the Society to Sandhaven, Arizona, far from most of the world’s heroes, but aspiring Arizona hero Jack Flag began tracking the team after they cheated his family out of their home. After defeating two team members, he told King Cobra that he wished to join the team himself. Seeking to rid himself of the nuisance, Klaus sent Jack on a “test mission: to rob Mr Hyde; however, Klaus hedged his bets by notifying Hyde that Jack was coming. When Jack still managed to defeat Hyde, King Cobra took it as a sign and offered Jack Flag his own identity: Jack would become King Cobra, and Klaus would retire from costumed life. Unfortunately, Jack had secretly contacted Captain America, and through the combined efforts of Jack, Captain America, his protégé Free Spirit and Force Works, the Society was defeated and imprisoned.

Realizing that he needed a Sidewinder to ensure his team’s freedom, and knowing that the previous Sidewinder was unwilling to help, King Cobra had the Brand Corporation equipment that he had stolen for the Society long before used to equip a new Sidewinder. He teamed briefly with Mr Hyde to help finance this work, but was twice captured, once by Captain America and once by Spider-Man and Alyosha Kravinoff. Each time he quickly escaped, and eventually succeeded in empowering a new Sidewinder, though that one was killed on an early test mission when Klaus hired him out to Death Sting. With the process working, King Cobra had yet another Sidewinder created, and this one freed the Serpent Society from their cells. Klaus also had the mutagenic serum which originally transformed him into the Cobra duplicated; he treated his nephew Piet Vorhees with this serum and Piet became the new Cobra while Klaus maintained the King Cobra identity. He also apparently oversaw the creation of a new Death Adder (the original having been long ago killed by a Scourge). King Cobra again led the Serpent Society on a mission of vengeance when he was tipped to Diamondback’s whereabouts; however, this turned out to be a Diamondback LMD (Life Model Decoy), and the team was ultimately defeated by the LMD and Captain America.

When Lucia von Bardas contacted the Society, King Cobra allowed her to have the Tinkerer build an armored suit for him, but was relatively unsurprised when von Bardas was revealed to have ulterior motives: the armor and many other criminals’ Tinkerer-modified suits were interlinked to create a bomb which von Bardas tried to use for her own terrorist purposes, but the suit was quickly destroyed and King Cobra was captured and imprisoned in the teleport-proof Raft. He got out when Electro engineered a mass escape, but was soon recaptured by Toxin. With the passing of the Super Human Registration Act, Baron Zemo recruited King Cobra to serve in the Thunderbolts army beside fellow Society members Rattler, Bushmaster and Death Adder. Together, they helped maintain order when the world was overrun by crazed superhumans spawned by the Wellspring of Power.