Origin
Dai Thomas is a native Britain who has been a police detective for many years. He has encountered the country’s superheroes several times, notably Captain Britain and Excalibur, as well as the Knights of Pendragon, and Eric Brooks- the vampire hunter known as Blade. When in America on holiday with his wife, she and Dai were caught in a battle between Thor and the Hulk, and his wife was killed. Since then, he has blamed all superheroes for his wife’s death, regarding them as a menace, pursuing Captain Britain for years as a result. Eventually, he reconciled with the Captain after they worked together to stop a superhuman killer who had been slaughtering Glaswegian mobsters.
Major Story Arcs
The Knights of Pendragon
During the events of The Knights of Pendragon, Dai came to be possessed by the Pendragon Spirit of Gawain, due to the actions of the Green Knight. In the first issue, he has a vision of the Green Knight killing a number of people at a Tastee Burger bar, an incident which actually happened in Central London, killing eighty-seven people. He was soon collected by Captain Britain and taken to a meeting W.H.O. headquarters, where he knocked out a raving Templeman. Dai recognized that Templeman had been quoting “Gawain and the Green Knight”, but did not speak to his own nightmares.
Dai, along the Stuart twins Alysande and Alistaire, went to investigate the Tastee Burger deaths, where they forced Kate McClellan to leave, only to follow her. Dai fell asleep in the car, having a vision of Gawain in battle with the Bane, and another incident at a farm in Sevenoaks. Upon waking, he and the twins were called to investigate Sevenoaks, Kent, where the farm owner was found dead. It was discovered he had been using various chemicals that harmed the environment.
Dai investigated a number of similar deaths; the director of the Omni Corporation (owner of Tastee Burger) had been trampled in the bush of Kenya. An ivory poacher had been crippled with his spine severed and teeth and bones stripped from his body. A fur trader’s decapitated head found with his skin wrapped around it. Coast Guards involved in pet-smuggling died in a shipwreck. With the next incidents, he encountered a sea-serpent made of oil, sinking a ship of smugglers, and a bird-like creature who killed a number of other pet-smugglers, both of whom he seemed to be able to communicate with. Kate McClellan arrived only for him to find out he’d been removed from the case.
A group of Omni Corporation mercenaries, lead by Dolph, attacked Dai, only for all of them to be soundly defeated. Dai fled after saying goodbye to Kate, with Captain Britain being ordered to find and retrieve him. Kate had a vision of Dai’s death in her sleep, but was unable to warn him before Captain Britain found him in South America.
Both men at the time were possessed by Pendragon Spirits; Captain Britain by Lancelot’s spirit, and Dai by Gawain’s. With his spirit spurring a berserk rage, Captain Britain killed Dai. Three days later, after having his body returned home to be buried, Dai was resurrected as Gawain. He found Captain Britain once again, asking him to follow, the two of them rescuing Kate from an attack by the Bane, and leading them both to the Green Knight.
With the Green Knight’s strength failing, Dai willingly released his Pendragon Spirit to bolster the Green Knight and reset the balance. No longer possessed, Dai returned to his own body. Newly returned to life, Dai investigated a series of killings by the “Jigsaw Man”, deducing that the killer was in fact Dolph, who had tried to kill him and Kate McClellan. He informed Kate and Captain Britain of his discovery, and was later somehow able to capture the murderer. Dolph was rescued, however, by a manipulated Cam McClellan and a number of Bane-possessed minions under Francesca Lexley Grace’s control, with Dai being injured in the attempt.
Some time later, Grace had successfuly resurrected the Red Lord. The Lady of the Lake instructed Adam Crown to dispatch a flock of the Green Chapel’s sentry owls to summon other Knights of Pendragon for the inevitable battle. One of these owls appeared to Dai Thomas, transporting him to Avalon, along with Iron Man, Black Panther, Captain Britain, and other Pendragons from the past. Despite knowing that the Green Knight would not be able to resurrect them again upon their deaths, Dai and the other knights fought against the Red Lord’s forces of the Bane. Thanks to Adam Crown cleansing the Bane from Grace, causing the other Bane to also turn back to normal, the Red Lord retreated, Dai having survived the battle.
Excalibur
Excalibur also sought his aid to hunt down the Warwolves, extradimensional beings made by Mojo to track Rachel Summers. Dai attended a party at Braddock Manor, accompanied by Emelia Witherspoon, a psychic who had helped him and Excalibur on a past case. A clairvoyant vision by Emelia alerted Excalibur to the murder of Alysande Stuart, and in their absence, she and Dai were rendered unconscious by mercenaries employed by Sat-Yr-9. Psylocke was able to sense the attack through Emelia, causing Nightcrawler to investigate. He found Dai and Emelia unconscious, only for him to be ambushed and knocked out as well.
For sixteen hours, Dai and the rest of the guests were tortured by Jamie Braddock, twin brother of Psylocke and brother of Captain Britain. The insane mutant used his reality-warping powers to transform all the captive guests into grotesque, monstrous forms, persisting until Meggan broke free of his control and attacked, breaking his concentration and returning everyone to normal. Excalibur battled and defeated Sat-Yr-9’s mercenaries, forcing them to flee. Dai was last seen with Psylocke, helping a shaken Emelia out of the Manor. As Dai and Emelia were not traditional superheroes, unused to such occurences, they seemed the most affected by Jamie Braddock’s torture, having a harder time coping emotionally with the trauma.
Powers and Abilities
While possessed by a Pendragon Spirit, Dai had superhuman strength and fighting ability along with nightmares like vision of the past, that allow for minimum precog abilities. While his stamina and reaction time were above human they were not yet in Captain Britain’s level who easily defeated and accidentally killed Dai. As a normal human, he is a seasoned police inspector and has experience with firearms and unarmed combat but is overweight.
Alternate Realities
Earth-2122
The Doppelganger of Dai Thomas on Earth-2122 is almost the perfect clone of his Earth-616 counterpart. Chief-Inspector at the C.I.D., opponent to all the super-beings and super-humans and super-heroes, the slightly difference shown is the pleasure in applying brutal force during the interrogation of jailed persons (actually, mutants believed to be enemies of the State), the same pleasure taken by the High Official of W.H.O. Allistaire Stuart (while his twin sister Alysandre is the scientific figure).