Ulysses Klaue

Twisted Tradesman

A merchant of death, Ulysses Klaue dabbled in assassination-for-hire. He perhaps excelled most, however, as a weapons dealer working mainly out of South Africa. This business allowed him to rub shoulders with such luminaries as Tony Stark, but always on the shadowy side.

Using information provided by Prince N’Jobu, King T’Chaka’s brother, Klaue stole vibranium from the small country of Wakanda to bolster the prince’s desire to see the metal shared with the rest of the world. During the event, Klaue learned of Wakanda’s true nature as a technologically advanced state, and set off a fatal explosion that would cement his status as an enemy of Wakanda for decades to come.

Evil Effects

Klaue operated in devil-may-care fashion throughout his twisted career, with little regard for any life other than his own. He would kill without compunction and spread destruction wherever he went, cackling as he did, but when he got down to business he acted as a true professional, albeit a murderous one.

His skill with weapons indicates the possibility of some military training. He favored handguns for personal use and while he was not opposed to subterfuge in achieving his goals, he preferred to work in the open, not caring who saw him or what impression of himself he left behind.

After Klaue lost an arm to the artificial intelligence known as Ultron, he replaced it with a prosthetic limb sporting technology based on Wakandan mining operations. The arm responded to his thoughts and was able to produce waves of sonic force with which he could move small or large objects or simply destroy them. It also featured the ability to disrupt other devices and forms of energy.

Known Associates

Beyond his former taskmasters of the Intelligencia, his various clients through the years, and a small retinue of hired soldiers he kept to protect his interests, Ulysses Klaue rarely associated with anyone for anything other than one-off assignments or brief bits of business. His acerbic personality and occasional erratic behavior seemed to keep most normal people away.

One of Klaue’s longest associations seems to have been with Erik Stevens, also known as Erik Killmonger, son of N’Jobu and himself a prince of Wakanda. The arms dealer treated him with something resembling a teacher-mentor relationship at first, but Klaue ended up being a pawn in Killmonger’s plan whose death would serve a key role.

If anyone ever existed who Ulysses Klaue actually favored or cherished, the memory of them has been lost along with the man himself.

To Blunt a Klaue

Ulysses Klaue’s attracted many opponents over the years, but the last two rulers of Wakanda rank high on the list. T’Chaka spent time and resources on tracking the man who tried to assassinate him and also stole vibranium from his nation, but one of his life’s biggest disappointments was his inability to capture Klaue. T’Chaka’s son T’Challa took up the reins of the chase after his father’s death and offered some of the strongest opposition Ulysses Klaue had seen in decades, resulting in his capture and temporary incarceration.

Special mention among the arms dealer’s enemies must be made of Ultron, the artificial intelligence who took Klaue’s ill-gotten vibranium (though he at least paid well for it), as well as the man’s arm for what the robot perceived as a slight against his origins.

A Dealer in Arms

Many years after his dealings with N’Jobu and his raid on Wakanda, Klaue still ran his illicit weapons brokerage out of a large freighter ship docked at a salvage yard. It was there he was approached by two young enhanced siblings from Sokovia named Wanda and Pietro Maximoff, who served as representatives of the robotic Ultron. The Maximoffs believed they could intimidate or threaten Klaue, but the criminal laughed them off and demanded to see their employer.

Ultron appeared onboard Klaue’s ship almost instantaneously after the demand and issued a demand of his own for the man’s vibranium. Feeling pressure from the towering metallic entity, Klaue gave him his store of the metal and in return received billions of dollars wired directly into various bank accounts of his by Ultron. Perhaps feeling a bit cocky at the moment, Klaue made a blithe comparison between the robot and Tony Stark, his creator. This proved to be a grave mistake, for Ultron severed one of the weapon dealer’s arms in a fit of pique, just before the Avengers boarded the ship in search of the robot. Klaue fled, leaving his soldiers behind to present a useless gesture of resistance.

Eventually, Ulysses Klaue replaced the lost limb with a death-dealing prosthetic one and met Erik Stevens, aka Killmonger. Together, they invaded the Museum of Great Britain to steal a Wakandan ceremonial axe made from vibranium, an act that placed Klaue back on the nation’s radar as a threat gone too long without justice. The current Black Panther, T’Chaka’s son T’Challa, moved to intercept his foe at a South Korean casino where Klaue planned to trade the axe for diamonds with CIA operative Everett K. Ross.

The deal went sour when T’Challa and his people were spotted by Klaue and his hirelings, and a fight broke out to capture the criminal to bring him to Wakandan justice. Klaue fled in a waiting vehicle, but after a high-speed chase the Black Panther halted his escape and nearly executed him in the middle of the street, if not for the intervention of T’Challa’s associates. Ross took Klaue to a CIA holding cell elsewhere in the city. When he interrogated the man, the criminal revealed what he knew about Wakanda to the agent. Before Ross could properly vet the information with T’Challa, Killmonger staged a violent rescue of Klaue, which spirited him away from his opponents.

Later, while securing an aircraft of Klaue’s to leave the country, Killmonger requested he be taken to Wakanda, something that the arms dealer was not keen on doing. Klaue was then surprised when Killmonger abruptly killed one of their partners, Limbani, and realizing their business pact was void, he attempted to hold Killmonger off by taking their female associate (and Killmonger’s lover), Linda, as his hostage. In short order, Killmonger shot and killed Linda and then Klaue himself, as he attempted to flee. Killmonger then took Klaue’s corpse with him to Wakanda to use as a calling card to gain entry to the secluded African nation, bringing them their long sought-after enemy.