Zadkiel

The archangel Zadkiel spends a millennium doing Heaven’s dirty work. He’s even tasked with overseeing Earth’s Ghost Riders, manipulating them from the shadows. Though he intends to overthrow God and sees Ghost Rider Johnny Blaze, AKA Ghost Rider, as a pawn to carry out his intentions.

Heaven Knows

Zadkiel serves God as an archangel, but eventually backs Lucifer's play to thwart their creator's leadership, though he decides to tell God about the soon-to-be-devil's machinations.  As such, God tasks Zadkiel with leading covert missions for Heaven after the Great Flood. This position includes overseeing the Spirits of Vengeance, which he describes as "Earthly hosts imbued with a vestige of power from God himself." It falls to him to make sure that the Ghost Riders never know their true origins. Along the way, he kills Midianites, those who lived in Jericho, Syrians, and any other enemies of Heaven.

A Host of Heavenly Powers

The exact abilities that come along with being an angel continue to confound mortals. Like his brethren, Zadkiel seems nearly eternal, having lived since the creation event. Unlike some of the others, though, Zadkiel has a penchant for war and destruction, which he has used to serve his Lord. However, after Lucifer's failed overthrow of Heaven, the boss turned Zadkiel and his Black Host into soldiers specifically designed to go on secret, stealthy missions and also oversee the Ghost Riders on Earth. 

Wielding his sword, Zadkiel proves strong and cunning enough to lead a successful invasion and occupation of Heaven, but is ultimately unable to control the Spirits of Vengeance he collected to fulfill the mission. All of his power, ultimately, cannot stand up to the Ghost Riders—both living and dead—who defeat him. He is vulnerable to imprisonment by demons and some form of pain, and potentially death, at the tip of Mephisto's sword when wielded by Frank Castle, AKA Punisher. 

Angels of a Feather Flock Together

For an unknown amount of time, Zadkiel served God loyally, performing the duties of an archangel. However, during Lucifer's rebellion, Zadkiel and some of his fellow angels sided with the Morningstar, but decided to turn on him. While Lucifer got banished, Zadkiel and his crew were turned into a unit dealing with Heaven's dirtiest missions. Lucifer never forgot how differently his brief cohort's punishment was from his own.

The angel slayed scores of individuals for his master and also became the unseen manipulator of the Ghost Riders, making sure they never found out about their holy origins. Eventually, Zadkiel got involved with Johnny Blaze, AKA Ghost Rider, who wanted to make the angel pay for toying with his soul. Around that same time, Zadkiel began manipulating denizens of Earth to do his bidding like Danny Ketch, AKA Ghost Rider, Deacon, Blackout, and the new Vengeance (Kowalski). 

Zadkiel's minions killed Caretaker, but his granddaughter Sara took up the mantle and became a stalwart opponent of the evil angel and the driving force behind pushing both Blaze and, eventually, Ketch to finally topple Zadkiel's reign. They also got some help from Daimon Hellstrom, AKA Hellstorm, and Jaine Cutter. After his defeat, Zadkiel was tortured by Lucifer and eventually attacked by the Punisher. 

The Avenging Angel

According to Lucifer, when he warred with Heaven, Zadkiel "sold him out." After the battle, Zadkiel and his followers were kicked out of The Choir of Heaven and turned into a black ops squad called The Black Host. The Spirit of Vengeance was to be their heavy hitter. 

Later, Johnny Blaze's wife Roxanne prayed to God to save his soul. Instead of the Almighty responding, though, the angel Zadkiel did so. Blaze had made a deal to sell his soul to the Devil, though, but the angels tied him to an entity of Heaven: the Ghost Rider. When Johnny discovered this, the angel made his way to the top of the Rider's hit list. At that time, Zadkiel was already working on his own plan to take over Heaven. Zadkiel had become tired of doing his boss's dirty deeds and figured he could take over and rule the throne himself. 

To facilitate this, he appealed to his angelic allies as well as his Earth-bound minions, many of whom could be identified by Zadkiel's symbol tattooed on their person. In Heaven, any soul that made its way there was locked outside of the Pearly Gates and forced to work on siege engines. Even Limbo was emptied, those souls also put to work in Zadkiel's war machine. Any who refused had their souls torn apart "and scattered to the winds of eternity." Meanwhile, on Earth a religious faction known as the Church of the New Dawn had been established to brainwash parishioners into serving the evil Angel. 

Knowing that he would need more power than he possessed, the rogue angel approached former Ghost Rider Danny Ketch and offered him the power he so sorely missed if he would collect the Spirit of Vengeance from all the world's Ghost Riders. Thinking he was helping the cursed, Ketch worked in active opposition to his brother Blaze, leaving all but a handful of Riders to stand between Zadkiel and his ultimate goal. 

Had one of his minions, a guard named Bob at Waxahachie Maximum Security Church release all of the prisoners as a cover for freeing Deacon and delivering him a pair of daggers. Though Deacon killed many sinners, he was ultimately defeated by a Bible-wielding Johnny Blaze. 

Zadkiel next sent Ketch to kill Caretaker backed by mercenaries Blackout, Orb, Death Ninja, and Doghead. This order led to Caretaker's death and the destruction of his soul at Zadkiel's hands, but also the mantle passing on to his granddaughter Sara, the new Caretaker. 

Speaking through a bird, Zadkiel ordered Ketch to allow the handful of remaining Ghost Riders to gather together before attacking. He then defeated a small army of angels who stood with God and then The Black Host to assist Ketch against the surviving Spirits of Vengeance. When Ketch managed to rob Blaze of his powers—with some help from another of Zadkiel's agents, Kowalski—he flew to Heaven where the angel used the aggregated power to destroy the gates holding him back from the throne. With the barrier gone, Zadkiel tossed Ketch back to Earth and took the throne, but did not become immediately omnipotent, though that would come the longer he held the power. 

Though he was confident in the power he had acquired, Zadkiel ordered the death of the Antichrist, Kid Blackheart. Sending Blackout, Deacon, Orb, Big Wheel, Madcap, Ebenezer Laughton, AKA Scarecrow, Vengeance, and Trull to do his dirty work, Zadkiel thought his victory was imminent. With Kid Blackheart out of the way, the armageddon prophesied in the Book of Revelations would become null and void, meaning the new head of Heaven could write the end of all things however he wanted. To stop that, Caretaker, Hellstorm, and Cutter attempted to take the devil's kid back to him by way of a portal in a deconsecrated church turned demonic temple, but ran into a few of his minions. 

Meanwhile, in Heaven, Zadkiel felt his power growing and planned for the time when he would have the ability to do absolutely everything he ever wanted, which included making all living beings grovel and burn before him. 

Eventually, the Gun Nuns opened their own door to Heaven for Blaze and Ketch who soon stood directly in front of the avenging angel. He put them both on the ground within moments thanks to his incredible power and eons of experience. However, after meeting with Roxanne's spirit, Johnny began to realize that Zadkiel could not actually control all of the Spirits of Vengeance he had used. All of the dead Ghost Riders stood up and overpowered Zadkiel, shutting him out of Heaven once more and then delivering him to a demonic plane for punishment.

After Blaze ran afoul of Zadkiel's tormentor, the fallen angel was sent to Earth to destroy the Rider. To attract Johnny, Zadkiel killed souls that the  Spirit of  Vengeance had saved in the past, sending their scarred souls to Hell where they awaited him. The Punisher found him in a Satanic church when he was looking for potential countermeasures for Ghost Rider (Blaze) when General Thaddeus Ross invited the Spirit of Vengeance to join their Thunderbolts group. While monologuing, Zadkiel showed Castle Mephisto's sword, which he claimed could slice Ghost Rider from Blaze. This reveal turned out to be a drastic miscalculation as Frank grabbed the sword and slashed him before stealing it. Zadkiel has not been seen since the attack and his exact status remains a mystery.