Tower

The past history of Atlanta native Edward Pasternak remains largely unknown, but eventually he became a mutant for hire. He was first seen being hired by former Secret Empire employee turned geneticist Carl Maddicks to capture the Beast, then a member of X-Factor, so that Maddicks could experiment on McCoy to learn of a means to reverse genetic mutation in order to turn his son Artie back to a human. Although Tower would succeed in capturing Hank, Maddicks would ironically hire X-Factor (then posing as mutant hunters) to "eliminate" Tower. Hank's friends would learn of Maddick's plot after defeating Tower in battle, and Marvel Girl would offer Tower a place with X-Factor. Tower would laugh at this offer and walk away.

Shortly thereafter, Tower would join with the Alliance of Evil, a group of mutants under the employ of Apocalypse. Interested in X-Factor's operations, the Alliance would send Tower to spy on their headquarters to learn a way to capture Rusty Collins. When Tower is discovered, X-Factor would clash with him in their mutant terrorist guise of the X-Terminators. Tower would flee from the mutants before capture, and would be reprimanded by his field leader Frenzy.

Apocalypse would capture the Mike Nowlan, a mutant with the ability to boost others powers who could only stop his abilities by being stoned all the time. Apocalypse would utilize Nowlan to boost the powers of his minions, including Tower, a process that would make Tower and the others addicted to Mike's power boosting capabilities. When Nowlan would escape from Apocalypse's clutches he would come under the protection of X-Factor leading to a clash between the group and the Alliance of Evil. The Alliance would threaten the life of Mike's wife Susan, forcing him to turn on X-Factor and return to Apocalypse's hideout with Tower and the others. X-Factor would come to come to his rescue, during the battle, Mike's power would flare out of control causing Tower to grow. However, when Susan would be killed in the battle, Mike would draw all the power back into him killing himself. In the confusion, Tower and the other members of the Alliance of Evil be arrested. While being interviewed by the press, Tower noted that wherever X-Factor went, the X-Terminators were never far behind, being the first to come close to the fact that both teams were the same.

Getting out of jail, the Alliance of Evil would lay low for a while until shortly after the implementation of the Mutant Registration Act, and would terrorize a live televise by television reporter Trish Tilby, prompting X-Factor (now outed as a team of mutants) to come to her aid and stop their rampage. X-Factor and their charges Boom Boom, Rusty Collins, Richter, Artie, and Leech would be overpowered by the group until the arrival of Beast (recently restored to his furry form) who would defeat the Institute single handed.

The members of the Institute would part company, and some years later Tower would be murdered by the hunter known as the X-Cutioner. Sometime later, Tower would be one of the many mutants resurrected by for Selene by Eli Bard using the Transmode Virus. He would be part of Selenes attack force on Utopia[10]. When Selene was ultimately destroyed by Warpath, her death eliminated the Transmode Virus from the mutants she had resurrected,[11] Tower's ultimate fate remains unrevealed.