Fire... storm or brand? Or Are We Just Splitting Atoms?

While Ronald Raymond and Martin Stein had a long amiable relationship, after first inadvertently merging into the superhero known as Firestorm, their counterparts of Earth-Two never had opportunity to meet. This was due to their differences in age, and the circumstances of their lives taking them in vastly different directions. Nevertheless, there were similarities: two eager young men with dreams of heroism, and two older intellectual men who developed devices allowing others to access vast cosmic energies.

Ronald Raymond was a high school student and an aspiring athlete who sought the attention of Doreen Day, and to that end joined a protest of the Hudson Nuclear Plant. As this power plant was being discommissoned, there were no security staff on site, only the plant's designer Professor Martin Stein. While confronting these protestors, both he and Ronnie were left unconscious, to become victims of a stick of dynamite left behind to detonate the nuclear material. When this occured, both Ronald and Martin fused into the combined Nuclear Man, who after designing a uniform embarked upon a heroic career* as Firestorm. While Ronnie was the dominant persona of this new hero, Martin became his mentor guiding the lad's actions.

Christopher Pike was a young man who idolized the Justice Society, and like Ronald, he aspired to living up to the example of his World's Greatest Heroes. Achieving the rank of a Commander at NASA, Pike was assigned to the Vulcan Probe One, with a mission parameter whereby he and two colleagues would journey around the Sun for a hundred days. Going insane while onboard, Pike slayed the other two astronauts, yet was preserved alive when his vessel plunged into the Sun. This was thanks to the vessel becoming a protective shell for Pike, along with the intervention of a benevolent alien stabilizing Pike's physical condition. Granted the ability to irradiate tremendous heat, which he used to fly and to project blasts of heat, Pike also gained transmutational abilities. He used this latter power, as the supervillain Vulcan Son of Fire, to both transform his molten metal armor into a harder metallic substance... and to generate a flaming axe as a weapon... which he would recreate on a later occasion. 

Vulcan then attacked the Justice Society, seeking misguided vengeance upon them for his appearance, and later joined their foes in the Secret Society of Super-Villains, shortly after the time that Professor Styne had made a monumental discovery. 

Professor Styne (yes, the counterpart of Professor Stein) had developed an experimental "Strato-Balloon", he enlisted a few volunteers including reporter Happy Terrill in order to fly it. When it had been exposed to a strange electrical storm surge, Happy attempted to fix repairs on the outside of the vessel and was mutated by these enigmatic energies into becoming the Ray. Styne's research assistant Cliff was also imbued with power from the storm, becoming the Dark. Later, the Ray would join fellow members of the All-Star Squadron in migrating to Earth-X where there were no heroes, leaving his native Earth-Two behind as the Freedom Fighters. 

As for Ronnie and Martin, they eventually accepted their symbiotic nature following the nuclear incident that melded them together. This new young potent powerhouse even gained enough acclaim to join the Justice League of America for a period of time. Ronnie continued his studies in high school, eventually attending a university in order to further his studies. Martin bounced around between employers, given the erratic nature of his mysterious disappearences, caused when Ronnie summonded Stein to merge into their colorful costumed crimefighter alias. 

During this period, Firestorm battled a range of adversaries, including Killer Frost (one time work associate to Martin), Multiplex (a former assistant to Martin) and Hyena (sister to Raymond's girlfriend Doreen) Among Ronnie's most persistent adversaries was Cliff Carmichael, counterpart of the Dark. Carmichael in one alternate future had himself become a supervillain known as the Thinker.

Decades after first journeying to Earth-X, both Ray and his Freedom Fighter teammates migrated once more to a third Earth, Earth-One (following a brief reunion on their native Earth-Two). 

On Earth-One, Happy finally had a rematch with Cliff, as the latter's alias of the Dark confronted the Ray seeking vengeance. Apparently, this villain was pulled from Earth-Two to Earth-One by the Shade, who used his Ebony Cane to traverse universes and entered a Dark Dimension. Cliff aka the Dark was one of his minions, used versus the Flash of both Earths.

Meanwhile, Vulcan had been residing within interdimensional limbo between Earths following his first with the Justice Society. It was shortly thereafter that he had encountered six members of his world's Secret Society of Super-Villains, themselves also exiled in that limbo. Joining forces with them, Vulcan journeyed decades into the past (during the time period that Styne was alive), in order to once more battle members of the Justice Society as well as the All-Star Squadron, while under leadership of the Super-Villains' leader Ultra-Humanite. On this occasion, Vulcan briefly met Danette Reilly, aka the fiery Firebrand, although only in passing. Eventually, he and the other villains were defeated by the All-Stars, and returned to their limbo prison.

However, Vulcan would once more reappear during the Crisis on Infinite Earths, along with an assembled of both heroes and villains. All were summounded to the Monitor's transdimensional satellite, in order to recruit them to face a threat to the entire Multiverse. In an alternate future, Vulcan returned to villany, and was once more defeated by Power Girl... a woman for whom his cosmic twin Firestorm had a long and enduring romantic crush.

* Ronnie Raymond and Martin Stein’s Firestorm adventures on Earth-One mirrored the adventures of Johnny Thunder and Archibald the Thunderbolt’s adventures on Earth-Two, both solo and as members of the Justice League and Justice Society respectively. Their counterparts on each others’ Earths were recurring foes of the League and Society during their few apprarances.