Lyla was originally an orphan, left adrift in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean following a tragic accident of unspecified origin. Feeling pity on her, the cosmic being known as the Monitor decided to save her life, and adopt her as his own. Raising her to be his personal assistant, he showed Lyla momentous moments not just in the history of her native planet of Earth-One, but also those of countless other parallel universes with their Earths*.
Gundra was a princess of an extraterrestrial civilization in Earth-Two's universe, led by the cosmic being known as Wotan. She was tasked with leading a legion of Valkryies likes herself. Within her realm, she had access to genetic-altering technology, which she used to transform her arch-enemy Wonder Woman and the Amazon's friends of Holliday College into Valkyries. Her motivation for this was vengeance, as the man she loved... Major Steve Trevor... spurned her romantic advances and chose Wonder Woman instead. She met him when tasked with retrieving heroes from Earth.
Lyla assisted her adopted father as they became arms dealers for various supervillains of Earths One, Two, S, and possibly other Earths. The Monitor and Lyla pursued this endeavor in order to obtain information on superhumans of each world, to ascertain which ones could assist them during the Crisis on Infinite Earths. When the time came, Lyla subjected herself to Monitor's special chamber, causing her to multiple into copies of herself, tasked with retrieving heroes from Earth.
Gundra had previously come into conflict with allies of Wonder Woman in the Justice Society, during their first case. Summoned to Berlin during the height of World War II, Gundra and her fellow Valkyries launched an attack on Europe, only to be repelled by the ten American heroes opposing them.
Both women possessed the power of flight at unimaginable speeds, massive strength, the ability to harness deadly energy, control over multiple copies of themselves, and a single minded determination to fulfill their commissions to bring the best and brightest from both Earths to their masters.
* While Lyla’s activities as Harbinger only technically lasted for a year from early 1985 into early 1986, her alter ego’s myriad of cloned duplicates traveled to various time periods to retrieve various superhuman beings to aid her and her master the Monitor in their cause. Their activities throughout the centuries, although brief, mirrored those of Gundra and her Valkyrie replicants who likewise retrieved a variety of warriors throughout the ages. We can ascertain that Lyla originated on Earth-One as this was the world she moved to following the loss of her Harbinger abilities (which she called her home world), rather than Earths Two, Four, S or X which also existed during this time.
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