At her introduction, Velocity is sixteen years of age and a runaway from the Cyberdata forces. Initially, it was not revealed that Cassie Lane (a.k.a. Ballistic) is Carin's sister. Ballistic presumably adopted a different surname to distance herself from the memory of their father, Frank Taylor, abandoning them. Both sisters wound up in an orphanage run by Mother May I, a mysterious Cyberdata operative with a red third eye in the middle of her forehead. During this time Velocity received the lightning tattoo over her eye, a gift from the resident bully of the orphanage. Soon afterwards, Mother May I saw Carin's potential for cybernetic enhancement and she was given or sold to Cyberdata. Velocity seems to spend a fair amount of time being captured by Cyberdata and subsequently rescued, although in such shenanigans more bits of her history and possible futures are revealed (eg, in issue #11, a virtual-reality simulation shows what Velocity might have become had her conversion to a SHOC been completed). She was SHOC-trained and implanted with a Brain Box, a Cyberdata invention that overcame the difficulties in adjusting to cybernetic implants. Primarily, in Carin's case, the Brain Box allowed her to run faster without overloading her brain or body with the chemicals naturally produced by the body with any muscle movement. It also allowed her to make directional adjustments to avoid obstacles when travelling at high speeds.