Fantastic Four: Doomsday Part 5

 

Five
You Can Read the Previous Chapter HERE!

As he straightened his tie and stretched an arm into the jacket of his new blue suit, Reed Richards said, “Ready, Sue?”

“What do you think of this, darling?” Sue asked, leaning into the doorway of their Baxter Building apartment. She wore a gold strapless evening gown cut low in front and plunging to her waist in back. The shimmering gown hugged her perfect figure where it was supposed to, and Sue looked every inch the model she had been before she had met Reed.

Appreciative, Reed circled his slim wife and whistled. “You’ll be the center of attention in that—dare I call it a dress? Is there enough material in it to legally call it a dress?” His eyebrow arched upward in mock seriousness.

Sue pouted. “Do you like it or not? And, please, don’t leer. It just doesn’t become an internationally known scientist such as yourself to leer so salaciously. After all, what if our son saw you like that?” She tsked him with a broad smile, then turned away with great flourish.

Reed crossed the room and took Sue into his arms. “I can ask the same, darling. Mothers didn’t look like you when I was growing up.”

He smiled a broad smile and lowered his voice to a whisper. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen you lovelier: not when we first met; not when we got married. Maybe I’m going crazy, but as you get older you get more and more beautiful.

“You don’t have an old painting aging in the closet by any chance, do you?” He laughed, then bent his head low to kiss her, not the mild kiss of a long-married couple familiar with each other, but the passionate kiss of a couple newly married, still anxious and fresh. It was long, fierce, and warm.

He felt her warm shoulder sway in his arms, and he was unable to remember ever caring about anyone before he had met her. Perhaps he had never even cared about himself.

He had always thought of himself as rather stiff and cold, all too logical. He had been raised in an orphanage and couldn’t remember what it must have been like to be loved and to love someone else in turn.

Work was all he busied himself with: the logical doings of the mind, he always told himself. The endless limit of his imagination could extend itself, should extend itself. He submerged his emotions, thought about nothing but his work.

Then he had met Sue, and she was always warm and laughing. So much the opposite of himself, yet he was fanatically drawn to her—not so much for her subtle beauty, but for how she acted when they were together.

She would readily listen to his hopes and dreams, and somehow she would always say something that would spur him ever on. She understood little of his work, but she cared about what he did because she cared about the man.

Sue Storm was able to make you the whole of her concern; nothing but you mattered while she was with you.

But she didn’t live for you alone. She had her own full life. She had been a model and at one time her all-American face was featured on every woman’s magazine. She was an actress who many considered a natural—“the new Hepburn!” the critics had called her. Her miraculous sensitivity somehow was reflected on the silver screen fifty times larger than life itself.

Yet she left the movies as unfulfilling. “I don’t need to play-act,” she said in one interview. “I have my own life I want to lead; I have things to do.”

At a White House reception for the sciences, Sue Storm spotted a tall, awkward-looking man sitting quietly in a dark corner, scribbling on a paper napkin with a blunt pencil, obviously oblivious to the social function he was attending.

The man was somewhat handsome, his brown hair already gray at the temples. “Excuse me,” she had said. “This seat taken? Your wife here?”

Reed Richards glanced up from his paper, somewhat confused. “Uh, no. I’m not married.” His stare returned to the paper and he continued to scrawl a complex formula on the napkin.

She sat next to him. “Let’s see, now. I take it you’re not one of the caterers working out the cost for this party. Am I right?” Once again Reed glanced up, confused. She was smiling broadly, and he then realized she had been watching him for ten minutes as he wrote down the formula for a non-fossil fuel he was trying to develop.

Her smile was contagious. “I’m sorry, Miss. I didn’t know I was being rude. It’s just that I had thought of substituting an alcohol-base compound for—I’m doing it again, aren’t I? I—”

“Don’t apologize. I was bothering you. My name’s Susan Storm . . .” He listened, not connecting the name, or perhaps he had never heard it before.

He put out his hand and took hers. “Richards, Reed Richards. I’m with the institute.”

“Well, do you like it or not? You still haven’t said anything.” Reed shook the cobwebs from his mind and grinned.

“Let me put it this way, Sue. If I had never known you before, I would fall instantly and madly in love. Yes . . . I like it. Does that make you feel better?”

Sue threw up her hands. “A romantic! I married a man as romantic as Swiss cheese. What did I ever see in you, Reed Richards?”

Reed shook his head, wondering. “I don’t know, but if I ever find out, I’m going to package it and sell it as a guaranteed aphrodisiac. By the way, have you seen Ben and Alicia?”

“If ya didn’t, ya just didn’t look in the right places.” Ben’s gravelly voice boomed from behind them and they turned to see the orange-skinned Mr. Grimm dressed in an ill-fitting black tuxedo, a flourished white shirt, and absolutely no shoes at all. He looked like a bizarre grotesquerie created for a comedy film by Mel Brooks.

“Whadda ya laughin’ about, Stretcho? Ya know it ain’t easy ta find a tux in size two-hundred gorilla.” Indignant, Ben looked at Alicia. “Ya believe the nerve o’ them, kid? Sheesh, I tell ya, with friends like these . . .”

Alicia smiled. “I’m sure if I could see you, Ben, I’d probably have the same reaction. From how Reed describes you, you probably are a rather strange sight.”

Ben grumbled. “Just ’cause I look like a monster, everyone’s gotta pick on me—even my gal.” Ben’s voice seemed disturbed, but he knew better. Despite his gargoyle appearance, Alicia loved him—and not because she was blind and couldn’t see his monstrous features.

Alicia was a sculptor, perhaps one of the best in New York. And her blindness only enhanced the empathic sensitivity her work displayed. She had created many statues of Ben in the years she had known him, and they all portrayed his strengths and virtues, somehow clearly apparent even over his seemingly brutish appearance.

She was the stepdaughter of one of the Fantastic Four’s earliest foes, yet she loved Ben and his friends though they had to battle her father time and time again. If only her father, with his two sighted eyes, could see them as clearly as she could, blind.

Ben was sweet, gentle, kind, and giving, and there was something tragic about him that brought out her love even more.

He had been turned into something inhuman, his temper was at times ferocious, and his power was enough to level a city block with apparent ease, yet he could take a wounded bird in his thick, brick-like hands and shed a somber tear when the bird had died.

He may be a monster to some who can only see his thick orange skin, but he had more humanity in him than almost anyone Alicia Masters had ever known.

“Well, we leavin’ or stayin’? I gotta get this monkey-suit back ta the shop by mornin’.” Ben reached for a large cigar and stuck it in his wide mouth. “C’mon, I ain’t got all day.”

Sue turned toward the monitor screen and pressed for Johnny’s room. “Hold on, I just want to say good-bye to Johnny.” The viewscreen flickered and Johnny’s face appeared on it. “We’re going, Johnny.”

Her brother smiled. “Have a good time, Sis, and don’t worry about anything here. Franklin’s off with Agatha Harkness and I’ve got a date. Just enjoy yourself, okay, Sis?”

Sue nodded and flicked off the image. Agatha Harkness was their son’s tutor and sitter, a strange woman who lived in an old mansion in upstate New York, in a place called Whisper Hill. When they hired her, they thought she would merely be a baby-sitter. They didn’t learn until much later that she fit into their extended family better than they could have expected.

Agatha Harkness was a witch, and she was damned good at it.

To Be Continued...Tomorrow at Atomic Kommie Comics

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Fantastic Four: Doomsday Part 4

Four

You Can Read the Previous Chapter HERE!

It was almost winter before the bandages were removed and in a mirror he saw the hideous mockery his face had become. His flesh was torn and scabbed, his hair missing and clumped in disgusting patches. Deep scars traced his face like the lines on a roadmap, and it was more than the proud Victor Von Doom could stand.

“God, I’m ugly—disgustingly ugly!” he cried, tears burning the welts that pockmarked his face. “What have I done to myself? What?”

A powerful fist smashed the mirror into a thousand cursed reflections, and blood ribboned down his torn hand. “It is too disgusting, too horrible. No other eyes must ever see my face again.”

He took to Asia and the mountains of Tibet. His mother’s diary told of an unknown sect of monks whose mastery of the Dark Arts made Cynthia’s knowledge pall in comparison.

The winter was especially harsh, bitter winds whipped around every peak, and Doom could only curse the gods for the freezing temperatures and the foul game that occasionally dared the icy snows. But Doom pressed on, remembering another wintry trek he had made with his father. He refused to be defeated then; nothing could stop him now.

The snow blinded him and for days he plodded forward, never knowing if his next step would take him toward his destination, or plunge him into a deadly crevasse.

His throat was parched, his muscles ached, and his bare skin would be cut and blood would instantly freeze to the wound. Hunger drove him mad and demons plagued his nights, yet nothing could stop him. He was Victor Von Doom. He would continue.

Until he dropped.

The snow was a warm blanket that gently covered his unconscious form. In his mind’s eye, he saw the seashore and proud horses, and Gypsies singing around the campfire. He saw his tall father holding his medicine bag tightly to his chest, laughing with the others, singing his bawdy songs.

And when the festival seemed to be at its zenith, he saw only blackness and he knew he was dead.

They spotted him in the snow, his bandaged face buried in a high drift, his parka ripped beyond usefulness, his provisions gone.

Four of them lifted him and brought him to their cave to be warmed by the fire. One robed figure motioned to the other: “Bring me the herbs and remedies.” He said nothing but was instantly understood. A third man removed his dark hood and sat cross-legged before the fire. The legends had foretold that one day “a faceless man will be your master.” Surely this man whose features had been ravaged was the man they had been promised.

For two months Doom slept in a coma; his pains had been eased by these strange, silent monks who prayed to the Dark Gods for his recovery. On Walpurgis Night, the day of Doom’s own birth, the fever which held him passed, and his eyes opened, and he picked himself off the straw cot and proudly stood before the monks, who bowed to him, chanting, “Master . . . master . . . master.”

Doom was satisfied. He was home.

A month later, he was strong. “There is much for me to learn. Your dark sciences and your most ancient secrets must be mine.” The monks bowed in acquiescence. They had awaited his coming for two thousand years. They were his to command.

By fall, there was nothing he did not know. He had mastered their sciences and sorceries with amazing ease. But something still nagged at him. The outside world had probably thought him dead. That insult could not be allowed. He had to return to life.

Then the awesome job began. Using the mouth of a giant idol as a makeshift furnace, the Gypsy son forged the most dreaded battle armor the world would ever see.

Within an unshatterable steel shell, he molded every weapon his mad mind could conceive. His servants took careful measurements: the arms, the legs, the chest . . . they all had to perfectly fit Von Doom.

Intricate computer circuitry was placed in the heavy iron glove, and on the right index finger a small ring was hidden which would unlatch the dreaded mask . . .

. . . that great gray skull-like face that would cover Doom’s own demolished visage.

“Does the armor pain you, Master?”

“Pain? That is for lesser men! What can pain mean to Victor Von Doom? Now—place on the mask!”

“But, Master, it has not completely cooled.”

“Say no more, monk.” Doom’s voice was seething with anger. “I will tolerate no further delay. I cannot wait a moment more.”

The great iron mask, still burning red with flame, was brought by heavy tongs toward Doom. His dark, brooding eyes glowed hungrily as it was placed on his face. “Never again will mortal eyes gaze upon the hideous countenance of Victor Von Doom. From this moment on, I shall be known as—DOCTOR DOOM!”

He stood tall and silent, a nightmare in gray, as a frightened monk approached him with the great green robe of Godhood, which he draped over Doom’s powerful shoulders. Gold-spun cord held by two golden disks fastened the flowing cape in place.

Yet even as he stood proud and regal as a King, Doom knew this iron armor was not yet enough. He needed power . . . the power of a country . . . to give him the immunity he required for his total scheme to be realized. And what better land to rule than the simple Bavarian country of his birth.

He had fled Latveria as a frightened child. But he would return as its absolute Monarch.

Years passed, and Doom gazed out the castle window watching his subjects scurry like mice far below him. They accepted him as ruler as he knew they would. His power assured that simple fact.

They were his people, and he treated them well, and he made their land more prosperous than it had ever been before. He asked little of them except total blind obedience, and his robot guard patrol would assure that.

Doom had his country, but he still wanted more.

“Tomorrow is the date, Master,” the old voice informed him. Doom turned from the window toward ever-loyal Boris. “Tomorrow is the date, sire.”

Doom’s own voice was deep and rumbling. “Yes, tomorrow the first step in realizing my true destiny will be taken. Prepare for my journey to America, Boris. I wish to arrive fashionably late for the festival.

“And I wish to see Reed Richards’s face when I do.”

With that, Doctor Doom threw back his great iron-clad face and laughed a cold, bone-chilling laugh.

To Be Continued...Monday 

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Fantastic Four: Doomsday Part 2

Two
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No trumpets sounded the day he was born. He was, after all, merely a Gypsy’s son, someone to be shunted away, hidden in some dark corner to be forgotten. He would undoubtedly become a beggar or a thief if he didn’t die young in some senseless squabble.

Yet, sharp-eyed Boris the lame saw the fire blazing deep in the infant’s dark, brooding eyes, and only Boris noticed that when Gretchyn, midwife to Cynthia, laid her bare palm to young Victor’s rear, the child did not cry.

And again, only old Boris realized the hour of the child’s birth was the hour of the howling wolf.

Boris bowed to his young master. He would serve as vassal to Victor Von Doom. For now. Forever.

Werner Von Doom proudly sat at his wife’s side as she nursed their newborn son. “Victor has your eyes, Cynthia,” he said, “your shining, coal-dark eyes.” He shuddered as the winter smoke curled from his lips.

Cynthia didn’t smile; she rarely did. “I ache, Werner. Do you have your herbs?” Werner nodded quietly and reached for his bag. He was a Gypsy healer, perhaps the best in Latveria, and his bag of potions and herbs was always at his side.

“Drink this, my wife,” he said, his deep voice echoing concern and fear. Cynthia did as her husband said, and the potion tasted bitter on her tongue. But she had tasted worse, much worse. Her own brews tasted of death.

Werner turned toward old Boris as his wife quickly fell asleep. “Let us leave. She needs her rest.” Boris said nothing as he stepped from the tent. It was too late for words. Victor Von Doom lived, and he knew it was only a matter of time before the world would come to fear this Gypsy’s son.

The boy was eight and studying at the foot of a master tutor from another village when Boris rode into camp, his aged face taut with fear. He shouted, “Victor! You must come home now. The Baron’s soldiers have come to seize your father!”

The boy’s expressionless face did not change. Quietly, he mounted Boris’s horse. “Go, then. Hurry to my father’s side. He will need me.”

The child speaks like a man, Boris thought. His heritage becomes more evident with every passing day. Soon it will be impossible to hold him back. Soon he will realize his tremendous power, and then . . . Boris shuddered at the thought.

The soldier was clearly impatient. “Well, Gypsy, do you come with me now, or will you die?” Werner stared up at the soldier standing in the opening of his tent. “I am only a Gypsy healer. I’ve done nothing. I treat the sick and the suffering, that is all.”

The soldier grunted. “Silence!” he commanded, his voice plainly thick with disgust at speaking with a lowly Gypsy. “You are to come with me by order of the Baron.”

Werner rose, hatred burning in his eyes. The one who killed my darling Cynthia was dressed in your colors, swine. I will never forget that. He slung his medicine bag over his shoulder and thought of his wife. Has it been six years since you were taken from me? I feel the pain and agony of an eternity.

Werner mounted the old nag outside his tent when he saw Victor running toward him. “Father, what is happening?”

Werner Von Doom allowed a slight smile. “Do not worry, Victor. I have done no wrong. I will not be harmed.”

“But the tribes need you, Father. I need you.”

Boris limped to the young one’s side. He placed a firm hand on Victor’s shoulder. “Do not fear for your father, Victor. He will be safe, and I will look after you until his return.”

Werner lifted the boy and held him tightly, then lowered him to the ground and rode off. “Why are they taking him, Boris? He only wishes to help the helpless. Why are they now after him?” Victor was confused, but his grim-set face reflected only bitter hatred.

Sadly, the elder Gypsy shook his head. “He is a Gypsy, boy—as are we all. It is a price we must pay.”

The Baron sat in a plush velvet chair in the center of a magnificent banquet hall. He was a big man, powerfully built. A long dueling scar split his face from his left eye to his chin. “My wife is sick, Gypsy. Heal her.” It was not a request. It was an order.

Werner shook his head. “Baron, it is hopeless. It is beyond my power to save her. The grip has taken hold of her and will not let go.”

The Baron’s face grew red. “You lie, Gypsy. Use your magic potions to save her, or you’ll pay with your own miserable life.”

Werner shrugged his shoulders. He was doomed. The woman would die within three days and he would then be slain. Unless . . .

On the second day, a tired Werner Von Doom entered the Baron’s throne room. “There is nothing more I can do, Excellency. She will recover.”

“Go, then, Gypsy, and pray for your sake that you have been successful.” With that, Werner was dismissed, and he quickly mounted his horse and rode off.

Night came early, and the castle was dark, save for a flickering candle in the Baroness’s chamber. The nurse who held her lady’s hand sang softly to herself, whiling away the night. Then she noticed the hand had become cold and limp, and her lady’s eyes were clear and empty. The Baroness was dead.

By week’s end, the Gypsy camp was overrun with the Baron’s soldiers. “I want the healer,” he demanded. “A boon to the man who brings his head to me.” But Werner Von Doom and his young son, Victor, were long gone.

They fled into the night, taking to the snow-deep Alps. The thin winter coats Werner had grabbed were hardly warm enough to ward off the storm that was brewing.

“Why do we run like cowards, Father? We can stay and fight.” Werner closed his lips to the freezing snows which blanketed him.

“You are like your dead mother. She, too, feared nothing, no matter how hopeless the odds.”

But Victor was insistent. “We can beat them, Father. We have the power. There is nothing that can stop a Von Doom. Nothing!”

So proud, little Victor, so very proud . . . and so very foolish. There are forces frail men cannot fight. Werner sorely wished Cynthia was at his side to counsel him now.

They found a cave for sanctuary from the raging snows, and Werner huddled closely to Victor to keep the child warm. The night would be the death of them both, he felt, struggling to force open his eyes. But the fight was lost.

Soon dreams came.

Cynthia stood beside her cauldron, her dark eyes blazing like the fires of Acheron. “I pass on my legacy to my son, Victor,” she proudly sang. “All that I am, he, too, will be.”

Werner watched helplessly as she placed the infant Victor into the heated cauldron. The child refused to cry as the boiling herbs bathed his tender flesh. Then Cynthia smiled the smile of the wicked. “It is done. He is one with me.”

The vision shifted. The Baron’s troops thundered into the village. “Heretics! Blasphemers! Witches, all of you! Die! Die! Die!” The soldiers were mad that dark night. They cut the canvas of Von Doom’s tent and tore Cynthia from his arms. He tried to help her, but a long sword was held to his throat, and he was forced to watch as his wife was ignobly drowned before his horrified eyes.

Eyes glazed over with sweat, he suddenly awoke. At his side, young Victor was still asleep, shivering from the bitter cold. Then, from outside the cave, he heard a whinny and the sound of galloping hooves.

“No! No!”

Victor awoke as his father shouted into the grayness outside the cave. “What is it, Father? Have the Baron’s troops found us?”

Von Doom’s voice was one of defeat. “We have lost our horse, Victor. The ropes must have loosened during the night. We are as good as captured.”

Victor shook his head grimly. “No. We won’t surrender. No matter what happens to us, we will go on. A Von Doom never surrenders. A Von Doom is always victorious.”

Tears streamed from Werner’s eyes. So much like his mother.

For three days they plodded through the snows, shivering, teeth chattering with every step. They’d never make it, Werner thought. They would die. Then he would be at his wife’s side again.

On the fourth day, they collapsed from fatigue and hunger. Why go on? Let death take us now . . . let us go to our reward.

Boris stared at the two lying at death’s door. Werner was failing; he wouldn’t last much longer. Young Victor was still unconscious, but breathing. He nodded toward a young girl to put two more logs on the fire. It was luck he had found them before the Baron’s men did. But was he too late?

It took four days for Victor to be roused. The child was weak, emaciated, yet he insisted on being at his father’s side. For a moment, Werner’s eyes opened and he saw Victor’s frail face staring down at him. “Heed my last words . . .” he sputtered out. “You must protect . . . protect . . .” And then nothing.

Victor fell to his father’s side, his face grim. “Father, no one will have to protect me. I shall become strong! Powerful! I will avenge your death!”

Yet Boris knew, for he alone remembered the Baron’s purge so many years before. He did not mean to protect you, young Victor. He meant the world must be protected . . . from the child who bears the name Von Doom.

Boris turned toward his men. “Take away Werner’s body. A funeral must be arranged.” But Victor would hear nothing of it.

“They murdered my mother when I was but an infant. And now they have slain my father. They’ll pay for that. All of mankind will pay.” He was a snarling lion, but Boris quieted him with a glance.

“Victor, you are on your own now. These are your father’s herbs and remedies. Use them only for good, lad.”

Boris left and Victor was soon alone. “They’ll all pay, Father. Mankind will be taught a lesson. I swear it.”

He opened the trunk carelessly. “Your medicine trunk will no longer be needed, Father. I will not doctor the ill. I’ll not spend a lifetime helping others only to suffer in the end.”

Beneath the herbs and potions, he saw a small chest. Across its lid was his mother’s name. “This belonged to her? I’ve never seen it before. What is it?”

The lid was locked, but Doom’s agile fingers quickly picked it open. Inside were strange vials, powders . . . magic potions. And a diary.

He read through the night. Each page was a treasure unto itself, for each page told of a magic spell, a dark secret known only to those now long dead.

Werner Von Doom had never told his son his mother’s secret, but Victor Von Doom knew it at last. His mother had been a witch, and he . . . he had inherited her dark and awesome powers.

Outside, the night grew thick with storm clouds, and thunder razed the heavens. The gods knew that from this moment forth, the world would never again be the same.

To Be Continued...Tomorrow at
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Halloween Horror HORROR FROM THE TOMB "Bone Man"

This 1954 comic series was so gruesome, it lasted only a single issue...

...but what an issue it was!

In late 1953, Premier Magazines entered the comic book field with seven titles, each in a different genre (romance, Western, crime, etc.), including Horror from the Tomb.

Unfortunately, the comic book "witch hunt" was in full swing and, in little over a year, Premier (along with almost 2/3rds of the industry) had ceased operations.

Horror from the Tomb changed it's name to Mysterious Stories with #2 and ran for five more issues, but the end was inevitable...

The writer is unknown, but the artist is Mannie Banks, who has less than two dozen comic stories (mostly horror tales at Atlas Comics) to his credit.

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Ten-Cent Plague

The Great Comic Book Scare and How It Changed America

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STRANGE TALES OF THE UNUSUAL "Five Sinister Statues"

Does "madness" lie within a tale...

...where the kool Bill Everett-rendered cover illustration doesn't match the interior art by Richard Doxsee?

The statues in this never-reprinted tale from Atlas' Strange Tales of the Unusual #11 (1957) resemble Indo-Chinese (Siamese or Laotian) sculptures, unlike the ones on the cover, which look decidedly-Chinese!

Makes you wonder which came first, and how long it was between the cover and the story actually being drawn!

Sadly, we'll never know the answer, since none of the creatives involved are still alive!

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Science Fiction Comics 
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MENACE "Walking Dead!"

"Walking Dead" didn't always refer to zombies...

...but it sure does here!

This cover-featured story from Atlas' Menace #9 (1954) came at the tail-end of the horror comic craze.
Dr. Wertham's crusade against those magazines had already taken it's toll as entire comic companies folded due to falling sales and public outcry.
Menace itself only lasted two more issues.
Luckily, Atlas (which already had a predilection for jumping onto whatever current fad was selling) had such a diverse line, that it was easy for Stan Lee and company to simply "switch gears" and replace the disgraced horror genre with other types of books.
For example, When MAD comics took off in the mid-1950s, Atlas had four MAD-clone comics; RIOT!, CRAZY!, WILD!, and SNAFU!!
None lasted more than five issues!
With the Silver Age dawning only a couple of years later, Atlas hung on long enough to become Marvel, and the rest is history...
Illustrated by John Forte with a cover by Gene Colan, the story's writer is unknown.

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HeartBreak Horror MENACE "Fake!"

Remember the old adage "Don't judge a book by it's cover"?

 Here's the codicil; "It goes both ways"!

Illustrated by Al Eadeh, this tale from Atlas' Menace #10 (1954) follows the classic trope of golddigger tripped up, not by her own greed, but by the fact her husband (who still loves her) is not even human!

Remember, the target audience for horror (as opposed to romance) comics was 8-14 year old boys, to whom girls were "yukky".

They were also the audience for whom Lois Lane , the nosy reporter who was always trying to either expose Superman's secret identity or trick the Man of Steel into marrying her, was the typical woman!