“Got the Teeth of the Hydra Upon you”

Page 1: Mockingbird reads over notes, looking angry. She says even with her background, this is mad-scientist territory. She calls Crossfire and says they need to go to lockup.

Page 2: Ravencroft. Mockingbird greets an administrator who goes over all the rules for security. The administrator says the patient has been very stable, and hopes that rehabilitation might be possible. Mockingbird agrees that she’s gifted, and should be helping advance scientific research. In an exam room, an orderly introduces Mockingbird (who he calls Dr. Hunter) to Tilda Johnson AKA Nightshade sitting at a small table bolted to the floor.

Page 3: Mockingbird greets her as “Dr. Johnson” but Nighshade says that her licenses and doctorates have all been revoked. Mockingbird asks the orderly if he can wait outside, so they can discuss confidential matters. Nightshade waits for him to leave, smiles and says “So, you’re a psychiatrist now, Bobbi?” Mockingbird is surprised, but starts telling her about a project that needs Nightshade’s expertise and promises she can get Nightshade out short-term if she agrees. Nightshade repeats “So, you’re a psychiatrist now, Bobbi?” Green Foam comes out her mouth and Nightshade collapses onto the table. The orderly rushes in, asking what happened. Mockingbird doesn’t know, and Nightshade, or whatever she was just talking to, isn’t moving.

Page 4: Mockingbird is escorted out, as the administrator tries to make sense of what happened, mentioning that all “supercriminal” patients undergo regular medical testing and suicide watch to prevent this. They think Nightshade just died. Once outside, Mockingbird calls Crossfire to say it looks like their expert is in the wind after leaving some kind of facsimile at Ravencroft & escaping. A word balloon coming from the phone answers back “2 weeks ago” Switch to Nightshade standing next to Crossfire with his phone. She asks why they came to visit her. Mockingbird says “High Evolutionary”. Nightshade asks where her lab is.

Page 5: Nightshade and Mockingbird are working on a whiteboard with equations and gene-sequence diagrams. Mockingbird asks if these will really work, given that it was written 100 years ago. Nighshade says there’s a whole planet of animal hybrids as testimony they will. She gestures to Crossfire and asks who else Mockingbird has pressganged into this team. Nightshade is impressed that Siryn and Kraven are in, and asks if they want something to counteract Scarecrow’s “fear pheromones”. Mockingbird says they tested for that & didn’t find any proof he ever had them. Nightshade asks how they explain people’s feeling of terror when he’s around. Crossfire says maybe that’s because he’s a superstrong twisted-limbed resurrected psycho dressed like a hillbilly cenobite.

Page 6-7: Crossfire briefs Tiger Shark, Bob, Feral, Scarecrow and Nightshade on their progress. He explains that the organization they’re fighting is a cult composed of a lot of SHIELD and HYDRA deserters, along with new civilian recruits. The things they retrieved were stolen unique weapons and more importantly a reproduction of several pages of The Darkhold believed to have been made by The High Evolutionary. Crossfire says that none of them should be surprised by how weird this will get given their line of work, but there’s some bizarre background. Elder Gods, ancient wizards, Frankenstein and fairy tale monsters are all real. A biologist named Herbert Wyndham, working in that primordial place where science and magic are hard to distinguish, has been creating new life forms since the 1940s.  This will be word balloons over panels of Werewolf by Night at Wundagore Mountain, Sinister & Apocalypse, Thulsa Doom and the Evolutinary War. The shadow-organization they’re fighting has found enough of his research to feasibly create some very dangerous creatures. HYDRA Bob says “what, like were-cats and shark men?” Tiger shark laughs. Crossfire introduces Nighthshade, saying she will know what they’re dealing with as much as anybody can, and the plan is to find the facility where they’ve made these things and destroy them. Feral asks when they move. Crossfire says as soon as the others get back from gathering intel.

Page 8: Kraven and Siryn are fighting Mandroids in a bunker. Kraven is knocking them over and prying off faceplates with a knife as Siryn throws them around and screams at the unmasked ones to paralyze them. Once they’re all down, Kraven asks which one to take. Siryn says to pick whichever one put up the best fight, he may know more than the others. They carry one of the Mandroid pilots out of the structure and load him in a van. The pilot has an eyepatch.

Page 9: Kraven drives while Siryn interrogates the pilot. She says she isn’t a telepath, but there are forces that speak to her. She says the words “Kraken”, “Zodiac”, “SHIELD” and “Darkhold” several times and tells the eyepatch man that if he doesn’t stop concentrating on old songs to keep her out, she’ll say them louder.

Page 10: Siryn and Kraven drive into a parking garage where the team are waiting. Scarecrow asks if Siryn’s scream left him insane. Siryn tells him that the guy wasn’t sane to begin with. Feral, with Kraven at her side, hang back with Crossfire. She tells him that they want progress on what he promised them. Weapon X and Kraven’s personal grudge. Crossfire says they’ve only started the operation, and once they have done adequate damage to this cult, his organization will give them what was promised. Feral reminds Crossfire that if he takes too long, the six can desert his “mission” and solve each other’s problems independently.

Page 11: In the van, Siryn asks what kind of things they’re making with the High Evolutionary’s notes. Nigthshade says that they were trying to create mythical monsters: A Hydra, a Kraken, a Leviathan. Siryn says there are good reasons these things were banished, and the men behind them must be made to understand their mistake, then she vanishes. The rest of the team, except Feral, hope they succeeded. It would be a shame to go to all this work and not get to kill something like that. Nightshade says this is why she hates working with supervillains.

Page 12: The monsters are being made in a former X-Corporation facility in Georgia. A charitable organization took over operations, promising to work on therapies for new genetic disorders, but the whole thing was a front for one of HYDRA’s old money laundering operations. The operative they kidnapped didn’t know security protocol for that facility, but he told them what kind of system they used. The team would go in and destroy the control unit for some robot sentries, but there was still an all-points alarm system running off its own power in the basement. One of them will have to swim in through a sewer drainage pipe to sabotage it. Kraven suggests Tiger Shark is best suited for swimming.

Page 13: HYDRA Bob swims through the sewers, saying “I hate this fuckin team.” Topside, Kraven tells Nightshade and Scarecrow to cover the civilian workers while he, Feral and Tiger Shark took out the robot controls upstairs. Scarecrow asks Nightshade if she’ll mind him gutting a few people to keep them from making a movie. Nightshade tells him not to do anything unless they’re attacked.

Page 14: Nightshade and Scarecrow go in the front door of the normal looking office building, you can see Feral climbing up the side. Nightshade starts to say “nobody move this is a robbery” but Scarecrow starts screaming and throws a pitchfork at the first person he sees. The receptionist pulls a machine gun and starts shooting at them, followed by people sticking their heads out of offices to do the same. There are no robot sentries. Nightshade tries to use Scarecrow as a human shield as she runs out the door, but he keeps contorting out of the way. Inside, the receptionist is calling for reinforcements. Tiger Shark walks down the staircase behind the desk, singing the Jaws music. They shoot him, but he’s bulletproof and he bites people’s hands off to stop them.

Page 15: Upstairs Feral picks a lock with her claws and she and Kraven start smashing a computer console inside. Feral says the lab facilities looked well-maintained. She was expecting castle Frankenstein. Kraven remarks that hospitals and labs are wrong. You can’t make an animal in a quiet air conditioned room. Life is mud and flies and things biting you as soon as you’re out of the womb. Feral says he must have been some father.

Page 16: The lights go out and Nightshade, Scarecrow and Tiger Shark come upstairs to meet Kraven and Feral. Feral tells them where the growing facility is. Bob comes up the stairs later but they stop him at the other end of the hallway because of the smell. They open a 30-foot door with a wheel handle big enough that Tiger Shark has to be the one to turn it and pull the door open. He’s complaining that they make him do the grunt work and he’s as capable and calculating as any of them when a giant tail  comes out the door and breaks him in half.

Page 17: A 3-headed Hydra taller than the door screams at them. The team scatters. Nightshade sprays one of the creature’s arms with something that makes it blister down to the bone, but doensn’t have enough to dissolve the whole thing. Feral and Scarecrow are dodging heads. Kraven manages to mount one of the necks as it sweeps down to bite him. Another of the heads has eaten Tiger Shark’s remains. Kraven is trying to saw through the neck with a knife. Bob screams “No! Cut off one head and 2 more shall take its place!”

Page 18: Siryn appears in front of the leader of the eyepatch cult, sitting in his study as seen last issue. He reaches for an antique microphone, but can’t speak into it. Siryn says that words only work when she wants them to. He asks if she wants something from him, or if Mockingbird wants something from him. Siryn says she doesn’t care what Mockingbird wants. She found him on her own. A soul like his is easy to pinpoint. He says she’s free to kill him, but there are consequences in this world and the next. A person doesn’t get to be as old as him without people looking out for him. Siryn tells him that his plans are going to fall apart relatively quickly no matter what, but the Demiurges are too dangerous. Whatever his endgame is, find another key to it. He laughs at this, saying the doors he needs to open don’t use keys. Siryn is tired of enigmatic mystery crap, which is all well and good he says, because her friends are about to be eaten by a giant lizard head.  She punches him in the face and disappears.

Page 19: The six are still fighting the Hydra. Crossfire shows up with a giant Sirynge under his arm, and he and Bob jam it into the creature’s leg. Siryn materializes and at the Hydra, and one of the heads smashes her into a wall. Nightshade tells them to go for the heart. Bob cuts into the Hydra’s belly with a laser rifle asks if that’s where its heart is, or if it even has one. Kraven grabs Scarecrow and shoves him into the cut, telling him to go look. Siryn is choking one of the heads, while the rest of them stay out of the way. Crossfire blames Nightshade for the tranquilizer not working. He tells Siryn to tear out a work table and expose a gas line, their best bet is to burn this thing.

Page 20: Crossfire and Feral start attacking the Hydra’s eyes as Kraven stabs it to lead it towards the gas. Bob has a flamethrower ready to go. He asks if they should wait, Scarecrow is still inside it. Nightshade tells him to go ahead, but Crossfire stops him. They need Scarecrow for the future. He yells to “go towards the light” and Scarecrow climbs out of the Hydra’s wound, saying he’s been born again, an innocent child. “Oh, and I saw Tiger Shark in there. Don’t think he’s going to make it.” Bob lights the gas and Siryn flies into the Hydra to push it the rest of the way into the fire.

Page 21: Outside the Hydra’s chamber, Crossfire asks if they found any more. Feral says there are 2 gestating in tanks on upper floors, and one alive and asleep. Nigthshade tells them the best plan is to make sure cutting the power stopped the 2 from growing, and then get the generator back on to electrocute the live one in the tank. Crossfire tells them Tiger Shark died because they were handling this sloppy like some kind of gang, they’re not the Wrecking Crew, this is a job. He’s especially angry at Siryn for disappearing from the van. She tells him they all know he doesn’t call the shots, and if he wants them to follow orders the one he works for can start delivering on their incentives.

Page 22: Scarecrow and Bob are in the basement. All panels of them are head and shoulders, with Bob’s hand drawn working in a couple. Bob is fixing the generator. Scarecrow says it’s frightening how quickly a life can end, and asks Bob if he agrees. Bob says he’ll miss Tiger Shark. Even though he was a remorseless shark man who’s tried to kill him. Scarecrow says people have some strange feelings. He asks if Bob wants to come over and give him a hand with the generator.  Wide last panel to show that Scarecrow is in the opposite corner of the room with Bob pointing a rifle at him while he works. Bob says “No, that’s okay. I can fix it myself.”

Page 23: Crossfire and Kraven are in another monster lab, hoisting a big power conduit into a giant tank. It’s still dark. Kraven asks what he or his people have over Siryn or Scarecrow. Crossfire asks Kraven if he’d like it if he told the others what Kraven wanted. Kraven says he doesn’t like killing this creature in its sleep. Crossfire wonders what fried Kraken tastes like. Kraven says “alligator calamari, if I recall. It’s been 25 years.”

Page 24: Mockingbird is in the lab reading SHIELD files while Crossfire briefs her on the Hydra killing on an intercom. His words cut out and she checks the cord. 5 people in cloaks and eyepatches break down the door, ready to deliver a traitor’s death with their laser guns.
Be here next Thursday!

 

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