Issue
Synopsis:
Issue
#36:
After
the events of last issue, Spectre finds himself without a home and with
no place to live.
For the time being, Spectre gets out of his costume and sleeps in
the alleyways of Hell’s Kitchen along with the other bums.
Morgan looks into his job requests, but still no luck.
Without much to do during the daylight hours, Morgan walks the
streets of New York, to help him further familiarize himself with the
city he’s sworn to protect.
As Morgan is walking by an electronics store, he sees a Villain
calling himself Bedrock on the TV screens.
Apparently, Bedrock is part of a group called the Elementals, and
they are demanding ransom for the son of computer mogul Richard Hale.
It seems that the Elementals have hijacked the TV broadcasts, as
they are on every channel.
Bedrock then crushes a rat in his stony fist to demonstrate what
will happen if their demands are not met within 48 hours.
Spectre
decides to get involved and starts by paying a visit to the father,
Richard Hale, in order to find some background on the case.
Spectre discovers that the boy was abducted on his way home from
school, his driver was brutally killed and the car was torn to pieces.
Spectre decides to investigate the car further, and heads to the
local junkyard.
Spectre attempts to use his Postcognition on the vehicle, but it
doesn’t seem to work.
Suddenly, Spectre hears footsteps behind him and spins around.
Before him stand the four members of the Elementals; Bedrock,
Blaze, Tempest, and Undertow.
They warn him to mind his own business and stay out of their way,
but Spectre ignores their warning, opting to instead strike Blaze with a
Forcebolt.
Tempest creates a tornado around Spectre, who narrowly escapes
its clutches while the three remaining villains create Elementals
reflecting their powers; earth, fire, and water.
Spectre attempts to telekinetically hurl Undertow into Blaze, but
Blaze manages to avoid the attack.
All at once, the villains concentrate their attacks at Spectre,
with Blaze, the Fire Elemental, and another of Tempest’s tornado
attacks missing him.
Unfortunately, Undertow tries to choke Spectre by creating water
in his throat, and while Spectre fights off the effects of that attack,
the Water Elemental breaks through the force field Spectre had erected
and Bedrock creates an earthdome surrounding Spectre.
Bedrock begins to taunt Spectre, chastising him for not heeding
his warning, while Spectre refuses to back down and taunts them right
back. While
in the earthdome, Spectre creates his Psi-Sword.
Bedrock pokes a hole in the earthdome so that Spectre can breathe
and to make certain he’s not up to anything in there.
As the taunting resumes, Spectre hears a “psst” and notices
that there’s someone in the earthdome with him, trying to get his
attention.
He notices a female superhero wearing a Spectre-like outfit.
She whispers to Spectre that she’s a friend and wants to help.
She continues by saying that she’ll create a distraction in
order to let him get away.
As she assures him that she’ll be okay, Spectre tries to create
a telepathic link with her, but seems to have major trouble getting
through.
Instead he simply conveys a brief message for her to meet him
later, after the two escape the Elementals.
Spectre then uses his telekinesis to destroy the earthdome while
the female pops up at the villains, catching them by surprise and
blasting them with energy blasts.
With her distraction, Spectre easily manages to escape.
About
an hour after the incident, Spectre meets up with the girl, who
introduces herself as Spectral and offers to be his sidekick.
Spectre inquires about her powers, which seem to include Energy
Blasts, Mental Resistance, and Intangibility.
Impressed, Spectre offers her a trial period and warns her of
what happened to his last sidekick who didn’t follow his instructions.
She agrees and the two make plans to meet again tomorrow night.
Spectral claims that she can find out where the TV transmission
was coming from, and heads off to investigate while Spectre changes back
into Morgan and tries to find a soft spot in the alley to sleep.
Issue
#37:
The
next morning, Morgan finds a few TV’s and watches them through the
store windows, looking for signs of another Elementals broadcast.
After wasting most of the day waiting, Morgan witnesses another
pirating of the airwaves and sees Bedrock reiterating the demands of the
previous day in the place of the 7 o’clock news.
To bring his point home, Bedrock pans the camera back to show the
8-year-old boy, tied and scared.
Then as abruptly as the transmission appeared, it ends.
Morgan finds an alley in which to make a quick change into
Spectre, and heads off to meet Spectral.
Spectral meets with Spectre and informs him that the broadcast
was coming from an abandoned chocolate factory.
Spectre makes it clear that Spectral is to follow his orders and
only rescue the boy; he claims he doesn’t want to lose another
partner. Spectral leads Spectre to the factory, sneaking around back
while Spectre sneaks in through the front of the factory.
As Spectre looks through one of the handrails on the catwalk that
he’s decided to sneak in on, he sees the Elementals amidst a slew of
very high-tech equipment.
He also sees the boy living in a glass box of sorts.
Spectre decides to fight, and creates his Psi-Sword and his Force
Field in preparation.
On the other end of the huge room that has now been gutted for
the Elementals private use, Spectre spots Spectral.
Spectral gives Spectre the signal that lets Spectre know that
she’s going after the boy while Spectre deals with the villains, as
per Spectre’s plan.
Spectre
jumps down from the catwalk and surprises the villains with a hefty
telekinetic Object Swarm.
While the villains are off balance, Spectre uses this opportunity
to slash Bedrock with his Psi-Sword.
The Elementals retaliate, but their attacks are clumsy, which
Spectre easily dodges or blacks with his Force Field.
Undertow tries to drown Spectre by creating water directly in his
throat, but Spectre (with the aid of his telekinesis) resists the attack
and spits it back at Undertow.
Spectre quickly finishes off Bedrock with his Psi-Sword,
preparing for the second wave of their assault.
Fending off their second wave fairly easily, Spectre decides that
Tempest is the most dangerous of the existing Elementals, and slashes
her with his Psi-Sword.
Panicking after seeing their leader fall so easily, the
Elementals try some team tactics.
Blaze attacks with a fire blast which is easily blocked by
another Force Field.
While Spectre is momentarily distracted by Blaze’s attack,
Tempest creates a tornado, which Spectre easily avoids with his flight.
Trying to catch Spectre unaware, Undertow creates a large body of
water above Spectre, in an attempt to ground him.
Again, Spectre easily avoids the attack while finishing off
Tempest with his Psi-Sword.
Blaze distracts Spectre again by shooting a large blast of fire
at Spectre, while Undertow quickly begins to fill the boy’s cell with
water.
Spectre, realizing their scheme, attacks Undertow with his
Psi-Sword to stop him from filling the cage to the top, drowning the
boy. Unfortunately,
Blaze uses that opportunity to superheat the cage and water, trying to
boil the boy alive.
The two Elementals tell Spectre that he can’t take them both
out before they kill the boy, but if Spectre surrenders, they’ll let
the boy live.
Suddenly,
the cage bursts as the hot water pours everywhere.
Spectre looks over and sees Spectral rushing the boy to safety.
Taking this surprise opportunity, Spectre finishes off Undertow
and turns to Blaze.
Blaze, however, attacks the main console where all the high tech
equipment is sitting.
All four Elementals and all of their equipment just disappears,
without a trace...
Spectre
heads to the back of the building to make sure that nothing happened to
Spectral or the boy, then puts the two of them on his back and begins to
fly the boy home.
The boy is in awe of Spectre, never seeing a superhero before in
person.
The boy keeps asking Spectre all kinds of questions, but Spectre
only gives him one piece of advice; to help others when he can, just as
Spectre helped him - to return the favor to someone else.
Spectre thanks Spectral, who jumps off his back while he’s
flying, then turns intangible and floats to the ground.
Spectre returns the boy to his father, who insists that Spectre
takes a suitcase of money as a reward.
Spectre tries to refuse, but not wanting to insult the man, takes
the suitcase.
Spectre finds a safe place to count the money, to find out just
how much he had agreed to take.
After counting the money, Spectre is taken aback as he realizes
the numbers add up to $50,000.
Issue
#38:
Spectre
decides to secretly check up on Monica, to make certain that she’s
doing well.
He is somewhat surprised to see that Monica has been doing some
charity work, giving back to the community.
She also seems to have indulged herself by sporting a new
wardrobe, complete with hats and jewelry.
Satisfied, Morgan deposits his newfound reward and gets himself
an apartment.
He also decides to buy some workout equipment and begins a new,
and rather difficult training retinue.
After settling in, Morgan goes out as Spectre on patrol.
His intentions are to find Spectral, but instead he finds a few
thugs trying to rob an elderly couple.
After quickly dispatching the thugs, Spectre finishes his patrol
and heads back home.
The
next day, as Morgan is watching television, he hears a news story about
the Elementals attacking the vault.
Apparently, there were a total of 13 escapees. But the only one
that was confirmed on the news was Sludge.
Spectre decides to head out on patrol to find the Elementals.
While on patrol, however, Spectre suddenly hears the familiar
sound of a jewelry store alarm sounding.
As Spectre nears to investigate, he hears a woman’s voice, and
his heart begin pounding uncontrollably.
He rounds the corner to face lady Jezebel, resisting her charms
but not being totally unaffected.
Lady Jezebel explains that she set the alarm off so to lure
Spectre here.
Jezebel continues as she claims to miss him and wants to relive
the nights they shared and the fun they had.
She confesses that she wants to turn over a new leaf, and she
looks to Spectre to help her with the transition.
Without warning, Spectre is hit from all sides by fire, earth,
wind, and water.
Spectre falls unconscious.
Spectre
awakens bound to a chair, apparently in some kind of technical lab or
workshop.
Bedrock moves into Spectre’s view, along with the rest of the
Elementals.
He explains to Spectre exactly how Spectre thwarted their plans
and of his meddling.
He goes on to introduce Lady Jezebel, Migraine and Glacier.
Bedrock then orders Lady Jezebel to coerce Spectre into joining
their cause, but Spectre resists her charms.
Bedrock then calls back for Shock to join them, but after a
minute or two, Shock is still nowhere to be seen.
Bedrock claims that since Lady Jezebel has proved to be useless
thus far, that the least she can do is go fetch Shock.
Lady Jezebel heads into the back, but gets blasted by fire on her
way there.
A man calling himself Arson and claiming to be Blaze’s twin
brother emerges from the back.
A second after he steps forward, Black Dragon and Frostbite
appear behind him, Frostbite is carrying Shock over his shoulder.
Frostbite then offers to trade Shock for Spectre, but Bedrock
declines, claiming that Shock too has proved useless.
In response, Frostbite holds up the limp Shock and shoves an ice
knife through her torso.
Black
Dragon and Arson attack, while Frostbite quickly moves to Spectre.
Frostbite frees Spectre, warning Spectre to get out while he
still can.
While Arson and Black Dragon take on the Elementals, Glacier
attacks Frostbite and Migraine heads over to Spectre.
Spectre attacks Migraine with his Psi-Sword, but Migraine creates
a Psi-Sword of his own and attempts to parry the blow. After
an unsuccessful parry leading to a cruel psychic slash, Migraine
attempts to return the favor to Spectre.
As Migraine’s Psi-Sword cuts the air next to Spectre, Spectre
goes for a kick to Migraine’s glass jaw, knocking Migraine out.
Frostbite
again warns Spectre to leave, and Spectre decides to take his advice.
As Spectre is leaving, he hears Bedrock ask Frostbite why he
saved Spectre.
Frostbite’s only reply is that it would not be in his boss’s
best interest.
Making it outside, Spectre notices that Lady Jezebel is trying to
escape in a car.
He telekinetically yanks out the car’s engine and apprehends
her. Lady
Jezebel pleads with Spectre that she is the least dangerous of all the
villains, and that if he really wanted to serve justice, he would try to
stop all the murderers and mercenaries that are still inside the
factory.
She continues to point out that people are getting murdered in
there and a true super hero wouldn’t allow that.
She adds that she’ll call the police in for backup, and Spectre
agrees.
Spectre flies across the ground with a furious pace, Force Field
up and Psi-Sword in hand.
As Spectre re-enters the building, everyone is gone, as well as
all the equipment that was in here just a few minutes ago.
All that’s left in the building is smattering puddles of blood,
which Spectre takes samples of.
Spectre then heads home, leaving the police to clean up the rest
of the mess.