Post by jordan on Aug 1, 2014 16:35:43 GMT -5
All Star Marvel Proudly Presents
Lucifer, The Hood & Michael Morbius
In
Dark City
Chapter II
Two Men Walk Into a Bar
By Jordan
*
Last Time in Dark City
Twenty-Six years after Lucifer kidnaps Parker Robbins from his home, Robbins and Lucifer now find themselves faced with an impossible task—find and kill the elusive Kingpin of Crime or be killed by the ultimate crime cartel—the Maggia! With their backs against the wall, they are willing to do everything in their power to secure their spots in the Maggia! And, on the other side of the city, SHIELD operative Michael Morbius delves into the secrets of a dark jewel not unlike that of Parker Robbins’!
*
The sunlight shines bright on an otherwise cold and unremarkable day. The snow is inches high, coming to the knees of a full-grown man, no older than thirty nor younger than twenty-five. His dirty blonde hair is covered in white and his jagged, war-torn face shows only hope and happiness—fore just in front of him is a child, ten years of age, packing another dense snowball to wing at the man. The boy’s raven-black hair brings out the fierce green in his eyes, filled with unknowing bliss as he tosses the snowball at his father. “Gotcha, dad!” The snowball impacts and shatters across the man’s face, sending even more snow into his hair. The boy’s red hood bounces around as he uses all his effort to wade through the dense snow. The broken black mark on his cheek remains untouched.
“Come now, Parker, surely you don’t believe that I can be taken down by such a weak throw!” The man calls out, taunting the boy to throw again.
“Oh, yeah?! I’ll show you weak!” The boy packs another snowball, but before he has a chance to toss it is knocked back by an even larger snowball from the arm of his father.
“That’s how you throw, boy. Toss like a man!” The challenge forces a new look into the boy’s eyes—a look of anticipation—anticipation to show his father how strong he is, to make his father proud. He packs the biggest, most dense snowball he can and, with all his might, heaves it at the man. He watches as the snowball catapults from his arm a mere three feet before falling back into the vast tundra, coming feet short of the man. The boy crosses his arms and dips his head, pulling his hood up. He mutters softly, “Sorry, dad” before a small tear escapes from his eye.
The man moves towards the boy without disrupting the snow around him. He places a hand gently on the boys back and rubs it softly. “There, there, Parker. No harm, no foul. We will work on that arm. One day, you’ll be as strong as me. On day, you’ll be able to take on the Heavens.”
*
Four-Thousand, Six-Hundred and Ten Miles Away
Michael Morbius can feel the radiant flashes of ten thousand cameras as they zoom and tick and flash like a million little eyeballs watching every move he makes. Sweat rolls down his olive skin, despite the harrowing, toothless gnawing of the cold breeze at his back. His long, blonde hair ripples in the wind. “Are you ready, Mr. Morbius?” A young girl asks in her best attempt at an English accent. Wonder where she’s from? Sweden, maybe.
“Yes, I think I am.” His voice comes out hampered and tired. He’s worked many, many months for this day. Finally, his day of recognition has come. He puts one foot out in front of him, pulls his body forward and steps out in front of the flurry of flashes and clicks and hoots and hollers. The man at the podium on stage is named Oliver Morris. He’s always the host during this award ceremony. Not for much longer.
“And now, the winner of the twenty-first annual Steve Rodgers Outstanding American Award—Michael Morbius!” Morris calls out over the microphone, the sounds from the crowd growing exponentially. If this wasn’t a SHIELD award ceremony, they’d definitely be here by now to police it. You’d think there was a mass murder happening from all the screams. Morbius slowly steps forward, his feet heavy and his body heavier. He extends his arm skywards in a gentle wave; his lips twist up into a smile. Oliver Morris steps to the side and motions for Michael to take the stage. Michael stands squarely in front of the podium; his beautiful, crystal-like blue-grey eyes staring out into the crowd. He holds a hand to his mouth and clears his throat. The crowd falls silent.
“My thanks to everyone here tonight and to everyone who voted for me to win this award tonight. It is such an honor to be here today, looking out at all of your faces. I would like to start by thanking my father, who first got me into the field of scientific occultism…” As Morbius speaks, hundreds of men and women are captivated by his stories—his father, who died at the hands of a cult when he was just a child; his mother, who died giving birth to his sister, Kendall; his sister, who he fought every battle for to keep her safe; Nick Fury, who gave him a job to feed his sister and put clothes on her back; the countless criminals in the world that he took down to move himself up in the food chain; the day his sister died because he was too slow—and when Michael Morbius walks off the stage, every citizen in America is weeping tears for the Morbius family. The cold breeze seems only to get colder. His pocket starts to vibrate and he stops in his tracks. Michelle must finally be back from her expedition. Morbius shoves his hand into his pocket and pulls out his phone to see that the love of his life is calling him. He flips open his phone and hits “answer.” “Hey there gorgeous, you get to see my speech?” He takes a seat in a nearby chair and waits for a response. He hears nothing at first, just a gentle “wooshing” sound, like a washing machine. “Babe?”
“Michael. Michael!” Her voice comes out in a panic, the screech so high that Morbius has to pull the phone away from his ear to save his hearing.
“Michelle, I’m here. What is it?” What could be happening? What happened to his wife on the expedition? What is that sound?
“There’s…there’s this black stone, we find it on the expedition. We didn’t know what it was, so we brought it back to study. B-but then…then something started happening. This…this man started to appear. H-he was wearing this suit. And th-then he was gone. And it got cold and—oh my God…he’s back. Michael, I love you. Please…don’t come home. Don’t!” She lets out a bone-jerking scream and the line goes dead.
*
Sixteen Years Later: Monday
The massive man sits at the head of a rather small billiards table, his beady eyes staring down at the two men shooting on eight. One man leans over the table and prepares to shoot. The large man at the head of the table stares intently and, when noticing the man has a perfect shot lined up, his eyes are flooded with terror. He lifts one massive leg and slams it against the ground, shaking the entire bar. The man shoots and slips, the queue ball goes wild and almost scratches. The large, bald man with the beady eyes laughs. Instead of confronting the goliath, the man backs away and awaits his opponent’s game winning shot. The opponent lines up at the table, the sweat drips quickly off his face, creating a small, wet patch on the pool table. He aims, and he shoots…but it’s too hard and the eight ball ricochets off the corner of the pockets and lies still near the center of the table. The laughter fades from the large, bald man’s face and his eyes now turn to rage. With one swift, fluid lunge, the massive man wraps his even bigger hand around the man’s head and crushes it, the red blood oozing from between his fingers. The man’s body lands on the floor with a thump.
Entering from the door on the other side of the room are two figures—Parker Robbins, aka the Hood, and Lucifer Morningstar, his father. Robbins dresses in his usual attire of the half unzipped red hoodi, his swirling tattoo perfectly visible in the dim light—the frightening marks under his left eye even more visible. And just to his left is his friend, a pale white, his sandy-blond hair highlighting his golden eyes with the black irises. They walk into the gloomy bar with a swagger and a presence, demanding respect and fear.
The pale man dressed a dark black button-down shirt and stonewash blue jeans, sporting a long gold chain from his neck, takes a seat at the bar, calling for a glass of scotch. The other man, Parker Robbins, walks slowly over to the pool table which is now covered in blood. The no-longer-laughing Kingpin stares at the Hood, put can find his eyes.
“Wilson Fisk.” Robbins says, his voice silencing the crowd in the room. No one in the underworld called Fisk by his real name. No one.
“Who the hell are you supposed to be?” Standing just over seven feet, the Kingpin towers over the Hood. But the Hood doesn’t flinch. He just looks up and stares into the eyes of one of the most powerful men in New York City.
“I’m Parker Robbins, the Hood.”
“And what do you want with me, Parker Robbins?”
“I want to give you fair warning that, by the end of this week, I will have killed you and brought your body to the Maggia.” Robbins breaks eye contact with the Kingpin and looks around the room at everyone. He addresses the crowd as a whole. “To any of you that wish to join what will soon become the next great Maggia family, come with me now.” A strange rustle of wind and Lucifer disappears from the bar. Wilson pulls up a chair and sits down, looking Robbins dead in the eyes.
“Listen, kid, you’re what—twenty-five? I’ve been at this game a lot longer than you have, and let me tell you—telling the man you want to kill isn’t a good way to go about killing him. Surprises work better.”
“I would rather look a man in the eyes when I kill him.” Robbins pulls up a chair as well, sitting down in front of Fisk. He steals a man’s whiskey and takes a sip. “This is a shitty little bar right here.”
“I’ve been coming here since my pop ran the place. Now I own it and this is my family. They’re willing to live and die for me kid. You ain’t got nothing but that blond who walked in with you and it looks like he’s gone.”
“He’s hanging around. He just doesn’t like the spotlight.” Robbins points to the corner of the store where a lone man stands, his arms crossed, sipping some kind of cheap scotch that burns on the way down. “What’s his name?” Fisk looks over his massive shoulder to find the man that Robbins is pointing to. It takes a second to click in the Kingpin’s brain, but finally he answers.
“John Carpenter.”
“Come over here, John Carpenter.” Robbins bellows. Carpenter uncrosses his arms and starts his way across the narrow bar. Finally he stands next to the Kingpin, staring into the horrifying eyes of the Hood. “Would you die for Wilson Fisk? Would you lay down your life for him?”
“He’s like a father to me,” Carpenter replies, without hesitation. “Of course I would lay down my life for him. We all would.” Within seconds, Robbins’ hand is gripped tight around Carpenter’s throat, squeezing the life right out of him. Kingpin stands and attempts to make a move on him, pulling his arm up and thrusting towards Robbins. Swiftly, Robbins moves to the side and uses Carpenter as a human shield. The Kingpin’s fist flies straight through the man who called him a father just moments ago. Blood sprays across the bar and Robbins drops the body on the floor.
“Would anyone else like to lay down their life for this man?!” The Hood screams out, addressing the Kingpin’s “family.” “NO?! Then leave!” Parker Robbins turns to the Kingpin for just one second. “Maybe you should get some enforcers.” With one swift movement, Parker turns and walks out of the bar.
Lucifer, The Hood & Michael Morbius
In
Dark City
Chapter II
Two Men Walk Into a Bar
By Jordan
*
Last Time in Dark City
Twenty-Six years after Lucifer kidnaps Parker Robbins from his home, Robbins and Lucifer now find themselves faced with an impossible task—find and kill the elusive Kingpin of Crime or be killed by the ultimate crime cartel—the Maggia! With their backs against the wall, they are willing to do everything in their power to secure their spots in the Maggia! And, on the other side of the city, SHIELD operative Michael Morbius delves into the secrets of a dark jewel not unlike that of Parker Robbins’!
*
The sunlight shines bright on an otherwise cold and unremarkable day. The snow is inches high, coming to the knees of a full-grown man, no older than thirty nor younger than twenty-five. His dirty blonde hair is covered in white and his jagged, war-torn face shows only hope and happiness—fore just in front of him is a child, ten years of age, packing another dense snowball to wing at the man. The boy’s raven-black hair brings out the fierce green in his eyes, filled with unknowing bliss as he tosses the snowball at his father. “Gotcha, dad!” The snowball impacts and shatters across the man’s face, sending even more snow into his hair. The boy’s red hood bounces around as he uses all his effort to wade through the dense snow. The broken black mark on his cheek remains untouched.
“Come now, Parker, surely you don’t believe that I can be taken down by such a weak throw!” The man calls out, taunting the boy to throw again.
“Oh, yeah?! I’ll show you weak!” The boy packs another snowball, but before he has a chance to toss it is knocked back by an even larger snowball from the arm of his father.
“That’s how you throw, boy. Toss like a man!” The challenge forces a new look into the boy’s eyes—a look of anticipation—anticipation to show his father how strong he is, to make his father proud. He packs the biggest, most dense snowball he can and, with all his might, heaves it at the man. He watches as the snowball catapults from his arm a mere three feet before falling back into the vast tundra, coming feet short of the man. The boy crosses his arms and dips his head, pulling his hood up. He mutters softly, “Sorry, dad” before a small tear escapes from his eye.
The man moves towards the boy without disrupting the snow around him. He places a hand gently on the boys back and rubs it softly. “There, there, Parker. No harm, no foul. We will work on that arm. One day, you’ll be as strong as me. On day, you’ll be able to take on the Heavens.”
*
Four-Thousand, Six-Hundred and Ten Miles Away
Michael Morbius can feel the radiant flashes of ten thousand cameras as they zoom and tick and flash like a million little eyeballs watching every move he makes. Sweat rolls down his olive skin, despite the harrowing, toothless gnawing of the cold breeze at his back. His long, blonde hair ripples in the wind. “Are you ready, Mr. Morbius?” A young girl asks in her best attempt at an English accent. Wonder where she’s from? Sweden, maybe.
“Yes, I think I am.” His voice comes out hampered and tired. He’s worked many, many months for this day. Finally, his day of recognition has come. He puts one foot out in front of him, pulls his body forward and steps out in front of the flurry of flashes and clicks and hoots and hollers. The man at the podium on stage is named Oliver Morris. He’s always the host during this award ceremony. Not for much longer.
“And now, the winner of the twenty-first annual Steve Rodgers Outstanding American Award—Michael Morbius!” Morris calls out over the microphone, the sounds from the crowd growing exponentially. If this wasn’t a SHIELD award ceremony, they’d definitely be here by now to police it. You’d think there was a mass murder happening from all the screams. Morbius slowly steps forward, his feet heavy and his body heavier. He extends his arm skywards in a gentle wave; his lips twist up into a smile. Oliver Morris steps to the side and motions for Michael to take the stage. Michael stands squarely in front of the podium; his beautiful, crystal-like blue-grey eyes staring out into the crowd. He holds a hand to his mouth and clears his throat. The crowd falls silent.
“My thanks to everyone here tonight and to everyone who voted for me to win this award tonight. It is such an honor to be here today, looking out at all of your faces. I would like to start by thanking my father, who first got me into the field of scientific occultism…” As Morbius speaks, hundreds of men and women are captivated by his stories—his father, who died at the hands of a cult when he was just a child; his mother, who died giving birth to his sister, Kendall; his sister, who he fought every battle for to keep her safe; Nick Fury, who gave him a job to feed his sister and put clothes on her back; the countless criminals in the world that he took down to move himself up in the food chain; the day his sister died because he was too slow—and when Michael Morbius walks off the stage, every citizen in America is weeping tears for the Morbius family. The cold breeze seems only to get colder. His pocket starts to vibrate and he stops in his tracks. Michelle must finally be back from her expedition. Morbius shoves his hand into his pocket and pulls out his phone to see that the love of his life is calling him. He flips open his phone and hits “answer.” “Hey there gorgeous, you get to see my speech?” He takes a seat in a nearby chair and waits for a response. He hears nothing at first, just a gentle “wooshing” sound, like a washing machine. “Babe?”
“Michael. Michael!” Her voice comes out in a panic, the screech so high that Morbius has to pull the phone away from his ear to save his hearing.
“Michelle, I’m here. What is it?” What could be happening? What happened to his wife on the expedition? What is that sound?
“There’s…there’s this black stone, we find it on the expedition. We didn’t know what it was, so we brought it back to study. B-but then…then something started happening. This…this man started to appear. H-he was wearing this suit. And th-then he was gone. And it got cold and—oh my God…he’s back. Michael, I love you. Please…don’t come home. Don’t!” She lets out a bone-jerking scream and the line goes dead.
*
Sixteen Years Later: Monday
The massive man sits at the head of a rather small billiards table, his beady eyes staring down at the two men shooting on eight. One man leans over the table and prepares to shoot. The large man at the head of the table stares intently and, when noticing the man has a perfect shot lined up, his eyes are flooded with terror. He lifts one massive leg and slams it against the ground, shaking the entire bar. The man shoots and slips, the queue ball goes wild and almost scratches. The large, bald man with the beady eyes laughs. Instead of confronting the goliath, the man backs away and awaits his opponent’s game winning shot. The opponent lines up at the table, the sweat drips quickly off his face, creating a small, wet patch on the pool table. He aims, and he shoots…but it’s too hard and the eight ball ricochets off the corner of the pockets and lies still near the center of the table. The laughter fades from the large, bald man’s face and his eyes now turn to rage. With one swift, fluid lunge, the massive man wraps his even bigger hand around the man’s head and crushes it, the red blood oozing from between his fingers. The man’s body lands on the floor with a thump.
Entering from the door on the other side of the room are two figures—Parker Robbins, aka the Hood, and Lucifer Morningstar, his father. Robbins dresses in his usual attire of the half unzipped red hoodi, his swirling tattoo perfectly visible in the dim light—the frightening marks under his left eye even more visible. And just to his left is his friend, a pale white, his sandy-blond hair highlighting his golden eyes with the black irises. They walk into the gloomy bar with a swagger and a presence, demanding respect and fear.
The pale man dressed a dark black button-down shirt and stonewash blue jeans, sporting a long gold chain from his neck, takes a seat at the bar, calling for a glass of scotch. The other man, Parker Robbins, walks slowly over to the pool table which is now covered in blood. The no-longer-laughing Kingpin stares at the Hood, put can find his eyes.
“Wilson Fisk.” Robbins says, his voice silencing the crowd in the room. No one in the underworld called Fisk by his real name. No one.
“Who the hell are you supposed to be?” Standing just over seven feet, the Kingpin towers over the Hood. But the Hood doesn’t flinch. He just looks up and stares into the eyes of one of the most powerful men in New York City.
“I’m Parker Robbins, the Hood.”
“And what do you want with me, Parker Robbins?”
“I want to give you fair warning that, by the end of this week, I will have killed you and brought your body to the Maggia.” Robbins breaks eye contact with the Kingpin and looks around the room at everyone. He addresses the crowd as a whole. “To any of you that wish to join what will soon become the next great Maggia family, come with me now.” A strange rustle of wind and Lucifer disappears from the bar. Wilson pulls up a chair and sits down, looking Robbins dead in the eyes.
“Listen, kid, you’re what—twenty-five? I’ve been at this game a lot longer than you have, and let me tell you—telling the man you want to kill isn’t a good way to go about killing him. Surprises work better.”
“I would rather look a man in the eyes when I kill him.” Robbins pulls up a chair as well, sitting down in front of Fisk. He steals a man’s whiskey and takes a sip. “This is a shitty little bar right here.”
“I’ve been coming here since my pop ran the place. Now I own it and this is my family. They’re willing to live and die for me kid. You ain’t got nothing but that blond who walked in with you and it looks like he’s gone.”
“He’s hanging around. He just doesn’t like the spotlight.” Robbins points to the corner of the store where a lone man stands, his arms crossed, sipping some kind of cheap scotch that burns on the way down. “What’s his name?” Fisk looks over his massive shoulder to find the man that Robbins is pointing to. It takes a second to click in the Kingpin’s brain, but finally he answers.
“John Carpenter.”
“Come over here, John Carpenter.” Robbins bellows. Carpenter uncrosses his arms and starts his way across the narrow bar. Finally he stands next to the Kingpin, staring into the horrifying eyes of the Hood. “Would you die for Wilson Fisk? Would you lay down your life for him?”
“He’s like a father to me,” Carpenter replies, without hesitation. “Of course I would lay down my life for him. We all would.” Within seconds, Robbins’ hand is gripped tight around Carpenter’s throat, squeezing the life right out of him. Kingpin stands and attempts to make a move on him, pulling his arm up and thrusting towards Robbins. Swiftly, Robbins moves to the side and uses Carpenter as a human shield. The Kingpin’s fist flies straight through the man who called him a father just moments ago. Blood sprays across the bar and Robbins drops the body on the floor.
“Would anyone else like to lay down their life for this man?!” The Hood screams out, addressing the Kingpin’s “family.” “NO?! Then leave!” Parker Robbins turns to the Kingpin for just one second. “Maybe you should get some enforcers.” With one swift movement, Parker turns and walks out of the bar.