Chapter 1: A Conclusion
"Any last words?" the nurse asks.
"You should fear me," replies the atrophied, wizened old man in a wheelchair.
"I hear that you were quite a terror back in your day, Laslo," Nurse Adrienne flicks her ID badge far into the salty sea.
"I WAS the Terror," Laslo Pevely proclaims, "And, I used to tear punks like you to pieces—literally."
"Well, we might tear you to pieces tonight," the femme fatale tosses her stethoscope.
The ersatz RN removes her scrub top. Apparently, the aspiring assassin does not intend to keep her shirt on. Exposed, Adrienne displays her stark alabaster skin and skimpy obsidian bra. Strangely, she has pinkish paint over her face and arms. However, old dick Laslo figures that she disguised her shockingly chalky appearance while preparing to kidnap him. Otherwise, the killer's cadaverous appearance catches too much attention at Mystic Meadows nursing home in Mystic, Connecticut.
Nurse "Adrienne" kicks free of her pants and shoes, and Laslo's hoary brows rise at the sight. Nekra stands revealed to the Terror in the midnight air, although the golden age hero does not know her. The strange vamp sucks the seabreeze sharply into her taut bosom, and the chilly maritime air warms her cold heart. She smiles her fanged smile at her prey.
Nekra declares, "I won't be the one to slaughter you and tear you to pieces. My job was simply to infiltrate the nursing home and to bring you here to the boys. I did my job. Now, this girl need only to clean-up after work." The she-beast sashays to the dock's edge, and she kneels over, her hindquarters high. The brine begins to remove the paint.
"I might tear you to pieces," M'Baku interjects. The massive man stands some distance from the centenarian. Some call M'Baku the Man-Ape; he stands seven-foot and 355 pounds. He can lift ten tons and flatten the Black Panther.
"I know She-Hulk! I know the Watchers! I know Howard the Duck!" Pevely proclaims, "My allies could tear you to pieces!"
M'Baku chortles, "Howard the Duck could tear apart the Man-Ape?" The Wakandan outlaw uses his outdated appellative.
"And, who are the Watchers? I've never seen them," kneeling Nekra razzes over her shoulder.
"And, we the Lethal Legion certainly do not fear an Avenger, a Hulk or not," intones the Grim Reaper at the old man's side.
Suddenly, an Atlantic swell arrives from nowhere. The surprise wave drenches the dock and those on it. Expressionless Reaper reacts not at all, nor does M'Baku mind his unanticipated bath. Terror titters amused in the unexpected spray. Nekra, however, is knocked hard aback and sprawled supine by the swift surge that slams her across the deck. The salty spritz subsides. And, Nekra looks silly. Snarling, she replaces her askew bra over bared breast. Sitting up, Nekra seizes sea lettuce from her hair and blows bilge from her nose. Standing, the Priestess of Hate harangues the Seven Seas sevenfold while stomping her furious feet in puddled brine. Shaking, she slaps off sediment and slime from her snow-white skin.
From the side, a chafing chuckle invades Nekra's ears. "Drown, you rat," the Terror tells his traitorous caregiver with a rasping guffaw.
Eric Williams contemptuously slaps elderly Laslo. The Grim Reaper declares, "Pevely, you gone geezer, one person whom I can't stand in life is the deluded hero. I hate the so-called hero who believes himself somehow better than I. My brother Simon, a.k.a. Wonder Man, had such contempt for others. The Lethal Legion tried killing him many times."
"Did they ever succeed?" the Terror interrogates.
"Yes! Sometimes," Grim Reaper will not be impugned and undercut.
"Oh," Laslo Pevely smirks.
Grim Reaper stares down the Terror, "My point is that this job will be good for the soul as well as the strongbox."
"Who hired you clowns to kidnap and kill me anyway?" the Golden Age sleuth wants to know.
"An old enemy of yours who has really exotic tastes in how you should suffer. In fact, the crazy old coot originally was going to hire Tiger Shark to rip you to shreds right off this pier. He prattled about poetic justice when hiring me. Apparently, a monster like the Terror deserves a Tiger Shark dismembering him as you often mauled others," Grim Reaper answers, "But, my benefactor decided that a man in a Grim Reaper costume would make for an artful enough execution."
"Hmph. Someone has a grudge after all of these years," the Golden Age hero speculates, "Have the Nazis finally gotten me?"
"Dummy, three of the Lethal Legion—M'Baku, Nekra, and Black Talon—are black," the Lethal leader notes, "We would not be working with supremacists."
"I see," Laslo nods, "You would associate with a better class of scumbag."
Undead Grim Reaper responds to the insult coldly, without rage. He simply extends his scythe arm into a straight blade and says, "Go associate with the sea-scum off shore, poor Pevely."
Sans ceremony, the supervillain stabs the invalid elder through the chest. The grand hero's death is undignified. Momentarily, blood squirts from the old dog's gasping mouth. Momentarily, M'Baku punts the expiring Terror and his wheelchair far into Long Island Sound. The mouth of the Mystic River swallows the surely deceased do-gooder with a splash far off Masons Island Yacht Club.
A wee farther out to sea, nightvision lens behold the plunk. Binoculars lower. And, Mandrill grabs scuba equipment from the bottom of his boat. His hairy form dives into the water. Searching for Laslo Pevely, Jerome Beechman considers how forever painful it is to see Eric Williams and Nekra Sinclair together. Nekra used to be jealous Mandrill's moll.
A little in-land, Black Talon sits at the wheel of an inconspicuous van. He watches the Lethal Legion approach him under the waning crescent. A silvery scythe glints in the gloom after their dirty deed. Behind Black Talon, there is a whole pallet of cash. The blood money looks a rich crimson in the moonlight.