 |
Web Hosting by Netfirms | Free Domain Names by Netfirms |
|
|
|
MAY...YEAR FOUR
Toad grins the smile of the wicked in Los Angeles, the City of Angels. High atop the skyscraper, he looks down, down, down, at the Angels apartment complex. On the outside, it appears to be a simple dwelling for the upper-middle class, but everyone knows that to be a lie. In actuality, it is the base of operations for the biggest drug-runner in Los Angeles.
Dozens of hired thugs patrol the complex, armed with automatic weapons loaded with "cop killers", armor piercing bullets. An intricate security system videotapes every millimeter twenty-four hours a day. Rumor says there may even be automated weapons installed into the vents, releasing gas and electricity. A cockroach couldn't get in without being seen, and exterminated within seconds.
But its not a cockroach that's going to break into the Angel Complex tonight. A Toad is.
Toad didn't plan on going to war with a crimelord. All he wanted to do was steal some quick cash from a bunch of thugs so he could repay his favor from Sledge. They could have just let that go, but no, they had to treat him like any common thief. They kidnap his friend, Masque, and try to kill him. They don't care that he's a mutant with enough strength to break them all.
They did the worst thing they could have possibly done. They gave Toad no respect. Now, they will all die.
Sticking to the side of the skyscraper via the substance exhuding from his hands, Toad considers his options, and his reasons. Of course he has to rescue Masque. He's the only one that's stood by him, treated him with any respect. Plus, Toad needs Masque to make a change in his features and powers.
That, however, is in the back of Toad's head. At the forefront are thoughts of revenge, of payback. Humans have disrespected Toad, and he must set an example by killing them all.
Kicking out, Toad leaps off the top of the 30+ stories skyscraper, going...straight...down. Straightening his body for maximum velocity, Toad whooshes down to the Angels apartment complex, a grin plastered on his face. Down, down he goes, until the room of the complex is mere meters from his head. In the seconds left to him, Toad twists and turns his body to miss the roof, the soles of his feet barely grazing the hard brick on the side. Kicking out again, Toad's momentum shifts, and his is carried upward and to the side.
Gliding across the street, Toad lands harshly, on the clear glass of the office building across from the complex. The sticky ooze sliding down the building, Toad ignores the scream of a late-night janitor. He instead gathers as much of his paralyzing fluid as he can. Finally, he kicks out again, leaping across the street to a window of the complex.
Twisting his body once again, Toad shatters through the window feet first. Landing easily on his feet, he throws out the fluid in a wide arc, covering several surveillance cameras. His presence masked for the moment, Toad drops back out the window to the ground below. No sooner does he land on the ground than he kicks out again, jumping high up onto the roof. Once again he throws out the fluid to block any cameras, before throwing himself behind an airvent.
A good thing he does this, for shots are immediately fired into the air. A shout of surprise also reaches Toad's ears, and he smiles. No doubt someone had been hit with the paralyzing fluid.
Moving quickly, Toad balances himself on his hands and kicks out at the vent with all his strength. Giving a squeal of protest, the vent becomes detached from the roof and goes flying at the source of the gunfire. Not bothering to see what happens, Toad crawls into the opening in the roof, going down into the complex.
He slides down the airshaft nearly ten feet before coming to an intersection. Crouching down on floor of the vent, Toad slams his fists against it. Tearing a hole through the floor, Toad exposes numerous electrical wires. Grabbing a handful of wires, he leaps up and out of the vent, back onto the roof.
Wires tear. Sparks fly. The complex goes dark.
Across the street from the complex, a lone figure watches the lights go out. This man recently had the option of killing Mr. Joseph Stevens, the druglord who resides in that complex, for a lot of money. He had considered the offer, but turned it down when the trouble with the Toad started. Seeing the Toad here tonight only confirmed his suspicions.
Bruce Canable turned from the complex and hailed a cab. If he has only one rule, it's to never get involved with superhumans.
Deep inside the Angels apartment complex, Joseph Stevens has no idea how close he came to certain death. Right now, he's screaming into a blank monitor.
"How did that freak do this!? Get the power back on and kill him! Now!"
"Calm down, Joe, we'll kill the mutie freak. After all, its only the Toad," Patrick, Joe's right-hand man, says reassuringly.
"Only the Toad? That's what you told me before, Pat! The fact that he's been able to get this far proves you wrong."
"Anyways, boss, we've prepared for something like this. All our men have flashlights on them, and all the doors automatically lock when the power goes."
"I know, I'm getting paranoid. That freak's as good as dead. Then we can make proper use of his friend." Joe's eyes shift to the bloody form of Masque, tied to chair in the corner.
Kneeling down in front of Masque, Joe speaks quietly. "Make no mistake, freak; we will kill you. But not before we make full use of your powers. For my men: new faces and no fingerprints. For my hookers: the bodies of supermodels. All this you will do. If you don't, I'll do everything I can to make you uglier than you are now. And I guarantee it will involve blowtorches and a lot of pain."
Masque can barely hear Joseph's words, such is the extent of the pain inflicted upon him. So far, the only thing that keeps him going is the fact that Toad has come. Maybe not for him, but Toad has come, nonetheless. Either way, his torturer will get what is coming to him.
Toad, in the meantime, creeps silently on the rooftop, searching out the gunmen there. He already found the crushed body of the gunman that fired at him, mangled underneath the vent. There was no sign of his paralyzing goop on him, however, which meant that another gunman was around somewhere.
Crouching low, Toad creeps slowly along the roof, eyes searching for anything out of place. A slight discoloration in the shadows; a glint of moonlight off the gun, anything.
Finally, from the corner of his eye, Toad spys a slight movement in the shadows. Without a moment's hesitation, Toad hurled a large glob of his paralyzing fluid. With a cry of surprise, the gunman drops his gun, his whole arm numb. The last thing he saw was the Toad leaping at him, arms outstretched.
Everyone on the roof dead, Toad kicked open the door into the complex and proceeded to work his way down.
Down in the basement, locked behind a 3-inch steel door, Joseph Stevens is screaming into a walkie-talkie, trying to contact his men.
"Oxer! Report now!"
Oxer, the strongest of Mr. Stevens' men, is dead. Toad struck him a blow to the nose, driving the bridge bone up through the brain and out of his head.
"Shark! Conrad! Where the hell are you guys!"
Both dead or dying. Shark is bleeding from massive internal injuries, his intestines liquefied from a kick to the torso. Conrad's neck is broken and his jaw was snapped off.
"William! Answer me now!"
William would like to, but he can't. His mouth and lungs are filled with a paralyzing fluid. In another minute, he'll be dead.
Joseph looks at the steel door with a look of fear. Vibrations rumble throughout the room, emanating from that door. Joe tells himself that nothing can get through that door. Nevertheless, he fumbles for his gun and aims at the steel door.
Turning his head slightly, Joe saw that Pat also had his gun ready. This lessened his fear somewhat. "You and me, Pat! We're gonna teach this freak to disrespect me!"
In response, the steel door burst open with a thunderous crash. Standing in it's place was the Toad, with a malicious look of rage etched on his face. "You know nothing about disrespect, human! I'm no one's whipping boy anymore!"
Suddenly, Toad smiled, as if he was a child who had a secret. "Consider yourself an example to everybody that I am more that I've seemed."
Mr. Stevens raises his gun and prepares to fire into Toad's chest. "Consider yourself dead, you pathetic mutie!"
"I'm afraid he's right, boss." Then Joseph felt a cold, hard gun barrel press against the side of his head.
And so, Patrick Jameson, Joseph Stevens' lifelong friend and righthand man, fired into Joe's head. His lifeless body slumped to the ground, the gun falling from his lifeless fingers. Mr. Joseph Stevens, one of California's biggest drug lords, was dead.
Toad smiled down at the bloody body before looking Pat in the eyes. "Thanks for helping out."
Pat smiled back the smile of a woman and replied. "The Brotherhood is a family. Even disbanded, we look out for each other."
With startling speed, the form of Patrick Jameson shifted and altered. Standing before Toad was the body of a stunning blue woman with red hair, wearing a white dress adorned with skulls. Toad had called, and Mystique answered!
Leaping over Mystique, Toad unties the ropes that restrain Masque. With a groan, the hideous mutant falls to the ground. As he tries to get up, Toad looks back at Mystique. "Thorough work."
"You asked me to properly impersonate one of Mr. Stevens' men. That meant I had to do some fun things."
"By the way, what happened to Mr. Jameson?"
"He's lying dead in a dumpster a couple blocks from here. To tell you the truth, Mortimer, I didn't expect you to make it this far, even with the blueprints I gave you."
"That'll change, Raven. Soon, everybody will think differently of me. Have you given any thought to what I asked you before?"
"About helping you reform the Brotherhood, since you had lost all credibility last time? I've already made a few calls. Avalanche agreed to join, if only to find where Blob and Pyro are*. I also made preparations with Arcade about using Murderworld to train."
"Actually, I was hoping you'd join as well."
"No, Toad. I agreed to help you this time because I'm sympathetic to you, but I plan to stay out of the public eye."
Mystique throws the gun to the ground and morphs into the body of a gang-dressed man. "I have to be going now. Good luck with the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants."
"I thank you, Mystique. Within a year, my team will make your old Freedom Force fiasco a bad memory."
Mystique fights the urge to kill Toad right then. She just tells herself that he's a tragic soul who is certifiably insane. Still, Toad can't help but notice that she leaves in a mild huff.
Crouching down over Masque, Toad goes face to face with the semi-conscious Morlock. "What do you think, Masque?"
Masque groans softly, and Toad nods. "You're right. I shouldn't kill her until I've established a loyal base of power. She hasn't really done much to earn my enmity, I admit. It's not like she laughed at me, something those bastards in the Hellfire Club loved doing.
"I suppose you want me to help you up, huh?" Not waiting for a response, Toad grabs Masque under his arms and hauls him roughly to his feet.
Dusting off Masque and wiping off the blood on his cloak, Toad continues to talk. "You know Masque, I took a very big risk coming here and getting you out. You already owe me a lot, and this incident has driven your debt up very high. Fortunately, I have an idea of an...improvent you can make on me. I passed a well-stocked kitchen on the way down here, so what say we get something to eat. Then you can get to work."
And so the two leave the moniter room, one half-dragged by the other. Toad cackles softly, and says one final thing. "Yessiree, Masque old pal. We're gonna have one heck of a surprise for the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants!"
Next Issue: It finally happens. The Brotherhood of Evil Mutants makes its MV1 debut! Who will show up to join the most infamous of all the X-Men's foes? Will they all survive the training session in Murderworld? Plus, the final piece in the evolution of the Toad!
The first time I saw the Toad was his card in the 1993 Skybox X-Men: Series 2 card set. That creepy-cool picture of the Toad, crouched down with that scary smile immediately made him one of my favorite characters. Unfortunately, the first time I saw him in the comic books was in that Generation X issue during Onslaught. That pathetic wretch who commanded toads was nothing like I expected. Thinking that was some sort of Toad II or something, I tracked down back issue appearances. What I found was Toad as Magneto's lackey, Toad building an amusement park, and Toad teaming up with Frog-Man and Spider Kid as Spider Man's annoying sidekicks. Finally, I found the X-Force issues that featured the cool, evil genius Toad. Unfortunately, those issues were by Liefeld, effectively removing any credibility they had. And so I went through life, a broken and disenchanted soul.
Until, like a sign from heaven above, X-Men the movie came out. This was Toad as he was meant to be; a high leaping, fast kicking nut with a long tongue. And so, my confidence in the character restored, I set out to make his as cool in words as he became on the big screen. I hope I've succeeded thus far.
Contact Stephen Crosby at: sjoc@linkny.com