Captain America Comics Vol 1 67

In the town of Universal City, Denton Smith and Cecil Babylon rob a satchel of diamonds and flee from the police. Elsewhere in the outskirts of town, at the mirror making shop of a man named Andrew, he turns down an offer to make a new mirror from a potential client, much to the dismay granddaughter. When Andrew's friend Mr. Zrr encourages Andrew to make no more mirrors, she tries to attack the diminutive man. Andrew tries to tell her that Zrr is a mischief maker from Dimension Zee. Zrr tosses sneezing powder into a fan and leads Andrew back to a back room where a mirror has been set up. Mr. Zee then uses their new found privacy to travel through the mirror back to Dimension Zee.

Elsewhere in the city, Jeff Mace and Betsy Ross are using a device to measure strange seizmographic signatures in the area that do not appear to be creating any earthquakes. Spotting Smith and Babylon, they change into Captain America and Golden Girl and attempt to apprehend them, but they flee into the Andrews Mirror Company. There they force their way into the back room where they accidentally discover the mirror into Dimension Zee. Unable to take their loot or weapons, the two use the mirror to escape and find themselves in the strange dimension. There they find that the world is full of jewels and eventually meet Mr. Zrr who tells them that jewels are so common in his dimension that they are nearly worthless. The two crooks then begin to figure out how best to capitalize it.

Back in the Earth dimension, Andrews granddaughter Sally and search for the two crooks but find nothing but their abandoned loot. They return it to the diamond company while Sally and Mr. Zrr wait outside, who has arrived with a large sum of gold and jewels to sell to the owner of the company. Captain America recognizes the coat Mr. Zrr wearing as the same worn by one of the diamond thieves. They try to give him chase on the street, but Zrr tosses a bundle of the money he earned out into the streets, and the heroes are forced to allow him to escape for fear of hitting any of the people rushing out into the streets to collect the money.

Finding that his seismographic device is going off the scale, Captain America, Golden Girl and Sally track it back to the mirror shop and the mirror itself. Captain America and Golden Girl pass through the mirror and find that Dimension Zee has become a crime racked dystopia. They find Mr. Zee who is depressed over what the two crooks have done to his home dimension. Found by Captain America and Golden Girl he agrees to help them, and uses his money to lure Smith and Babylon into a trap. They are quickly subdued by Captain America and Golden Girl. With the crooks captured, the people of Dimension Zee give up their criminal ways. When Captain America and Golden Girl pass back through the mirror with the captured crooks. As they do the mirror pitches over and shatters on the ground, closing the doorway between dimensions forever. With her grandfather trapped on the other side Sally is at first upset, but consoles herself with the fact that her father was happier in Dimension Zee than he was on Earth.

Appearing in "Design for Death"

Featured Characters:

Human Torch

Supporting Characters:

Toro

Antagonists:

Mephisto (Ted Sparks) (First appearance)

Races and Species:

Synopsis for "Design for Death"

The Human Torch and Toro have travelled to Greenwich Village to pay a visit to horror writer Ted Sparks and are shocked to find blood inside his apartment. But this turns out to be only a prop as Sparks has decorated his apartment with various props to help in his horror writing. They wonder how this sort of decorum might have an effect on the mind of the writer. They find Sparks as he is retrieving his mail in a peculator way: with a fishing rod.

When they remark on his imagination, Sparks tells them that with all his imagination he cannot win the heart of his girl Peggy because he is not a "brute". He goes on to explain that she has spurned him after she asked him to darn his socks and even after she said that she would marry him and has been too busy to see him. He ignores the Torch and Toro's suggestion that she has been too busy to talk to him and that there is likely a rational explanation and goes to work on his latest story, a bloody revenge story about a jilted lover. The Torch and Toro leave Sparks to his work to go look for Peggy to talk some sense into him.

Sparks begins to write and falls asleep. His dreams forms a demonic version of himself called Mephisto and it goes out to get revenge against all women. Mephisto goes to a circus benefit hosted by the Torch and Toro. There he douses the heroes flames and then grabs female trapeze artist Brenda Coleman. He offers his love to her but when she refuses he sends her falling to her death and flees the scene. He then arrives at an opera house and interrupts the performance to profess his love to the lead actress with a song. She finds his singing repulsive and so he ditches her to try and charm Taffy Cavanaugh a popular cover girl. When she refuses him because he is penniless he tries to kill her as well when the Human Torch and Toro arrive to stop him. They toss a fire ball at the villain catching him on fire...

.. When Sparks suddenly awakens on his desk, his sleeve lit on fire by a candle and the whole series of events nothing more than a dream. Peggy, the Torch and Toro soon arrive and Peggy douses the fire. She explains that there is nothing wrong and gives him a new pair of socks which she had been busy knitting for him. Sparks thanks the Torch and Toro for sorting things out and tells them that he is happy again.

Appearing in "Catch A Killer"

Appearances not yet listed

Synopsis for "Catch A Killer"

Synopsis not yet written

Appearing in "The Singer Who Wanted To Fight"

Featured Characters:

Captain America (Jeff Mace)

Supporting Characters:

Golden Girl (Betsy Ross)
Scotti Warren (First appearance)

Antagonists:

Killer Casey (First appearance)
Hawk Martin (First appearance)

Other Characters:

Martha
Rocky Gonzales (First appearance)

Races and Species:

Humans

Items:

Captain America's Shield (Replica)
Captain America's Uniform (Replica)

Synopsis for "The Singer Who Wanted To Fight"

At Papa Lenori's restaurant, singer Scotti Warren has grown tired of being a spaghetti tenor and wishes he could find a more famous living since his music career is not going anywhere, since it has proven difficult to save up money to pay for his own concert. He confides this in his girlfriend Martha, and the conversation is overheard by Jeff Mace and Betsy Ross who take pity over his plight. Suddenly boxer Killer Casey enters the restaurant and begins pushing people around. When he knocks over a waiter, Scotti decides to get involved and is surprised when he is able to knock down Killer down with a single punch. But before the stunned Killer can start a fight, his manager Hawk Martin quickly pulls him away, wanting to avoid ruining a reputation that he has built up for his boxer for the past three years.

Scotti walks away from the situation wondering if he is not destined to be a boxer and decides to follow this new career path despite Martha's fears. When she expresses these fears to Jeff and Betsy, they are convinced that he will give up on this foolish notion in a day. However, they soon read in the paper that Warren is becoming an up and rising boxing champion in short time. Finding this suspicious, the two decide to investigate as Captain America and Golden Girl. Watching Scotti in the ring, they are shocked to see that everyone that Scotti fights has been throwing the fight and suspect that there is something suspicious going on. Golden Girl slips away to go meet with Martha, but happens upon Killer Casey and his manager discussing how they have been setting Scotti up for a fall and have him lose the upcoming match against Killer so they can cash in on the gambling bets.

When Golden Girl tries to warn Scotti of this plot, he thinks that they are trying to get him to give up on boxing and refuses to turn down the fight. Captain America steps in and offers to help train Scotti for the fight. However in the ring, Captain America breaks Scotti's jaw so he cannot fight in the match and takes his place. During the match Killer Casey attempts to win the match by dousing his gloves in chloroform to blind Captain America. Despite this handicap, Captain America still manages to defeat Killer Casey in the ring. Having placed a bet against Killer Casey, Captain America used the receipts from the box office to help fund Scotti's music career, getting him the concert he always wanted to have.

Notes

Although the narratives of the Captain America stories identify Cap as Steve Rogers, as per the retcon of What If? #4 these appearances are attributed to Jeff Mace. He is identified as such in the summaries above to avoid confusion.

Mr. Zee in the story "Secret Behind the Mirror" has more than a passing resemblance to the DC Comics character Mr. Mxyzptlk.

Links and References

References