Spider-Man and Zoids Vol 1 7

As our story begins, Mary Jane Watson confronts Peter shortly after his return home from battling the Puma. She reveals to him that she has known that he was Spider-Man for years - which comes as a complete shock to him.

Peter tries to convince Mary Jane to stay, but she fears that all he is going to do is lie to her again. She confides that while she cares for him, she just can't deal with the fact that he is a superhero, and that is the main reason why she left New York to begin with.

As Peter scrambles to try and get Mary Jane to stay, the Black Cat comes leaping into his apartment through the window. This blows away any chance Peter had of keeping his secret identity. Seeing the Black Cat in his apartment and realizing she knows his secret as well, Mary Jane leaves in tears. Peter calls after her to come back, but the Black Cat tells him not to worry about this other woman, as he doesn't need a "bimbo" like her.

Peter snaps at the Black Cat for entering his apartment in such a reckless fashion, jeopardizing his secret identity. The Black Cat isn't interested in dealing with her lover's emotional outburst and begins to leave. Peter doesn't want her to go and is surprised when his costume, currently in street-clothing form, shoots webbing at her.

While he tries to make sense of this, the Black Cat embraces him, realizing that he does care about her. As she hugs him, Peter is more concerned about his costume, and how little he knows about it.

Meanwhile in Heartsdale, New Mexico, Thomas Fireheart returns to his office at Fireheart Enterprises, where he asks his secretary, Jenna Taylor to assemble a dossier on Spider-Man, so that he can prepare for his final conflict with him.

Back in New York, Peter boards up the window that was broken previously during his battle with the Puma. He decides to try and call Mary Jane, but she doesn't answer. She is busy packing up her things, but when she comes across a photo of her sister and her kids. Mary Jane realizes that she is running from Peter, the same way she ran away from her sister. She wonders why she runs away from all the people she cares for.

Giving up on reaching Mary Jane, Peter wills the costume off his body and sits down. He thinks about everything that has been going on in his life and wonders how things began spiraling out of control. Peter relaxes in a chair, and no sooner is he asleep, than his costume crosses the room, bonds to him and takes the still unconscious wall-crawler out web-slinging.

As he, Peter has a nightmare where he is a teenaged version of himself being stalked by his black costume. In the dreamscape, he is rescued by his original red and blue costume. As the two costumes fight over each other, Peter tries to flee but the two garments go after him. As they fight over Peter, he wakes up screaming. Peter finds himself back in bed, unaware that his costume took him out while he was asleep. Disturbed by his dream, Peter decides to finally take his new costume to be examined by Reed Richards of the Fantastic Four.

Later that day, Spider-Man pays a visit to the Baxter Building where he is granted access by the security systems. There he finds the Human Torch and Mister Fantastic in the lab. He tells them that he has come to take Reed up to his offer to examine his new costume. Spider-Man then undergoes a battery of tests to determine how the costume can shoot webs, meld itself over his body, and camoflage itself as normal clothing.

While this is going on, the villainous Rose is entertaining the Hobgoblin at his penthouse. However, before he listens to the Hobgoblin's proposal, he is determined to prove if this is really the Hobgoblin, as he had heard that he had been killed. Guards, summoned by The Rose, attack the Hobgoblin, who takes them all down within a few seconds. Convinced that he is dealing with the genuine article, the Rose listens to the Hobgoblin's proposal, that they their pool their resources together to in order to rival the Kingpin. To start their campaign, they will destroy Spider-Man once and for all.

Back at the Baxter Building, Spider-Man and the Human Torch reminisce over their experiences on Battleworld, while they wait for Reed to finish his examination of the costume. Mister Fantastic soon enters and tells Spider-Man the shocking truth about his costume: It's a living symbiotic creature that is attempting to bond to him permenantly.

Panicked, Spider-man tries to remove the costume, but it fights back. Having determined that the costume is sensitive to loud noise, Mister Fantastic uses a sonic blaster to force the costume off Spider-Man. The Human Torch then contains the creature in a circle of flame to hold it in place, and Mister Fantastic traps it in a containment device.

With his costume removed, Peter covers his face, reminding the two members of the Fantastic Four that he has a secret identity to maintain. The Torch has a solution to the problem and gets Spider-Man one of his old Fantastic Four costumes and a paperbag to wear over his face as a crude mask. Despite being embarassed by this new ensemble, Spider-Man grudgingly accepts it for the time being, since he has to wear something.

Reed asks Spider-Man if he can keep the alien costume to examine it further. The wall-crawler tells Reed that he can keep it, as he never wants to see it again. After the Human Torch drops Spider-Man outside of the Baxter Building, the wall-crawler makes his trek back home. However, along the way, he happens upon a liquor store robbery that has been interrupted by the police. Spider-Man swings in and easily trounces the crooks. With the battle is over, Spider-Man is swarmed by reporters who want to know who he is. Embarassed and overwhealmed, the wall-crawler quickly escapes.

In the aftermath of this experience, Peter laments over how humbled he has been made recently and wonders what to do about Mary Jane and the Black Cat. Suddenly, it begins to snow, which is the final straw in what in what has turned out to be a horrible day for Spider-Man.

Once back home, Peter Parker watches the news coverage of his embarassing outing as the "Unknown Superhero". Trying to figure out what to do without his new costume, Peter pulls out his web-shooters out of storage and contemplates wearing his old red and blue costume again, when suddenly there is a knock at the door.

It's Mary Jane who has come to talk to Peter, having grown tired of running away from her problems. She has decided that since she knows Peter's biggest secret it is only fair to tell him her own. Meanwhile, back at the Baxter Building, Spider-Man's alien costume seething with hatred and a desire for revenge. Although it is being held in Reed's lab, it is trying to escape from the containment unit that it is being held.

Appearing in "Cowboys and Idioms"

Reprint of the 1st story from
Fantastic Four #272

Featured Characters:

Fantastic Four

Supporting Characters:

Antagonists:

Nathaniel Richards (First appearance)
Warlord (First appearance)
Warlord's Mutates
- Gont (First appearance)
- Other mutates

Other Characters:

The Kid (First appearance; dies)
Arthur Richards (First appearance)
Bret Colby's posse
Doctor Doom (Mentioned)
Avengers (Mentioned)

Races and Species:

Humans

Locations:

Earth-616
- Sol
  - Earth
    - North America
      - United States of America
        California
        Central City
        Richards Family Estate
        
        Tombstone, Arizona (Referenced)
        
        Dodge City, Kansas (Referenced)
Earth-6311
- Other-Earth
  - Warlord's Fort (First appearance)
  - an "Old West" desert town

Items:

Vehicles:

Mechanical Rocket-Powered Horses
Striders (First appearance)

Synopsis for "Cowboys and Idioms"

Reprint of the 1st story from
Fantastic Four #272

Having discovered a time platform in the laboratory of Reed Richards' long lost father, the Fantastic Four and Wyatt Wingfoot have decided to use the device to try and search for him. After the final preparations are made, Reed has the family butler -- Giles Peacock -- activate the device and the group are transported sideways in time to a parallel universe where Reed believes his father may have been lost. The group materializes in a strange desert where they spot what appears to be a town patterned after an old town of the American Frontier surrounded by bombed out craters. Seeking to learn more about this mystery, Reed sends Sue to do reconnaissance while invisible, stressing to her that it is important that she goes unseen until they can learn more about where they are. As Sue makes her way to the town she wishes her husband would stop treating her like she is delicate. Examining the blast craters she notes that they are quite old. Once she reaches the town she turns invisible and remarks about how it looks like Dodge City circa 1884. As she looks around, she suddenly witnesses a cowboy being thrown out of one of the buildings. This cowboy, dubbed the Kid, is being challenged to a draw by the local outlaw Bret Colby. As they prepare to draw, Sue decides to step in as she does not want there to be unnecessary bloodshed. When the two gun fighters draw, Sue puts up an invisible wall between them. She is surprised to find that they are not carrying six-shooters but high tech weapons of some future time. Colby, using a heat-seeking bullet, watches as his shot leaps over the invisible wall and strikes the Kid in the back, killing him instantly.

Realizing that something was interfering with his fight, Colby begins to look around. Unable to see any trace of anything he decides to use the infrared scanner on his gun. Sue tries to stop him by turning it invisible, but Colby can still figure out how to fire the weapon and begins firing it in her general direction. With her cover blown, Sue erects an invisible shield around her and makes herself visible so she can barrel through Colby and run out of town. As Sue gets out of town she is suddenly surrounded by three of Colby's men, riding rocket powered robot horses. Seeing that Sue is in trouble the rest of the Fantastic Four leap to her aid, She-Hulk belting out the Thing's old battle cry of "It's Clobberin' Time". The Fantastic Four make short work of the three cowboys and their mechanical steeds. As Sue tries to explain what happened, the group is then attacked by a massive tripod device resembling the martian ships from H.G. Wells' novel War of the Worlds. The device stomps on She-Hulk and when Johnny tries to use his flames to free her, is manages to cover him in particles of carbon, snuffing out his flame. As the tripod begins to move, Sue notices that She-Hulk has punched a hole into the robots foot and is smashing her way up the inside of its leg. With the leg trashed, the tripod topples over in a heap. She-Hulk then bursts out and liberates the masked pilots inside.

By this point, Bret Colby and his men have arrived on the scene who explains that he attacked Sue because he thought they were with the Warlord. When Reed tells them that they are not with the warlord, Reed introduces himself. This causes a start with Colby and one of his men, who believes that Warlord is a Richards. Wondering if Reed is family to the Warlord, they decide to try to use the situation to their advantage. Meanwhile, She-Hulk unmasks their attackers and they are shocked to discover that they are nothing more than cave-men in high tech armor. Reed explains that these throwbacks of humanity are controlled by neurological devices in their helmets. As Reed muses over the bizarre mishmash world they have found themselves on, the Fantastic Four are unaware that they are being monitored from afar.

When one of the guards monitoring the course of events he asks his mistress if they should inform their ruler of what is transpiring. The woman tells the guard that she will bring the news herself. The hard faced woman then has her servants remove the armor she is wearing and dresses her in a fine gown. It is a softer, gentler woman who then enters the chambers of her husband and son to bring news to the ruler of this society... Nathaniel Richards, Reed's father.

Links and References

References

Spider-Man and Zoids Vol 1 7

Appearing in "Zoids"

Synopsis for "Zoids"

Appearing in "The Sinister Secret of Spider-Man's New Costume!"

Synopsis for "The Sinister Secret of Spider-Man's New Costume!"

Appearing in "Cowboys and Idioms"

Synopsis for "Cowboys and Idioms"

See Also

Links and References

References