Marvel Novel Series 04 - Captain America - Holocaust For Hire Read online

  THE RED SKULL!

  His name inspires terror wherever it is heard, and sane men tremble in undisguised fear before his awesome, hideous presence!

  There is nothing this despotic madman is incapable of creating, nothing he will hesitate to destroy!

  And now he has set into motion the most monstrous scheme of his infamous career—and every tick of the clock brings our world that much closer to the brink of Thermonuclear Warfare!

  Tick ... tick ... tick ... tick ... tick ... tick ... tick ...

  CAPTAIN AMERICA

  HOLOCAUST FOR HIRE!

  A heart-pounding, thrill-a-minute manhunt, pitting the insane genius of the Red Skull against the patriotic power of

  CAPTAIN AMERICA

  Living Legend of World War Two!

  AN INSTANT COLLECTOR’S ITEM: THE STAR-SPANGLED AVENGER IN A FULL-LENGTH NOVEL!

  CAPTAIN AMERICA’S

  RED, WHITE AND BLUE

  SHIELD SIZZLED INTO

  HIS ENEMY’S MIDDLE . . .

  Then Cap, after executing another impressive somersault, planted his red-booted foot against the man’s chest.

  The gunman exhaled loudly, let go of his automatic and toppled to one knee. Cap dealt him a choppy blow to the neck which laid him out cleanly atop another of his fallen associates.

  Pivoting, Captain America picked up his shield in time to ward off the slug from the small .32 revolver Jupiter had produced.

  Grinning, Cap charged the fat man.

  He never reached him.

  Jupiter had whirled around and jabbed at a button set in the wall. The floor opened, sending Cap plummeting down into the murky waters of the East River, towards the scow that housed Jupiter’s headquarters.

  This was no ordinary scow. The craft was powered by a mighty engine and its propellers had started to spin, thrashing away at the dark water.

  The suction began tugging at Cap, pulling him away from the air he sought and toward the deadly chopping blades . . .

  Another Original publication of POCKET BOOKS

  POCKET BOOKS, a Simon & Schuster division of

  GULF & WESTERN CORPORATION

  1230 Avenue of the Americas,

  New York, N.Y. 10020

  Copyright © 1979 by Marvel Comics Group, a division of Cadence Industries Corporation. All rights reserved.

  All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form whatsoever.

  For information address Marvel Comics Group,

  575 Madison Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10022

  ISBN: 0-671-82086-9

  First Pocket Books printing May, 1979

  Cover Art by Dave Cockrum.

  Printed in Canada

  Dedicated to

  The Ford Motor Company—

  for making all this

  necessary.

  One

  The walls came tumbling down.

  Along with red tile roofs, plate-glass windows, wrought-iron balconies, bamboo shutters, great chunks of concrete, jagged beams of wood, twisted metal girders.

  And people. Men, women, children. Falling, screaming, twisting through the bright morning, as building after building shook and shook and finally collapsed.

  A scant ten minutes ago Kitambaa had been a proud new seaport city, capital of the emerging African nation of Jangwa. It had been clean, well-groomed, proud of its many towering office buildings, its banks, libraries, and university. Sparkling new cars traversed the wide, well-paved streets, along with efficient green buses and a multitude of bicycles. And the harbor itself was crowded with ships from all over the world.

  The first sign of anything wrong had come from the harbor area. There, along the docks, the dozens of woebegone stray dogs who haunted the waterfront alleys, foraging for food, had suddenly started yowling. Some of them began writhing in the dust on their scruffy backs. Something was bothering them, something only they could sense.

  It wasn’t like any other earthquake. At the start, the ground didn’t tremble at all. The buildings just started to shake, very slightly at first, quivering and giving off an odd hum.

  The quivering grew worse. Inside the high new offices in the heart of Kitambaa pictures began to jump off the walls, and framed diplomas crashed to the floor. File-cabinet drawers popped open, coffee machines leaped from their perches. Desks hopped, chairs rolled. The office people shouted, screamed, some warning their fellow workers not to panic.

  Everything was shaking now. Windows snapped, sending sharp shards of glass flying down into the streets. The lampposts were swaying, the palm trees shivering. The ground itself caught the shakes and commenced vibrating, cracking. Zigzag rents opened in the handsome streets and went knifing along for blocks—cracks wide enough to swallow up cars and people.

  The whole city was falling. Great hunks of masonry and steel broke free of the high buildings to come crashing down. Cars were smashed, and so were the helpless people in them. There was no wise course to follow. If you ran, you might fall into a gaping chasm, be hit by a runaway car or be struck by the raining debris. But if you stayed inside, your building would collapse on you. So people ran, hid—and were destroyed.

  Square mile after square mile of the city was falling apart. The hard-won achievements of over five years of struggle and work were shaking and collapsing into nothing.

  Fires started, as ruptured gas and fuel lines exploded. Torn power lines whipped and sizzled, broken water mains geysered.

  The two special television cameras that had been, very quietly, planted the night before shook free of their positions and went crashing into the street, sending off their final roller-coaster views of the destruction of Kitambaa.

  The black man in the spotless white uniform laughed, wiping at his perspiring face with a pale blue handkerchief. The gold braid with which he was richly adorned jiggled and clacked.

  “Delightful, delightful,” he said as the pictures faded from the television monitors he’d been watching intently. “A most wonderful and complete devastation.” He laughed harder, causing the gold fringe decorating his wide shoulders to flap in time to the bouncing of his plump black body.

  “Then our demonstration met with your approval, General Nguruwe?” asked the man who sat in a shadowy corner of the vast office. He was large and hairless. He wore a black suit and his right arm was made of metal.

  The general struggled to bring his pleased laughter under control. “But of course, Baron Graff,” he replied, holding back a guffaw. “It was totally magnificent. As they say in your country, it was groovy.”

  The baron’s monocle popped out from his eye. “My country remains . . . never mind, general.” He extended his gunmetal fingers. “If you will hand over the fee.”

  “Certainly, certainly.” The general wiped again at his plump black face. “Ah, to see the vile city of theirs brought to dust was well worth the price. Kitambaa rightly belongs to us, to my country. Indeed, half of Jangwa consists of our ancient tribal lands, unjustly given to them because of United Nations’ stupidity in—”

  “General, let me once again assure you I have no interest in your petty politics.” The baron stood. His metal arm accidentally brushed against a table lamp and sent it smashing to the hardwood floor. He made no apology as he approached the African dictator with his metal hand outstretched. “Our fee, if you please.”

  Swallowing, tucking his handkerchief away inside his uniform, General Nguruwe nodded. “It’s in the briefcase, baron.” He gestured at the leather case that sat smack in the center of his highly polished mahogany desk. “One hundred thousand do
llars in cash. A very reasonable price for so satisfying a show.”

  “We’re interested in testing our process a few times before we . . . before it is put to its ultimate use.” The metal fingers closed around the handle of the briefcase and the baron picked it up.

  “You don’t wish to count it?”

  “I’m certain it’s all here, general,” said the hairless baron. “For if it wasn’t, then your own lovely capital city would quite soon be rubble.”

  The general attempted a not too successful chuckle. “Exactly how does your process work, how do you—?”

  “I’m afraid that must remain our secret.” With the briefcase swinging slightly in his metal hand, Baron Graff headed for the door.

  “Um . . .” began the plump general, rising out of his chair and waddling after his visitor. “I didn’t inquire about this before, baron, but . . . well, we have many enemies. Did you approach any of them and offer them a chance to destroy us?”

  The baron’s face was, for an instant, touched with a faint smile. “Of course, general.”

  The dictator gasped. “And why didn’t you—?”

  “They couldn’t meet our price.” With a polite bow, the baron left the executive suite.

  Two

  Giacomo Macri was one of the happiest beings, at the moment, in all of this particular borough of New York. A thickset man in his middle thirties, Macri sat in the back room of Mama Francesca’s restaurant holding five very desirable playing cards. The eight, nine, ten, Jack, and Queen. All of them hearts. Breathing carefully and evenly through his moderately flattened nose, he kept his face expressionless. There was $690 piled up in the center of the round green table, and Macri knew he was going to win it.

  “Are you in or out?” Phil Sewlin was asking Butchy O’Kennon.

  Butchy was a huge man with a very small head. His tiny sunburned face was creased with thought, or a reasonable facsimile thereof. “I’m considering.”

  “Look, Jack bet eighty bucks and I raised him and he saw me and raised me ten,” Phil explained. “You want to stay you got to toss a century into the pot. Otherwise drop out like Lucky done.”

  “Geeze, I got good cards is the thing, Phil.”

  “You ain’t supposed to tell us that, dummy,” said Lucky, who was nearly as large as Butchy, a fact emphasized by his too tight pinstripe suit. “And hold your cards up. Playing with you is like playing Old Maid with my kids.”

  “How’s your oldest boy?” inquired Butchy. “I hear he got the flu or something. Is he going to be able to make his first communion or—?”

  “Bet or fold!” urged Phil, his voice climbing.

  Macri poked his tongue into his cheek, glancing first at the wall clock and then, very casually, at the cards in his hand. He was sure he had the others by the short hairs. What were the odds of anybody else having a straight flush? And if this jerk Butchy put in, the pot would grow to $790. Some of these guys Jupiter is hiring lately, Macri thought to himself, are real meatballs. You’d think a guy smart as Jup—

  The back door burst off its hinges.

  It was an absolutely stunning sight—the door flying across the smoky room, its hinges flapping free like little metal wings, coppery screws spinning every which way.

  Butchy dropped his cards first. He pushed back from the table and yanked his .38 revolver out of his belt. Then he fired at the strange figure who came hurtling into the room in the wake of the defunct door.

  The bullet bounced off the man’s shield.

  “Shield?” Macri had never seen anything like this before. A big muscular guy decked out in some kind of trick suit that made him look sort of like the American flag. He had red boots, blue tights, and a blue chain-mail tunic that was decorated with red and white stripes and a big white star. He wore a blue cowl with little white wings at the temples, and red gloves. He was carrying a big round metal shield, with a white star smack in its center.

  Phil thought about the cash first, scooping it off the table and stuffing it into the pockets of his suit before whipping his .45 automatic out of that fancy monogrammed shoulder holster of his.

  Lucky yelled, “Holy smokes, it’s Captain America!” and then decided not to stick around for the fight. He jumped right over the card table, scattering cards and ashtrays, and dived for the other door.

  But this red, white, and blue flash beat him to it, pulling him clear off the floor and tossing him backwards. Tossing him directly into Macri.

  It took the wind clean out of him. Worse, the force of the jolt made him drop his cards. “Hell, the only straight flush I’ve had in six weeks!”

  He made a charge at the star-spangled figure who’d burst in on them.

  Bullets from both Phil’s and Lucky’s guns were sizzling through the air, but not one of them was hitting this Captain America guy. He either ducked or deflected the bullets with that red, white, and blue shield. He was faster and trickier than some guy in the circus.

  Macri bobbed, weaved. He was going to get in a punch while this fancy Captain America was distracted by the gunfire. A couple of right jabs in the ribs ought to—

  “Yow!”

  The captain’s left fist slammed out, connected with Macri’s ample chin and sent him sprawling. He went bicycling back until his head bonged into the far wall.

  “We can save a lot of trouble,” suggested Captain America, “if you fellows will simply tell me where I can find Jupiter.”

  “Go to the planetarium,” snarled Phil. Holstering his gun, he picked up a chair and charged.

  But Cap wasn’t where he was supposed to be.

  Instead he was unexpectedly swinging from the overhead light fixture. This made him, briefly, into a deadly sort of pendulum. His crimson-booted feet connected with Butchy’s chin.

  “Unk!” Butchy bit his tongue, swayed, and passed out.

  Landing catlike, Cap sent his shield spinning away from him. It flew swiftly, giving off an unsettling sort of hum, until it drove into Phil’s midsection. That folded Phil up like a boarding house bed and stopped his plans to draw his gun again.

  Macri, meanwhile, had eased his knife out of his leg holster. Narrowing his eyes, he flung it.

  The blade struck Captain America in the back, square between the shoulder blades, and bounced off.

  “Bounced off?” Macri, realizing that the Cap’s chain mail had done him wrong, decided to head for a doorway.

  That trouble was that this Captain America was everywhere. Somersaulting deftly over the tipped table, he was suddenly right in front of Macri.

  “Listen,” said Macri, uncomfortably aware that he was the only one still on his feet. “You must have made a mistake, all we got here is a perfectly legit little restaurant.”

  “The restaurant isn’t bad,” said the star-spangled figure. “In fact, the scampi is quite good. But this happens to be one of Jupiter’s fronts, a part of his numbers operation.”

  “Numbers?” Macri blinked, not too successfully feigning innocence. “You know, it really makes me damn mad when people go around accusing anyone with a foreign-sounding name of being mixed up in—”

  “Save it,” advised Cap. “Tell me where I can find Jupiter. I want to talk to him fast. Otherwise I’m going to keep dropping in on the businesses I know he’s got a fat finger in.”

  Macri had an insight. “Hey, you must be the guy what smashed up the horse parlor in Rego Park and cold-cocked six guys.”

  “I am,” admitted Captain America with an intimidating grin.

  “Hell, you really—”

  The room’s other door, the one still on its hinges, swung suddenly open.

  Captain America tensed, then relaxed.

  A waiter had entered with a tray. A silver covered dish rested on top of it. “Mama thought you boys might like a little snack,” he announced.

  “Huh?”

  The waiter halted near Cap, lifted the lid of the dish and picked up the .38 revolver that lay on it. The revolver barrel was pressed to Cap’s head befo
re he could make a move. “You want to see Jupiter?” the waiter asked. “You got it. C’mon.”

  Two more men with guns were planted on the threshold.

  Captain America had a satisfied expression on his bronzed face as he allowed himself to be escorted out of the room.

  “I had a straight flush,” Macri said to nobody.

  Three

  His boss lay flat out on the expensive flooring.

  Jake Sheridan circled him once, then sat down on a canvas chair that provided him with a view of a large stretch of smog-smeared Hollywood. “How many more, Lou?”

  Panting, Lou Mixx replied, “Eleven more pushups. Then I have to do sit-ups.”

  Jake was a middle-sized man of thirty-six, casually dressed in denims and a rugby shirt. He was tan and curly-haired. “I want you to send me to New Haven.”

  Struggling with his exercises, the chunky managing editor of Newsmag inquired, “Why?”

  “Ought you to be wheezing like that? Isn’t that Mother Nature’s way of warning you to knock it off?”

  “Nobody said getting into shape was going to be easy. Why New Haven?”

  “What sort of shape are you aiming for? It may take years to arrive at what you want,” remarked the reporter. “New Haven is the starting point for something big.”

  “Explain,” puffed Mixx as he counted off the remaining push-ups.

  “It’s about earthquakes. Probably you’ve—”

  “No more quake mysteries, Jake. That piece you did two weeks ago, about the guy in Solvang who had the Lemurians telling him when the next big California quake was due, got me a lot of flap from back—”

  “That was only a human-interest thing. Anyway, I’m not talking about local quakes.” Shifting in his chair, Jake fished a small notebook out of his hip pocket. He flipped it open to a middle page. “Yesterday it was Kitambaa, over in Africa. Whole darn place, a spanking new city wrought out of the jungle, is in ruins.”

  “So? Acts of God are happening all the time. We’re giving the quake a couple paragraphs in our world roundup section.”