Sabretooth : Mary Shelley Overdrive #2

Issue Date: 
September 2002
Story Title: 
Mary Shelley Overdrive - part 2
Staff: 

Dan Jolley (Writer), Greg Scott (Artist), JD Mettler (Colourist), Dave Sharp (Letterer) Tony Harris (Cover art), Franco & Reicht (Assistant Editor), Marts & Powers (Editors), Joe Quesada (Editor-in-chief), Bill Jemas (President)

Brief Description: 

Sabretooth and Bonnie escape Kalashnikov’s forces to hide out in a brothel owned by an old friend of his called Ruth. He vows to protect her at all costs. He hunts down Leonid, one of the soldiers, and violently beats the truth of why they are trying to kill Bonnie. Bonnie is carrying a plague; it has no cure, and if she isn’t killed within the next 16 hours the plague will be unleashed, killing millions. Sabretooth doesn’t want to believe him, and twists off Leonid’s head in his rage.

Full Summary: 

Having just shot Sabretooth full of tranquiliser darts, Leonid and his soldiers are arguing over what to do. Bonnie is whimpering, and they suggest they gag her. Leonid thinks that’s sick, and figures he should’ve left them in the rest home. One of his soldiers tells him they’re younger than he is. “Save it old man,” laughs Leonid. Suddenly Sabretooth jumps up, not unconscious after all, and shouts for Bonnie to hit the floor as he takes out one of the guards. He rushes to a weapon’s chest and pulls out two guns as bullets fly at him. He turns around and fires indiscriminately at the soldiers, massacring them as Bonnie watches in terror. A guard tells Sabretooth that they’re gonna shut him down, no matter what; he just kicks him violently into the wall. He gives Bonnie his car keys, telling her to get the car. As she runs off an injured soldier, crawling across the floor, grabs hold of her leg and stands up, about to kill her with a knife; but she blows his head off with a machine gun she’d picked up from one of his fallen comrades earlier. As Sabretooth continues to kill one soldier after another Leonid tells him to give up, but Victor Creed doesn’t give up. He tells Leonid that they don’t move right for soldiers, and they don’t have the right gear for soldiers either; otherwise he’d be dead already. Then he heard the “old geezer” crack, and wants to know why they smell like corpses. Leonid tells Sabretooth he should be helping them before he slashes Victor’s throat; but this doesn’t stop Sabretooth, never mind kill him, as he charges forward, sending them both crashing through a window, where they land on the street outside, witnessed by Bonnie in Sabretooth’s car. As she drives up he tells her to move aside, that he’s driving. She obliges; but as they drive off he casually tosses a hand grenade at his enemy’s car, destroying it, as the soldiers jump away from the explosion. As Leonid and his lieutenant watch the burning car he comments that Creed has no idea what he’s doing. He asks if Piotr and Aleksander can walk; his lieutenant isn’t sure, so is ordered to carry them if he has to. Leonid reports to Kalashnikov, telling him they’ve lost Creed and Hale, but only temporarily, as they have the make, model and tag number of their vehicle; they have all known phone lines tapped for both of them; and they’ve hacked into the NYPD system and put out an APB for them. Kalashnikov tells him to keep “Danilov” in mind while looking for them; and, when he does find them, to bomb the entire area down to the ground. Cyril asks Kalashnikov if he can catch them, but he needs him in the lab. Cyril tells him he can do this, and that he dealt with Danilov. But before Cyril was young as he is now he used to be a microbiologist called Dr. Phillip Krantz, and Kalashnikov tells him that they need Cyril’s scientific acumen in the lab right now. Cyril reluctantly agrees.

Driving away Bonnie wonders what they are listening to on the radio. Sabretooth tell her it’s Joe Cocker, and not to switch the station. He’s a bit upset at leaving his armoured car behind, then comments on how calm she is. She thinks she’s in shock, and not sure how to process what’s been going on. He tells her she processed that shotgun back there pretty well. She mumbles that he saved her life yet again...then they arrive at their destination. They go in the back way, where two scantily dressed females say “hi” to him. He tells them to fetch Ruth. Ruth is happy to see him, even though he didn’t call. She tells him she’s got Cable fixed so he can watch CNN again. He just wants his room for a while, and he wants her to take care of Bonnie, starting with some clothes and anything else she needs. Ruth wants to know which of the girls he’ll be wanting tonight; he just wants them to keep their mouths shut, And some food. His favourite is sirloins, and Ruth pops off to the kitchens to cook it for him. Bonnie asks him about the place they’re staying at, but he wont answer her. She thinks all this is just too much, but he vows to protect her.

Later that night Bonnie sneaks downstairs for a midnight snack, after Sabretooth has left. She asks Ruth what he’s told her; only that she supposed to look after her. Bonnie wants to know some things about her rescuer. She gives her what information she can; that he loves Monty Python, hates Brad Pitt, and sometimes reads John Sanford novels. He even once told her he thought about making a living building custom furniture. She jokes that she’d tell her what he likes in bed, but she probably knows that already. That’s as much as she knows about him, other than that he can be the Devil himself sometimes, and that if someone had come to her this afternoon and told her that Victor Creed would show up wanting her to protect someone she’d have called that person a liar. “Where’d he say he was going anyway?” Ruth asks. “Hunting,” Bonnie replies.

Leonid is watching another apartment for signs of his quarry. He reports in, telling them he’ll move onto the next target in a few minutes, thinking to stay around at his current location, just to see if he got lucky. Suddenly Sabretooth smashes the radio and binoculars out of his hands, knocking him to the floor. Leonid kicks out, telling him if he had a brain in his head he’d tell them where Bonnie is. Creed just goes right in there, ending up with Leonid’s knife stuck in his chest. “You know,” says Sabretooth. “I’m really sick of these knives.” He pulls the knife out of his body; licks his blood off the blade; and snaps it in half with his teeth. He charges at Leonid, musing about how he did leave scratches on them last time, and they aren’t invulnerable, and wonders just how much damage he can inflict. He snaps Leonid’s arm over the side of the building, then gets him in a neck hold and demands to know why they want Bonnie dead. So Leonid tells him; Bonnie Hale is carrying a bio-engineered stealth plague, undetectable for 72 hours, but then...instant epidemic. However, one of his own stupid men infected her by mistake, so they killed him; and now they have to kill her, because there is no antidote, and unless she dies, in sixteen hours, the plague will be released. Sabretooth calls him a liar, not wanting to believe it. He violently twists Leonid’s head off his body, running off, mumbling the words “You’re lying...”

Characters Involved: 

Sabretooth

Bonnie Hale

Piotr

Leonid

Leonid’s lieutenant

Kalashnikov

Aleksander

Cyril

Ruth

Two unnamed prostitutes

Story Notes: 
Issue Information: 
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