From Ancient Asgard he comes, The Prince of that Realm, an immortal warrior whose heritage is tied both to the realm eternal as well as Earth itself ! He stands for honor and is a divine force for good in the eternal struggle . His Strength of arm is second to none and it swings the mystic hammer Mjolnir for all that is just and right ! He is The Mighty THOR, God of Thunder ! And all the forces of the storm are his to command!

Thor #523

"Retribution!"

By Ralph L. Angelo Jr.

Splash Page : Odin sits heavily on his throne, ancient parchments cover the floor around him as his brow wrinkles in concentration. Behind him is seen the Vizier entering the room, with the Enchantress in tow.

Vizier: "My Lord, as you requested, I bring thee Amora, known as the Enchantress."

Page 2

Odin: "Aye good Vizier, I thank thee."

Odin stands and stretches .

Amora: "Thou hath requested my presence my Lord. How may I be of service to thee?"

Odin:" Come child, walk with me."

Together they enter Odins Gardens.

Odin: "Tis beautiful here . I love this place, though none save my wife know of this."

Amora: "Why hast thou chosen to tell me of this Lord Odin?"

Odin: "Amora, of late thou hast redeemed thyself, and I consider thee one of the Asgardian royal once more. As such I would impart certain ... knowledge to thee. I have seen much concerning the future of the nine worlds of late. In truth there is not much to tell in one divergence of the time line, in another Asgard springs eternal."

Page 3

Amora: "Thou doth speak of the "Weeping Dawn."

Odin: "Aye. The end of Godhood. It comes for us all child. There is a chance it will be stopped, but as the lord of Asgard I must plan for every eventuality. But that is not my reason for calling thee here. In the recent past thou hath redeemed thyself . Passing numerous tests of thy mettle. Yet one more awaits. It will cement thy return to the path of the righteous. This will cost thee greatly, but the rewards will be greater still. Thou wilt know when the time comes. Thou must act with thy heart Amora the Enchantress. To falter will set thee back on the path thou has but recently left, and will most assuredly spell thy doom."

Amora: " I ...will take thy words under advisement my lord. "

Odin: "Very well then Amora. No I bid thee leave, return to Thors side on Midgard. There is where your final test will take place. Farewell child."

Odin turns and leaves as a perplexed enchantress considers his enigmatic words.

Page 4

Splash page of a warehouse wall being shattered by a thrown Mjolnir, as Thor stands in the forefront and behind him swings in Spider-Man and Daredevil on either side!

Thor: "Villains! Surrender thy leader , the ghoulish thug "Tombstone" or face the wrath of an angered Thunder God !"

Page 5

In answer the thugs begin firing automatic weapons at the three heroes .

Spidey: "I don't think they're listening Goldilocks. I guess we have to teach them the error of their ways."

Thor begins to spin Mjolnir before him, deflecting the automatic weapons fire in all directions.

Thor: "Stand behind me noble warriors, Thor will protect thy flesh from being pierced by stray bullets."

Spidey leaps clear, and towards the firing thugs.

Spidey : "While I appreciate the sentiment Thor, I think I can have a little fun here myself."

Spidey slings a glob of webbing into one of the gunsels faces, then lands on the man feet first, decking him

Pow!

Page 6

Daredevil : (I'm no Spider-Man, his incredible reflexes and his Spider-sense are allowing him to avoid everything these punks are throwing out. )

DD hurls his Billy club at a thugs back, hitting the man in the base of the neck, instantly knocking him out!

PAK!

Thor meanwhile plows through the wildly firing gunsels , knocking them flying.

Thor: "Have at thee mortal scoundrels! Thy master is lower then the lowest rabid cur, and thou art his lapdogs! Now thou wilt tell us of his current whereabouts, or suffer the consequences!"

Thug 1: "Run! This guy ain't human. He'll kill us all!"

Spidey swings in behind the thug, who turns right into Spidey,

Spidey: "What, we don't rate? Aren't you in the least bit worried about me or my hornheaded pal?"

The thug swings at Spidey, who easily ducks below the wild punch.

Page 7

Thug 1: "I ain't afraid a you bug-man! I'll take you on any day! It's the T-God ahm not stupid enough ta face."

Spidey knocks the thug flying with a round house left, sending him at least ten feet.

POOM!

Spidey: "To bad tough guy, I guess you'll learn the error of your ways now huh?"

Daredevil kicks another thug in the face, swinging in on his billy club line

Kow!

DD : "No Spidey, these kind never do. They're always to busy trying to earn a fast buck by breaking a few easy bones."

Spidey belts two more with a leaping kick from a standing position, each leg to a different side

toom, boom!

Spidey : "I hear that Scarlet O'Devil, but I think this is the last of 'em. Where's Thor?"

Page 8

Suddenly a huge roaring crash reverberates through the warehouse

Bra-KOOM!

DD: "Uh-oh, I think that answers your question."

Both heroes swing quickly through the large warehouse , rounding stacks of merchandise they see a turned over and smoking forklift and an Angered Thor holding the driver of the forklift by the throat.

Thor: "Where is he varlet? Answer me or thou wilt beg to face your master for fear of my wrath!"

Thug 2: "I-I, h-he, u-uh ---"

Spidey bounces over and grabs the punk from Thors hand, then leaps to the roof of the warehouse. Once there hanging upside down he dangles the terrified creep forty feet above the ground.

Spidey: "Now c'mon bunky, let's have a chat shall we? My buddy is reeealy angry right now, and I don't know how long I can keep him calm. Now I think you oughtta tell me what he wants to know, but if you don't wanna tell me, I can leave you with him for a while. A LOONG while, if you know what I mean."

Page 9

The man looks at Spidey and at the ground so very far below then begins to nod almost uncontrollably.

Minutes later the three heroes are swinging their way out of the Brooklyn warehouse and towards..

DD: "Staten Island huh? Fortunato. I remember when we fought against him and his forces a while back*. We barely got out of that war zone with our skins last time."

*See the Adjective less Spider-Man, circa #63-65. But it was actually Ben Reilly playing Spidey at the time, and DD does know this, but Thor doesn't. --Rockin' Ralphy

Thor: "Mayhap so my friend, but at that time thou did not have the power of Thor with thee. This time the evil of Tombstone and Fortunato both will be ended. So swears the God of Thunder!"

Fortunatos estate is a veritable fortress. Men walk nonchalantly with machine guns in hand, as well as all sorts of other, more exotic weaponry. Deep inside the sanctum of this boss of bosses a meeting is taking place. A meeting between Tombstone and....

Tombstone: "Fortunato, lissen to me. How was I to know Thor was going to be involved in this mess. Let me grab some men and we'll tidy this up."

Fortunato: "You whispering ghoul, what's wrong with you? You're going to go against a God? It's bad enough that idiot Devastator * drew Thors attention to me with his antics, but now you do the same? Mama mia, I'm surrounded by idiots!"

*See ish 517

Page 10

Fortunato: " No Tombstone, no more. You tidy up nothing. You get out of town. Go down to Florida and you do nothing. You get involved with nothing. If you disobey me , I'll know and you'll pay the price for your betrayal. Ashpet?"

Tombstone looks long and hard at the wizened , one eyed old man who sits commandingly before him, his faithful wolf at his side and he thinks to himself

Tombstone: ( I could snap this old geezers neck in a second, and his doggie would waste his time breakin' his teeth on my rock hard skin but--)

Suddenly a man enters the room screaming..

Man: "Boss ! We got a big, BIG problem, Spider-Man and Daredevil are here, and they got that Thunder-God guy wit 'em !"

Fortunato bolts upright angrily from his chair pointing at Tombstone.

Fortunato: "YOU! You did this to me ! Forget what I said . You die here and now!"

Page 11

Suddenly the roof cave in as Thor flies through it, and, hammer first, directly into Tombstone

BOOM!

Thor: "Scum! Thou hath given me a merry chase, but no more! Now wilt thou pay for thy perfidy!"

Thor grabs the stunned Tombstone by the throat and hurls him bodily through a wall

BRAM!

Outside Tombstone struggles to his feet.

Tombstone: (I gotta get outta here! No way I c'n trade blows wit' this guy.)

He begins to run , when suddenly webbing covers his shoulder, and with a powerful yank, snaps him around. Spidey hangs on a wall of the estate.

Spidey: "Where're you goin' Lonnie? We haven't even had a chance to reminisce about old times."

Page 12

Tombstone pulls on the webbing, yanking Spidey off the wall, and into a powerful right.

P-KOW!

Tombstone: "Get outta here you webbed pest. I got no time for your nonsense."

Suddenly Daredevil swings around on his billy club line and kicks Tombstone in the face.

Chock!

DD: "Okay pasty face, how about my nonsense?" (Ouch! I felt like I just kicked a block of granite! This guy is as tough as stone!)

Tombstone: "Heh, tickles little man. Lets see how you scream when I yank those horns outta your head."

Spidey: "Oh I don't think so Lonnie."

Spidey slams him with a massive right, knocking him to the ground

Ba-thoom!

Page 13

Thor exits the hole in the building and plods angrily towards the wounded Tombstone. Then the Asgardian grabs him and brings the villain face to face.

Thor: "How does it feel evil one, to face one who could destroy thee almost effortlessly? Now thou doth know how thy prey, the Sapristis have in truth felt at thy recent attacks. What thou didst do to Jerry Sapristi was reason enough for vengeance, but what thou hath done to his daughter...Thou wilt pay."

Tombstone: "You don't scare me tough guy. You ain't got what it takes to permanently take a guy out. You ain't got the eyes for it."

Thor: "Wrong murderer, Thor has fought in battles for centuries unending, and more then a few were bloody massacres.'

And suddenly Tombstone begins to see something present in the Thunder Gods face what wasn't there a moment before. And he begins to fear....

Page 14

But at that moment Fortunato exits the hole in his mansions wall, to scream at the heroes.

Fortunato: "Idiots! You think I don't have my resources as well? Well now you can learn the error of your ways!"

Suddenly out of the very ground rise a dozen armored engines of destruction,

Spidey: "What the ? Dreadnaughts?!?!"

DD: "Oh boy, we are in something serious now boys."

Dreadnaught 1: "Directives: Destroy the intruders designated "Spider-Man", "Daredevil" and "Thor"."

The dreadnaughts begin firing deadly blasts of energy at the three heroes, Spidey leaps over them , barely keeping ahead of the searing blasts, while Daredevil gets in close to the nearest Dreadnaught.

DD: (The only chance I have is to stay tight with this thing, until Thor or Spidey can finish it off. At a distance it'll just fry me alive.)

Page 15

Thor: "Fear not good Daredevil, the God of Thunder will allow no harm to befall his boon companion!"

Thor hurls Mjolnir through the dreadnaught that was attacking DD, destroying it in one blow.

Spidey: "Hey guys, I could use a little help over here, uh Thor, you hear me at all?"

Spider-Man leaps over energy blasts from two dreadnaughts, before landing between them, he spins his head from side to side and then smiles beneath his mask, as he leaps instantly upwards thirty feet as the two Dreadnaughts obliterate each other with their energy blasts.

Fra-ZAAACK!

Spidey: "Forget it dudes. Everything is fine here."

Daredevil reaches out with his radar sense , reading patterns of heat emanating from the dreadnaughts and..

DD :"Spidey, Thor. Under their arms, and along their sides are cooling ports. That's where you've got to strike them."

Page 16

Spidey : "Okay horn head. What ever you say!"

Spider-Man fires webbing into the cooling ducts of two dreadnaughts in front of him and the result is immediate!

Dreadnaught 5: "Danger! Heat overload commencing! Danger Danger! *Skrack*"

Boom! The two Dreadnaughts explode almost simultaneously.

Meanwhile Thor engages three at the same time, punching one with a left handed blow, while hurling Mjolnir into and through another, while a third tackles him from behind.

Thor: "Unngh! Verily monsters, thou art well made in truth, but still art thou no match for the Odin son!"

Page 17

Thor reaches around behind him, and grabs the head of the Dreadnaught that tackled him from behind, and snaps its head off

Brak!

Meanwhile... Tombstone drags his hurting form away from the deadly battle.

Tombstone: (Maybe the old coot was right, I should get outta here fer a while, and Miami might not be a bad place ta lay low.)

With that Lonnie Lincoln slinks off and out of the Thunder Gods life.

Inside the Mansion Fortunato watches the battle and cackles.

Fortunato: " Kill them my Hydra given gifts, kill them all! No one messes with the boss of bosses! No one!"

The old man turns around, and right into a silently standing dreadnaught.

Page 18

Fortunato: "Unnff, What are you doing here? Get out there and help kill those heroes. Do as you're told robot."

Dreadnaught 12: " This battle is lost. The power of the Thunder God is to much for these units to persevere against. You have failed Hydra. There is nothing that can be salvaged here. Hydra hereby cuts all ties to you. There is a penalty for failure. You know the cost."

Fortunato's heart practically stops in his chest as he looks fearfully at the emotionless construct before him.

Next to the old man the great grey wolf senses his masters fear and begins to growl angrily, then the wolf suddenly leaps at the Dreadnaught.

Outside the heroes hear

Sha-Racck!

Spidey: "Inside, guys quick!"

Spider-Man is the first inside as he finds the Dreadnaught turning from two unrecognizable charred sets of remains on the floor.

Page 19

Dreadnaught 12: "This mission is over. This unit has succeeded in eliminating the disavowed one. Now this unit will leave."

The Dreadnaught turns and begins to jet upwards, when a stream of webbing suddenly wraps itself around the robots legs, anchoring it to the stone walls of the fortress like mansion.

Spidey: "Not so fast tinman."

Thor: "Aye robot, tis not thy place to escape. "

Dreadnaught 12: "Very well then, self destruct sequence activated. T minus 5-4-3..."

Spidey: "Run guys! My Spider-Sense is screaming!"

The three heroes rocket out of the house just as....

BA-ROOOOM!

The entire mansion explodes, disintegrating to dust almost instantly.

DD: "This is not good."

Thor: "How so fearless one? A major evil has been destroyed this day. How could that be a bad thing?"

DD: " This leaves a major hole in the New York underworld. There's going to be plenty of players trying to fill the void created by Fortunato's death. I think we may have just opened a very big can of worms gentleman, one that should've been left closed for now."

Page 20

Later, at the hospital room of Jenny Sapristi, Sigurd Jarlson stands with Jerry Sapristi looking at the wounded girl in the hospital bed. Behind both men stands Amora the Enchantress in mortal garb. Jerry leans heavily on a cane.

Jerry: "I-I can't believe it Sig. The docs say they can't do any more for her. She-she ain't got the will to live anymore they're tellin' me. My baby's gonna die."

The older man begins to sob uncontrollably. Sig looks at Amora, who for one of the few time in her long life feels compassion for the mortal who loves his daughter so. Sig puts his arm around Jerry and walks him slowly out of the younger Sapristis room as Amora looks on. Then turning her head she stares long and hard at the still form of Jenny Sapristi, and suddenly the monitor next to the bed flatlines! Amora stops dead in her tracks, not knowing what to do, when slowly the words of Odin ring in her mind. Silently Amora weave a spell about her, as arcane energies fill the room. Sigurd sees the light coming from the room and runs for the door, but it resists his strength.

Sig: (Verily, tis impossible! I could tear this wall entire down, but to do so would reveal my power as Thor. What is Amora doing? Almost it looks like...) "NO! Amora, Stop!"

But it is to late. With a mighty heave Thor tears the door open to reveal Jenny Sapristi sitting up in bed, amid sparkling energy. Slowly she looks around at her surroundings. Then Jerry is there, sidling past Sig

Page 21

Jerry: "Baby? What happened here? Where's Sigs lady friend? "

Jenny: "I-I don't know Daddy, I heard a voice in my sleep, telling me that everything was going to be alright . That this woman was going to help me. I was at this long tunnel with light at the end when this voice called me back and told me that she was going to make everything better. Then I was sitting up in bed, feeling great."

Sigurd Jarlson smiles, but tears begin to fill his eyes as he looks away, closing the door behind him he leaves the hospital and the re-united family. But in his heart he wonders at the sacrifice he just witnessed, from a woman who previously was a callous, and unflinching thorn in his side many times over, but who of late became his most cherished companion in life. Sigurd Jarlson wonders at the incredible transformation that has overtaken Amora the enchantress, turning a shallow uncaring witch into a warm and sensitive woman. A woman he will miss for a long, long time.

Hammering Mails, C/O CptMarvell@yahoo.com

Another solid issue, Ralph. The resolution to the Red Norvell subplot was nice -- maybe he will pop up again as a recurring supporting character (maybe he'll take Sig up on the job offer eventually?). The street-level stuff is very interesting -- I can't recall Thor ever being so deep into it before. I have never liked Tombstone but he certainly seems evil here. The Thor/Tombstone fight seems like one destined to be really, really short though... Keep up the great work! Barry

I hope you like this issues resolution of things Barry.

Hey Ralph! Well, I'm not strictly sure that I like Red being depowered and sent to earth forever. On the other hand, you didn't say that he was depowered for sure.... Anyway, Jenny's fate was horrible and it makes me seriously hope for Tombstone's brutal beating. I really am looking forward to seeing how this all works out! TJB

Well dija like what you saw TJ? Let me know buddy

That's it for this issue gang. Join us next ish for the first part of "Godhoods end"

Ralph