"What Lies Beneath..."
Kelsey Walsh steered her car onto the shoulder of the highway. She pulled her blonde hair up into a ponytail and spread out a much abused-looking road map, consulting between it, a small, scribble-filled notepad, and the GPS on her phone.
She glanced up; peering across the moonlit desert landscape, catching a faint glimpse of buildings in the distance and a few, dim lights.
She frowned in thought, tossed her navigation aids onto the passenger seat and drove away from the highway, taking the direct route across the desert.
She bumped along for ten minutes before reaching the outskirts of a tiny town. She drove onto what appeared to be the town’s main street and parked in front of a small grocery store.
The lights were out and when she pressed her face against the glass, could see no sign of movement inside. Kelsey frowned and walked across the street to a diner. Again, no lights or sign of anyone inside.
“Seriously…?” She muttered. “Nine o’clock on a Friday and the town just shuts down? No wonder the population is barely triple digits. Where else should I check…?”
She spotted a two-story building with a police car parked in front.
“That looks promising.” Kelsey nodded, grabbing her denim jacket and phone from her car, before jogging down the sidewalk to what she hoped was the local police station. There was a light, and the door was unlocked, but just as she was opening the door, she heard voices outside.
Frowning thoughtfully, she let go of the door and walked around the side of the brick building. The gap between the buildings lead to a small parking lot that contained a couple more police cruisers, a pair of motorcycles a sharp black car that would not look out of place in a ‘Fast and the Furious’ movie and a white horse with a white saddle.
A trio of men was standing near the vehicles. Two of them were dressed in motorcycle leathers, one blue and much road worn, the other black. Leaning against the black car was a teenage boy in jeans, jacket and a black t-shirt.
The two men in leathers appeared to be having an argument; while the teenager kept back, looking tired and slightly bored.
Kelsey held back, pressing against the wall, sinking into the shadows and waiting to see what was up before joining the conversation.
The man in blue had sandy blonde hair and looked older than the man in black.
“Can I help you, Miss?” a voice said, just as a hand came to rest upon her shoulder.
She gave up her cool, reporters’ detachment with a frightened yelp, that mortified her, while also catching the attention of the other three men.
“You find someone, Hamilton?” the man in blue asked.
Kelsey turned, looking quickly over her shoulder, catching a glimpse of a middle-aged man, dressed all in classic western attire.
“We’re here to help,” the older cowboy said. “Come on, I’ll introduce you to the boys.
With a gentle hand, he steered Kelsey over to the trio by the vehicles.
“Fellows, may I introduce…” he prompted.
“Um…I’m Kelsey Walsh,” she said, anxiously.
“Johnny Blaze,” the man in blue said, stepping forward. “Hamilton’s right, we might look a bit scruffy, but we are here to help.”
He gestured over his shoulder.
“This is Dan and Robbie.”
“Hi,” the younger man, Robbie she guessed, greeted her with an unsure wave.
The man in black grunted and nodded.
“What’s going on?” Kelsey finally exclaimed. “Who are you guys? Where is everybody? What’s…?”
“Oh, she’s going to be a big help,” Dan muttered.
“Let it go,” Blaze snapped, before turning back to Kelsey. “We’re…well, complicated, but we are the good guys. We came to town, after a call from a friend of Hamilton’s and got here only to find everyone gone…no idea how or where. We were…discussing what to do, when you showed up. What’s your story?”
Kelsey looked around at the motley group, trying to make sense of what she’d stumbled into. No good idea presented itself, so she shrugged and decided to take Blaze’s word for it and tell them what she knew.
“I’m a reporter,” she explained. “Haven’t been able to land a job with any of the bigger papers or networks, so I do freelance stuff, mostly been…”
“We don’t need your resume,” Dan interrupted, earning frowns from Blaze and the cowboy.
“I’d been looking into a story about some disputed land rights near here. Roxxon was looking to do some mining, but there was a court case from the local tribes, nearby towns and a government research place. I got a tip that something sketchy was going on, might be Roxxon, might be whatever the government was ‘researching’. I came to talk to the local law and maybe a contact at the lab…I find the place quiet as a mime convention and you guys being all ‘sons of anarchy’. You’re telling me the whole town is gone? Nobody’s here?”
“Great!” Dan grumbled, crossing his arms. “She doesn’t know anymore then we do. We’re wasting time when there’s more important things to do…”
“You got somewhere else to be?” Johnny snapped. “You know where the road is! So, shut up, help or go do these ‘more important’ things you’ve got on your calendar.”
The two men glared at each other for a few seconds, giving Kelsey the opportunity to study them a bit and notice a bit of a resemblance…brothers, maybe.
Dan broke eye contact first and walked off.
“Fine, I’m going to have a look around.”
He stalked off, brushing past Kelsey, on his way to the main street.
“Lot of anger in that boy,” Hamilton said, quietly.
“Not telling me something I don’t already know,” Johnny sighed. “Not like he doesn’t have a reason…. Hey, Robbie.”
“What?!” The teenager said, with equal parts surprise and worry.
“Do me a favor and go keep an eye on Dan.”
“If he won’t listen to you, what makes you think…?”
“You don’t have to have a deep meaningful talk with him, just go.” Johnny explained. “Till we know what’s going on, I don’t think any of us should be wandering around in the dark.”
“Yeah, okay,” Ronnie nodded and jogged off.
“Now what?” Kelsey asked.
“Now we…compare notes and try and figure out where to look,” Blaze suggested, vaguely.
“I was thinking of checking my friend’s house,” Hamilton said. “See if he had any evidence to go with this hunch of his. If you and the young lady want to investigate her leads…”
“I thought you didn’t want us going off alone?’ Kelsey asked.
“I won’t be,” the older man said, with a faint smile. He turned and made a clicking noise with his tongue and the white horse looked up and walked towards the trio. “Phantom will keep an eye on me,” he said, stroking the horse’s neck.
He tipped his hat and walked away, the horse following behind.
“Be just a second,” Johnny Blaze said to the young reporter, as he walked after the cowboy.
“What’s on your mind?” Hamilton asked.
“I’m not crazy right? You feel it too? That…tingle…a sense there’s more to this then we think?”
“Oh yeah, an ache in my back teeth,” the older man nodded. “Might not be ‘end of the world’, but there’s something supernatural going on. Don’t let Dan rattle you. His temper’s making him contrary. We listen to you for a reason. Now, go convince that girl we aren’t a bunch of crazy yahoos…”
“Who are you guys…?” Kelsey asked, once Blaze had re-joined her. “You aren’t cops and you’re too scruffy to be super heroes…you’re…I don’t even know…!”
“No, we don’t have badges or Avengers secret decoder rings,” Johnny told her. “But, we are, for the most part, the good guys and are trying to help. Same thing I told Danny, this is a volunteer gig, I’d like you to trust and help us, but you can walk away any time.”
She studied his rugged, earnest features for several seconds, and realized that somehow, in some part of her brain, she did trust him and was beginning to suspect whatever was going on, she wasn’t up to dealing with it by herself.
“Okay, what do we do now?” She asked.
“What do you want to do?” He countered. “You said you were checking leads…what were they?”
“Well, this town doesn’t rate a newspaper,” Kelsey said, fishing her notebook and phone. “It’s got a weekly two-pager that lists church suppers and high school sports scores, the guy that runs it retired here from a bigger paper that I…almost worked for…and…”
“I got it,” Blaze nodded. “Check his place and the police?”
They walked around to the front of the police station. Hamilton had mounted his horse and was galloping off to the residential area. They saw no sign of Dan and Robbie.
“The reporter or the sheriff’s?” Blaze asked.
“Reporter,” Kelsey nodded, heading down the street. “Though, coffee would be nice too.
“Tell me about it,” Johnny muttered, walking along with her. “We’d been on the road for awhile before coming here, only to be greeted by roads made of potholes and dirt and not a drop of coffee.”
“You guys do a lot of…this kind of thing?” She asked.
“Every damn day, it seems,” he replied, before stumbling. “Jesus! Have these people even heard of asphalt?”
When we find everyone, you can complain to the mayor.” Kelsey said, catching his arm and helping to steady him. “So, I’m thinking there may be illegal mining going on…what is wrong with you…?”
Johnny Blaze stumbled again, sinking into the dirt up to his calf.
“Something wrong with the ground…?” He muttered, as he peered downwards and tried to pull his foot out of the dirt. “Did they mine and mess up the ground under…what the hell…?”
Within seconds, Johnny had sunk down to his waist. Kelsey lunged and grabbed his wrists, finding herself in a bizarre tug of war with the ground to keep the man in blue leathers from sinking below.
With a rough jerk, Johnny Blaze was pulled into the ground, dragging the young reporter along with him.
# # # # # # # # # #
A couple blocks away, Robbie Reyes was jogging along, trying to keep up with Dan Ketch.
“I don’t need a babysitter, kid,” Dan muttered.
“Johnny thinks we shouldn’t be wandering around by ourselves until we know what’s going on,” Robbie said. “And I’ve got a name, dude.”
“Yeah, whatever,” The man in black said. “Not looking for a sidekick either.”
“Wow, is being a jerk your super power or do you have some kind of daily practice thing going on…?” Ronnie asked. “Y’know, just curious.”
Dan Ketch glared over his shoulder at the younger man.
“Yeah, you know, I go to high school in East L.A., right?” Robbie said, after a few seconds. “I’ve got scarier guys than you in my Algebra class…and have I mentioned, I met the devil…?”
“Man, kid, you are a pain in the ass. Come on; let’s go ‘on patrol’. The sooner we get this over with, the sooner I can get back to my life.”
“Yeah, hurry home and…what? Kick puppies and tell kids there’s no Easter bunny?” Robbie asked rolling his eyes.
Dan shook his head and Robbie could swear that for a second the corner of his mouth went up in the briefest of smiles.
Then the man in black leather turned and walked off.
“You coming or what?” he asked.
Just as the teenager was about to reply, the ground opened up and Dan Ketch plummeted out of sight.
Robbie Reyes stood, wide-eyed and dumbfounded, all his teenage bravado gone as he dropped to his knees and began digging through the sandy earth, trying to find his teammate.
# # # # # # # # # #
The white horse slowed from a gallop to a walk, as it approached the modest, ranch-style house. All the windows were dark.
Hamilton Slade dismounted, and walked up to the house.
“Keep an eye out, fella,” he told the horse, before climbing the three squat concrete steps and entering. “Bernard…?” he called. “Anybody home?”
He moved, like a shadow through the darkened house, from room to room, alert for anything that might give him a clue as to what had happened to his friend and the nearly one hundred other citizens of this town.
In a small back room that served as an office, Hamilton fanned out the stack of papers he found, picked up a couple pages and moved to the window to read by the light of the full moon.
“Looks like Miss Walsh might be right bout illegal mining,” he muttered, forehead wrinkled in thought.
A distant noise caught his attention and in a smooth, swift gesture, he dropped the pages and swept up the six-shooter from his gun-belt.
Hamilton stood statue -still, straining his hearing. He soon realized the noise wasn’t coming from the house, but rather outside. Peering out the window, he looked across Bernard’s small backyard, past the low fence and into the field beyond.
The ground was all churned up, as though it had been recently plowed, but Hamilton could see no other sign of any farming. The field seemed to shift, the dirt moving as though hit by a fierce wind and figures began climbing up out of the ground and shambling towards the house.
“Well, that can’t be good,” the older cowboy muttered.
# # # # # # # # # #
Johnny Blaze landed hard and then was immediately struck by a petite female reporter. He lay on the floor of the underground tunnel, alternating between gasping to catch his breath and spitting out dirt.
“Owww…oh, man,” he muttered, pushing himself upright. He sat, with his back against the hard packed dirt wall before getting, shakily to his feet.
Kelsey lay in a heap on the floor, not feeling up to more than turning towards Blaze accusingly.
“Safer if we stay together…?” she said, sarcastically. She got up to her knees, and then rubbed at her bleeding lip with the back of her hand.
“Come on,” Johnny said, going over and offering a hand.
“Where are we?” she asked, getting to her feet. “Can hardly see a thing.
“Considering we’re underground, that’s impressive. Should be pitch dark. Some kind of…chemical smeared on the walls making the light…?”
“Bio-luminescence,” Kelsey said. “I worked for the science section when I was in Chicago. How come if the ground collapsed, I can’t see the hole we came in through…?”
“Cause it didn’t collapse,” Blaze said, looking around. “Something grabbed my leg when I stepped into that…’sink hole’…or whatever…some one or thing did this, made this tunnel…”
“And kidnapped a hundred people…!” Kelsey breathed, anxiously. “Holy crap, this isn’t about illegal mining this is…weird, dangerous…super villain type stuff…we need to get of here!”
“Okay, take a breath, we’ll figure it out,” Johnny said, laying a hand on her trembling shoulder. “Now, I’m going to do something, I think will help us, but I need you not to freak out on me, okay?”
“What?” she asked. “Not freak out? You mean more than I already am? I don’t see how that’s possible.”
Johnny Blazed closed his eyes and clenched his fists and after several seconds of concentration his head burst into flame. When it faded away a skeleton in blue biker leathers had replaced the man, his skull engulfed in flickering flame.
“Gaaaaahhh!” Kelsey exclaimed, staggering backwards. “You…you are…uh… the Blazing Skull…!”
“Really?” Johnny Blaze asked, his voice more raspy and echoing than his human tone. “Blazing Skull…?”
“How…who are you…?” Kelsey babbled, standing her ground and taking a deep breath. “Are you a mutant?”
“I’m Ghost Rider,” Johnny told her. “My…friends…partners and I are charged with looking into weird events like…this.”
“Your partners?” Kelsey interrupted. “All four of you burst into flame?”
“Can we focus on more important things for a minute?” Johnny said. “You seem to be handling this, so I’m going to say a few more things and you need to listen and stay calm.”
“If I didn’t run screaming from…that,” Kelsey said, pointing at his skull. “Then I think I can handle anything else you need to tell me.”
“Fine, first there’s this,” he reached behind his back and from a leather scabbard drew a sawed off shotgun that gleamed like shiny black death.
“That’s not so bad,” Kelsey muttered.
“Yeah, I only got it because of this,” He raised his free hand and a burst of flame erupted from his upheld, gloved fingertips, lighting up the tunnel and revealing that they were not only not alone, but were in fact surrounded by dozens of inhuman figures.
“Want to freak out now?” Ghost Rider asked quietly.
“Yes please,” Kelsey gulped.
# # # # # # # # # #
Dan Ketch hit the hard packed dirt floor with a grunt of pain and then pushed himself up. The minute he reached his feet, he closed his eyes and was soon cocooned in flame.
When the flames parted the Ghost Rider stepped out.
He was bigger than Johnny; his leathers seemed barely able to contain his new form. His skull was wreathed in flames that burned blue. Wrapped around his right arm was a length of chain that also seemed to be on fire. He took hold of it and with a quick jerk pulled it free like a whip.
“So, who wants to play?” he growled. “I can see you. Get out here and let’s get this over with.”
Several figures stepped out of the shadows, holding clubs and spears, and advanced on the burning figure.
# # # # # # # # # #
The flame flared from Johnny Blaze’s hand and the dozen figures around them flinched back, mewling and frightened.
They were small, barely coming up to Kelsey’s shoulder. Their skin was leathery and dull yellow in color. They all had over-sized baldheads and pointed ears. The only clothing they wore was crude loincloths and visors that looked like they’d been carved from wood or bone.
They cowered back from the Ghost Rider’s flame.
“I don’t want to hurt anyone,” he said, lowering his shotgun.
“Liar!” a voice screeched.
The crowd parted and a new figure stalked towards them.
“Okay, now this makes a little more sense,” Ghost Rider muttered.
“It does…?” Kelsey whispered, peering over his shoulder at the bizarre mob they faced.
“Yeah, we are in much worse trouble than I thought. Let me do the talking.”
“Surface dwellers lie as easily as they breathe!” the newcomer accused, stepping away from the crowd.
He was a human that stood slightly taller than the yellow creatures, clad in a green, loose fitting bodysuit, blue high collar cloak and a visor, similar to what the others wore, but made of blue plastic.
He was an unattractive man, with a bulbous nose, saggy bulldog cheeks, a low forehead and thinning grey hair. In one of his pudgy, stubby-fingered hands he held a staff that looked like yellow plastic.
“It keeps getting better,” Ghost Rider muttered.
“The Mole Man!” Kelsey exclaimed.
“Him you know by name,” Blaze said.
“Ghost Rider didn’t attack New York when I was working as an intern,” she snapped.
“Demon!” The Mole Man screeched, striking the ground with the end of his staff. “Was it the humans, not content to use their science, in harming my kingdom, have they summoned you to wreck further havoc?”
“Return the people to the town above,” Johnny Blaze intoned, in his most intimidating Ghost Rider voice. “And I will be satisfied to leave your domain unharmed!”
“No!” Mole Man exclaimed, stamping his foot, as well as striking the ground with staff again. “The surface world has dared to intrude upon my kingdom and harm my subjects! A price must be paid!”
“Oh man…!” Kelsey breathed. “Roxxon was doing illegal drilling and…!”
“Yeah, I figured that part out,” Ghost Rider whispered over his shoulder, before turning back to the Mole Man. “The captives you have taken are innocents. Release them and I will see the true offender punished.”
“I should take the word of a demon as proof that these wretched surface dwellers are innocents?” Mole Man growled. “I may be ugly, but am not stupid!”
“Fine, “ Ghost Rider said, raising his shotgun. “Surrender the townspeople to me or I shall be forced to deal with you before I am able to seek out the true offenders.”
“So, be it,” the Mole Man spat raising his free hand and pointing at the two intruders. “My subjects, subdue them and bring them to me!”
With a low rasping hiss the mob of subterraneans rushed forward.
# # # # # # # # # #
Dan Ketch flicked the flaming chain whip, as the half dozen figures stepped into the light of his flames.
They were taller than the yellow-skinned creatures, broad-shouldered and fine featured. They looked like statues carved from craggy pinkish-red stone. They were bare-chested and wore short kilts of rough purple cloth.
All their weapons also seemed to be carved from stone.
Dan could feel the waves of heat radiating off them as they approached.
“What manner of creature are you?” one of them rasped, in a low menacing tone. “Are you a minion of the thieves?”
“I am seeking the people from the surface,” Ghost Rider replied, grimly. “Whatever your dispute with them, you are my enemy until they are returned safely.”
The man, who looked as though he’d been carved from volcanic rock, frowned.
“We have taken no captives,” he said. “We have seen some, herded through the tunnels by the moloids, but we seek what was stolen from my people.”
“You expect me to believe there just happen to be two groups lurking underneath the same town?” Ghost Rider snapped, angrily. “Return the townspeople! I have no interest in talk until they are safe!”
“We…I do not understand…?” the volcanic man replied, puzzled.
“This is all you need to understand!” Ghost Rider snarled, lunging forward, swinging his chain. It caught the lead one across the chest, drawing sparks. With his free hand he punched the stone man next to him full in the face, the spikes on his gloves cracking his opponents stone skin.
“Come on!” Ghost Rider raged, flinging himself at the stone men.
# # # # # # # # # #
Up above ground, Robbie Reyes had gotten to his feet and ended up wandering through the town, trying to find any of his teammates, before going up on the roof of the police station to see if he could spot anybody.
His car and the two motorcycles were still in the back parking lot.
“What the hell…?” he shouted at the empty town. “Where did you guys go!”?
He got nothing back, but a faint echo of his voice.
“This sucks,” he muttered, before spotting a light on the horizon. “Huh…? Didn’t that lady say something about a sketchy science lab…?”
He fished in his jean pocket and came out with his key chain.
# # # # # # # # # #
Johnny Blaze hurled a ball of fire at the mole creatures, driving them back. A few braver ones burst through, and Blaze struck them with the butt of his shotgun.
“Stay close,” he said over his shoulder.
“Where am I going to go?” she asked.
The blasts of fire kept the Mole Man and his minions from overwhelming the duo, but they wouldn’t flee the tunnel. They’d pull back, and as soon as he moved to deal with another group, they’d move back in. The moloids had them pushed back against the wall. Blaze couldn’t see any escape route and didn’t like the odds of him being able to fight his way out and keep Kelsey safe.
Swinging his shotgun, Ghost Rider, forced the yellow creatures back. Much as he wasn’t thrilled with them, he didn’t think it right to shoot them yet.
He gave up on the gun, re-holstered it in his back scabbard and unleashed fire from both hands.
The Mole Man used his staff like a vaulting pole and launched himself over the wall of flame. He landed on his feet, bent his knees and swung the staff, catching Ghost Rider across the knees.
Gritting his teeth, Blaze stumbled, but didn’t fall.
Mole Man jabbed his staff forward, hitting Ghost Rider in the chest and zapping him with an electrical charge.
“Aarrrrrrrgh!” Ghost Rider raged, the front of his suit singed, revealing the ribcage beneath.
He clapped his hands together, grabbing hold of the Mole Man’s staff. Fire ran from his gloved fingers and down the staff, melting his handprints into the yellow plastic. The Mole Man shrieked in pain and gave the staff a twist. It split into two sections. Grinding his teeth in pain and anger, the Mole Man struck Ghost Rider across the shoulder.
Blaze staggered back, pinning Kelsey between his back and the dirt wall.
“John…Johnny…!” she grunted. “Can’t breathe! What do…we do…?”
Blaze clenched his fists, melting his half of the staff into an unrecognizable slag. He grabbed the nearest moloid by its skinny neck and swung it as a makeshift club to drive back the other dozen.
“Come on!” he raged.
As the crowd was ready to swarm over the duo, a ghostly figure floated down through the tunnel’s ceiling.
It wore a white bodysuit, old style cowboy boots, gun belt, a short cape, a full head covering mask and a cowboy hat. It held a pair of six guns in its white-gloved hands.
“Hamilton!” Blaze exclaimed.
The western Ghost Rider fired into the crowd as he floated downwards. The bullets, like the cowboy were white and pulsed with a ghostly light. They passed through the bodies of the moloids, leaving no visible wound, yet the thin yellow creatures collapsed to the ground when struck.
“How’d you find us?” Johnny Blazed asked.
“Followed a couple of those fellas,” Hamilton replied, gesturing towards the Mole Man’s minions with one of his guns, while continuing to fire the other. “Not the first time I’ve crossed paths with them.”
“Now, this is starting to make sense,” Blaze muttered.
Then the wall opposite them burst and Dan Ketch and a quartet of what looked like living statues came tumbling through.
His fireballs went wildly into the crowd of moloids. They ran, panic-stricken, in all directions, nearly trampling their leader, as well as the Ghost Riders.
Johnny leapt forward, shoved the Mole Man away from them and grabbed Dan by the back of his leather jacket.
“What is going on?” he snapped.
Dan spun, flaming fist swinging, before realizing who was behind him. He opened his hand and the fireball went out with a ‘poof!’.
The three Ghost Riders put their heads together for several minutes before they were interrupted by the return of their various subterranean adversaries.
The Lava Men got to their feet and picked up their weapons, the moliods rallied around their leader.
“So,” Kelsey said, wide-eyed and anxious. “The pink guys think the townspeople stole something from them and the yellow guys think they were attacking their home…?”
“Yeah, pretty much,” Johnny muttered.
“So, which is it?” she asked.
“No idea,” he replied.
“Don’t know, don’t care,” Dan said, cracking his knuckles.
“We can sort it out after we avoid getting beaten to death,” Hamilton said, raising his six-shooters. “Here they came!”
The three Ghost Riders formed a wall between the underground dwellers and Kelsey, each bringing their respective weapons up.
The yellow and pink creatures hit them like a wave and the trio cut through them with pistol, shotgun and chain.
Hamilton and Johnny split their energies between fighting off and protecting, while Dan was single minded in his attack on the subterrainians. He whipped the chain savagely and hurled fireballs.
“Glad someone is enjoying themselves,” Hamilton muttered, as he fired, carefully picking off any of the yellow-skinned creatures that got too close.
“Little too much,” Johnny grunted, catching a Lava man’s spear on the stock of his shotgun and shoving him away. “Something to worry about if we get through this!”
“If?” Kelsey exclaimed, ducking down even further behind Johnny to avoid fireballs, showers of dirt and stones.
“The Mole Man has an army,” Hamilton said, grimly. “Even angry as Dan is, we can’t fight them all. We need to get out of here! We need to find another way to fix things!”
“Working on it!” Blaze replied, firing at the Mole Man, who used his broken staff to bat the fireball aside.
“You can’t just use one of your magic guns to make an escape route?” Kelsey shouted, to be heard over the cacophony of the battle.
“We are demons, not Harry Potter!” Johnny Blazed yelled back. “I can’t magically make a doorway appear!’
The fight moved slightly in the Ghost Riders’ favor when a section of the tunnel roof collapsed, burying a good portion of the yellow creatures in a shower of dirt, rock, bits of machinery, a half dozen men in hazmat suits and yet another Ghost Rider.
He was shorter, and slimmer then the others. Instead of leathers, he seemed to be wearing more of a black bodysuit. His skull had a metallic sheen and the nimbus of flame around it was white hot.
He had, clutched under his arm, an egg-shaped stone, large as his head. It seemed to consist of the same pink-red rock as the Lava Men. It was veined with gold that pulsed with a strange energy.
The whole thing seemed like some kind of bizarre football game had just crashed into the tunnel.
The younger Ghost Rider got to his feet and held the strange rock up above his head with one hand.
“Anybody lose one of these?” he shouted.
The Lava Men stopped in mid-fight, each dropping to one knee, heads bowed.
All the other combatants stopped, looking around in confusion, the yellow molids drifting towards the Mole Man, looking for guidance.
Thinking fast, Johnny Blaze moved to the middle of the tunnel and brought his hands together in a dramatic clap that generated a basketball-sized ball of fire.
“Enough!” he shouted. “We have returned your artifact and brought to you the true perpetrators! You, Lava Men, will take it and return, peacefully to your domain!”
He turned to face the Mole Man.
“And you shall return your captives to their home! They had no role in the attack upon your people!”
The Mole Man lowered his head and muttered under his breath.
“Will you do what I have said or do you wish to see how much carnage my brothers and I can bring down upon your kingdom?!”
Begrudgingly, the Mole Man nodded and with that simple gesture the battle was over.
# # # # # # # # # #
Kelsey spent the next couple days in town, helping the people return to their homes and getting her story. How much of it anybody would believe or the government would let her get away with printing was anybody’s guess.
The four Ghost Riders reverted to normal, helped where they could and then very discreetly left town when the government aid workers, state police and federal investigators showed up.
Forty-eight hours after arriving in town, she found herself stopping at a rest stop several miles outside of it. Four familiar figures were gathered at the far end of the parking area around a mix of vehicles.
Dan Ketch sat sidesaddle on his motorcycle, peering sullenly at the highway. Hamilton was leaning, relaxed against the side of a dingy white pickup truck.
Johnny Blaze and Robbie stood nearby. The two older men were talking, while Robbie was occupied with a fast food burger.
Robbie spotted Kelsey first and waved to her with his free hand.
She parked nearby and then walked over, helping herself to some of his fries on the way by.
“Well, here we are again,” she said, going to stand by Johnny.
“Everything okay?” Johnny asked. He was sipping from a take out coffee.
“They got everybody home, nobody died, and the Mole Man seems to have kept his promise to fill in the tunnels under the town,” she explained. “And I wouldn’t be surprised if a fault line under the Roxxon facility suddenly became active.”
“So, what the hell happened?’ Dan asked. “What were we all fighting about?”
“Come on, man!” Robbie said. “Even I was paying attention enough to figure most of it out! That egg thing was full of some kind of…energy and Roxxon found it when they were drilling.”
“Right,” Kelsey nodded. “So, when things got hot, they figured out they could use it to power their equipment, stay off the grid and keep mining, even with the lawsuits and things, supposedly stopping them. They just didn’t know that the Lava Men were under the town looking for their artifact.”
“Meanwhile, their mining was riling up the Mole Man,” Hamilton added. “And the town got caught in the crossfire.”
“So, we done?” Dan asked.
“Yeah, cause I really need to get back home,” Robbie added.
“Yeah, we’re done,” Johnny said with a tired smile.
Hamilton nudged him with his elbow.
“Oh…and, thanks for helping us…and leaving us out of your story,” he said.
“Well, the story was crazy enough without me mentioning demons…” she said.
“Not technically a demon myself,” Hamilton shrugged. “I’m the host for a collective of spirits.”
“And I was given powers when my uncle tried to sacrifice me in a magic ritual,” Robbie added.
“And you guys say that kind of stuff like it doesn’t sound insane,” Kelsey said, shaking her head. “What is your deal?”
“You ever hear of the four horsemen of the apocalypse?” Dan Ketch asked.
“Uh…yeah, in Sunday school or something…?”
“That’s us,” Dan said. ‘We took the job away from the other guys that had it.”
“Anyway,” Johnny said, trying to get the conversation back on track. “We appreciate it. Now, let’s go home.”
Robbie threw away his fast food wrappers, got fist bumps from everyone and drove off.
Hamilton gave Kelsey his contact info at the museum he worked for, a gentlemanly tip of his hat and was on his way.
Kelsey sat in her car, rummaging through the accumulated debris from being on the road for the past week, chasing stories. She was only half paying attention as she watched Johnny and Dan have one more, tense conversation, wondered how much of what they’d told her about themselves and when, not if, she was sure of that part, their paths and hers would cross again.
The two men shared a brief farewell. Dan Ketch barely nodded. Then they were on their bikes and gone.
“What have I gotten myself mixed up in?” Kelsey frowned, before starting her car and hitting the highway herself.
# # # # # # # # # #
A realm away, a figure, sat and studied the images of Kelsey and the four Ghost Riders in an orb of flame, and pondered similar thoughts.
“Curious,” he muttered, whether to himself or to the captive that lay bound in chains at his feet was unclear. “Who is she? She has all the appearance of a damsel, merely a pawn in the game to come…and yet, things are rarely that simple…let’s keep an eye on her, as well as the Riders, and see what comes of it…”
Bound in chains and mouth sealed, his captive could merely glare upwards.
# # # # # # # # # #
Author’s note: So, how’d I go from being a casual Ghost Rider fan, at best, to writing about four of them…?
When David sent me a list of characters he’d like to see taken out of limbo, I noticed that GR had the least amount of back issues to read and next thing I knew I was hooked.
Partially because there was a bunch of interesting plot threads left by the guys that came before me, as well as they both had very different voices for their runs and the idea of writing a duo of Ghost Riders, who were very different from each other, could be fun. Like a really warped cop buddy movie.
Then came marvel’s very short-lived Ghost Rider series, featuring Robbie Reyes and a then I remembered the old west Ghost Rider and I had myself a whole team of Ghost Riders, a couple pages of story notes and was prowling the bins of my local comic shop for Ghost Rider back issues.
If this is your first issue of M2K’s Ghost Rider, first welcome, and second if you’ve read the issues before, cool (most of them were pretty good) if not, all you need to know is the basics of who Ghost Rider and I’ll fill in the rest as we go.
Yes, something big and bad did happen between Dale Glazer’s last issue and my first, but like the ‘Time War’ in Doctor Who, all you need to know is something big and bad happened.
These guys are a team, but I’m stealing an idea from John Byrne’s ‘Alpha Flight’, in that they are a team that doesn’t hang out together much. There will be lots of solo stories and occasionally something important will happen to bring all or maybe just a couple of them together.
Also, these are four very different characters and I’d like to spend a couple issues showing those differences and setting up the new status quo.
So, enjoy and feel free to drop me a note if you like what read or if there’s somebody from GR’s supporting cast or rogues gallery you’d like to see.
I have a rough plan for my first year on this title, but it’s loose enough that if a cool suggestion comes my way I could fit it in.
-Travis Hiltz
She glanced up; peering across the moonlit desert landscape, catching a faint glimpse of buildings in the distance and a few, dim lights.
She frowned in thought, tossed her navigation aids onto the passenger seat and drove away from the highway, taking the direct route across the desert.
She bumped along for ten minutes before reaching the outskirts of a tiny town. She drove onto what appeared to be the town’s main street and parked in front of a small grocery store.
The lights were out and when she pressed her face against the glass, could see no sign of movement inside. Kelsey frowned and walked across the street to a diner. Again, no lights or sign of anyone inside.
“Seriously…?” She muttered. “Nine o’clock on a Friday and the town just shuts down? No wonder the population is barely triple digits. Where else should I check…?”
She spotted a two-story building with a police car parked in front.
“That looks promising.” Kelsey nodded, grabbing her denim jacket and phone from her car, before jogging down the sidewalk to what she hoped was the local police station. There was a light, and the door was unlocked, but just as she was opening the door, she heard voices outside.
Frowning thoughtfully, she let go of the door and walked around the side of the brick building. The gap between the buildings lead to a small parking lot that contained a couple more police cruisers, a pair of motorcycles a sharp black car that would not look out of place in a ‘Fast and the Furious’ movie and a white horse with a white saddle.
A trio of men was standing near the vehicles. Two of them were dressed in motorcycle leathers, one blue and much road worn, the other black. Leaning against the black car was a teenage boy in jeans, jacket and a black t-shirt.
The two men in leathers appeared to be having an argument; while the teenager kept back, looking tired and slightly bored.
Kelsey held back, pressing against the wall, sinking into the shadows and waiting to see what was up before joining the conversation.
The man in blue had sandy blonde hair and looked older than the man in black.
“Can I help you, Miss?” a voice said, just as a hand came to rest upon her shoulder.
She gave up her cool, reporters’ detachment with a frightened yelp, that mortified her, while also catching the attention of the other three men.
“You find someone, Hamilton?” the man in blue asked.
Kelsey turned, looking quickly over her shoulder, catching a glimpse of a middle-aged man, dressed all in classic western attire.
“We’re here to help,” the older cowboy said. “Come on, I’ll introduce you to the boys.
With a gentle hand, he steered Kelsey over to the trio by the vehicles.
“Fellows, may I introduce…” he prompted.
“Um…I’m Kelsey Walsh,” she said, anxiously.
“Johnny Blaze,” the man in blue said, stepping forward. “Hamilton’s right, we might look a bit scruffy, but we are here to help.”
He gestured over his shoulder.
“This is Dan and Robbie.”
“Hi,” the younger man, Robbie she guessed, greeted her with an unsure wave.
The man in black grunted and nodded.
“What’s going on?” Kelsey finally exclaimed. “Who are you guys? Where is everybody? What’s…?”
“Oh, she’s going to be a big help,” Dan muttered.
“Let it go,” Blaze snapped, before turning back to Kelsey. “We’re…well, complicated, but we are the good guys. We came to town, after a call from a friend of Hamilton’s and got here only to find everyone gone…no idea how or where. We were…discussing what to do, when you showed up. What’s your story?”
Kelsey looked around at the motley group, trying to make sense of what she’d stumbled into. No good idea presented itself, so she shrugged and decided to take Blaze’s word for it and tell them what she knew.
“I’m a reporter,” she explained. “Haven’t been able to land a job with any of the bigger papers or networks, so I do freelance stuff, mostly been…”
“We don’t need your resume,” Dan interrupted, earning frowns from Blaze and the cowboy.
“I’d been looking into a story about some disputed land rights near here. Roxxon was looking to do some mining, but there was a court case from the local tribes, nearby towns and a government research place. I got a tip that something sketchy was going on, might be Roxxon, might be whatever the government was ‘researching’. I came to talk to the local law and maybe a contact at the lab…I find the place quiet as a mime convention and you guys being all ‘sons of anarchy’. You’re telling me the whole town is gone? Nobody’s here?”
“Great!” Dan grumbled, crossing his arms. “She doesn’t know anymore then we do. We’re wasting time when there’s more important things to do…”
“You got somewhere else to be?” Johnny snapped. “You know where the road is! So, shut up, help or go do these ‘more important’ things you’ve got on your calendar.”
The two men glared at each other for a few seconds, giving Kelsey the opportunity to study them a bit and notice a bit of a resemblance…brothers, maybe.
Dan broke eye contact first and walked off.
“Fine, I’m going to have a look around.”
He stalked off, brushing past Kelsey, on his way to the main street.
“Lot of anger in that boy,” Hamilton said, quietly.
“Not telling me something I don’t already know,” Johnny sighed. “Not like he doesn’t have a reason…. Hey, Robbie.”
“What?!” The teenager said, with equal parts surprise and worry.
“Do me a favor and go keep an eye on Dan.”
“If he won’t listen to you, what makes you think…?”
“You don’t have to have a deep meaningful talk with him, just go.” Johnny explained. “Till we know what’s going on, I don’t think any of us should be wandering around in the dark.”
“Yeah, okay,” Ronnie nodded and jogged off.
“Now what?” Kelsey asked.
“Now we…compare notes and try and figure out where to look,” Blaze suggested, vaguely.
“I was thinking of checking my friend’s house,” Hamilton said. “See if he had any evidence to go with this hunch of his. If you and the young lady want to investigate her leads…”
“I thought you didn’t want us going off alone?’ Kelsey asked.
“I won’t be,” the older man said, with a faint smile. He turned and made a clicking noise with his tongue and the white horse looked up and walked towards the trio. “Phantom will keep an eye on me,” he said, stroking the horse’s neck.
He tipped his hat and walked away, the horse following behind.
“Be just a second,” Johnny Blaze said to the young reporter, as he walked after the cowboy.
“What’s on your mind?” Hamilton asked.
“I’m not crazy right? You feel it too? That…tingle…a sense there’s more to this then we think?”
“Oh yeah, an ache in my back teeth,” the older man nodded. “Might not be ‘end of the world’, but there’s something supernatural going on. Don’t let Dan rattle you. His temper’s making him contrary. We listen to you for a reason. Now, go convince that girl we aren’t a bunch of crazy yahoos…”
“Who are you guys…?” Kelsey asked, once Blaze had re-joined her. “You aren’t cops and you’re too scruffy to be super heroes…you’re…I don’t even know…!”
“No, we don’t have badges or Avengers secret decoder rings,” Johnny told her. “But, we are, for the most part, the good guys and are trying to help. Same thing I told Danny, this is a volunteer gig, I’d like you to trust and help us, but you can walk away any time.”
She studied his rugged, earnest features for several seconds, and realized that somehow, in some part of her brain, she did trust him and was beginning to suspect whatever was going on, she wasn’t up to dealing with it by herself.
“Okay, what do we do now?” She asked.
“What do you want to do?” He countered. “You said you were checking leads…what were they?”
“Well, this town doesn’t rate a newspaper,” Kelsey said, fishing her notebook and phone. “It’s got a weekly two-pager that lists church suppers and high school sports scores, the guy that runs it retired here from a bigger paper that I…almost worked for…and…”
“I got it,” Blaze nodded. “Check his place and the police?”
They walked around to the front of the police station. Hamilton had mounted his horse and was galloping off to the residential area. They saw no sign of Dan and Robbie.
“The reporter or the sheriff’s?” Blaze asked.
“Reporter,” Kelsey nodded, heading down the street. “Though, coffee would be nice too.
“Tell me about it,” Johnny muttered, walking along with her. “We’d been on the road for awhile before coming here, only to be greeted by roads made of potholes and dirt and not a drop of coffee.”
“You guys do a lot of…this kind of thing?” She asked.
“Every damn day, it seems,” he replied, before stumbling. “Jesus! Have these people even heard of asphalt?”
When we find everyone, you can complain to the mayor.” Kelsey said, catching his arm and helping to steady him. “So, I’m thinking there may be illegal mining going on…what is wrong with you…?”
Johnny Blaze stumbled again, sinking into the dirt up to his calf.
“Something wrong with the ground…?” He muttered, as he peered downwards and tried to pull his foot out of the dirt. “Did they mine and mess up the ground under…what the hell…?”
Within seconds, Johnny had sunk down to his waist. Kelsey lunged and grabbed his wrists, finding herself in a bizarre tug of war with the ground to keep the man in blue leathers from sinking below.
With a rough jerk, Johnny Blaze was pulled into the ground, dragging the young reporter along with him.
# # # # # # # # # #
A couple blocks away, Robbie Reyes was jogging along, trying to keep up with Dan Ketch.
“I don’t need a babysitter, kid,” Dan muttered.
“Johnny thinks we shouldn’t be wandering around by ourselves until we know what’s going on,” Robbie said. “And I’ve got a name, dude.”
“Yeah, whatever,” The man in black said. “Not looking for a sidekick either.”
“Wow, is being a jerk your super power or do you have some kind of daily practice thing going on…?” Ronnie asked. “Y’know, just curious.”
Dan Ketch glared over his shoulder at the younger man.
“Yeah, you know, I go to high school in East L.A., right?” Robbie said, after a few seconds. “I’ve got scarier guys than you in my Algebra class…and have I mentioned, I met the devil…?”
“Man, kid, you are a pain in the ass. Come on; let’s go ‘on patrol’. The sooner we get this over with, the sooner I can get back to my life.”
“Yeah, hurry home and…what? Kick puppies and tell kids there’s no Easter bunny?” Robbie asked rolling his eyes.
Dan shook his head and Robbie could swear that for a second the corner of his mouth went up in the briefest of smiles.
Then the man in black leather turned and walked off.
“You coming or what?” he asked.
Just as the teenager was about to reply, the ground opened up and Dan Ketch plummeted out of sight.
Robbie Reyes stood, wide-eyed and dumbfounded, all his teenage bravado gone as he dropped to his knees and began digging through the sandy earth, trying to find his teammate.
# # # # # # # # # #
The white horse slowed from a gallop to a walk, as it approached the modest, ranch-style house. All the windows were dark.
Hamilton Slade dismounted, and walked up to the house.
“Keep an eye out, fella,” he told the horse, before climbing the three squat concrete steps and entering. “Bernard…?” he called. “Anybody home?”
He moved, like a shadow through the darkened house, from room to room, alert for anything that might give him a clue as to what had happened to his friend and the nearly one hundred other citizens of this town.
In a small back room that served as an office, Hamilton fanned out the stack of papers he found, picked up a couple pages and moved to the window to read by the light of the full moon.
“Looks like Miss Walsh might be right bout illegal mining,” he muttered, forehead wrinkled in thought.
A distant noise caught his attention and in a smooth, swift gesture, he dropped the pages and swept up the six-shooter from his gun-belt.
Hamilton stood statue -still, straining his hearing. He soon realized the noise wasn’t coming from the house, but rather outside. Peering out the window, he looked across Bernard’s small backyard, past the low fence and into the field beyond.
The ground was all churned up, as though it had been recently plowed, but Hamilton could see no other sign of any farming. The field seemed to shift, the dirt moving as though hit by a fierce wind and figures began climbing up out of the ground and shambling towards the house.
“Well, that can’t be good,” the older cowboy muttered.
# # # # # # # # # #
Johnny Blaze landed hard and then was immediately struck by a petite female reporter. He lay on the floor of the underground tunnel, alternating between gasping to catch his breath and spitting out dirt.
“Owww…oh, man,” he muttered, pushing himself upright. He sat, with his back against the hard packed dirt wall before getting, shakily to his feet.
Kelsey lay in a heap on the floor, not feeling up to more than turning towards Blaze accusingly.
“Safer if we stay together…?” she said, sarcastically. She got up to her knees, and then rubbed at her bleeding lip with the back of her hand.
“Come on,” Johnny said, going over and offering a hand.
“Where are we?” she asked, getting to her feet. “Can hardly see a thing.
“Considering we’re underground, that’s impressive. Should be pitch dark. Some kind of…chemical smeared on the walls making the light…?”
“Bio-luminescence,” Kelsey said. “I worked for the science section when I was in Chicago. How come if the ground collapsed, I can’t see the hole we came in through…?”
“Cause it didn’t collapse,” Blaze said, looking around. “Something grabbed my leg when I stepped into that…’sink hole’…or whatever…some one or thing did this, made this tunnel…”
“And kidnapped a hundred people…!” Kelsey breathed, anxiously. “Holy crap, this isn’t about illegal mining this is…weird, dangerous…super villain type stuff…we need to get of here!”
“Okay, take a breath, we’ll figure it out,” Johnny said, laying a hand on her trembling shoulder. “Now, I’m going to do something, I think will help us, but I need you not to freak out on me, okay?”
“What?” she asked. “Not freak out? You mean more than I already am? I don’t see how that’s possible.”
Johnny Blazed closed his eyes and clenched his fists and after several seconds of concentration his head burst into flame. When it faded away a skeleton in blue biker leathers had replaced the man, his skull engulfed in flickering flame.
“Gaaaaahhh!” Kelsey exclaimed, staggering backwards. “You…you are…uh… the Blazing Skull…!”
“Really?” Johnny Blaze asked, his voice more raspy and echoing than his human tone. “Blazing Skull…?”
“How…who are you…?” Kelsey babbled, standing her ground and taking a deep breath. “Are you a mutant?”
“I’m Ghost Rider,” Johnny told her. “My…friends…partners and I are charged with looking into weird events like…this.”
“Your partners?” Kelsey interrupted. “All four of you burst into flame?”
“Can we focus on more important things for a minute?” Johnny said. “You seem to be handling this, so I’m going to say a few more things and you need to listen and stay calm.”
“If I didn’t run screaming from…that,” Kelsey said, pointing at his skull. “Then I think I can handle anything else you need to tell me.”
“Fine, first there’s this,” he reached behind his back and from a leather scabbard drew a sawed off shotgun that gleamed like shiny black death.
“That’s not so bad,” Kelsey muttered.
“Yeah, I only got it because of this,” He raised his free hand and a burst of flame erupted from his upheld, gloved fingertips, lighting up the tunnel and revealing that they were not only not alone, but were in fact surrounded by dozens of inhuman figures.
“Want to freak out now?” Ghost Rider asked quietly.
“Yes please,” Kelsey gulped.
# # # # # # # # # #
Dan Ketch hit the hard packed dirt floor with a grunt of pain and then pushed himself up. The minute he reached his feet, he closed his eyes and was soon cocooned in flame.
When the flames parted the Ghost Rider stepped out.
He was bigger than Johnny; his leathers seemed barely able to contain his new form. His skull was wreathed in flames that burned blue. Wrapped around his right arm was a length of chain that also seemed to be on fire. He took hold of it and with a quick jerk pulled it free like a whip.
“So, who wants to play?” he growled. “I can see you. Get out here and let’s get this over with.”
Several figures stepped out of the shadows, holding clubs and spears, and advanced on the burning figure.
# # # # # # # # # #
The flame flared from Johnny Blaze’s hand and the dozen figures around them flinched back, mewling and frightened.
They were small, barely coming up to Kelsey’s shoulder. Their skin was leathery and dull yellow in color. They all had over-sized baldheads and pointed ears. The only clothing they wore was crude loincloths and visors that looked like they’d been carved from wood or bone.
They cowered back from the Ghost Rider’s flame.
“I don’t want to hurt anyone,” he said, lowering his shotgun.
“Liar!” a voice screeched.
The crowd parted and a new figure stalked towards them.
“Okay, now this makes a little more sense,” Ghost Rider muttered.
“It does…?” Kelsey whispered, peering over his shoulder at the bizarre mob they faced.
“Yeah, we are in much worse trouble than I thought. Let me do the talking.”
“Surface dwellers lie as easily as they breathe!” the newcomer accused, stepping away from the crowd.
He was a human that stood slightly taller than the yellow creatures, clad in a green, loose fitting bodysuit, blue high collar cloak and a visor, similar to what the others wore, but made of blue plastic.
He was an unattractive man, with a bulbous nose, saggy bulldog cheeks, a low forehead and thinning grey hair. In one of his pudgy, stubby-fingered hands he held a staff that looked like yellow plastic.
“It keeps getting better,” Ghost Rider muttered.
“The Mole Man!” Kelsey exclaimed.
“Him you know by name,” Blaze said.
“Ghost Rider didn’t attack New York when I was working as an intern,” she snapped.
“Demon!” The Mole Man screeched, striking the ground with the end of his staff. “Was it the humans, not content to use their science, in harming my kingdom, have they summoned you to wreck further havoc?”
“Return the people to the town above,” Johnny Blaze intoned, in his most intimidating Ghost Rider voice. “And I will be satisfied to leave your domain unharmed!”
“No!” Mole Man exclaimed, stamping his foot, as well as striking the ground with staff again. “The surface world has dared to intrude upon my kingdom and harm my subjects! A price must be paid!”
“Oh man…!” Kelsey breathed. “Roxxon was doing illegal drilling and…!”
“Yeah, I figured that part out,” Ghost Rider whispered over his shoulder, before turning back to the Mole Man. “The captives you have taken are innocents. Release them and I will see the true offender punished.”
“I should take the word of a demon as proof that these wretched surface dwellers are innocents?” Mole Man growled. “I may be ugly, but am not stupid!”
“Fine, “ Ghost Rider said, raising his shotgun. “Surrender the townspeople to me or I shall be forced to deal with you before I am able to seek out the true offenders.”
“So, be it,” the Mole Man spat raising his free hand and pointing at the two intruders. “My subjects, subdue them and bring them to me!”
With a low rasping hiss the mob of subterraneans rushed forward.
# # # # # # # # # #
Dan Ketch flicked the flaming chain whip, as the half dozen figures stepped into the light of his flames.
They were taller than the yellow-skinned creatures, broad-shouldered and fine featured. They looked like statues carved from craggy pinkish-red stone. They were bare-chested and wore short kilts of rough purple cloth.
All their weapons also seemed to be carved from stone.
Dan could feel the waves of heat radiating off them as they approached.
“What manner of creature are you?” one of them rasped, in a low menacing tone. “Are you a minion of the thieves?”
“I am seeking the people from the surface,” Ghost Rider replied, grimly. “Whatever your dispute with them, you are my enemy until they are returned safely.”
The man, who looked as though he’d been carved from volcanic rock, frowned.
“We have taken no captives,” he said. “We have seen some, herded through the tunnels by the moloids, but we seek what was stolen from my people.”
“You expect me to believe there just happen to be two groups lurking underneath the same town?” Ghost Rider snapped, angrily. “Return the townspeople! I have no interest in talk until they are safe!”
“We…I do not understand…?” the volcanic man replied, puzzled.
“This is all you need to understand!” Ghost Rider snarled, lunging forward, swinging his chain. It caught the lead one across the chest, drawing sparks. With his free hand he punched the stone man next to him full in the face, the spikes on his gloves cracking his opponents stone skin.
“Come on!” Ghost Rider raged, flinging himself at the stone men.
# # # # # # # # # #
Up above ground, Robbie Reyes had gotten to his feet and ended up wandering through the town, trying to find any of his teammates, before going up on the roof of the police station to see if he could spot anybody.
His car and the two motorcycles were still in the back parking lot.
“What the hell…?” he shouted at the empty town. “Where did you guys go!”?
He got nothing back, but a faint echo of his voice.
“This sucks,” he muttered, before spotting a light on the horizon. “Huh…? Didn’t that lady say something about a sketchy science lab…?”
He fished in his jean pocket and came out with his key chain.
# # # # # # # # # #
Johnny Blaze hurled a ball of fire at the mole creatures, driving them back. A few braver ones burst through, and Blaze struck them with the butt of his shotgun.
“Stay close,” he said over his shoulder.
“Where am I going to go?” she asked.
The blasts of fire kept the Mole Man and his minions from overwhelming the duo, but they wouldn’t flee the tunnel. They’d pull back, and as soon as he moved to deal with another group, they’d move back in. The moloids had them pushed back against the wall. Blaze couldn’t see any escape route and didn’t like the odds of him being able to fight his way out and keep Kelsey safe.
Swinging his shotgun, Ghost Rider, forced the yellow creatures back. Much as he wasn’t thrilled with them, he didn’t think it right to shoot them yet.
He gave up on the gun, re-holstered it in his back scabbard and unleashed fire from both hands.
The Mole Man used his staff like a vaulting pole and launched himself over the wall of flame. He landed on his feet, bent his knees and swung the staff, catching Ghost Rider across the knees.
Gritting his teeth, Blaze stumbled, but didn’t fall.
Mole Man jabbed his staff forward, hitting Ghost Rider in the chest and zapping him with an electrical charge.
“Aarrrrrrrgh!” Ghost Rider raged, the front of his suit singed, revealing the ribcage beneath.
He clapped his hands together, grabbing hold of the Mole Man’s staff. Fire ran from his gloved fingers and down the staff, melting his handprints into the yellow plastic. The Mole Man shrieked in pain and gave the staff a twist. It split into two sections. Grinding his teeth in pain and anger, the Mole Man struck Ghost Rider across the shoulder.
Blaze staggered back, pinning Kelsey between his back and the dirt wall.
“John…Johnny…!” she grunted. “Can’t breathe! What do…we do…?”
Blaze clenched his fists, melting his half of the staff into an unrecognizable slag. He grabbed the nearest moloid by its skinny neck and swung it as a makeshift club to drive back the other dozen.
“Come on!” he raged.
As the crowd was ready to swarm over the duo, a ghostly figure floated down through the tunnel’s ceiling.
It wore a white bodysuit, old style cowboy boots, gun belt, a short cape, a full head covering mask and a cowboy hat. It held a pair of six guns in its white-gloved hands.
“Hamilton!” Blaze exclaimed.
The western Ghost Rider fired into the crowd as he floated downwards. The bullets, like the cowboy were white and pulsed with a ghostly light. They passed through the bodies of the moloids, leaving no visible wound, yet the thin yellow creatures collapsed to the ground when struck.
“How’d you find us?” Johnny Blazed asked.
“Followed a couple of those fellas,” Hamilton replied, gesturing towards the Mole Man’s minions with one of his guns, while continuing to fire the other. “Not the first time I’ve crossed paths with them.”
“Now, this is starting to make sense,” Blaze muttered.
Then the wall opposite them burst and Dan Ketch and a quartet of what looked like living statues came tumbling through.
His fireballs went wildly into the crowd of moloids. They ran, panic-stricken, in all directions, nearly trampling their leader, as well as the Ghost Riders.
Johnny leapt forward, shoved the Mole Man away from them and grabbed Dan by the back of his leather jacket.
“What is going on?” he snapped.
Dan spun, flaming fist swinging, before realizing who was behind him. He opened his hand and the fireball went out with a ‘poof!’.
The three Ghost Riders put their heads together for several minutes before they were interrupted by the return of their various subterranean adversaries.
The Lava Men got to their feet and picked up their weapons, the moliods rallied around their leader.
“So,” Kelsey said, wide-eyed and anxious. “The pink guys think the townspeople stole something from them and the yellow guys think they were attacking their home…?”
“Yeah, pretty much,” Johnny muttered.
“So, which is it?” she asked.
“No idea,” he replied.
“Don’t know, don’t care,” Dan said, cracking his knuckles.
“We can sort it out after we avoid getting beaten to death,” Hamilton said, raising his six-shooters. “Here they came!”
The three Ghost Riders formed a wall between the underground dwellers and Kelsey, each bringing their respective weapons up.
The yellow and pink creatures hit them like a wave and the trio cut through them with pistol, shotgun and chain.
Hamilton and Johnny split their energies between fighting off and protecting, while Dan was single minded in his attack on the subterrainians. He whipped the chain savagely and hurled fireballs.
“Glad someone is enjoying themselves,” Hamilton muttered, as he fired, carefully picking off any of the yellow-skinned creatures that got too close.
“Little too much,” Johnny grunted, catching a Lava man’s spear on the stock of his shotgun and shoving him away. “Something to worry about if we get through this!”
“If?” Kelsey exclaimed, ducking down even further behind Johnny to avoid fireballs, showers of dirt and stones.
“The Mole Man has an army,” Hamilton said, grimly. “Even angry as Dan is, we can’t fight them all. We need to get out of here! We need to find another way to fix things!”
“Working on it!” Blaze replied, firing at the Mole Man, who used his broken staff to bat the fireball aside.
“You can’t just use one of your magic guns to make an escape route?” Kelsey shouted, to be heard over the cacophony of the battle.
“We are demons, not Harry Potter!” Johnny Blazed yelled back. “I can’t magically make a doorway appear!’
The fight moved slightly in the Ghost Riders’ favor when a section of the tunnel roof collapsed, burying a good portion of the yellow creatures in a shower of dirt, rock, bits of machinery, a half dozen men in hazmat suits and yet another Ghost Rider.
He was shorter, and slimmer then the others. Instead of leathers, he seemed to be wearing more of a black bodysuit. His skull had a metallic sheen and the nimbus of flame around it was white hot.
He had, clutched under his arm, an egg-shaped stone, large as his head. It seemed to consist of the same pink-red rock as the Lava Men. It was veined with gold that pulsed with a strange energy.
The whole thing seemed like some kind of bizarre football game had just crashed into the tunnel.
The younger Ghost Rider got to his feet and held the strange rock up above his head with one hand.
“Anybody lose one of these?” he shouted.
The Lava Men stopped in mid-fight, each dropping to one knee, heads bowed.
All the other combatants stopped, looking around in confusion, the yellow molids drifting towards the Mole Man, looking for guidance.
Thinking fast, Johnny Blaze moved to the middle of the tunnel and brought his hands together in a dramatic clap that generated a basketball-sized ball of fire.
“Enough!” he shouted. “We have returned your artifact and brought to you the true perpetrators! You, Lava Men, will take it and return, peacefully to your domain!”
He turned to face the Mole Man.
“And you shall return your captives to their home! They had no role in the attack upon your people!”
The Mole Man lowered his head and muttered under his breath.
“Will you do what I have said or do you wish to see how much carnage my brothers and I can bring down upon your kingdom?!”
Begrudgingly, the Mole Man nodded and with that simple gesture the battle was over.
# # # # # # # # # #
Kelsey spent the next couple days in town, helping the people return to their homes and getting her story. How much of it anybody would believe or the government would let her get away with printing was anybody’s guess.
The four Ghost Riders reverted to normal, helped where they could and then very discreetly left town when the government aid workers, state police and federal investigators showed up.
Forty-eight hours after arriving in town, she found herself stopping at a rest stop several miles outside of it. Four familiar figures were gathered at the far end of the parking area around a mix of vehicles.
Dan Ketch sat sidesaddle on his motorcycle, peering sullenly at the highway. Hamilton was leaning, relaxed against the side of a dingy white pickup truck.
Johnny Blaze and Robbie stood nearby. The two older men were talking, while Robbie was occupied with a fast food burger.
Robbie spotted Kelsey first and waved to her with his free hand.
She parked nearby and then walked over, helping herself to some of his fries on the way by.
“Well, here we are again,” she said, going to stand by Johnny.
“Everything okay?” Johnny asked. He was sipping from a take out coffee.
“They got everybody home, nobody died, and the Mole Man seems to have kept his promise to fill in the tunnels under the town,” she explained. “And I wouldn’t be surprised if a fault line under the Roxxon facility suddenly became active.”
“So, what the hell happened?’ Dan asked. “What were we all fighting about?”
“Come on, man!” Robbie said. “Even I was paying attention enough to figure most of it out! That egg thing was full of some kind of…energy and Roxxon found it when they were drilling.”
“Right,” Kelsey nodded. “So, when things got hot, they figured out they could use it to power their equipment, stay off the grid and keep mining, even with the lawsuits and things, supposedly stopping them. They just didn’t know that the Lava Men were under the town looking for their artifact.”
“Meanwhile, their mining was riling up the Mole Man,” Hamilton added. “And the town got caught in the crossfire.”
“So, we done?” Dan asked.
“Yeah, cause I really need to get back home,” Robbie added.
“Yeah, we’re done,” Johnny said with a tired smile.
Hamilton nudged him with his elbow.
“Oh…and, thanks for helping us…and leaving us out of your story,” he said.
“Well, the story was crazy enough without me mentioning demons…” she said.
“Not technically a demon myself,” Hamilton shrugged. “I’m the host for a collective of spirits.”
“And I was given powers when my uncle tried to sacrifice me in a magic ritual,” Robbie added.
“And you guys say that kind of stuff like it doesn’t sound insane,” Kelsey said, shaking her head. “What is your deal?”
“You ever hear of the four horsemen of the apocalypse?” Dan Ketch asked.
“Uh…yeah, in Sunday school or something…?”
“That’s us,” Dan said. ‘We took the job away from the other guys that had it.”
“Anyway,” Johnny said, trying to get the conversation back on track. “We appreciate it. Now, let’s go home.”
Robbie threw away his fast food wrappers, got fist bumps from everyone and drove off.
Hamilton gave Kelsey his contact info at the museum he worked for, a gentlemanly tip of his hat and was on his way.
Kelsey sat in her car, rummaging through the accumulated debris from being on the road for the past week, chasing stories. She was only half paying attention as she watched Johnny and Dan have one more, tense conversation, wondered how much of what they’d told her about themselves and when, not if, she was sure of that part, their paths and hers would cross again.
The two men shared a brief farewell. Dan Ketch barely nodded. Then they were on their bikes and gone.
“What have I gotten myself mixed up in?” Kelsey frowned, before starting her car and hitting the highway herself.
# # # # # # # # # #
A realm away, a figure, sat and studied the images of Kelsey and the four Ghost Riders in an orb of flame, and pondered similar thoughts.
“Curious,” he muttered, whether to himself or to the captive that lay bound in chains at his feet was unclear. “Who is she? She has all the appearance of a damsel, merely a pawn in the game to come…and yet, things are rarely that simple…let’s keep an eye on her, as well as the Riders, and see what comes of it…”
Bound in chains and mouth sealed, his captive could merely glare upwards.
# # # # # # # # # #
Author’s note: So, how’d I go from being a casual Ghost Rider fan, at best, to writing about four of them…?
When David sent me a list of characters he’d like to see taken out of limbo, I noticed that GR had the least amount of back issues to read and next thing I knew I was hooked.
Partially because there was a bunch of interesting plot threads left by the guys that came before me, as well as they both had very different voices for their runs and the idea of writing a duo of Ghost Riders, who were very different from each other, could be fun. Like a really warped cop buddy movie.
Then came marvel’s very short-lived Ghost Rider series, featuring Robbie Reyes and a then I remembered the old west Ghost Rider and I had myself a whole team of Ghost Riders, a couple pages of story notes and was prowling the bins of my local comic shop for Ghost Rider back issues.
If this is your first issue of M2K’s Ghost Rider, first welcome, and second if you’ve read the issues before, cool (most of them were pretty good) if not, all you need to know is the basics of who Ghost Rider and I’ll fill in the rest as we go.
Yes, something big and bad did happen between Dale Glazer’s last issue and my first, but like the ‘Time War’ in Doctor Who, all you need to know is something big and bad happened.
These guys are a team, but I’m stealing an idea from John Byrne’s ‘Alpha Flight’, in that they are a team that doesn’t hang out together much. There will be lots of solo stories and occasionally something important will happen to bring all or maybe just a couple of them together.
Also, these are four very different characters and I’d like to spend a couple issues showing those differences and setting up the new status quo.
So, enjoy and feel free to drop me a note if you like what read or if there’s somebody from GR’s supporting cast or rogues gallery you’d like to see.
I have a rough plan for my first year on this title, but it’s loose enough that if a cool suggestion comes my way I could fit it in.
-Travis Hiltz