Avengers West Coast #64
Show and Tell
Captain America is on monitor duty at Avengers Mansion when he receives a distress call from his old friend Rick Jones. Cap witnesses as Jonse hauled off camera by some kind of monster. Attempting to trace the call, Captain America is shocked to discover that the call was coming from Avengers Compound in California. Calling the compound back, Cap is connected with the Human Torch who tells him that what he witnessed was impossible and that there hasn’t been any sign of either Rick or this monster on site. When Cap suggests that perhaps their equipment had been tampered with, the Torch runs a system diagnostic.[1] Sure enough, he discovers that their computers were remotely accessed from a location somewhere in the midwest. The moment that Cap has the coordinates he races off to find out what’s going on.
This entire situation is being monitored by Stevie Wojciehowicz from his home computer.[2] He is pleased that everything is going according to plan when his mother comes upstairs and tells him that it is time for bed. Stevie pretends to comply, however he has other ideas in mind and sneaks out of his bedroom window with a mysterious stone that he calls his lucky red rock, which is actually the Crimson Gem of Cyttorak.
Meanwhile, Captain America arrives at the location given to him by the Human Torch: an abandoned amusement park. At that same moment, the Great Lakes Avengers get a distress call from what appears to be Captain America and decide to rush out and lend a hand. While back on the west coast, the Torch continues to analyze the hack on their system. He quickly discovers that the amusement park wasn’t the true location of the fake transmission, but merely a relay point. The computers also pick up an alien energy signature that matches the mystic Ruby of Cyttorak. Unfortunately, the energy source causes the computer to short out, prompting the Torch to ask Wonder Man to cover him before he takes off to prevent Cap from walking into a trap.
As Captain America searches the amusement park when he is ambushed by the GLA, who mistake him for a super-villain in the dark. As the Torch arrives on the scene he reviews what the Avengers know about the Gem of Cyttorak. He notes that it was the mystical artifact that gave the Juggernaut his powers and how the villain clashed frequently with the X-Men and Thor. More recently, the Juggernaut had recovered the gem and used it to give power to his frequent partner, Black Tom Cassidy. However, doing so halved the Juggernaut’s own might. Reclaiming his full power, the Juggernaut then tossed the gem into space so nobody could steal his power in the future.[3] That’s when the Torch is struck by lightning.
Meanwhile, Captain America has gotten away from the GLA and is put through the paces as Stevie unleashes various traps and super-hero themed robots set up to fight him. He then encounters the monster that appeared in Rick’s distress call and gives it chase.
By this time, the Torch has recovered from the lightning strike and arrived at the amusement park. Amused to see the Torch arriving on the scene, Stevie uses the gem to conjure up duplicates of the Human Torch. The real Torch is blasted across the park where he is attacked first by creatures, then by doppelgangers of his old wartime allies and foes such as Toro, the Sub-Mariner, Baron Blood, and Union Jack.[4] That’s when he spots Rick Jones fleeing into the nearby wax museum from the corner of his eye and races after him. On the other side of the building, the monster also lures Captain America into the museum.
Inside, the Torch and Cap are forced to fight animated wax statues of various heroes and villains. They are unable to stop the monster from seemingly killing Rick Jones. However, it turns out, that it wasn’t really Rick at all, but another animated phony. That’s when the Great Lakes Avengers come crashing in through the wall. This leads to another battle until everyone realizes that they have all been fooled by whoever the mastermind is. While everyone is distracted, Stevie cold clocks Captain America from behind and runs off with what he thinks is his shield. In the aftermath of the battle, none of the Avengers can figure out who was responsible for the attack but Cap vows to bring them to justice.
The following day, Stevie goes to school with the stolen shield to show off for show and tell. An unpopular student, Stevie is heckled the entire time he is giving his presentation. He goes into a length preamble about how he obtained the Crimson Gem of Cyttorak: it was knocked back into Earth orbit by Nova, a Herald of Galactus and later found by Stevie lying on the ground in the woods near his home.[5] He then used the gem to steal the powers of the Juggernaut, neglecting to tell his class that the Hulk’s clash with the Juggernaut allowed for this to happen.[6] He then tells the class how he used the gem to save the Avengers the night before and as a token of gratitude, Captain America gave him his shield. Stevie then opens the art portfolio he has been holding this whole time to show off the shield he stole the night before. However, as it turns out, Cap managed to swap out his real shield with the one worn by the wax figure in the museum. Seeing the melted wax shield prompts the other kids to laugh at him. Furious over this humiliations, Stevie clutches the Crimson Gem of Cyttorak and vows to get revenge against the Avengers, but first he is going to make himself the new teacher of his class.[7]
Recurring Characters
Captain America, Human Torch, Wonder Man, Great Lakes Avengers (Mister Immortal, Flatman, Big Bertha, Doorman, Dinah Soar)
Continuity Notes
When Cap asks if the Torch can “interface” with the computer system, he reminds Steve that he’s a very old android and his parts are not compatible with modern electronics. This is very true as the Torch was built in 1939 as seen in Marvel Comics #1. However, Captain America Annual #11 will reveal that the technology used to create the Torch to begin with included future technology brought to the past by Kang the Conqueror. That said, I think it’s safe to assume that this future tech is also incompatible with present day computers either.
Stevie’s last name is not given in this story. It’s identified as Wojciehowicz in the Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe A-Z Update #1’s profile on Cyttorak.
A brief history of the Crimson Gem of Cyttorak and the Juggernaut is displayed here:
It covers the Juggernauts origins as it was originally told back in X-Men #12.
A scene here of the Juggernaut fighting the X-Men depicts depicts him fighting Cyclops and Wolverine. Both mutants are wearing the costumes they wore post Giant-Size X-Men #1. This suggests that this flashback was taken from X-Men #103. However, Cyclops wasn’t present during that fight. So his appearance here is likely in error.
At the time of this story, Thor had just recently fought the Juggernaut for the first time, as seen in Thor #411-412.
The time that Juggernaut gave part of his powers to Black Tom was in Marvel Team-Up #50.
Here, the Torch states that Toro, Union Jack, and Baron Blood are dead. This was indeed the case with these characters, at least at the time of this story. The details:
Toro was the Human Torch’s wartime sidekick. In recent times, Toro was brainwashed by the Mad Thinker and died fighting Namor in Sub-Mariner #14. He will be resurrected in Avengers/Invaders #12.
The Union Jack that the Torch is referring to is the original, James Montgomery Falsworth. He died of old age as reported in Marvel Comics Presents #42. His successor, Brian Falsworth had died in the 1950s after a car accident, as told in Captain America #253. The legacy of Union Jack continues with Joe Chapman taking on the role in those same stories.
Baron Blood: the original Baron Blood was killed in Captain America #254 as well. He will be resurrected in Knights of Pendragon (vol. 2) #11.
This apparently happened during Galactus and Nova’s last trip to Earth in Excalibur #25.
A footnote here tells readers that Stevie’s encounter with the Hulk and Juggernaut is part of an as yet untold tale. As of this writing in September 2022, the story has not been told in any form or another. Probably because this whole story idea is stupid.
This story ends promising the tale will be continued elsewhere. Thankfully, sanity reigned and Marvel did not publish a follow up to this stupid story. The Cyttorak entry in Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe A-Z Update #1 states that the Juggernaut recovered the gem from Stevie shortly after this story.
Topical References
Stevie Wojciehowicz’s home computer is depicted as having a CRT monitor. This should be considered a topical reference as this is an obsolete technology.