Slugfest

Captain America has found that determining right from wrong has gotten harder since he first became a crime fighter during World War II. Case in point: responding to a tip from the mechanics who fix his motorcycle, Captain America breaks up a drug deal happening nearby. However, it’s only when the police arrive on the scene that he learns that two of the men were undercover members of the city’s vice squad and Cap’s intervention foiled their attempt at getting at the crime boss in charge. Although Cap realizes he screwed up, he questions the authorities engaging in criminal activity just to make a bigger bust. This is why the Avenger usually doesn’t involve himself in ordinary crime fighting.

Meanwhile, in Florida, Jack Monroe — aka Nomad — has secured a bartending job aboard the private yacht of Ulysses X. Lugman, the notorious drug dealer known as the Slug. During his break he thinks about how he got involved in tracking the crime boss down. It was not long after he hit the road on his own. He picked up a hitchhiker named Priscilla Lyons and the pair quickly feel in love. He eventually learned that she was on the road to Florida to try and find her brother, Phil, who is in deep with the local drug trade. Nomad agreed to find her brother and bring him home and began working his way into the Slug’s operations. Returning to his post, Jack is horrified when the Slug tortures on his henchmen for bungling a drug deal. As punishment, Ulysses has his private pool filled with slugs and dunks his subordinate over and over again. Disgusted by this display, Jack goes back outside where he finds Phil outside having a cigarette. He uses this opportunity to pass along Priscilla’s message. Unfortunately, Phil likes working for the Slug and tells Jack to leave him alone, or else.

Meanwhile, Priscilla begins to worry because she hasn’t heard back from Jack in over three weeks. Fearing something has gone wrong and remembering how Nomad used to fight crime with Captain America, she puts in a call to Cap’s hotline to ask him for help. Steve gets the message after delivering his latest pencils directly to the Marvel Comics office. There he meets his new editor Don Dealy and his assistant Dave Wohl. When Steve returns to his mobile headquarters he receives the message from Priscilla and races to Florida to see if Nomad needs his help.

That evening, Jack is sleeping in his bunk when he hears Phil breaking into his room. He tries to change into his Nomad costume but is quickly overpowered by the Slug’s men. Believing him to be a mole, they inject Jack with heroin and toss him overboard to drown.

The following morning, Steve Rogers arrives in Florida and meets with Priscilla and learns about Jack’s mission. Renting a motorboat, Steve heads out into the ocean to look for sign of the Slug’s private yacht. Instead, he finds Jack floating in the water having survived a night out at sea thanks to using his pants as a primitive flotation device and the super-soldier serum in his body fighting off the effects of the cold water and the heroin in his system.[1] Grateful for the rescue, Jack accepts Steve’s offer for help.

That evening, when the Slug’s yacht returns to its usual spot, Captain America and Nomad sneak aboard. Jack has Cap deal with the guards because he doesn’t want Steve to stop him from killing the Lugman for his crimes. Sneaking into the ship’s kitchen, Jack intentionally causes a grease fire and tosses all the fire extinguishers overboard. With the ship now on fire, Nomad then confronts the Slug and his men. After the armed guards are defeated, Captain America insists that they save everyone on board, including Ulysses. Nomad refuses to help the obese drug dealer and while he helps the passengers evacuate the ship, Captain America stays behind and tries to help the Slug — who can only move with the help of a motorized scooter — tries in vein to get him to safety.

Captain America and Nomad manage to abandon ship before it explodes, but Cap is unable to keep the Slug afloat in the water and the weight of his motorized scooter causes him to sink like a rock. Although Captain America feels bad that he couldn’t save the Slug, Nomad is more than happy to hear that he is dead. However, not long after they swim away, the Slug emerges from the water gasping for air, his titanic bulk allowing him to eventually float to the surface.

Recurring Characters

Captain America, Nomad, Slug, Priscilla Lyons

Continuity Notes

1. As explained in Captain America #155, Jack and the Captain America of the 1950s injected themselves with a version of the same super-soldier formula that created Captain America. Here, Steve says that the serum must have fought off the effects of the heroin, stating that he had a similar experience in the past. This is in reference to the time that he was injected with a lethal venom by Viper in Captain America #157-159. This temporarily granted Steve super-human strength but this enhancement eventually faded away by about Captain America #218.

Topical References

• Priscilla is depicted as having a CRT television that needs an antenna to pick up signals as well as a rotary phone. This should all be considered topcial.

• While the appearance of real world people in stories are generally considered topical references, the appearance of Marvel Comics creators in the fiction is not. As such, the appearances of Don Dealy and Dave Wohl are not considered topical. All Marvel creators exist in the Marvel Universe in their relative prime, thus they continue to exist even if their real world counterparts stop working for the company or die.