Requiem: Part One

Steve Rogers and his girlfriend Rebecca Quan are having breakfast at the local diner. There, Rebecca tells Steve and Phil (Steve’s co-owner at the diner) about the nightmare she had. In it, she in her bathroom when suddenly, she is caught in the middle of a recent terrorist attack on the city.[1] As she chokes on the dust, the dream ended with reporters getting in her face and asking how she feels being the woman creating a divide between Captain America and the Avengers. Phil figures she is still processing the recent terror attack and figures that it’ll be at least another generation before New Yorkers get over it. Steve points out that people still haven’t gotten over the Holocaust.

There call is interrupted when Steve gets a call telling from Tony Stark him that Senator Lester Pauly and several hundred people were killed during a campaign stop in Cleveland and he has been called in to investigate. Cap meets up with Tony to go over the footage which shows the decimation of an entire city block in what appears to be a massive explosion.[2] However, Tony has yet to determine what the cause of the blast was. Changing into Iron Man, Tony joins Captain America on the scene to investigate. While in the massive blast crater a swarm of mechanical insects rise from the ground and begin swarming them. With too many to deal with, Iron Man initiates a electro-magnetic pulse to shut them all down. This temporarily stops Tony’s mechanical heart from beating but Cap quickly reboots his armor before Stark dies.[3] When they inspect the insects, Iron Man can’t identify the metal alloy they are made of. He is also shocked when he sees that they are all branded with the Stark Enterprises logo.

Suddenly, the insects all begin vibrating, prompting Iron Man to fly Captain America to safety. Then, before their astonished eyes, the entire block is restored to normal. Senator Paley and those believed dead are also discovered to be alive and well. When Steve questions Lester, he has no memory of what happened after the blast until everything went back to normal. If he was dead, Lester is disturbed because there no apparent afterlife to speak of. By this time, Iron Man has had a chance to examine the mechanical insects more closely. After a tachyon trace analysis he has determined that they came from 25 years into the future. More surprisingly, given their construction, Tony has determined that they are apparently some kind of toys. In fact, while it may seem advanced to them, the devices would be considered cheap junk from the era in which they came from.[4]

When Steve calls Rebecca to tell her what happened, she is on her way back to his apartment after getting some groceries so she could make him a surprise dinner when he gets home. Ending the call, Rebecca goes into Steve’s apartment where he is attacked by a woman dressed in a costume inspired by the American Flag. She is Becky Barnes and she demands to know where Captain America is, calling him her father. Rebecca is surprised because, as far as she knows, Steve doesn’t have any children.[5][6] That’s when Becky gets a look at the photos of Captain America and clarifies that she is looking for Isaiah Bradley. Rebecca still has no idea what the woman is talking about. When Barnes tries attacking her again, Quan is more than willing to defend herself, saying that she has beat cancer.[7] That’s when Becky Barnes suddenly disappears in a flash of light, leaving Rebecca more confused than ever.

Recurring Characters

Captain America, Becky Barnes, Rebecca Quan, Lester Pauly

Continuity Notes

1. This dream is about the same terrorist attack Cap experienced in Captain America (vol. 4) #1. In that story, it is depicted as the 9/11 terror attacks. That is a topical reference (see below).

2. In case you’re wondering why Captian America is reporting to Tony Stark on this, it’s because this story takes place during a time when Tony was briefly Secretary of Defense. He served in this role from Iron Man (vol. 3) #73 until he is forced to resign in Avengers #503.

3. Also around this time, Tony was outfitted with a completely mechanical heart after his real one was ripped out by an Ultron possessed suit of his armor, as seen in Iron Man (vol. 3) #30-31. This stops being an issue when Tony’s body is completely repaired by Extremis, as seen in Iron Man (vol. 4) #1-6.

4. The mystery of the toy insects and Becky Barnes are all explained next issue, obviously. Per Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe A-Z #4, this comes from a possible future that has been designated to Reality-40727.

5. Isiah Bradley was a test subject during the military’s attempt at recreating the Super-Soldier Formula following the death of Abraham Erskine, the formula’s creator, in Captain America Comics #1. The Earth-616 version’s adventures took place in Truth: Red, White and Black #1-7. Unlike his counterpart of Reality-40727, the Isiah Bradly of Earth-616 suffers from mental deterioration because of the experiments conducted on him as explained in Truth #7. It also rendered him sterile and as such he won’t go on to have a daughter named Becky either.

6. There are a couple of noteworthy items seen in Steve Rogers’ display case in this story: A replica of his original triangular shield (used in Captain America Comics #1 before it was swapped with his trademark circular shield in the following issue) as well as the chest plate of the armor he wore from Captain America #437-443.

7. Rebecca Quan beat cancer through chemo-therapy, as we’ll learn next issue.

Topical References

• This story is stated as taking place in June, 2004. This should be considered topical as it is relative to the date of publication.

• Rebecca Quan’s nightmare involved witnessing the collapse of the original twin towers of the World Trade Center. This event happened on September 11, 2001 when the buildings were struck by airplanes hijacked by terrorists. This story was written in the context that that event happened in the recent past. Although the story states that Rebecca wasn’t living in New York at the time, the event was traumatic to many people who saw the events unfold on live television. That said, as the Sliding Timescale pushed the Modern Age forward in time, it has become increasingly impossible for someone Rebecca’s age (who appears to be in her early 20s) to have been born when 9/11 happened. As such, having a nightmare about 9/11 in this instance should be considered topical. Modern readers should interpret as a general terrorist attack that happened in New York that was unique to the fiction.

• In her dream, the reporters call Rebecca the “Yoko Ono” of the Avengers. Yoko Ono is an artist and musician that is infamously known for her relationship with John Lennon, a former member of the Beatles. Ono is often the scapegoat blamed for why the Beatles broke up in the late 60s, even though the truth is far more complicated and nuanced than that. That said, this should be considered a topical reference as a more contemporary example could be used in place of Yoko Ono.

• Phil states here that nobody would get a 9/11 memorial tattoo because it would get them flayed in New York City. He’d be proven wrong as people would get 9/11 tattoos like, right away. For a story written in 2004 the writer seems ignorant to all the grifters who used 9/11 imagery to make a quick buck. That said, this should be considered topical not only because Phil was wrong, but we’ve also moved forward in time where people with “Remember 9/11” tattoos are dating AF.

• Rebecca states that she used Steve’s TiVo to record a Life With Renaud marathon. She is referring to French sculptor Francis Renaud who died in 1973, so we can assume that this is a historical series. TiVo is a brand of digital video recorder. They were highly popular in the early 2000s for their ability to work like a VCR (which had fallen out of disuse due to the advent of DVD technology). People could set a timer and TiVo would record a TV show that they could watch later, the added bonus being you could fast forward through commercials. This should be considered a topical reference as TiVo is a brand of DVR. Also, while this technology is still in use today, it has also fallen on the wayside as steaming media services have greatly reduced the need to record something that is playing at a specific time.