Captain America (vol. 5) #24
The Drums of War Part 3
This story following the events of Civil War #5. Civil War continues from Black Panther (vol. 4) #22…
At the advice of Dum Dum Dugan and SHIELD’s psychologist, Director Maria Hill has decided not to pull Sharon Carter from active duty after her recent insubordination.[1] However, Sharon is being reassigned from capturing Captain America and is now being assigned to the effort to capture Nick Fury instead.[2] This is the last thing Sharon needs, but she has no choice but to comply anyway.
When she returns to her quarters, she is startled when she finds a Nick Fury Life Model Decoy in her quarters.[3] It tells her that its handler would like to speak with her and scans her retinal pattern to make sure it’s speaking with the real Sharon Carter. As it turns out, the decoy has been hijacked by the real Nick Fury who is using it to speak to her from an undisclosed location. When she tells him that Hill might suspect her, Fury is certain she doesn’t know they’re in contact. She isn’t watching Sharon for that, unlike those who were closest to him, like Dum Dum. He then tells her that he has some serious concerns about Captain America.
At that same moment, Captain America has taken a lull in the superhero civil war to pick up a lead on the Red Skull, who has been on the loose since before the Stamford incident.[4] He knows that the Red Skull has been working with Advanced Idea Mechanics and Nick Fury has tipped him off to one of their locations. However, when Cap arrives, he discovers that Hydra also intercepted the transmission and sent a team to that location as well. He ambushes some stragglers and steals one of their uniforms so he can blend in with the others and look around. Once inside, he sees that AIM was aware that they were coming and took off in a hurry. He quickly checks the security monitors to see who was in charge. What he finds is a surprise. That’s when he is caught by a team of Hydra agents who demand to know what he is doing.
With his cover blown, Cap strips off his disguise and has to fight his way through a horde of Hydra soldiers. Even though they greatly outnumber them, Cap plows through them because they are poorly trained in hand-to-hand combat. When it appears that they are going to lose the fight, one of the Hydra agents activates his suicide vest. Captain America is just barely able to protect himself with his shield. Staggering out of the building, Cap is too slow to get away and quickly has to face a team of SHIELD’s Cape-Killers.
However, before another fight can break out, something shorts out the Cape-Killer suits, incapacitating them all. This was caused by Sharon Carter who arrives in a SHIELD flying car. She tells Steve to hop on before reinforcements arrive and they quickly flee the scene. She explains that Fury figured out how to take them out with an electro-magnetic overload. However, it will only work this one time, as Tony Stark will surely come up with a way to counteract it in the future. Steve wonders if it was worth using to save him, and Sharon reminds him that Nick Fury sent her. They had learned that AIM bugged out and Steve was walking into a trap, but had to hurry to him since they were only communicating via dead drops. When Steve reminds Sharon that backed the Super-Human Registration Act the last time they talked, Sharon says she did, until they killed Goliath.[5] With Stark and the others now using villains to help enforce the SHRA, he wonders if they are also using Hydra now.[6] Sharon isn’t certain. When she asks what Steve found out about the Red Skull, he tells her that like everything involved with his eternal foe, it wasn’t anything good.
Meanwhile, at the Kronas Building, the Red Skull has set up Arnim Zola in the lab after pulling him from the AIM facility. Zola is working on a way to reverse engineer the device given to them by Doctor Doom so they can use it for their own purposes.[7] The Red Skull says that with this device they will be able to destroy everything Captain America holds dear.
… Civil War continues in Civil War: War Crimes #1.
Recurring Characters
Captain America, Sharon Carter, SHIELD (Maria Hill), Nick Fury, Hydra, Red Skull/Aleksander Lukin, Arnim Zola
Continuity Notes
Captain America has been a wanted fugitive after refusing to enforce the Super-Human Registration Act in Civil War #1. Maria Hill attempted to use Sharon’s romance with Cap to try and trap him, only she couldn’t bring herself to do it. See Captain America (vol. 5) #22.
Nick Fury went into hiding following the events of Secret War #1-5. To everyone it is believed that Fury has gone into hiding to avoid the legal repercussions of an unsanctioned invasion of Latveria. In reality, he has uncovered a plot by the Skrulls to invade Earth. See Mighty Avengers #12 and Secret Invasion #1-8.
SHIELD has been utilizing with Nick Fury LMD to hide the fact that Nick Fury has gone AWOL from the general public. It started acting as the real Fury in Marvel Team-Up (vol. 3) #13. We learned the truth about it last issue, the same story where it was hijacked by the real Nick Fury.
Captain America is referring to when the Red Skull attacked London, which happened in Captain America (vol. 5) #18-21. The Stamford incident that predicated the Civil War happened in Civil War #1. He also mentions the Negative Zone prison built in response to the Super-Human Registration Act, aka Prison 42. It was first opened in Civil War: Front Line #5.
Goliath was killed by a clone of Thor created by those supporting the SHRA. See Civil War #4.
Villains like the Green Goblin and Bullseye have been conscripted into the Thunderbolts to act as SHRA enforcers. This also happened in Civil War #4.
The Red Skull procured this device from Doom last issue. It is a time displacement device which they will use on Captain America as part of a convoluted plan to take over Cap’s body. This plot will begin next issue, but won’t be fully explained until Captain America: Reborn #1-5.
Topical References
Many of the TVs and computer monitors in this story are depicted as CRT models. This should be considered a topical reference as this is an obsolete technology.
Civil War Reading Order
Road to Civil War: Amazing Spider-Man #529, 530, 531, Fantastic Four #536, 537, New Avengers: Illuminati #1
Main Event: Civil War #1, She-Hulk (vol. 2) #8, Wolverine (vol. 3) #42, Amazing Spider-Man #532, Civil War: Front Line #1
Civil War #2, Thunderbolts #103, Civil War: Front Line #2, X-Factor (vol. 3) #8, New Avengers #21, Wolverine (vol. 3) #43, Amazing Spider-Man #533, Fantastic Four #538, Civil War: Front Line #3, Thunderbolts #104, Civil War: X-Men #1
Civil War #3, Cable & Deadpool #30, Civil War: Young Avengers & Runaways #1, Civil War: Front Line #4, X-Factor (vol. 3) #9, New Avengers #22, Wolverine (vol. 3) #44, Amazing Spider-Man #534, Fantastic Four #539, Civil War: Front Line #5, Ms. Marvel (vol. 2) #6, Civil War: X-Men #2, Heroes for Hire (vol. 2) #1, New Avengers #23, Wolverine (vol. 3) #45, Civil War: Young Avengers & Runaways #2, Cable & Deadpool #31, Ms. Marvel (vol. 2) #7, Civil War: X-Men #3
Civil War #4, Wolverine (vol. 3) #46, Heroes for Hire (vol. 2) #2, Civil War: Young Avengers & Runaways #3, Civil War: Front Line #6, Captain America (vol. 5) #22, Cable & Deadpool #32, Amazing Spider-Man #535, Civil War: Choosing Sides #1, Fantastic Four #540, Civil War: Front Line #7, Civil War: X-Men #4, Ms. Marvel (vol. 2) #8, Wolverine (vol. 3) #47, Heroes for Hire (vol. 2) #3, Captain America (vol. 5) #23, New Avengers #24
Civil War #5, Civil War: Young Avengers & Runaways #4, Iron Man (vol. 4) #13, New Avengers #25, Punisher: War Journal (vol. 2) #1, Civil War: Front Line #8, Amazing Spider-Man #536, Black Panther (vol. 4) #22, Captain America (vol. 5) #24, Civil War: War Crimes #1, Civil War: Front Line #9, Iron Man (vol. 4) #14, Fantastic Four #541, Black Panther (vol. 4) #23, Punisher: War Journal (vol. 2) #2
Civil War #6, Civil War: Front Line #10, Amazing Spider-Man #537, Fantastic Four #542, Civil War: The Return #1, Punisher: War Journal (vol. 2) #3, Black Panther (vol. 4) #24
Civil War #7, Amazing Spider-Man #538, Civil War: Front Line #11, Black Panther (vol. 4) #25, Civil War: The Initiative #1, Iron Man: Director of SHIELD #15, Mighty Avengers #1, Captain America (vol. 5) #25, Civil War: The Confession #1, Fallen Son: The Death of Captain America #1, 2, 3, 4, 5, Fantastic Four #543-544, Avengers: The Initiative #1