Old Friends and Enemies Part 3 of 3

When Professor Zhen Chen stole the remains of the Human Torch, the new Captain America (James “Bucky” Barnes) went to Taiwan to get them back. However, given their past, he went as the Winter Soldier. Soon, both Bucky and his ally the Sub-Mariner found themselves captured. Discovering a way to make a virus out of the Human Torch’s flame powers, Zheng then infected Namor to see how his new illness would affect those with Atlantean physiology. While it can still be transmitted to members of this amphibious race, its effects are slowed down in water.

Still, Zheng is impressed with how effective this new pathogen is. When James calls him sick, Chen justifies his creation. Due to his Chinese upbringing he understands the importance of population control. If something isn’t done about human overpopulation, the planet will no longer be able to sustain life. Zheng Chen is merely coming up with a solution to the problem of too many people. He tried raising the alarm bells decades earlier, but the international community would not listen. This forced Chen to flee mainland China and work for the Taiwanese government to fund his experiments. He figures he can save the planet by wiping out 25 to 50% of the planet.

When James points out that Chen is being a hypocrite wanting to wipe out billions of people to avenge the death of one person. Zheng doesn’t deny it, but defends his rational saying people as a mass are meaningless, while an individual can mean the entire world to a person. That’s when the Man With No Face reports that the virus isn’t working on the Sub-Mariner. Taking a look for himself, Zheng wonders if this is the fact that Namor is a half-Atlantean, a mutant, or both.

That’s when Captain America’s shield flies across the room and shatters the glass of Namor’s suspension tank. It was thrown by the Black Widow (Natasha Romanov), who was James’ back-up plan in case everything went wrong. She is armed with electrified bullets as electricity seems to be the Man’s only weakness. As his bodyguard is taken down, Professor Chen flees the scene.

When Natasha frees the Winter Soldier, he takes one of her guns and puts a few more bullets into the Man With No Face, just to be sure he is down for the count. Without the sedated water surrounding him, the Sub-Mariner is able to free himself. His trademark anger is in full display as Taiwanese soldiers enter the room. Dealing with them by himself, Namor tells Winter Soldier and Black Widow to go after Chen. They fight through all opposition while Professor Chen reaches his main lab. There he has a massive tank filled with his new flame virus and is scrambling to unleash it upon the world.

When Winter Soldier and the Black Widow arrive they are too late to stop Professor Chen from activating the countdown. Worse, the Man With No Face has caught up with them. Luckily, so has the Sub-Mariner, who is looking to get revenge against the Man for his earlier defeat. When Chen tries to come to the defense of his creation, Namor knocks him aside with a single blow.

With seconds left before the end of the world, Winter Soldier takes a risk and severs the canister from the delivery system. Although this was a huge gamble it pays off and prevents the virus from being released. Seeing his plans falling apart, Zheng Chen begins to suffer a heart attack. Seeing his master dying, the Man With No Face gives up the fight in order to be by Chen’s side for his final moments. He mourns his master’s loss, as he shouldn’t be the only one of the two of them to survive. Namor assures the Man that he won’t be and quickly snaps his neck, killing the villain instantly.[2] Namor justifies killing the Man and he gets no protests since Winter Soldier wasn’t sure of any other way to stop the Man.

They soon find the remains of the Human Torch and Bucky is disgusted with how he was being used, not just by Zheng, but by the United Nations, who kept it a secret they took his body. Hearing this gladdens the Sub-Mariner, who says James sounds like the Bucky of old, and for a moment he thought he was hearing the late Steve Rogers.[3] After torching Zheng’s lab, the heroes load the Human Torch onto Namor’s ship and head back to America. Along the way, Natasha gives James shit for not telling her the whole truth about his past history with Zheng Chen. She reminds him that lying to a spy like her is a stupid idea. He admits that she was right and promises not to do it again. Still, now he has put an unresolved part of the Winter Soldier’s past behind him he can now wear his Captain America costume without fearing he will tarnish its reputation.

A few weeks later, the original Human Torch is given a proper funeral at Arlington National Cemetery. Unfortunately, due to Captain America’s outlaw status he couldn’t be there in person. However, Norman Osborn uses the opportunity to boost the profile of his team of Avengers in his place.[4] James later waits until nightfall to sneak into the cemetery so he can pay his final respects to his old friend.[5]

Recurring Characters

Captain America/Winter Soldier, Sub-Mariner, Black Widow, Man With No Face, Zhang Chin, Human Torch, Dark Avengers (Iron Patriot, Ares, Wolverine, Ms. Marvel, Captain Marvel, Spider-Man, Hawkeye)

Continuity Notes

1. The OG Human Torch has been dead since New Invaders #9. His remains were stolen for Zheng Chen in Captain America (vol. 5) #43-45. Winter Soldier and Namor’s attempts to recover his remains have occurred over the last two issues.

2. Time of this writing (March, 2023) the Man With No Face is still considered to be among the deceased.

3. At the time of this story, the original Captain America is believed to have died in issue #25. In reality, he has merely been unmoored from time, as we’ll learn in Captain America: Reborn #1-5.

4. Norman Osborn scored a huge public relations victory for landing the kill shot that took out the leader of a Skrull invasion of Earth in Secret Invasion #8. He was made Director of SHIELD, which he rennamed to HAMMER. He also formed his own team of Avengers, which consisted of villains taking up the identities of established heroes. Osborn has been militantly enforcing the Super-Human Registration Act to benefit his team, while coming down hard on outlaw anti-registration heroes such as Captain America. See Secret Invasion #8 and Dark Avengers #1.

5. You can’t keep a good Torch down for long. The original Human Torch will be revived shortly after this story. See Torch #1-8.

Topical References

• In this story, Professor Chen claims to have created avian flu. As the name of the illness suggests it originated in birds. It was particularly a problem with bird livestock, such as chickens. The virus eventually mutated and began infecting humans. The first recorded case of cross-species infection happened in China in 1997. At the time this story was growing outbreaks happening in China and other South Asian regions starting in 2003 and there were concerns that it might spread to North America. However, back then the there were Presidents who knew what the fuck they were doing and the CDC was able to minimize infections, not like the absolute shitshow the later COVID-19 pandemic was, but I digress. At any rate, since Zheng Chin has found a way to extend his lifespan, one could assume that these references are factual as opposed to topical.