Wraith Part Three

The Scarlet Spider and Wolverine have come to put a stop to the Assassins Guild after they put out a hit on Logan. However, in the middle of the final battle an woman the Guild fears called the Red Death arrived to break things up. Wolverine and the Spider find themselves caught in in her telekinetic grasps.

The Red Death introduces herself as Candra, someone Wolverine remembers and is surprised to see is still alive. Candra reminds him that she is one of the Externals, a breed of immortal mutants. She explains that while the X-Men previously destroyed her body, her mind endured.[1] She then forced the Assassins Guild to kill for her so she could draw strength from the deaths and rebuild her body. She senses that both the Scarlet Spider and Wolverine have experienced death and come back to life and presumes that by killing them, she will be finally be restored to her full glory.[2]

Kaine asks Candra to let him go and his “little friend” go, as this seems more like a mutant thing to him. When she asks who his little friend is, a spider lowers down from the ceiling and when it gets into Candra’s field of view she freaks out. As the Spider and Wolverine break free, Kaine is amused that someone with god-like power like Candra could be freaked out by spiders. He then blinds her with his webbing allowing Wolverine to leap in for the killing blow. Unfortunately, Candra is able to knock Logan back with a telekinetic blast. By this point, Bella Donna has regained her bearings and orders her assassins to kill Wolverine and the Scarlet Spider.

While Wolverine is slaughtering the assassins, Kaine tries to attack Candra. This time, he is knocked aside by Bella Donna’s energy blasts.[3] As the two fight it out, Candra manages to pull the webbing off her face and immediately goes after Kaine for the damage it has done to her face. Before she can kill Kaine, Wolverine manages to stab her in the back with his claws. Her powers weakening, Candra decides to regain her strength by killing the remaining assassins in the room. As this slaughter is going on, Kaine debates ducking out but decides against it since Candra might still come after him. Meanwhile, Harvester and Flower are recommending to Bella Donna that they should flee as well. However, Kaine and Wolverine convince them that Candra can still hunt them down and if they wish to survive this, they all have to work together to stop her.

The Scarlet Spider leaps in head first, popping his wrist talons. Unfortunately, Candra blasts him aside. She then kills more of the assassins, including Harvester and the Hand ninja in Bella Donna’s employ. Still their sacrifices allow Wolverine to get close enough to cut off one of Candra’s arms. With their plan failing, Bella Donna decides to turn on Kaine and is about to kill him when Flower knocks her out and tells him to fix things. While Candra is busy torturing Wolverine, Kaine manages to sneak behind her and stab a stinger through her head. Suddenly, Candra falls to the ground and her body begins to decompose, ending her threat.

Bella Donna doesn’t think this is over and vows that the Red Death will return and orders her surviving minions to kill the intruders. That’s when the Arranger arrives and orders everyone to stand down. He tells Bella Donna that the Assassins Guild is now under the control of his employer, the Kingpin. When Bourdeaux balks at this, a number of Hand ninjas appear out of the shadows proving that the Arranger has greater numbers and her defiance is a no-win situation. As it turns out, the Scarlet Spider called in a favor that Wilson Fisk owed him for dealing with one of his insubordinate.[4] Wolverine is furious that Kaine did this that he punches him in the face, something that Kaine figures he deserves.

Later, the pair are flying back to the Jean Grey School in the X-Men’s Blackbird. Logan radios in to the Beast to tell him that they are on their way back. Hank is pleased because Kaine’s sidekick, Hummingbird, is exhausting to deal with. After the call, Logan warns Kaine that these deals with the devil, like he had made with the Kingpin, have a habit of coming back to haunt you. However, Logan’s advice doesn’t matter to Kaine since he knows what its like to make a deal with the devil and has been the devil in some of those cases. He figures if anyone wants a piece of him they can get in line.

Recurring Characters

Scarlet Spider, Wolverine, Assassins Guild (Bella Donna Bourdeaux, Red Death, Smithy, Harvester, Flower), the Hand, the Arranger, Beast (voice), Hummingbird (voice)

Continuity Notes

1. Candra seemingly perished following a battle with the X-Men back in X-Men (vol. 2) #61.

2. Kaine and Wolverine have faced their own mortality on more than a few occasions.

   • Kaine in particular has died on two occasions. Once at the hands of the Kravinoff family and the second time he was killed by the Lobo siblings. Both times he was resurrected by the Other. See Amazing Spider-Man #634-637 and Scarlet Spider (vol. 2) #13-15.

   • As for the times Wolverine has cheated death? Name a time! The guy has been killed and brought back more than a few times. Two immediately come to mind. In Uncanny X-Men Annual #11 Wolverine was killed by Horde only to be resurrected when a drop of his blood landed on the Crystal of Ultimate Vision. Later, in Uncanny X-Men #226-227 in particular when he sacrificed his soul to defeat the Adversary only to be resurrected shortly thereafter. There are probably plenty of other examples I’m missing because, it’s Wolverine, and he’s appeared in a shit ton of stories, but those are the big ones I can remember.

3. Bella Donna states that she should have killed Kaine in Houston. The Assassins Guild previously clashed with the Scarlet Spider in Scarlet Spider (vol. 2) #3-4.

4. Kaine earned a favor from the Kingpin after he went after the Mark, a member of the Hand who was involved in human trafficking who had a habit of dumping dead bodies for the police to find. See Scarlet Spider (vol. 2) #12.1