Avengers Spotlight #26

Feb 8

Feb 8 Avengers Spotlight #26

1980s, Acts of Vengeance

Tales from the Vault, Part 1

The Frightful Four are just the latest bunch of criminals to be incarcerated at the Vault, a super-max prison for super-villains located in the Colorado Rockies.[1] Among the members, the Wizard is the most vocal, vowing to escape this prison just like every other. This is overheard over the security monitors by Frank Ensign, aka “Guardsman Prime”, the head of Vault security. He decides to personally escort the Wizard down to his cell as a form of intimidation.

Ensign takes the Wizard down to level 5 and boasts that his cell will be his only sight for years. Placed in his cell, the master escape artist begins looking for a way to break out of his cell. Suddenly, a mysterious man in a suit and fedora appears in his cell and offers to help the Wizard escape in exchange for a small favor.[2]

When Guardsman Prime returns to the monitor room, he becomes concerned that the Wizard appears to be talking to someone in his cell that cannot be captured on camera and races down to confront him.[3] By the time he has arrived, the Wizard has somehow gotten his own armor back and has freed himself from his cell. The alarm is called and the other Guardsmen scramble to contain the situation. However, Guardsman Prime is unable to stop the Armadillo, Scarecrow, Mister Hyde, and Electro from being released as well.

With the situation growing out of control, the other staff try to contact the outside world and inform them of what’s going on inside the Vault. Unfortunately, their lines of communication have been cut.

Badly beaten, the defeated Guardsman Prime makes a ditch effort to contact the outside world using the communicator built into his helmet. The distress call is picked up by Peggy Carter, part of the Avengers Crew on Hydrobase. However, when she answers the call, nobody is there to call back…

Tales From the Vault, Part 2

Iron Man has also received the distress call and arrives at the Vault to lend a hand. He finds Guardsman Prime laying on the floor in the cell block. The guard is not happy to see Iron Man, considering the Avenger was responsible for the last breakout in the facility. Before Iron Man can defend himself, he is ambushed by Orka, another escaped prisoner. Iron Man easily trounces the Atlantean warrior and then goes about looking for the other Guardsmen. He finds them all passed out in one of the cells.

Meanwhile, in one of the upper levels, Hawkeye also arrives on the scene to help prevent the prisoners from escaping. Going down into the cellblock, the archer discovers Iron Man laying out Whirlwind. Also remembering how Iron Man was responsible for the last break-out, Hawkeye accuses his fellow Avengers for pulling the same stunt again. When Iron Man tries to explain he’s not the same Iron Man, Hawkeye calls bullshit on him.[4] The two have a brief fight, until Iron Man gets close enough to blast Hawkeye in the face with a respulsor ray and convinces him to stop fighting so they can work together to contain things.

Pulling up the floor under he unconscious Guardsmen, Iron Man begins carrying them out with Hawkeye playing defense. They quickly run into the Scarecrow, but Clint convinces him to return to his cell without incident. After an unexpected encounter with the massive Yetrigar, the two Avengers manage to get outside the prison with the rest of the staff. Once there, Iron Man hacks into the computers and activates the lock down protocols with drops bars all over the facility and seals the exits with a titanium/concrete compound. To make extra sure nobody gets out, Hawkeye uses an electro-magnetic pulse arrow to fry all the electrical systems. This also has the unforeseen effect of knocking out Iron Man’s armor. Falling flat on his face, Iron Man tells Hawkeye that the EMP had better wear off before the rest of the Avengers show up.

Recurring Characters

Iron Man, Hawkeye, Guardsman Prime, Mister Hyde, Scarecrow, Orka, Frightful Four (Wizard, Klaw, Titania, Hydro-Man), Griffin, Angar the Screamer, Armadillo, Whirlwind, Molten Man, Yatrigar, Cactus, Loki, Robin Chapel, Anne Marie Hoag, Peggy Carter,

Continuity Notes

This would follow the Frightful Four’s defeat in Fantastic Four #326-333.
This mystery man is revealed to be Loki, as seen in Avengers West Coast #55.
Guardsman Prime states here that his current suit is seems better than the old Starktech models. The original Guardsman armor was constructed by Tony Stark’s friend Michael O’Brien using Stark technology back in Iron Man #43. When the Vault was opened in Avengers Annual #15, similar suits were given to the guards. More recently, Iron Man bricked all unauthorized use of his technology, including the Guardsmen armor, as seen in Iron Man #228/Captain America #340.
Hawkeye has known that Iron Man was secretly Tony Stark since Iron Man #193. When Iron Man was bricking unauthorized Starktech from Iron Man #225-231, he faked Iron Man’s death and convinced everyone that it was a new person in the armor. He was able to sell this lie since the general public was not aware that Stark and Iron Man were the same person at the time.

Topical References

One of the Vault staffers refers to the Vault as “MacGuyver Proof” this is reference to the titular character of the show of the same name. MacGuyver (played by Richard Dean Anderson) was known for his inventiveness in using every day items to get out of tight situations. It was a common trope of the show and it became something of a running gag. The original run of MacGuyver ran until 1992. While there was a reboot in 2016, it came to the end of its run in 2021. Either way, this reference should be considered topical.