Caged Angels, Part 6

Four imprisoned telepaths have been using their powers to throw Thunderbolts Mountain into complete chaos.[1] This has been going on as Doctor Leonard Samson has been conducting a psychological evaluation on Penance (Robbie Baldwin).[2] After hearing a series of explosions, Samson decides they cannot ignore the chaos going on outside. That’s when Moonstone (Karla Sofen) enters the room. She has been influenced by the telepaths to kill Samson.[3] When she announces her intentions, Len is pleased to have been giving an opportunity to fight her.

Samson is able to shrug off her initial attacks thanks to his gamma ray enhanced body. Instead, she decides to turn her power on Robbie. However, Baldwin is able to deflect her energy attacks and unleashes his kinetic powers on her with enough force to send her smashing through multiple walls. When Leonard asks Robbie not to kill her, Baldwin is able to create kinetic bubbles that he uses to stop her forward momentum.

Meanwhile, Songbird (Melissa Gold) heads down to the holding cell to try and stop the telepaths. Along the way, she crosses paths with Norman Osborn, who has been forced to become the Green Goblin again. Although she thinks she should just leave Norman to ruin his own reputation, the desire to fight him is too great so she begins attacking the Goblin.[4] The two pummel each other to the point of exhaustion. However, Melissa is the ultimate victor, unleashing a sonic scream that rips the Goblin mask off Norman’s face before he passes out. She joins him moments later.

Seconds later, another person enters the room, this is Bullseye who had been undergoing surgery to restore his mobility this entire time. The four telepaths in lockdown had left him for last and this has proven to be a grave mistake. Armed with four hobby knives he has come down to test his throwing accuracy and kills each of the prisoners one after the other. Try as they might, none of the four telepaths can mentally control Bullseye, likely due to the nanites in his body and he kills them without much resistance and takes pleasure in knowing he hasn’t gotten rusty.[5][6]

Within 48 hours, Thunderbolts Mountain is back under control. Leonard Samson is now leaving, but Robbie has decided to remain. When Len tries to convince him to come and continue treatment, Baldwin explains that he became Penance to make things right. He now sees how wrong things are with the Thunderbolts and decides to remain in order to correct things here. Meanwhile, Norman Osborn is spinning the situation to his superiors. He downloads responsibility of the four telepaths to human error and white washes his stint as thew Green Goblin as nothing more than shared hallucinations created by the prisoners. As he finishes his phone call, Norman is visited by Songbird.

Melissa knows that Norman has managed to flip this situation around to his favor. However, she points out that three members of the team — Moonstone, Venom, and Swordsman — are now out of commission. She managed to get the security footage — footage that shows that Norman really did dress up as the Green Goblin — and passed it off to Leonard Samson before he left. She uses this as a means to blackmail Norman into making her team leader. She also issues a list of demands: input on the capture missions the Thunderbolts undertake in the field as well as having the team do search and rescue operations in their downtime. Norman thinks its insane that she is using her one bargaining chip in this fashion, but agrees to her terms. As she gets up to leave, Norman reveals that he is aware that she was the one who tricked Bullseye into getting himself incapacitated on their last mission.

Recurring Characters

Thunderbolts (Norman Osborn, Songbird, Moonstone, Penance, Bullseye), Caged Angels (Mindwave, Caprice, Mirage, Bluestreak), Doc Samson

Continuity Notes

1. Got ourself a parade of obscure characters with names shared by other characters in the Marvel Universe. They were all captured over the course of Thunderbolts #116 and 117. Lets break it down:

   • Caprice was once a trainer for the Scourge of the Underworld program, as seen in US Agent #1-4.

   • This Bluestreak should not be confused with Don Thomas, the original Bluestreak. At the time of this story, Thomas had been dead for years after being killed by Scourge back in Captain America #318.

   • Mindwave is a new character who first appeared last issue as well. He shouldn’t be confused with Mind-Wave (with a hyphen) who was a Scourge victim who died in Captain America #319.

   • Mirage is also a new individual and should not be confused with Desmond Charne, the man who also called himself Mirage. Like Bluestreak before him, he was killed by Scourge in Captain America #320.

   • It is unclear why Caprice’s co-conspirators all named themselves after past Scourge victims, it’s kind of a weird flex but whatever. Oh, in case anyone is interested the dead namsakes of Caprice’s allies will all later be resurrected in Punisher (vol. 8) #5.

2. Penance was once the carefree hero known as Speedball. That was until he and his fellow New Warriors were responsible for the explosion in Stamford, Connecticut, the inciting incident that led to the passage of the SHRA in Civil War #1. Apparently the lone survivor, Robbie was used as a scape goat and dragged through the legal system. After a series of near death experiences and beatings, Robbie discovered that his powers now only activated when he was in pain. He reinvented himself as Penance, with armor that had spikes on the inside to atone for the lives he was responsible for. See Civil War: Front Line #1-10.

3. The reason why Moonstone has a massive hate on for Len Samson is because he defeated her during her first outing as a supervillain. See Incredible Hulk #229.

4. Here, the Green Goblin quips that he should have thrown Songbird off a bridge when he first met her. This is a reference to Gwen Stacy was the first love of Peter Parker, aka Spider-Man, Norman’s arch nemesis. In order to punish the wall-crawler, the Green Goblin murdered her in Amazing Spider-Man #121.

5. Recently, Bullseye had his neck snapped by American Eagle while also having his brain zapped by the very same nanites that make him immune to telepathy, that happened in Thunderbolts #115. This left the maniac a prisoner in his own body until he underwent surgery in issue #117.

6. Caprice, Bluestreak, Mindwave, and Mirage are all still considered among the deceased, as of this writing (November, 2023).