FOURTH REICH

Part IV: Philosophical Differences

By Derrick Ferguson and Dino Pollard

It had once been one of the proudest and most distinguished symbols of freedom and democracy on the planet Earth. Home to the men honored to bear the title of President of The United States. Rich in history and tradition it was the place where decisions that changed the world were made. And no matter the scandal, no matter the bad choices, no matter the occasional disgraceful incident, The White House itself remained pristine and sacred.

Until now.

Now it was no longer The White House. It was The Red House. And just as it had been almost supernaturally white before, now it was hideously crimson. As if the very lifeblood of America itself had been used to color its outer exterior. And the rumors were that it had. It was now one of the most fearsome sights imaginable. Ringed with armed and armored troops whose only purpose was to protect their lord and master from any possible attack. But who would dare to attack Washington D.C. which was now the most heavily fortified city on the planet. Or attack The Red House, itself an impregnable fortress?

None.

The heroes of this warped world were reduced to hiding and cowering, skulking in the dark, snatching small victories here and there. They operated in shadow and stealth because to come out in the light would mean their deaths. And he who now ruled America knew full well where they were, where they hid. And he permitted it. Even omnipotence needed to have its ego fed. And what was the good of being undisputed master of all unless there were those who gave a worthy struggle?

The Red Skull sat on a balcony overlooking the concrete pit that was now home to Victor Von Doom. Two inches of fecal matter and mud covered the floor of the pit. Massive black hogs snorted and grunted as they moved about the pit but they stayed well clear of the man who sat in one corner, looking back up at The Red Skull with eyes that radiated sheer hatred. Naked as the day he was born he had lived in this filthy hole for months now. Once a week he was removed, given a luxurious bath by trained Japanese courtesans and served the finest meal prepared by French chefs. Then he spent the night in an antique four poster bed that had once belonged to Thomas Jefferson on sheets of Egyptian silk.

And in the morning he was again stripped naked and flung back into the filthy pit with the hogs. To again spend his days and nights in degradation and muck. To add further insult to injury The Red Skull had restored Doom’s face to its original handsome visage before the accident that had moderately scarred it. The true damage to Doom’s face had been performed by his donning his now famously feared metal mask before it had properly cooled.

The Red Skull sipped his Moroccan tea and his heart was filled with much great gladness. It pleased him to see the gypsy scum where he belonged at last. It had always sickened The Red Skull to see Doom strut about so arrogantly, playing at being royalty. He always knew that one of the first things he would do once the world was his would be was to humble the gypsy swine and make him live among his own kind. The one day of cleanliness and splendor was just an added twist of the knife.

It was not designed to break Doom. It would take considerably more than that. But it would do for now. It was good to sit here every morning, have his tea and look down upon Doom and contemplate what was going through his mind.

The Red Skull finished the last of his tea and put the cup down on a small glass table by his chair. He stood up and with the barest thought; his silk pajamas and embroidered robe were instantly transformed into a Douglass Chieng double-breasted business suit. The Red Skull appreciated and felt comfortable in the 1940’s style cut and lines of the suit. Changing clothes was so easy when one was omnipotent. But soon, The Red Skull would put his omnipotence away for what had become another weekly ritual. One that he enjoyed far more than even humiliating Doom.

Flanked by four armed bodyguards The Red Skull made his way to The West Wing. He actually didn’t need the guards since there was no way that a direct attack on his person would be successful. But he enjoyed the sound of their jackbooted feet as they marched in crisp precision exactly five feet behind him at all times. It gave The Red Skull comfort to hear such a sound. It was the sound of order and discipline. And the people so desperately needed discipline. Left to their own devices they would waste their lives in meaningless, petty pursuits. The people needed guidance and purpose. And now they had it.

The West Wing was sealed off from the rest of The Red House by a constant force field that only The Red Skull could walk through and he now did so, his guards turning about to face the long corridor and standing at attention.

The Red Skull walked alone, his footsteps echoing in the hallway. He came to a doorway and it opened of its own accord at his approach. He entered the room, took a pack of Bloomstrand cigarettes from his inner jacket pocket. He inserted one of the cigarettes into an amber cigarette holder. He lit it and stood there silently smoking for a minute as he watched.

A man was firmly bound to a large metal cross in a blatant parody of crucifixion. But there were no nails driven through his hands and feet. The Red Skull had devised a much better torment for this special captive. His eyelids were held open constantly by a special device that kept his eyeballs moistened as well. The device forced the captive to constantly watch the huge view screen that took up almost the entire far wall. There were images that constantly bombarded the captive’s horrified gaze.

One of The Red Skull’s soldiers snatched a baby from the arms of a shrieking mother and flung the baby in the path of a truck rumbling down a rubble-strewn street. Men and women were lined up against a blood-splattered wall and mercilessly machined gunned to death. Poison gas bombs were fired into tenements and the inhabitants staggered out into the street, blood pouring from their mouths, their ears, their eyes. Men, women and children were raped alike by Red Skull soldiers in a gigantic warehouse where they were kept for just that purpose. Men, women and children were forced to work in factories, under the watchful eye of soldiers with machine guns. A man stopped working to beg for a drink of water. He was given a chest full of bullets instead. The parade of horrors went on and on and on.

The Red Skull walked over to stand beside the cross. He looked over at his special captive who was staring at screen dazedly. He couldn’t turn his head as a clamp held his head firmly in place so that he could not even look away. But he knew The Red Skull was there. “Come to gloat again?”

“Naturally. It does my heart good for us to have these little sessions, my friend. Men such as we should talk on a daily basis.”

“The only thing I want to talk about is stopping these atrocities.”

“And how do you know that they are real? These could simply be computer generated images that I’m using to torture you.”

“Because I’ve know you for years and I know full well how your diseased mind works. Nothing gives you greater pleasure than to cause suffering and misery.”

“Ah. But there you are wrong.” The Red Skull blew out blueish smoke as he watched a tank making its way over a vast field of human bones. Skulls shattered into powder as the treads relentlessly rolled on. “I have no reason to engage in senseless brutality now that the world is mine. Indeed, omnipotence has gifted me with a capacity for…mercy.”

The captive laughed harshly. “You were born without a soul so therefore you don’t possess the ability to even recognize what mercy is. You only think you know what it is and even then it’s only so you can use it as a weapon. The same way you use every other positive, wholesome human trait.”

The Red Skull snapped his fingers and the device released the captive’s eyelids. Gratefully, Steve Rogers closed his aching eyes. They’d been open most of the night. Even with the drops they felt as if sand had been rubbed into them. The Red Skull snapped his fingers again and the cross moved of its own accord across the room where it came to rest next to a table and chair. The Red Skull walked over and sat down, continuing to smoke his cigarette. When he flicked off the ash it simply disappeared into thin air.

The Red Skull held out one hand. Something slowly emerged from his palm, right through the skin until it was lying there, casting a rich golden glow over the faces of The Red Skull and Steve Rogers.

The Cosmic Cube.

The Red Skull placed it on the table and smiled with fleshless lips. “So what shall we talk about today, my friend?”

“The same thing we always do. What do you want, Skull? You have me totally in your power. Surely that’s enough to satisfy you. Take out your revenge on me but for God’s sake, put the world back the way it was and let innocent people live their lives the way they were meant to be lived.”

“And who is to say that the way they live now is not the way they were meant to live?” The Red Skull’s eyes narrowed just a bit and a martini appeared on the table. “Their destiny has been fulfilled. Humankind exists only to serve the will of The Red Skull, nothing more.”

“You can’t kill everybody, Skull.”

“And I have no desire to do so. Merely eradicate the genetic inferiors that pollute the gene pool.” The Red Skull sipped his martini. “You think that I chose to engage in such atrocities simply to slake a bloodlust. Nothing could be further from the truth, Captain. I simply take the simplest and most expedient method to remove the weakest elements of mankind.”

“You justify genocide so easily.”

“It is you who justify the continued existence of worthless scum whose polluted genetic codes holds back humanity from it’s rightful destiny. Under my guidance mankind will take it’s place among the stars. Earth is too small for the heritage of humanity.”

“Maybe the rest of the galaxy isn’t ready to start goose stepping to your tune.” Steve Rogers shook his head. “Look at us, Skull. Men out of our time still fighting a war long over. World War II ended sixty-five years ago and what are we still doing at each other’s throats? My God, man…when will we end this?”

“It is at an end as far as you are concerned!” The Red Skull laughed. “You are my prisoner and so you shall remain. By the power of The Cosmic Cube I intend to keep you alive forever so that you will be an eternal witness to my triumph. Von Doom I shall also keep alive but he shall live with pigs for eons to come. Your Avenger compatriots have provided me with amusement these past weeks and months. I permitted their petty guerilla rebel group because I enjoyed seeing the so-called ‘Mighty’ Avengers reduced to children scuttering around in the shadows, terrified of the shadows, wondering at what moment my boot would land on their collective necks and bring the game to an end.”

The Red Skull finished off his martini. “But they start to bore me. I do believe it is time to ‘up the ante’ as you would say.”

“Whatever you do, Skull, The Avengers will find a way to stop you. It’s what we do.”

“And how will they do that? I have removed their greatest weapon: you. Without your strategic skill and cursed iron will The Avengers are without their one unbeatable resource.”

“You’re making the same mistake that every other enemy of The Avengers have made. The Avengers don’t need me to defeat you or anybody else. Just their desire to see justice done and evil punished.”

The Red Skull stood up and walked over to Steve, looking at him as if he’d just sprouted another head. “Incredible. I’ve been hearing you talk like that for 65 years now and it still never fails to amaze me at how naïve you truly are. You honestly do believe in the platitudes you utter, don’t you?”

“That’s why I’ve beaten you every time, Skull. I believe in what I feel and what I say. You believe in nothing except the disease that’s rotted away what little bit of soul you ever had. I feel sorry for you.”

“I’d advise you to feel sorry for your Avengers my dear Captain. They shall need it far more than I.”

The Red Skull extended a hand and The Cosmic Cube floated into his palm. “But in the meantime, please feel free to continue watching the…entertainment I have provided for you…”

The sounds that were coming from the throat of Master Man were hardly romantic. To Warrior Woman they always sounded like the phlegmy gasps of a severe asthmatic attempting to smoke a cigarette. She made the appropriate sounds in return and thought about her beloved Herr Nacht as Master Man completed his business and thankfully rolled off of her, breathing like a spent racehorse.

Warrior Woman climbed out of the luxurious king-sized bed and stalked to the bathroom to take a shower. She always took one after what Master Man laughingly referred to as lovemaking. Mongoloid baboons had more skill. But Warrior Woman had been restored to life and vitality through the will of The Red Skull and he had commanded her to indulge Master Man’s physical needs. For some reason it amused The Red Skull to see the both of them in such a position. As if he were not already amused with terrorizing an entire planet.

The scalding hot water poured over her but to her it felt like a cool rain against her invulnerable skin. When The Red Skull had restored her he had considerably augmented her powers so that now she was easily a physical match for Master Man in terms of strength and invulnerability. For some reason The Red Skull had allowed her to remember the world the way it was, unlike Master Man or Merrano The U-Man, both of who believed the world had always been this way. She lathered her legs and thighs, contemplating that The Red Skull had always been far too devious a plotter for his own good. He wove plots within plots and had far too many of them at one time, all to satisfy his amusement. It angered Warrior Woman that this entire situation with her and Master Man was yet another of his pointless amusements. But thanks to The Cosmic Cube they were all clowns in The Red Skull’s circus now. And considering that she was one of his most trusted counselors and lived like royalty what did she really have to complain about? As her hands moved across her body the thought occurred to her that perhaps she could herself accomplish what Master Man had been unable to…

…the door of the bathroom was thrown open with a crash. “Darling, hurry and get out of there! Get dressed! The Skull summons us to The Oval Office!”

Warrior Woman sighed. In one way or another, men always left her unsatisfied…

Master Man frowned as he and Warrior Woman entered The Oval Office and saw that Merrano was already there. The seven foot tall, blue-skinned Atlantean was not one of Master Man’s favorite people. Of, they worked together well enough but that didn’t change the fact The U-Man was a genetic inferior and one day would have to be eliminated. After he had served the will of The Red Skull, of course.

The Red Skull sat behind his desk, clearly displeased. “Why is it that every time I summoned the three of you to my prescence, Merrano is always the first to arrive.”

Master Man wrapped an outrageously muscled arm around Warrior Woman’s shoulder. “A thousand pardons, Herr Skull. But you know how it is when you’re in love with a beautiful woman. It never ends.”

“Actually, I wouldn’t know,” The Red Skull said dryly. “But I will address the matter of your tardiness later. Sit. More pressing matters concern us now.”

“What matters are those, Herr Skull?”

The Red Skull sat back and his voice was pure honey as he said; “Oh…the final and complete destruction of The Avengers. Would that be enough?”