Ape-Man #5

It seemed like there was nothing those Commies wouldn’t try, except for tackling Ape-Man!  And even that was only true until the --

“Attack of the Red Chimp!”

by Scott Casper, thanks to Stan Lee and Jack Kirby for Tales to Astonish #39

The delivery truck came to a screeching halt at the dock, the driver pulling up perpendicular to the gangplank. Some tough-looking men waited on the barge, expecting the delivery.  A strange, accented voice came over a crackling loudspeaker:

“Hurry and load the cages aboard the ship!”

Other men were already swinging open the back doors of the truck, pulled down a ramp, and tugged on wheeled cages to roll them down onto the street.  The cages were large, and needed to be, since they contained every ape from the ape exhibit at the Bronx Zoo, including Mattie the gibbon, Bobo and Faben the chimpanzees, Plato and Ginger the orangutans, and Johnson the gorilla.

A man working a crane on the dock hoisted the cages, one by one, into the air and onto the deck of the barge. The last crate, holding Johnson, was in the air when a Volkswagen microbus screeched around a corner, some blocks away, but made a beeline straight for the docks at dangerous speeds for city streets.

“Stop that van from reaching the ship!” commanded the voice on the crackly loudspeaker.

Three men answered by producing sub-machine guns. They lined up and opened fire on the approaching microbus, aiming for the windshield and the front tires. The windshield shattered right away, but the driver was hunched down out of sight. The left tire blew out first, and then the right, sending the microbus swerving out of control. The vehicle tipped over and rolled, clattering down the street straight towards the gunmen, who had to scatter out of its way.

When Ape-Man appeared, he was leaping over the top of the still-rolling microbus, over the heads of the gunmen, tucked and rolled right past them, and then jumped up into a sprint for the gangplank. In the minute it had taken to get this far, Johnson’s cage was on deck and the barge was starting to move. Ape-Man easily vaulted the distance to the deck, landing within reach of one of the tough guys guarding the cages and took him down with a ferocious right hook.  Three others held what appeared to be cattle prods, no doubt meant to harm the apes. Ape-Man laid into them and, a minute later, was standing over the last of them still conscious.

“Where’s the Red Chimp?” Ape-Man angrily asked in his face.  The anger was more for show, for inside, Ape-Man was secretly nervous.

Unlike W., The Price, goons from the H.E. corporation, and the smaller crooks Ape-Man had fought so far, the Red Chimp had a history stretching back 10 years. Ape-Man had done some digging at the library and found out that the Red Chimp was once an ordinary chimpanzee, its intelligence enhanced by Russian scientists, and then trained by the KGB to be a spy. The Red Chimp was suspected in assassinations and government coups all over the world, but no one would likely have known anything about him had True Blue not stopped him once in ‘57, when a lot of the details of the Chimp’s past came out.

The loudspeaker crackled again. “If you are looking for me, come to the fore end of the barge, Ape-Man.”

The barge was about 100 feet long, with a wheelhouse cannibalized from a tugboat at the fore end.

Ape-Man looked into each of the cages and saw the ape prisoners looked nervous. “Just stay calm; I’ll get you back home,” Ape-Man said into his headpiece communicator. The apes understood.

Ape-Man moved cautiously from the cages towards the fore of the barge, and not just because he suspected a trap. The barge had been used for transporting garbage in the recent past and a thin layer of it still covered the deck. It also concealed the trap, until metal bars rose up six feet high out of the deck, folded over, and began to spin.

There was an obstacle course of spinning bars, at varying heights, between Ape-Man and his destination. They were spinning fast and it would have been near impossible for anyone else to time jumps just right to land safely between them, but for Ape-Man’s agility and reaction time, it was only mildly challenging. He was even beginning to see a pattern to the rotations -- until he couldn’t. When some of the bars started swinging in the opposite direction, it caught him off-guard and he fell after having his legs painfully swept out from underneath him.    

The bars stopped spinning. Ape-Man recovered and rose to his feet. Now standing on the other side of the now-motionless obstacle course was the Red Chimp. The chimpanzee stood there, legs apart and arms loose at his sides, clad only in a red, sleeveless, button-up military jacket and short pants. He could have easily attacked, but seemed to have been patiently waiting for Ape-Man’s recovery.

“What do you want?” Ape-Man asked.

“‘Vhat any man ‘vants, so will intelligent chimpanzee,” the Red Chimp said. “More specifically, I ‘vanted to lure you out and take the measure of you. See if you are as I am.”

“Wait…” Ape-Man said. He took a cautious step forward as he mulled this over. “Are you saying you kidnapped all the apes from the zoo, lured me here, to see if we could be friends?”

“Nothing so sentimental. I have not made myself into greatest living spy over the last 10 years by being so ‘veak as to need friends. I came to see if you needed ...an ally.”

“I don’t work with Commies.”

The Red Chimp chuckled. “Heh, heh -- treatments that keep my intelligence so high are costly; you think spying for politicians pays bills? Is industrial espionage ‘vhere real money is. I ‘vas ‘vondering...how much you know about H.E. and ‘vhat they are really after.”

This took Ape-Man aback. He knew that the H.E. corporation was after his inventions and was not above sending thieves after them, or even an assassin to kill him. Was there more, though, that he should know about…?

After a pregnant pause, Ape-Man said, “My answer’s the same.”

“Is pity. Let me know if you change your mind,” the Red Chimp said, and he pressed a button o a remote control device in his hand.

The spinning bars trap started up again, forcing Ape-Man to concentrate on dodging. It took him over a minute to extricate himself and, by then, the Red Chimp had fled to a small speedboat tied to the far side of the wheelhouse. The Ape-Man could only watch as the master spy got clean away.

Don’t worry, the Red Chimp will be back, and Ape-Man will be waiting for him! But, next time, Ape-Man faces the challenge of the fairer sex. Don’t miss it!

Ape-Man #4

The Ape-Man has always been smarter than his opponents before, but what happens when he faces a mad scientist who is his equal? Find out in —

“The Price of Defeat!”

by Scott Casper, thanks to Larry Lieber and Jack Kirby for Tales to Astonish #38

Face front, true believers! This tale is going to start right in the thick of it!

Teenagers scattered like alarmed pigeons as Ape-Man burst out of the planetarium. He leaned into his run, sometimes running on all fours as his long, loping arms swung in front of him. But where he was headed…he was not sure. Where?  Where could he be? Every clue he left has just been a red herring so far! Ape-Man inwardly fumed. While he fumed, he noticed that not everyone was running from him. He could not ask anyone why they were running, looking as ape-like as he did, but he could look around and try to trace back an origin point they were running from, and it seemed to be the nearest science lab building on the campus.

“Aha!” Ape-Man shouted and he sprinted for the front entrance to the science lab building. He went for the door handle and almost touched it — but drew his hand back when he glanced through the door’s glass panel and saw there was something affixed to the door handle on the inside. Getting a better look, he saw they were jumper cables, hooked to a car battery on the floor. Ignoring the handle, Ape-Man jumped up into the air and kicked the door hard with both feet — hard enough to break the door open. After ducking inside, he stopped and listened, only to hear men’s gruff voices coming from down a corridor, and the sound of an idling vehicle. There must have been a door open at the rear of the building, Ape-Man figured.

Ape-Man snuck down the corridor, ducking into a doorway in time before two big men emerged from the stairwell carrying something heavy between them. Glancing at their backs as they walked away from him, he saw they wore delivery uniforms.

“I hope there ain’t more of these…” one of them grumbled.

Ape-Man silently crept after them, eventually following them to a loading dock where two more men in delivery uniforms were coming from the back of an idling van. They held a big cardboard box open for the other two men to put what appeared to be a piece of computer equipment inside.

Someone in sneakers was coming up behind Ape-Man, too close for him to dodge out of sight again. Ape-Man glanced back and saw a man in a dark suit, wearing a hood over his face — and the man saw him right back. The hooded man reacted with surprise, but not too much alarm.

“It’s Ape-Man!” the hooded man shouted with a familiar voice. “Don’t just stand there! Get him!”

Ape-Man glanced back and saw that two of the movers had pistols in their hands now. He was exposed here in the corridor, but behind him was the doorway to what looked like a chemistry lab he could duck into for cover. Ape-man glanced back again at the hooded man, who had stepped away already to an elevator that was opening for him.  It only took a moment’s calculation for Ape-Man to figure that the men with guns posed the greater threat. Ape-Man reached into the room behind him, grabbed up a waste basket, and swung it over the head of the nearest goon. While the first goon struggled with aiming a gun while he could not see, Ape-Man picked him up and threw him into the goon right behind the first.

“I – do – not – like – guns!” Ape-Man roared, shaking his fists in the air. He hopped as he walked forward and that was because he was picking up a dropped gun with each foot, one at a time, and tossed them back behind him.

“It really talks!” one of the remaining men from the van said. He lost it and took off running for the exit at the back of the building. The remaining man on his feet picked up a crowbar and tried to swing it at Ape-Man, but Ape-Man grabbed it and held it fast, jumped up, kicked a goon in the face who was getting back up on his feet, and used his falling weight to jerk the crowbar out of the other man’s hands. The crowbar went flying, and hit the other goon in the face, who had also been about to get back up. The Ape-Man tumbled backwards when he hit the floor, rolled back up into a standing position, kicked the waste basket up into the air, caught it, and pitched it into the face of the only man still standing. Since this guy seemed particularly strong, Ape-Man gave him a quick jab to the solar plexus as well and watched the man fall to the floor, gasping for breath.

Ape-Man dashed over to where he had tossed the guns and emptied each of their bullets. He glanced over at the elevator and observed that it had gone up to the third floor, the top floor. The stairs were nearby, so Ape-Man bolted into the stairwell and bounded up the stairs.

On the third floor, Ape-Man emerged into a long hallway with open doors on both sides. A trail of crates, some of them quite large led from the elevator to one particular door. Ape-Man crept up to it and noticed a plaque by the door read “computer room”.  He looked inside and saw it had been cleaned out. There was an open window at the back of the room and it looked like someone had left a glove on the windowsill. Ape-Man, curious, moved closer for a look.

“I must admit I underestimated you, Ape-Man,” said that familiar voice again.

Ape-Man spun around and saw that the hooded man had been hiding behind the door and now swung it closed. He held a semi-automatic in his right hand, pointed at Ape-Man.

“I wanted you on campus, and so I left you an assortment of clues to follow, and traps at the location of each false clue to keep you busy, but only to serve as a diversion for my crime.”

“What crime?” Ape-Man said. “I thought you were up to something serious, like murdering a student or a professor — not stealing a computer, that was probably covered by insurance anyway.”

“Well — aren’t you a smart gorilla?” the hooded man shot back sarcastically. “This wasn’t just any computer, but an Atlas, on loan from England. It can operate at a speed of roughly a million instructions per second. With it, I will be able to calculate the perfect crimes, and start a crimewave of unrivaled brilliance. This is the price society will pay, and why I am called…the Price!”

“Price, like Vincent Price?  Is that why you’re trying to sound like him?”

“Sound like him? Sound like him?” the hooded man said testily. He tore off his hood with his left hand, revealing that he was actually the spitting image of Vincent Price.  “My name is Elijah Stasiuk, Dr. Elijah Stasiuk. I’m a brilliant scientist, but no one ever took me seriously because of the uncanny resemblance. They called me a mad scientist,” Dr. Stasiuk said, taking two steps forward. “Well, now I’m a seriously pissed scientist, and I’m going to take what I want from now on — starting with that headset you’re wearing. Does that only allow you to communicate with other apes, or does it control your ability to look like one too?”

“You’ve done your research,” Ape-Man said. He took off the headset slowly. “Here, why don’t you try it for yourself?” And he tossed it high into the air.

Dr. Stasiuk followed the headset with his eyes wide and knew he could not let it fall and get damaged. He reached out to grab it — only to feel his legs kicked out from underneath him as the Ape-Man dropped to the floor and sweep-kicked him.

Ape-Man was on him in a heartbeat, snatched away the gun, and tossed it out the window.

“No…I can’t have been beaten on my first outing…by an ape!” Dr. Stasiuk moaned.

The Price wasn’t the first and he won’t be the last. Be here next time for Ape-Man’s next exciting adventure!

Ape-Man #3

“The Ape-Man’s Secret!”

by Scott Casper, thanks to Lieber and Kirby for Tales to Astonish #37

Poe Park, South Bronx
November 3, 1962

Polka music wafted from the gazebo in the park. The children dancing were warm, but for everyone else it was chilly and they needed their sweaters or jackets.

Detective Martin Webster was not there for the music (he did not care for polka) and he did not have a child at the free concert (though he and his wife had tried to have one); Martin Webster was there to talk to Jacob Stern. Stern, a Jewish man of about 30 years of age, had been standing a short distance away from the festivities, smoking a cigarette, which had made it easy to approach him. Martin had in fact already identified himself and started asking some casual questions, to put Stern at ease.

“No, I don’t have any kids,” Jacob said. “But that girl over there? She’s my niece.”

“Ever take her to see the apes at the zoo, Mr. Stern?”

Jacob gave Martin a quizzical look. “What’s this about, officer?”

“Ape sightings, Mr. Stern. Four reports of them on my desk back at the office. You know what I don’t have on my desk? Any reports of apes going missing from the zoo.”

“There’s a good explanation for that.”

“Which is?”

“None of our apes have gone missing. It was just Halloween, you know. Maybe someone had rented an ape costume and was trying it out.”

“I see. An ape costume. Yes, that could explain it. Do you think that’s the explanation for the Ape-Man?  A man in a costume?”  

Jacob shrugged. “Sure. Why not?”

Martin seemed to mull that over a bit, then changed direction. “On the first, you saw the costumed vigilante people were calling the Bronze Defender, yes?  The one who had publicly proclaimed he was going to clean the protection rackets out of the Bronx last month. You called in to the police, in fact, from the zoo, when the Bronze Defender appeared there.”

“Yeah, that was me. So…?”

“So witnesses say an ape appeared out of nowhere and attacked this Bronze Defender. Then the ape ran off and, when people came to help him, they found incriminating photographs next to him that linked the Bronze Defender to the very protection racket this man had been claiming he was fighting. You see where I’m going with this, don’t you?”

“I guess I do. You’re wondering where the photos came from? I would guess that the Bronze Defender was carrying them himself, and when the man in the ape costume attacked him, they just…fell out.”

“No, that’s not where I was going with that, Mr. Stern. What I wanted to ask was…you called the police before the attack. Before anyone suspected the Bronze Defender of anything. So, why did you call?”

Jacob just stared at him for about 30 seconds. Then he responded indignantly, “Officer, I have never approved of these so-called superheroes and their vigilantism!”

Bronx Zoo
Meanwhile

Back at the zoo, in Dr. Raymond Carter’s office, Bernie Spengler hung up the phone. “That was Jacob,” Bernie said. “That Detective Webster followed him and questioned him, like we hoped. That should give you plenty of time to finally give me some straight answers.”

“I guess you deserve it,” Raymond said. He collapsed into his chair, in total surrender. “What do you want to know first?”

“Are you, are you serious? Who is the Ape-Man?  One of the apes, or–”

“It’s me.  It’s me!” Raymond said, rolling his head from side to side as if it pained him to say it. “When that burglar broke in here months ago, the only way I could stop him was to try our experiment on myself — imprint Johnson’s gorilla characteristics onto myself, so I could scare or fight the burglar off.”

“Raymond…” Bernie said, pacing around the desk and behind Raymond’s chair. “This seemed like a good idea to you at the time?”

“Yes — I don’t know. It all seemed to happen so fast.” Raymond leaned forward, pushed the glasses up on his forehead, and covered his eyes with his hands.

“But then you did it again?”

Raymond sat up straight again, having composed himself. “You were there that day. Those goons from H.E….”

“Yes. Heterodyne Electronic, the big conglomerate.” Bernie came around the side of the desk, leaned forward, and planted his knuckles on the desk. “Did they know about the Ape-Man?”

“Not yet, but they’d known about my research. B.R.A.D.–”

“Their Biological Research Advanced Division?”

“No, that branch was shut down and restructured into Biology & Radiology Augmentation Development. My research was right up their alley, but they were making no headway on their own so they wanted mine. When I wouldn’t sell it to them, they sent some men in to just take it.”

“So you turned into Ape-Man again to stop them.”

“I never planned to become Ape-Man again!” Raymond looked up into Bernie’s eyes, frustration etched in his face. “But…I had used the machine on Johnson again, this time without activating the imprinting matrix, so that information would be saved for future study. In fact, I was reviewing some readouts in the lab that day when they snuck in and overpowered me. I was strapped to the receiving table. They thought the ray could hurt me and threatened to use it on me if I didn’t cooperate. I let them, so it would turn me into Ape-Man again, so I could stop them.”

Bernie stood up and stepped back. “But you’ve become Ape-Man again since then.”

“It’s true…when someone left that sign in the zoo demanding that Ape-Man meet him, it turned out to be a hired gun calling himself W.”

“What does that stand for?”

“Oh…I don’t know,” Raymond said with a shrug. “Probably just his middle initial.  Anyway, I don’t have proof, but I believe H.E. hired him to get me.”

“And this last time, when you caught the Bronze Defender — was he working for H.E. too?”

“Oh, no. He was just a criminal.  I did find I could reactivate the matrix with saved data, transforming me back into Ape-Man, without putting Johnson at further risk. And I’ve…been, well, using it to try to make life better around here ever since, whenever Ape-Man could do it better than I could.  Now…do you think I’m crazy?”

Bernie seemed to pause and think about that for a moment. “No. I’ve never thought you were crazy. When you told me we could harness the strength of a gorilla in a human body, I didn’t tell you you were crazy. I think you’re a good man, and I’m behind you in this.  I’ll keep your secret.”

They both paused, perhaps thinking about the same thing. Finally, Raymond asked the question. “Jacob doesn’t know everything yet. Do you think he’ll still help me?”

“Yes. Maybe….Probably.”

But will Jacob? Find out in upcoming issues of Ape-Man!

Ape-Man #2

“Ape-Man, I know your secret! Meet me at the Wallace Ave. Warehouse tonight! –W.” was all the sign read.  Why did it strike such fear in the heart of Ape-Man? Find out in —

“The Challenge of W!”

by Scott Casper, thanks to Lieber and Kirby for Tales to Astonish #36

Mattie was a small female gibbon, an “escapee” from the Bronx Zoo’s collection, as the other apes were. Mattie chattered a little, then sped to the wall, leapt up, and found the bars on the warehouse windows more than adequate for scaling up the side of the building. In moments, Mattie was inside; tense minutes after that, Mattie was hanging off the door handle of the back door as it swung open.

“Nice work, Mattie!” Ape-Man said. “Mattie, you stay here. Faben, you’re with me!” he said to the chimpanzee with him. He had some more instructions for Faben which he gave the excited chimp before heading inside.

Ape-Man could not even see the third floor windows when he entered; there was a partial roof over him and partition walls blocking his view of the whole floor of the warehouse. The partition walls extended out from the side walls to support columns that rose through the second floor. It was a little scary how good a burglar Mattie was, having found her way down here so fast.  

Ape-Man moved cautiously into the dark interior of the warehouse. He had expected to find more cover, but the warehouse was disturbingly free of good hiding places, like stacks of boxes and crates. Multiple staircases ascended to the partial second floor of the place and, as Ape-Man moved into the middle of the warehouse, he could finally see all the way up to the roof.

A button was pushed somewhere up above him and the lights began to flicker on all over the warehouse. Looking up, Ape-Man spotted a figure who had been standing quietly on a catwalk connecting sections of the second floor positioned almost directly above him. The figure was a thin, slight man dressed like a cowboy, complete with ten-gallon hat and twin pistols holstered at his waist. The figure was casually posed, leaning on the rail of the catwalk, but had an old-fashioned Winchester bolt-action rifle cradled in his arms that lent him menace.

“Well, slap my knee and caaaalll me crazy!” the cowboy shouted excitedly. “If that don’t beat all, my trap’s done caught me an ape with some curious fashion sense! Now, the big money question is, is you a talkin’ ape, or am I just wastin’ my time not pullin’ this trigger…” the cowboy said, still sounding comical, but drawing the rifle up to his shoulder and pointing it right at Ape-Man with frightening speed.

Ape-Man raised his hands and spoke in a deep, growly, but still human-like voice. “You must be ‘W’.  You can’t be surprised, if you know my secret…” Ape-Man said.

“W” laughed. The rifle jiggled a little, but was still aimed at Ape-Man. “For a talkin’ ape, you’ll be feelin’ mighty stoopid’ in a minute. ‘Cuz I never knew any secrets. I jus’ make up thangs’ when I need to get wut’ I want.”

“And what is that, Mr…?”

“Just call me W — most people do,” W said. “Mostly I aim ta’ get paid for shootin’ ya, but first…I’m wondering if there’s anything to be gained from keepin’ ya’ alive a little longer. Like that thingee you’re wearin’ on your noggin. Does that have somethin’ to do with you bein’ able to talk? Cuz that might be worth somethin’ to me…like shootin’ you so you’ll die quick instead a’ slow…”

“Wait, let me take this off…” Ape-Man said, reaching up for his headset. Instead of taking it off, though, he carefully increased the volume on his mic and shouted “Faben, now!”

The chimpanzee had found the circuit breaker box near the rear of the building, as per his instructions, and on command threw the biggest switch in the box. The warehouse was immediately plunged into darkness.

W, instead of shooting right away, fumbled for the control box for the lights he had meticulously strung out to the catwalk on an extension cord and wrapped around the railing. He pressed the button a few times, but could not get the lights to come back on.  Frustrated, he growled. “My Pappy always told me not to trust a smooth-talker — even if he is a gorilla!”  W had both hands on his rifle again and scanned the darkness below for some movement he might observe by moonlight. Something moved on the far staircase — he took quick aim and fired. The echo of the gunshot reverberated through the warehouse and a single shell casing clattered to the floor. The partial silhouette disappeared and W was left with nothing to look at again.

Ape-Man had been able to ascend the staircase quickly by swinging upwards from the railing. While the ground floor had been largely empty, the second floor had long crates stacked four feet high, cardboard boxes just as tall mounted on wooden pallets, and metal shelves that stood against the columns that rose up from the lower floor.

“Ah’ know you’re up here, Ape-Man…” W called out into the darkness. “I suppose you think this makes things even, but ah’m still the one with the gun here…” W talked tough, but he was prepared to take fewer chances; he switched his rifle from single shot to automatic fire.

Ape-Man heard the catwalk rattle; W was moving too. He could lose himself in the darkness quickly, the same as Ape-Man had, if he did not move fast. Ape-Man rested his hand on a shelving unit and realized that it was actually standing on a long, wheeled dolly.

W was about to move off the catwalk when he heard, and then saw, a wobbling metal shelving unit careening towards him on a runaway dolly. Figuring Ape-Man might be pushing it, W took the time to spray bullets between the shelves. As the dolly hit the uneven floor of the catwalk, the tall shelves began to tilt W’s way. W walked backwards, watching the shelves topple towards him as he dodged — and then saw Ape-Man bound out of the darkness onto the top shelf, riding it as it fell towards him!

Ape-Man let the falling shelves’ momentum catapult him towards W. He reached the gunman before W could raise the rifle again and swatted it out of his hands. The rifle clattered on the floor below, but hardly anyone heard it, for Ape-Man then slammed bodily into W and they both tumbled end over end across the catwalk until they landed on the other side, with Ape-Man on top. During the tumbling, Ape-Man had dextrously drawn the six-guns slung in holsters on each of W’s hips and held the guns pointed at W’s face.

W, for his part, calmly laid there underneath, smiling up into the face of an angry gorilla. In his hand was a flare, which W had pulled off his belt instead of going for his guns. W closed his eyes and flicked the flare on. Ape-Man, reacting a moment slower, was blinded. Ape-Man backed off, still well-armed, but not willing to shoot wildly. He had no intention of shooting anyway, but had merely hoped to force W’s surrender. Now Ape-Man could only struggle to see past the spots in front of his eyes as he heard W running to the stairs.

“You were smart, Ape-Man, but ah’m a mite bit smarter! Harvard-educamucated’ and everythin’!  See ya’ in the rematch, Ape!”  

Oh, I’ll be waiting! Ape-Man thought to himself.

And so Ape-Man’s secret was still safe — but what is his secret? The end — for now!

Ape-Man #0

The Ape-Man — who is he? What is he? The startling answers to these questions could be found, one night, in the laboratory of Dr. Raymond Carter.
On this fateful day, Dr. Carter stood alone in the office, brooding, his long shadow cast over the room as he faced the twilight outside his window. In his hand, he clutched a letter from the administration of the zoo that housed his lab. The zoo wants to see results! Raymond thought. My funding depends on it. The future of my research depends on it! If I am to save both, then I must succeed tonight!

Raymond Carter carelessly tossed the letter towards his desk and exited the room, bound for the test subject cages that lined the corridor outside his private lab. The familiar tread of his shoes on the tile floor signaled a chorus of chattering from the caged animals.

“Plato,” Raymond said, touching the bars of the cage holding his prized orangutan. Plato was suffering from hepatitis. “Johnson,” he said, reaching over to the cage of the strong, healthy, but troublesome gorilla in the next cage over. “Let’s see if my newest adjustments produce any results.”

Circling the cages to the entrance to the lab, Raymond unlocked this inner door, turned on the lights inside, and opened the back gate to Plato’s cage. He coaxed Plato with a banana onto the titled gurney that would be the receiving end of the ray. Plato was conditioned not to resist when being strapped down by being rewarded with food before and after. Johnson was more problematic; instead of being strapped down, Raymond had needed to devise a smaller cage that could hold Johnson in place while the ray was passing through him.

Unbeknownst to Dr. Raymond Carter, a man was at the back door to his lab — a man with sinister intent. He wore a jacket similar to the ones many employees of the zoo wore, similar enough to fool anyone who did not look too closely. He wore a cap on his head. Despite being a Caucasian male in just his 30s, this man had lived hard and his features were hard and deeply lined in his face.

Perfect, no one around, the Burglar thought to himself. The zoo must keep a lot of valuable stuff locked away in this lab. It’s late enough that no one should be inside, but not so late that I’ll arouse too much suspicion if I’m seen loading stuff into my truck by the loading bay. I’ll be outta here before anyone thinks to question me. He allowed himself a smile as he produced the lockpicks he would need to get inside.

Raymond began recording. “Experiment number 114…I have corrected the wavelength of the ray to compensate for the specific ratio of difference in body densities between my test subjects, which I am hoping is the missing component that has kept the ray from working so far. If successful, the ray will copy the physical traits from the first recipient of the ray and map, or overlay, these same traits onto the second recipient of the ray. In this way, a stronger animal might make a weaker animal stronger, a healthier animal make a sickly animal healthier…if I can someday adjust for specific traits, I can eliminate disease by mapping disease resistance, or perhaps even the absence of the disease, onto the second recipient. It is now…5:43 pm and I am activating the ray.”

A switch was thrown and electrodes crackled with fresh power. The ray projector hummed gradually louder. It was a necessarily large instrument, mounted to the floor on a heavy column that also held a large canister of radioactive chemical “soup”. The projector emitted pulsed charged particles in a beam, particles that had altered in the soup of Raymond’s devising. The beam, barely visible to the eye, was weak enough that it only irritated Johnson and made him rattle his cage bars, but the radioactive particles imprinted now with Johnson’s physical traits as passed through him and moved on to their next target, Plato. The particles should cause benign mutations immediately that would mimic Johnson’s physiology.  Only–

Nothing. Raymond checked and triple-checked his figures and the results of the machines monitoring all of Plato’s vital functions. Not even a fluctuation. He would draw blood to test still, plus tissue taken from other parts of the body, but it seemed like the results were exactly the same. The DNA was just too smart for him; it was not fooled into accepting the changes it was being offered.

Raymond was taking a blood sample from Plato when he heard noise from out in the hallway; something was upsetting the other animals. Curious, he walked with the syringe to the door as soon as he was done and opened it for a look. He was startled to see the shadow of a man moving towards him in the corridor, coming from the reception area! Raymond closed the door and listened through it, as he heard the man speak out loud.

“Shut up, you stupid monkeys!” the intruder shouted at the chattering animals. “If I can’t find something of value to grab in here, I’m taking all of you! Maybe there’s a black market for zoo animals…”

Raymond’s mind raced. He didn’t hear the door! Not over the apes in their cages. There was still a chance if he hurried, so he dropped the syringe and fumbled for his keys, then hurriedly put them in the door and locked himself in. Raymond stepped away from the door as he heard the doorknob jiggled from the other side. He held his breath, waiting to see if the intruder would try to break the door down, or shoot his way in, or…

There were footsteps barely audible in the corridor of the intruder walking away. Apparently he had decided to search elsewhere for easier loot, but would be back eventually for the valuable scientific equipment locked here in the lab. Raymond put his keys away and deeply regretted never having a telephone installed in the lab. He’ll be back soon, and I’ve no way to fight back as he takes everything I’ve worked for! The only one strong enough in this room to stop him is Johnson, but he has no intelligence to guide him. If–

That was when a crazy, desperate plan entered Raymond’s panicked brain. There was still time to try the ray one more time, but not on Plato…

In the minutes that followed — the Ape-Man was born! But was he a man made more like an ape, or an ape made more like a man? Follow the astonishing tales of his monthly adventures to find out!

Ape-Man #1

(I understand the fiction site, Brave New 'Verse, which was hosting my Ape-Man stories is going away. So I'm moving them here to my blog. This is an original pastiche hero and an ode to the Silver Age of Marvel Comics. Enjoy!)

“The Ape-Man!”

by Scott Casper, thanks to Lee and Kirby for Tales to Astonish #35

180th Street & Daly Avenue, The Bronx
September 5, 1962
Bernie Spengler stood at his favorite newsstand and plucked a 12-cent comic book off the rack, right out from under the big sign that read ‘cigarettes’. The last time he’d bought a comic book, they were only 10 cents. Bernie did not balk about the price increase, though; he had a lot of free time on his hands today and much to take his mind off of.

“You read that stuff?” a familiar voice asked. Bernie looked up at Jacob Stern, his coworker as of yesterday. Wearing his gray suit and matching Fedora with his customary red tie, Jacob looked just like he was heading into work — which Bernie, supposed, he did too, just out of habit.

The newsstand was at the corner where the two men would meet every day before heading to Dr. Carter’s office in the Bronx Zoo, where they had worked as assistants, at least until Carter had dismissed them. They had letters of recommendation from Carter and his promise to help them land jobs at any zoo in the world — but their jobs were “no longer required” here.

Jacob was buying a pack of cigarettes. “So where are you gonna’ work?” he asked nonchalantly to Bernie.

“I don’t know. I haven’t thought about it yet,” Bernie said truthfully. He had felt in a daze since coming home yesterday early.

“Did you keep that letter from Carter?” Jacob asked. “Like it’s going to do us much good. ‘Fired’ still means fired, no matter how he dresses it up.”

“Excuse me,” a mustachioed man in a nice blue suit and tan Fedora said. A man in a similarly nice suit was standing behind him, listening, as if they were together. “Did I hear you say Carter? Did you two gentlemen work for Dr. Raymond Carter?”

“What if we did?” Jacob retorted in Jacob’s typical, confrontational style.

“We understood he had just let his two most trusted assistants go, while he’s been working for months on some top secret project.”

“What if he has?”

The two strangers glanced at each other. “It just seems strange that Dr. Carter would let his assistants go, unless he’s finished whatever he was working on. Or doesn’t want to share credit?”

“Are you two journalists…?” Bernie asked. He had been only half-listening at first, but now he was curious why these men were asking these strangers, or seemed to have known to find them here.

“Go one, beat it!” Jacob said. “How do we know you’re not commie spies? We ain’t tellin’ you anything.”

The mustachioed man looked like he was going to respond, but the other man touched his jacket and gave him a look that told him to let it go. They both tipped their hats and walked away.

“If that don’t beat all,” Jacob said. “If they’d offered me a good bribe, I might have told ‘em everything I know! Well…see ya’ in the funny papers, Bernie. It was great workin’ with ‘ya.”

Jacob lit a cigarette and walked away. Bernie rolled up his new purchase and tucked it under his arm. He watched Jacob walk away, wondering if they would ever work together again. Then he watched the two strange men walking away, and wondered where they were going.

It wasn’t any of his business now, Bernie told himself as he strolled away in another direction. He had always known Dr. Carter to be an eccentric research biologist, so maybe firing his assistants was just par for the course with these eccentric scientist types. They had made such huge strides lately, though, with the transfer ray for combining human and gorilla physical traits. The potential for making stronger children, or smarter gorillas, was staggering in its implications — as well as its potential for profit. Bernie never would have thought Dr. Carter the type, but perhaps the temptation to sell out had been too great for him.

An hour of walking later, Bernie had changed his mind. Those two men with the questions had been suspicious. Maybe suspicious enough that Raymond should know about them. Maybe suspicious enough that Raymond would be so appreciative for hearing about them that he would hire Bernie back.

Dr. Raymond Carter’s lab was in a new building, built with a research grant, adjoining at the rear of the 51-year old Monkey House in the zoo. There was a back door for entering the lab directly, right next to the loading dock, but since Bernie had handed in his key to it already, it seemed more appropriate to come up to the “front” door at the rear of the Monkey House and wait to be admitted.

It was a Wednesday morning and the Monkey House was open. A mother was trying to get her two awful little boys to pay attention to Ginger, the orangutan. Ginger was not in a particularly playful mood that morning, though, and was just lazily swinging from a rope. Bernie handed one of the boys his recently purchased comic book. The boys shrieked with wild abandon as they tore into it; Bernie did not even bother to look back to see if the mother was appreciative. He was already on his way to the front door.

The aforementioned door, however, was ajar and opened even wider when Bernie knocked on it. “Hello?” he asked as he peaked inside. The reception room was dark and empty. Around the corner, to the left, he could hear the chatter of apes, upset about something, coming from the research cages. In this room, there was an alcove off to the right with a door to a restroom in it and Bernie thought he saw movement there in the shadows.

Bernie was startled at first, for it was odd to see the door left unlocked, but the reception room left dark. He steeled himself as the figure stepped forward from the dark alcove — and turned out to be Jacob Stern.

“What are you doing back here?” Bernie asked.

“Same as you?” Jacob asked back. “Figured Ray would want to know about those two men who were asking us questions?”

“Is he here?”

“Beats me, I had to go as soon as I got here,” Jacob said, checking his fly.

At that, there was more sound, the screeching of apes and crashing sounds, like crates toppling over. And was that a man shouting? Raymond? As one, Bernie and Jacob raced to investigate. Around the corner were the test subject cages, but they all stood empty. The noises were coming from up ahead, on the left, in the loading bay area. Just before Jacob could round the corner to peek in, two men came bolting out of room and into the corridor. They were scruffy men, one young and thin, the other a big bruiser, like a boxer, both wearing torn jackets and shoving Jacob and Bernie out of their way to escape.

“Lemme’ outta’ here!” the bruiser shouted.

Two gunshots rang out from inside the loading bay area. Suddenly, running away seemed like a good idea. Bernie and Jacob both high-tailed it back to the reception room, but Bernie stopped at the desk and picked up the phone.

“Really?” Jacob said testily. He had stopped in his tracks, halfway to pursuing the two other men out the door into the Monkey House, when he noticed what Bernie was doing.

“Someone needs to call the police,” Bernie said as he dialed.

A third man, a Hispanic man whose clothes were even more tattered, came running from the corridor and through the reception room, but this time he was being pursued — and pummeled — by Bobo the Chimp and Johnson the Gorilla, on either side of him. The man just kept yelling, in a mixture of English and Spanish, for them to stop.

There was more noise from the corridor, someone being hit by something heavy, and then two more men stumbled into Reception. These two Bernie and Jacob recognized — the men from the newsstand. They turned and recognized Bernie and Jacob at once. One of them had a gun in his hand and looked like he was thinking about using it. Both men hesitated, turned, and only backed slowly towards the exit into the Monkey House.

What followed them was the biggest surprise to Bernie and Jacob of all. It was a 200 lb. gorilla, built like a male gorilla, but small for a full-grown one — but one dressed in a matching red- and black-striped short sleeved shirt and short pants, as well as some sort of headset over its ears and in front of the side of its face.

The man with the gun was waving it back and forth, as if unsure if he should shoot at the ape, Bernie and Jacob as witnesses, or all three, but it became a moot point when the ape yanked a filing cabinet drawer out and flung it at the gunman with uncanny accuracy. The gunman went off-balance and lost his gun, and probably would have wound up sprawled on the floor if the other man had not been there to catch him.

“Come on, let’s get out of here!” the other man said. And they did.

The ape ran into the middle of the room, stood erect, and roared out words as it shook its fists over its head. “Tell H.E. — they’ll never get it!”

It was only then that the ape seemed to notice Bernie and Jacob. It looked at them with intelligent recognition and…embarrassment? Then it turned and fled the way it had come.

Only when it was gone did Bernie notice he had someone on the phone asking if someone was there. He just looked at Jacob instead, dumbfounded, and Jacob looked back. They were both thinking the same thing.

“Dr. Carter, he’s…created an Ape-Man!”