In Pursuit of... Doom!

Sweet Christmas! What the heck set these two off?

Eight issues into its run, Luke Cage, Hero For Hire is already turning to guest appearances to beef up its sales, and by coincidence this tale just happens to revolve around money--or, more to the point, the title character being short-changed by the lord of Latveria himself, Dr. Doom.

What could have led up to such a situation? It seems that some of Doom's robots have turned on their master and fled to the United States with state secrets, disguised as humans. And so Cage is hired by proxy to find and capture these "men," with his client obviously wishing to remain anonymous and withhold any information as to who is paying Cage's bill or the true nature of the "individuals" he's being paid to find (and at $200/day, which was probably a decent fee in 1973 for someone in Cage's line of work.)

But in the process, he discovers exactly what these "thieves" are when they put up more of a fight than Cage was expecting and their facade of human flesh is ripped away--and so he pays a little trip to his client's abode, the Latverian embassy, where Cage has his first meeting with that country's king.

Cage clearly isn't exactly awed or cowed by Doom, whom he almost appears to regard as something of an eccentric (!); but the good doctor is persuasive enough to convince him to carry on with the job, and Cage sees no practical reason to turn him down.

But when the resistance of his powerful foes forces him to use lethal force, he becomes incensed at Doom for essentially using him for his own ends; and when his client adds insult to injury and stiffs him of his fee before leaving for Latveria, all bets are off as far as the lengths Cage will go to in order to set things right.

If you're thinking that two-hundred dollars seems a trivial sum for Doom to renege on--along with writer Steve Englehart's implication that he's something of a cheapskate--join the club. Englehart's explanation (such as it is) is forthcoming, though you may not be any less confused on the matter.

Courtesy of a jet which Cage impatiently convinces the Fantastic Four to loan him (in their first meeting--and yes, another guest appearance, receiving no small amount of pages), Cage arrives in Latveria and, predictably, must fight his way into Doom's castle. Yet eventually, Cage confronts his armored swindler--only to find that as far as Doom is concerned, the matter has been settled and virtually forgotten, in a convincing scene laid out by Englehart.

With the pleasantries having swiftly segued to battle, these two go at it--Cage fighting mostly on principle (though with every intention of having Doom pay up), while Doom simply won't allow himself to be dictated to, much less defeated. Yet there is still much to be said between them.

Though it's a rare day when Doom's armor has been damaged in battle with someone, it has indeed happened on occasion; yet how difficult it still seems to accept that Doom's armor has an Achilles' heel based solely on its integrity--and that, in all the battles he's been through, no one has ever thought of Cage's tactic before now.

Before he can take advantage of it, however, and perhaps induce Doom to honor their agreement while he's at a disadvantage, Cage finds he must intercede when Doom is suddenly surprised and attacked by an alien foe which has long been involved in Doom's affairs and desires to bring about his death. And once the strange intruder has been driven off, Doom finds his mind has changed toward Cage, at least enough to give the man what he's asked for.

That Doom has a problem with his cash flow is news to me, given the expensive equipment and armament he's amassed as well as the lavish furnishings of his castle (to say nothing of his art collection). As for Cage, he likely would have come after Doom even if he'd needed to take a commercial flight (and been forced to shell out considerably more than was owed him). At any rate, when he gets back to the States, perhaps the deal is now sweetened for him by being able to take a measure of satisfaction in counting Victor von Doom as "another satisfied customer."