Deadpool (2nd series) #48

Issue Date: 
January 2001
Story Title: 
Cruel Summer: part 3
Staff: 

Jimmy Palmiotti (writer), Paul Chadwick (pencils), Mike Raicht (assistant editor), Chris Eliopoulos (letters), Mike Marts (editor), Joe Quesada (editor-in-chief)

Brief Description: 

Deadpool wakes up, and doesn’t realize he has been buried alive by Anastasia and Fred. He discovers they still left a lighter in his costume and, when he tries to use it, the entire coffin and his costume catch on fire! Meanwhile, Fred and Anna try to escape, but when Anna discovers that Fred lied to her and he doesn’t have the promised money, she betrays him. She makes Fred return to Redhook, where they buried Wade, and she digs him back up and kills Fred. At the same time, Vinnie has killed Nikki and he himself is still alive. He has Busta hire a spy, Sandee, to find out who Deadpool is and what’s going on. Not after long, Sandee reports back to him and has spotted Wade and Sandee. Vinnie has Busta drive him to the scene. Anna tries to explain how this entire event was set in motion, but Wade doesn’t believe her, and also not that she ever had feelings for him. He feels used. Vinnie and Busta rush in, but their car crashes and Vinnie dies in the explosion. Anna gives Wade her gun, claiming her feelings are real. She wants Wade to shoot her if he believes otherwise, but she’s certain he won’t do that. Wade stands up, correcting Anna that she doesn’t know him at all, and pulls the trigger.

Full Summary: 

First thing Wade sees, are bright lights. He fixates on one in particular: a light that shapes in the form of the beautiful Anna. Her voice sounds like it’s a hundred miles away. She starts calling out to him, until her head eventually changes into a dead skull! Suddenly, Anna’s whisper turns to scream. The coppery of blood overwhelms Wade. Problem is, it’s not Anna’s blood he smells. It’s his! The dream is over, dude. Wade opens his eyes, and all he can see is… darkness.

Belt Parkway, Brooklyn, New York…

Anna can’t believe it: she’s on the run with Fred the cop! Fred wouldn’t exactly call this running. He’s just glad that Deadpool took care of things for them. Anna smiles they took care of him, though, she does feel kind of bad for doing that. But she’s certain that the one million dollars from Fred’s wife’s life insurance will help them feel a whole lot better. Fred admits he’s got a problem with the money. There was a clause in his wife’s policy that he was unaware of. They can only collect 200,000 dollars. It’s still plenty to live on, but he apologizes for it. Anna feels sorry, too. She quickly takes out a gun and points it at Fred, shouting he must think she’s an idiot. She already checked that before they started this mess, and she just knows he’s got the full amount of money. She wants him to turn the car around or else she’ll blow his head apart!

Memorial Hospital…

Vinnie is still alive! He doesn’t know what possessed Nikki for trying to shoot him, but he believes she had to be an idiot for thinking he wouldn’t save a gun under his pillow. He tells Busta to pull a bag over Nikki’s corpse and get rid of it. He guesses her partner in crime ran off. Vinnie asks Busta if he has seen anything strange at the tattoo parlor lately. Busta admits he has. He explains that Anna has been acting strange lately, and there is this guy who claims his name is Johnny, and he’s been stopping by a lot. At first, Busta thought there was something going on between the two, so he had them followed. He wants to take a call, as his friend Sandee is all over the job.

Elsewhere…

Wade doesn’t realize he’s been buried alive. He does realize he can’t panic, thinking he can be anywhere. He searches his costume, and notices he still has his lighter with him. He turns it on, and remembers he just got hit by a shovel that apparently belonged to Anna. Suddenly, the lighter’s fire spreads. Wade jokes that at least his costume is fireproof, but then he realizes… it’s not the suit he’s wearing now! The fire spreads around him, and his entire body catches on fire! He screams. Anna suddenly opens the coffin and promises she’ll help Wade out. He explains that he was talking to Fred when he got attacked, but he could smell it was Anna who hit him. She admits that.

Not far away…

Sandee explains to Busta that Anna has been very busy. She and Fred buried Deadpool, who looked like a super hero to her, and drove away afterwards. Problem is, Sandee just saw them drove back, and Anna dug Deadpool up. Sandee wants to know what’s going on, but Busta tells her to hold on until he gets there, which shouldn’t take long. Vinnie is with him, and is ready for some payback.

Redhook…

Anna apologizes for doing this to Wade. He doesn’t understand, since he thought they had something special going on. Anna wants to explain that it’s not as clear-cut as Wade might think this is. She reveals that, the men he killed, they were all bad. Wade knew that, as that’s the reason why he took the job. But Fred had a plan to collect the money of his wife’s life insurance policy. She and him were going to take the money and run away to South America. Problem is, Anna is kept property of the mob. Fred came up with the idea of hiring Wade to off the competition and make a clean brake with her, without anyone backing their backs. The only complication was Wade. Never in a million years would Anna have figured she would care so much for a person like she’s doing for Wade.

Wade jokes she sure has a funny way of showing it. Anna defends that Fred wanted Wade dead. She never wanted that. Wade realizes Anna used him but Anna defends that Fred used them both to get what he wanted. She reveals that they were going to leave Wade buried in the ground, and that it was his idea to bury him. Fred, tied up in the car, shouts at Wade not to listen to any of her nonsense. He claims that all of the men Wade killed were Anna’s ex-boyfriends. And she even killed his wife.

Wade can hear Fred’s voice. Anna confirms that, explaining she tied him up after she made him turn the car around. She claims that Fred was going to leave him stuck in the ground to die. Wade doesn’t feel too well. Fred shouts at Deadpool to think about it, but Anna walks over to him with her gun ready, correcting Fred that nobody asked for his opinion. She shoots him! Sandee hears the shots and panics. Anna notices Sandee now, something she hadn’t done before. She calls out to Sandee to come out of the car this instant. Anna holds her gun read. She recognizes Sandee as Busta’s friend. She orders her to give her cell phone, and Sandee does. Anna presses re-dial and gets on Busta’s phone.

Anna wants to know what Sandee told Busta, promising she’ll let her life for that. Sandee hesitates, but confesses that she was hired to follow Anna and told Busta where she is. Anna doesn’t like having more lose ends. An almost out of breath Wade tries to tell Anna not to shoot Sandee, but she ignores him and shoots her anyway! Anna claims she’s doing this out of love for Wade. He’s confused. Anna suggests she starts explaining things from the beginning.

She reveals that she met Fred at the tattoo parlor when he was off of duty. They became friends and she confided in him the position she was stuck in. The guys Wade killed were killers, and she was in the heart of the storm. Each day, she got drawn deeper and deeper into the killers’ world. Everything was out of control and Fred was her ticket out of it. If she tried to leave with all the information she had in her head, Anna knew she wouldn’t make it out of New Jersey alive.

Wade wants to know why Fred didn’t just call his police buddies to help her out. Anna tells Wade not to be stupid, reminding him that people in uniforms can’t be trusted. Wade thinks he was dealing with corrupt cops. Anna claims that half of the police force is on the take. Wade wants to know why Anna hit him with the shovel. Anna claims that she needed to convince Fred that they were a team, and then get the money and come back to dig Wade out. Wade notices that Anna keeps talking when he zones out. He doesn’t want to hear about it anymore. His face and body are on fire and he isn’t thinking straight. He can hardly feel his healing factor at work. Wade calls Anna an idiot, because he had it all planned out and was going to save her. But he wants to ask her his question anyway, and wants to know why he was hired to kill those men.

Anna doesn’t know who else they could have hired. They read Deadpool kills for hire. She claims they were just regular people with regular problems, and Wade is a super hero. She doesn’t think he would have understood. Wade realizes that Anna did kill Fred’s wife. Anna wants to come clean with Wade. She reveals that Fred wanted his wife dead. It was a two-for-one deal. She dies and they got the million dollars of life insurance. Anna knows that if she didn’t do it, someone else would have done the murder for sure.

Wade also realizes that Anna was that mysterious person he saw Fred hugging back at Beth’s funeral. Anna admits she felt bad about what she had done. She claims there isn’t a minute that goes by when she thinks about what happened. Wade refuses to believe that. Anna knows that, but just wants Wade to run away with her.

Busta stops the car. Vinnie wants to know why Busta stops, as even though they can see Wade and Anna, they aren’t at the spot yet. Busta claims this isn’t his problem. Vinnie threatens Busta with his gun, claiming he’ll make it his problem. He makes Busta drive through a fence, and head at top speed at Anna! She opens fire and hits the window. Busta can just barely dodge the bullets. Wade has jumped into safety, but he still feels too weak. The car crashes. Wade thinks that Busta might be still alive, despite the crash, and wants Anna to go help him. Anna agrees to do that, if that’s what Wade wants her to do.

She drags Busta out of the car. He’s almost out of breath, but apologizes to Anna, as he never meant for it to go down like this. Anna tells him to shush, and get some rest. Vinnie has survived the crash as well, and is angry. He reminds Anna that he took care of her, got her in the business and got her everything she needed, and now it has come to this. Vinnie shouts he doesn’t like to be played, so now Anna has to pay for it. He tries to pull the trigger but, on that moment, the car explodes, and Vinnie dies in the explosion!

Wade admits he can’t say he has seen that happening before. He asks Anna how Busta is doing. She jokes that he’s doing much better than Wade, as he just passed out. Wade thinks Busta is lucky, as Wade himself can barely stand. But he does mention that this is it – this is where it’s got to stop. Anna doesn’t understand. She claims that this is just the beginning… for them. She mentions the one million of dollars in the trunk. They can get out of this clean. Wade doesn’t think so, as they are leaving a boatload of bodies behind, like Fred’s wife. Anna claims Beth is just a war casualty, and still regrets that happened. There’s also Sandee, the girl Anna just killed. Anna claims that Sandee was a drug dealer.

Anna defends that they are all bad guys in somebody’s eyes. She believes that the fact is that she and Wade belong together. And she knows he knows that. Wade admits that he knows he can’t trust her. Anna doesn’t believe that. She claims that she trusts and understands Wade. She offers him her gun. She offers him to use the weapon if he thinks what they had wasn’t real. Anna knows what she felt was real. She believes that she and Wade are so alike, and belong together. She’s confident that Wade won’t shoot her. Wade tells Anna that she doesn’t know him at all, and… pulls the trigger!

Characters Involved: 

Deadpool

Anastasia

Busta Bloodvessel

Fred Pierson

Vincent “Vinnie” Calabresse (mafia boss)

Sandee (Busta’s spy)

Nikki’s corpse (his former partner)

Story Notes: 

With the story ending with an open plot, it can be presumed that Wade really shot Anna at the end of the story, as she’s never shown in a comic again.

This issue reveals mafia boss Vinnie’s full name.

Issue Information: 
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