Deadpool (2nd series) #65

Issue Date: 
May 2002
Story Title: 
Healing Factor - prologue
Staff: 

Gail Simone (writer), Udon - Erik Ko, Alvin Lee, Rob Ross, Eric Vedder, A-Zero, TR2 (art team), Dave Sharpe (letters), Mike Raicht and Mike Marts (editors), Joe Quesada (editor in chief), Bill Jemas (president)

Brief Description: 

Several months ago, Deadpool was hired to assassinate an Asian crime lord, but accidentally stumbled into a truce meeting of the four most powerful crime leaders of Asia. Although he only randomly shot his gun, he actually killed all of them. The incident gave him quite a reputation and he is now an admired and respected mercenary. He also set up Deadpool Inc. and his assistant Sandi has her hands full coordinating his many appointments. Deadpool also takes in a homeless bum he calls Ratbag and makes him his biographer. Later that day, Deadpool is offered a high amount of money to take a certain job in Germany. He agrees, but it's a set-up. Deadpool is approached by a man calling himself the Black Swan. He is angry for buffoons like Deadpool ruining the nobility of the assassination profession, and especially because dealing with the four crime lords was supposed to be his final defining task. Black Swan has a strange ability: he can hack into the human mind and body like it's a computer and place a virus there. Deadpool is left paralyzed and can do nothing to prevent getting beaten up by the Black Swan and his forces time and again.

Full Summary: 

(six months ago)

Deadpool is on a restaurant roof in Kobe, Japan, fighting several bodyguards. He manages to take them out before they can call for backup. Deadpool looks down through the roof window, and sees that the Four Winds, the biggest rivaling Asian crime lords are in their truce talks. Deadpool has been hired by Minamiyori, the South Wind, to kill his rival Kita, the North. Right as he is aiming with his rifle, one of the guards awakens and pushes Deadpool through the window. In freefall, Deadpool tries to accomplish his job and fires various times before crashing onto the table of the four crime lords. Getting up, he finds his rifle bent from the impact and no longer useful. Deadpool then attempts to talk his way out of the situation, as all guards in the room are pointing their weapons at him, but then all Four Winds fall over, face first into their food. In mid-fall, Deadpool has accidentally not only shot his target, but all of them. The guards gaze in awe, all have been shot straight through the heart.

Only one man, Black Swan, is sitting calmly on a chair, kind of annoyed, he too is holding a gun, but does not seem to belong to the guards. Meanwhile the bodyguards have dealt with the first shock, and now go after Deadpool, who jumps off the table into the crowd and runs for the kitchen while being shot at by dozens of guns. Deadpool grabs a turkey as his prize, and also uses a piece of butter on his still aching butt (from the fall), before jumping out of a window and escaping. Deadpool knows that he accidentally killed his employer and won't get paid - so what? Above on the rooftop, the bodyguard who pushed Deadpool watches him ride away on his bike.

(Present)

Deadpool is training at Merc Works, his favorite gym, and various Hydra agents and AIM operatives are all around him listening to him telling the story of how he assassinated the Four Winds. They are mighty impressed and when Deadpool complains about having no towel, the guys are actually beating each other to get one for their idol. Deadpool walks over to the gym's bar and heavily flirts with a gorgeous babe until he is interrupted by his beeper. It's Sandi calling him back to his office. Deadpool gets changed and now wears a shirt with a black tie, and a customized Deadpool Inc jacket, though he still has his usual facemask on. As he leaves Merc Works, all assembled wave and wish him well, they really admire him.

Outside, Deadpool walks to his Ferrari and drives to an apparently abandoned bar. He enters it through a broken window and sits down on a bar chair. He presses a secret button and an elevator shaft opens, taking him to the main lobby of Deadpool Inc. Sandi is sitting at the desk with a headset on. She is telling a new client that Deadpool is busy for the next weeks. After ending her phone call, she comes over to Wade and fills him in on today's schedule: a labor dispute at the docks and taking the Latverian ambassador's poodle hostage. Sandi also shows him some sketches for a redesigned costume, though Wade finds it weird that they all sport high heels.

Sandi then points towards a dirty man and says that he might be there to apply for a job, though she is not quite sure. Deadpool takes a look and decides to take him. How could he deny such a noble brow and prominent nose? He decides to make Ratbag, as he calls him, his personal biographer. Inside his office, Deadpool fills Ratbag in on what he has to do: he will follow him and write down his thoughts. Deadpool starts with pondering who he is: hero, villain, mercenary, sex-god and champion skeeball player. Wade takes off his facemask and sighs as he looks into a mirror. On top of his ugly scarred head there are a few tufts of hair. Deadpool tried out Rogaine, but with not much success. Deadpool wants Ratbag to re-read his thought, but on the paper he only scrawled "Ratbag" dozens of times and says, "I used to know what month it is!"

Right then the phone rings. Deadpool answers it and tells the person on the other end that he is outbooked for the next months, yet when he hears the amounts that he is offered, Deadpool decides to skip all other assignments and agrees to come to Germany for whatever job he is supposed to do. Several hours later, Deadpool arrive at an airport in Germany and are picked up by a limousine. They are taken to a beautiful castle, and the driver hands Deadpool a suitcase of weapons. Deadpool asks if there is somebody inside that he should avoid shooting, but the driver says that there are no innocents inside. Wade tells Ratbag to wait at a safe distance and leaves. After he is gone, the driver takes off his disguise. It's none other than the guard Deadpool fought on the rooftop in Kobe.

Approaching the castle, Deadpool takes out various guards and enters only to find somebody waiting for him. The man tells that he has been expecting him, as he is both the named target and the man who called Deadpool in the first place. He then introduces himself as Black Swan, and explains that his family has been in the assassination business for three hundred years now and he doesn't like a mask wearing buffoon like Deadpool to invade. Deadpool's arms goes numb and he sinks to the ground, while Black Swan continues that he is proud of his profession but people like Deadpool make it vulgar and coarse. The Four Winds was to be his final straw in an impeccable career and Wade ruined it. He then starts to beat up the immovable Wade with a fire poker. Black Swan recognizes Wade's healing factor kicking in, however he too has special powers. He says that he is a viral programmer who can hack himself into the human body's natural harddrive and download viruses into his opponent's brain. Although helpless, Deadpool still cracks a joke, annoying the Black Swan even more. He orders his men to take Deadpool and Ratbag back to the States, and Deadpool should be beaten to near death every fifteen minutes along the way.

The next morning, Sandi arrives at work and finds the lobby violated. A trace of blood leads to Deadpool's office and once she opens the door. She sees her boss in a really worse condition, tied up on a chair. Around his neck is a sign saying, "I'm an ignorant buffoon". Ratbag is sitting next to him, stating the obvious "We're not okay at all right now..."!

Characters Involved: 

Deadpool

Sandi

Ratbag

Misha, a Hydra agent

Jake, an AIM operative

Black Swan

Black Swan's assistant / driver
In a flashback:

Deadpool

Higashi / East, Kita / North, Manishi / West, Minamiyori / South (all Four
Winds)

Black Swan

Black Swan's assistant / driver

Story Notes: 

Rogaine is a hair growth product marketed to men with male pattern baldness.

Issue Information: 
Written By: