Hi everyone,
Today, I'll be writing about the thirty-eighth issue of Marvel's ROM: Spaceknight. The cover, drawn by Gene Day, shows a translucent ROM, behind Shang-Chi, with a quartet of Dire Wraiths interspersed in the overall image. The story was called "Suffer the Little Children!" The issue had a cover date of January 1983.
The tale begins from Shang-Chi's perspective. We see the star of the monthly Master of Kung Fu title hiding behind a tree, as several robed figures make their way toward a building on a foggy evening. Shang peers from his hiding spot and observes one of the figures waving a clawed hand that emits an energy bolt, which breaks the door of the facility. Shang knows that the beings aren't human and decides to investigate further.
From one of the barred windows, Shang sees the figures descend a staircase and eventually enter a room where several caskets have been placed. A trio removes the lid from one of the caskets, revealing a long-dead girl's skeleton. One of the robed beings utters incantations and orders the skeleton to rise. To Shang's amazement, she sits up and asks who had called her.
The hero decides he's heard enough, and Shang-Chi breaks through the window to pounce upon the beings. We soon learn that the robed figures are Dire Wraiths, who seek to prevent the human from granting the dead girl's request to be released. The wraith who caused her revival uses magic to temporarily incapacitate Shang, but he fends off the attack and tosses a nearby lit lamp at the wraith witch, causing it to incinerate into dust. The remaining wraiths turn into blackbirds and attempt to flee, but are also destroyed after being struck by the same lamp that extinguished their leader. After the battle, Shang turns to the open casket and asks the dead girl to resume her eternal slumber. He does not know yet just exactly what Dire Wraiths are, or why they attempted to revive the girl, but he intends to learn the answers to those and other questions that the encounter raised.
At the same time, on the western coast of Wales in England, ROM: Spaceknight stands beneath a different tree, his energy analyzer grasped firmly in one armored palm. He had used the device to track wraiths to a house just mere feet from where he stood. He recalled his encounters with young Sybil and Stephen (as recounted in recent previous issues) before venturing further. Before the Galadorian could move forward, a car was parked in front of the house's front door. An elder, bespectacled gentleman departed from the vehicle and knocked on the front door. It opened slightly, and an older woman from inside learned that the visitor was a man named Carruthers, who was there in his official capacity as an orphanage inspector.
ROM watched the exchange and quickly realized that the woman was Mara, the wraith witch who had once been young Sybil's caretaker. He was shocked by this revelation, knowing that he had sent the wraith to limbo before freeing the child. Curious, the silver Spaceknight stealthily walked closer to the building. The inspector was led by Mara up a flight of stairs to the children's room. The youth were all sitting up at the foot of their beds. He demanded to know why one child's flesh was ice cold, to which Mara was more than happy to soon show the children's true identities as Dire Wraiths. The wraiths attacked the human just before the silver Spaceknight burst through the window.
The energy analyzer revealed that all in the room except the Spaceknight and Carruthers were wraiths. ROM soon learned that this Mara was a sister witch to the one he'd banished (in issue #33). She and her companions attacked their foe, much to the human's astonishment. Carruthers took advantage of the commotion to escape, while ROM fought the wraiths who continued to change forms throughout the skirmish.
Carruthers soon made his way to the basement, where the children had been kept. However, a wraith witch stood over the entranced youngsters and used her magic to turn several of them into foul, monstrous-looking entities. He was frightened, but summoned enough courage to fling a nearby torch at the witch. The witch began to dissolve, but was about to lash out before ROM's neutralizer ray sent her to limbo. With the witch gone, the children reverted to their normal appearances.
At Stormhaven Castle in Scotland, Shang had not confided in his friends about his battle with Dire Wraiths. Nayland Smith was preoccupied, reading a newspaper article about the mummy of an Egyptian child princess that was going to be delivered to a British museum. Upon hearing that, Shang asked to see the article. Seeing the similarities between the child in the photo and the one from the casket, he asked his partners to depart for London at once.
Meanwhile, at Brandy Clark's employer, a pharmaceutical lab in Clairton, West Virginia, Brandy stood before a table where Starshine's Spaceknight armor lay. She wondered aloud what she was doing and hoped to accomplish by taking the armor there. She was startled by a stranger who knew that she wanted to become a Spaceknight. The man identified himself as Doctor Dredd and claimed that he could help her accomplish that goal.
The clever cover of this issue drew me in initially, and the parallels between Shang-Chi and ROM's interactions with Dire Wraiths kept me reading. This issue was also one of the reasons why I later went on to collect the Master of Kung Fu title's first series run in its entirety. Both encounters and Brandy's plans moved the storylines along rather well.
Well, that's all for now. Next time, I'll write about the thirty-ninth issue of Marvel Comics' ROM: Spaceknight. We'll see ROM meet Shang-Chi and his supporting characters for the first time and unite against a common foe. We'll also find out just what Doctor Dredd had in mind for Brandy Clark. Until then, have a great week and don't forget to be kind to one another.
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