SHADOWPLAY!
The splash page shows Strange scanning around using the Eye of Agamotto while the spectres of the cover fade into the background, ready for their actual place in the narrative. Eternity, it seems, has dumped Strange in a realm of shadows, because why keep things metaphorical when you can have LITERAL shadowplay going on? Strange returns the Eye to its amulet and muses that perhaps the reason he can see nothing is because there is nothing to see! Man, this is some deep stuff. (Like last issue, I suspect it probably seems deeper if you're off your face on drugs). And one brief flashback to the end of last issue later, Strange spies a figure emerging from the swirling mist. A figure dressed in a surgical gown and bearing his own face!The man hands Strange an invitation to "the Dance of The Red Death", and Strange, correctly deducing that this is Eternity's first move (because coming so soon after Eternity straight up told him he would do this there could still be other possibilities) follows the Surgeon Supreme through the mist and to an estate, complete with mansion, where there's a total sausage fest of a party going on.
P. A. R. T.
Why? Because if he doesn't Eternity will destroy the fucking world. As Strange approaches he realises that everybody at the party looks exactly like him, except they're all dressed like regular people while come in like the comedy cliche of the person who went to a formal affair in fancy dress. (Really though, who the fuck puts "fancy dress" on an invitation when they mean formal attire? Fucking wankers, that's who.)Strange is lead thru the house to the gathering's leader, who is wearing a Richard Nixon mask and who tells Strange that he's responsible for the impeding collapse of society while the baying party-goers shout their agreement- continuing the theme of presciently paralleling the way conservative twats like to blame everyone on the internet who isn't them for all of society's ills. With Strange being such a massive SJW Cuck it seems that people can't be normal with him around, and in time for the Red Death's midnight arrival "all rabble-rousers" (meaning Doctor Strange) are to be arrested.
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| This image is only here to troll the sort of people who use this image. |
Our mystic hero is having none of this nonsense and with hands outstretched casts a teleportation spell... which fails completely, leaving him to be tackled by two of his doppelgängers. However, Strange isn't just a MOTHERFUCKING WIZARD but a bit of a martial artist two and manages to fight off his fowes before a third assailant clocks him with a bit of lead pipe, ably demonstrating the most direct way lead can cause neurological damage. Fake Nixon stands and gloats over Strange's prone form, only to be interrupted by a chandelier crashing to the ground.
MEANWHILE...
Clea and Rama Kaliph look on as Eternity looms over the real world like a bad acid trip, and Clea asks whether the be-turbaned stereotype will be able to assist in dealing with the problem. But it appears only Doctor Strange himself has unlocked the secrets of Eternity... showing that magic and science are really quite similar, at least in the "person keeps knowledge to himself only to have that secrecy bite him on the arse when he gets in trouble" department.Frustrated Clea wanders off, giving herself the opportunity for some emo internal monologuing about whether Strange really loves her after she turned her back on everything just to be with him. Luckily we are spared Clea locking herself in her room to listen to My Chemical Romance while crying at a photo of her erstwhile love by Lord Phyffe bursting onto the roof to announce Baron Mordo has escaped!
Yeah, they're up on the roof of the Sanctum. The VERY SAME roof we saw Mordo shouting from at the end of the last issue. I mean, sure, the looming figure of Eternity is a bit of a distraction but even then you're still going to notice a crazy person dressed in bright green come up and start screaming next to you...
Anyway, Clea doesn't believe him for her beloved Stephen (he's so dreamy) cast the holding spells and he's so amazing he couldn't possibly fail... but on entering the bedroom she finds it empty!
MEANWHILE...
Strange is thrown into a dark cell, much to the consternation of its existing occupant, and Eternity appears from the darkness to verbosely taunt the Sorcerer about how shit he is without magic, because when you've got someone at your mercy you might as well be a twat about it. Strange soon realises that the cellmate is none other than Drunk Strange: scruffy, unshaven and about as cheerful a wet weekend in Swindon.
Strange, quickly giving up on any attempt to jolly Drunk Strange along, adopts a brooding pose against the wall (hey, an audience of one drunken man is still an audience) and his thought processes lead him back around to Nightmare and whether this all might be some trick. Turning the Eye of Agamotto on himself to seek inner truth (fucking hippies) Strange is disappointed to realise that his mind is unclouded and the cell he finds himself in is, for all intents and purposes, reality. But! As he leans on the wall some more a stone moves, and Strange discovers the escape tunnel Drunk Strange is digging, but instead of accepting the offer of help Drunk Strange picks up a chain and prepares to ambush the mage as he peers into the hole.
[INTERLUDE: Baron Mordo's astral form prances around over Manhattan, drawn to a kindred madness.]
Drunk Strange continues preparing to ambush Actual Strange.
[SECOND INTERLUDE: Clea has indeed retreated to her room to listen to MCR and be all emo about Strange.]
Regaining entrance to the manison, Strange attempts to speak with the be-masked leader only for narrative causality to suddenly remember Drunk Strange and have him brought up from the cells at the same time. Strange attempts to warn the party goers that the Red Death and their own leader are the real enemies, and in that moment the leader tears Stranges jacket off to reveal that he'd been wearing it over the Cloak of Levitation this whole time without so much as a tiny flaw to the silhouette; that is some good tailoring right there.
And them, accompanied by an Edgar Allen Poe quote for added Culture, the Red Death arrives, wearing a cloak that is less fancy than Strange's but sure a fuck is a lot bigger. He drifts towards Strange and Not-Nixon, who admires his punctuality (because, frankly, it'd be embarrassing for all concerned if death was late), and Death responds by raising his hands and just starting to fucking kill everyone. Strange, naturally is having none of this, and using the Eye of Agamotto, which is beginning to prove as multifunctional as New Who's sonic screwdriver, melts the mask off the Leader revealing another him (who didn't see that one coming a mile away, huh?)
Then he turns the Eye on Death himself, melting his mask only to reveal another mask, and then 'Death' just fucks off unchallenged by anybody. The Leader complains that his mask is gone and therefore he's no longer unique (just like the modern internet conservatives, he's the one that really wants to be a special snowflake). Eternity shows up and Strange calls him on his bullshit because, really, this has been a fairly sucky game so far; Eternity is the GM who only GMs because he wants to be in charge but doesn't get that he has to make the game entertaining for everyone else.
Strange points out that had the magic rules not been removed for no reason he could totally have got the XP through easier means, so Eternity's response is to transport him to the temple where he first learned the mystic arts as the feet of The Ancient One. Eternity reinstates magic, but I think we know by now that he's got some other dick move up his sleeve to compensate.
And finally the astral form of Baron Mordo finds the only person in the world probably crazier than he is, in the form of The Aged Genghis...
Next time, the fucking world ends in Doctor Strange #12!
*I'm British, fuck off.
Strange, quickly giving up on any attempt to jolly Drunk Strange along, adopts a brooding pose against the wall (hey, an audience of one drunken man is still an audience) and his thought processes lead him back around to Nightmare and whether this all might be some trick. Turning the Eye of Agamotto on himself to seek inner truth (fucking hippies) Strange is disappointed to realise that his mind is unclouded and the cell he finds himself in is, for all intents and purposes, reality. But! As he leans on the wall some more a stone moves, and Strange discovers the escape tunnel Drunk Strange is digging, but instead of accepting the offer of help Drunk Strange picks up a chain and prepares to ambush the mage as he peers into the hole.
[INTERLUDE: Baron Mordo's astral form prances around over Manhattan, drawn to a kindred madness.]
Drunk Strange continues preparing to ambush Actual Strange.
[SECOND INTERLUDE: Clea has indeed retreated to her room to listen to MCR and be all emo about Strange.]
CLANG!
Feeling the connection of Clea's emoness across space and time, Strange looks up just in time to dodge the falling chain and using quickly takes down his assailant before making good his escape. Which takes two hours. Two hours in which nobody, apparently, came to investigate the crashing and yelling. Back in the mansion's grounds Strange ambushes one of the guests and changes into his clothes (and luckily, because all the guests are him, they fit perfectly.)Regaining entrance to the manison, Strange attempts to speak with the be-masked leader only for narrative causality to suddenly remember Drunk Strange and have him brought up from the cells at the same time. Strange attempts to warn the party goers that the Red Death and their own leader are the real enemies, and in that moment the leader tears Stranges jacket off to reveal that he'd been wearing it over the Cloak of Levitation this whole time without so much as a tiny flaw to the silhouette; that is some good tailoring right there.
And them, accompanied by an Edgar Allen Poe quote for added Culture, the Red Death arrives, wearing a cloak that is less fancy than Strange's but sure a fuck is a lot bigger. He drifts towards Strange and Not-Nixon, who admires his punctuality (because, frankly, it'd be embarrassing for all concerned if death was late), and Death responds by raising his hands and just starting to fucking kill everyone. Strange, naturally is having none of this, and using the Eye of Agamotto, which is beginning to prove as multifunctional as New Who's sonic screwdriver, melts the mask off the Leader revealing another him (who didn't see that one coming a mile away, huh?)
Then he turns the Eye on Death himself, melting his mask only to reveal another mask, and then 'Death' just fucks off unchallenged by anybody. The Leader complains that his mask is gone and therefore he's no longer unique (just like the modern internet conservatives, he's the one that really wants to be a special snowflake). Eternity shows up and Strange calls him on his bullshit because, really, this has been a fairly sucky game so far; Eternity is the GM who only GMs because he wants to be in charge but doesn't get that he has to make the game entertaining for everyone else.
Strange points out that had the magic rules not been removed for no reason he could totally have got the XP through easier means, so Eternity's response is to transport him to the temple where he first learned the mystic arts as the feet of The Ancient One. Eternity reinstates magic, but I think we know by now that he's got some other dick move up his sleeve to compensate.
And finally the astral form of Baron Mordo finds the only person in the world probably crazier than he is, in the form of The Aged Genghis...
Next time, the fucking world ends in Doctor Strange #12!
*I'm British, fuck off.
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