Lee & Kirby & Ortolani: The Last Fantastic Four Story, Part Five

This is the back half of the fourth and concluding installment of the Final Fantastic Four story that Italian creator Leonardo Ortolani produced for the tenth issue of the Italian fanzine MADE IN USA in 1994. It was set immediately after the last FF issues produced by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby and was intended as a climactic end-piece to the entire series as a whole–the sort of wrap-up that eternally long-running super hero properties never get.

As with the previous chapters, all of the translation here is being done by me using software, so it’s possible and even probable that some errors have crept in.

CAPTION: …

VOICE: Reed…

REED: Someone’s calling me…and…that voice…I know that voice!

VOICE: Reed…

REED: It can’t be you! You can’t be…

REED: …Katherine?!

REED: My god, Kathy…

REED: …how many years has it been…

KATHY: Hello, Reed…

KATHY: What is that?

REED: It’s a gift for you…

KATHY: Did you make it?

REED: Yes! Me! All by myself!

REED: I worked on it day and night…for a week!

REED: But it didn’t cost me much…

REED: I was thinking about you…

KATHY: Well…you were gone…

KATHY: I…

KATHY: …now I’m with Bobby…I’m sorry…

REED: Why? Why, Dad? I did it all for her! All by myself!

DOOM: …how many things have you done together?

DOOM: Do you want it, Richards?

DOOM: Keep it…

DOOM: …it is yours.

SUE: I-love-you-so-much-Reed…

SUE: I-love-y…>CRRR<…uch…eed….ZZTT<

SUE: I-l…>GLAK< WHIIRR…much >CLIK<

SUE: …much >CLIK<

SUE: …much >CLIK<

SUE: …m…

REED: What did you do to her?!

REED: No!

REED: I…it’s me!

REED: me…

REED: me…

REED: me…

REED: Gas…

REED: Hallucinogenic gas…

REED: Susan…forgive me…

REED: You too, Ben, my friend…

REED: It’s too late to go back…all I can do to fix it…

REED: …is to move ahead faster!

CAPTION: …

SUE: I couldn’t stand them anymore!

SUE: Those eyes…those silences full of questions…that continuous search, dig, rummage through every fold of my soul…

SUE: …it horrifies me…

SUE: …it hurts!

SUE: But any defense on my part is considered guilty…

SUE: They believe what they know…what they see…

SUE: …and who will believe Susan Storm? The Invisible Girl?!

SUE: Nnn!

SUE: …my legs!

SUE: If they believed me…

SUE: …if only they had believed me…

SUE: …they wouldn’t have left me alone…

BEN: Hang on, Sue!

BEN: …IT’S CLOBBERIN’ TIME!

CAPTION: Ben Grimm.

CAPTION: The strength of a thousand men.

CAPTION: The heart of one.

SUE: The battle is…over!

SUE: Ben?

SUE: …he’s so motionless!

SUE: Ben?!!

SUE: Ben, answer me, please!

SUE: Ben!!

SUE: B…Ben?!

CAPTION: Benjamin Grimm is free from the grotesque form in which he was imprisoned.

CAPTION: Forever.

REED: Doom…

DOOM: So the moment of the duel has come…the males fight for the possession of the female…

REED: Forget it, madman…there’s not going to be any duel!

DOOM: Don’t be stupid, Richards!

DOOM: You want Susan as much as I do! We are the same!

REED: That’s where you are wrong. We’re not the same. You speak of Susan as an object to have…

REED: …like a spoiled child who wants the toy all to himself!

DOOM: How…

DOOM: How dare you?

REED: No, Doom…

REED: How dare you?!

REED: Susan and I are not looking for toys, but people…and we found each other…many years ago…

REED: And you had already lost then!

REED: No, there will be no duel…much less for a Control Rod that has surely already exhausted its energy, you would have already used it otherwise…

REED: No, Doom…we will leave this ship and I will find a cure…

DOOM: Crazy arrogant…

DOOM: …you won’t find it…

DOOM: …but do not fear for the fate of your son….

DOOM: When you are no longer there, I will personally raise him…

DOOM: …he will become my worthy successor…

DOOM: …I will reap the fruit of your love, Richards! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha!

REED: You…pig!

REED: You won’t touch my son!

REED: You are too dangerous to allow to go free!

DOOM: Yes, Richards…fight…strike me…

DOOM: And now…

REED: UNH!!

DOOM: …let it all end!

DOOM: …and in the end, Doom triumphs!

REED: The control device for my elastic structure!

SUE: Reed!

DOOM: Susan?!

SUE: Reed! Oh god, no! Reed! No! No!

REED: Suss…

SUE: Not you too!

REED: Ss><

SUE: REEED!

SUE: He’s gone.

SUE: He’s gone at last.

SUE: We are alone again…

SUE: You and I…how it was meant to be…

SUE: …have I done well, my darling?

SUE: I divided them…so that they were weaker…

SUE: I thought…I thought you didn’t care about me any more…

DOOM: Susan…

SUE: …that you had forgotten me!

DOOM: Forget you? No! Never! We have a lot of time to recover…but we’ll fill it, you’ll see…

DOOM: I will give you all of my heart…

SUE: I want it…

SUE: …now…

DOOM: !!!

CAPTION: Now Susan knows the taste of revenge.

CAPTION: As in an ancient hunting ritual, she eats it while it is still warm.

CAPTION: And madness wrenches from her an inhuman scream, the result of devastating discharges from her force-field…

CAPTION: The mammoth Victoria groans, shot to death…

CAPTION: …and after a few moments of fearful roll…

CAPTION: …descends on New York, with an endless lament of twisting metal!

SUE: NNH!

DOOM: The life support systems built into my armor have activated…

DOOM: My dear…

DOOM: filthy…

DOOM: bitch…

DOOM: Unfortunately…I will have to trade you for a new body…

DOOM: Believe me…it will hurt me more than it hurts you…

CAPTION: The woman is dragged into a pentacle traced on the ground…

DOOM: Come, you monsters…

CAPTION: And while Doom mutters ancient formulas, Hell begins to manifest itself around them…

DOOM: …come and heal my wound!

CAPTION: Little red eyes peer at him…and pause, drooling, over the blood that still drips from the hole…

DOOM: What are you waiting for, you idiots?!

DOOM: What

DOOM: are you

DOOM: looking at…

DOOM: Susan?

DOOM: Begone!

DOOM: No!

DOOM: She…

DOOM: She is here!

DOOM: …but she is invisible, you understand?

DOOM: She is invisible!

DOOM: You must believe me!

DOOM: I command you to believe me!

CAPTION: Obscene laughter is the only reply…

DOOM: Noo! Back!

DOOM: I am Dooooooom!

DOOM: NNOOOOOO

CAPTION: Muscles, bones, metal…all are chewed greedily before he has finished screaming…

DOOM: SUUSSSAAAAAAA><

CAPTION: Invisible hands plunge into the closing vortex…

CAPTION: …but all they manage to bring back to this plane of reality is the useless symbol of what was once Victor Von Doom…

CAPTION: Then…after that last effort…Sue curls up on herself and waits for her end…invisible to all…

DAREDEVIL: I’ve found her!

DAREDEVIL: She’s right here in front of me!

AGATHA: Very good, Mr. Murdock…carry her into the magical pentacle and prepare to be transported…in body and spirit…

AGATHA: …to my home!

CAPTION: …

REPORTER: …the world mourns the disappearance of the 4 heroes…people, in a slow procession, bring flowers to the disaster site…miles left homeless…

REPORTER: In the 4PM bulletin, we will connect with the kingdom of Latveria, where the end of the dictatorship is…><

CAPTION: A short cry…desperate.

AGATHA: She’s woken up.

AGATHA: I brought her back to visibility through the harness she wears…

AGATHA: Unfortunately…

AGATHA: …her face….

DAREDEVIL: What happened to you, Mrs. Harkness? What happened to Susan Richards when she found herself facing Hell?

AGATHA: She had to see for herself.

CAPTION: The red devil says nothing more.

CAPTION: There is a dark side in each of us…

CAPTION: Unexpressed feelings, truths removed, irrefutable sins…

CAPTION: …a hell that people prefer to hide at the bottom of their soul…or mask…

CAPTION: …because if it were revealed, it would open up abysses of pain and destruction…

CAPTION: Ever since the accident brought him to heaven, he has always found himself face-to-face with himself.

CAPTION: It took years, to accept, to have the courage to look at himself as he really is.

CAPTION: Difficult years.

CAPTION: Suffering.

CAPTION: But in the end, he succeeded.

CAPTION: And that made him a hero.

CAPTION: A man.

CAPTION The Man Without Fear.

CAPTION: Maybe it will take years for Susan Richards too…

CAPTION: Perhaps, one day, she too will find the courage to look at herself without a mask.

CAPTION: END.

CAPTION: Dedicated to…

CAPTION: …Stan Lee, Jack Kirby and Joe Sinnott, who together created the most beautiful stories of the Fantastic Four.

CAPTION: …Francesco Matteo and all the other MADE IN USA guys , for their friendship and precious help in making my dreams come true (they created a monster!)

CAPTION: …all those who love good comics, and who I would have loved to be able to please.

CAPTION: …Manuela and Vassili who endure me.