The Thing #1
# The Thing #1 This anthology issue contains multiple weird tales of fantasy and horror. One story follows American troops who discover a mysterious green creature emerging from a tank captured from the Russians, which kills Colonel Sil and escapes into enemy territory. Another story features Hiram Crane, an eccentric bookkeeper with unusual early morning habits, who mysteriously bursts into flames on a city street, leaving investigators baffled about his identity and the cause of his death. A third tale involves Peggy Hunt and Drew Sweeney as they travel to the Surprise District, where Sweeney reveals a mysterious reason for visiting a savings bank that leads to an unexpected revelation.
Dr. Eustus Riko's audacious experiment to pierce the veil between dimensions goes catastrophically wrong when his attempt to summon a creature from Dimension 2-K-31 misfires—depositing a shapeshifting monstrosity into a Korean War battlefield instead of his laboratory. As soldiers encounter the formless mass and discover its terrifying ability to mimic any form, the narrative pivots to reveal the creature's true origin: a peace weapon designed by alien scientists Zuzo and Katu, now loose and uncontrollable in a world at war. This is a tale of scientific ambition colliding with brutal reality, where the answer to humanity's conflicts becomes its greatest nightmare.
Joe Curran arrives at the isolated Grunwald Island lighthouse in 1933 to begin a year-long posting with only two companions—Hans Kruger and Arturo—for company. When a derelict ship appears on the horizon with no lights, the three men soon discover the horrifying reason: the vessel is infested with thousands of ravenous rats that swarm toward the lighthouse, forcing them to barricade themselves in the tower and fight for their survival against mounting odds and psychological strain. As desperation and madness close in around them, Joe must find a way to endure the nightmare and warn others before the creatures claim more victims.
When Hiram Crane spots a headless man asleep across from him on the early-morning subway, he chalks it up to exhaustion—but the city's police are racing against a real killer, a maniac decapitating victims on the night trains. As Hiram wrestles with whether he witnessed a nightmare or a genuine horror, the investigation stalls and the killer vanishes, leaving one exhausted inspector to wonder if he's about to become the next victim.
When a mysterious figure calling himself "Hellfire of Doom" begins incinerating citizens across the city with infra-red rays, reporter Louis Mann and Detective Dick Trails race to stop the killer before panic consumes the entire community. As the death toll mounts and a blackmail demand reaches the mayor's desk, clues point toward Dr. Hirozi, an escaped madman from a rest home—but the truth of who wields this terrible power proves far more unsettling than anyone anticipated.
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Reprinted in Gwandanaland Comics #1999-A (2019)
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