Ghost in the Apparatus of the Spirit in the Shell of the Machine (comic story)
Ghost in the Apparatus of the Spirit in the Shell of the Machine was the second comic in the Journey Into Misery subseries of the webcomic The Cosmic Beholder. Written and drawn by Paul Hoppe, it was released both in serialised webcomic form and in a limited print run.
Although Jenny Everywhere was a recurring character in The Cosmic Beholder and the comic was advertised as such from the start, she played no part in this first story, which instead starred Kelly and Jenkins in their second appearance.
Contents
Plot
Back in New York City after their abduction by the Vanilla Puddings of Riegel 6, Kelly and Jenkins have been trying to return to a normal life, ignoring their powers — but there is only so long they can put up with being chained to each other with indestructible alien manacles. Kelly decides to drop in on an old inventor friend of hers, Professor Madison, who lives in a facility in the middle of a desert, who she believes might be able to help.
Due to absent-minded Madison forgetting they were coming, the two have to contend with the advanced security system fencing in her property, but after all is cleared up, Madison greets Kelly in good spirits. She introduces the “Terrific Two” (as Jenkins has been calling the superpowered pair of him and Kelly) to her assistants, Hank Richards and Rodney Rabbit, the latter of whom is a genetically-modified rabbit who would seem to have stepped out of a cartoon, were he not perpetually drunk.
Madison shows them a giant robot she has been developing, controlled by a living person using motion capture sensors, and which she has nicknamed “the Rabbit” due to its large ‘ear-’like antennae. The Rabbit's claw proves strong enough to break the chain, freeing Jenkins and Kelly, but they are persuaded to stay a while so that Madison can analyse their superpowers. Preliminary tests confirm that the aliens altered the two's DNA, but Madison wants to run more experiments, and the two agree to stay the night (during which night Rodney successfully propositions Kelly, and Hank very unsuccessfully propositions Jenkins).
In the morning, however, a panicked Madison discovers that her Deathray has been broken out of her vault in the night by a being with apparent super-strength. With the security cameras showing nothing, Jenkins proposes that “the Terrific Two” take on their first case as superheroes. Kelly is reluctant, but Madison persuades her, and goes so far as to create matching superhero outfits for the Two.
Thus, the following night, do the two, in their newly-minted Terrific Two outfit, stumble upon the apparent culprit, a huge bedsheet-ghost-like figure who soon turns out to be “the Rabbit” under a white tarp, on whose right arm the Deathray has been mounted. While the Two fight the robot (during which fight Kelly is briefly knocked out), Madison and Rodney run to the control room to find out who's controlling the Rabbit. It turns out to be none other than Hank Richards, jealous of Kelly's attention for Rodney over her human assistant. Rodney easily overpowers him by shooting the control panel, electrocuting Hank.
This has the unexpected side-effect of kickstarting the now-free Rabbit robot's access to sentience. It begins to make a grand speech about its awakening being the beginning of a new, golden era of human-robot cooperation, only for Kelly, now awake, to crush it to pieces. Madison is quick to excuse Kelly's terrible mistake, insisting that she didn't know — but it is not clear that her hopes in Kelly's better nature are well-founded…
Worldbuilding
Universes
- This story takes place all in one universe, later named as Reality Z-25 31-H.
Other
- Hank Richards has “several PhDs from Harvard and Yale”.
Continuity
- This story picks up after the events of COMIC: Journey Into Misery and includes a recap thereof.
Behind the scenes
Read online
Ghost in the Apparatus of the Spirit in the Shell of the Machine is available online on the Cosmic Beholder blog.
