The story so far:
Nero's PUNISHER: DEAD MAN'S PARTY casting and preview
http://www.comicbookmovie.com/fan_fic/news/?a=26270
Nero's PUNISHER: DEAD MAN'S PARTY vol. one
http://www.comicbookmovie.com/fan_fic/news/?a=26463
Nero's PUNISHER: DEAD MAN'S PARTY vol. two
http://www.comicbookmovie.com/fan_fic/news/?a=26790
Nero’s PUNISHER: DEAD MAN’S PARTY vol. three
http://www.comicbookmovie.com/fan_fic/news/?a=27092
Nero’s PUNISHER: DEAD MAN’S PARTY vol. four
http://www.comicbookmovie.com/fan_fic/news/?a=27483
Nero’s PUNISHER: DEAD MAN’S PARTY vol. five
http://www.comicbookmovie.com/fan_fic/news/?a=28144
Nero’s PUNISHER: DEAD MAN’S PARTY vol. six
http://www.comicbookmovie.com/fan_fic/news/?a=28880
SCENE TWENTY-FIVE:
A still weakened and very pale and scruffy Frank walks back to his safe house with an arm load of medical suplies. He reaches the door and scans but sees no threat. Only a couple being bothered by a heavy set man with glasses and a cheap suit attempting to hand them evangelical tracts. As he shuffles his bags to his stronger right arm the portly figure walks up.
Micro:
Excuse me sir, but have you heard the good news? Our Lord’s return is fast approaching.
Frank:
(Turning to look at the man) Not interested.
Micro stands before him with a gun aimed at him; before Frank bleary eyes can drop the bags and pull a weapon Micro fires a dart into his neck. Frank waivers and drops the bags, but does not fall. Micro panics and nervously pulls a second tranquilizer pistol from his overcoat pocket. Castles eyes are filled with a murderous fury; Micro fires the second round into Castle’s left shoulder. Frank staggers toward him before finally passing out. Micro looks as if he’s about to have a massive coronary. He leans against the door way shaking.
Micro:
Christ, I think I shit myself. [frick].
At JFK we see Soap arriving at the airport by taxi. The porter asks to see his ticket and he pats his pocket, then the other. Suddenly we see a flash of his trench coat lying on his kitchen table; the ticket protrudes from one pocket the envelope with the traveling cash from the other.
Soap:
Mother[frick]er.
(He checks his watch: 12:10 PM.)
I’ve still got time. Shit. Shit. TAXI! (Getting in) 499 Dean Street. Hurry please.
There is a dreamy montage of the three principles as they drive to their respective fates.
[[Soundtrack: Opening solo of Metallica’s “Fade to Black” begins playing opening solo.]]
Micro drives over the RFK Bridge; Frank lies unconscious and bound in the back of the van. He eyes the Punisher’s comatose form nervously, a fresh dart loaded in the pistol atop the dash.
Shotgun et al, toss the nude lifeless body of Charlene out in front of the burnt out tenements in Red Hook. As several of her girls run to her they see the a nail has been driven into her chest, it holds in place a scrap of paper with a death’s head smeared on it in Charlene’s blood.
Soap and his taxi turn onto heavy traffic on Atlantic Avenue. He looks out the window nervously, his head leaning against the glass. He checks his watch again, 12:50.
As he drives southwest through Red Hook on BQE Micro actually passes the hit team; he and Shotgun lock eyes. Micro watches fearfully in the side view mirror as the men drive on.
Soap arrives home and dashes upstairs grabbing his coat, nervously checking the pockets to confirm the airline ticket and running cash provided by Micro are still there before running back out only to find his taxi gone.
Soap:
Man, damn.
He looks around for a moment before realizing his unmarked unit is just down the block. Leaving his official vehicle at the airport was not in the plan as it would give some indication as to where the detective may have gone to his pursuers, but he has no recourse now. In the background we see the apale panel van, slowly turn off of 6th Avenue. Soap rushes to his car and gets in. He pulls into the street as the van passes. He is forced to slam on his breaks as the van stops suddenly in front of him on the crowded one way thoroughfare that is Dean Street.
Soap:
(Honking his horn) Aw, c’mon! I’ve got a flight to catch!
With that the rear doors swing open. Soap is looking down the barrel of a Mossberg 500 Bullpup wielded by Shotgun and an Italian Spectre M4 submachine gun in the hands of Ramirez.
Our view changes to that of Soap as seen from the hood of his car.
Soap:
(Snorts a half laugh) Shit.
We see Soap’s hand jerk the gear shift into reverse and peddle to the floor. With that the windshield erupts. A wall of buckshot and 9mm shatters the glass exactly where Soap’s face was. Through the breaking glass we see blood spray the interior of the windshield and Soap’s form lull onto the passenger seat before the incoming rounds shatter the safety glass into an opaque fog of cracked glass. After a brief moment of continuous fire Shotgun and Ramirez run out of ammo. Soap’s car slams backward into another parked car’s bumper. Krieger drives the van down the street doors open as several police officers run down the block in response to the cacophony of gunfire so near their precinct. Ramirez opens fire at the officers scattering them. Some vainly return fire with their service .38’s while others make a beeline for the victim sure to be found in the now smoking Chevy.
Lenny, the desk sergeant, is among the first to arrive at the bullet riddled car.
Lenny:
Jesus Christ that’s Soap’s unmarked. It’s Soap! Somebody just shot up Soap. Call for a [frick]in’ ambo! Get a [frick]in’ medic!
Lenny’s face is pale as he looks into the blood stained interior.
Lenny:
Aw, Jesus, Soap.
SCENE TWENTY-SIX
Frank comes around to the smell of coffee and the bubbling of a percolator. His head is swimming and his vision is blurry. He has drooled in his unconscious state and attempts to wipe it away only to discover his wrists are bound with heavy steel bracelets. The realization startles him to wakefulness.
He is sitting in a darkened room, strapped to a heavy steel chair that is bolted to the floor; a chain crosses his chest and shoulders forming a five point harness. His arms are held perfectly straight aimed directly at the floor to either side of the chair, attached to the bracelets are heavy gauge chain clasped to boled reenforced anchors on the floor. There is no slack to allow movement. The same has been done to Frank’s feet.
Micro:
Hello Frank.
The voice comes from behind him, footfalls mark the unseen man’s location as he circles out of sight.
Frank:
Kill me and get this over with.
Micro:
I’m not here to kill you Frank. I’m here to save your life.
Frank:
And why would you do that?
Micro:
Because you saved mine.
Frank:
Congratulations.
Micro:
Deciding whether or not to kill me?
Frank:
No, I know I’m going to kill you.
Micro:
Not curious who I am?
Frank:
Frankly, I couldn’t give two shits.
Micro:
My name is Linus Lieberman. You saved my life on Tuesday, April 19th 1982, in front of the Forest Houses, in Morrisania in the South Bronx.
Frank:
And that means what to me?
Micro:
To you? Nothing. I had a good life, graduated Magna from MIT, married my college sweetheart, got a job with IBM right when computers were becoming something. I designed a few patents for new circuit boards and then new microchip technology; sold the patents to the company, I made a damn good living. My wife and I were happy. We had a son, my Jacob. God, he was a smart kid… he could read at three. Just figured it out. He could do anything. My wife died when Jacob was four, uterine cancer. From that day on it was just me and Jacob. I made sure he went to the best schools, had the best of everything. He was always top of his class always everything a father could want in a son. My son was my life. I loved my boy Mister Castle.
Jacob got a full scholarship to Columbia University, he wanted to study journalism. I worried you know, kid from Connecticut thrown into the big city. What could I do? I let him go. He loved it; he kept his nose clean and made the grade. In his third year one of his professors, this arrogant prick, this old hack kneed gonzo journalist [frick] from the ‘60’s, tells him he needs to get in the field, tackle some hard subject matter up close. Jacob decided to do an expose on the heroin epidemic.
Jacob told me what he was thinking about writing; that was the fall of ’80. And I knew… I just knew, something bad was going to happen. I felt it here, you know. But I’m dad, you know, I spoiled him. I couldn’t say no to him. He was grown; he was twenty, a man. In the begging everything was fine. He called home every couple of days, like always. Then the calls came every couple of weeks. Then once a month. And I knew. He didn’t come home that Christmas. After a few weeks I called the university. His roommate said he hadn’t seen him since November. His advisor said he had flunked every class in fall semester, that he had lost his scholarship. No one knew where he was.
I talked to his girlfriend; she said that at first he was just collecting information from the junkies. Getting their stories, then the pushers, then they started clamming up. Saying they couldn’t trust him because he wasn’t willing to use. They started calling him a narc. So he started to taste a little to get their trust again. Then he stopped asking question and just started using. By December she’d left him, she said he’d become a junkie. He was living on the streets in the South Bronx.
I tried to look for him myself. I got mugged a dozen times. I was stabbed twice.
Finally I hired PI’s; they found him in late October of ‘81. He was living on the streets, he was… prostituting himself; sleeping with men for cash or drugs. Heroin. I went to him, I brought him home. He robbed the place. Took everything he could and disappeared. I'd lost him. A month later I got a call from the NYPD. Homicide division. They found Jacob in an alley; someone had beaten him and… burned him to death with gasoline. The police say he was only identified by his dental records. I tried to push the cops to find out who did it. I wanted the men that killed my son, but the cops… the [frick]ing cops; they said to my face that they didn’t have the resources to investigate the murder of a junkie. To my face! I had to have the PI’s track down what happened.
My son had pawned everything from the house and blown it on drugs; half of what he stole from me was stolen from him. He was out of cash and begged a dealer for dope. The guy beat him down. My son got a gun from another junkie; he came back and robbed the dealer. Sometime that night the dealer must’ve tracked him down, he brought a few men with him. He killed my son. He beat my Jacob half to death and then drenched him in gas and lit a match. His name was Andre Bryson.
Frank:
B-Pain.
Micro:
(Nods)Street name, B-Pain. I took this to the police and still the sons of bitches wouldn’t do a Goddamn thing. I handed them the conviction. Nothing! So I bought a gun. Me; the most liberal, most passive guy you’d ever meet. I missed ‘Nam by filing as a conscientious objector for God’s sake. I drove to the Bronx with a picture of this guy and I parked in front of the Forest Houses projects and I waited.
I had no plan aside from walking up to him and shooting him in the face. I had never even fired the revolver I bought, this little .38 special. I bought it because I had seen it on TV, knew cops carried them so they must be good. Finally he showed up. He had a crowd of guys with him and I knew I was dead. Maybe I’d get close enough to shoot him, but I’d only get one shot before they killed me. I’d shoot him, they’d shoot me and it would just be… over.
It took me an hour to work up the nerve to get out of my car and walk down the block. I was crossing the street, heading straight for Bryson. I had my hand in my coat pocket, my pistol in my hand. He saw me. He was just beginning to register that I was coming at him when… BAM. You walked up right beside him. You shot him in the head with a shotgun. I was looking in his eyes when his face peeled away. I just stood there as you killed the other three. The last man crawled into the street; maybe he thought I’d help him. You just walked up put you foot on his back and put him down. I just stood there dumbfounded. You looked right at me. Like you were deciding whether or not I was a threat; whether or not to kill me. In the end you just walked away.
I knew from that moment what I had to do. I knew I could help you. You could do the things I couldn’t. You could make them pay. You could fight the war I was too afraid to. I started reading up on you, reading about how the shrinks thought you were crazy, thought you were a sociopath. But I knew. I knew you were fighting a war. I knew I could take what you did and give you the tools and logistical support you were lacking.
Frank:
And how can you do that?
Suddenly the light switches on revealing that Frank is in the center of a small warehouse filled with crates and boxes marked for the US Army and Marine Corps. M-16’s, M203 Grenade Launchers, M67 Grenades, Explosives, M60’s, M21 and M40A1 sniper rifles, laser rangefinders, communications equipment, computers, body armor, flack vests, explosives, and thousands upon thousands of rounds of ammunition.
Frank:
How did you get all of this?
Microchip:
I closed out my own accounts ages ago, sold my home, cashed in my pension, liquidated everything, hacked and erased every record of my existence, on August 11th 1984, Linus Lieber disappeared.
Know anything about computers Frank? You’d be amazed what you can do with a custom Mac and a land line now days. I hacked into the New York National Guard’s supply system and established two new supply depots, on paper only, forged all the documentation I needed and low and behold the military delivered right to the warehouses I rented. They just thought it was another logistics storage facility, the Army hides stashes of gear in plain sight far more than you’d think. They keep depots scattered about in case the Russkies ever come over the top and invade. By the time the Army realized what had happened and raided my fake depots I’d long since cleaned them out; moved everything to smaller caches, like this one, scattered around the tri-state.
What I don’t have here we can buy. I’ve managed to create a war chest of nearly seven million dollars. I hacked into banking systems connected to criminal enterprises and bled small amounts here, larger amounts there. Grand theft blood money en masse. All of it is yours, Frank.
You need information? I can get it. I can tap into law enforcement and federal criminal records find anyone, get to anyone. Anything you need I can do it. Building schematics, I can get them. Tax records and forensic accounting, I’m your man. Weapons and procurement, I’m learning and I’m a damn fast learner. I can be your partner, Frank. We’d work as a unit. I can run day to day operations and weapons procurement while you focus on planning and mission readiness. You carry out the missions while I run intel and overwatch.
Frank:
No deal.
Micro:
I need this, Frank. I… I’m like you. I don’t have anything left, but this… this [frick]ing anger. This hate. I hate them. The pushers and dealers. All those mother[frick]ers who just do whatever they want, hurt and kill and nobody gives a shit. I want them dead. Somebody has to set an example. Someone has to punish them.
Frank:
So do it yourself.
Micro:
I can’t. I don’t have the stomach for it. To kill a man. Not even a scum sucking bastard like Bryson. I can’t do what you do. You can’t do what I do. Together, though. Together we could do so much [frick]ing damage, Frank. I could steer you at the big game. I can get you access to those dark back room mother[frick]ers like Sandoval. I can make them fear you.
Frank:
Why now? What made you finally get off your fat ass and contact me?
Micro:
Toomey. B-Pain was one of his pushers when he operated in Harlem. I wanted Toomey. I’d been planning on you taking him for two years. Why did you think I had all the information on the man? His business. His holdings and property. Years of research into his organization. When I heard that you had knocked out one of his crack dens and then put two and two together as to why I knew you were finally on his scent. So I conveniently bumped into Detective Soap. I handed over everything I had on Toomey and let you go to work. Then you [frick]ed it all up.
Frank:
I [frick]ed it up? Before I charged in on Herrera there was a phone call warning them that I was there. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out you made that call.
Micro:
That was me trying to save you from yourself.
Frank:
Your idea of “saving” involves me nearly bleeding to death from a…
Micro:
You aren’t ready to take on the big boys yet, Frank. How were you going to fight them, huh? You think I have resources? Me: a semi-retired computer nerd from Hartford who learned how to system hack as a hobby. If I can track down your safe houses, flops, the acreage upstate, and your meager little weapons caches in my off hours, funded only by the sale of my home and my pension, what do you think the cartel could do? Frank, it’s been a little less than forty-eight hours since you hit them and they’ve tracked down at least as much on you as I have in three years, they’ve flown in a hit team of world class scary [frick]s and have killed one of the few people you openly knew, and sent the other running for his life. Did you ever stop to think what the collateral damage from your overzealousness was going to be? Did you care?
Frank:
They knew the risks.
Micro:
[frick] you! [frick]-you! These people aren't soldiers; a drugged up hooker and a burn-out cop do not constitue selfless crusaders. They aren't martyrs to your [frick]ing cause. You didn’t see the look in Charlene’s eyes when they took her. The fear. That was on you, you son of a bitch. Your fault! You put her between you and a bullet.
Frank:
And you let them take her.
Micro:
[frick] you, Frank.
Frank:
You want to make them pay; for Charlene, for your son?
Micro:
Your Goddamn right I do!
Frank:
In a few days a ship will arrive at Pier 12. I don't know which docks, or what ship, but you find out which one and then you can see them punished. Toomey, his hitters, and anyone else that gets in my way. I'll finish it. You do that and then we'll talk about you being a partner. Consider this a trial run.
Micro:
Thank you, Frank.
Frank:
Now get these [frick]in' chains off me.
Frank’s narration (PWJ):
Punisher War Journal: Friday, January 25, 1985.
Looks like I may have found a recruit.
SCENE TWENTY-SEVEN:
Shotgun, Ramirez, and Krieger arrive at the estate in Westchester as the late afternoon sun begins to dip below the tops of the trees that surround the palatial estate. They have adumped the van in favor of new vehicle. The men approach the main house with their duffle bags full of weapons when the door opens and Conejo emerges followed by half a dozen men.
Conejo:
Productive day?
Shotgun:
We ain’t dead yet. That’s a start.
Ramirez:
We killed the woman and the detective. That should get Castle's attention.
Conejo:
Our intelligence officers believe they may have discovered several properties belonging to Castle, one of them would have been a reasonable distance for a wounded man to run to after the ambush on Fifth Avenue. Here is the address. South Bronx.
(He hands over a slip of paper.)
These gentlemen will accompany you. Remember; Sandoval wants his head.
Shotgun:
I bet he does.
Back at the warehouse in Red Hook. Frank rubs his wrists as Micro pulls up files on his main computer. These are the three men that took Charlene. Krieger, Ramirez, and…
Franks eyes narrow at the fuzzy mug shot on the screen.
Frank:
J.R. Walker; son of a bitch.
Micro:
Know him?
Frank:
I know him.
[[Flashback to Vietnam; Soundtrack: Jimi Hendrix “Hey Joe”]]
We see quick cuts of Walker opening fire on a small group of civilians and as Frank emerges from a nearby tree line. He jerks the 60 from Walkers hands and cracks him across the face with the butt of it. Walker goes down blood streaming from his left eye. He pulls a knife as Frank brings the rifle butt down hard on Walker’s throat, leaning on it like a shovel. Frank’s hands scorch on the red hot barrel, but he persists in a blind fury. Frank chokes Walker as men rush to pull him off the sergeant. Walker pulls the cotter pin on a grenade and flips the jungle clip. He smiles at Frank as he holds the pin in one hand and the live grenade gingerly in the other, showing Frank that if he passes out he’ll let go of the M61 releasing the safety lever and blasting not only he and frank, but the other men gathered near them. Frank relents.
As the jolly greens rotor away, we see jets dropping bombs on areas near-by atop markers of orange smoke. The injured Walker smiles again at Frank and flippantly tosses an orange marker off the jolly directly into the heart of the village. Frank can do nothing as the smoke grenade falls, he watches helplessly from the open crew door as the chopper clears the airspace and two F-105 Thunderchiefs roll in and napalm the area. The village burns under a torrent of black smoke as two more F-100 Super Sabres release another payload. Walker is escorted away by MPs at the firebase as Frank gently taps a finger on his M1911.
Micro:
Oh my God.
The tone of Micro's voice snaps Frank back to attention. He looks over to see Micro fumbling with the remote to one of his televisions. Frank's eyes twitch at the scene playing mutely on the screen. Micro adjusts the sound.
The screen shows a reporter standing in front of Soap's precinct and clips of the scene earlier as Soap's car smoldered riddled with bullets, firemen and cops bustling about.
Reporter:
... Soap, head of the NYPD's Punisher Task Force was attacked in front of his own home earlier today. Reports indicate an ambush was carried out by multiple assailants in grey van who then exchanged rounds with officers in their escape. Soap is listed in extremely critical condition at an undisclosed hospital. Police sources do not believe this is the work of Frank Castle also known as the vigilante The Punisher whom Soap was tasked to catch. The fact there were multiple suspects leads the police to believe there were other motivations behind the shooting.
Micro:
How could he have [frick]ed that up? I did everything but drop him off at the airport myself.
Frank:
Turn it off. Find me that ship. Someone is going to die for this.