The Red Skull is in Paris
exulting in the Nazi victory over France
as he addresses a crowd of subjugated Parisians. Captain America, watching from
an underground tunnel, is all for attacking the Skull here and now but
Marilyne, the resistance leader, pulls him back down., insisting it would be
suicide for the group to do so….
Later, as Cap, Bucky, and the Howling Commandos rest in the resistance’s
secret base in an abandoned church, Cap and Marilyne go off together. Bucky and
Reb Ralston spy on them through a keyhole, and their minds turn to thoughts of
sex. It turns out that Cap merely wants Marilyne to repair the broken straps on
his shield. While doing so she tries to impress upon Cap the importance of the
French fighting to free their own city from the invader, which Cap has trouble understanding
as America has
never been occupied. Bucky makes a noise and Cap pushes open the door hitting
Bucky and giving him a black eye. Batroc brings news that the Nazis are plotting
to loot the Louvre that night so the resistance agents plan to be there to stop
them. In a private meeting, Bucky is resentful that Cap called him James in
front of everyone and thinks that Cap holds a grudge over Bucky’s losing his
shield (issue #2). That night Bucky does not turn up at the museum so Cap heads
out to stop his partner from making a futile attack on the Red Skull. Instead,
the resistance members fall into a Nazi trap set by the traitorous Batroc….
Cap arrives at the Eiffel
Tower to find Bucky a prisoner of
the Red Skull, who is planning to blow up the national monument; the villain
challenges Cap to choose between saving France—or
saving his partner….