Having finished the renovation of
his apartment building, Steve Rogers steps back for a look and encounters a woman
in a flowing gown who appeared mysteriously behind him. Despite her youthful appearance,
she claims to have seen Steve’s mother watching him through the window when he
went to school. She gives her name as Lyra. Steve is dubious, especially when
she tells him who she is (which we don’t hear); he asks her to prove it and
suddenly the brambles nearby turn into huge and thriving rose bushes. She needs
his help and asks him to come to the front door at midnight, handing him a slip
of paper with an address on it. And then she’s gone….
To test her, he invites Sam Wilson
over to watch a movie that will end only after it’s too late to make the rendezvous.
But five minutes before Steve would need to leave, Sam gets a call from his
security firm asking him to check a disturbance (later revealed to be a cat
giving birth to kittens in his apartment). This leaves Steve with exactly
enough time to reach the midnight address….
So Steve rides his motorcycle over
and discovers that the slip with the address now includes a note assuring him
his bike will be safe. He then learns the Front Door is a theater with a
strange ticket policy. The audience is full of strange people and Steve is
shown to his seat by a young woman with butterfly wings who gives him a blank
program that will fill itself in as the show proceeds. An astrologer named
Teresa offers to give him a reading. When she learns he was born in 1922, she
heads backstage and returns to ask for his autograph….
The show begins with an emcee
promising no pain, no struggle, no violence, no death, because they are all
under protection. Steve watches the offbeat acts all reflecting on what it’s
like to be isolated and alone. Then Steve is called backstage to meet Lyra….
As he steps through the doors, he
is suddenly in his Captain America outfit. Lyra stands in the rubble of a
ruined cityscape, welcoming him to the Pale City. She tells him the city was destroyed
by her brother and the Front Door has been a haven for those who would make the
world better which Cap recognizes as “change agents,” as Asmoday called them.
She shows him that the battle with the demon changed his shield so that here it
seems to be made of crystal. Her brother was protector of good but the
overwhelming evil of the Nazis drove him insane so that he believes the only recourse
now is to destroy the world and start over. The Front Door is now the
last-ditch effort against Death itself and her brother’s forces are about to
attack. She explains that her brother will try to get her out of the way since
he can’t destroy her. So Cap will be needed to locate a shadowy person who is set
to arrive and bring him to the theater. And she warns him to only look at her
brother through the crystal shield. She asks if his is ready, then draws back
the curtain as the horde of demons attacks….