Working
as morgue assistant to Dr. Rudy Gillespie, Jane Foster is there to see him
quoting Shakespeare’s The Tempest while working on a recently deceased
actor. Suddenly, with the words “and with strange aeons, even Death may die,”
the dead man seizes Gillespie by the throat; Jane breaks the corpse’s arm as he
calls on them to aid the dying Death. Gillespie, having deduced that Jane is
Valkyrie (and insulted that she thinks he is stupid), tells her to go off on
her mission. She transforms into Valkyrie before him, thanks him for treating the
dead with respect, and heads off to visit Doctor Strange….
At
home, Strange, having recently regained the use of his hands in DOCTOR STRANGE
(2018) #19, is practicing card tricks. Val explains her errand and Strange
conjures up the image of Death. It seems Death has a human form and thereby may
be vulnerable to human weakness. So Strange sees the need to call in
specialists….
Val and Strange visit a secret clinic where
heroes can have their injuries tended to. They are greeted by Night Nurse (and
Dr. Strange’s ex) who introduces them to three more recruits, heroes with
medical backgrounds: Cardiac (Elias Wirtham), Excalibur (Faiza Hussain), and
Manikin (Whitman Knapp). Val gives them her death stare, learning all about
them. With the mission (and the guest stars) explained, Strange teleports them
all to a dark dimension; Strange suggests that Night Nurse, with no special
powers, should stay behind but she declines. They enter the dark forest and
Manikin turns into his futuristic self, Highbrow, who detects movement around them—and
then they are attacked by the zombie-like Death’s Minions. Manikin changes to
his Homo Erectus form to fight and Excalibur gives her sword to Night Nurse to
protect herself. The heroes are overwhelmed by numbers until Val realizes their
enemies cannot fly so she tells Strange to levitate them away from danger. And
then they see a glowing grim reaper figure who is the Death of Death, hovering
over Death’s mansion….