Mephisto still holds a grudge against Thor so he looks in on
the life of Dr Donald Blake to seek out a weakness. Don is counseling his
patient Brenda Barclay who has just learned she cannot bear children and he
offers her the position of receptionist for his practice. Mephisto calls up Darkoth the Death-Demon, formerly Desmond Pitt who was
transformed into a monster by Doctor Doom and decides to use his orphaned son
against him. The villain tells Darkoth that if he delivers the soul of Don
Blake to him, Darkoth can have Blake’s body to be restored to life and be reunited
with his son. Darkoth reluctantly agrees and is transported to Don’s bedroom;
Don awakens and transforms into Thor but Darkoth flees rather than kill Don.
Thor follows and learns that Darkoth is fighting with Mephisto as an unwilling
pawn. Thor intercedes just as Mephisto gains control over Darkoth so the two
fight but Darkoth recovers his mind and pleads with Thor to cleanse him of
Mephisto’s evil, which Thor does, allowing the already dead Darkoth to lie in
peace. Mephisto is miffed and Thor fights off a horde of demons as Darkoth/Pitt’s
soul goes to heaven….
Epilogue: Don arranges for Tom and Brenda Barclay to adopt
Desmond Pitt’s son….
“The Golden Apples of Immortality”
Writer: Doug Moench. Pencils: Alan Kupperberg. Inks: Jack Abel.
Colors: Christie Scheele.
Synopsis: The bad guys led by Loki and Tyr take the goddess
Idunn captive and seize her store of golden apples; they hide a supply
sufficient for themselves in the bole of Yggdrasil and feed the rest to the Midgard
Serpent. Soon, Odin learns from the Warriors Three that the Golden Apples are
gone and the gods of Asgard face mortality. The baddies gather to besiege Asgard
and Loki discovers that Queen Jolena is outside the city as Odin has abandoned
her. Meanwhile Tyr challenges Odin….