He had a beard started. To most people this would not be a shock. But Dan Cassidy had been blasted by a Demon called Nebiros on the Caribbean island of Ile Du Diable. Since then, he had discovered that the Blue Devil suit that he had been wearing during the attack was now permanently attached to him. Actually, it was him. He had been to several specialists since returning and they all said that he was in perfect health . . . aside from the fact that he was now a living and breathing movie character. He was also getting stubble on top of his head as well.

Sharon Scott, Dan's girlfriend and fellow actor, came up behind him. "I think it looks sexy."

Dan shook his head. "Thanks, but it still doesn't help the fact that I have indigo skin, fangs, and horns coming out of my head."

"Mr. Verner, you have to be a little more understanding. Dan Cassidy cannot be placed in solitary confinement. It's not fair to him, or anyone else."

"I'll tell you what Ms. Bloom. Get him out of my suit, and he can go out in public as much as he wants to. Besides that, your picture caused the death of Wayne Tarrant and five other crew members, the disappearance of Rex Mason . . . not to mention this little thing has gotten me hit with lawsuits from so many sides . . . "

"That wasn't our fault. Simon Stagg had Eric Williams trying to get photographs of the ruins, and things went wrong from there. It had nothing to do with the movie itself. Let alone Dan, Wayne or Rex."

"Tell that to Stagg. He's the main one suing me for everything I have. Class action and all that."

"Dad, this is Simon. I'm heading over to your offices right now."

" . . . "

"Okay."

" . . . "

"See you soon."

Simon hung up the phone. What else could go wrong?

He heard voices outside the door to his room.

"He will see me."

"But his family said . . . "

"That will be all."

"But . . . "

"You may go about your business," the voice said as the door began to open.

Eric looked over to see Simon Stagg himself standing in the doorway.

Stagg took a step towards Eric. "We have much to discuss, you and I."

He had been back to his apartment several times, but had not bothered checking voice mail or his e-mail account.

He deleted message after message from solicitors, an old girlfriend, and the group leader for the next project he was supposed to work on for his Uncle's company. He had covered all of that with a quick visit to the lab.

The last message before the tape ran out surprised him though. It was from Tatsu Yamashiro. He hadn't thought about her, or her husband Maseo in a few years.

"Hello. Dane Whitman. This is Tatsu Yamashiro, you trained with my husband Maseo Yamashiro several years ago in Japan. He admired you very much, and I need your help in setting some wrongs right. I have been looking for someone in the Los Angeles area. I can be reached at the . . . beeeeeeeeeeeeeep."

Dane listened to it several times, but could still not make out anything of where she was staying. "Of all the luck," Dane said as he put down his pen. "Hopefully she'll call back."

"This is going to make me a fortune . . . ," he said as he slipped the shoes on his feet, "a stinking fortune."

"Behold the power of my gun!" one of them shouted back, as he stopped, turned and aimed his pistol.

"Go get 'em boy," Ambush Bug said as he let Cheeks the Toy Wonder fly.

The young kid with the gun was staring at the kids' plush toy flying at him so intently that he forgot to fire his gun.

"What the hell . . . " the kid said as Cheeks hit him in the chest and bounced off.

When he finally remembered that there was a costumed person that had thrown the doll at him, he looked up in time to see a fist right before it hit his face.

"One down and one to go," the hero proclaimed. "Could one of you good citizens call the police? Whoop!"

Ambush Bug bent down, picked up his sidekick off the ground and ran after the other fleeing shoplifter.

"Whoop!"

Dan hung up the phone. "Sounds good hon," he said as he heard the closet door open and shut. "That was Marla. She said that I have to lay low for a few more days. So if you want to go get some more stuff from your place and bring it here . . . "

Dan bound up the stairs and looked around the room that Sharon had just walked into moments before.

"Sharon . . . where are you? There's no way you got past me and I would have heard you go back down the stairs."

He opened the closet door, and saw Sharon's things lying in a heap on the floor.

He knew that he kept passing out. His water had run out some time ago, and that by all rights he should be dead . . . yet he wasn't. He was crawling around looking for a way out of the prison that he currently found himself in.

He didn't fully trust his own senses, after all, no food and water for as long as he had been without them could lead to hallucinations. That's why he didn't think too much of the fact that his face felt different. It felt a bit more wrinkly, and dry. His hands also felt "wrong" for some reason.

He figured he would die soon, and it would all be over.

He rolled over onto his back and closed his eyes. "Might as well go to sleep."

"What the -- !" she cried. "Danny?"

She looked around. She was standing on a busy street corner. Looking around, she recognized where she was . . . Times Square.

"Oh . . . my . . . God . . . " she said as she looked around. "How did I get here . . . "

He had a thought about Dan's legal problems with Verner Brothers, and wanted to see what his aunt thought.

The phone rang, and the caller ID said that it was Dan's Malibu house phone number.

"Hey Dan, this is Gopher."

"Gopher, is your Aunt there?"

"Nope, but I wanna run something by you."

"Can it wait? Sharon just disappeared from my house."

"What?"

"I said she vanished. She was putting some stuff in the closet upstairs, and I went up a few seconds after her, and she wasn't there."

"That's weird."

"Yeah, I thought so too. Let me know if she calls there. I'll have my cell with me. I have to go looking for her."

"Dan, I had a thought about the situation you're in . . . didn't you and James design and build the suit with your own money?"

"Yeah . . . Verner Bros was going to pay us back after the movie opened. It was in the contract," Dan said, seeing where Gopher was going with this. "Have your Aunt Marla look into it for me. I have to go."

"Sure thing," Gopher said as he hung up the phone.

"Might as well get this over with . . . " he mumbled to himself as he got out of the car.

He didn't notice the police cars enter the parking lot after he entered the building.

"This is Dan," he said anxiously. Hoping it was Sharon.

" . . . "

"What . . . how . . . "

" . . . "

"Okay. I know someone there. He's a Vice President of B&G Software."

" . . . "

"His name is Michael Carter. I know him from High School. We played Football together. Where exactly are you at?"

" . . . "

"Okay. Stay there. I'll have Michael get someone over there in a few minutes."

"Simon. I'm glad you're here. We've had someone embezzling money from the company for a while now, and it turns out we finally were able to trace the person down."

"Okay, who is it?" Simon asked.

Sanford Williams turned to face his son. A deep sadness was on his face. "You."

Before Simon could react, the doors to the office flew open and several police Officers came into the room.

"Simon Williams. You are under arrest. Anything that you say . . . "

He stood up on the ledge of the building, closed his eyes and stepped off.

He stepped into mid air and did not drop.

"THEY WORK!"

He laughed hysterically. AS he did, he slowly started descending towards the ground.

The boots relied on concentration to work, and his was currently ever so slightly broken with glee.

He lowered himself to the ground and ran back into the building.

"These are going to make me a fortune."

"Well Cheeks," he said holding his little sidekick up at face level, "looks like two evildoers are getting their due reward."

He looked around and saw that the police were coming down the street.

"Time to go," he called out to nobody in particular.

He threw Cheeks up to the roof of a building he was standing in front of and once Cheeks grabbed onto the roof, the hero was pulled up by an line attached to an automatic retractable mechanism within the doll.

"Good Day Citizens! Whoop!"

"You really don't have to do this Mr. Carter," Sharon said to him as they headed towards a private jet.

"Please, call me Booster. It's an old nickname from my football days that's stuck with me. Besides, like I told you already, I have to go out to the West coast anyway to meet with some Stark Technologies reps. So, it's no problem to give you a lift."

"Okay. Booster. I'm sure Danny will want to see you anyway, to say thanks."

"Hey, did he ever tell you about the time that we . . . "

It was finally agreed that Dan could resume his life, as much as he could now anyway. He agreed to not use the Blue Devil name in public as it would break copyright agreements.

Jock agreed to sell Marla, Danny and his crew the old Stellar Studios lot that had been a financial weight for years to the Verner Bros. Studios. He bought it cheaper than he would have thought possible, but good old Jock was happy to have it off the books, and would just write the loss off anyway.

Danny was still under contract to Verner Bros., but it was agreed that the Blue Devil script would be rewritten to make Danny the hero of the film. It would also be dedicated to the memories of those lost during the tragedy.

As Dane drove up towards the house he noticed a horse heading towards him. A very large winged horse. Sitting on top of the horse was a man dressed in a suit of armor.

"This is something you don't see every day . . . even in this town."

The horse began trotting towards him, and then something very odd happened. The horse expanded two large wings and began rise off the ground.

Dane swerved his car out of the way of the lance that the rider was carrying.

All he heard was the man on the horse screaming, "Thou shalt all rue the day that the Red Knight made himself known!"